Most of the vegetables raised for the people of Mexico are brought in the early morning from the floating gardens a short distance from the city, where there are some lakes. A kind of water-plant grows in these lakes very fast and mats together, making marshy beds.
Long ago, in the time of Montezuma, the Aztec farmers learned to make gardens out of these floating masses of weeds. They cut out large squares which they covered with mud drawn up from the bottom of the lake. The soil was rich and moist so that no place in the world could be better for plants. Flower and vegetable seeds were sown and in a short time beautiful gardens were growing.
From that day to this Indians have been busy tending these floating gardens. They pass from one to another in canoes, gathering vegetables and flowers for the city market. One boat will be filled with lettuce, another with luscious red tomatoes, while still another will be loaded with bright-colored flowers. It is a pretty sight to see them as they move slowly along through the Viga Canal that leads from the lakes to the city. Again and again the Indians paddling along with their loads are passed by pleasure boats filled with young people, who make the air resound with the odd sweet songs of the country.
Volcanoes.
South of the city of Mexico there is a range of hills, and beyond these is a chain of volcanoes, two of which bear the names of Popocatapetl and Iztacsihuatl. It is much easier, however, to think of them as “Smoking Mountain” and “The Woman in White,” for such are the meanings of these long words. Both these volcanoes wear garments of snow and they look so peaceful that the children of Mexico are not troubled with the thought of what might happen if they should awake in fiery anger some day and send out streams of red-hot lava over the country below.
The slopes of Popocatapetl are dotted with the huts of Indians who earn their living by getting loads of sulphur from the crater of the volcano.
The highest mountain peak in Mexico is Orizaba, or the “Star of the Sea.” As you sail towards the eastern shore of Mexico and when you are still so far away that no other part is in sight, the lofty volcano Orizaba appears before you with its summit in the clouds. The Indians chose a fitting name for it, because it certainly seems to rise out of the sea.
Among the Mines.
When the Spaniards became the rulers of Mexico they found themselves the owners of the richest silver mines in the world. A great part of the silver used to-day came from those mines. Although immense fortunes have been made in the country for hundreds of years, yet the mines are still rich in the precious ore. They are owned by white men, but the work of getting the silver is done mostly by Indians. Mules are sometimes used to carry the ore from the dark caverns underground to the bright world outside, but much of even this work is done by the Indians themselves, who climb up the steep sides of the mines with heavy loads on their backs day after day.
When the silver is found it is generally mixed with sulphur, but sometimes a lump of the pure metal is turned up. One of these lumps weighed four hundred and twenty-five pounds, and was worth eight thousand dollars.