THE GOVERNOR'S PALACE OF SANTA FE (_Continued_)
Of all the traditions clinging round the old Palace at Santa Fe, those
connected with Don Diego de Vargas, the reconqueror of New Mexico, are
best known and most picturesque. Yearly, for two and a quarter
centuries, the people of New Mexico have commemorated De Vargas' victory
by a procession to the church which he built in gratitude to Heaven for
his success. This procession is at once a great public festival and a
sacred religious ceremony; for the image of the Virgin, which De Vargas
used when he planted the Cross on the Plaza in front of the Palace and
sang the Te Deum with the assembled Franciscan monks, is the same image
now used in the theatrical procession of the religious ceremony yearly
celebrated by Indians, Spanish and Americans.
The De Vargas procession is a ceremony unique in America. The very
Indians whose ancestors De Vargas' arms subjugated, now yearly reenact
the scenes of the struggles of their forefathers to throw off white
rule. Young Mexicans, descendants of the very officers who marched with
De Vargas in his campaigns of 1692-3-4, take the part of the conquering
heroes. Costumes, march, religious ceremonies of thanks, public
festival--all have been kept as close to original historic fact as
possible.
De Vargas, himself, was to the Southwest what Frontenac was to French
Canada--a bluff soldier animated by religious motives, who believed only
in the peace that is a victory, put the fear of God in the hearts of his
enemies, and built on that fear a superstructure of reverence and love.
It need not be told that such a character rode rough-shod over official
red-tape, and had a host of envious curs barking at his heels. They
dragged him down, for a period of short eclipse, these Lilliputian
enemies, just as Frontenac's enemies caused his recall by a charge of
misusing public funds; but in neither case could the charges be
sustained. Bluff warriors, not counting house clerks, were needed; and
De Vargas, like Frontenac, came through all charges unscathed.
The two heroes of America's Indian wars--Frontenac of the North, De
Vargas of the South--were contemporaries. It will be remembered how up
on the St. Lawrence and among the Mohawk tribes of New York, a wave of
revolt against white man rule swept from 1642 to 1682. It was not
unnatural that the red warrior should view with alarm the growing
dominance and assumption of power on the part of the white. In Canada,
we know the brandy of the white trader hastened the revolt and added
horror to the outrages, when the settlements lying round Montreal and
Quebec were ravaged and burnt under the very cannon mouths of the two
impotent and terrified forts. The same wave of revolt that scourged
French Canada in the eighties, went like wild fire over the Southwest
from 1682 to 1694. Was there any connection between the two efforts to
throw off white man rule? To the historian, seemingly, there was not;
but ask the Navajo or Apache of the South about traders in the North,
and you will be astonished how the traditions of the tribes preserve
legends of the Athabascan stock in the North, from whom they claim
descent. Ask a modern Indian of the interior of British Columbia about
the Navajos, and he will tell you how the wise men of the tribe preserve
verbal history of a branch of this people driven far South--"those other
Denes," he will tell you. Traders explain the wonderful way news has of
traveling from tribe to tribe by the laconic expression, "moccasin
telegram."
Whether or not the infection of revolt spread by "moccasin telegram"
from Canada to Mexico, the storm broke, and broke with frightful
violence over the Southwest. The immediate cause was religious
interference. All pueblo people have secret lodges held in underground
_estufas_ or _kivas_. To these ceremonies no white man however favored
is ever admitted. White men know as little of the rites practiced in
these lodges by the pueblo people as when Coronado came in 1540. To the
Spanish governors and priests, the thing was anathema--abomination of
witchcraft and sorcery and secrecy that risked the eternal damnation of
converts' souls. There was a garrison of only 250 men at the Palace;
yet already the church boasted fifty friars, from eleven to seventeen
missions, and converts by the thousands. But the souls of the holy
_padres_ were sorely tried by these _estufa_ rites, "_platicas de
noche_," "night conversations"--the priests called them. Well might all
New Spain have been disturbed by these "night conversations." The
subject bound under fearful oath of secrecy was nothing more nor less
than the total extermination of every white man, woman and child north
of the Rio Grande.
