Page:Mexico, picturesque, political, progressive.djvu/91

shaded paths, with trays of luscious sweetness and color balanced upon their erect heads; and even the dark, solemn-faced children dimple into subdued laughter as they munch the dulces which no one is too poor to buy. Here and there a mozo and his sweetheart walk contentedly hand in hand through the broiling sun, or nestle closely together in the corner of one of the great high- backed stone seats, always either eating or smoking. From the stand in the centre, the band plays its gayest strains; for music here seems to be one of the component elements of happiness. The giddy, dashing small mule-cars, which make up in speed the slow gravity of the rest of the world, spin around one corner to Tacubaya, and another to San Cosmo, and a third to Los Angels: the first class filled with respectable commonplace; the second with a picturesque medley of gleaming teeth and eyes, of bright zarapes and blue rebosos, of positive dirt and superlative happiness. Both classes smoke; all classes smoke; high and low, old and young, clean and filthy, in door and out, every one, everywhere, and always. Perhaps it is because they are carried away by the ruling passion for smoke, that they persist in making