RAMBLES ABOUT MONCLOVA.

as was that of Napoleon into Moscow, as a compensation, our exodus was not such an emphatic illustration of the mode of taking The famous Monterey armistice, if pro- French leave." Our camp was almost litductive of little in military diplomacy, was erally established upon the rock, for nothing at least indicative of the magnanimity of but a thin covering of earth-the washings a great soldier and illustrious patriot. It of the surrounding hills-separated us from formed an episode in a campaign conducted the unyielding granite. This bank was thus with rare ability and vigor, and constitutes not only one of deposit, but acted upon by an interesting incident in the career of a the fitful breeze, furnished like similar instihero, who having lived long enough for glory,tutions at home, a circulating medium for died in the full possession of that integrity the army which found itself in other orifices which through a long life he had kept with than the pocket. Many of us, however, had his country and his fame. Politicians reso often had dust thrown into our eyes that mote from the scene of action, and accuswe were not wholly unprepared to take it tomed to judge of most measures by the efeven in the concrete without winking. fect they might have upon a party triumph Apart from this annoyance the site of our or defeat, were incapable of fully apprecia- encampment was one of singular attractiveting the motives of a commander, who could ness and beauty. The Sierra del Carmin be generous in the hour of victory, and be-threw its lofty heights against the sky to the stow upon a conquered enemy, a tribute of eastward, while on the southern and western respect, which could in no wise detract from sides, the undulations of the city were visithe honor or interests of his own govern-ble within half a mile, the dome of the cament. It was an easy matter for such per- thedral lying like a vast globe amid the versons to express regrets" for an act of no-dant and tufted foliage of palm, cypress and ble disinterestedness, which perhaps they pecan, which spring from their rocky beds in had as little disposition to imitate as capa- almost tropical luxuriance. To the north the city to comprehend. It is not the object of eye rested the broad fields of corn wathis article, however, to vindicate the policy ving in the wind, and flinging back from of that measure, or the wisdom of its au- their ripened blades the golden and gorgeous hues of autumn. Contrasting with these rich tints, were the double lines of green distinctly marked, now straight, sharp and angular, and now winding in graceful curves,

thor. The man who "with the consciousness of pure motives," dared, while under his frown, to address an official superior, "I ask no favor and I shrink from no responsibility," may safely trust for his vindication and reward, "the final verdict of impartial history." The connection of the writer with the armistice was not a very direct one, and by it he was affected only as an obscure member of another division of the army, which having pursued an imaginary object with keen scent and untiring bottom, for a distance of seven or eight hundred miles, was

upon

and

tracing the course of unseen currents, which like the silent benefaction of those good Samaritans, whom a kind Providence makes the almoners of his bounty, scatter joy and gladness along the pathway of sorrow, conceal the cause in the munificence of the effect. The Mexicans with exemplary industry and skill, have here improved every finally halted at Monclova, to inquire what acre of land which could be subjected by any process to the dominion of husbandry. was to be gained by going farther. The Wherever the furrow may be turned the Monterey truce afforded an opportunity for the brief dialogue involved in this question

and answer, as well as for the rambles about Monclova herein related.

plough has forced its way; and though the heavens refuse to them "the early and the latter rain;" though the months of torrid heat and cloudless skies reveal to them only a heaven of brass and an earth of iron, wherever a stream bubbles from the plain or gushes from If our entrance into the capital of Coahu- the mountain, channels are wrought in which ila was not quite so magnificent in its array, is conveyed to the famished soil, a substi

THE CAMP.

VOL. XXI-44

tute for that nourishment which the clouds collision occurred, we were frequently met withhold. From these fountains dikes are with frowning brows and scowling eyes, sug sometimes carried fifty miles, to convey the gesting what willing hands and vengeful indispensable element of animal and vegeta-hearts would do but dare not. The veil was ble life. The Rio Monclova supplies its val- also drawn at times from before their local ley with the means of irrigation, and it is of differences, revealing feelings of great bitcourse well cultivated. The principal pro- terness between the Federalists and Cenducts are corn, wheat, cotton, sugar and tralists, and of still more rancorous acerbity beans; of these corn and cotton predomi-between the rich and the poor, the Fednate. There are also extensive fields of the eralists being mostly included among the Magney (Agave Americana,) the cultivation latter. These had hoped on our arrival to of which is very profitable. It has a vari- see the officials removed and disgraced, and ety of uses. It makes the best fence while to be thus avenged of their wrongs, by the growing that any country affords. It sup- mortification and overthrow of their wealthy plies the place of the hemps of Asia, and enemies. They were disappointed, as it the papyrus of Egypt, as most of the Mexi- was our practice, if not our policy, to court can manuscripts that are sent abroad, are of the higher classes, whose real sentiments paper made of Magney leaves. The plant were disguised under the amiable hypocrisy moreover is frequently cut up as food for of politeness. Yet it was known that they animals, and from its fibrous texture is man- had attempted to organize an opposition to ufactured into rope, twine and coarse jeans. our entrance into the city, which had ingloThe fibres also in their natural state are used riously failed. Like the army in Flanders, for thread-the writer having worn a pair of they "swore terribly," in advance, denouncshoes thus put together. In addition to all ed us as ruthless invaders, plundering their which the plant furnishes the most popular homes and violating their wives and daughbeverage in the country-an article always ters, and boasted that three or four hundred in demand.

