As a workman the Mexican is surprisingly good, considering the poor food they are able to buy with the small wages they get. They have not much initiative, but can be taught to do almost anything and do it well. A few years ago American mechanics could command almost any salary in Mexico, but now Mexicans can do for themselves, and Americans would starve on the salary. When I arrived I had not one single man who had ever seen asphalt laid before, or knew anything about a plant. I had plans with me, and we went to work and put up the plant. Then I had to teach my yard foreman (an American) the first principles of the asphalt business. I got up at three each morning and started up the plant, then went to the street with the first load and showed the men how to lay it, and did the rolling myself. I soon found, though, that I could not keep this up, so we wired to the States for a roller-man and a raker. And with these two men, who understood their branch of the work, I managed to get through the first season and complete a contract for $84,000. The yard foreman picked up his end in an astonishing short time, and after the first job that end gave me very little trouble. We were about two-thirds through the work when I noticed that my two Americans were acting sulkily and hanging back, till finally it came one day to a climax and they both went on strike. The cause of the strike was so trivial that I thought there must be something more behind, but did not find it out till some months afterwards. A short while after I came here the company had got a superintendent for their Mexico City branch from New York, and this roller-man and raker were men who had worked for him there. It seems that he had arranged with them to make trouble for me so that I should not finish the work, and then he could get a man of his own in my place. However, in the middle of the trouble he was caught padding the company’s pay-roll, and just escaped arrest by getting out of the country. This broke up the strike, and I was able to finish up and get rid of my men, who had done one good thing for me—and that was to break in a crew of Mexicans, with whom I have done the work ever since.