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Page:Our Sister Republic - Mexico.djvu/299

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ALTAMIRANO, THE INDIAN ORATOR.
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always endow all Presidents and all Congresses with the wisdom necessary for the discharge of their supreme responsibilities.

Señor Savadera, Minister of Gubernacion, spoke next, and Deputado Rojo followed him, each giving, as did all the subsequent speakers, a sentiment in honor of Mr. Seward and the "moral alliance of the American Republics for the defence of republican institutions against foreign aggression."

Then came the great speech of the evening—that of the homeliest and cleverest orator in Mexico, the Indian scholar, radical republican, brave soldier, and anti-Church statesman, Ignacio M. Altamirano of Guerrero. This singular representative man of the aboriginal race of Mexico has nothing in his personal appearance to attract the attention of the casual observer, but the magical effect of his impassioned eloquence is beyond description, and one must see and listen to him to comprehend it.

IGNACIO M. ALTAMIRANO.

Born of Aztec parents in the State of Michoacan, and reared in the strict observance of the Catholic faith, this man has educated himself up to a standard seldom attained in the United States, or Europe, and learned to hate the priesthood who for centuries held in abject slavery the consciences and minds of millions of his race, with a hatred which finds expression in such lan-