On the Mexican Highlands Part 7

[Ill.u.s.tration: WASHING COPPER ORE]

It is a wonder that even the Mexicans can thus work these mines, year after year, and make the smallest profit. The most efficient American manager would find this to be impossible. The Mexican _superintendente_ lives on nothing and his Mexican employes live on less. Eighteen to twenty cents a day Mexican (less than ten cents a day in American) is the miner's pay. On this amount he must support himself and often a large family. The Mexicans follow the old Spanish theory, that human labor is cheaper than machinery, if you can crush down the human labor to a sufficiently low wage. Hence, the Mexican employing cla.s.ses discourage both the use of machinery and the education of the _peon_. Ignorance and the abject poverty of the working cla.s.s is the Spanish-American ideal. The day laborer in Mexico is little better than a slave. The wealthy mine owner, who lives in luxury in the distant Capital, or in Paris, or Madrid, may exhibit the evidences of culture and refinement, but Mexico can never greatly advance until the ma.s.ses of the common people shall be enlightened and by modern statesmanship be lifted from this condition of industrial servitude.

Some of the types among these Indians are curious. One man has a head that runs up straight behind his ears, nor has he much brain in front. Another looks like a j.a.panese. These Indians--they are called Indians, but are many of them half-breeds, for there is much Spanish blood mixed in among them--are pitifully poor and are hopeless in their poverty. They have been hammered and battered for so many centuries by the merciless Spanish overlord, that they have had all spirit long ago knocked out of them. They seem to be unable now to rise. Nor are they a hardy race. When sickness prevails they are too poor to employ a doctor, but rely upon charms and religious rites. I have just acted the part of a physician. I have brought with me a small box of selected medicines sufficient for the common ailments of this land of semitropics. I am now prescribing quinine for _Dona_ Caldina, calomel for _Senor_ Perez. I hear that a crippled man is coming to-morrow to see me and ask whether the white _senor_ can cure him and make him walk. There is a certain childlike quality about these peones. How humbly they accept the superiority of the white man, whom they do not love!

I see many instances of what might be called degenerates, misshapen heads, ill-shaped and deformed bodies, signs of a race too much inbred. They wear white cotton clothes, peaked straw hats and rawhide sandals. The men generally carry blankets (_zerapes_) folded across the shoulder which they wrap up in, as do their brothers on the highlands, when the air grows cold.

[Ill.u.s.tration: AN ANCIENT DUMP OF COPPER ORE]

The coldness of the nights and the burning heat of the day are strange. I slept last night in flannel underwear, a woolen jersey over that and flannel pajamas still outside; then two thick wool blankets and a rubber _poncho_ over all. Early, toward one or two o'clock I woke up chilled to the bone. I put on my corduroy coat. I was just warm, for an icy wind was blowing down from the lofty alt.i.tudes of the _Tierra Fria_. This morning when the sun rose about six o'clock, the air was still cold. In an hour it was pleasantly warm, birds were singing and flying from tree to tree. By nine o'clock the sun blazed like a ball of fire. I am now, at half past nine, going about in slippers, in linen trousers and my thin pajama coat, and even then I hide from the sun. By ten o'clock a silence lies upon the land profound and overwhelming, not a living thing is astir, except only the lizards and the cicadas. The daylight ends precipitately. The day lasts only as long as the sun is up. By half past five the sun hangs above the mountains on the west. Suddenly it is gone. In fifteen minutes it is dark, the stars are out, and such white stars they are!

The cold air of the highlands then settles down upon us for the night.

XIII

Some Tropical Financial Morality

CHURUMUCO, MINA EL PUERTO, ON THE RIO DE LAS BALSAS, _December 6th_.

