again, and has jars of cold water poured over
him; whereupon he dresses himself (which is not a long process, as he
only wears a shirt and a pair of drawers), and so goes in to supper,
feeling much refreshed. If he would take the cold bath only, and keep
the hot one for his clothes, which want it sadly, it would be all the
better for him, for the constant indulgence in this enervating luxury
weakens him very much. One would think the bath would make the Indians
cleanly in their persons, but it hardly seems so, for they look rather
dirtier after they have been in the _temazcalli_ than before, just as
the author of _A Journey due North_ says of the Russian peasants.

To us the most interesting question about the Mexican Indians of this
district was this, _Why are there so few of them?_ There are five
thousand square leagues in the State of Vera Cruz, and about fifty
inhabitants to the square league. Now, let us consider half the State,
which is at a low level above the sea, as too hot and unhealthy for men
to flourish in, and suppose the whole population concentrated on the
other half, which lies upon the rising ground from three thousand to
six thousand feet above the sea. This is not very far from the truth,
and gives us one hundred inhabitants to the square league--about
one-sixth of the population of the plains of Puebla, in a climate which
may be compared to that of North Italy, and where the chief products
are maize and European grain.

In the district of the lower temperate region, which we are now
speaking of, nature would seem to have done everything to encourage the
formation of a dense population. In the lower part of this favoured
region the banana grows. This plant requires scarcely any labour in its
cultivation; and, according to the most moderate estimate, taking an
acre of wheat against an acre of bananas, the bananas will support
twenty times as many people as the wheat. Though it is a fruit of
sweet, rather luscious taste, and only acceptable to us Europeans as
one small item of our complicated diet, the Indians who have been
brought up in the districts where it flourishes can live almost
entirely upon it, just as the inhabitants of North Africa live upon
dates.

In the upper portion of this district, where the banana no longer
flourishes, nutritious plants produce an immense yield with easy
cultivation. The _yucca_ which produces cassava, rice, the sweet
potato, yams, all flourish here, and maize pro