years, instead of one hundred as generally believed. It grows wild here, but large plantations of it are cultivated. Just before the plant is ready to blossom the natives gather the big fat leaves together, around the bud, forming a sort of basin. The bud is then cut out and the juice from the stalk collects in the leaf-formed basin. One stalk will yield as high as two gallons a day for six months.
The pulque is collected in jars that the gatherers carry suspended from their shoulders. It is sucked out of the basin through a hollow bamboo or reed, and squirted from the mouth into the jar. A knowledge of this fact does not render the stuff any more palatable to foreigners. It is awfully nasty stuff, but they say that when you get acquainted with it you like it real well.
Mescal is a sort of brandy distilled from pulque, and will paralyze almost as promptly as a stroke of lightning. Metheglin—honey and water—is made from the honey ant; they are placed in a piece of bolting cloth and the honey squeezed out of them.
The street-car system here is quite unique. But first a few statistics may prove interesting; they run on ninety miles of rails, and carried last year nine million passengers; the company owns one thousand five hundred mules and horses, one hundred and thirty-nine first-class coaches, sixty-five second-class, forty-six platform or freight cars, and twenty-six funeral cars. They pay an annual dividend of six per cent, on a capital of $5,000,000. The Chairman of the Board of Directors, Senor Castillo, speaks Spanish and English; they are very particular about free passes, and so far this year have only issued six.
First-class cars are exactly like those in the States, and the second-class look just like the "Black Maria," except the wheels. Cars, just like open freight or truck cars on railroads, are used for hauling instead of wagons, and a dozen of these, loaded with merchandize, are drawn by one team. Movings and everything are hauled in this manner; the price charged is comparatively small. Cars do not run singly, but in groups of four and five. Even on the first-class cars men smoke as much as they wish, and if the women find it unbearable they go out and stand on the platform; there are two