We were up before the day, our horses and mules having been fed with grain a little after midnight. Thus the food is digested before the journey of the day is begun. It was dazzling starlight with a gleaming streak of white moon. Our two pack beasts had been loaded, we had breakfasted and were in the saddles a little after four. A keen wind which cut like a knife-edge blew steadily down from the highlands behind us. I had kept on my warm clothes of the night. We traveled rapidly by the brilliant starlight and pa.s.sing down the _aroyo_ along which we camped, turned down the San Pedro River toward the south. We crossed the stream frequently, traveling in single file. By seven o'clock the sun was peering over the hills and I began to shed my clothes. By half past eight I retained only my thinnest underwear, my pajama coat, my linen trousers and slippers. By ten o'clock the sun was scorching, our great Mexican _sombreros_ alone saving us from its fierce rays. Our way lay for twenty miles almost due south down the valley of the San Pedro, then turning to our left, we followed a slightly-traveled trail, crossing a succession of low hills, until after four long hours we came to immense plains or _llanos_ stretching flat as a table for twenty miles toward the Balsas River. The streams were dry, the leaves were falling from shrubs and trees. It was the dry season. Mesquit and cactus and mimosa were the only vegetation, except the blistered stalks of the sun-dried gra.s.ses. No water was visible anywhere. The ground was parched and cracked. A light breeze which followed us all day and a few highflying clouds, which now and then hid the sun, alone saved us from being almost broiled alive. The watch in my pocket became burning hot, I could scarcely hold it in my hand; the metal b.u.t.tons on my clothes almost burned themselves loose; only the dryness of the atmosphere made it possible to have made this journey during the day.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE LLANOS. HAWK POISED UPON AN ORGAN CACTUS]

The great _llanos_, stretching south and southwest, were crossed by many well-beaten trails, where the horses and cattle, which roam here in thousands, have worn the paths they take to reach the distant water. It is said that these animals, which wander at large, have schooled themselves to cross the wide plains beneath the stars in the cool of the night.

We reached the mines of El Puerto about half past one o'clock, crossing the plain for several hours toward the mountain on whose side the mines are perched. The only living things we met upon these _llanos_ were the jack rabbits and an occasional roadrunner, which birds were very tame. Although his rabbitship has attained a reputation for lightning leg-velocity upon the sagebrush plains of our own far-west, yet surely his Mexican cousin has him outcla.s.sed. A _vaquero_, followed by a couple of lean and seasoned hounds, had met us on the borders of the _llanos_ and kept with us almost across the plain. The dogs, despite the fact that they must well have known the power of the jack rabbit, would often come upon one crouched in the gra.s.s, and so nearly within their reach that they quite forgot their lessons of the past, and started full cry upon his trail. It was almost laughable to see the hounds' despair, so quickly did the rabbits shoot out of sight, quite beyond all dog power to keep the pace. The pair would regularly return with their tails between their legs, the picture of disorganized defeat.

We have climbed three hundred feet up the side of the mountain to a group of open sheds, thatched with palm leaves, while above us volcanic rock ma.s.ses tower more than two thousand feet. Across the river Balsas, apparently rising from the water's edge, are the tremendous heights of the Cordillera, lifting themselves twelve to thirteen thousand feet above the level of the sea.

The Mina el Puerto is an ancient mine, now nearly exhausted; for it has been worked almost two hundred years, all through a single doorway cut into the rock, barred by a great wooden door, fastened by a ponderous lock with a ponderous iron key. Each morning, for many decades, the owner has taken the key from his belt, unlocked the big door and sent fifteen to twenty naked Indians down the "chicken ladders" four hundred feet into the hot mines below. There is no ventilation, there are no pumps, there is no other way to go in or out. Two or three hours is the longest time a man can work at the bottom of this hole; when the Indian can stand it no longer he climbs up bringing on his back the ore which he has been able to dislodge, or a bag of water, if any shall have leaked in. By three or four o'clock in the afternoon, those who went down have all come out again. The ore they have dug is thrown upon a pile beneath the palm-thatched roof; the owner of the mines then locks the door. When the ore pile has been reduced to powder by the hammering of many dusky hands, it is concentrated in the wooden troughs, washed with water from the river Balsas, three miles away, brought up in bullskin sacks upon the backs of mules; and when a sufficient number of two-hundred-pound bags of concentrated ore have been acc.u.mulated, forty or fifty mules are tied together neck to tail, loaded with the bags and driven almost one hundred miles up to the plateau. These ores have always been particularly rich, the gold and silver in them having been sufficient to pay the cost of transportation to and charges of the smelter, leaving the copper for net profit.

The Mexican owners have lived well from the fortune of their mines. In fact, to them copper ore in the ground has been equivalent of cash in the bank. When they have wanted money they have dug into their ore bed. They generally smelted it themselves in crude clay furnaces, using charcoal burned near at hand. What of gold and silver there might be was also run into the copper bars and the bars were currency.