THE MESON DE SANTIAGO.

men would compel us to re-cross the Rio Grande. Their valour, however, did not stick, the hundreds were not assembled; and, according to a little French woman in

The omission of drills, parades and other the city-the wife of a recent emigrantexercises tending to familiarize the troops the women of Monclova were provokingly with company and regimental evolutions, af- ind.ferent to the reports that were circulatforded so much leisure, that officers and men ed concerning the fates that awaited them. were enabled daily to exchange the monoto- The husband of this woman by the way, was ny of camp for the monotony of town, and something of a character, as well as his wife. to determine whether in Mexican as in Eng- He was imported with a Mr. Castro's colony lish, two negatives destroy one another." into Texas, but not liking the prospect there, The only approximation to a hotel that we pushed ahead with a touch of Yankee enhad found in the country was the "Meson terprise, until he reached Monclova. There de Santiago," a popular resort for refresh- he suddenly found himself baker and blackments, where might be obtained in addition smith, cobbler, carpenter and cabinet-maker, to pulque, aguardiente and muscal, stewed though in Paris he modestly confessed he rice and garlic; stewed pumpkin, squash, knew but one trade indifferently well. He tomatoes and garlic; stewed beans, potatoes gave a more apt and comprehensive descripand garlic; stewed veal, kids and garlic; tion of Texas and Mexico, than any to be stewed pig, onions and garlic, and perhaps found in the books, and one worthy of presdivers other dishes, of which a "stew" is ervation: "If one wants nothing here he the invariable form and "garlic" the invari- can find it everywhere."

able feature. In these visits it was not dif- A striking, almost startling, characteristic ficult to perceive that the people of Monclo- of Monclova, is the extreme quiet of the va were more hostile than those we had pre- streets. There is no rumbling of carriages, viously encountered, and though no serious no clattering of carts; perils from omnibuses

MASS AT THE CATHEDRAL.

are unknown, and there are no crowds of pe- and superstition-the foundation and the capdestrians, no votaries of mammon jostling stone of the Mexican system-by which you aside in a headlong hurry from that mind and body are enslaved under the presword of Damocles-an impending protest, text of the soul's emancipation. and no splendid equipages of more splendid women in pursuit of blonde, beaux or brocades. Belleship and beauty are here invisible on the pavé. The laces lie on the For the purpose; perhaps, of introducing. shelves of the shops in unprofitable repose, an extra item of impressiveness into their dethe few that enter being mostly Americans. votions, and appropriating to themselves as The hammer of the mechanic, the varied much of martial consequence as could be evidences of industry and art, the laugh of squeezed out of their positions, a detachment cheerfulness, the life, bustle and activity at- from head-quarters, with a respectable estendant upon a healthy social and political cort, paraded the second Sunday after our system are here unknown, or exist unseen. arrival, for church. The party reached the If it were not for the naked children playing Cathedral before the commencement of serwith the dogs and donkeys, a stranger might vice, and were thus favored with a fine opfancy himself among the exhumed suburbs portunity for an examination of its interior of Pompeii or Nineveh. The narrow, crook-decorations and novel embellishments. One ed streets, the low walls of mud which form side of the principal chapel was garnished · so many dwellings-unrelieved by front with a mass of placards, which from their doors or windows-each house looking like a number and extent might have been mistaprison and perhaps telling a tale of crime and ken for a broadside of theatrical advertiseits consequences, are suggestive only of sad ments: they proved to be, however, a series and melancholy reflections. The activity that of papers under the highly respectable sancprevails is that of destructiveness; houses tions of Pius VIII. and Gregory XVI., exfalling to the ground, walls crumbling into pounding and enforcing the traffic in "indulruins, and half-starved, half-living wretches gences." Along the opposite wall were leaving their hovels tenantless, and trusting ranged some half dozen confessional boxes, themselves to the tender mercies of the ele- within one of which an attendant padre was ments. The wealth, and pride, and gran-listening to the mumbling utterances of a deur which prevailed when Monclova was a female who might have been soliciting parminiature court, and a Spanish Hidalgo, as don for last night's prostitution. The side Viceroy, rioted and revelled in the pomp chapels formed the picture galleries; the and pageantry of royalty, fell with the un-paintings were mere daubs, rudely illustrafortunate revolution; and in the shipwreck tive of the superstitions of the church. Those of the State, which has continued from that nearest the altar were executed with some time to this, in a series of storms and con- artistic skill, but could excite no admiration vulsions raised by priests and demagogues in minds at all elevated above the miserable. who had not the power to rule them, all that idolaters for whose worship they were inremained of Castilian art, elegance and refine-tended.

