Page:Our Sister Republic - Mexico.djvu/219

Rh High walls with stout gates surround most of these great haciendas, and on the roofs of some we noticed breastworks of adobe, with loop-holes for musketry, carried up above the battlements. These tell the story of the times of civil war and brigandage so happily passing away I trust, from Mexico forever. One of these great haciendas, if resolutely defended by its occupant and his retainers, could only be taken by means of artillery. The villages are all surrounded by square lots, each containing half-an-acre to two-and-a-half acres, fenced with the organo cactus, and each cultivated by a separate family.

At 12 o'clock, we were in the ancient city of Salamanca, the penal capital of Guanajuato, having meantime passed through the old market-town of Irapuato, which has some five thousand inhabitants, and two very old churches with elaborately carved stone fronts, now in a dilapidated condition. The State-Prison at Salamanca is located in what was once a convent, which had a church attached, and thieves and desperadoes come to work where nuns had droned away their lives in pious idleness. The convicts, five hundred in number, are engaged in various kinds of labor, as at Guadalajara, and in spite of the clamor raised by the Church party and press, about the despoiling of the Lord, and desecration of the property by substituting a penal colony for a nunnery, the buildings are being improved and extended, and it is evident that the property will never again be used as a place of religious seclusion.

The Government of Mexico seems to be thoroughly aware of the necessity of maintaining its attitude towards the church in all firmness, and the indignant protest of Bishop or priest, and the anathemas of the