monly used. The seat of honor is at the head, where the most distinguished and most honored guest is always placed; the rest arrange themselves according to their rank and consequence; the dependants occupying the lowest seats.

enjoy the fruits of industry, and nature supplies their wants so bountifully, they are compelled to exert themselves but little.

These are in fact serious defects, but the improvement of the Mexican people is daily taking place. They are After a cup of chocolate at six o'clock the next morn- beginning to be enlightened with the rays of the rising ing, we went in pursuit of game, and roamed through sun of liberty; and after the present generation has the hills and mountains which are contiguous, meeting passed away, the succeeding one will exhibit those with very little success. At about twelve we partook | political and moral virtues, which are the offspring of of our breakfast, which was brought to us more than freedom. The effects of a daily increasing intercourse two leagues from the hacienda-after which we prose- with foreigners are even now perceptible, and lead me cuted our hunt. Our sole reward was a heavy shower to believe, that, before many years roll over, a wonderof rain-and between four and five we returned to the ful change must take place. Society, too, will improve: hacienda, well wearied, having walked at least twelve ladies will no longer gormandize or smoke-will dismiles over steep mountains. cover that it is vulgar to attend cock-fights, and will bestow, with increased regard for their personal appearance, greater attention upon the cultivation of their minds.

On the following day we set out with our mules, &c. to try our fortune higher up the mountains, and after a ride of between three and four hours, reached a herdsman's hut, where we were to lodge at night. We were unsuccessful in finding game in the evening, and after a laborious search for deer, sought our hut-a log building, about fifteen feet square, in which twelve of us, men, women and children, stowed ourselves. Annoyed by fleas, and almost frozen by the chill mountain air, within two leagues of the snow-crowned Iztaccihuatl, we passed a sleepless night.

In Mexico, there are few parties, either at dinner, or in the evening. None will suit but great balls, and these must occur seldom, else none but the wealthy can attend them, so expensive are the decorations and dresses of the ladies. They esteem it extremely vulgar to wear the same ball-dress more than once. Society is cut up into small tertulias or parties of intimate acquaintances, who meet invariably at the same house, and talk, play the piano, sing, dance, and smoke at their ease and pleasure.

Sometimes I attend the Theatre. This is divided into boxes, which families hire for a year. If the play be uninteresting, they visit each other's box, and pass the evening in conversation. It is diverting to observe the gentlemen take from their pockets a flint and steel for the purpose of lighting their cigars, and then to extend the favor of a light to the ladies; and sometimes the whole theatre seems as if filled with fire-flies.

Early next morning, whilst others of the party engaged in hunting for deer, with two companions I ascended the highest peak of this range, (except those covered with snow,) with great labor and fatigue; but we were compensated amply by the grand view beneath and around us. The adjoining peak to the south of us was the Iztaccihuatl, about a league distant. We felt very sensibly the influence of its snow. Beyond this, the Popocatepetl raised its lofty cone, while far in the southeast appeared Orizaba, around whose crest the clouds were just then gathering. The plains of Puebla Immediately on rising, a Mexican takes a small cup and Mexico are on opposite sides of this seemingly in- of chocolate with a little bread and a glass of water. terminable ridge on which we stood. From the latter, At ten, they take what they call breakfast-it is in fact the clouds, which we had been long admiring far beneath equivalent to a dinner, consisting not of tea or coffee, but us, hiding the world from our view, were gradually of meats, sweetmeats and wine. At about three, dinner curling, and disclosed the distant capital with its adjoin- is served. At six or seven, they again take chocolate; ing lakes and isolated hills. The chilling wind drove and at ten, an enormous supper is laid of hot meats, &c. us from our height, but in descending we often rested equal to a third dinner. At these meals, three or four to enjoy a scene which the eyes never tire in beholding. dishes of meats, with very few vegetables, are brought In the evening, we left the mountain for the hacienda, on in various courses-the olla podrida, a mixture of where we spent another day. Our friends were ex-meats, fruits, and vegetables boiled together-always tremely kind to us, and regretted more than ourselves constitutes a part of the first course—frijoles—beans our ill success in quest of game. Being little of a sports- boiled-invariably precede the sweetmeats, of which man, to me it was a trifling disappointment. I enjoyed the Mexicans are extremely fond. Perhaps this is the abundant gratification in seeing the country, its people reason why good teeth are seldom seen in Mexico. and manner of living. Whatever may be said of the bad blood of the Mexicans, I cannot but view them as a mild and amiable people-nature has bestowed her bounties liberally upon them: for their state of degradation and ignorance they are indebted not to any natural deficiencies of their own, but to the miserable and timid policy of their former Spanish masters. They are superstitious, but this arises from their education; they are jealous of strangers-the policy of Spain made them so; and they are ignorant, for in ignorance alone could they be retained in blind subjection to the mother country. If they are vicious, their vices arise from their ignorance of what is virtuous-of what is ennobling. They are indolent because they are not permitted to

