114 



MEXICO. 



ment, and I think with every probability of truth. Like 

 all other portions of the Mexican army which came in 

 our way, the officers were gaudily dressed in very bad 

 taste, and the men looked more like footpads than sol- 

 diers. 



And now the scene of the fashionable promenade 

 changes to the portales, where some hundreds of dames 

 and gallants form into two dense lines, from which, when 

 once entangled, you can hardly extricate yourself; and 

 continue defiling up and down with monotonous regular- 

 ity and at a funeral pace, for half an hour or more ; while 

 the dirty steps at the doorways of the shops opening under 

 the arcades, upon which the beggars and lepers have 

 been reclining during the day, are now, to your astonish- 

 ment, crowded by luxuriously dressed females, chatting 

 and smoking with their beaux. This is perfect Mexican 

 — just as an acquaintance described to me his morning 

 visit to a noble lady to whom the preceding evening he 

 had been presented at the opera, where she shone in 

 lace and diamonds — when he found her in the most 

 complete dishabille ; all her French finery thrown aside ; 

 without stockings, and eating tortillas and Chile, out of 

 the common earthenware plate of the country. I must 

 do the Mexican gallants the credit to say that some time 

 ago a proposal was started to provide chairs. The offer, 

 however, was indignantly refused by the belles ; and there 

 they squat to this very day, according to the custom of 

 their mothers and grandmothers. 



At this hour the mantilla w 7 as almost universally laid 

 aside. The females of this country cannot be said to be 

 distinguished for personal beauty. They are short in 

 person, and seldom the possessors of elegant form or 

 features. The eyes are commonly fine, and the majesty 

 of their gait, which is remarkable, is characteristic of the 

 admixture of Spanish and Indian blood. In their style 

 of dress, they have now adopted the French fashion ; al- 

 ways preserving the mantilla, however, as before men- 

 tioned, in the earlier part of the day. 



I regret to see national costumes on the wane, here 

 and elsewhere ; most following the vile fashions of France 



