64 
proaches to this tableland on the east, at Jalapa and at Saltillo, 
are utilized by the two railways connecting Veracruz and Mexico 
City. It was part of our plan to enter the central region by one 
railway and return by the other. On these immense plains, with 
an average elevation of 6,000 feet, wheat, corn, rye and barley 
are grown in vast quantities, often to the extent of two crops a 
year in well-watered localities. The most conspicuous plant, 
however, is the maguey, Agave americana, cultivated all over 
this region as the source of pulque, the national beverage. 
On the way from Puebla to Mexico - maguey plantations 
were almost continuously in view, with large pulque haciendas, 
from which trainloads of pulque are shipped each morning to the 
capital. e scenery is uniform except at Atotonilco and be- 
ond, where the railway crosses the rough range of volcanic hills 
separating the two mesas. Wheat and corn alternate with the 
maguey in the valleys, yucca and cacti ornament the rocky 
places and serve for hedges, and straggling pines and some hard- 
woods crown the higher hills and barrancas; while the snow- 
topped Malintzi, Ixtaccihuatl, and Popocatepetl, towering from 
13,500 to over 18,000 feet above sea-level, dominate the view 
for most of the distance. 
Mexico City was reached shortly after dark, and we registered 
at the Hotel Palacio, near the Cathedral. An aqueduct was 
being constructed within a few feet of this famous church and 
thousands of bones of the Aztec nobility were being unearthed, 
which dated back to 1520, when Alvarado made his attack upon 
the temple. In the extension of this aqueduct along the Tacuba 
road, a great many interesting relics discarded in the precipitate 
flight of the Spaniards on “da noche triste” 
recovered, The National Museum, containing an immense col- 
lection of objects of both historic and prehistoric interest, was 
closed for rearrangement and will not be reopened until the cen- 
tennial celebration next fall. 
n the day we reached the city, the government started to dig 
a lake about the tree of ‘a noche triste,’ under which Cortez 
reviewed his mutilated army, with the hope of prolonging its life. 
This celebrated historic tree, a giant ahuehuete, or cypress, Za- 
are expected to be 