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prepa

23d November, 1825. I have stated that few parties are given in Mexico. Balls are sometimes held by the American and English Legations. If, on these occasions, fifty ladies attend, it is considered a prodigious number to assemble together. The expenses of ration which they incur are enormous, and deter many, however devoted they may be to pleasure, from partaking in frequent diversions of this kind. Society, too, has not acquired that equilibrium which the democratical institutions of the country must produce eventually. A powerful aristocracy, as may reasonably be supposed, still exists in the capital-time alone will level this-it will die with the present generation, taking for granted

that the republicanism of Mexico will be permanent. | to go out, or to shelter ourselves. The mornings now Aristocracy, of course, reduces the highest class of so- are only a little cool, although we are in mid-winter; ciety to a limited number, so that a large assemblage of and our tables are supplied with fruit as bountifully as ladies here would be thought small in the United States. in the months of July and August. Our other ills are At whatever hour you invite company, it will not in like manner trivial. We are sometimes ennuyés collect before nine, and the most fashionable appear for want of society, but books, and sometimes a game between ten and eleven. The music soon invites them of chess, enable us to live without being driven to the to the waltz, or to the Spanish country-dance, both of commission of suicide. And as a dernier resort, we which are graceful, and perhaps voluptuous, when throw ourselves into the arms of Morpheus, this being danced, as in Mexico, to the music of guitars or of ban- the peculiar delightful climate for sleep-no mosquitos, dolines. They dance upon brick floors-there are none nor extremes of heat or cold. The thermometer ordiother in Mexican houses—generally bare, but foreigners narily ranges at about 70° of Fahrenheit. have introduced the more comfortable fashion of covering them with canvass; and as the steps are simple, without the hopping and restlessness of our cotillons or SCENES FROM AN UNPUBLISHED DRAMA, quadrilles, it is not so unpleasant as would be supposed; they glide over the pavement without much exertion. The dancing continues, not uninterruptedly as with us, but at intervals, until twelve o'clock, when the ladies are conducted to the supper table, which must be loaded with substantial as well as sweet things. After supper, dancing is continued, and the company begins to disperse between one and two in the morning, and sometimes not until near daybreak.

None of the wealthy families have followed the example set them by foreigners. They give no balls or dinners. Although I have now been here six months, I have never dined in a Mexican house in the city. Their hospitality consists in this: they place their houses and all they possess at your disposal, and are the better pleased the oftener you visit them, but they rarely, if ever, offer you refreshments of any kind. It is said that they are gratified if you will dine with them unceremoniously, but they never invite you.

31st December, 1825. I can scarcely persuade myself that to-morrow will be New-Year's day. The weather is most delightful. We are now sitting with our windows open-at night too. About a fortnight ago the mornings were uncomfortably cool; but the sun at mid-day is always hot. What a delightful climate! And we are now eating the fruits of a northern midsummer. We have always had fresh oranges since our arrival. A week since we had green peas; and to-day | five different kinds of fruit appeared upon our tableoranges, apples, walnuts, granadites de China, and chirimoyas—the last, la reina de los frutos, (the queen of fruit,) tasting like strawberries and cream.

