A dam of piles and riprap was thrown across the river at a point where it is about 1500 feet wide at flood. From this dam the line of the main canal was traced to the entrance of the Tlahualilo,—a distance of 39 miles. The canal terminated in a distributing tank at the entrance to the irrigable area, whence it bifurcated, one arm being carried along the western side of the basin.

The rainfall in the Bolson of Mapimi is confined to a few days of heavy showers about the beginning of June and the beginning of December. But up in the mountains of Durango, where the Nazas takes its rise, the rainfall at the same season is very heavy and protracted, resulting in high water in the river, which lasts for several weeks at a time. It is during these freshets that the cultivated lands in the Nazas district are irrigated. For the rest of the year they receive no water, except from occasional brief showers. In the Tlahualilo basin, a week or ten days of irrigation is all that is needed in the course of a year, the water soaking easily and quickly through the almost impalpable silt, and the hot sun forming a protecting crust which checks evaporation, and retains the moisture in the subsoil for a surprisingly long time. In fact, owing to their long roots, the cotton plants strictly require irrigation only once every other year, but corn and wheat, of course, must receive it at each planting. The distribution of the waters is regulated by government schedule, each property on the river being allotted its proportion of water, according to priority of settlement. Each canal on the river is permitted to take as many irrigations as it desires during the season of high waters, but in strict rotation. That is, after a property has taken one quota, it cannot repeat the process until all the others have taken theirs, when its second quota is available. Where another property, as often happens, does not care to use all the water to which it is entitled, its further allotments may be used by its neighbor. The waters, on leaving the river, are heavily charged with sediment largely volcanic in its origin, and this is deposited on the lands at each flooding in the shape of extremely fine mud.

Six years of experience with this property demonstrates the fact that irrigation, when applied to fertile land under a carefully planned and thoroughly executed system, where the water supply is owned by the user, puts agriculture among the least dubious of industries. The system adopted by the Tlahualilo Company is especially worthy of attention, because of the notable unity of plan pursued from the inception of the enterprise to its fullest development, and of its resultant economies. It was on this property that a disastrous experiment of colonization from Alabama took place in the year 1896, when hundreds of negroes were taken from Alabama and other points of the southern portion of the United States under the supposition that they could

withstand the down-pour of the tropical sun of Mexico, and by their knowledge of the cultivation of cotton succeed in carrying out the purpose of the men who undertook the enterprise. Unused to food conditions in Mexico, especially for want of bacon and corn bread, they were infested with sickness, which caused great mortality among them, and frightened and demoralized they fled from Tlahualilo, this experiment showing very plainly that Mexican planters cannot rely for labor on the colored people of the United States.

The production of cotton and corn in the vicinity of Torreon can be increased eightfold by building reservoirs in the Nazas River and its tributary cañons, to hold the water back for the irrigation of the vast area of fine cotton and corn lands that are yet unproductive, simply through the non-retention of the great amount of water flowing to the sea, unused, annually, and the same result could be obtained by doing the same thing with many other rivers in Mexico. With onefourth of the water now needed to produce a good crop, the same amount of grain can be produced by good cultivation. The reason is that by the methods now in vogue in most parts of the country, so little soil is loosened by the plow that nearly all the water runs off, where rain is relied on, and only with a great amount of rain can a crop be raised. When irrigation is used, the water required to keep the hard ground moist is entirely in excess of the reservoir, rain, and river supplies. This is the reason of the short grain supply and of the necessity for importing during years of drought large quantities of corn. If the ground were plowed deep and well, it would absorb most of the rainfall and create sufficient surface moisture to meet the moisture from below, which would counteract the dry action of the atmosphere on the soil and roots of the grain, which, by its luxuriant growth, would soon shade the ground, and thus contribute still further to the retention of moisture.

The fact is, taking Mexico as a whole, that there is not a year so dry but that with good cultivation, sufficient grain can be raised to supply domestic demands, while all the excess above that quantity in favorable seasons should be used as feed for stock, which would supply the large quantities of lard, tallow, hard-oil, etc., now being imported, and would leave a large amount for export, together with a considerable quantity of meat for the same purpose, thus helping to cover the balance of foreign trade and keeping our silver dollars in the hands of the farmers and stockmen, to improve and increase their lands, herds, and flocks.

FAUNA.

The present Mexican fauna belongs, like its flora, to the North American zone, so far as regards the plateau regions, and to the Antilles in respect to the coast lands round the Gulf, while that of the

Pacific seaboard is intermediate between the Californian and South American. In the general aspect of its terrestrial animals, Mexico is connected more with the United States, whereas in its marine forms the reverse movement has taken place. Thus the prevailing species in the Gulf of Mexico as far as Tamaulipas and Texas, and the Pacific coast northwards to Sonora and Lower California, have migrated from South America. The species in the two oceanic basins differ almost completely; and, despite the proximity of the Pacific and Atlantic shores, their shells are quite distinct.

The fauna includes three species of large felidæ, the puma or American lion, jaguar, and ocelot; among the smaller is the wildcat. Wolves are common in the northern States, and also the coyote; besides which there are bears, wild boars, and bisons. A species of sloth is found in the southern forests, with five varieties of monkeys. Of the other wild animals the principal are hares, rabbits, squirrels, two or three kinds of deer, beavers, moles, martens, and otters.

