TRAVELS AND ADVENTURES IN MEXICO: IN THE COURSE OF JOURNEYS OF UPWARD OF 2500 MILES, PERFORMED ON FOOT. GIVING AN ACCOUNT OF THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS OF THE PEOPLE, Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1851, by HARPER & BROTHERS, In the Clerk's Office for the Southern District of New York. PREFACE. In taking the liberty of laying before the public the following narrative, I deem it proper to make a few preliminary remarks. This is the first effort at composition, destined for the public eye, that I have ever attempted. I therefore beg my readers to remember that they must not expect to meet with highwrought descriptions or well-rounded periods, but a plain matter-of-fact narrative, drawn from my notebook, which was often penned by stealth or in haste, and always obliged to be reduced to such a small compass as to enable me to conceal it in an inside pocket. The notes I was compelled to make with a miserable pencil and on worse paper. Combine these difficulties, gentle reader, with a hungry stomach, an aching head, and ofttimes a miserable stable or shed for a night's shelter, and you will then have some idea of the circumstances under which I have often been compelled to write my notes. I venture to lay the ensuing narrative before the public because I believe that it will tend to increase the stock of useful knowledge regarding a country of great natural resources with which we are now closely connected, and that it contains much to gratify the |