Yet such were the conditions upon the flanks of Mt. Popocatapetl when, in the Autumn of 1914, it was determined to erect on such a site the Popocatapetl Dam, for the containment of the Popocatapetl reservoir and the ultimate irrigation of El Plan. Mt. Popocatapetl rises in a graceful cone to the height of 22,130 feet above the level of the sea. Its summit is crowned with eternal snows, while round its base, in spite of numerous earthquakes, constantly followed by the outburst of vast fountains of boiling water, cling a score of towns and villages, some with Spanish, others with unpronounceable names. To these the beneficent and lengthy rule of Gen. Porfirio Diaz has lent a political security which Nature would do well to copy,--has led the inhabitants to seek their treasure upon earth, and has bequeathed the inestimable advantage of the great Popocatapetl Dam. I say the “inestimable advantage,” for though the construction of this remarkable barrage has wholly cut off the insufficient water supply of this region, it has brought into the neighbourhood very considerable sums of American money, an active demand for labour, and a line of railway at the terminus of which can be purchased the most enlightened newspapers of the New World. The simplest journalist,--should such a being be possessed of the means to travel in these distant regions--might also inform the residents,--should they in turn be willing to hear him patiently,--that the irrigation of El Plan, though 150 miles distant from their now desiccated homes, can not but react to their advantage and create a market for their wares. Mysterious designs of Providence! This mountain (among the noblest of volcanic phenomena) was destined to threaten with ruin a great English family, to precipitate onto the Treasury bench a young man of unassuming manners and of insufficient capacity, to shake half the finances of the world, and to determine a peerage for a man to whom such ornaments were baubles! To appreciate by what chain of circumstances Popocatapetl’s hoary head might with its nod produce so distant a consequence, it is necessary for the reader once again to fix her mind most firmly upon the truth that an underground river flowing with terrific force through a region of perennial fire, must of its nature form a most insecure foundation for any considerable body of masonry, and that the danger of building upon such a bottom will be the more apparent if the material used, etc. * * * * * In the light of this knowledge, which (in common with the majority of rational beings) Ole Man Benson possessed, an investment in the stocks of a Company whose dividends depended upon the security of such an edifice might have seemed to those ill-acquainted with our modern Captains of Industry, an unpardonable folly. It is none the less true that Ole Man Benson carried a heavy load of “Popocatapetls,” naked and unashamed.