All the domestic animals introduced by the early Spanish settlers have multiplied prodigiously. The horses, though small, retain the spirit and graceful form of the Andalusian or Arabian stock, from which they mainly sprang.

The waters of the estuaries and coast streams teem with fishes, all the numerous varieties of which differ on the two oceanic slopes, but still present a certain analogy in their general distribution. Turtles are taken in considerable numbers on the coast, and the carey, or turtle-shell, of Yucatan and Guerrero is the object of a trade valued at $20,000 yearly.

The ophidians are represented by a few boas in the southern forests, and several species of snakes, some extremely venomous, as the rattle and coral snakes. The largest lizard is the iguana, whose flesh is by some of the natives used as food. Noxious insects infest the hot regions in myriads; alacranes, or scorpions, in two different varieties, are everywhere feared, and many children were every year killed by their sting in the city of Durango before the proper antidote was found and used. Scolopendras, gigantic spiders, tarantulas, and mosquitoes abound.

Bees are numerous and their wax is an article of export, and the silkworm, though comparatively neglected, yields an annual profit of some importance. The birds of prey are eagles, hawks, and zopilotes, or turkey-buzzards, the scavengers of the coast towns, with three or four species of owls. Domestic fowl are extremely abundant. The parrots, humming-birds, trogons, and so forth, vie in richness of plumage with those of Brazil, and the Mexican songsters, the prince of which is the zenzontle, or mocking-bird, are unequalled by those of any other country.

Of all the Mexican fauna, two only have been domesticated: the huahulotl (Meleagris Mexicana), which is a species of duck, and the turkey, introduced into Europe by the Spaniards from the West Indies, hence by the French called "coq d'Inde." The techichi, an edible dumb dog, was soon exterminated when taxed by the Spanish authorities. The other farmyard animals have all been introduced into Mexico by the conquerors.

In the Gulf of California, and especially near La Paz, and the neighboring archipelagoes, extensive beds of pearl oysters are fished. Some other islands in the same gulf are frequented by myriads of various species of aquatic birds, and have already yielded many hundred cargoes of guano.

It is noteworthy that the Pacific islands, lying at some distance from the coast, have all a fauna different from that of the mainland. Thus the little Tres Marias group, about sixty miles off the coast of Jalisco, has a special species of humming-bird. The Revillagigedo Archipelago also forms a separate zoölogical zone, and the island of Guadalupe, over one hundred and fifty miles distant from Lower California, has eleven species of land birds, every one of which differs from the corresponding species on the adjacent continent.

ETHNOLOGY.

Mexico is inhabited by native Indians found there during the Spanish conquest, by descendants of the conquerors of Mexico and other European races, and by a mixture of the two. There are so few inhabitants of African descent that it is hardly worth while speaking of them. The proportion of this population is about as follows: Of European descent, 19 per cent. ; native Indians, 43 per cent.; mixed races, 38 per cent.

Mexican Indians.-The native Indians found by the Spaniards belong to several nations and tribes, having different features and entirely distinct languages. The principal of these tribes are the following, some of which are now extinct :

These tribes have been classified in the following families:

There is a great deal of similarity between the Mexican Indians and the Malay Asiatic races-especially the Japanese branch-which gives foundation to the idea that the aborigines of Mexico originally came from Asia, or vice versa.' Their intensely black hair and eyes, their brown or yellow color, their small stature and the slight obliquity

1 The following extracts from the San Francisco, Cal., Bulletin of June 7, 1897, confirm my views on the subject:

"Information is received from Australia concerning the reports of F. W. Christian of the Polynesian Society, who has returned to Sydney after an extended tour of the islands of the South Seas, the Caroline group especially, where he has been on a successful search for ethnological specimens. These reports are of great importance to the scientific world and are said to let much light on a vexed question which has puzzled the most learned savants for years. Mr. Christian has discovered extensive traces of the Chinese and Japanese in the islands of the Pacific, and claims to have discovered evidence pointing to the existence of a civilization of nearly two thousand years ago, which is linked with the ancient civilization in Central America, and will probably explain the origin of the Aztec races.

'Under the auspices of the Polynesian Society, according to advices from Sydney, via Honolulu, received per Coptic yesterday, Mr. Christian worked. The gentleman spent nearly two years looking for traces of the Chinese in the islands, and was lucky enough to find ancient records, specimens of handiwork and weapons which proved that Asiatic races were extensive traders among the South Sea group thousands of years ago. Evidence of a very decisive nature was secured which shows that a large trade was carried on via the islands of the Caroline group, between China and Central America, and that the ancient Chinese were more inclined to emigrate than their latter-day brethren and colonized extensively.

**Extensive inquiries were made as to the traditions of the islanders, and many discoveries were made concerning the early history of the Malays with regard to navigation, all proving that the Torres strait's route to the Pacific was not taken, but that voyages were made to many of the Caroline islands.

The coincidence is a strange one that a despatch from Hermosillo, Mexico, dated June 6th, reports that a rock recently discovered in the mountains of Magdalena district, State of Sonora, which is covered with Chinese inscriptions, has just been visited by Sen Yup, a well-educated Chinese of Guaymas. He says the inscriptions are Chinese, but are somewhat indistinct. He made a copy of them, and has translated enough of the lines to show that the writing was probably inscribed on the rock at least two thousand years ago."