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POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



In the Apam district, the plantations are chiefly found on the large 

 haciendas or estates. The first impression of a traveler who passes from 

 Vera Cruz to the capital is likely to be wrong if, as is usually the case, 

 he regard the table-land — so barren after the tropical vegetation in 

 and below the coffee country — as a desert with this strange industry as 

 its one resource. The observant person, however, sees, usually with 

 surprise, enormous stacks of straw here and there in the maguey 

 fields, each commonly marked with a great carved cross or other sym- 

 bol, and all carefully trimmed into house form ; and a shrewd infer- 



Fig. 5. In Gardens in Sicily. 



•ence that where there is a good deal of straw there must be some grain 

 is justified on a closer acquaintance with the country. 



A first visit to a Mexican hacienda is an interesting episode in 

 one's traveling experiences. Comfort, as we understand it, is scarcely 

 to be had in the dustier regions during the dry season; and as one 

 looks over the barren country it is hard to see where food is obtained 

 for the swarm of peon retainers for whom even a church is not lacking 

 in the walled village which their dwellings constitute. The wealth of 

 such an estate is found in its extent. I recall the surprise with which, 



