Page:Appleton's Guide to Mexico.djvu/127

Rh With the improved processes of tillage, including the use of modern implements, extensive tanks and irrigating ditches, all of which are likely to be introduced at an early day, the staple products of Mexico will of course be increased many fold.

The culture of sugar and tobacco is, and will doubtless continue to be, more profitable than that of the cereals. The cultivation of the tropical and semi-tropical fruits will also be carried on far more extensively than at present throughout the tierra caliente, and in the lower parts of the tierra templada.

A recent correspondent of the Chicago Tribune describes the Mexican farmer as follows: "On the ranch or village home of the 'greaser' Mexican everything bears the stamp of negligence and shiftlessness. Their gaunt, sharp-nosed, long-legged, and tan-colored hogs share with their owners in the comforts of the family residence. No fences except brush surround their fields. Generally there are none. They raise just sufficient wheat, barley, beans, and chili (red peppers) to meet their absolute needs. They thrash their crops upon bare, smooth ground by driving flocks of goats over them and washing in the nearest stream. They often plow with a crooked stick, and the hoe is their seythe, sickle, and reaper. Even their hay is cut with a hoe. They as a rule live in villages and cultivate small fields upon their outskirts. Living as they do, and possessing a soil which under irrigation is wonderfully productive, they require but little ground to cultivate."

Agricultural implements are admitted free of duty (vide p. 57). American reapers, mowers, plows, etc., have been introduced on the ranches of the northern and central part of the table-land. Time will, however, be required to induce the peons to abandon their rude ancestral tools that simply scratch the ground. Labor is abundant at three reales (37½ cents) a day. It is hardly necessary to remark that