Plant-worship--Hikuli--Internal and External Effects--Hikuli both
Man and God--How the Tarahumares Obtain the Plant, and where They
Keep It--The Tarahumare Hikuli Feast--Musical Instruments--Hikuli
Likes Noise--The Dance--Hikuli's Departure in the Morning--Other
Kinds of Cacti Worshipped--"Doctor" Rubio, the Great Hikuli
Expert--The Age of Hikuli Worship.
To the Indian, everything in nature is alive. Plants, like human
beings, have souls, otherwise they could not live and grow. Many are
supposed to talk and sing and to feel joy and pain. For instance,
when in winter the pine-trees are stiff with cold, they weep and pray
to the sun to shine and make them warm. When angered or insulted,
the plants take their revenge. Those that are supposed to possess
curative powers are venerated. This fact, however, does not save them
from being cut into pieces and steeped in water, which the people
afterward drink or use in washing themselves. The mere fragrance of
the lily is supposed to cure sickness and to drive off sorcery. In
invoking the lily's help the shaman utters a prayer like this:
"Sumati okilivea saeva rako cheeneserova
"Beautiful this morning in bloom lily thou guard me!
waminamela ke usugituami cheeotsheloaya
drive them away (those who) make sorcery! thou make me
grow old!
cheeliveva tesola chapimelava otsheloa
thou give me walking-stick (to) take up (in) old age
rimivelava Matetrava Sevaxoa
(that I may) find! thanks exhale fragrance
wilirova!"
standing!"
("Beautiful lily, in bloom this morning, guard me! Drive away
sorcery! Make me grow old! Let me reach the age at which I have to
take up a walking-stick! I thank thee for exhaling thy fragrance there,
where thou art standing!")
High mental qualities are ascribed especially to all species of
_Mammilaria_ and _Echinocactus_, small cacti, for which a regular cult
is instituted. The Tarahumares designate several varieties as hikuli,
though the name belongs properly only to the kind most commonly used
by them. These plants live for months after they have been rooted up,
and the eating of them causes a state of ecstasy. They are therefore
considered demi-gods, who have to be treated with great reverence,
and to whom sacrifices have to be offered.
The principal kinds thus distinguished are known to science as
_Lophophora Williamsii_ and _Lophophora Williamsii_, var. _Lewinii_. In
the United States they are called mescal buttons, and in Mexico
_peyote_. The Tarahumares speak of them as the superior hikuli (hikuli
waname), or simply hikuli, they being the hikuli _par excellence_.
The Huichol Indians, who live many hundred miles south of the
Tarahumares, also have a hikuli cult, and it is a curious and
interesting fact that with them the plant has even the same name,
although the two tribes are neither related to nor connected with each
other. The cults, too, show many points of resemblance, though with the
southern tribe the plant plays a far more important part in the tribal
life, and its worship is much more elaborate. On the other hand, the
Huichols use only the species and variety shown in the illustration,
while the Tarahumares have several. Major J. B. Pond, of New York,
informs me that in Texas, during the Civil War, the so-called Texas
Rangers, when taken prisoners and deprived of all other stimulating
drinks, used mescal buttons, or "white mule," as they called them. They
soaked the plants in water and became intoxicated with the liquid.
The plant, when taken, exhilarates the human system, and allays all
feeling of hunger and thirst. It also produces colour-visions. When
fresh, it has a nauseating, slightly sour taste, but it is wonderfully
refreshing when one has been exposed to great fatigue. Not only does
it do away with all exhaustion, but one feels actually pushed on, as I
can testify from personal experience. In this respect it resembles the
Peruvian coca; but unlike the latter, it leaves a certain depression,
as well as a headache. Although an Indian feels as if drunk after
eating a quantity of hikuli, and the trees dance before his eyes,
he maintains the balance of his body even better than under normal
conditions, and he will walk along the edge of precipices without
becoming dizzy. At their nocturnal feasts, when drinking heavily
of both tesvino and hikuli, many persons may be seen to weep and
laugh alternately. Another marked effect of the plant is to take
away temporarily all sexual desire. This fact, no doubt, is the
reason why the Indians, by a curious aboriginal mode of reasoning,
impose abstinence from sexual intercourse as a necessary part of the
hikuli cult.
The effect of the plant is so much enjoyed by the Tarahumares that
they attribute to it power to give health and long life and to purify
body and soul. The little cacti, either fresh or dried, are ground
on the metate, while being mixed with water; and this liquor is the
usual form in which hikuli is consumed.
