While these institutions promise much for the future, Mexico is not without her living writers who, in spite of the unfavorable atmosphere of disturbed politics, have found time to devote themselves to literature. Guillermo Prieto has a well deserved fame in his own country, and outside of it wherever he is known. He was born in 1810, and has passed his life in devotion to the liberal cause, which owes much of its success, to his personal bravery, the boldness of his writings, and his sagacious management of affairs. He has served in the higher offices of government, and written upon political economy and finance, but it is as a poet that he is honored and beloved. Prieto is not alone as a writer of prominence, but of others there is not room to speak. It would be a mistake to suppose that Mexico was lacking in the possession of fine minds, cultivated intellects, and eloquent pens. It will, of course, have been perceived by this time that the Mexicans from whom so much is expected in the future are the descendants of the Aztec and other native tribes. These form a large part of the population of the country,--the portion which their remote origin, and the vicissitudes of their stay upon Anahuac, make the most interesting to the romantic lover of picturesque history. The country is occupied also by those descendants of Spanish families who avoided the decree of exile issued in the early days of independence. Inter-marriages with Indian blood have crossed this stock, so that many good families in Mexico have Indian ancestors among their Spanish ones, and it would probably be rare to find a family wholly unmixed with this strain. What effect this grafting of Castilian character has had upon the native stock, is a subject interesting to students of national characteristics. Cruelty upon cruelty, superstition upon bigotry, might be pronounced a dangerous repetition likely to result from the mixture of the two races which established the Inquisition and revelled in the custom of human sacrifice. On the other hand, the lofty pride of the traditional Spaniard might find its match in the inherited love of splendor of the descendant of the Aztecs. However these things might be, the Mexican-Spaniard has not attained a high reputation among other nations for honesty, generosity, or elevation of character. Whatever may be the fairness of the prejudices against him, partly due to the disadvantages he has been under by being judged always by enemies who have invaded his country for his destruction and their own profit, it is less to this race than to that of the pure Indian blood of the country, that Mexico looks for the regeneration of her future history.