quent thereon, of this
varied and interesting land; and having thus observed them we must turn
our attention to the human family whose _habitat_ they form--the men
and women of Mexico of to-day.

CHAPTER IX
THE MEXICAN PEOPLE

Ethnic conditions--Spanish, Mestizos, Indians--Colour-line--Foreign
element--The _peones_--Land tenure--The Spanish people--The native
tribes--The Apaches--The Mexican constitution--Class distinctions--
Mexican upper class--Courtesy and hospitality--Quixotism of the
Mexicans--Idealism and eloquence--General characteristics--Ideas of
progress--American anomalies--_Haciendas_--Sport--Military
distinctions--Comparison with Anglo-Saxons--Republicanism--Language--
Life in the cities--Warlike instincts--The women of Mexico--Mexican
youths--Religious observance--Romantic Mexican damsels--The
bull-fights.

The Mexican people are divided for sociological or ethnological
purposes into three divisions--the people of purely white European or
Spanish descent, those of combined European and native races, and the
pure-blooded Indians. The first have been technically termed
_Criollas_, or Creoles, although the designation has, of recent years,
been used in a different sense; the second _Mestizos_, or mixed race;
whilst the third, the _Indios_, are the direct descendants of the
peoples who occupied the country in pre-Hispanic times.

The total population is estimated at fifteen million souls, or possibly
slightly under. Of this, according to the census of 1900, the people of
purely white descent numbered about 19 per cent.; the Mestizos, who may
be looked upon as the typical Mexicans of to-day, 43 per cent.; whilst
the remaining 38 per cent. were assigned as the proportion for the
Indians. The figures and divisions cannot be looked upon, however, as
arbitrary or exact. At the present time it is considered that the
Mestizo class probably embraces more than half of the total, whilst the
real proportion of people of absolutely pure white race is probably
much less than described, possibly not more than 10 per cent., as the
mixture permeates all classes.

The white and mixed races, especially the former, constitute the
property-owning and administrative classes, and naturally the Mexican
upper class is drawn from these. The six million Indians, more or less,
constitute some fifty aboriginal tribes in various stages of
semi-civilisation or savagery, distributed all over the country from
Sonora to Yucata