ment, has sunk to the bottom, and the relics

In the absence of an organ, the regular exof monarchical associations that yet float ercises were opened by a full blast from the upon the surface, will soon disappear for- brass band, whose sonorous strains attuned ever. The substitution of native for foreign to the notes of the Barber of Seville, mingled misrule has been attended with only ruinous in appropriate concord with the whining inresults; the revolution commenced, carried tonations of the priest. This functionary on and concluded by the priesthood, whose was arrayed in robes that rivalled those of power it incalculably increased, has brought the harlequin in variety of coloring as well disaster after disaster upon the people, and as richness of material. The envy or ambihas proved to a demonstration that the re-tion of the redoubtable Colonel Chapeau appublican principle loses all vitality when its peared to be excited either by the gay cossele sustenance is derived from ignorance tume or active gyrations of the priest and

the responsive kneelings and crossings of compared with the robozo sinks into a fashthe congregation, and fearful perhaps, that ionable barbarism. Such a woman at her his presence might be unobserved by the as-devotions is the outward embodiment of sembled Mexicans, he made himself pain-ideal purity, and loveliness. She appears a fully conspicuous in pantomiming with Cap-faultless isolation of religion, kneeling on tain Ram-Rod, touching the conduct and po- the hard ground, her face bowed to the earth, sitions of the Americans who were present. or fixed with profound reverence upon the There was neither noise nor confusion among cross, with form erect like animated marble; them, until his reformations commenced, but her rebozo drawn so close to the temples as both necessarily followed from this new mode to reveal only the liquid lustre of her eyes, of Church discipline. The fraction of the and arranged with a careless witchery that audience under his immediate influence, was defies imitation, her attitude combines as kept in a state of constant fermentation. much of grace and elegance and fascination. These efforts, however, were most ungrate- as flesh and blood have snatched from the fully appreciated by the masses; the priest guardian spirits of paradise.

went on with his exhibition wholly regardless Of the three churches in Monclova, but of the active competition of his military one of them, in the language of Sproker, rival, and the congregation followed their of Mohawk memory, "goes." This one on sacerdotal fugleman, rather than the evolu- account of its superiority in magnitude and tions of heresy in epaulettes. general appearance, is known as the CatheMany specimens of female beauty, scarce-dral, and is incomparably the finest strucly to be met elsewhere, were present; as ture in the city. It is in the form of a cross, the feminine aristocracy of Monclova is the main chapel or body of the building, exprobably much like that in the United States, clusive of the transepts, is about one hundred in this, that its members are generally to be and fifty feet long and eighty feet wide. found at Sabbath morning service. A Mex-The roof is formed by six groined arches, ican woman, if not beautiful, has a style and supported on rude massive pillars, forty or manner peculiarly her own, suggestive of fifty feet high, with capitals resembling those pure blood and high breeding. Her figure of the Ionic order. The college is a stone is slight, well rounded and elastic, and in her or adobe building, handsomely located on a queenly tread there floats a nameless grace, lofty eminence overlooking the city. It is which alone embodies the idea of perfect understood to be under the patronage of the poetry of motion. Her foot is small, well Jesuits, and the course of studies thus preformed, and crowned with an exquisitely scribed, tends rather to fetter and pervert turned ankle. The arm is round but not so the mind, than to liberalise or enlighten it. white as alabaster; the hand is small, the Every thing approaching to a just conception fingers tapering away into bewitching dimi- of science and its uses, is sedulously exclu nutiveness. She has regular features; a ded; the instruction being confined to a thoughtful brow, shaded by hair, long, black smattering of the classics, and the reading and glossy, a faultless mouth, nose and chin, of the "Fathers." Nothing is considered and teeth white as ivory. Her eyes are worthy to be acquired or to be taught, that magnificent, large and lustrous, black as does not contribute to the strength and prenight, and blazing like the stars of heaven. servation of the Papal superstition. Her dress is light, airy and graceful, a re- Directly below this edifice-the descent finement upon that of the lower classes, being perpendicular so that the face of the which usually consists of slippers without hill forms a natural wall to several housesstockings; a simple chemise visible above and in agreeable proximity, is the cock-pit. the waist, with a supply of petticoats below, This is a really beautiful circular area, about fastened by a red sash, that would com-forty yards in diameter, having its circumpletely barricade the west side of Broadway. ference planted with trees and arranged The rebazo a sort of scarf-is always worn with seats. Professor and pupil, priest and abroad, instead of the bonnet, which,-though people, are here assembled on terms of possibly a necessity in a northern climate,equality, equality, as patrons of this highly refined,

