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The good land and cultivated spots in Mexico are but dots on the map. Were it not that it takes so very little to support a Mexican, and that the land which is cultivated yields its produce with little labor, it would be surprising how its sparse population is sustained. All the towns we have visited, with perhaps the exception of Parras, are depopulating, as is also the whole country.
I should have starved if I had not sometimes plucked an ear or two out of the maize fields; I likewise gathered grapes from the parras and berries from the brambles, and in this manner I subsisted till I arrived at the bellotas, where I slaughtered a stray kid which I met, and devoured part of the flesh raw, so great was my hunger.
Nothing green save the fruits, especially the grapes, huge clusters of which were depending from the "parras"; for the locust touches not the fruit whilst a single leaf remains to be devoured. As we passed along the walks these horrible insects flew against us in every direction, and perished by hundreds beneath our feet. "See the ayanas," said the old Mahasni, "and hear them eating.
This is the feature which excites the greatest indignation at Athens; the minister of war does not dare to promote a corporal; the minister of public instruction would tremble to send a village schoolmaster to a country demos, even at the expense of the citizens; and the minister of finance would not risk the responsibility of conferring the office of porter of the customhouse at Parras, before receiving the royal instructions how to act on such emergencies, and ascertaining what creature of the camarilla it was necessary to provide for.
One day we marched on the road from Monclova to Parras thirty-five miles without water, a pretty severe day's marching for infantry. "Grass is very scarce, and indeed there is none at all in many regions for miles square. Its place is supplied with prickly-pear and thorny bushes.
It appeared, however, to be well frequented: numerous cars were creaking along it, and both horsemen and pedestrians were continually passing us. The villages were frequent. Vines, supported on parras, were growing, if possible, in still greater abundance than in the neighbourhood of Pontevedra. Life and activity seemed to pervade everything.
The whole country in the neighbourhood of Pontevedra is inconceivably delicious, abounding with fruits of every description, especially grapes, which in the proper season are seen hanging from the "parras" in luscious luxuriance. An old Andalusian author has said that it produces as many oranges and citron trees as the neighbourhood of Cordova.
He had ordered grapes from Parras, and figs black figs, a little withered, and candied tunas. And there was a roast of beef with herbs and chili sauce, and enchalades. The electric lights were turned on up-stairs and down when they entered the house, and Sylvia had an alarmed moment when she pictured a lot of guests waiting for them.
The Parras monteses which yields the somewhat sour wine of the island of Cuba, was probably gathered on the Vitis tiliaefolia which Mr. Willdenouw has described from our herbals.
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