BY EDGAR A. POE.

I.

ROME. A Lady's apartment, with a window open and looking

into a garden. Lalage, in deep mourning, reading at a table
on which lie some books and a hand mirror. In the back
ground Jacinta (a servant maid) leans carelessly upon a chair.
Lalage. Jacinta! is it thou? -

Jacinta (pertly.) Yes, Ma'am, I'm here.
Lalage. I did not know, Jacinta, you were in waiting.
Sit down!-let not my presence trouble you-
Sit down!-for I am humble, most humble.
Jacinta (aside.) 'Tis time.

(Jacinta seats herself in a side-long manner upon
the chair, resting her elbows upon the back, and
regarding her mistress with a contemptuous
look. Lalage continues to read.)

Lalage. "It in another climate, so he said, "Bore a bright golden flower, but not i' this soil!"

(pauses-turns over some leaves, and resumes.) "No lingering winters there, nor snow, nor shower"But Ocean ever to refresh mankind "Breathes the shrill spirit of the western wind." Oh, beautiful!—most beautiful!-how like To what my fevered soul doth dream of Heaven! O happy land! (pauses.) She died !—the maiden died! O still more happy maiden who could'st die! Jacinta!

(Jacinta returns no answer, and Lalage presently resumes.)
Again!—a similar tale

Told of a beauteous dame beyond the sea!
Thus speaketh one Ferdinand in the words of the play—
The mar- "She died full young"- -one Bossola answers him-

kets contain numerous other sorts. Our friends at home “I think not so!—her infelicity
are now gathering around the glowing coals, or tread-Seem'd to have years too many"—Ah luckless lady!
ing the snow without. We see the former in the kitch- Jacinta! (still no answer.)
en only the latter on the valcanoes which tower in the
distance.

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Here's a far sterner story

But like-oh! very like in its despair-
Of that Egyptian queen, winning so easily

7th December, 1827. A letter from home affords me
the satisfaction of knowing that our friends generally | A thousand hearts-losing at length her own.
continue to enjoy good health, and are subject to none
other than the ordinary ills of life, such as cut-throat
weather, squalling brats, or a twinge or two of gout or
rheumatism. These are evils which humanity is decreed
to suffer throughout the world; but in Mexico we are
more exempt from most of them than elsewhere. The
sun now shines twelve hours of every day, and either
the moon or stars give light to the other twelve. Such
will the weather continue to be until May or June,
when the rains fall with such regularity and certainty,
that very slight observation enables us to know when

She died. Thus endeth the history-and her maids
Lean over her and weep-two gentle maids
With gentle names-Eiros and Charmion!
Rainbow and Dove!-Jacinta!

Jacinta (pettishly.) Madam, what is it?
Lalage. Wilt thou, my good Jacinta, be so kind
As go down in the library and bring me
The Holy Evangelists.

Jacinta. Pshaw! (exit.)
Lalage. If there be balm
For the wounded spirit in Gilead it is there!

There is a vow were fitting should be made-
A sacred vow, imperative, and urgent,
A solemn vow!

Monk. Daughter, this zeal is well!
Lalage. Father, this zeal is any thing but well!

That's meant for me. (aside) I'm sure, Madam, you Hast thou a crucifix fit for this thing?

For ruin'd maid. Fair mirror and true!-thou liest not! I live—I live.
Thou hast no end to gain-no heart to break-
Castiglione lied who said he loved-
Thou true-he false!-false!-false!

(while she speaks a monk enters her apartment, To give thee cause for grief, my honored friend.
and approaches unobserved.)
Command me, sir, what wouldst thou have me do?
At thy behest I will shake off that nature

Sweet daughter! in Heaven. Think of eternal things! Which from my forefathers I did inherit,
Give up thy soul to penitence, and pray!
Which with my mother's milk I did imbibe,
Lalage (arising hurriedly.) I cannot pray!-My soul And be no more Politian, but some other.

Politian. Weep not! oh, weep not thus-thy bitter | Far less a shadow which thou likenest to it,