A pile of bars meant rollicking jaunts and roystering junkets. The family and friends, the servants and retainers were gathered together, muskets and swords, horns and mandolins were a.s.sembled, horses and pack animals were loaded and bestridden, and a tour of the surrounding countryside was made. Bullfights, c.o.c.kfights, b.a.l.l.s and fandangoes were gloriously enjoyed, duels were fought, hearts were stormed and the copper ingots were blown in even to the last ounce. Then the company would return, the fast-locked door would again be opened and a new supply of copper extracted from the mine. Like princes lived these _Senores de las Minas_, so long as the earth yielded up her hidden treasure.

[Ill.u.s.tration: ARRANGING A BATTLE]

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE VICTOR]

At this particular mine, this sort of thing has been going on for a hundred years. Generations have come and gone and come again, and the ore has not yet given out. But the thrifty ancestors so managed it as to pay only the smallest taxes to the government. Why should they pay good money into the itching palm of the distant despots, who might for the moment hold supreme power in the far-off capital! The first owner had "denounced," (i. e. taken up), only half an acre. In the middle of this he cut the doorway to the mine. His descendants have always paid taxes on that half acre! The government never asked for more. Even Diaz was content. So the workings went on, and spread and ramified into the many acres surrounding the single so well-guarded entrance.

The original half-acre had long years ago been mined out. And no one ever entered the mine or knew of its depth or lat.i.tude except the owner, who took the big key from his belt each workday morning and opened the ponderous wooden door. The Indians dug and sweated and smothered in the hot depths, even as their forbears had done. The Castrejon family held fast to the big key and enjoyed their credit for unbounded riches. La Mina el Puerto was a busy place, and its hospitality was equal to its wealth.

Thus it might have continued to this day, but for an accident which happened two or three years ago. One stormy night two travelers sought shelter beneath the Castrejon thatch. In crossing the _llanos_ they lost their way and their horse cast his shoe. They discerned the light on the mountain side and came to it. The courteous lord of the mine gave them true Spanish welcome. "All that he had was theirs!" They slept in his biggest hammocks and ate his fattest _poios_ (chickens).

The strangers were _gringos_ (Americans) and "missionaries" and one spoke excellent Spanish and the other smiled. El Senor told them how many years he had worked the mine, he and his ancestors, and he boasted, just a little, of its wealth. In the morning, rested, fed and smiling, they bade their gracious host a parting _adios_ as they followed his _superintendente_, who rode with them to the main road from which they had strayed. The mine as usual worked on. The incident was forgotten. A few months later, one sultry evening, the _gringos_ returned and with them a mining inspector of the Mexican government and a company of _rurales_. The _Fomento_ (Department of the Interior) had granted to them all of the mineral rights surrounding and outside of the half acre which contained the big door. _Los Senores_ de Castrejon had never had legal t.i.tle to any mineral, but what lay under that half acre. If ore had been taken from outside of that half acre, it had been stolen from the government and dire are the penalties for theft in this land of the iron hand. And what ore had been taken from the outside of that half acre now belonged to the two strangers. They might sue in the courts and recover the full value of it and all legal costs. The two Americans were very courteous as they explained these matters to _El Senor_. The mining inspector was there to examine the mine and the _rurales_ held in their hands repeating rifles of the latest pattern. _El Senor_ was a discreet man. He accepted the courteous offer of the smiling Americans that they would not prosecute, provided he made them a deed for all claim he had to the half acre, the big door and whatever else he might possess. He was pleased to sign the deed. He then mounted his horse--they gave him back his horse--and rode away a beggar. Next morning the Americans put the big key in the door, unlocked it and sent the Indians down to their daily toil. The mining inspector received liberal recompense for his trouble and rode contentedly back to the _Tierra Fria_. The _rurales_ were induced to remain yet a little while, as a sort of protection against unforeseen mishap.

The new owners remained long enough to place a new native _superintendente_ in charge at increased salary, and then accompanied the _rurales_ upon their return. But _los Americanos_ were themselves gentlemen who had had to leave the States in rather hasty flight, and soon fell into feud among themselves. One, I learn, is now residing in a Mexican penitentiary for robbing a brother missionary, and the other, having sold his own interest as well as that of his partner to uninitiated purchasers in Kansas, has also disappeared. At the time of our visit the mines are in the hands of a receiver of the courts, and the Kansas people are endeavoring to ascertain just "where they are at." Do you wonder, when I tell you that I find throughout all this ancient mining region a certain suspicion of visiting Americans, even on the part of Mexican owners whose t.i.tles are beyond a flaw?

