talents, the Mexican citizen is not devoted, early in his career, by thoughtful parents, either to intellectual pursuits or to that mental discipline which would regulate an impulsive temperament or fit him for the domestic, scientific, or political position he might attain in other countries, under a different social régime. He recollects that in the best days of the colony his family had been distinguished, powerful and rich, and he finds it difficult, in his present impoverished state, to forget this traditionary position. Accordingly, he acts upon the memorial basis of the past, as if it were still within his grasp or control. This renders him thriftlessly improvident. Mexicans still speak of the epoch when they or their parents "swam in gold," or dispensed ducats to the dependants on whom they now reluctantly bestow coppers. Besides this, their indolent indifference, which almost amounts to Arab fatalism, makes them not only subservient to the past, but idolaters of a hope which is quite as fallacious. According to their belief, better times are continually approaching. Something, they imagine, will shortly occur to improve their broken or periled fortunes. "Paciencia y barajar,"—"patience and shuffle the cards," is a maxim on the lips of every one who is overthrown by a revolution, loses his friends, incurs censure, or finds himself starving for want of a dollar. If you enquire as to their prospects, their friends, their interests, or, indeed, in regard to almost any subject that requires some reflection for a reasonable reply,—they answer with the habitual—"Quien Sabe!"—"who can tell!" which in the vocabulary of a common Mexican is the—"quod erat demonstrandum" of any social or political problem.
Such qualities and habits do not prepare a nation for resolute action upon progressive principles. We consequently find, throughout Mexico, an universal predisposition to dependence upon others, or to a blind reliance upon chance. The drum and the bell which ring forever in our ears in Mexico, apprise us that immense numbers who possess sufficient influence to introduce them into the army or the church, repose comfortably under the protection of those two eleemosynary institutions.