322 



THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGA7JNE 



Photograph from Russell Hastings Mill ward 



THE MARKET AT GUANAJUATO: MEXICO 



Note that the men wear trousers instead of the typical pajama-like costume of the Mexi- 

 can. Formerly a recognized means of getting labor for public works in Mexican towns was 

 to arrest road-builders, carpenters, masons, or whatever class of worker was needed, on some 

 flimsy charge, and sentence them to "hard labor" for a requisite period on municipal projects. 

 Some years ago Guanajuato introduced a variation in this practice and replenished its treasury 

 by fining all natives coming into town in the usual garments. There also was a suspicion that 

 some enterprising trousers-maker h?.d influenced the city government. After their first sur- 

 prise, the crafty country folk evaded the fine, and also avoided making a run on the trousers 

 market by buying one pair per community and arranging schedules by which the busy 

 trousers became ambulant jitneys, making three or four trips per day with different passengers. 



lope are still seen in north Sonora. While 

 hunting on the coast near Port Libertad 

 our party jumped a herd of 35 antelope. 



Nor must you go far into the Canadian 

 north or run over to Tibet to hunt the 

 wary bighorn. Here -in northwest So- 

 nora you can shoot him, if you can stand 

 the heat and strain of a climb over blis- 

 tering, inhospitable rOcks, and can stalk 

 and hit him after you locate him. 



One American hunter I know counted 

 24 of these majestic animals, filing in 

 solemn dignity from the month of a 

 mountain cave, in Lower California, 

 where they had lain to escape the midday 

 heat. Afterward, exploring one of these 

 caves, my friend found an odd mat, an- 



cient and tattered, made of human hair. 

 There were scraps of broken pottery, too, 

 and a worn sandal of braided grass. 



On some of these cave walls are 

 scratched crude drawings of men and 

 animals. These petroglvphs occur from 

 Tucson all the way down to Guadala- 

 jara — dim, puzzling records of a vanished 

 race. 



A DIVERSITY OE RACES IN MEXICO 



Pew Americans realize the diversity of 

 races in Mexico. From Sonora to Yuca- 

 tan over 50 separate dialects are spoken. 

 All the inhabitants of the West Coast, 

 however, with the exception of some hill 

 tribes of Indians, can understand Span- 

 ish. 



