Identifier: mexicoitsancient01enoc (find matches)
Title: Mexico, its ancient and modern civilisation, history and political conditions, topography and natural resources, industries and general development;
Year: 1910 (1910s)
Authors: Enock, C. Reginald (Charles Reginald), 1868-1970
Subjects:
Publisher: New York, Scribner
Contributing Library: The Library of Congress
Digitizing Sponsor: The Library of Congress

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eir lumbering and dusty course, thesaddle is the only, and indeed the most characteristic,mode of travel ; and the arriero and his string of pack-mules is the common carrier, and the mountain road ordusty desert trail the means of communication fromplace to place. Along these the horseman follows, dayafter day, his hard but interesting road, for to the loverof Nature and incident the saddle ever brings matter ofinterest unattainable by other means of locomotion.The glorious morning air, the unfolding panorama oflandscape—even the desert and the far-off mountainspur which he must round ere evening falls, are sources,of exhilaration and interest. The simple people andtheir quaint dwellings, where in acute struggle for lifewith Nature they wrest a living from rocks and thorns—are these not subjects, even, worthy of some passingphilosophical thought ? Not a hilltop in the vicinityof any human habitations—be they but the wretchedjacales or wattle-huts of the poorest peasants—but is
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A FIRST RECONNAISSANCE 15 surmounted by a cross : not a spring or well but isadorned with flowers in honour of that patron saintwhose name it bears ; and not a field or hamlet or minebut has some religious nomenclature or attribute. Forthe Mexicans are a race into which the religion of theConquistadores penetrated indelibly, whose hold uponthem time scarcely unlooses. The creeds of the priests,moreover, are interwoven with the remains of Aztectheistic influence, and the superstitions of both systemshold the ignorant peasantry of Mexico in enduring thrall.Much of beauty and pathetic quaintness there is in thisstrong religious sentiment, which no thinking observerwill deride ; much of retrograde ignorance, which he willlament to see. The Great Plateau tapers away towards the south,terminating in the Valley of Mexico, bounded bythe snowy Cordillera of Anahuac. Within this rangeare two great volcanic uplifts, two beautiful mountainpeaks, crowned with perpetual snow—the culminatingorogra

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