The Viga during the Carnival--Variety of Equipages--The Millionaires--The
Monks--Masked Ball--An Alarming Sight--Medical Students--Dinner at the
Prussian Minister's--Rides on Horseback--Indian Love of Flowers--Santa
Anita--The Chinampas--Their Origin--Indians in Canoes--Song of "El Palomo"
--Fighting--The Great Lakes--The Drain of Huehuetoca--The great Market of
Tlatelolco.
16th March.
We are now in Lent in the midst of prayer, church-going, and fasting. The
carnival was not very gay, with the exception of a few public masked balls
and very brilliant _paseos_. The Viga is one of the most beautiful
promenades imaginable, though it might easily be rendered still more so;
but even as it is, with its fine shady trees and canal, along which the
lazy canoes are constantly gliding, it would be difficult, on a fine
evening, just before sunset, especially on the evening of a fête-day, to
find anywhere a prettier or more characteristic scene. Which rank of
society shows the most taste in their mode of enjoyment, must be left to
the scientific to determine; the Indians, with their flower-garlands and
guitars, lying in their canoes, and dancing and singing after their own
fashion as they glide along the water, inhaling the balmy breezes; or the
ladies, who shut up in their close carriages, promenade along in full dress
and silence for a given space of time, acknowledging by a gentle movement
of their fan, the salutations of their fair friends from the recesses of
their coaches, and seeming to dread lest the air of heaven should visit
them too roughly; though the soft breeze, laden with balm, steals over the
sleepy water, and the last rays of the sun are gilding the branches of the
trees with a broken and flickering light....
Then at certain intervals of time each carriage slowly draws up beside its
neighbour (as in the other paseo); the elegant _carratela_ beside the
plebeian hackney-coach; the splendid equipage of the millionaire beside the
lumbering and antique vehicle whose fashion hath now departed. There sit
the inmates in silence, as if the business of life were over, and it was
now their part to watch the busy world from the loopholes of their retreat,
and see it rolling along whilst they take their rest. The gentlemen also
draw up their prancing steeds, though not within hail of the carriages, but
they in the fresh air and under the green trees have as much advantage over
the Señoras as the wandering friar has over the cloistered nun.
Yet enter the Viga about five o'clock, when freshly watered, and the
soldiers have taken their stand to prevent disturbance, and two long lines
of carriages are to be seen going and returning as far as the eye can
reach, and hundreds of gay plebeians are assembled on the sidewalks with
flowers and fruit and _dulces_ for sale, and innumerable equestrians in
picturesque dresses, and with spirited horses, fill up the interval between
the carriages, and the canoes are covering the canal, the Indians singing
and dancing lazily as the boats steal along, and the whole under a blue and
cloudless sky, and in that pure clear atmosphere: and could you only shut
your eyes to the one disagreeable feature in the picture, the number of
léperos busy in the exercise of their vocation, you would believe that
Mexico must be the most flourishing, most enjoyable, and most peaceful
place in the world, and moreover the wealthiest; not a republic, certainly,
for there is no well-dressed _people_; hardly a connecting link between the
blankets and the satins, the poppies and the diamonds. As for the
carriages, many would not disgrace Hyde Park, though there are some that
would send a shiver all along Bond-street; but the very contrast is
amusing, and upon the whole, both as to horses and equipages, there is much
more to admire than to criticise....
There, for example, is the handsome carriage of the rich -----, who has one
of the finest houses in Mexico; his wife wears a velvet turban twisted with
large pearls, and has at this moment a cigar in her mouth. She is not
pretty, but her jewels are superb. How he made his fortune, partly by
gambling, and partly by even less honourable means, let some abler
chronicler relate. Or look at this elegant _carratela_, with its glass
sides all open, giving to view a constellation of fair ones, and drawn by
handsome gray _frisones_. These ladies are remarkable as having a more
European air than most others, brighter colours, longer and simpler
dresses, and Paris bonnets. Perhaps they have been in Europe. It is
remarkable that the horses of the gentlemen all appear peculiarly
unmanageable every time they pass this carriage. Another handsome, plain
carriage, containing the family of one of the Ministers; mother and
daughters all beautiful, with Spanish eyes and dark glowing complexions,
followed close by a hackney-coach containing women with rebosos, and little
children, with their faces and fingers all bedaubed with candy.... Some of
the coachmen and footmen wear Mexican dresses, and others have liveries....
