This speculation finds its chief manifestation in the marketing of food--the distribution of the necessities of life is in Mexico, as elsewhere, the source of sure profit. But in Mexico, so great is the fear of men of what may happen, that the profits of speculation transcend anything known to our busiest food profiteers. The farmers will not take the chances (which include the uncertainties of costly graft) incident to getting freight cars or pack animals as well as the fear of bandits. This allows the speculators, in quick turnovers, to make as much as 200 per cent on a car of corn in a fortnight, and this condition has lasted for nearly eight years. Another phase of speculative activity is in the importation of foreign goods. The Mexican customs laws are complicated with elaborate classifications, and at best it is something of a speculation for a merchant to import goods in the days of sudden changes in classifications and boosts of tariffs without notice. In addition, however, many favored henchmen of government officials have been given concessions to import all goods free, privileges which it is said they sell to any one who will take the risk for a fixed charge of one-half of the customs fee that would otherwise have been collected. Now and then these favored persons take a flyer of their own and one of them once sent in a carload of shoes, most of which were dumped in Monterey. Having paid no duty, the shoes were sold at prices which demoralized the local market, for the normal duty on a pair of shoes averages $1.50. Other things “happen.” For instance, a favored group gets a trainload of goods--say foodstuffs--at an entry port. Then the government suddenly announces that, effective at once, the high duties on these foodstuffs are to be removed. The goods of those “in the know” go across duty free, and if other merchants telegraph orders to take advantage of the open port, as like as not they find, when the goods reach the border, that the high duties have been put back as suddenly as they were removed. Such things as these happened with great frequency in the days of Carranza. Perhaps they are not happening now, for Mexico is on her good behavior. But all this has occurred frequently enough to have shaken the faith of simple men. The fear of what may happen to-morrow--things of this sort or something else--stifles business, for business is a timid spirit, and does not recover its confidence quickly. I hold no brief against the present governments of Mexico. They have been and still are revolutionary governments. They have a natural faith in their own vital importance to Mexico, and consider that whatever it may have cost the country to get such government is money well spent. But for her own sake and for the sake of those of us who are sincerely interested in knowing what troubles Mexico, it seems that we should realize by this frank analysis the lack of faith which I describe.