handsome he is!" (Valga me,
Dios, que lindo es, pobrecito!)And the way the young lady gazed was a
revelation to me. The fire of her limpid black eyes struck me as a ray
of glorious light. An indescribable thrill, never before known, rose in
my breast and she held me enthralled under a spell which I had not the
least desire to break. And they said that it was I who had the evil
eye! To say that these people were lacking in the virtues and
accomplishments of modern civilization entirely would be a mistake very
easily made indeed by strangers who, on passing through their land, did
not understand their language and were unfamiliar with their social
customs and mode of living. They extended unlimited hospitality to
every one alike, to friend or stranger, to poor or rich. They were most
charmingly polite in their conversation, personal demeanor, and social
intercourse and very charitable and affectionate to their families and
neighbors. These people are happy as compared with other nations in
that they do not worry and fret over the unattainable and doubtful, but
lightheartedly they enjoy the blessings of the present, such as they
are. Therefore, if rightly understood, they may be the best of
companions at times, being sincere and unselfish; so I have found many
of them to be later on, during the intercourse of a more intimate
acquaintance. In the large towns, as Santa Fe, Albuquerque, and Las
Vegas, where there lived a considerable number of Americans, these
would naturally associate together, as, for instance, the American
colony in Paris or Berlin or other foreign places, so as not to be
obliged to mingle with the natives socially any more than they chose.
But in the village where my relatives lived, we had not the alternative
of choosing our own countrymen for social companionship.

Therefore, I realized when I reached my destination that I had to
change my accustomed mode of living and adapt myself to such a life as
people had led eighteen hundred years ago. I thought that if I took the
example of the Saviour's life for my guiding star, I would certainly
get along very well. Undoubtedly this would have sufficed in a
spiritual sense, but I found that it would be impractical as applied to
my temporal welfare and the requirements of the present time. For I
could not perform miracles nor could I live as the Saviour had done,
roaming over the country and teaching the natives. And then, seeing
that there were so many Jews in