But here come three carriages _en suite_, all with the same crimson and
gold livery, all luxurious, and all drawn by handsome white horses. It is
the President? Certainly not; it is too ostentatious. Even royalty goes in
simpler guise, when it condescends to mingle in the amusements of its
subjects. In the first carriage appear the great man himself and his
consort, rather withdrawing from the plebeian gaze. There is here much
crimson and gold, much glass and well-stuffed cushions, much comfort and
magnificence combined. Two handsome northern steeds, white and prancing,
draw this commodious equipage. The next is a splendid coach containing the
children and servants, while in the third, equally magnificent, are the
babies and nurses. By the side of the first carriage rides an elderly
gentleman, who, were his seat firmer, might be mistaken for a _picador_. He
wears a rich Mexican dress, all covered with gold embroidery; his hat with
gold rolls is stuck jauntily on one side, contrasting oddly enough with his
uneasy expression of countenance, probably caused by the inward trepidation
of which he cannot wholly repress the outward sign while managing his high-
bred steed, and with his feet pressing his silver stirrups, cautiously
touching him with a whip which has a large diamond in the handle.
But the chief wonder of his equipment, and that which has procured him such
a retinue of little ragged and shouting boys, is his saddle. This
extraordinary piece of furniture, which cost the owner five thousand
dollars, is entirely covered with velvet, richly embossed in massive gold;
he sometimes appears with another, inlaid with pure silver.
His whole appearance is the most singular imaginable, and the perturbation
of spirit in which he must return when it begins to grow dusk, and he
reflects at once upon his own value, and his countrymen's taste for
appropriation, must balance the enjoyment which his vanity receives from
the admiration of the little boys in the Paseo.
Just as these millionaires pass by, an old hackney-coach in their wake,
attracts our attention, exactly the sort of quaint old vehicle in which it
sometimes pleases Lady Morgan to introduce her heroines. In it are six
figures, closely masked, their faces covered with shawls. After many
conjectures, it is impossible to guess whether they are men or women. It
_was_ impossible, but as the carriages return, the wind suddenly blows
aside the shawls of two of the party, and discloses the gowns and hoods of
the--friars! _O tempora! O Mores!_
There were three masked balls at the theatre, of which we only attended
one. We went about ten o'clock to a box on the pit tier, and although a
_pronunciamento_ (a fashionable term here for a revolution) was
prognosticated, we found everything very quiet and orderly, and the ball
very gay and crowded. As we came in, and were giving our tickets, a number
of masks came springing by, shrieking out our names in their unearthly
voices. Captain G----, brother of Lord -----, came to our box; also a scion
of _La jeune France_, M. de C----, who condescendingly kept his hat on
during the whole evening. In a box directly above us were the French
legation who arrived lately. Amongst the women, the dresses were for the
most part dominoes, adopted for greater concealment, as it was not
considered very creditable to be there.
There were also several in men's attire, chiefly French modistes, generally
a most disreputable set here, and numerous men dressed as women. There were
masked Poblanas without stockings, and with very short petticoats; knights
in armour; innumerable dresses probably borrowed from the theatre, and even
more than the usual proportion of odd figures. The music was very good, and
the dancers waltzed and _galloped_, and flew round the room like furies.
There was at least no want of animation. Hundreds of masks spoke to us, but
I discovered no one. One in a domino was particularly anxious to direct my
attention to the Poblana dress, and asked me if it would have done for me
to attend a fancy ball in such a costume. Very angry at his absurdity, I
began to explain how I should have dressed, when I recollected the folly of
explaining anything to a creature whom I did not know. C---n stepped out of
the box, to walk amongst the crowd, at which various masks showed great
signs of joy, surrounding and shaking hands with him. The boxes were filled
with ladies, and the scene was very amusing. Señor M----, whose box we
occupied, ordered in cakes and wine, and about one o'clock we left the
ball-room and returned home, one of our soldiers acting as lackey....
