CHAPTER XXV.
SOCIETY.
1887.
Evolution of a new race — Indians and Meztizos — Climate and Epidemics — Benevolent Institutions — The Mexican of the Present Time — Slavery and Peonage — Negroes and Léperos — Orders and Titles of Nobility — Social Manners and Customs — Artisans and Rancheros — Condition of Mexican Women — Marital Relations — Innovations on the National Costume — Holidays and Festivals — Observance of Holy Week — Gambling — Theatres and Country Amusements — Horse-racing — Popular Drives and Walks — Highwaymen — Travelling in the Interior — Immigration Unsuccessful — Relative Positions of Foreigners in Mexico.
The peaceful, semi-dormant times of colonial rule were undoubtedly favorable to the evolution of a race which is rapidly absorbing the Indian and Spanish parent stock and advancing toward a fixed type. What this will be is wholly a matter of speculation. If left to themselves the mestizos must in time become the national race, as already represented by a large body among them,[1] but our age is not one of exclusiveness, and growing intercourse is opposed to strict conservatism. Mexico is exposed in an exceptional manner to the encroachments of universal progress, lying as she does on the borders of a nation impelled above any other by the spirit of the age. The territory ceded by the treaty of 1848 is rapidly transforming
- ↑ Many writers regard the type as already stamped in the majority of the mestizos, while Jourdanet and others still look for modifications, either toward Indian or white, although they fail to present any well-defined argument. Pimentel, Econom., 180-8, joins Alaman in a despairing wail at the prospective disappearance of the present races like the builders of the present ruins in Central America.
(598)
