Unknown Mexico Part 23

The Pleiades are women, and the women of this world are their sisters. They were living with a man who used to bring them their food. One day he could not find anything, and drew blood from the calf of his leg, and brought it in a leaf from the big-leaved oak-tree. He told the women it was deer-blood, and thus he sustained them. On discovering that it was his blood, they became very angry and ascended to heaven, where they are yet to be seen.

When he came home in the afternoon he missed them, and followed their tracks, but could not find them. He slept alone, and in the night he said to the mice, which he took for the women, "Come, come to boil the deer-blood!" He continued his search until he reached the place where they had disappeared. The women, seeing from above how he went around looking for them, laughed, and he caught sight of them and called out, "Tie your girdles together that I may get up also." He climbed up; but when he had almost reached them, the oldest of the women told the others to let him drop, because he had deceived them. He became a coyote and has remained in that shape ever since. If he had succeeded in getting up, he would have become a star, the same as the women.

The three stars in the Belt of Orion are deer.

Chapter XXIV

On to Morelos--Wild and Broken Country--The Enormous Flower-spike of the Amole--Subtropical Vegetation of Northwestern Mexico--Destructive Ants--The Last of the Tubars--A Spectral Ride--Back to the United States--An Awful Thunder-storm--Close Quarters--Zape--Antiquities--When an "Angel" Dies--Mementos of a Reign of Terror--The Great Tepehuane Revolution of 1616--The Fertile Plains of Durango.

After having at last succeeded in getting men, I continued my journey to the northwest, over the very broken country toward the town of Morelos, inhabited almost entirely by pagan Tarahumares. There were, of course, no roads, only Indian trails, and these in many places were dangerous to travel with beasts of burden. The barrancas during the month of May are all but intolerably hot, and it was a relief to get up now and then on the strips of highland that intersperse the country and look as fine as parks. At the higher alt.i.tudes I noticed a great number of eagle ferns, and the Indians here plant corn in the small patches between the ferns, merely putting the grains into the gravelly red ground without tilling the soil at all.

Lower down were groves of big-leaved oak-trees. Their leaves are sometimes over ten inches long and of nearly the same breadth, and are frequently utilised by the Indians as improvised drinking-vessels.

On the summits of the barrancas, and on the slopes over which we descended into the valleys, an astonishing number of parasites and epiphytes was observed, especially on the pines and oaks. The round yellow cl.u.s.ters growing on the branches of the oaks sometimes give the entire forest a yellow hue. In the foot-hills I saw a kind of parasite, whose straight, limber branches of a fresh, dark green colour hang down in bunches over twenty feet in length. Some epiphytes, which most of the year look to the casual observer like so many tufts of hay on the branches, produce at certain seasons extremely pretty flowers.

In the valleys of the western inclines of the sierra there is nothing suggestive of tropical luxuriance or romance in the landscape, which impresses one chiefly with its towering mountains and vast slopes. Gra.s.s is plentiful enough among the stones and rocks, and groups of fresh green trees indicate where ground is moist and water to be found. The country is dry, and from January to June there is no rain. Yet an aloe, which smells like ham, is so full of juice that it drips when a leaf is broken. This, too, is the home of the agaves, or century-plants, and I know of nothing so astonishing as the gigantic flower-spike that shoots upward from the comparatively small plant called amole. One fine day in May I came upon one, which I measured. It was by no means the largest one to be found, but the spike itself, without the stalk, was 15 feet 8 inches in height, and 31 inches in circ.u.mference at its thickest part. It seemed a pity to cut down such a magnificent specimen, but, as I wanted to count the flowers, I had one of my men fell it with a couple of blows of an axe. After counting the flowers on one section, I estimated that the entire spike bore at least 20,000 beautiful yellow blossoms, each as large as a tulip. It required two men to carry the spike, and as they walked they were followed by a mult.i.tude of humming-birds, which remained fearlessly at work among the flowers of what they evidently considered their own private garden. They might have to fly miles before finding another like this. The flower-stalk of the maguey is eaten before it flowers. It looks like a big bamboo stick, and when roasted in the hot ashes is very palatable, sweet, and tender.

Below the Indian village of Coloradas stands an isolated peak 400 to 500 feet high, in regard to which the Tarahumares have the following legend: A Tepehuane once cut bamboo reeds and tobacco, down on the river, and being followed up by the Tubars changed himself into this stone. The man's girdle can still be made out.

At the village my interpreter asked me for the cover of a copy of London _Truth_, and for the wrapper on my photographic films, that with these pictures he might adorn the altar of the old adobe church.

