The mirror. (Stillwater, Minn.) 1894-1925, 1913-07-03
MEXICO.
w. r. N.

paper Read Before the Chautauqua Circle
A land of sorrow, of blocdshed.
A land Of the richest promise, yet
land blinded to its true destiny
because hatred and treachery rule
the hearts of it's people, instead OF
peace and good will.
Had the question been asked a
few decades ago, what country be-
sides our own possessed the great
est naturally advantages, and gave
the best promise of future growth
and prosperity, very likely the ans
wer would have been Mexico,
which had then but thrown off the
Spanish yoke and achieved national
independence. Lay aside for a
moment all modern ideas derived
from her known weakness and an
archy, and see how great and mani
fold these apparent advantages
| were.
Situated where the continent of
North America is narrowing from
the immense breadths of the United
States and British America to that
thread of communication between
continents, the Isthmus of Panama;
on the one side it's shores are wash
ed by the waters of the Gulf of
Mexico for more than 1900 miles,
and on the other, the tranquil
Pacific for four thousand
more. Yet the distance from her
greatest eastern port. Vera Cruz, to
the old Spanish treasure-depot,
Acapulco, on the western coast, was
not us the bind flies, more than
three hundred miles, and might,
| with modern means of transit, be
travelled between sunrise and sun
set. Thus. with one hand she
seemed ready to grasp the wealth
of the Indies, while with the other
she welcomed all the the products
of European skill. This wonderful
geographical location had, indeed,
| been rendered useless in the past by
the jealous spirit and exclusive en-
actments of her oppressor. But
F" hat might not be hoped in the
future of free people, quickened
into fresh life by the breath of lib
erty?
Then, the inexhaustable resources
of every description which nature
had crowded into her soil. Per-
| haps there is not on the whole
earth another strip of country, ex-
tending north and south only a
thousand miles, where, side by side,
are all climates and all their pro-
ducts. On the coast the land is
low hot and luxurlant,- THE native
home of the richest tropical growths.
Travel inland but a few miles and
you rise to greater elevation, and
find yourself beneath the bluest of
skies and inhaling the purest of
airs; while all around is new veg
itation, 1.-THE grape, olive, tobacco,
the banana, itself the most nourish-
ing Of all plants, and one of which
it is said, on the space where In
dian corn would sustain but
three human lives, will nourish with
its bounty more than fifty. A few
miles more and you stand on that
great plateau, ELEVATED with but
little variation six or seven thousand
feet above the level of the sea and
stretching on every side over vast
area. There, under the tropics.
and beneath tropical sun, Is a
temperate atmosphere, cool and
bracing. There almost in sight of
the deadly vapors of the coast, is a
new climate, which deals kindly
even with the constitutions of
northern people. There all the great
cereals of the North, the wheat
barley and corn come to their most
luxuriant perfection.
Here too, is the true Ell Dorado;
J here the rivers that run down their
yellow sands. For here are the
veins of gold that attracted the
, Spaniard with his fatal greed, and
mines of silver that for 300 years
have been yielding untold treas
. urers, and today are as ready al
} ever to yield untold treasures more
i With such germs of wealth bidder
J in her soil what WAS needed t(