Page:Face to Face With the Mexicans.djvu/238

 good to dress the saints," meaning, that they are always at church, and, having nothing else to do, dressing saints is a proper occupation for them.

Thirty years are allowed a señorita ere she is launched on that monotonous soltera journey; and they are to be found as often in wealthy as in plainer families.

Bachelors are quite common, and they also have their special names. Sometimes solterones, at others, solterones perniciosos (bad or pernicious unmarried men). A Mexican lady said to me, "Life to the solterones is never bleak nor desolate. They keep up their houses and have everything about them that contributes to their happiness!"

Young marriageable men are called gallinos, older ones, gallos (young and old roosters). And those tireless, idle young men who stand on the streets habitually, watching the señoritas on their way to mass or to shop, are called by the appropriate name of lagartijos (lizards), because they are always in the sun.

Foreigners are not long in sorting these out from the multitude, as they make it a rule to stare one out of countenance.

They compare with the idlers of all countries, and are not a whit behind them in deportment and dress—even the eyeglass is not wanting.

A natural and, it would seem, national source of pride to the Mexican, is his small and elegantly formed foot, and, not satisfied with its original graces of slender form and arched instep, he compresses its size by wearing tight-fitting, high-heeled, and pointed-toed shoes.

Apropos of this little display of personal vanity, shared by both the sexes, I may repeat what a lady of great culture and refinement told me in plain words, that while her husband was handsome, good, and kind, yet, had he not possessed the most perfect foot she ever saw, never would she have married him!

The women are by no means migratory in their habits. Indeed, with few exceptions, they do not travel in their own country. They