Land without chimneys; or, the byways of Mexico

by Alfred Oscar Coffin

The usual cut of coat is a short jacket or jumper. Others wear a long sack coat, and instead of buttoning it they gather the two corners together and tie them in a knot. This distinctive style has a kind of freemasonry importance in which I was never initiated. Then his pantaloons are white, with the bottom widened immensely. The shepherds have a style all their own. They have a buckskin jacket cut short, and buckskin pantaloons cut long, with a row of buttons on the outside. Then he takes his knife and slits the legs inside and out, from the knee down, then he gathers up the ends and tucks them under his belt, and depends upon his underwear for effect on dress parade. He always scores. Some people might say he looks badly, but with his clan he is in very correct form and why should you object?

The porters, or public drays dress in white cotton, with one leg of their pants rolled up to the knee, leaving the leg bare.

Around his neck he wears a large badge like a policeman’s, with his official number, showing that he is licensed to carry packages, from express money orders to upright pianos. He is the only express wagon here, and is absolutely reliable. He will shoulder your Saratoga and trot a mile without resting. I recall the case of one who stumbled with an American drummer’s trunk on his back, and when the street commissioners gathered up his remains, they were spread over two square yards of pavement. P. S. the trunk was not injured.

Four of these cargadors will carry your piano to any part of the city. For moving household goods, they have vans made on the plan of a hospital stretcher, with a man in the shafts at each end, and a rope passing over his shoulders to the shafts, and they will carry a dray load each time. Two dozen chairs by actual count is what I have seen one man carry. The mule has been promoted to the street car, out of respect to the two-legged express wagon.

The dress of the cow-boy and rural police is something to admire. A high sombrero, costing from twelve to fifty dollars, weighted down with monograms and silver ornament.

Leather or buckskin suit with silver buttons from boots to neckband. Silver spurs and silver bridle bits. Saddle whose every piece of ornament is solid silver, a horse-hair lariat, and if he is a Rurale, a rifle, and he sits his horse like a centaur.

The dude is in a class alone, but he counts one when on dress parade. A tall, black sombrero with silver ornaments. Scarlet jacket, reaching to the waist, and sprayed with silver braid in fantastic designs. Buckskin pantaloons, flaring at the bottom and silver buttons all the way up, and along-side a series of cross-section slashes, interwoven with a beautiful ribbon from spur to waistband. Silver spur and bridle bit, a saddle worth as much as the horse, and a bright nickel-plated revolver buckled around his waist.

At the fashionable hour for promenade, he mounts his horse, and slowly rides over the town and graciously permits the populace to admire him. I think he ought to be knighted for his liberality. Most people who go to that much trouble to shine, generally make you buy a dollar theater ticket for the pleasure of looking at him, strains his constitution and bylaws showing off, and cannot ride a horse at all.

But commend me to the Mexican dude. After he has set the town agog, he turns up a certain avenue, which contains a certain house, projecting from which is a balcony, in which dwells the only girl in town, and, after he has passed in all his silent glory, he throws bouquets at himself for the wonderful impression he has made, and then goes home to undress. Earth cannot hold him much longer. I fear his own ardor and faith in himself will finally sublimate him, but our loss is heaven’s gain. The children; there are no children; they are just vest-pocket editions of old folks. Usually they are dressed in their innocence, but that is a quality of goods that does not last long here. When a boy is old enough to wear anything else, it is exactly like his father’s, tall sombrero, pants that strike his heels, and a red sash around his waist. Suspenders are not worn here. When a girl is no longer innocent, she dresses in a rebosa. By wrapping it around her head it reaches her feet. They don’t have much time to be little for they marry at eleven and twelve. The upper class men, of course dress as Americans, but Paris sets the fashion in Mexico always. All these things you see at the market in San Luis Potosi, but you see them in hundreds, while I have only described them as individuals, and have not half turned the kaleidoscope yet.

The streets must be all vacated by eleven o’clock at night, and when the hour for closing has arrived, nothing is locked up. The thousand and one vendors have no care for their goods. A piece of canvas is spread over them and a brickbat placed on to keep the wind from interfering, and they go home.