HOT^SES, CATTLE, SHEET, GOATS, AND SWTYE. 1 9 



Vast quantities of this dried meat are consumed, for it is savory, keeps well, and 

 is soon prepared, it being only necessary to. lay a piece on the coals and roast it. 



In the shrubless plains of Zacateces, San Luis Potosi, Durango, Coahuila, and 

 Chihuahua, contmues the authority upon whom we are mainly depending for this 

 information, the soil is everywhere poorly manured. In the rainy season, from June 

 till October, these plains are covered with tall grass, but in December all begins to 

 fade, the pools in the hollow dry up, and in the warmest months, April and May, 

 water is frequently not met with for days. In these deserts the horses and mules are 

 chiefly bred. The haciendas are seldom sufficiently furnished with water, and are 

 forced to have recourse to tanks, in which it is collected, or to bore deep wells. 



It is infinitely more difficult to breed horses than cattle. The latter are impelled 

 by instinct to seek for watering-places, which they find in the deepest ravines, often 

 wandering several leagues a day to a river or lake, and always returning before 

 night to the favorite pasture. The horses, on the contrary, must be driven every 

 day to >4'ater, as they would otherwise die of thirst. The mares always keep to- 

 gether in troops of forty or sixty (in atajos) being led by a stallion, who often trots 

 round the troop to hurry those that lag behind, and who fights furiously with any 

 other stallion that may chance to approach. 



The herdsmen of these troops are the boldest horsemen in existence. They lead 

 a poor life, as their salary rarely exceeds five dollars a month ; they live in wretched 

 huts, and seldom behold a village, or enjoy the pleasure of society. Half their time 

 is passed in the saddle, and their delight is to race with other herdsmen, to cast the 

 lasso, and to mount the untamed horses and mules. 



Good stallions are dear, and command high prices. Mules are bred on the north- 

 ern plateaux, and require more attention than horses. Four-year fillies are bought 

 up from the pasture at from eight to ten dollars each, mules from twenty-five to 

 thirty dollars. The large estates have often from eight thousand to ten thousand 

 horses and mules, and usually effect their sales in winter, in the larger towns. 



Sheep-breeding is carried on, in most districts, leSs for the wool than for the tallow 

 and flesh. The race is bad, and the wool inferior, although the extensive dry pas- 

 tures, the mountain-ridges covered with aromatic herbs, and the equable climate, 

 would be in the highest degree favorable to an improved breed. From egotism and 

 petty jealousy, the Spaniards never introduced the Merino breed to the colonies. It 

 is on record, however, that Cortez was_ the first to do this very thing, after he had 

 secured the estate and marquisate of Oaxaca. Just as they prohibited the culture 

 of the vine, of olives, and m.ulberries in Mexico, in order to retain for the mother- 

 country the trade in wine, oil, and silk, so were they determined to keep the trade 

 in fine cloth in their own hands, without reflecting that the traffic in fine wool would 

 have brought them in a far more considerable profit. In recent years, however, 

 some of the more enterprising Mexicans have procured superior ewes .and rams 

 from Saxony and the Pyrenees, and the effect is already becoming apparent. To- 

 wards the end of the rainy season the flocks are collected, the fat wethers and old 

 ewes selected and slaughtered, and the flesh stewed down in a range of large coppers. 

 The firm tallow, in masses of about two hundred pounds, is packed in sheep skins, 

 and forwarded to the cities and mining districts, where it meets with a ready sale. 

 The slaughtering period [inatanza] usually lasts a month, and is a holiday for the 

 shepherds who have only to perform the slaughtering, skinning, and cutting up, re- 

 ceiving as extra wages the heads and intestines of the victims, and fatten themselves 



