Page:Mexico, picturesque, political, progressive.djvu/11

Rh narrow waters of the Rio Grande, one enters Mexico with no more consciousness of change than in passing from one portion of a frontier town to another. Until within a few years the passage was made by means of a primitive rope ferry, with a delicious slowness and uncertainty which were partial preparation for the strangeness beyond. Some taint (or shall we call it tonic?) of Bohemianism there is in most healthy human natures, which creates delight in the unconventional, and makes the pulse throb with excitement at the first escape from routine. At the entrance to a new world, one craves something beyond the practical methods of commonplace, but to-day the triteness of a hackneyed civilization follows one to the very threshold. A jingling little tramway crosses a wooden bridge, and the traveller steps into the streets of El Paso del Norte with the straws and dust of a familiar world still clinging to him. But in a moment it is as if a magician's wand had been raised. He left on the other side of the river the busy, bustling American settlement, thriving but ugly; he enters upon enchantment here. A soft, caressing air woos like mild breath of welcome after the