3. III.
MEXICO.
We make Acapulco, a Mexican coast town of some
importance, in a few days, and all go ashore.
The pretty peasant girls peddle necklaces made
of shells, and oranges, in the streets of Acapulco, on
steamer days. They are quite naïve about it. Handing
you a necklace they will say, “Me give you pres
ent, Senor,” and then retire with a low curtsey.
Returning, however, in a few moments, they say
quite sweetly, “You give me pres-ent, Senor, of
quarter dollar!” which you at once do unless you
have a heart of stone.
Acapulco was shelled by the French a year or so
before our arrival there, and they effected a landing.
But the gay and gallant Mexicans peppered them
so persistently and effectually from the mountains
near by that they concluded to sell out and leave.
Napoleon has no right in Mexico. Mexico may
deserve a licking. That is possible enough. Most
people do. But nobody has any right to lick Mexico
except the United States. We have a right, I
flatter myself, to lick this entire continent, including
ourselves, any time we want to.
The signal gun is fired at 11, and we go off to the
steamer in small boats.
In our boat is an inebriated United States official,
who flings his spectacles overboard and sings a flippant
and absurd song about his grandmother's spotted
calf, with his ri-fol-lol-tiddery-do. After which
he crumbles, in an incomprehensible manner, into
the bottom of the boat, and howls dismally.
We reach Manzanillo, another coast place, twenty-four
hours after leaving Acapulco. Manzanillo is a
little Mexican village, and looked very wretched indeed,
sweltering away there on the hot sands. But
it is a port of some importance nevertheless, because
a great deal of merchandise finds its way to the interior
from there. The white and green flag of
Mexico floats from a red steam-tug (the navy of
Mexico, by the way, consists of two tugs, a disabled
raft, and a basswood life-preserver) and the Captain
of the Port comes off to us in his small boat, climbs
up the side of the St. Louis, and folds the healthy
form of Captain Hudson to his breast. There is no
wharf here, and we have to anchor off the town.
There was a wharf, but the enterprising Mexican
peasantry, who subsist by poling merchandise ashore
in dug-outs, indignantly tore it up. We take on here
some young Mexicans, from Colima, who are going
to California. They are of the better class, and one
young man (who was educated in Madrid) speaks
English rather better than I write it. Be careful not
to admire any article of an educated Mexican's dress,
because if you do he will take it right off and give
it to you, and sometimes this might be awkward.
I said: “What a beautiful cravat you wear!”
“It is yours!” he exclaimed, quickly unbuckling
it; and I could not induce him to take it back again.
I am glad I did not tell his sister, who was with
him and with whom I was lucky enough to get acquainted,
what a beautiful white hand she had. She
might have given it to me on the spot; and that, as
she had soft eyes, a queenly form, and a half million
or os in her own right, would have made me feel bad.
Reports reach us here of high-handed robberies
by the banditti all along the road to the City of
Mexico. They steal clothes as well as coin. A few
days since the mail coach entered the city with all
the passengers stark-naked! They must have felt
mortified.
