bareheaded, their
hair, usually black, ablaze with jewels or entwined with flowers fresh
picked--the sweet-scented suchil, the white star-like jasmine, and
crimson grenadine. Alongside ride the cavaliers, in high-peaked,
stump-leather saddles, their steeds capering and prancing; each rider,
to all appearance, requiring the full strength of his arms to control
his mount, while insidiously using his spurs to render the animal
uncontrollable. The more it pitches and plunges the better he is
pleased, provided the occupants of the carriages have their eyes on him.

Every day in the year--except during the week of _Guaresma_ (Lent), when
capricious fashion takes him to the Paseo Viejo, or _Lav Vigas_, on the
opposite side of the city--can this brilliant procession be seen moving
along the Calle de Plateros, and its continuation, the Calle de San
Francisco.

But in this same thoroughfare one may often witness a spectacle less
resplendent, with groups aught but gay. Midway along the street runs a
deep drain or sewer, not as in European cities permanently covered up,
but loosely flagged over, the flags removable at will. This, the
_zanca_, is more of a stagnant sink than a drainage sewer; since from
the city to the outside country there is scarce an inch of fall to carry
off the sewage. As a consequence it accumulates in the zancas till they
are brimming full, and with a stuff indescribable. Every garbage goes
there--all the refuse of household product is shot into them. At
periodical intervals they are cleared out, else the city would soon be
a-flood in its own filth. It is often very near it, the blue black
liquid seen oozing up between the flagstones that bridge over the
zancas, filling the air with a stench intolerable. Every recurring
revolution make the municipal authorities of Mexico careless about their
charge and neglectful of their duties. But when the scouring-out
process is going on, the sights are still more offensive, and the smells
too. Then the flags are lifted and laid on one side--exposing all the
impurity--while the stuff is tossed to the other, there to lie festering
for days, or until dry enough to be more easily removed. For all it
does not stop the circulation of the carriages. The grand dames seated
in them pass on, now and then showing a slight contortion in their
pretty noses. But they would not miss their airing in the Paseo were it
twenty times worse--that they wouldn't. To them, as t