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94 the possession of a single virtue. The remaining sixth of the population of Mexico are Europeans by birth or their immediate descendants, the Spanish element predominating. The national language also is Spanish—a language not well fitted for the uses and progress of a commercial nation; and which will inevitably constitute a very serious obstacle in the way of indoctrinating the Mexican people with the ideas and methods of overcoming obstacles and doing things which characterize their great Anglo-Saxon neighbors. It should also be borne in mind that a language is one of the most difficult things to supplant in the life of a nation through a foreign influence. The Norman conquest of England, although it modified the Saxon language, could not substitute French; neither could the Moors make Arabic the language of Spain, although they held possession of a great part of the country for a period of more than seven centuries. It seems certain, therefore, that Spanish will continue to be the dominant language of Mexico until the present population is outnumbered by the Americans—a result which may occur before a very long time in the northern States of Mexico, where the population at present is very thin, but which is certainly a very far-off contingency in the case of Central Mexico. Of the present population of Mexico, probably