Some unwise governor--Trevino, I think it was--had issued an edict in
1675 forbidding the pueblos to hold their secret lodges in the
_estufas_. By way of enforcing his edict, he had forty-seven of the wise
men or Indian priests (he called them "sorcerers") imprisoned; hanged
three in the jail yard of the Palace as a warning, and after severe
whipping and enforced fasts, sent the other forty-four home. Picture the
situation to yourself! The wise men or governors of the pueblos are
always old men elected out of respect for their superior wisdom, men
used to having their slightest word implicitly obeyed. Whipped, shamed,
disgraced, they dispersed from the Palace, down the Rio Grande to
Isleta, west to the city on the impregnable rocks of Acoma, north to
that whole group of pueblo cities from Jemez to Santa Fe and Pecos and
Taos. What do you think they did? Fill up the underground _estufas_ and
hang their heads in shame among men? Then, you don't know the Indian!
You may break his neck; but you can't bend it. The very first thing they
did was to gather their young warriors in the _estufas_. Picture that
scene to yourself, too! An old rain priest at San Ildefonso, through the
kindness of Dr. Hewitt of the Archaeological School, took us down the
_estufa_ at that pueblo, where some of the bloodiest scenes of the
rebellion were enacted. Needless to say, he took us down in the day
time, when there are no ceremonies.
[Illustration: An adobe gateway of old-world charm in Santa Fe]
The _estufa_ is large enough to seat three or four hundred men. It is
night time. A few oil tapers are burning in stone saucers, the pueblo
lamp. The warriors come stealing down the ladder. No woman is admitted.
The men are dressed in linen trousers with colored blankets fastened
Grecian fashion at the waist. They seat themselves silently on the adobe
or cement benches around the circular wall. The altar place, whence
comes the Sacred Fire from the gods of the under world, is situated just
under the ladder. The priests descend, four or five of them, holding
their blankets in a square that acts as a drop curtain concealing the
altar. When all have descended, a trap door of brush above is closed.
The taper lamps go out. The priests drop their blankets; and behold on
the altar the sacred fire; and the outraged wise man in impassioned
speech denouncing white man rule, insult to the Indian gods, destruction
of the Spanish ruler!
Of the punished medicine men, one of the most incensed was an elderly
Indian called Pope, said to be originally from San Juan, but at that
time living in Taos. I don't know what ground there is for it, but
tradition has it that when Pope effected the curtain drop round the
sacred fire of the _estufa_ in Taos, he produced, or induced the
warriors looking on breathlessly to believe that he produced, three
infernal spirits from the under world, who came from the great war-god
Montezuma to command the pueblo race to unite with the Navajo and Apache
in driving the white man from the Southwest. If there be any truth in
the tradition, it is not hard to account for the trick. Tradition or
trick, it worked like magic. The warriors believed. Couriers went
scurrying by night from town to town, with the knotted cord--some say it
was of deer thong, others of palm leaf. The knots represented the number
of days to the time of uprising. The man, for instance, who ran from
Taos to Pecos, would pull out a knot for each day he ran. A new courier
would carry the cord on to the next town. There was some confusion about
the untying of those knots. Some say the rebellion was to take place on
the 11th of August, 1682; others, on the 13th. Anyway, the first blow
was struck on the 10th. Not a pueblo town failed to rally to the call,
as the Highlanders of old responded to the signal of the bloody cross.
New Mexico at this time numbered some 3,000 Spanish colonists, the
majority living on ranches up and down the Rio Grande and surrounding
Santa Fe. The captain-general, who had had nothing to do with the
foolish decrees that produced the revolt, happened to be Don Antonio de
Otermin, with Alonzo Garcia as his lieutenant. In spite of no women
being admitted to the secret, the secret leaked out. Pope's son-in-law,
the governor of San Juan, was setting out to betray the whole plot to
the Spaniards, when he was killed by Pope's own hand.
Such widespread preparations could not proceed without the Mission
converts getting some inkling; and on August 9, Governor Otermin heard
that two Indians of Tesuque out from Santa Fe had been ordered to join a
rebellion. He had the Indians brought before him in the audience chamber
on the 10th. They told him all they knew; and they warned him that any
warrior refusing to take part would be slain. Here, as always in times
of great confusion, the main thread of the story is lost in a
multiplicity of detail. Warning had also come down from the alcalde at
Taos. Otermin scarcely seems to have grasped the import of the news; for
all he did was to send his own secret scouts out, warning the settlers
and friars to seek refuge in Isleta, or Santa Fe; but it was too late.
