The upper class Mexican is often a well-educated and well-informed man of the world, and in appearance and habit differs little from the European. His wealth has permitted him to be educated in the best establishments his country affords, or often abroad, in France, England, and in a less degree the United States, and to spend years in Europe and live a life of ease, preferably in Paris--that true Mecca of the Spanish-American people. The Mexican gentleman is generally courteous and punctilious, and gives much attention to dress and matters of ceremony, after the general manner of the Spanish-American, and the frock-coat and silk hat form his indispensable exterior whenever possible. His courtesy pervades his business relations generally, as well as social affairs. And, indeed, this pleasing quality permeates the whole social _regime_ from the highest official or wealthy citizen down to the poorest _peon_ or to the Indian labourer. The matter of courtesy, in addition to being native both with the Spanish progenitor and the native race, is, it might be said, part of the political Constitution. The republics of Spanish-America at least regard all men as equal in this sense, a condition which is far from existing in the Anglo-Saxon Republic of the United States, where brusque assertion of even the meanest authority is evident, in the present development of that country. Nor is it to be supposed that Mexican politeness is a mere veneer, or mask, to be put on and off as occasion dictates, for it arises from native kindliness--a species of Quixotism of a laudable nature. The Mexican largely shares the spirit of hospitality of the Spanish-American race, and this, besides being a native characteristic, was strongly implanted in colonial days by the very exigencies and circumstances of the times. In some parts of the country, until recent years, hotels or inns were unknown; and it was sufficient for the traveller to knock at almost any door to ask and receive food and shelter for himself and his retainers and beasts, even though the people of the place might be ignorant of his name or business: and the best that was forthcoming was put at his service. Something of practical patriarchal simplicity governed life in regions more remote from main routes of travel, which held, and indeed still hold, much of charm for the traveller from lands whose hospitality--as Britain or the United States--is the result often of ostentation or social necessity rather than that of native kindliness. This amiable trait of more or less pastoral communities, as Mexico and South America, tends naturally to disappear before the influence of the commercial element which is invading the country, and it is not to be expected that it will survive always.