Hikuli is also applied externally for snake-bites, burns, wounds, and
rheumatism; for these purposes it is chewed, or merely moistened in
the mouth, and applied to the afflicted part. Not only does it cure
disease, causing it to run off, but it also so strengthens the body
that it can resist illness, and is therefore much used in warding off
sickness. Though not given to the dead, since the dead are no longer
in need of remedies, hikuli is always partaken of at the feasts of
the dead.
Moreover, hikuli is a powerful protector of its people under all
circumstances, and it gives luck. If a man carries some hikuli in
his belt, the bear cannot bite him and the deer cannot run away, but
become quite tame and can easily be killed. Should he meet Apaches,
hikuli would prevent them from firing off their guns at him. It
gives luck in foot-races and all kinds of games, in climbing trees,
etc. Hikuli is the great safeguard against witchcraft. It sees even
better than the shamans, and it watches that nothing bad is put into
the food. The Christian Tarahumares, when they partake of hikuli,
think that the devil runs out of their stomachs. Hikuli purifies any
man who is willing to sacrifice a sheep and to make native beer. There
is, however, no remedy for a murderer; not even hikuli can cure him.
The Christian Tarahumares make the sign of the cross when coming into
the presence of the plant, and I was told to lift my hat to it. It
is always saluted in the same way as a man, and is supposed to make
the customary responses to the salutations. Hikuli is not as great as
Father Sun, but sits next to him. It is the brother of Tata Dios; and
the greatest hikuli is his twin brother, and is therefore called uncle.
Sometimes these plants are dressed up in pieces of blankets, and
cigarettes are placed before them. Boys must not touch hikuli, and
women only when they act as the shaman's assistants and have to grind
it. As a matter of fact, only shamans can handle it properly, and even
they wash their hands carefully, and sometimes elect not to touch it
at all, making use of little sticks instead of their fingers. Certain
shamans washed their hands and rinsed their mouths immediately after
eating from my vessels, because hikuli would be angry with them for
eating strange food cooked by strange people.
Hikuli is not kept in the house, because it is extremely virtuous,
and might become offended at the sight of anything immodest. It is
placed in a special jar or basket, in a separate store-house, and is
never taken out until tesvino and meat have been offered to it. If this
were neglected, it would eat the Indian's soul. If anything happens
to hikuli--for instance, if irreverent mice eat it--the owner fears
that he may be made crazy as a punishment for his failure to guard
it. If anyone should steal hikuli, he would be sure to go crazy,
unless he returned the plant to its original owner. He must also kill
an ox and make a big feast, in order to set himself right again with
the mighty god and with the people.
After four years, hikuli grows old and mouldy, and loses its
virtues. It is then buried in a corner of the cave or the house, or
taken to the place where it came from, and fresh plants are obtained
instead. According to tradition, when Tata Dios went to heaven in the
beginning of the world, he left hikuli behind as the great remedy of
the people, Hikuli has four faces and sees everything. Its power is
well shown in the following myth:
The Bear in a cave said to Hikuli, "Let us fight and let us first
smoke over there." They smoked and they fought, and Hikuli was stronger
than the Bear. When Hikuli threw the Bear down, all the wind went out
of the Bear; but the Bear said again, "Let us smoke and let us fight
a few times more." And they did so, and Hikuli again threw down the
Bear, and the Bear seated himself on a stone and wept, and went away,
and never returned.
Hikuli is not indigenous to the Tarahumare country of to-day. To
obtain it long and until recently perilous journeys have to be
undertaken every year to the plateaus of eastern Chihuahua, in the
Sierra del Almoloy, near the railroad station of Ximenez, and to
the Sierra de Margoso, beyond Santa Rosalia de Camarga, crossing
the tracks of the Mexican Central Railroad. From two or three to a
dozen men start out to get the plants, first purifying themselves
with copal incense. It takes a week or ten days to get to the Sierra
de Margoso, where the plants are chiefly found, and about a month is
consumed on the entire journey. Until they reach the hikuli country,
the Tarahumares may eat anything; but once there, they must abstain
from everything except pinole. Upon arriving at the spot, the pilgrims
erect a cross, and near it they place the first plants taken up, that
these may tell where others may be found in plenty. The second batch
of plants gathered is eaten raw, and makes the men drunk. As speech
is forbidden, they lie down in silence and sleep. The following day,
when perfectly sober again, they begin early in the morning to collect
the plants, taking them up with the utmost care, by means of sticks,
so as not to touch or injure them, because hikuli would get angry
and punish the offender. Two days are spent in gathering the plants,
each kind being placed in a separate bag, because, if they were mixed
together, they would fight. The bags are carefully carried on the
backs of the men, as the Tarahumares generally have no horses.
