In its human life it is equally prolific in diversities. In few other places in the world is there such a commingling of dissimilar human elements. I doubt if even the cities of the Orient can present such contrasts of wholly unrelated races of people, as well as so great a variety of the white race. Here, in one small town, one may find representatives of several different tribes of the aboriginal Indians, in every state of civilization and savagery, picturesquely attired in bright-colored costumes, bearing their peculiar baskets and pottery. Here, also, is the next higher stratum, the Mexicans, in great numbers, and in all mixtures of blood from the nearly pure Indian peon upward. Here are African Negroes in considerable numbers, emigrants from the Southern States, and every town has its Chinese and usually its Japanese contingent, the overflow from California. Above all these, and in greatly superior numbers, rises the white man, usually American by birth, and yet generously intermixed with many of European nationalities. In most of the older towns, such as San Antonio in Texas and Tucson in Arizona, whole neighborhoods appear more foreign than American, presenting strange contrasts between modern store-buildings, banks, and churches, and ancient weather-worn adobe houses where the Mexicans live almost as primitively as did their forefathers a century ago. The peopling of the country makes one of the most interesting and significant stories in the history of the nation. For many years it was the unknown land, the land of possibilities and wonders, as well as of danger and death. Therefore it attracted the hardy pioneer, and here, for lack of any other frontier on the continent, the pioneer, though with the germ of westward ho! still lingering in his blood, has been compelled at last to settle down. I shall not soon forget the sorrowful desert-dweller whom I met in what seemed the ends of the earth in Arizona. His nearest neighbor was fifteen miles away, his post-office twenty-five miles, and yet he was bemoaning the fact that the country was becoming crowded. "If there were any more frontier," he said, "I'd go to it."