_Sat.u.r.day._ Early this morning Tio and I mounted into our saddles and with an Indian-Mexican guide crossed the _llanos_ to see two quartz veins showing copper. The veins are "undenounced," open to whosoever may care to take them up. We did the unusual thing of going out in the middle of the day, and before we returned the fierce sun's heat burned almost like flames of fire. I have never known anything but fire so to scorch. Even in this great heat we pa.s.sed a hawk poised upon a cactus top watching for his prey and seemingly wholly unmindful of the terror of the sun.

[Ill.u.s.tration: VAQUEROS CROSSING THE RIO DE LAS BALSAS]

After our _siesta_, we loaded the two pack beasts, saddled our riding animals and, about four o'clock in the afternoon, set out for the river Balsas, two miles to the south, and to the little town of Churmuco on its banks. From the mountain side we took a last look over the wide expanse of the _llanos_, extending twenty or thirty miles toward the west, as level as a floor, the blue line of the Cordilleras marking the horizon far beyond.

We pa.s.sed through several prehistoric, Indian towns. Their streets were laid out with regularity, generally at right angles, the foundations of the ancient houses still plainly showing. In many places, the base walls were intact and constructed of rounded bowlders laid carefully, in a row, upon one another in substantial tiers.

The rich bottom land along the river, wholly uncultivated, much impressed me. The soil, a black and chocolate loam, is capable of bearing any crop, and is twenty to thirty feet in thickness. There was no cultivation anywhere. These lands belong to some mighty _hacienda_ (a hacienda contains often from one hundred thousand to two million acres) owned by some absentee _haciendado_. It is said to be worth about ten cents (Mexican) per acre!

The river Balsas looks as broad as Elk River in West Virginia, where it enters the Kanawha (four or five hundred feet in width). It is now the dry season, but, nevertheless, the river is swift and deep, a tide of clear blue water too swift and too deep to ford or swim. In the rainy season it must be a boisterous mighty stream, for its fall is rapid. In the dry season it is fed by the melting snow fields of Popocatepetl and Ixtaccihuatl far to the east. The stream is said to afford good fishing, and in it veritable crocodiles (Cayman) abound.

Approaching the river, we found ourselves at a primitive ferry where two wild-looking _vaqueros_ were about to cross. Availing ourselves of this opportunity to voyage upon the Balsas--Mexico's greatest river--we tied our horses in the shade of a friendly mimosa and climbed aboard the craft used as a ferryboat--a sharp pointed scow which is entered at the stern. The two Indian boatmen pulled each a ponderous blade, but despite their most strenuous efforts, the powerful current carried us down quite half a mile before we landed upon the farther sh.o.r.e--a wide bar of sand and pebbles. Our fellow pa.s.sengers eyed us in suspicious silence, each holding fast his _broncho_ lest it should jump out, their wild dark glances betokening little friendliness. Reaching the sh.o.r.e each silently swung into his saddle and galloped off toward the not far distant Cordillera. These silent, untamed men traverse this desolate country everywhere, keeping constant track of the thousands of cattle and horses which roam their wastes; and the Indians of Guerrero bear the name of being the most turbulent and treacherous of all Mexico.

Recrossing, we traveled for an hour through rich and uncultivated bottom lands along the river's course, until we came to the primitive town of Churumuco, a hamlet occupied by Indians only, an Indian priest gazing out of the dilapidated church as we rode by. Here we found a _fonda_ (inn) with ample _corral_. A half-caste Spanish-Indian woman, "_Senora Dona_ Faustina," cooked us a supper of potatoes, rice, _tortillas_, and _chilis_ (peppers) stewed in cheese, substantials which were washed down with clear hot coffee. Here, in the intense heat, the burning peppers were vivifying and we ate them greedily.

We slept on native mats set on frames three feet above the adoby floor in the open _patio_. Pigs, cats, chickens, dogs and children scrambled beneath.

We were just rolling up in our blankets, when _Dona_ Faustina excitedly addressed my companions, Tio and El Padre, and I gathered from her speech that _chinchas_, as long as your hand, had a habit of crawling along the rafters and dropping upon the unsuspecting sleeper, while, unless your shoes were hung above the floor, _tiernanes_ (scorpions) were likely to camp in them until dislodged. I hung my slippers above the _tiernanes_ stinging reach and lay awake apprehending the _chinchas'_ descent, but the fatigue and heat of the day, the soporific influences of _chilis_ and cheese, soon wrapped me in a slumber from which only the braying of our white pack mule at last aroused me, as Izus cinched upon him the burden for another day.