In the field in which it grows, it sings beautifully, that the
Tarahumare may find it. It says, "I want to go to your country, that
you may sing your songs to me." It also sings in the bag while it is
being carried home. One man, who wanted to use his bag as a pillow,
could not sleep, he said, because the plants made so much noise.
When the hikuli-seekers arrive at their homes, the people turn out
to welcome the plants with music, and a festival at which a sheep or
a goat is sacrificed is held in their honour. On this occasion the
shaman wears necklaces made of the seeds of _Coix Lachryma-Jobi_. In
due time he takes them off, and places them in a bowl containing water
in which the heart of the maguey has been soaked, and after a while
everyone present gets a spoonful of this water. The shaman, too, takes
some, and afterward wears the necklaces again. Both plants, the _Coix
Lachryma-Jobi_ as well as the maguey, are highly esteemed for their
curative properties; and in his songs the shaman describes hikuli
as standing on top of a gigantic seed of the _Coix Lachryma-Jobi_,
as big as a mountain.
The night is passed in dancing hikuli and yumari. The pile of fresh
plants, perhaps two bushels or more, is placed under the cross, and
sprinkled with tesvino, for hikuli wants to drink beer, and if the
people should not give it, it would go back to its own country. Food
is also offered to the plants, and even money is placed before them,
perhaps three silver dollars, which the owner, after the feast,
takes back again.
During the year, feasts may be held especially in honour of hikuli,
but generally the hikuli dance is performed simultaneously with,
though apart from, the rutuburi or other dances. On such occasions
some shamans devote themselves exclusively to the hikuli cult, in
order that the health of the dancers may be preserved, and that they
may have vigour for their work.
The hikuli feast consists mainly in dancing, which, of course, is
followed by eating and drinking, after the customary offerings of
food and tesvino have been made to the gods. It is not held on the
general dancing-place, in front of the Tarahumare dwelling, but on a
special patio. For the occasion a level piece of ground may be cleared
of all stones and rubbish, and carefully swept with the Indian broom,
which is made of a sheaf of straw tied in the middle.
Meanwhile some people go into the woods to gather fuel for the
large fire which will be needed. The fire is an important feature
of the hikuli-feast, a fact indicated by the name, which is napitshi
nawliruga, literally, "moving (_i.e_. dancing) around (nawliruga) the
fire (napitshi)." There seems to be a preference for fallen trees,
pines or oaks, but this may be because they are found in plenty
everywhere, are drier and burn better, and finally save the men the
labour and time of cutting them down. Quite a number of such trunks
are brought together, and placed parallel to each other in an easterly
and westerly direction; but not until after sunset is the fire lighted.
The master of the house in which the feast is to be held gives some
plants to two or three women appointed to the office of shaman's
assistants. At an ordinary gathering, a dozen or two of the plants
suffice. The women are called rokoro, which means the stamen of the
flower, while the shaman is the pistil The women grind the plants
with water on the metate, and then take part in the dance. They must
wash their hands most carefully before touching them; and while they
are grinding a man stands by with a gourd, to catch any stray drop
of liquor that may drip from the metate, and to watch that nothing
of the precious fluid is lost. Not one drop must be spilled, and
even the water with which the metate is afterward washed, is added
to the liquid. The drink thus produced is slightly thick and of a
dirty brown colour.
The shaman (sometimes there are two) takes his seat on the ground
to the west of the fire, about two yards off. On the opposite side
of the dancing-place, toward the east, the cross is placed. The
shaman's male assistants, at least two in number, seat themselves
on either side of their principal, while the women helpers take a
position to the north of the fire. On one occasion I observed that
the men grouped themselves on one side of the shaman, the women on
the other. Close by the shaman's seat a hole is dug, into which he or
his assistants may spit, after having drunk or eaten hikuli, so that
nothing may be lost. After this improvised cuspidor has been used,
it is always carefully covered with a leaf.
As soon as the shaman has seated himself, he takes a round
drinking-gourd, and by pressing its rim firmly into the soil and
turning the vessel round, makes a circular mark. Lifting up the bowl
again, he draws two diametrical lines at right angles in the circle,
and thus produces a symbol of the world.
