archbishop, where the Papal brief authorizing the coronation was read, and the notarial certificates of the action made, and it was received by the archbishop amid the clangor of bells and salvos of artillery.

The event of the coronation revived the discussion of the authenticity of the tilma and the image; one bishop at least, the Bishop of Tamaulipas, dissented and preached against it, and the great agnostic, Senor Don Juan Mateos, who has been called the Ingersoll of Mexico, opened the flood gates of his splendid oratory against the story of the tilma and eulogizing the advancement which he saw in the unbelief of a bishop of the church. But the legend will go on forever, and it can do no harm, even if it only serves for a pretty story.

The great church fronts on the main plaza of the city of Guadalupe, opposite the street that leads to the causeway over which the street cars pass to and from the City of Mexico. The church is a massive stone structure with a tall tower, filled with bells, on each corner; the southwest tower holds the town clock; the towers are over a hundred feet high. The center facade is of stone of marble whiteness, handsomely sculptured; twenty stone columns support the elaborately carved friezes of the first and second elevations; between the sets of two columns are life-size figures, also in stone. Immediately over the main entrance and in the center of the facade is a sculptured representation of the scene in the bishop's house when Juan Diego let the roses fall from his tilma, disclosing the image of the Virgin.

THE STONE SAILS OF GUADALUPE

Near the church is a stone stairway that leads to the Capilla del Cerrito, the Chapel of the Hill, built on the spot where the legend says the roses grew in the barren rock, at the Virgin's word, for Juan Diego to gather and take to the bishop in token of her wish for a temple there. About half way up the stairs are the Stone Sails of

Guadalupe, and thereby hangs a tale: Some sailors in dire distress in a storm-tossed ship that had lost her rudder, prayed to the Virgin of Guadalupe and vowed that if she would bring them safe to land they would carry the foremast to the Hill of Guadalupe and set the sails before her shrine. There the sails are to this day, incased in stone, a memorial to the protecting power of the Virgin. The date of the placing of this curious work remains untold in the annals of Guadalupe.

CHAPTER XXII

SOCIAL CONDITIONS IN MEXICO

There are but two classes of society in Mexico,- those who work to live and those who live by the labor of their fellow-men, the one including all the wealth and intelligence of the country, members of the professions and public officials, and the other consisting only of those who serve. Between the two there is an almost impassable gulf; for the poor are hopelessly poor, and looked upon with contempt, while the high-born, if reduced to poverty, prefer starvation to manual labor, which is considered as degrading. At present there is no great powerful middle class, though such an element is being gradually evolved through the social and material progress of the country. There is not, as in most of the countries of Europe and in the United States, a great body politic consisting of farmers, traders, and artisans, many of them owning the land which they till, the wares which they sell, and the shops and dwellings which they occupy. This most important factor in the community, forming as it does the very backbone of a nation, is still in process of development. Thus the term lower classes, in whatever sense it may be used, signifies in Spanish America something different from its meaning elsewhere on this continent and perhaps elsewhere in the world.

The present condition and status of the lower classes are matters easy of explanation. Given as a base the conquered aboriginals, merged into innumerable castes by intermarriage with Africans and Europeans; steep them in ignorance and superstition; grind them for cen

turies under the heel of political, ecclesiastical, and social despotism, and the result is exactly what might have been expected.

In physique, the Mexican peon is somewhat below medium stature, and of slender build, but hardy, and remarkably patient of fatigue. The men frequently carry for a considerable distance packages of two or three hundred pounds weight, the load being born on the back and shoulders and balanced by a leather strap around the forehead and chest, while women support lighter burdens on their heads, after the fashion of the French and Italian peasantry. Their condition is pitiable in the extreme; for in the cities they are the servants of servants, and in the country, bound by debt or family ties, they live, almost as bondsmen, on the haciendas, or the mines where dwelt their fathers and forefathers.

The lowest grade include some of the most abject creatures on earth, says Bancroft, beings who are almost a reproach to humanity, or rather to the European civilization which placed them in a condition far more degraded than that of their ancestors under aboriginal regime. They are thinly and but partially clad in coarse cotton garments, many of them going barefoot and bareheaded; their food consists of whatever they can pick up, and at night they huddle together in adobe huts, or sleep on the ground wherever they may chance to be when night overtakes them.

USED AS PACK ANIMALS

Even those who are a little higher in the scale of civilization are utilized in the cities as pack-animals, and in the mines in place of machinery; and yet so fearful are they of losing their employment that they destroy all labor-saving implements, even though they may tend to relieve them of a portion of their burdens. In the streets and on the highways they may be seen bearing huge timbers, loads of adobe, and boxes and packages of

enormous weight; and heavy articles, as pianos and iron safes, are carried for miles across barrancas almost impassable for vehicles.

But degraded as is the condition of the lower classes in Mexico, it has improved somewhat since the era of the revolution. Descriptions which have been handed down to us of the 20,000 leperos, or lazzaroni, who twenty years ago infested the suburbs of the capital, represent a scene of poverty, filth and wretchedness almost beyond belief. Not long afterward a law was passed requesting vagrants to go to work or suffer imprisonment, and this regulation produced a wholesome effect. Not that the reform proved radical, for to this day beggars may be seen who pass their lives standing, like statues, by the wayside or on the street corners, rather than raise a hand to provide themselves with food. Others, shockingly deformed, obstruct the sidewalks, and exhibit their twisted frames in mute appeal for aid.

Nevertheless there are few classes of laborers who do more work for less money than the Mexican peon. It is, moreover, a significant fact that there are few Chinamen in their midst, except on the plantations of the lowlands; for Mongolians cannot compete with them, either in amount or quality of labor, or in the straitness of their economy.

PEONS GIVE FAITHFUL SERVICE

The employer who keeps faith with his Mexican laborers, paying them promptly according to his agreement, will receive faithful service in return, being acknowledged as their master almost by divine right; for the peons and their ancestors have been drilled for centuries in the school of servility. So accustomed are they to kicks and curses that they regard this species of abuse as incidental to their sphere of life. Even when making their purchases at the stores they look with suspicion on the shopkeeper who addresses them politely; for such treatment