The Ancient Cities of the New World

es-Suburbs-Railway-Monuments-Cathedral-S. Domingo-S. Francisco

hich have grown wonderfully during the last twelve years, some measuring seven feet in girth and over 100 feet in height. Beneath the shade of these beautiful trees stretch b

At present, it only reaches the imposing monument erected in honour of Christopher Columbus, which every Frenchman should admire as coming from Paris and the work of a Frenchman. The immediate area round Mexico has been completely transformed by lines of railroad and tramways; in places once occupied by fetid water or marshy ground, pretty v

Government House is in a true sense the House of the people, being filled from early morning by friends, employés, or petitioners. Every one is free to come and go, without let or hindrance, all are received by the Governor without having to ask an audience, and every one is welcomed with the greatest affability, as I can from personal experience amply testify. To give an idea how far the spirit of patriotism was roused by the war of intervention, I will quote the words of a deputy, w

him idle, unfits him for commercial and industrious pursuits? He has lived hitherto under laws harsh and severe for him alone; is there no fear that once free, he will plunge into the vices of freed men, rather than put on the virtues of civilised people? If we are to borrow our experience from the past, this would be the case, since when, shortly after the conquest, he lived under milder laws, the effect was to sink him into such an appalling condition of moral depravity as to move the good Franciscan monk Sahagun to say of him: "We ought not perhaps to be surprised at finding among them the usual shortcomings which belong to their country, since the Spaniards who live here, and especially the American born, are in no way better than the Indians. Even the natives of Spain, after a few years in this country, are quite altered, and I have always ascribed this change to a difference of climate and latitude. It is humiliating to our feelings as Christians," exclaims Sahagun, "to reflect that the Indians of olden time, wise in their generation, knew how to remedy evils peculiar to the soil, by means of practices which were their safeguard, whereas we succumb to our evil propensities; the result of which is that we see a new generation, Indian as well as Spanish, rising around us, which it is difficult to manage or to save. Parents have not that authority they ought to have over their offspring to guard them against their natural proclivities. The ancient dwellers of this soil were far better inspired when they abandoned the education of their children to public authority, which replaced paternal rights. Unfortunately this method was tainted by idolatrous and superstitious practices; but were these to be eliminated and the ancient method introduced afresh among the Indo-Spanish people, a great public good would undoubtedly follow, which would relieve the Government of many difficulties now pressing upon it. As it is we hardly know how to deal with those reared in our schools, who, f

quoted is suggest

of the whites, has also made them idle, insolent, treacherous, and depraved. A sad look-out for times to come. But even granting that all happens for the best, is there much pr

her nations, is sure to be promptly adopted, without any inquiry whether it is applicable, suitable, or useful, among a people wholly unprepared to receive them; and this total impo

e to stop the whole machinery. Most Mexicans have, or wish to have, Government employment, leaving to foreigners the development of their national wealth; banking, trade, and the workin

earing before an inferior one. Be that as it may, it is certain that on the day when the Anglo-Americans shall be able to dispense with the services of the Mexican, they will not scruple to thrust him aside, careful however to keep the Indians of the Highlands, now a do

themselves, as shown a hundred times in the defence of their liberties, should be swallowed up by the Saxon element. The "

ose altars reeked with the blood of human hecatombs in every city of the empire. The first stone for this church was laid in the reign of Philip II., and the canonicate of Archbishop Pedro Moya de Contreras. The foundations, which extended as far as the north side of the old temple, embracing the whole space now taken up by the courts, were carried on under the energetic supervision of Alonzo Perez de Ca

ished, the inauguration took place. The choir, however, was only completed in 1730, when the rich and marvellous balustrade, which divides the choir from the sanctuary

ant steeple, crowned by three statues, representing the theological virtues. On each side, towers, severe in design, and topped by cupolas, rise to the height of 78 metres.6 The interior is one mass of gold. The choir, which is immense, occupies the principal nave, and, by means of a costly composite gallery, is made to join the main altar, designed after St. Peter's in Rome. The two lateral naves, destined for the congregation, have no choir or seats of any kind, and Mexican ladies, who are very regular in their attendance at

upon it, however, as their most precious jewel; to this may be added the "Assumption of the Virgin," of massive gold, weighing 1,116 ounces; a silver lamp hanging before the sanctuary, which cost ￡16,000; the

e wall, and has proved to be one of the most precious monuments of Indian antiquity. Antonio de Gama, in a masterly treatise, explained the objects to which it was devoted, and poured a flood of light on the astronomical science of the Aborigines and their

style considered as a whole. It is from the Sagrario that the last sacrament used to be carried to comfort the rich and powerful, in a gilt carriage, or beneath a gorgeous da?s, amidst a cortège of priests, who preceded and followed it, its presence being announced by the ringing of a silver bell. At its approach the traffic and movement of the tow

AGRA

g

g

arly religious and Catholic, decreed on the same day the suppression of all religious communities, the confiscation of their goods, and the disestablishment of the Church, and though a large majority mildly protested, nobody cared; not so the monks and priests, who whirled anathemas and fulminated the excommunicatio maxima against whomsoever should lend a hand to the demolition of the convents-nay, even against those who would be found bold enough to pass through the streets thus op

t they did not refrain from bearing away to their housewives the wainscoting

ng turned Protestants, were employed as guides by the Boston and New York Biblical Missions. As for the clergy, contrary to the received opinion that on being deprived of their emoluments and tithes they wo

flat roofs) of the neighbouring houses. They did their work so often and so well that the desolation of these cloisters is complete. The pictures which once were their chief ornament are mostly in holes, and the walls blackened with shot and powder. S. Domingo has the hardly enviable privilege of having been the seat of the Inquisition. Here, in 1646, the terrible tribun

s gone, the ruthless hand of democracy has pulled down cell and chapel; streets run in places once occupied by its altars; its flower-beds are turned into a nursery-garden, and its silent cells are tenanted by poor families, whose women and children fill the air with their shrill and discordant voices. All that remains is the fa?ade, with its magnificent gate-a curious mixture of Renaissance pilasters, covered with figures in high relief, surmounted with composite capitals, divided by niches adorned with statues, besides a marvellous wealth of ornamentation, not in the best tas

ed with images, sometimes of their fantastic and hideous deities. Sculptured images were so numerous, that the foundations of the Cathedral in the Plaza Mayor are said to be entirely composed of t

THE CONVENT

human figure, or the personification of the Deity, which they were not permitted to discard; this e

inest in Mexico; they are composed of white, slender columns, in Moorish style, with indented arches, for

on these walls is beyond description, for the silence is only broken in the rare intervals when an aguador comes to fill his cantaros and chochocoles (earthen pots and jars) at the foun

but distortions, funeral piles and dislocations; all the tortures, in fact, which the perverted ingenuity of man has devised to harass his fellow-creatures. Among them, some are lifting to heaven their gory heads, whose blood is streaming down to

quity; but the superstitious ignorance of the monks allowed it to fall into decay, and documents of h

e of the finest in the world. The Government is converting the church into a librar

Mines, El Salto del Agua, Chapultepec Military Colle

CAN

DEL AGUA