In the centre he puts a hikuli, right side up; or he may dig a hole
in the centre, to the depth of five or six inches, and place the
hikuli in this. He then covers it up with the gourd, bottom up,
so that the plant stands within a hollow sphere. The gourd may be
replaced by a wooden vessel of similar shape; but in any case it is
firmly planted in the ground to serve as a resonator for the musical
instrument,--the notched stick, which the shaman leans against the
vessel, and on which with another stick he rasps an accompaniment to
his songs. If he does not plant the gourd carefully in the ground,
it will make a discordant sound, which will vex the demi-god, and he
will cause someone in the house to die. The noise produced by the
rasping is enjoyed by Hikuli; that is why he is placed beneath the
bowl. He is powerful, and manifests his strength by the noise produced.
The notched stick, as well as the rasping-stick, is made from the
heavy, hard Brazil-wood, brought from the vicinity of San Ignacio,
the hikuli country. The shaman holds the notched stick in his left
hand, a little away from himself, so that it touches the vessel at a
point below the middle of its length, the part between the shaman's
hand and the point of contact being a little longer than the portion
from that point to the end of the stick.
The notched sticks which are shown in the illustration, from a
Tarahumare burial-cave, are apparently of considerable age. The Indians
to whom I showed them did not know them, but they all affirmed that
they were rasping-sticks. On two sides of one of them are slanting
lines, which symbolize the road of Tata Dios; on the intervening sides
are transverse lines which represent falling rain. As the implements
were found near Baborigame, they may possibly have belonged to the
Tepehuanes, the northern members of whom also have the hikuli cult.
When the shaman begins to rasp, he starts from the farther end
of the notched stick, though not quite at the point, and runs his
rasping-stick quickly and evenly, about twenty-six times, toward
himself, and away again; then he makes three long strokes down and
outward, each time throwing out his arm at full length, and holding
the stick for a second high up toward the east. This is repeated
three times, and is the prelude to the ceremony. Now he begins to
sing, accompanying himself with even strokes on the notched stick,
playing regularly, one stroke as long and as fast as the other,
always first toward himself, then down again. His songs are short,
lasting only about five minutes.
Presently the shaman's assistants, men and women, rise. They carry
censers filled with burning charcoals and copal, and emitting a heavy
smoke, and proceed toward the cross, to which they offer the smoking
incense, kneeling down, facing east, and crossing themselves. This
feature, if not wholly due to Catholic influence, is at least strongly
affected by it.
Having offered incense to the cross, they return to the shaman. The
women now sit down again in their previous places. The men receive
from the shaman rattles (_sonajas_) consisting of deer-hoofs tied with
bits of reed to a strap of leather. They are either held in the right
hand or slung over the shoulder. When there are not enough rattles
for all assistants, a bell may be substituted.
Finally everything is ready for the dance to commence. The men wear
white blankets, in which they keep themselves wrapped up to the chin
throughout the night; but they have no sandals. The dance is performed
by the shaman's assistants, and consists of a peculiar, quick, jumping
march, with short steps, the dancers moving forward one after another,
on their toes, and making sharp, jerky movements, without, however,
turning around. They dance in the space between the fire and the cross,
and move in a direction opposite to the sun's apparent movement. Nobody
present is allowed to walk in contra-direction to the dancers. After
six or eight rounds, they enlarge the circuit so as to include the
fire; and whenever a dancer finds himself just between the shaman and
the fire, he quickly turns around once, then, dancing as before, moves
on to the dancing-place proper. Now and then the dancers give vent
to what is supposed to be an imitation of the hikuli's talk, which
reminded me of the crowing of a cock. Beating their mouths quickly
three times with the hollow of their hands, they shout in a shrill,
falsetto voice, "Hikuli vava!" which means, "Hikuli over yonder!"
The women take their turns separate from the men, though sometimes they
dance simultaneously with them. They move around in silence, and their
dance is slightly different from that of the other sex. Sometimes two
and two may be seen dancing toward each other. They all wear freshly
washed, clean white skirts and tunics, and the entire scene around
the big fire is marvellously picturesque.
The dancing may sometimes lag, but the singing and the rhythmical
rasping of the shaman are kept up through the night, interrupted
only once or twice, when he sees fit. He politely excuses himself to
Hikuli, and formal salutations are exchanged with the plant under
the bowl both when he goes and when he returns. On such occasions
he stops his singing and rasping, and notifies Hikuli by striking
the notched stick several times quickly with the rasping-stick,
and finishing off with three slow beats.
