Santa Clara is close to the height of land. Seven thousand two hundred feet above the sea, my aneroid declared, and from that altitude we began to descend. The thirty miles to Ario is one steady decline, a gradual fall of twelve hundred feet.
This whole country hereabout is held in vast haciendas of thousands of acres, and is chiefly owned by nonresident landowners who rarely, if ever, visit their possessions, but trust entirely to overseers to manage and work them and wring an income from the hapless peon. It is a land of great fertility. Only the most primitive methods of agriculture are employed, and work is done in the most inefficient way. Yet huge incomes are withdrawn from the land, and spent by the distant haciendado in his city home in Mexico, or in Paris, or Madrid. These lands are said to be marketable (buyable) at about ten dollars (Mexican) per acre, say four dollars in United States money. As I have been riding along, viewing mile after mile of this superb fertility in a climate temperate all the year around, I have pondered much on what a garden it might have been, and it yet may be, if ever the thrifty American shall have it in possession.
Toward noon we began to gain a wider view of the landscape opening before us toward the south and west. Our altitude was steadily lessening and, many miles distant, seemingly, there was a sudden falling away of the land to profound and indefinite depths, whence came the impression of tropical verdure, the whole expanse backed on the horizon by blue and jagged lines of lofty mountain chains, peaks and summits which sometimes pierced the zenith, far to the southwest. They were the mighty Cordilleras of Guerrero, a hundred miles away and barring from view the Pacific Ocean just beyond. On a day wholly clear, it is said, the snow-capped cones of Colima may be seen, also, far to the northwest, but gaze as we might we could catch no glimpse of the mighty volcano.
Thousands of cattle are raised in Mexico, and we passed many extensive herds being driven toward Patzcuaro. They were urged on by vociferous vaqueros, swearing musically the immense and cumbrous Spanish oaths—yet have we seen almost no milch cows and the few we saw were those gathered in a corral hard by a wide thatched-roofed building, known as a “milk ranch,” an establishment where milk is gathered and shipped to nearby Ario, and butter and cheese are made for immediate sale. A cross upon the gable denoted it to be under the protection of the Virgin and I hope assured milk unadulterated to its patrons. From my saddle I caught a snap shot of the ranch and send you the pretty picture.
Our road now showed signs of being in better repair. Finally, the maze of intricate paths along which we had traveled, coalesced, and the ancient pavement now appeared intact. On either hand, tall wide-spreading ash trees arched over the perfect road, carven stone benches stood beneath them, and we found ourselves entering the important town of Ario. It is a place of more than five thousand inhabitants, the county seat of the District, the home of the Jefe Politico (the “political chief,” mayor, governor, boss and judge), through whose iron-handed rule the central government of Diaz maintains its firm control.
We passed an ancient church, turned to the right, entered a wide doorway and halted in a well-flagged court, in the center of which a fountain played amid many flowering plants and cages of gay-feathered birds. It was the hotel Morelos. We were at the end of our journey in the Highlands. We were come to the last town in the Tierra Fria. We were on the brink of the hot country, the Tierra Caliente, which lay stretched out beyond us, one short day’s ride and below us six thousand feet.
A MILK RANCH—NEAR ARIO