The night was warm and close, the first dull, heavy air I have known in Mexico. We were now actually in the _Tierra Caliente_--where, the saying is, "the inhabitants of Churmuco need never go to h.e.l.l since they already live there."

It was not yet three o'clock in the morning and still dark. _Ros_ and _poios_ and coffee were already prepared for us. "_Adios, Dona Faustina!_" "_Adios, Senorita!_" "_Adios, Senores!_" "_Adios, adios!_"

and we trotted out of the _corral_ and, turning northward, moved up a deeply-cut _baranca_ over a more generally traveled trail than that by which we had come. The coldness of night no longer chilled us, the air was almost warm, while no sign of day made mark upon the heavens above us; the black s.p.a.ces of the night were yet ablaze with great white stars. The constellations to the northward I well knew, but to the south there were many wholly new and, supremest of them all, just clinging along the gigantic mountain summits, shone the splendid constellation of the Southern Cross, my first glimpse of it. We reined in our horses, turned and watched the big l.u.s.trous stars descend and disappear behind the impenetrable curtain of the Cordillera's towering chain.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE LANDING, RIO DE LAS BALSAS]

The Balsas River was now behind us. The _baranca_ we ascended widened out. We were upon the well-beaten track of travel from Guerrero, and even Acapulco, to the north. Ere the sun came blazing up, we were many miles on our way. And well for us it was so, for the day's heat has been the most terrible I have yet endured. The animals did not sweat, nor did we, the air was too dry for that, but my blood boiled, my bones baked, and my skin parched from the fierce hotness of the sun.

Even the cowboys we here and there encountered sat silent in their saddles beneath the mimosa's and mesquit's thickest shade.

The land was desolate, with no habitations save here and there a solitary _rancho_ or wayside resting place, where pa.s.sing travelers might find rough lodgment and perhaps food for themselves and beasts.

The only sound was the droning whir of millions of cicadas.

It was nearly midday when we reached the grateful shelter of La Mina Noria, there to tarry and revive until we should fare on in the cooler evening hours.

XIV

Wayside Incidents in the Land of Heat

MINA NORIA TO PATZCUARO, _December 8th-10th_.

Later in the day we were ascending the San Pedro valley toward the Hacienda Cuyaco. It was just growing dusk when we heard the music of violins. We came upon an Indian habitation of two buildings connected by a wide, thatched veranda. Here, upon the veranda, several dark-faced youths were playing a slow-timed Spanish fandango, and twenty or more young girls, arranged in rows of fours, were taking steps to the music, swaying their bodies and shaking small gourds, filled with pebbles, for castanets. The enthusiasm of the musicians, the soberness and gravity and grace of the dancers, as they stepped and postured, made a charming picture. They were gowned in white, with flowers in their black hair, and they danced with easy dignity. We halted our horses and watched the grave company, no one paying the slightest heed to our presence, otherwise than to acknowledge our "_Buenas Dias_" and parting "_Adios_."

By the time the night came down upon us, we were far upon the road.

Just at the moment of the falling darkness, we met a band of Indians with their _burros_. They had halted. Each Indian had doffed his _sombrero_. One Indian kneeling, was crossing himself. They were facing a small rough cross rising from a pile of stones. Each threw one more stone upon the pile, crossed himself, bent his knee, and moved on. It was a spot where death has met some traveler. The cross sanctifies the place. The stones permanently mark it and, year by year, the pile grows bigger from the constant contribution of the one stone added by each pa.s.sing traveler.

The night found us at a primitive Indian shelter; a thatched roof above an earthern clay stove. In the _corral_ several droves of pack mules had already been unburdened for the night. Beneath the thatch the drivers were wrapped in their _zerapes_ and slept profoundly. We unrolled our cots, set them out beneath the stars and fell asleep, even as we were. By two o'clock we were awakened before the others were astir. We made cups of coffee from the hot water on the stove where the smouldering fire lingered through the night, and were in our saddles before the Southern Cross had sunk from view. We were to make a great day's ride, pressing on even to Ario, if that were possible, twenty-four leagues away (sixty miles) and five thousand feet above us in the air. Should we be able to do it?