This, then, is what the writer has to report respecting the economic condition and prospects of Mexico. His conclusions have not come to him, as perhaps may be inferred or charged, mainly from a somewhat extended but brief tour of observation; for no one can be more conscious than he of how little one can know of a country who, ignorant of the language, the customs, the political and social condition and pursuits of its people, sees it simply and hurriedly as a traveler. But the journey in question was, nevertheless, sufficiently extensive and instructive to thoroughly satisfy at least as to two points: First, that here was a country, bordering on the United States for a distance of more than two thousand miles, which was almost as foreign to the latter, in respect to race, climate, government, manners, and laws, as though it belonged to another planet; and, secondly, that the people of the United States generally knew about as much of the domestic concerns of this one of their nearest neighbors as they did about those of the empire of China. The temptation to enter upon a field of economic investigation so fresh and so little worked was too attractive to be resisted; and, accordingly, with the sole purpose of desiring to know the truth about Mexico, and to form an opinion as to what should be the future political and commercial relations between that country and the United States, the writer has made a careful study of a large amount of information that he has found accessible, both from public and private sources. And it is on the basis of this study, and with the kindliest feeling for and the deepest interest in Mexico, that he has written. In so doing, however, he claims nothing of infallibility. He frankly confesses that in respect to some things he may be mistaken; and that others might draw entirely different conclusions from the same data.[1] But for the entire accuracy
- ↑ One curious illustration of this point is to be found in the following extract from a letter recently addressed to the Mexican "Financier" by a Mexican gentleman, in contravention of the writer's opinions respecting the present industrial condition and prospective development of Mexico. He says: "If you pass through the Academy of San Carlos, you will see pictures executed by native Mexican artists in the highest style of art, comparing most favorably with any production of the academies of design of Paris, Rome, Munich, or elsewhere. Go with me, if you please, to a narrow lane in the small but picturesque city of Cuarnevaca, and there in a small room, working with implements of his own make, you will observe a native, whom you would perhaps class among the peons, carving a crucifix in wood, so highly artistic, with the expression of suffering on our Saviour's face so realistic, that any foreign sculptor of the highest renown would be proud to call it a
