LIFE IN MEXICO
DURING A
RESIDENCE OF TWO YEARS
IN
THAT COUNTRY.
By Mme. C De La B
Thou art beautiful,
Queen of the valley! thou art beautiful!
Thy walls, like silver, sparkle to the sun,
Melodious wave thy groves
Southey's Madoc.
IN TWO VOLUMES.
VOLUME I.
BOSTON:
CHARLES C. LITTLE AND JAMES BROWN.
1843.
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1842, by
Alexander D. Inglis,
In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of Massachusetts.
BOSTON:
PRINTED BY FREEMAN AND BOLLES,
WASHINGTON STREET
PREFACE
The present work is the result of observations made during a two years' residence in Mexico, by a lady, whose position there, made her intimately acquainted with its society, and opened to her the best sources of information in regard to whatever could interest an enlightened foreigner. It consists of letters written to the members of her own family, and really, not intended originally, — however incredible the assertion, — for publication. Feeling a regret that such rich stores of instruction and amusement, from which I have so much profited, myself, should be reserved for the eyes of a few friends only, I strongly recommended that they should be given to the world. This is now done, with a few such alterations and omissions as were necessary in a private correspondence; and although the work would derive more credit from the author's own name, than from anything which I can say, yet as she declines prefixing it, I feel much pleasure in making this statement by way of introduction to the public.
Boston, December 20, 1842.