The country is but thinly populated east and north of Morelos, and the steepness of the valleys through which the Indians are scattered, makes it difficult to reach them. At the time of my visit these Indians had absolutely nothing to sell us but the sweet mescal stalks. In the end of May I reached Morelos, an old mining place, about 1,800 feet above sea-level.

The surrounding hills and mountains were covered with the typical Mexican vegetation of the warm regions. The many odd-shaped cacti form a strong contrast to the light and pinnate leaves of the numerous leguminous shrubs, acacia, sophronia, etc. The chilicote, or coral-tree (_erythraea_), with scarlet flowers, is seen everywhere; also palo blanco, with a white stem, looking like an apple-tree. The year 1893 was an exceedingly dry one throughout northern Mexico. My mules, obliged to travel under a scorching sun, sometimes had to be without water for twenty-four hours. Still, in those hot barrancas, I saw no difference in the vegetation. The trees and plants did not seem affected by rain or no rain. The only exception I noticed was that the fiat, leaf-like joints of the nopal cactus shrivelled up a little on the surface, but the fleshy inside seemed as juicy as ever. Even during the dryest season the trees and shrubs here blossom and bear fruit, and mornings and evenings the air is filled with the perfume of acaciae, cacti, and other plants. One is at a loss to understand how the cattle can subsist on these shrubs, but they have adapted themselves to circ.u.mstances, and are able to chew up the thick stems of the cacti, in fact the whole plant, with the result, however, that their stomachs are so filled with spines that the Mexicans cannot utilise the tripe. The frugal Indian is the only one who does not reject it, but manages to burn off the biggest spikes while toasting the tripe on cinders.

Near Morelos are ancient house ruins, some round and some square, and also traces of circular fortifications built of loose stones. Several of the latter were from sixteen to twenty yards in diameter and located on the top of mountain ridges. The remains are attributed to the Cocoyomes.

The commonly accepted idea that in southern lat.i.tudes anything may be easily cultivated is often proved by actual observation to be fallacious. Sometimes there may be too much rain, sometimes not enough. The worst enemies of plant-life in the warm countries are the many pests. One evening my host, Don Manuel Perez, showed me some of the foes he had to combat in order to maintain his garden. Certain kinds of ants bite off the flowers and leaves and carry away the pieces. The insects come out at night and may strip a tree of its leaves and fruits before morning. It was an astonishing sight to see the dark stem of an elder looking .as if it were green, on account of the mult.i.tude of ants, each of which carried a bit of green leaf half an inch long. Every evening a man went around to burn them off with a torch of resinous pine-wood.

Some Tubar Indians were induced to come to Morelos to be measured and photographed. The few representatives of the tribe I saw had good figures and small hands and feet. They seemed to be shy, but rather kind-hearted, jolly people, resembling the Tarahumares in appearance. They are found from the village of San Andres, three miles from Morelos, as far as the village of Tubares. According to tradition their domain extended in former times much higher up on both sides of the river, to where Baborigame is now. But they were gradually restricted to the locality on which the remnant of the tribe at present resides. They are said to have been fierce and constantly fighting the Tarahumares. There are now not more than a couple of dozen pure-bred Tubars left, and only five or six of these know their own language, which is related to the Nahuatl. The name of the tribe as p.r.o.nounced by themselves is Tuvalim.

Most of the Tubars are found in the pueblo of San Miguel, seventeen miles from Morelos, down the river. An old woman told me that she did not know what the Tubars had done that they were disappearing from the world. The few remaining members of the tribe were related to one another, and the young people had to marry Mexicans. The customs of the Tubars evidently resembled much those of their neighbours, the Tarahumares, who until recent years invited them to their dances. The Tubars danced yohe, and the dancers accompanied their singing by beating two flat sticks, like two machetes. They did not use hikuli. In the sacristy of the church in the old Tubar village of San Andres, I found a complete tesvino outfit, jars, spoons, etc., the vessels turned bottom up, ready for use. The saints, too, must have tesvino, because they are greedy and exacting, and have to be propitiated. The Tubars are said to have worn white girdles.

