78 Geoarapbfcal "Notes on flDejico. 



stain from hard labor, and, without any care for their coming offspring, 

 continue grinding their corn until the moment of parturition. Then, 

 before the proper time for taking the child from the breast, it is fed 

 with food unsuitable for its age and difficult of digestion, which occa- 

 sions diarrhoea or other maladies that either cause its death or at least 

 contribute to its imperfect development. 



Another circumstance which causes the degeneration of the Indians 

 is their premature marriages. In Mexico the marriageable age for wo- 

 men has been fixed by law at eighteen years, and in the tierra caliente, 

 or hot country, at fourteen ; but in some places Indian girls are married 

 at twelve. Every Indian father considers it his duty to marry his 

 children, whether boys or girls, as soon as they are of age, the parents 

 of course making the match to suit themselves. 



This used to be the case not only with the Indians, but even with 

 persons of Spanish descent. I once heard General Degollado, a very 

 good and prominent man in Mexico, say, that the day he married he 

 took, immediately after the ceremony was over, his bean-shooter and 

 went to shoot birds, because he had no conception of what he had done, 

 his parents having arranged the match for him ; but he added that he 

 could not possibly have made a better choice of a wife. 



The Indians are strong by nature ; and in this is to be found the fact 

 that so many of them reach an advanced age, in spite of their scant 

 and poor food, their unhealthy mode of living, and their damp and un- 

 wholesome habitations, consisting of miserable huts where whole 

 families are huddled together. 



The Spaniards in Mexico. The Spaniards are a money-making, 

 wonderfully frugal race, since they have been battling with hard con- 

 ditions at home for centuries. The Spaniard in Mexico is as Richard 

 Ford who spent thirty years in the peninsula, and who was a close ob- 

 server, depicts him a hardy, temperate man, well fitted, under favor- 

 able conditions, to become a dominant influence. 



In Mexico, the energy of the Spaniard is remarkable. He is force- 

 ful of word and phrase, energetic in his movements, immensely vital, 

 tremendously persistent, and wonderfully enduring. After thirty years 

 behind a counter selling groceries, he retires, a man of fortune ; not 

 always large, but sufficient, and is still a man of force and ready for 

 undertakings demanding good brain power and courage. They come 

 over mere lads, from ten to fifteen, toil and moil, feed frugally, and 

 sleep hardly, and they become millionaires, bank directors, great mill 

 owners, farmers on a grand scale, hot-country planters and monopolists, 

 for the Spaniard is born with the " trust " idea ; while his sons are too- 

 often dudes and spendthrifts. 



The thrifty Spaniard toils and saves, and his ambition is to marry a. 

 rich girl, frequently the daughter of a Mexican landowner, and so he 



