)
)
)
)
)
)
)
)
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Our conductor [was] a Virginian who had lived for
thirteen years in this region . . . Mexican women he thought
the kindest in the world. Many an American owed his life to
them. They were fond of white men, which made the Greasers
jealous and dangerous. "Are the men treacherous?" "I never had any trouble with them; but stranger, I always watch a Greaser, and at night I never let one travel behind me. It's the safe way, if you don't want to get shot or stabbed in the back." . . . Dancing, a passion with the ancient Aztecs and mingling in all their religious exercises, continues the staple amusement of their mixed descendants. There were three or four fandangoes in Santa Fe every night, the Mexicans always participating with wonderful zest. There were only one or two American ladies in the Territory; though the number has since increased. Many native women were mistresses of the white residents by the consent, even the desire, of their degraded husbands. Chastity is practically unknown among them, but they possess all the other distinctive virtues of their sex. These poor creatures, utterly devoid of personal purity, willing to give or suffer any thing to obtain jewelry or silks, are uniformly tender and self sacrificing, ready to divide their last crust with the hungry, and deny themselves every comfort to nurse the sick and minister to the wretched. . . . Degenerate descendants of that strange race, whose "gorgeous semi-civilization" was once the world's wonder, modern Mexicans are treacherous, effeminate, cowardly and superstitious, almost meriting John Randolph's bitter invective: "a blanketed nation of thieves and harlots." |