Mr. Hartman, whom I left in San Miguel to conclude some investigations, returned a few weeks later to the United States. On the small plateaus near San Miguel, two hundred feet or more above the river, he found interesting old tombs, which were well known to the inhabitants under the name of _bovedas_. The presence of a tomb was indicated on the surface by a circuit of stones from three to five feet in diameter set in the ground. There were groups of ten or twelve circuits, and the tombs underneath were found at a depth of five or six feet. They consisted of small chambers excavated in the clayey soil, and were well preserved, though they contained no masonry work; still at one place a yoke of oxen while dragging the plough had sunk down into the subterranean cavity. The entrance to such a tomb is from one side, where a large slab, placed in a slanting position, protects the inside. Nothing was discovered in the four tombs that were opened but some curious slate-coloured beads of burnt clay. People of the district reported, however, that small jars of earthenware had been found in the _bovedas_. No doubt the absence of skeletons was due solely to the length of time that had elapsed, for even in the cemetery of the church Mr. Hartman found similar tombs that contained several skeletons. These tombs were indicated by the same kind of stone circuits as the rest, but were only about three feet down in the hard clay, and had no slabs in front of the entrance. In one of them Mr. Hartman found six corpses more or less decomposed, the sepulchre having evidently been used for a long time. In the same cemetery the Mexicans buried their dead.

I continued my journey down the river through the country once inhabited by the Tubars. As the heat was intense, I availed myself of the light of the full moon and travelled at night. Now and then the read touched the big river where the croaking of the frogs was intensely doleful and monotonous, but withal so loud that on a quiet night like this they could easily be heard two miles off.

Warm winds fanned me to sleep, and only when my mule ran me against some spiny branch, did I wake to find myself in a fantastic forest of leafless, towering cacti, that stood motionless, black, and silent in the moonlight, like spectres with numberless arms uplifted. The overwhelming noise of the frogs seemed to voice their thoughts and forbid me to advance farther. But the mule accelerated its pace, the shadows glided quicker and quicker, up and down the stony, slippery path that wound its way through this ghostly forest.

In the daytime there was a disagreeably strong, warm wind blowing, making it difficult even to get the saddles on our mules, but the nights were calm. At the pueblo of San Ignacio n.o.body speaks the Tubar tongue. Blue herons have a permanent breeding-place here on an almost perpendicular rock, four to six hundred feet high, where I counted twenty nests.

In travelling down to Tierra Caliente there is one place at which one must leave the river and ascend to the pine region. This is below the village of Tubares. The river narrows here and forms rapids, and it has been calculated that the water in flood-time rises sixty-five feet. Alligators do not go above these rapids. In two days' journey from Morelos one may reach the undulating country of Sinaloa, _la costa_, which is warmer even than the barrancas.

At San Ignacio I left the river, and turned in a northeasterly direction to Batopilas. After five days' pleasant sojourn at Mr. Shepherd's hospitable home there, I again ascended the sierra, and, after visiting the Indians of Santa Ana and its neighbourhood, arrived at Guachochic. Leaving my mules here in charge of my friend Don Carlos Garcia, I soon started again toward the northeast on my way back to the United States, pa.s.sing through the Indian ranches, and finally arriving at Carichic (in Tarahumare Garichi, "where there are houses," probably ancient) on July 31st. At less than an hour's distance from the place I was overtaken by a thunder-storm, the heaviest my Mexicans or I had ever experienced. In a few minutes the almost level fields were flooded as far as the eye could see, and the road we followed began to run with brown water. As we advanced through the mud, the small arroyos were rapidly filling. The rain did not abate, and the force of the currents steadily increased. When only three hundred yards from the town we found ourselves at the edge of a muddy stream, running so rapidly that it tore pieces from the bank, and carried small pines and branches of trees with it. As it was impossible to cross it, we had to wait, however impatiently, for the rain to subside sufficiently to allow us to wade through the water. And all the next day was spent in drying my things.

One year later I was again in Carichic, and from there I made my way to Guachochic. One night I had to spend in the house of a civilised Indian, as it rained too heavily for us to remain outdoors. The house was made of stone and mud, without windows, and the door had to be closed on account of the dogs. There was no way for air to get in except through the chimney, over the fireplace. There were nine people and one baby in the small room. Strange to say, I slept well.

My mules and outfit had been well taken care of at Guachochic, and I now arranged with Don Carlos Garcia to take most of my belongings to Guanazevi, a mining town in the neighbouring State of Durango, while with a few of the best mules I crossed Barranca de San Carlos near Guachochic, and pursued my way through regions inhabited by Tarahumares and Tepehuanes. A stammering Tarahumare was observed, the only Indian with this defect that has come to my notice.

The road I followed to Guanazevi from Guadalupe y Calvo leads through a part of the Sierra Madre which is from nine to ten thousand feet high and uninhabited, and for two days we met n.o.body. In winter the region is dreaded on account of the heavy snowfalls that are liable to occur here. Several people are said to have perished, and one freighter on one occasion lost twenty-seven mules. In the wet season bears are numerous, and, according to trustworthy information, have attacked and eaten several Tarahumares.