tion.

ennobling, and eminently national institu- [the antagonism of wealth and power, to poverty and weakness. As a body the masThe Custom House is an antiquated struc-ses have no very clear conceptions of their ture, original in design and limited in ca- principles or their objects; and their views pacity, standing at the extreme point of the of the rights of man are drawn not from city, in the direction of Saltillo and Parras. education but from necessity. With them It has a high, round tower attached, intended liberty is but an instinct, and liberty regulaas a look-out for prowling contrabandistas, lated by law, a substantiality of which but which is ascended by means of a spiral stair-very few have ever dreamed. They boast way. The masonry, like that of all old not of any proud descent from Spanish HiSpanish constructions, is in a good state of dalgos, but ground down and trodden under preservation, and the cloistered arch which foot by the plagues and oppressions of sucforms the roof retains undiminished its cessive military despotisms and a crushing symmetry and strength, though erected, ac- ecclesiastical oligarchy, they have not yet cording to an inscription above the entrance, relinquished all hopes of an ultimate delivin 1744. The building in 1846, formed a lerance from their iron task-masters. They residence for a small Mexican family.

THE ALAMEDA.

have still faith in the potency of those original principles of right, which existed before. human governments and rulers, and which Strolling about the town in one of our will survive when human governments and hours of idleness, I one day found myself rulers have passed away. They are not republoitering with no very definite object, amid licans seeking an alliance with the U. States; the shady retreats of the Alameda. This they have no affinity for us or for our councharming resort was now desolate and for- try; they have known us only as enemies, saken. The winds scarcely sighed a passing and their habits, language and religion are requiem through the waving branches of the opposed to any political union with the Imvenerable trees, over past scenes and asso-perial Republic of the North. Yet they seem ciations, probably never to be renewed. The to have an abiding confidence that a mightplace once enlivened by the merry laugh and ier revolution than any they have yet witinnocent prattle of children, or sacred to the nessed will again convulse their country, gentle pressure and eloquent whisperings of but leave behind it the elements of peace young Mexicos in love, had become a and prosperity, purified from their long conlounging spot for idlers-visiters from a dis- tact with corruption. But these views are tant region sent hither to spy out the weak-dreams rather than realities, shadowy outness and eat out the substance of the land. lines of a hopeful fancy, rather than the maThe statue of an Indian maiden, which tured conclusions of reason, which, it may seemed to have been erected as the tutelary safely be affirmed, can never be realized genius of the place, had shared the fate of in the way these people imagine. Their its rural dominions, and in its shattered and condition can only be improved by a fundacrumbling remains, suggested no imperfect mental change of ideas and associations, and type of the downward destiny of the Aztic this can hardly be effected without a change race and empire. The Alameda of Mon- of blood. There must be something more clova-there is but one-forms the isthmus radical than a revolution in rulers, in govas it were, connecting the old Indian town ernment, or even in forms of government. or Puebla, with the modern city, and lies The diseases of Mexico are woven into all principally in the former. Near it are her institutions, social, political and religious, the ruins of a deserted church, and the and the condition of the people and country dwellings around it are of the poorer class, is most strikingly portrayed in the language resembling the aboriginal wigwam. Their of Holy Writ. "From the sole of the foot occupants are the "poor" in contradistinction even unto the head, there is no soundness in from the "rich," in Mexico the only real di- it, but wounds, and bruises, and putrifying vision of parties. Centralism and Federalism sores. Their country is desolate, their land, may be regarded as cant terms, signifying strangers devour it in their presence, and it