those who desire them, they are legally superfluous and alone have no validity whatever.' (See Report on Church and State in Mexico to the State Department by Consul-General Strother, December, 1883.)
"How the lower orders of the Mexican people other than the distinctive Indian population regarded the proceedings of the government against the Church is thus described by M. Désiré Charney in the account of his researches in Central America: 'Upon the suppression of the monastic orders in Mexico, and the confiscation of the property of the clergy, and the demolition of certain churches and convents, the multitude protested, but without violence. The leperos, all covered as they were with medals, rosaries and scapulars, pulled down the houses of their fetiches, while the old women—indignant witnesses of the sacrilege—ejaculated their avés without ceasing. The exiles had fulminated the major excommunication against whoever should have act or part in the work of demolition or should tread the streets cut through the grounds of the torn-down convents, but after a week or so all fear vanished, and not only did the destroyers go about their work without remorse, but they even used the sacred wood-work of the churches to make their kitchen-fires, and the new streets had their passengers like the older ones.'—North American Review, October, 1880.
"Mr. Strother, who has studied the matter very carefully, suggests that an explanation may be found in the character of the Indian races of Mexico, who constitute the bulk of the population, and 'whose native spirit of independence predominates over all other sentiments.' He also throws out the opinion that 'the aborigines of the country never were completely Christianized, but, awed by force or dazzled by showy ceremonials, accepted the external forms of the new faith as a sort of compromise with the conquerors.' And he states that he has himself recently attended 'religious festivals where the Indians assisted, clothed and armed as in the days of Montezuma, with a curious intermingling
