Page:Mexico, picturesque, political, progressive.djvu/35

Rh of twenty or thirty feet, becomes more and more common, making almost the only division between the small fields of the natives; another cactus, tree-shaped and brutally ugly, begins to appear in groves, very repulsive, and with leprous-looking bulbs of pale blossoms on the ends of the spiked, fleshy leaves. Along the sides of the narrow-gauge road leading from the main line to Marfil, whence tram-cars lead to Guanajuata, mines begin to dot the mountain-sides, and the quiet hurry of a Mexican business district creeps into the scene. The roads become alive with herds of burros laden with every product of tropic or temperate zone, and shambling solemnly, earnestly, lopearedly, toward the distant market town.

Quaintest spot and most delightful in the wide world! The little city of Guanajuato — may its name be written in letters of gold! — has succeeded in charming away the small remnant of common-sense which Mexico has left us. Squalor and poverty, open sewers and the highest death-rate on the continent, were powerless to dim its delightsomeness. A walled city among the mountains, a fortified place set upon the side of heights so steep that the houses seem to be