half-castes, but seldom in those of the pure Mexicanos, of whom they are suspicious, not without good reason. They are conservative to a degree, and isolation has rendered them illiberal and somewhat fanatical, so that the Mexican Government has always regarded them with some distrust.
The dwellings of the Tarascan Indians recall those of the Japanese peasant. They are built of heavy pine logs and roofed by shingle-covered boards which overlap one another. They consist of one room and are built without windows. The chief industry of the country is the textile work before alluded to. Such agriculture as exists is on a feeble scale, and consists for the most part of individual efforts to raise corn and beans for private consumption. As in some other native quarters of Mexico, the women are the salvation of the community, and were it not for their bravery and unselfishness it would go hard with the men, many of whom are quite content to allow their wives to labour day in, day out, for them whilst they loaf and liquor. May the writer suggest to the charitable that a better sphere for their bounty and usefulness could not be found than in the amelioration of the lot of these poor native women of Mexico, many of whom possess not even the common liberties of humanity, but are forced to exist in an environment compared to which a well-nourished slavery would be a paradise.
The Tarascans are, however, gifted with a keen commercial sense, and peddle their wares over an extensive tract of country, their stocks comprising pottery, home-made musical instruments (they are musical to a degree), blankets, maguey rope, and so forth. They make the entire journey on foot and return with necessaries purchased in the towns they have visited, these articles being, of course, of such a kind as cannot be procured in their own villages. They can make a profit of 300 per cent, on their pottery alone, and on their return usually succeed on doubling their gains by the sale of the articles they have brought back. Their turnover
