The United States of Mexico is a federation composed of twenty-seven states, three territories, and the federal district in which the capital is located. The states are sovereign within themselves and are held together under a federal constitution very much like our own. This constitution was adopted on the 5th of February, 1857, and its semi-centennial was recently celebrated with a few of the original signers present. There is a congress composed of two bodies, the Senate and Chamber of Deputies which meets twice each year. Each state is represented in the former by two senators and in the latter by one representative for each forty thousand of population. The right of suffrage is restricted so that only a small proportion of the population can exercise that privilege. They have not really reached popular government, and politics, as we know them in the United States, do not exist. A presidential election scarcely caused a ripple on the surface. President Diaz was no doubt the popular choice, but comparatively few votes were cast at his last election. The rule of the Diaz government although decidedly autocratic was beneficient, and has redounded to the good of the country. Though practically an absolute ruler, President Diaz always acted through the regularly organized channels of a complete form of republican government, and outwardly, at least, there was no semblance of a dictatorship. Mexico is a country of great natural resources and possibilities which have been only partially developed. Its soil is remarkably fertile and could support five times, and, if water could be found on the plateaus, ten times the present population. And I say this notwithstanding the fact that one man has said that Mexico is the poorest country south of Greenland, and north of the south pole. The flora of the country, among which are many useful and medicinal plants, is exceedingly rich and varied. More species of fibre plants are found there than in any other country, and the commercial utility of these plants is not yet fully appreciated. In no country has there been greater waste of natural resources than the Spanish conquerors caused in Mexico. It is as a mining country that Mexico has been best known and the Mexican silver mines have been famous ever since the discovery of the New World, and they are still the greatest single source of wealth. Some of them which have been worked for centuries are still yielding small fortunes in the white metal each year.