Ottumwa tri-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1903-1916, 1906-02-20
fBY A. w. LEE.l
Mexico City. Feb. 70. 1905.

tBY A. w. LEE.l
Mexico City. Feb. u, 1905.
When In Mexico IL you are in 4
hurry, "fol get It." 1t is really astonish.
ing how soon you learn the meaning Of
the Word, "manana" (tomorrow) and
now quickly you fall into the native
naoit OF applying it to everything you
don't feel like doing today. Nobody
seems 10 hurry here except the drunk
en- drivers OF some Of the public car.
rlages, and then for a moment every
nody tries to get out Of the way; there
is little excitement and then every
thing apparently settles down to the
usual calm and placid exterior
A trip to Mexico for one who has
never been in this country before Is
certainly a trip Of life time. The
sights, sounds and smells that greet
one from the time the border is crossed
are combination of the strange, new,
interesting, wonderful, beautiful. dis
agreeable, amusing and sorrowful,
while everything Is intensely foreign.
The first pleasureable sensation is at
the border where you hand over say
$40 bill to the railroad ticket agent.
and ask for Mexican money In ex-
chanse. and he hands you back $40,
partly in Mexican currency and partly
In big. round, shining Mexican silver
dollars that are bigger and heavier
than our own. For q brief time YOU
are rich and indulge in pleasant anti
cipations of the many things you will
buy with SO much money, but, alas,
the dream is a short one. for the first
thing you buy, unless 1t is the labor
OF some poor devil of peon, or some
OF the native food, much of which YOU
won't eat, costs you at least two times
and usually more than two times as
much as the same article at home. AL
most the only thing that we have found
to be really cheap as compared with
home prices Is carriage hire, which
costs from Is cents to $100 per hour,
Mexican, which means one.half that
amount when valued in United States
currency. One pays ten cents for the
morning paper, thirty cents for q
shave, forty-f1ve cents for an order Of
breakfast food and twenty-five cents
for cup of coffee. Indeed, when one
buys anything in Mexico he seems to
be dealing in superlatives SO far as
prices are concerned. Practically ev-
erything costs double excepting labor.
Here is where free silver coinage
(Which, however, was discontinued by
a law that went into effect May J.,
1861 gets in It's deadly work for the
man and woman who tolls. Labor is
cheap, wretchedly cheap. The laborer
who gets 81, Mexican ESQ cents In our
money! per day is getting big pay.
NTA ~ fnfA
from Coo to 81. Clerks speaking two
languages, / am told, only get $50 per
menth, while the letter carriers draw
the munif1cent stipend Of 81, Mexican
per day. Policemen get $1.50 per day.
1t Is true that the rate is wages is In
creasing now. but an official govern
ment report published In 1904 esti-
mates the daily wage of farm laborers
at rs cents per day. On the coffee
plantation the laborers receive from 81
to SO cents per day.
Mexico In 1905 discontinued free sill
yer coinage, because the developrn ent
of the country which Is now going on
with great rapidity made 1t necessary
to do so. Either free silver coinage
must stop or industrial development
must cease. The government, which is
in the hands of wise and able men,
took the stand that industrial develop
ment and progress should continue,
and therefore it was decreed by Presi-
dent Diaz, by the authority Of the
Mexican congress, that free silver coin
age should cease. But free silver coin
age has been going on for centuries
ever since 1887 when the first mint was
established in Mexico. Official reports
show that during the 365 years, from
1887 to 1902. the mints of Mexico
coined $3,469 1885, 31.72 in silver, or an
average Of over $9,000.00O per year for
all that long period. To go at once to
the full gold basis would mean vide
spread bankruptcy and financial ruin,
so Mexico adopted the middle ground
and remains on the silver basis with
gold as the standard Of value for all
her money. Whatever may be the
fiuctuation in the market price Of sill
yer, the Mexican government has I'M
dertaken to guarantee that the Mexi-
can silver dollar shall be worth fifty
cents in gold, Just as the United States
government has been compelled,
equally by force Of circumstances, to
guarantee that the United States silver
dollar is worth 81 In gold. The Mexi.
can government is nov having gold
coins minted, but in order to keep all
Mexican money on the same basis, the
Mexican $40 gold piece will contain
only SIS worth Of gold, the balance
being alloy. This new coinage law,
which went into effect May /, 1908, has
given a stability to Mexican money
that was lacking previously, and the
effect has been most salutary and bene-