His songs describe how Hikuli walks with his rattles and with his
staff of authority; he comes to cure and to guard the people and to
grant a "beautiful" intoxication. To bring about the latter result,
the brownish liquor is dispensed from a jar standing under the cross. A
man Serves it in small quantities from agourd, which he first carries
around the fire on a rapid run, making three circuits for the shaman,
and one for the rest of the assemblage. The spirits of the feasters
rise in proportion to their potations. Sometimes only the shaman and
his assistants indulge in the drinking; on other occasions all the
people partake of the liquor.
Song to the Hikuli.
Hi-ku-li o-ku-li-va-va Ta-mi-sae-li-va re-ga
Hikuli, uncle! Our authority thus!
A-go-na wi-li si-nae Na-na-ja re-ga we-la
Yonder standing upright, see! The ancients thus placed him.
The secondary effect of the plant, depression and drowsiness, shows
itself more plainly on the company when they sit down between the
dancing, than on the well-trained shaman, who, besides, is kept awake
by his occupation. As one or the other of his assistants succumbs to
sleepiness, he has to ask permission of Hikuli, through the shaman,
to go off and rest for a while, and must properly notify Hikuli of
his leaving and returning to duty. Toward morning all the assistants
are struggling hard to overcome somnolence, while the shaman sings
and rasps as conscientiously and enthusiastically as ever.
But all rouse themselves for the important acts of curing the people
by rasping and of despatching Hikuli. Just at daybreak, as the fire is
dying out, the shaman gives the welcome signal that the dance is over,
by the three final raps on his notched stick. Then the people gather
at the eastern end of the dancing-place, near the cross. The shaman
rises from his seat, carrying in his hands his rasping implements, and,
followed by a boy who carries a gourd with water, he proceeds to confer
upon everybody present the benediction. Stopping in front of each
one, he solemnly dips the point of the rasping-stick into the water,
and after touching the notched stick lightly with the wetted end,
first in the middle, then on the lower end, and finally on the top,
he daubs the head of the person three times with it. Then he rests
the end of the notched stick against the man's head and rasps three
long strokes from end to end, throwing out his hand far into the air
after each stroke. The dust produced by the rasping, infinitesimal
though it be, is powerful in giving health and life. Now he turns
toward the rising Sun, holding out his implements to him; and, quickly
rubbing up and down a few times at the lower end of the notched stick,
he makes a long stroke from end to end, passing the hand far out from
the stick toward the Sun. By this act, three times performed, he waves
Hikuli home. In the early morning, Hikuli had come from San Ignacio
and from Sara-polio, riding on beautiful green doves, to feast with
the Tarahumares at the end of the dance, when the people sacrifice
food, and eat and drink. The greatest Hikuli eats with the shaman,
who alone is able to see him and his companions. If Hikuli should
not come to the feasts, there would always be on the Tarahumares the
breath or stain of sorcery.
Having bestowed his blessings, Hikuli forms himself into a ball, and
flies home to his country, accompanied by the owl, who also flies to
its shelter at that hour.
The dust produced by the rasping of the shaman in the course of
the night is carefully gathered up and kept in a buckskin bag as a
powerful remedy for future use.
After the feast everybody has to wash his face and hands, a duty
esteemed most important.
Besides hikuli waname ordinarily used, the Tarahumares know and
worship the following varieties:
1. Mulato (_Mammilaria micromeris_).--This is believed to make the
eyes large and clear to see sorcerers, to prolong life and to give
speed to the runners.
2. Rosapara.--This is only a more advanced vegetative stage of the
preceding species--though it looks quite different, being white and
spiny. This, too, must only be touched with very clean hands, in the
moral sense, it would seem, as much as in the physical, for only people
who are well baptised are allowed to handle it. It is a good Christian
and keeps a sharp eye on the people around it; and when it sees anyone
doing some wrong, it gets very angry, and either drives the offender
mad or throws him down precipices. It is therefore very effective in
frightening off bad people, especially robbers and Apaches.
3. Sunami (_Mammilaria fissurata_).--It is rare, but it is believed
to be even more powerful than waname and is used in the same
way as the latter; the drink produced from it is also strongly
intoxicating. Robbers are powerless to steal anything where Sunami
calls soldiers to its aid.
