Rensselaer Republican, Volume 26, Number 22, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 January 1894 — FRONTIER MEXICO. [ARTICLE]

FRONTIER MEXICO.

Difficulties of Travel in the Land of the ‘"Greasers.” Harper's Magazine. The hacienda San Jose deßavicora lies northwest from Chihuahua 225 of the longest miles on the map. The miles run up long hills and dive into rocky canons; they stretch over never ending burnt plains, and across the beds of tortuous rivers thick with scorching sand. And there are three ways to make this travel. Some go on foot—which is best, if one has time—like the Tahuramaras; others take it ponyback, after the Mexican manner; and persons with no time and a great deal of money go in a coach. At first thought this last would seem to be the best, but the Guerrero stage has never failed to tip over, and the company make you sign away your natural rights, and almost your immortal soul, before they will allow you to embark. So it is not the best way at all, if I may judge from my own experience. We had a coach which seemed to choose the steepest hill on the route, where it then struck a stone, which heaved the coach, pulled out the king-pin, and what I remember of the occurrence is full of sprains and aches and general gloom. Guerrero, too is only three fourths of the way to Bavicora, and you can only go there if Don Gilberto, the patron of the hacienda —or, if y >u know him well enough, “Jack” —will take you in the ranch coach.

Afterburn ping over th e stones all day for five days, through a blinding dust, we were glad enough when we suddenly came o~t of the timber in the mountain pass and espied the great yellow plain of Bavicora stretching to the blue hills of the Sierra. In an hour’s ride ngore through a chill wind, we were at the ranch. We pulled up at the entrance, which was garnished by a bunch of cow punchers, who regarded us curiously as we pulled our aching bodies and bandaged limbs from the Concord and limped into the patio. To us was assigned the room of honor, and after shaking ourselves down on a good bed, with mattress and sheeting, we recovered our cheerfulness. A hot toddy, a roaring fireplace, completed the effect The floor was strewed with bear and wolf skin rugs; it had pictures and draperies on the walls, and in a corner a wash basin and pitcher—so rare in these parts —was set on a stand, grandly suggestive of the refinements of luxury we had attained to. Idonotjvish to convey the impression that Mexicans do not wash, because there are brooks enough in Mexico if they want to use them; but wash-basins are the advance guards of progress, and we had been on the outposts since leaving Chihuahua.

Stanislaus county, California, will soon have the highest overflow dam in the world. It is called the La Grange dam and is being constructed for the Modesto and Turleck irrigation districts. Its location is three miles from the town of La Grange. Work on the project was commenced in June, 1891, and has been prosecuted continuously ever since. A force of 200 men has been employed on the work, the total cost of which will be $600,000. Nathan Parker, president of the Manchester, N, H., National Bank, the oldest bank officer in active service in the United States, celebrated his eighty-fifth birthday last week, by giving a dinner to the employes of the bank.. Van Roberts, of Rich Hill, Mo., has been rewarded for an act of bravery performed twenty years ago. About 1873 he saved John Bennet from drowning, and the latter, who died recently at Las Vegas, N. M., willed him, it is said, $600,000. A New Yorker has patented a scheme to throw sunlight into dark rooms, cellars and other apartments where the light of day never reaches. The apparatus first condenses the beams of light, then carries them to the desired locality aud diffuse* them by a peculiar arrangement of mirrors, operated by clockwork.