iet. Meat is often
used--when obtainable--dried, in strips, generally of beef. Mutton, or
_carne de borrego_ is consumed to some extent, and goats' flesh more
frequently. The Mexican _peon_ is not necessarily particular as to the
quality of this meat. If a cow or bullock perishes upon the plain from
drought or accident, the villagers soon get wind of the fact and the
carcase is cut up and appropriated in short order. Indeed, the flesh of
horses is not despised at times! And, as may be supposed, there are no
troublesome municipal restrictions or health officers in such places to
interpose authority against the practice, and the struggle for life,
especially upon the great plateau, is keen.

Of course, as we rise in the social scale a large variety of foods are
consumed, of excellent quality and unstinted quantity, such as we have
described in speaking of the upper class. Even here, however, a Mexican
"Mrs. Beeton" would have to describe a number of novel and appetising
dishes of national character, and peculiar to the country.

The _peon_, like his superior the educated and wealthy Mexican, is
excessively fond of tobacco. His cigarette is his great solace and
enjoyment. No manufactured and papered article is the _peones'_
cigarette. The dried husk of the _maiz_ is taken and cut into pieces of
the required size. Into this he sprinkles a small portion of strong
tobacco and rolling it into a thin roll in a certain dexterous way,
smokes it without necessity of gumming or fastening the edge. These
cigarettes have a distinctive and agreeable taste and aroma, and the
foreigner who has grown accustomed to them will certainly find nothing
superior in the machine-made cigarettes of the United States or Great
Britain--especially the former. The upper-class Mexican does not use
these cigarettes of _hoja de maiz_, or _maiz_ husk, but unceasingly
smokes either the imported Havannas, or the Mexican paper-covered
varieties, which are generally excellent.

The _peon_ does not generally use matches to light his cigarette. He
produces an _eslabon_, or small steel link, which he strikes upon his
piece of flint, deftly dropping a spark upon his rag tinder, and so
creates the means of ignition. Matches cost money--why spend
unnecessarily? Or, seated at the camp-fire, he takes a glowing wood
ember for the purpose, and indeed the traveller finds that this method
of lighting a husk cigarette imparts a peculiar flavour or sense of
satisfaction