The Indians got word they had been betrayed and broke loose in a mad
lust of revenge and blood that very Saturday when the governor was
sending out his spies.
It would take a book to tell the story of all the heroism and martyrdom
of the different Missions. Parkman has told the story of the martyrdom
of the Jesuits in French Canada; and many other books have been written
on the subject. No Parkman has yet risen to tell the story of the
martyrdom of the Franciscans in New Mexico. In one fell day, before the
captain-general knew anything about it, 400 colonists and twenty-one
missionaries had been slain--butchered, shot, thrown over the rocks,
suffocated in their burning chapels. Pope was in the midst of it all,
riding like an incarnate fury on horseback wearing a bull's horn in the
middle of his forehead. Apaches and Navajos, of course, joined in the
loot. At Taos, out of seventy whites, two only escaped; and they left
their wives and children dead on the field and reached Isleta only after
ten days' wandering in the mountains at night, having hidden by day. At
little Tesuque, north of Santa Fe, only the alcalde escaped by spurring
his horse to wilder pace than the Indians could follow. The alcalde had
seen the friar flee to a ravine. Then an Indian came out wearing the
priest's shield; and it was blood-spattered. At Santa Clara, soldiers,
herders and colonists were slain on the field as they worked. The women
and children were carried off to captivity from which they never
returned. At Galisteo, the men were slain, the women carried off.
Rosaries were burned in bonfires. Churches were plundered and profaned.
At Santo Domingo, the bodies of the three priests were piled in a heap
in front of the church, as an insult to the white man faith that would
have destroyed the Indian _estufas_. Down at Isleta, Garcia, the
lieutenant, happened to be in command, and during Saturday night and
Sunday morning, he rounded inside the walls of Isleta seven
missionaries and 1,500 settlers, of whom only 200 had firearms.
What of Captain-General Otermin, cooped up in the Governor's Palace of
Santa Fe, awaiting the return of his scouts? The reports of his scouts,
one may guess. Reports came dribbling in till Tuesday, and by that time
there were no Spanish left alive outside Santa Fe and Isleta. Then
Otermin bestirred himself mightily. Citizens were called to take refuge
in the Palace. The armory was opened and arquebuses handed out to all
who could bear arms. The Holy Sacrament was administered. Then the
sacred vessels were brought to the Governor's Palace and hidden. There
were now 1,000 persons cooped up in the Governor's Palace, less than 100
capable of bearing arms. Trenches were dug, windows barricaded, walls
fortified. Armed soldiers mounted the roofs of houses guarding the Plaza
and in the streets approaching it were stationed cannon.
Having wiped out the settlements, the pueblos and their allies swooped
down on Santa Fe, led by Juan of Galisteo riding with a convent flag
round his waist as sash. To parley with an enemy is folly. Otermin sent
for Juan to come to the Palace; and in the audience chamber upbraided
him. Juan, one may well believe, laughed. He produced two crosses--a red
one and a white one. If the Spaniards would accept the white one and
withdraw, the Indians would desist from attack; if not--then--red stood
for blood. Otermin talked about "pardon for treason," when he should
have struck the impudent fellow to earth, as De Vargas, or old
Frontenac, would have done in like case.
When Juan went back across the Plaza, the Indians howled with joy,
danced dervish time all night, rang the bells of San Miguel, set fire to
the church and houses, and cut the water supply off from the yard of the
Palace. The valor of the Spaniards could not have been very great from
August 14th to 20th, for only five of the 100 bearing arms were killed.
At a council of war on the night of August 19th, it was decided to
attempt to rush the foe, trampling them with horses, and to beat a way
open for retreat. Otermin says 300 Indians were killed in this rally;
but it is a question. The Governor himself came back with an arrow wound
in his forehead and a flesh wound near his heart. Within twenty-four
hours, he decided--whichever way you like to put it--"to go to the
relief of Isleta," where he thought his lieutenant was; or "to retreat"
south of the Rio Grande. The Indians watched the retreat in grim
silence. The Spanish considered their escape "a miracle." It was a
pitiful wresting of comfort from desperation.
