MEXICO 



3767 



MEXICO 



In addition to primary schools, almost 1,000 

 in number, which are supported in part by 

 the Federal government and in part by the 

 states and municipalities, there are a number 

 of secondary schools, normal schools and pro- 

 fessional schools. .The United States is proud 

 of the institutions of higher learning which 

 were founded in its very early history, but 

 Mexico had a university in 1553 before the 

 vast region to the north of it had even been 

 explored. For over three centuries, until 1862, 

 this institution carried on work, but in that 

 year it closed its doors. In 1910, however, it 

 was reorganized, and bids fair to exert a strong 

 influence on educational affairs in Mexico. 



Religion. Mexico has no state Church, but 

 no country with an established religion has 

 people more uniformly of one faith. The Ro- 

 man Catholic Church, to which most of the 

 people belong, has always had an important 



place in the history of the country; indeed, 

 missionaries fired with zeal for the conversion 

 of the Indians were among the very first ar- 

 rivals. Most of the Indians are, nominally at 

 least, converts to Christianity, but they cling 

 to many heathen rites and superstitions, often 

 sacrificing in secret to the gods their ancestors 

 worshiped before the coming of the Spaniards 

 in the sixteenth century. 



It was not until 1859 that Church and State 

 were separated in Mexico and the vast proper- 

 ties which had been accumulated by the Church 

 nationalized. At about that time freedom of 

 faith was allowed. The various Protestant de- 

 nominations took advantage of this liberty to 

 send missionaries into Mexico, and their work 

 has continued steadily ever since. Growth has 

 been slow, however, and at present all the 

 Protestant churches together have a member- 

 ship below 25,000. 



The Geography of Mexico 



Its Coast. Mexico has a total coast line of 

 about 6,300 miles, of which 4,574 miles are on 

 the Pacific Ocean and Gulf of California. All 

 along the eastern border the shore is low and 

 sandy, presenting few points of interest except 

 where the mountains approach the coast closely 

 enough to be seen from the shore. The ports 

 on this Atlantic side are by nature almost 

 worthless, but much money has been spent on 

 making certain of them, as Tampico and Vera 

 Cruz, secure and commodious. On the Pacific 

 coast, on the other hand, there is a series of 

 excellent ports, Acapulco, especially, comparing 

 well with almost any other port in the world. 

 But these present no such busy scenes as does 

 San Francisco Bay, for instance, farther north 

 on the same coast; indeed, some of them are 

 scarcely valuable, because they are shut off by 

 towering mountains from the industrial centers 

 of the country. The western shore line is for 

 much, of its length as flat and monotonous as 

 the eastern, but at intervals offshoots from the 

 country's great mountains run down to the sea 

 and there break off abruptly and picturesquely. 



Its Surface. There are three well-marked 

 surface regions in Mexico. These are a great 

 central plateau; two border ranges, one on the 

 east and one on the west; and a fringe of 

 coastal lowland, in places very narrow. The 

 great force in making Mexico geographically 

 what it is to-day has been volcanic action, and 

 the high plateau was built up very largely from 

 the outpourings of volcanoes. In the south the 



table-land is 8,000 feet above sea level, but it 

 slopes gently to the north, and at the United 

 States boundary line is only 3,600 feet in alti- 

 tude. Rising above its surface here and there 

 are mountain peaks, which would appear much 

 taller were it not for the general high level of 

 the plateau. 



Dividing this plateau region from the "hot 

 lands" of the coast, which vary in width from 

 ten to one hundred miles, are the Sierra Madre 

 Oriental, on the east, and the Sierra Madre 

 Occidental, on the west. The latter range has 

 throughout its extent an average height of more 

 than 10,000 feet. As the country narrows toward 

 the south these border ranges approach each 

 other more and more closely, and finally join 

 in a wild jumble of peaks and valleys, some- 

 what north and west of the narrowest part of 

 the country. Here are to be found wonderful, 

 shapely volcanic peaks, three of which are 

 snow-crowned all the year, even in a region 

 where the limit of the eternal snows is 15,000 

 feet. These three are Orizaba, which the an- 

 cients called Citlaltepetl, or Star Mountain, 

 the tallest peak in the country, 18,250 feet in 

 height; the famous Popocatepetl, or Smoky 

 Mountain, 17,520 feet in height; and Iztacci- 

 huatl, or White Woman, 16,960 feet, from 

 whose snow crown great glaciers push down- 

 ward. There are other peaks, also, and most 

 of them are volcanic; but there is one small 

 volcano, only 4,330 feet in height, which has 

 a peculiar fame. Jorullo, it is called, and ac- 



