Page:Travels in Mexico and life among the Mexicans.djvu/608

600 But with the exception of the fruit trees, and the willows and poplars of the river-banks, the chaparral is about the only vegetation of the region. "The exquisite climate, at a level of nearly four thousand feet above the sea, and these environs of cultivated land, contrasting forcibly in their vivid green with the gray alluvial hills, and rocky mountain crests, impart to the place a charm peculiar to all the scenery of Northern Mexico, which has something Levantic, or of a North African character." Its gardens and vineyards, and its slow-running acequias, meandering through narrow streets and adobe walls, give to Paso del Norte an aspect different from other frontier towns, as if a fragment of Southern Mexico had been transported here across the intervening deserts.