We camped one night at a place where a man had been killed by robbers some time before, and one of the Mexicans shudderingly expressed his fear that we should probably hear the dead man cry at night. This led to a discussion among the men as to whether the dead could cry or not. The consensus of opinion was that the dead could cry, but they could not appear. This, by the way, is the common Indian belief. My Tepehuane servant took an intense interest in the arguments. His face became suddenly animated with fear, and the thought of the dead changed him from an indolent fellow into a valuable aid to my chief packer in watching the animals at night. His senses became so keen as to be quite rea.s.suring in regard to robbers at night, and from that time on he was really a valuable man, active and alert.

There is a small colony of Tarahumares living a few miles north of Guanazevi, near San Pedro. Here I excavated some corpses that had been buried several years before on a little plain. The graves were about four feet deep. In Guanazevi a silver "bonanza" was in full blast and much activity prevailed.

We were now outside of the sierra proper; but on the route south, which I followed for several days, I was never farther away from the mountain range than thirty miles. At Zape, about twenty miles to the south, there are some ancient remains. As the princ.i.p.al ones have been described by E. Guillemin Tarayre, who explored Mexico under Maximilian, it is not necessary for me to dwell on the subject. Suffice it to say that walls constructed of loose stones are commonly seen on the crests of the low hills and are attributed to the Cocoyomes. Circles and squares made of stones set upright in the ground may also be seen, and nicely polished stone implements are frequently to be found near by.

Outside of Zape are a number of ancient burial-caves, which have been disturbed by treasure-seekers. As a curiosity, I may mention that a Mexican once brought to light a big lump of salt that had been buried there. It was given to the cattle.

One afternoon a gay little procession of men and women pa.s.sed my camp, some on horseback, others walking. One of the riders played the violin, another one beat a drum. An old woman who just then stepped up to sell something explained to me that "an angel" was being buried. This is the designation applied to small children in Mexico, and I could see an elaborate white bundle on a board carried aloft by a woman. My informant told me that when a child dies the parents always give it joyfully to heaven, set off fireworks and dance and are jolly. They do not weep when an infant dies, as the little one would not enter Paradise, but would have to come back and gather all the tears.

The way southward led through undulating country devoid of interest. To judge from the cl.u.s.ters of ranches, so numerous as to form villages, the land must be fertile. There were no more Indians to be seen, only Mexicans. All along the road we observed crosses erected, where people had been killed by robbers, or where the robbers themselves had been shot. A man's body is generally taken to the cemetery for burial, whether he was killed or executed, but a cross is raised on the spot where he fell. The crosses are thus mementos of the reign of terror that prevailed in Mexico not long ago. Most of the victims were so-called Arabs, or travelling peddlers, sometimes Syrians or Italians, but generally Mexicans.

The most important place I pa.s.sed was the town of Santiago de Papasquiaro, which is of some size, and situated in a rich agricultural country. The name of the place means possibly _"paz quiero"_ ("I want peace"), alluding to the terrible defeat of the Indians by the Spaniards in the seventeenth century. There is reason to believe that before 1593 this central and western part of Durango had been traversed and peopled by whites, and that many Spaniards had established haciendas in various parts of the valley. They held their own successfully against the Tepehuanes until 1616, when these, together with the Tarahumares and other tribes, rebelled against them. All the natives rose simultaneously, killed the missionaries, burned the churches, and drove the Spaniards away. A force of Indians estimated at 25,000 marched against the city of Durango, carrying fear everywhere, and threatening to exterminate the Spanish; but the governor of the province gathered together the whites to the number of 600, "determined to maintain in peace the province which his Catholic Majesty had placed under his guardianship." He routed the enemy, leaving on the field more than 15,000 dead insurgents, without great loss to his own troops. The Indians then sued for peace, and after their leaders had been duly punished, they were dispersed to form pueblos. The insurrection lasted over a year, and many b.l.o.o.d.y encounters between the natives and their new masters occurred in the course of the following centuries, the result being that the Indians in the State of Durango have not been able to maintain themselves, except in the extreme northern and southern sections.

There was an epidemic of typhoid fever in some of these ranch-villages, and in one place I saw two dogs hung up in a tree near the road, having been killed on account of hydrophobia. A strong wind was blowing day and night on the llanos along the river-course, which annoyed us not a little. It was a real relief to get up again on the sierra, about fourteen miles south of Papasquiaro, and find ourselves once more among the quiet pines and madronas.

