"Do you take nuts?" succeeded by the night-cry of "Chestnuts hot and
roasted!" and by the affectionate vendors of ducks; "Ducks, oh my soul, hot
ducks!" "Maize-cakes," etc., etc. As the night wears away, the voices die
off, to resume next morning in fresh vigour.

Tortillas, which are the common food of the people, and which are merely
maize cakes mixed with a little lime, and of the form and size of what we
call _scones_, I find rather good when very hot and fresh-baked, but
insipid by themselves. They have been in use all through this country since
the earliest ages of its history, without any change in the manner of
baking them, excepting that, for the noble Mexicans in former days, they
used to be kneaded with various medicinal plants, supposed to render them
more wholesome. They are considered particularly palatable with _chile_, to
endure which, in the quantities in which it is eaten here, it seems to me
necessary to have a throat lined with tin.

In unpacking some books to-day, I happened to take up "_Sartor Resartus_,"
which, by a curious coincidence, opened of itself, to my great delight, at
the following passage:

"The simplest costume," observes our Professor, "which I anywhere find
alluded to in history, is that used as regimental by Bolivar's cavalry, in
the late Columbian wars. A square blanket, twelve feet in diagonal, is
provided, (some were wont to cut off the corners, and make it circular;) in
the centre a slit is effected, eighteen inches long; through this the
mother-naked trooper introduces his head and neck; and so rides, shielded
from all weather, and in battle from many strokes (for he rolls it about
his left arm); and not only dressed, but harnessed and draperied." Here
then we find the true "Old Roman contempt of the superfluous," which seems
rather to meet the approbation of the illustrious Professor Teufelsdroch.