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Show VANDAL TOURISTS IN MEXICO. Why the Natives Regard Visitors From This Country as Barbarians. Writing to the Herald of Boston, F. R. Guernsey, that journal's admirable correspondent in Mexico, and a non-Catholic, non-Catholic, by the way, says: "It ought not to be necessary, as in Puebla, to place a sign in good English Eng-lish on the doors of the Cathedral requesting re-questing foreign visitors to remove their hats! And it is unspeakably bad taste to snap a kodak in a church where Divine worship is going on, as a Protestant clergyman in an interior city tells me is done. "A well educated young American woman, coming here with letters from eminent authors in the United States, went to a great church in an interior city with an American gentleman there residing. She had asked to see the vestments of, the bishops, used on high occasions, and reputed to be of marvel- "Nothing loth', the American took his , fair country woman' to the sacristy and opened the drawer containing the robes one of which was embroidered in gold and pearls. Drawing a well concealed pair of scis"- -t, this female vanda! snipped off v orner of a robe! 'Itis just what I have wanted for my collection,' collec-tion,' she calm'.y expxlained. Her guide was vastly mortified at her action, ac-tion, but said nothing. Afterward he explained to the bishop and took the vestment to thia city, where it cost him a round sum to have the repairs made. "The vandals have already chipped off bits of the polished stone of Maximilian's Max-imilian's memorial chapel at Quere-taro, Quere-taro, although the edifice is a new one. j It has now to be guarded. "The commoner sort of tourist will 1 'swipe' anything, and has no respect for Catholic churches, manifesting loudly his contempt for 'superstition' as-he moves about among the kneeling worshipers, audibly commenting on the images, pictures, etc. These are the things that tend to make the Mexicans ! regard us as barbarians, and the rudest rud-est of the rude. Incredible stories, but perfectly true, are told of the invasion of private houses by kodak - carrying , tourists, - who might have been invited i in had they politely expressed their desire de-sire to ik? pictures of. the patio." |