The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1900-03-24


During tho Season for Tourists From
tho North--Vieys on Love Entertain.
ed by the Two Types of Young
Women.
The invasion of the tourist girl at this
season gives the smartly dressed and
cane-supported Mexican dude many mo-
ments of interested speculation. LOS
gomosos' line Plateros street, occasion
ally drift down the street to the door
way of the Iturbide Hotel, and with a
Latin American air of affected creole
indifference, gaze on the tall, daintily
attired and wholly Independent daugh-
tiers Of our Uncle Samuel.
During the hours that most men de-
vote to their offices or the conduct of
their business, the lizard" of the Mexi-
can capital hugs the walls of the great
shops, preferentially the jewellers, and
nursing his big-headed cane contem-
plates, ecetatically the feminine shop
ping procession. 1t is daily exhibition
of the wealth, grace and fashionable
world of Mexico; fair women mingled
in a surging crowd of bullfghters and
Bishops, bill collectors and fianeurs,
journalists and professional men, pass
ing, always passing, up and down the
great central shopping thoroughfare of
the city. The provincial and Haunting
modes of the women from the provinces,
up to the capital on a shopping tour,
give rise to the comment of the up-to-
date women of the metropolis, and the
lips Of the 'gomososD holding up the
walls, curl in derson at the loud colors
worn by 'las napas," or women from
the interior, who may be rich in mines
and haciendas, but who lack Eel buen
gusto" and the -refinemente of the
federal capital
Often the lizard" or lagartijo" is
not ill-looking. His mustachios turn up
in the German military style, his eyes
are big and bold and very black, and
his manners are as cultivately impudent
as his tailor is correct. Gel correotis-
mo-" good form, is the desire of the
young mans heart; every point of his
toilet has been duly considered. His
ideal Is to lounge on the "banquetas.'
or sidewalks, Of the principal street, and
dart ardent oft languishing glances at
the daughters of wealthy families. In
this manner he spends his late after
moons and his early evenings, when the
great shops are all brilliant with light |
and fair faces approach the windows of
the great jewelry shops. Sometimes. |
grown overbold, the pride of the Pla-
teros street "echar una for" throws a I
flower at the senoritas, or bestows the
same delicate attention on the hand
some married women. To "echar una
flor" is to make verbal compliment,
and it is a high art. The women, if
the 'f1or" be graceful, are apt to be
pleased rather than offended. The bull
fighters, in their mushroom hats and
Short Jackets, have their favorite cor
ner, and their compliments are Anda-
1usian in poetic eloquence.
1t is into this daily. procession up and
down the great thoroughfare which
has for social termni the Jockey club
"zaguan," or entrance, and La Perla
jewelry store, that the tall, slender,
klaintily attired American tourist girls
Iare plunged. What charming heads,
svelte forms, pretty audacites of color
and independence of manner the OBJ
servant 'gonoso'' finds. 1t is a type
be never wearies of studying; he ex-
changes numberless observations with
his companion lizards" as they hug
the wall and let the girls go by.
Taller is the fair tourists than the
average young Mexican gallant, and he
has to look up to her pretty face to
catch her eye. And this feat of an up t
ward glance of alteration lends piquan- t
cy to the young dandy's sport of wo- {
man-ogling. That the American girl is t
rich, her father millionaire, is t
an article of faith among the dudes Of $
Plateros street. Hence she is a gallant
prize to be won, if that be possible, and /
the deed done, the financial future of the t
dude is assured. Ignorant of the lam a
guage, the fair Americana" passes the
1'toreros' with their mushroom hats, s
and deliriously arounsed by the sight of f
the ''hermoea vanqui' Spain hau's v
down the flag, of blood and gold again f
as the daughter of Uncle Sam trips by, n
and Spain does so chivalrously and gal Il
antly. Winged words in the clipped e
Spanish of Andalusia are shot at ia f
.ourista," but she heeds not the COM h
2liment, and the tbullfighters are cha 1
,rined and swear they will give UP Il
lirtations and "copitas' of sherry, and n
earn English! p
Grace priests sweep BY in their great a
.loaks, under which they hide the soul T
ane, which must not legally be exhibit O
ID, and they too, glance at the Amer- Il
an girl, tall, Gibeonion, of lovely COM Of
,lexion and eyes deep, liquid gray or
blue as of the sky of Mexico. And CT
ften the priest turns to catch another m
,limpse of this high novelty this "alta b
ovedad," on the streets Of ancient re
1exico, W
The oval-faced Mexicana women are
another type. They early incline to st
are soft-eyed, their lashes al
re long, and their little feet take them in
over the ground, for still is ly
he walk of the woman of Spanish blood hi
and turns the heads of F.
.mericans and the modern Mexican as CO
did that far-famed "meneo," the &c
ober heads of the Roman military in
hiefs stationed in the southern prov ar
ices of Ibeia centuries ago. ar
1t Is February, the Mexican spring kr
egins, the odor of violets fills the air, en-
nd delicious languor steals over ones sv
snees; and in this mood one stops to an
axe on this wonderful procession of no
lie women of Mexico, daughters of the tr,