4. Hikuli walula saeliami.--This is the greatest of all, and the
name means "hikuli great authority." It is extremely rare among
the Tarahumares, and I have not seen any specimen of it, but it was
described to me as growing in clusters of from eight to twelve inches
in diameter, resembling waname with many young ones around it. All
the other hikuli are his servants. The reason why so few of these
plants are brought to the Tarahumare country is that he is very
greedy, requiring oxen for food, not being satisfied with sheep,
goats, or anything else. Therefore but few Tarahumares can afford
to entertain him in their country. If an ox is not killed for him,
he will eat the Indian. He always holds his head down, because he is
listening to all the ceremonies that are being held in the Tarahumare
land, and he is always full of thoughts of how he may cure his sons,
the Tarahumares. He never dies. When a person is very ill, and there
is no such hikuli in the country, the shaman in his thoughts flies
to the hikuli country, where "the great authority" stands looking
at his children, the people, and offers him the soul of an ox that
has been sacrificed. Hikuli accepts the offering, and sends back his
blessings by his servants, who are always well dressed and wear straw
hats, "like regular Americans," as my shaman friend Rubio expressed
it. Only the shamans, however, can see them come, to cure the hearts
of the people and to clean their souls.
All these various species are considered good, as coming from Tata
Dios, and well-disposed toward the people. But there are some kinds
of hikuli believed to come from the Devil. One of these, with long
white spines, is called ocoyome. It is very rarely used, and only for
evil purposes. If anyone should happen to touch it with the foot,
it would cause the offending leg to break. Once when I pushed one
of these globular spiny cacti out of my way with a cane, my Indian
attendant immediately warned me, "Leave it alone, or it will make
you fall down precipices."
At one of the feasts which I witnessed I wished to taste hikuli, as
it was new to me. A lively discussion arose between the shamans, and
I was finally told that I might sit with them, as it was known that I
had some of the sacred plants in my possession. The condition was made,
however, that I should take off my sombrero. It happened to be a cold
and windy December night, but I obeyed and put my handkerchief over
my head, to which no objection was raised. The man who carried the
gourd, first danced in front of the shaman, then around the fire,
and finally brought it to me. The liquid tasted somewhat bitter,
but not exactly disagreeable; and while I drank, the man looked at
me with astonishment, as if he had expected that hikuli would refuse
to be taken by me.
I drank only a small cupful, but felt the effect in a few
minutes. First it made me wide awake, and acted as an excitant to the
nerves, similar to coffee, but much more powerful. This sensation
lasted for about ten minutes, when it was followed by a depression
and a chill such as I have never experienced before. To get warm
I almost threw myself into the fire, but not until morning was the
feeling of cold conquered. Some Tarahumares told me that they are
similarly affected, and for this reason they do not take it. When I
told the shaman about the effect hikuli had on me, he asked whether
I had rasped on the notched stick, because, he said, hikuli does not
give chills to people who rasp. In other words, according to him,
the effect might be warded off by physical exercise.
A shaman who agreed to sell me some hikuli took me with him to his
house. Then he walked over to a store-house of pine boards, and with
a long stick undid the lock from within, taking off a few boards from
the roof to get at it. After some searching, he produced a small
closed basket. Holding this in his hand, he rapidly ran around me
in one ceremonious circuit, and said in a scarcely audible voice:
"Thank you for the time you have been with me; now go with him; I
will give you food before you go." The smoke of copal was blown over
the plants in the basket, that they might eat; and I had to smell
of the incense, so that hikuli might find pleasure in being with
me. The shaman then opened the basket and asked me to select what I
wanted. I picked out twelve plants, but, as he asked $10 for them,
I contented myself with three.
On my way back to civilisation, I spent some time at Guajochic,
near which place the great hikuli expert, Shaman Rubio, lives. He
is a truly pious man, well-meaning and kind-hearted, living up to
his principles, in which Christianity and Paganism are harmoniously
blended. He is highly esteemed by all his countrymen, who consider him
the greatest hikuli shaman in that part of the Tarahumare country. His
profession brings him a very comfortable living, as his services are
constantly in demand, and are paid for by fine pieces of the animals
sacrificed. For curing the people he even gets money; and what with
praying and singing, drinking tesvino and hikuli, fasting and curing
the sick, he passes his days in the happy conviction that he keeps
the world going. From him I obtained specimens of the various kinds
of cacti which the Tarahumares worship,--a betrayal of the secrets
of the tribe, for which the other shamans punished him by forbidding
him ever to go again on a hikuli journey. Though in the first year
he obeyed the sentence, he did not take it much to heart, feeling
himself far superior to his judges, who, he knew, could not get along
without him, and in the end would have to come to him; for he is the
most virtuous of them all, and therefore knows the commands of Tata
Dios better than anyone else.
