Page:A Study of Mexico.djvu/35

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THE PICTURESQUE IN MEXICO.
25

There is not one human being or passing object to be seen that is not in itself a picture, or which would not form a good subject for the pencil. The Indian women, with their plaited hair, and little children slung on their backs, their large straw hats, and petticoats of two colors; the long string of arrieros with their loaded mules, and swarthy, wild-looking faces; the chance horseman who passes with his serape of many colors, his high, ornamental saddle, Mexican hat, silver stirrups, and leather boots—all is picturesque. Salvator Rosa and Hogarth might have traveled here to advantage hand-in-hand; Salvator for the sublime, and Hogarth taking him up where the sublime became ridiculous."

Where Indian blood greatly predominates in the women, the head, neck, shoulders, and legs, to the knee, are generally bare, and their garments little else than a loose-fitting white cotton tunic, and a petticoat of the same material, often of two colors.

At Aguas Calientes, within a hundred yards of the station of the "Mexican Central Railroad," men, women, and children, entirely naked, may be seen bathing, in large numbers, at all hours of the day, in a ditch conveying a few feet of tepid water, which flows, with a gentle current, from certain contiguous and remarkably warm springs.