Chapter XXV

Winter in the High Sierra--Mines--Pueblo Nuevo and Its Amiable Padre--A Ball in My Honour--_Sancta Simplicitas_--A Fatiguing Journey to the Pueblo of Lajas and the Southern Tepehuanes--Don't Travel After Nightfall!--Five Days Spent in Persuading People to Pose Before the Camera--The Regime of Old Missionary Times--Strangers Carefully Excluded--Everybody Contemplating Marriage is Arrested--Shocking Punishments for Making Love--Bad Effects of the Severity of the Laws.

The sierra for several days' journey southward is about 9,000 feet high, and is not inhabited, except in certain seasons by people who bring their cattle here to graze. I doubt whether anyone ever lived here permanently. The now extinct tribes, to whose territory this region belonged, dwelt, no doubt, in the valleys below. The high plateau consists of small hills, and travelling at first is easy, but it becomes more and more rough as one approaches the big, broad Barranca de Ventanas.

Having pa.s.sed for several days through lonely, cold, and silent woods, now and then interspersed with a slumbering snow-field, it was a real pleasure to come suddenly, though only in the beginning of February, upon plants in full bloom on the high crest that faced the undulating lowlands of Sinaloa, which spread themselves out below, veiled in mist. The warm air wafted up from the Hot Country brings about this remarkable change in the flora of the precipitous inclines toward the west. The air was filled with perfume, and it was lovely to be on these high, sunny tops. Foliage trees, especially alders, began to appear among the pines, basking in the dazzling sunshine. I also noticed some fine ferns spreading out their graceful fronds.

A few miles farther and much lower I made camp above the Indian pueblo of San Pedro, as far as I could make out the most eastern extension of the northern Aztecs (Mexicanos or Mexicaneros, as they are called here). From here southward I found them in many of the warm valleys of the Sierra intermingled with Tepehuanes and Coras.

There is an excellent road zigzagging down to the mining place of Ventanas ("Windows," from the formation of a rock) for the greater part of the distance; but at the outset the way, at two places, is so narrow that parties coming from opposite directions could neither pa.s.s nor turn back, which is not pleasant with a yawning chasm of a couple of thousand feet so close at hand.

I was anxious to secure men to go up again into the sierra and farther south; but the people were afraid of the cold, and n.o.body seemed to know anything about the country except the postmaster, and he only in a vague way. Mazatlan is not much more than 100 miles off and Durango 125 miles. There are here a great many d.y.k.es of porphyry of different ages, but neither slate nor granite in the immediate vicinity, though there is some granite farther up the river.

Among the mine-owners who lived in Ventanas I was surprised to find a Swedish gentleman. They all received me hospitably, providing me also with two men, whom I badly needed. We had to ascend on the other side of the barranca as high as we had been north of this place, and for a day we travelled through snow and rain. Corn does not grow here. From one point the Pacific Ocean can be seen. We then descended again a couple of thousand feet to the village of Chavaria, which is the only Mexican village I have seen where the houses had gable roofs covered with shingles. The walls of the houses were adobe, but I was told that the earth at this place is not suitable for making the usual flat roofs.

While camping here I saw, on the 15th of February, a flock of six giant woodp.e.c.k.e.rs pa.s.s by in the morning. Except in the pairing season these birds are not seen in such numbers. The journey over a high part of the Sierra Madre to the Mexican village of Pueblo Nuevo requires two days. On the second day I obtained a magnificent view toward the east and southeast. The high peak towering in the distance is Cerro Gordo, very broad at the base and conical in shape. Patches of snow were visible on it, and snow lay in the crevices wherever we travelled.

I descended through magnificent groves of cedar-trees to Pueblo Nuevo, making my camp on top of a hill, from which I overlooked the little settlement and the valley in which it nestles. As every house is surrounded by its little garden of orange-trees, aguacates, and guayahas, the landscape presented a ma.s.s of verdure of different shades, the ugly, often dilapidated houses being almost lost in the green. Lemons grow wild, and therefore there is no sale for them. Lemon juice mixed with milk is in many parts of Mexico considered a remedy for dysentery.

A young priest, who exercised a supreme but judicious authority in this secluded spot, treated me with much consideration. He took an honest pride in the development of his little village, and showed me its sights, first the church, which he was embellishing in many ways, and then the spring which supplied the place with water, and where the women gathered to wash their clothes and gossip. We met many graceful figures carrying jars on their shoulders, as in ancient times.