Fanubourg St. Germain. They are sometimes stigmatized as "Mochos," literally hypocrites. They are rich, pass much of their time abroad, protest against the sequestration of the Church property, and exhibit a refined horror at the vandalism of these later times.
"The government," they tell you, "is in the hands of the populacho, the rabble; the gente honrada, respectable society, has nothing to do with it."
In a novel which I have by a Mexican writer, Cuellar, a secretary of legation at Washington, the scene is laid in this faction or clique. "Chona," or Incarnacion, the heroine, or leading feminine character, "had been brought up from childhood more to abhor than admire. The conversations in the family continually turned upon the utter antipathy which the men and things of Mexico inspired."
"They had for visitors Church notables and those of the wealthy who still retained the parchments of their ancestry. If they made any new acquaintance it was some Spaniard lately come into relations with them through the business of their estates."
The fashionable men in the story have been educated at Paris, and become elegantly blasé there as well. In
contrast to these is shown one Sanchez, a vulgar, pushing fellow, upheaved from the depths by the revolutions. He has the
"gift of gab," which he has utilized to make himself a figure in politics; has enriched himself with the spoils of the Church establishment, and secured a good
place under government. He more than hints, however, when he is found to have finally lost it, that he is ready to engage in upsetting "Don Benito" —it is now under the régime of President Juarez that the scene is laid— or in any other convulsion that may promise to again mend his fortunes.