But at Isleta, the Governor found that his lieutenant had already
retreated taking 1,500 refugees in safety with him. It was the end of
September when Otermin himself crossed the Rio Grande, at a point not
far from modern El Paso. At Isleta, the people will tell you to this day
legends of the friar's martyrdom. Every Mexican believes that the holy
_padre_ buried in a log hollowed out for coffin beneath the chapel rises
every ten years and walks through the streets of Isleta to see how his
people are doing. Once every ten years or so, the Rio Grande floods
badly; and the year of the flood, the ghost of the friar rises to warn
his people. Be that as it may, a few years ago, a deputation of
investigators took up the body to examine the truth of the legend. It
lies in a state of perfect preservation in its log coffin.
The pueblos had driven the Spanish south of the Rio Grande and
practically kept them south of the Rio Grande for ten years. Churches
were burned. Images were profaned. Priestly vestments decked wild Indian
lads. Converts were washed in Santa Fe River to cleanse them of baptism.
All the records in the Governor's Palace were destroyed, and the Palace
itself given over to wild orgies among the victorious Indians; but the
victory brought little good to the tribes. They fell back to their
former state of tribal raid and feud. Drought spoiled the crops; and
perhaps, after all, the consolation and the guidance of the Spanish
priests were missed. When the Utes heard that the Spanish had retreated,
these wild marauders of the northern desert fell on the pueblo towns
like wolves. There is a legend, also, that at this time there were great
earthquakes and many heavenly signs of displeasure. Curiously enough,
the same legends exist about Montreal and Quebec. Otermin hung timidly
on the frontier, crossing and recrossing the Rio Grande; but he could
make no progress in resettling the colonists.
Comes on the scene now--1692-98--Don Diego de Vargas. It isn't so much
what he did; for when you are brave enough, you don't need to do. The
doors of fate open before the golden key. He resubjugated the Southwest
for Spain; and he resubjugated it as much by force of clemency as force
of cruelty. But mark the point--it was _force that did it, not
pow-wowing and parleying and straddling cowardice with conscience_. De
Vargas could muster only 300 men at El Paso, including loyal Indians. On
August 21, 1692, he set out for the north.
It has taken many volumes to tell of the victories of Frontenac. It
would take as many again to relate the victories of De Vargas. He was
accompanied, of course, by the fearless and quenchless friars. All the
pueblos passed on the way north he found abandoned; but when he reached
Santa Fe on the 13th of September, he found it held and fortified by the
Indians. The Indians were furiously defiant; they would perish, but
surrender--never! De Vargas surrounded them and cut off the water
supply. The friars approached under flag of truce. Before night, Santa
Fe had surrendered without striking a blow. One after another, the
pueblos were visited and pacified; but it was not all easy victory. The
Indians did not relish an order a year later to give up occupation of
the Palace and retire to their own villages. In December they closed all
entrances to the Plaza and refused to surrender. De Vargas had prayers
read, raised the picture of the Virgin on the battle flag, and advanced.
Javelins, boiling water, arrows, assailed the advancing Spaniards; but
the gate of the Plaza stockade was attacked and burned. Reinforcements
came to the Indians, and both sides rested for the night. During the
night, the Indian governor hanged himself. Next morning, seventy of the
Indians were seized and court-martialed on the spot. De Vargas planted
his flag on the Plaza, erected a cross and thanked God.
[Illustration: A view of part of San Ildefonso, New Mexico, showing the
famous Black Mesa in the background]
One of the hardest fights of '94 was out on the Black Mesa, a huge
precipitous square of basalt, frowning above San Ildefonso. This mesa
was a famous prayer shrine to the Indians and is venerated as sacred to
this day. All sides are sheer but that towards the river. Down this is a
narrow trail like a goat path between rocks that could be hurled on
climbers' heads. De Vargas stormed the Black Mesa, on top of which great
numbers of rebels had taken refuge. Four days the attack lasted, his 100
soldiers repeatedly reaching the edge of the summit only to be hurled
down. After ten days the siege had to be abandoned, but famine had done
its work among the Indians. For five years, the old general slept in his
boots and scarcely left the warpath. It was at the siege of the Black
Mesa that he is said to have made the vow to build a chapel to the
Virgin; and it is his siege of Santa Fe that the yearly De Vargas
Celebration commemorates to this day. And in the end, he died in his
boots on the march at Bernalillo, leaving in his will explicit
directions that he should be buried in the church of Santa Fe "under the
high altar beneath the place where the priest puts his feet when he says
mass." The body was carried to the parish church in his bed of state and
interred beneath the altar; and the De Vargas celebration remains to
this day one of the quaintest ceremonies of the old Governor's Palace.