Page:Mexico, picturesque, political, progressive.djvu/10

8 which Nature has lavished upon our own land. It is evident that many instincts of love, of remembrance, and of affection naturally go to increase pilgrimages to the shrines of the Old World. But, when every allowance has been made, there still remains an unaccountable lack of curiosity and knowledge concerning that portion of the world which is essentially ours.

This being so, it is small cause for surprise to find near us, united to portions of our southern country by ties of common origin, customs, and language, a land almost unknown, much misunderstood, and wholly misrepresented. A country picturesque beyond description, and beautiful beyond belief; with traditions of the past to interest the antiquarian, and problems of the future to occupy the progressionist; with the fascinations of a strange tongue and a strange people, and with that indefinable charm which those indolent, lotos-eating lands exercise always over the sterner and colder nature of the north-man,—Mexico lies among her mountains, almost as far removed from human ken as the Enchanted Beauty before the Prince kissed her sleeping eyes.

Separated from Texas at El Paso only by the