It is to him that I owe a good deal of what I know about this
plant-worship, as well as several songs used in the cult. He came
often to see me, and one day told me in confidence that the hikuli
in my possession would have to be fed before they started on their
long journey to the United States; for it was a long time since they
had had food, and they were getting angry. The next time he came he
brought some copal tied up in a cotton cloth, and after heating the
incense on a piece of crockery he waved the smoke over the plants,
which he had placed in front of him. This, he said, would satisfy
them; they would now go content with me, and no harm would come to
me from sorcerers, robbers, or Apaches. This was a comfort, for to
reach Chihuahua I had to pass through some disturbed country, and
there were rumours of a revolution.
It seems that at present only the districts around Nararachic and
Baqueachic get hikuli from its native country, and that all the others
procure it from these two. Until recently the people of Guachochic
also went to fetch plants, and a few may yet undertake the journey. One
old man showed me some hikuli which he had gathered thirty-five years
ago. At Nararachic they use hikuli all the year round, that is, as
long as they have corn, because "hikuli wants tesvino." The people in
the barrancas are too timid to go on the expeditions, and they buy the
plants at the price of a sheep apiece. The purchaser holds a feast,
not only when he brings the demi-god to his home, but also a year
after the event. In the eastern section of the country, and in the
foothills around Rio Fuerte, hikuli is not used at all. It is very
rarely planted by the Tarahumares; the only instance I saw of it was
in Tierras Verdes.
A significant light is thrown on the antiquity of the cult, as
well as on the age of the tribe itself, by a certain variation in
the ceremonial which I observed in the southwestern part of the
Tarahumare country. There it is the custom of the shaman to draw
underneath his resonator-gourd a mystical human figure in the sand,
and to place the hikuli in its centre. Regarding this mystical figure,
my lamented friend, Frank Hamilton Cushing, informed me that similar
or almost identical drawings are found depicted on the lava rocks of
Arizona. In a letter dated October 30, 1893, he said:
The figure you sketch for me is closely allied, for example,
to very ancient ritualistic petrographs in the lava regions
of Arizona. You will see this at a glance by the figure of
one of those petrographs, which I reproduce in juxtaposition
with yours:
Others which I have recorded are even more strikingly
similar. I have always supposed that these figures were
designed for "medicine" ceremonials, but thought of them
rather as pertaining to the medicines of the elements, wind,
rain, water, etc., used in connection with sacrifices (with
which ceremonial rites were terminated) than as connected
with actual medicinal ceremonials. I was led to this belief
by finding in connection with some of them little cup-shaped
concavities pecked into the angles of the figures (as _a, a,
a_). You will observe that a line is drawn from the middle and
straight portion of my figure and coiled around the concavity
at the right side, and that the terminations of the upper
cross lines are bifurcated around similar though smaller
concavities. This entire figure represents a water-animal
god, one only of a number of semi-human mystic monsters. For
convenience his heart is drawn out to one side, and within it
is placed the cup of the "chief" medicine; while in his left
hand is the cup of the "good" medicine, and in his right hand
the cup of "bad" (_i.e_., strong) medicine. If in the light of
this you re-examine your figure, you will see with me that it
represents a man-god sitting, his legs doubled under him and
his medicines distributed around and upon him according to his
parts, and in accordance also, probably, to their importance
and the case in hand. He must always have the chief of all
medicines placed on his heart, as the renewer of life. Then,
strictly with reference to the ailment to be treated, and its
location in the body or limbs of the patient (I should say),
the other medicines. I throw this out as a suggestion, yet
with much confidence in its at least approximate correctness as
indicated by my comparative studies. Probably a consultation of
your notes and the remembrance of variations of the ceremony
you have seen, will signify to you whether I am right or
not. Remember that if these people have this ceremonial in
connection with the treatment of disease, they will also have
it in the treatment of the weather, etc., when "diseased,"
so to say. You have opened up a new significance of many
outlines among the older lava-remains, and if my record
of these in turn has helped to explain your diagram, etc.,
you can judge of my pleasure and appreciation."