Page:Face to Face With the Mexicans.djvu/259

Rh We went down the steps and were soon lost in the variegated concourse, but our interest was undiminished. Confronted on every hand by gambling booths, tents, palm huts, and a motley multitude, cooking, eating and drinking, to open the way for our exit required the strength of a Hercules. We had glimpses of men and women in the booths who played on harp, guitar, and bandolin, and if their faces



had been carved from wood or stone, they could not have been more immobile or expressionless.

The defects, by night-time, in a picture so realistic, were concealed in a measure by the glamour of moonlight and torchlight, but the longing of unsatisfied human nature urged us to return on Sunday afternoon to take a more prosaic view of it in the broad, open daylight. It was a cruel and a crucial test. An army of beggars in