The Birmingham age-herald., 1917-07-21

ma" and whose policy was founded on dolce far niente" and things of that sort.
 It occurred to Colonel Cantu that a taste of modernity wouldn't hurt Baja Gower) California at all So, with the neatness and dispatch which character izes the politics of our Latin neighbors the old governor was placed in sudden durance and urged to decide whether ne preferred to be shot at sunrise or take up an immediate and indefinite residence in San Diego.
 q hope this story is authentic. l got it straight from the Chamber of Com merce, who got it from the newspapers of a couple of years back.)
 The old governor very sensibly chose
 San Diego, and the new governor started right to work modernizing hls half of the isolated peninsula. Cantu has gathered about him as aids and counselors the finest talent available.
 One of the first things he did was to construct under Engineer Gonzalo Ga rita the mountain road from the states over which we came. Garta has won fame for himself by his successful irri- gation system in the Imperial Valley, and other important undertakings. lie is now making shore road down from
 California which will cut the journey more than 30 miles.
 ARMY PAY IS HIGH Senor Garita is tall and most pie turesquely handsome He looks as if he had just stepped from one of Richard Harding Davis novels, yet his nearest approach to spoken English was a wave | of his stetson and smile that spoke all l languages as he drove off in his Amer ;, ican car.
 1 Governor Cantu puts his army to work | |. k, I,,A1 1r f,fc cNl- | diers tilling the federal farms" and | doing the engineering chores. am told
 it is the postpaid soldtery in the world. 1 Every man receives from SIPS to S2 a l day for his service in American gold, l and any skilled laborer in Ensensada can | earn S2.50 a day and up.
 1 In the Mexcan town of Juarez, across | the creek from the ultra modern city of l Fl Paso, the only industries I could dis | cern were begging and the vending of | fly-blown sweets. In Ensenada, on its 1 isolated peninsula, with the ocean on 1 one side and the Gulf of California on | the other, not to mention a vicious and | impossible desert to the east on the | war-ridden Mexican mainland, l heard the chug of power plant, the thud of pile drivers working on wharves in the harbor, the throb of kelp cutter rip, 1 ping from it's bed the unctuous slippery sea growth now much sought after fol it's potash that goes into gunpowder. ! MAKING A NEW LAND Even the sand on the crescent-shapet beach where the waves come rolling l lazily in has it's treasures-abalones ane moonstones and even a pearl-bearins oyster or two. The mountains close bS are rich with ore veins and gem pockets Governor Cantu has plans for developing them all.
 Not that he told all this in words. Foi our audience with his excellency wa
 brief. The spirit was willing, but Gov
 ernor Cantu has been too busy Ameri
 canizing his part of Mexico to hay,
 Americanized his speech.
 'I prefer anyhow he said through willing and accomplished interpreter, ''t
 let my work speak for me. Whateve
 modern life you see here has come in tn last two years We are working hard
 for the country is just awakening an there is everything to do
 Come back again few years hence