The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1899-10-29
coURTING IN MEXICO.
Conditions Which Make the TeIe-
phone "A Most Useful Auxiliary.
From the Mexican Herald.

/ To begin with, it is clear the conditions
of society are quite distinct with these
people. The custom Of carrying on a court
ship. under the window of your mistress,
as often as not. TOO without the knowledge
of her parents. is entirely the correct thing.
| in any other country this would be fir
| tation carried to an extreme, bat not so in
! Mexico. Where custom sanctions there is
| nothing more 20 Re- said and after al IL
| seems to be IN the very air.
Young women in Mexico are not perm t
| ted anything ike The freedom their more
! fortunate sisters n England and America
| enjoy. Here again, there is a god reason
Tor this In former days the country, as
every one knows. was in a most terribly
unse tied state. Go only a short distance
out Of Mexico and you win still see the
most evident proofs of this in the heavily
built surrounding walls of many of the
haciendas These walls are in some cases
lCopholed for musketry. Some of these pic
! turesque old piles are ver'table fortresses
ana are Terfectly self-Contained, with their
| m.Tader or watch tower, rerched up on
an angle Of the wall, and the quaint little
dome Of the capila showing through the
| trees. Those were feudal days, and the
| great landowners had their r. ainers about
them on heir estates. This was necessary,
| for tie people were ever on the alert
| against ermed invasion The roads were
!
land from end to end.
Is it surprising then that under these
| circums tances the MeXicans should have
| learned to guard their women safely with
| in the walls of heir haciendas? Besides,
| apart from the danger of bandits and rob
bers which have always existed, the his
tory of this country has been one long
| succession Of Tnerciless revolutions, party
| against party, foreign interventons and
so forth. War and revolution do not GER
tainly bring with them much security for
| women Moreover it must be remembered
that these customs have an even older
origin. The people are Spanish. and, there
fore, TO a great extent Moorish. 1t is un-
doubleday a fact that several of the Oldest
| families in Mexico to-day have a strong
| Moorish strain, handed down in all prOba-
! bility by Andalusian ancestry. Andalusia,
| as most people are aware, re aims n a most
| marked manner many of the old Moorish
customs and traditions. The Moors have
/ left their descendants in that part of the
| country, ard many a dark almOpd-eyed
Andausian senorita. langudly watching
the crowd below in some Old street OF
Granada, through the heavily barred Moor
! iSh window. is as thoroughly an oriental
| type as any you will see in the East One
Moorish custom which remains in this
| country is that of clapp.ng the hands to
call a servant. This is certainly not Spnn-
ish or Mexican, but entirely Eastern.
ne manner IN MulCU a rove dudlF cOtIl-
| nences is quite interesting, and in this,
| as in every other matter in Mexico there
| is a right and wrong way of setting
about it. In the first instance the meet
| ing between the man and the girl is quite
| accidental Possibly he is passing in the
street and sees her at the window. Mutual
| interest IS aroused, and then there you
have the commencement of as pretty
| cowtshiD as you could wish for, and one
| that is thoroughly Mexican.
Now, the usual way for the young man,
one would think, would be to get an in
PRODUCTION" we English almost look upon
an Introduction as sacred. This, however.
is not at all necessary, and in most cases
| it is possible the man knows something
| about the girl beforehand. Having decid-
ed that he would ike TO carry on an affair
with her his first move is in some man
| ner or other to send her his card accompa-
! MED by a declaration of his admira ton.
! If he has been very much fascinated.
| poem is perhaps addressed to the fair one.
| I must not forget to mention that it is a
| very uusual thing for the gentleman to ask
the lady for some token by which he may
know that she desires to countenance his
| suit Perhaps he requests her to wear
red rose in her hair, or perhaps It may be
| that he earnestly begs the senorita to
| throw him some particular flower from her
window when he comes TO learn his fate.
There are many and numerous other
ways of starting a love affair." and the
| ingenuity sometimes displayed is very
amusing There is one factor in particular
which is favorable to lovers in this coun-
| try, and that IS the cleVerness of the serv-
ants There is no man who understands
the fine points of an intrigue better than
your real genuine Mexican mozo, and he
J will throw himself in q perfectly whole
hearted manner into your plots and hep
you out of the most unexpected difficulties
All praize to the mozo! He never intrudes
but at the same time he is muy slmpatico
and watches Developments
I cannot refrain from referring to one
particular episode of which 1 have no
doubt a select few have some KNOWLEDGE
There is a certain street in this ancient
and historic Ciudad de Mexico, which IS
the nightly scene of most comical and
certainly very original courtship. Creep
softly out at the witching hour, not mid
night, but the proper time, and peradven-
ture, provided you look in the right place.
you may come across a youth leaning In
a studiously careless position against a
wall Above him at some considerable
hight is a small stone balcony, and the oc-
cupant of this is a pretty young lady
closely yelled in a black tapalo. The first
thing to strike the observer as somewhat
curious is the fact that the man does NOT
seem to be interested in the balcony (
all Neither does the girl appear to be
leaning over the balustrade on Inc lookout
! lOI any Oit. Dul pause u lIOiHeltt ana
presently you will discern a faint black
line wandering up the expanse of white
stucco wall, and then the whole puzzle Is
solved Those two charming lovers are
communicating with each other by means
of a hand telephone. They each have one
end of the instrument, and IL you pass
by sufficiently near you might possibly
catch an indistinct murmur of voices. He
is certainly very constant. had occasion
to pass that way one miserable evening
; during the rains; Mexico was then sim
ply inundated with water, and the rain
on that particular evening was simply com
ing down in sheets That, however, did
not daunt the knight of the telephone
There ne was as usual sheltered in a ser
notwithstanding waterproof. The rain
water off the street had come up over the
pavement, and he stood patiently, but no
doubt quite cheerfully, in a formidable
puddle. Such heroism surely deserved
equal sacrifices on the part of the bal
cony. too but not bit of it. The young
! Ia s.,wvs I'LL.