A MEXICAN LAND OF CANAAN 



309 



wrested from its hills and fortunes in 

 pearls fished from the hot waters of its 

 gulf. Out of a lonely gulch in Sonora, 

 Indians once took a nugget of 600 

 pounds, a chunk of pure silver so heavy 

 it had to be carried away on a platform 

 slung between two stout mules. 



"The Mineral Storehouse of the 

 World/' Humboldt called Mexico ; and a 

 tale is told at Ures of one Senor Almada, 

 who, on the occasion of his daughter's 

 marriage, lined the bridal chamber with 

 silver plates and paved the path from his 

 house to the church with the same pale, 

 chaste metal ! 



A FERTILE, UNKEMPT GARDEN 



Yet if this West Coast were robbed to- 

 day of all its gold and silver, its copper 

 and graphite, it would still remain one of 

 the prize regions of earth, a vast un- 

 kempt garden of startling fertility, alive 

 with wild animals and birds — a Mexican 

 Eden, where life is simple and easy. As 

 one idler phrased it, "In Sinaloa you can 

 kick your breakfast off the trees any 

 morning in the year." 



Of ranches and plantations there are 

 many, of course, especially in the watered 

 valleys ; but the coast country as a whole 

 is largely undeveloped, vast areas being 

 still covered with jungle brush and wild 

 grass. 



The very richness of the mineral de- 

 posits and the fact that for generations 

 the Spaniards worked only the mines, 

 pausing neither to sow nor reap, tended 

 to keep the country back. Indeed, as one 

 old Mexican wisely said, "If all the work 

 that's been done in our mines since Cor- 

 tez went prospecting had been put to 

 plowing and irrigating, we'd be raising 

 grain enough now to feed fifty millions, 

 instead of having to import flour and 

 corn from the United States." 



Ever since the Children of Israel set 

 out for Canaan a certain inexorable law 

 has led restless men of all races to seek 

 homes where soil and climate make life 

 easiest. Hence, indisputably and inevi- 

 tably, a tide of migration must some day 

 set in to this West Coast, just as it once 

 flowed into our own empty west and into 

 Canada. Mexicans alone cannot settle it 

 and bring it to full fruition, for there are 

 not enough of them, and they achieve 



better results with the stimulus of foreign 

 aid and example. 



Already hundreds of pioneer colo- 

 nists — Americans, Chinese, and a few 

 Europeans — are settled here. As mer- 

 chants, miners, and planters, as doctors, 

 engineers, and manufacturers' agents, 

 these foreign residents are scattered all 

 down this coast from Tia Juana to Te- 

 huantepec. 



In the Yaqui Valley one American cor- 

 poration, originally organized by two far- 

 seeing financiers, has already worked an 

 agricultural miracle. Aided by American 

 soil experts, plant wizards, and advised 

 by such men as built the Roosevelt dam, 

 it has cleared and watered thousands of 

 acres and established a pioneer American 

 colony. 



The shallow, weed-choked irrigation 

 ditch that the Indians knew is replaced 

 by long, deep canals with miles of laterals 

 and take-offs, and giant dredges now 

 move tons of mud a day where once the 

 peon toiled with his frail shovel. Oil- 

 burning tractors and marvelous gang- 

 plows have crowded out the crude im- 

 plements and scratching sticks of a dec- 

 ade ago. 



In other places and in other ways the 

 American immigrant's influence is setting 

 up a higher standard of industrial and 

 social life. At Nacozari, Sonora, a Yan- 

 kee mining company has built a free club 

 and social center for its Mexican em- 

 ployees ; there are baths, pool tables, a 

 library of Spanish and English books, 

 and current periodicals. 



Strikes have never disturbed this camp. 

 Its American managers are required to 

 learn the language of the country, to 

 study the psychology of the people, and 

 to respect their customs and traditions. 

 When one of this company's native engi- 

 neers sacrificed his life in an explosion to 

 save many fellow workmen, the companv 

 named the town plaza in his honor and 

 built a monument to his memory. 



SONORANS "THE VANKEES OF MEXICO" 



Here in Sonora the American idea has 

 taken particularly deep root. Mexicans 

 from other States call these Sonora na- 

 tives "the Yankees of Mexico" because 

 of their thrift, advancement, and close re- 

 lations with the Americans. Practically 



