substantial justice without reference to legal technicalities; and his successors were much like him.[1] A sergeant was discharged for treating a Mexican unjustly. An American "doctor" was expelled for disorderly conduct. Soldiers were not allowed to endanger the people by riding fast in the streets. Property stolen or destroyed was paid for by the army, and this rule was made to work the other way also. The town prospered; and although some of the soldiers would now and then help themselves to fruit or snatch a piece of candy from a stand, and cases of outrage on the one hand or assassination on the other occurred at intervals, the people — notably hostile at first — became friendly, the windows were always full of laughing girls, and the women in their rebosas, red petticoats and blue cloth slippers went every evening to the fountain in the plaza with their tall earthen jars, unmolested and unafraid.[2]
Tampico, to say nothing of the drills and parades, offered enough interesting sights and amusements to keep the soldiers out of mischief, one might have thought. The many strange and beautiful trees; the mullard and sea-trout, schools of yellow jackfish, huge, pearly tarpon, and many other denizens of the rivers and lagoons; the buzzards coasting on air, the grunting ravens, and forty other kinds of birds; the long, slender pirogues of red cedar constantly bringing luscious fruits to the market; the many vessels coming and going: these were only a few of the attractions. But in reality the town was a hard problem, for its nearness to the United States and its commercial relations made the exclusion of all undesirable visitors impossible. So-called restaurants bearing popular American names flourished, and, in spite of the prohibition against importing liquor, strong drink was about all they offered except hard beef; while the existence of gambling houses was proved by the severe and repeated orders against them. Almost every volunteer, said a regular officer, celebrated his arrival with a "frolic,"[3] and according to the Mexican accounts, threats, insults and small depredations were not infrequent.[4]
But in Tampico as elsewhere, the people had much less to suffer, in all probability, than from the Mexican troops who formerly had garrisoned the town, and the big United States