I paid a visit the other day, which merits to be recorded. It was to the
rich Señora -----, whose first visit I had not yet returned. She was at
home, and I was shown into a very large drawing-room, where, to my
surprise, I found the lamps, mirrors, etc., covered with black crape, as in
cases of mourning here. I concluded that some one of the family was dead,
and that I had made a very ill-timed first visit. However I sat down, when
my eyes were instantly attracted by _something awful_, placed directly in
front of the sofa where I sat. There were six chairs ranged together, and
on these lay stretched out a figure, apparently a dead body, about six feet
long, enveloped in black cloth, the feet alone visible, from their pushing
up the cloth. Oh, horror! Here I sat, my eyes fixed upon this mysterious
apparition, and lost in conjecture as to whose body it might be. The master
of the house? He was very tall, and being in bad health might have died
suddenly. My being received, argued nothing against this, since the first
nine days after a death, the house is invariably crowded with friends and
acquaintances, and the widow, or orphan, or childless mother must receive
the condolences of all and sundry, in the midst of her first bitter sorrow.
There seems to be no idea of grief wishing for solitude.
Pending these reflections, I sat uneasily, feeling or fancying a heavy air
in the apartment, and wishing, most sincerely, that some living person
would enter. I thought even of slipping away, but feared to give offence,
and in fact began to grow so nervous, that when the Señora de ----- entered
at length, I started up as if I had heard a pistol. She wore a coloured
muslin gown and a blue shawl; no signs of mourning!
After the complimentary preface, I asked particularly after her husband,
keeping a side glance on the mysterious figure. He was pretty well. Her
family? Just recovered from the smallpox, after being severely ill. "Not
dangerously?" said I, hesitatingly, thinking she might have a _tall son_,
and that she alluded to the recovery of the others. "No;" but her sister's
children had been alarmingly ill. "Not _lost_ any, I hope?"--"None." Well,
so taken up was I, that conversation flagged, and I answered and asked
questions at random, until, at last, I happened to ask the lady if she were
going to the country soon. "Not to remain. But to-morrow we are going to
convey a _Santo Cristo_ (a figure of the Crucifixion) there, which has just
been made for the chapel;" glancing towards the figure; "for which reason
this room is, as you see, hung with black." I never felt so relieved in my
life, and thought of the Mysteries of Udolpho.
The houses being so large, and the servants not drilled to announce
visitors; besides that the entresols are frequently let to other families,
it is a matter of no small difficulty for a stranger to pioneer him or
herself into the presence of the people of the house. The mistakes that I
have made! for not being aware of this fact concerning the entresols, which
are often large and handsome, and the porter having begged me to walk up, I
generally stopped at the first landing-place, and then _walked up_ to the
first door that I saw. I did walk in one morning upon two gentlemen who
seemed marvellously startled by my visit. They looked like two medical
students, and were engaged before a table, Heaven knows how; dissecting, I
imagine. I inquired for the Señora -----, which astonished them still more,
as well it might. However, they were very civil, and rushed downstairs to
call up the carriage. After that adventure I never entered a house
unaccompanied by a footman, until I had learnt my way through it.
We had a pleasant dinner-party a few days ago at the Prussian Minister's,
and met the C---s family there. The Condesa de C---- has been a long while
in Europe, and in the best society, and is now entirely devoted to the
education of her daughters, giving them every advantage that Mexico can
afford in the way of masters, besides having at home a Spanish governess to
assist her, an excellent woman, whom they regard as a second mother.
Though there is very little going on in Mexico at present, I amuse myself
very well; there is so much to see, and the people are so kind and
friendly. Having got riding-horses we have been making excursions all round
the country, especially early in the morning, before the sun is high, when
the air is delightfully cool and refreshing. Sometimes we go to the Viga at
six in the morning, to see the Indians bringing in their flowers and
vegetables by the canal. The profusion of sweet-peas, double poppies,
bluebottles, stock gillyflower, and roses, I never saw equalled. Each
Indian woman in her canoe looks as if seated in a floating flower-garden.
The same love of flowers distinguishes them now as in the time of Cortes;
the same which Humboldt remarked centuries afterwards. In the evening these
Indian women, in their canoes, are constantly crowned with garlands of
roses or poppies. Those who sit in the market, selling their fruit or their
vegetables, appear as if they sat in bowers formed of fresh green branches
and coloured flowers. In the poorest village church the floor is strewed
with flowers, and before the service begins fresh nosegays are brought in
and arranged upon the altar. The baby at its christening, the bride at the
altar, the dead body in its bier, are all adorned with flowers. We are told
that in the days of Cortes a bouquet of rare flowers was the most valuable
gift presented to the ambassadors who visited the court of Montezuma, and
it presents a strange anomaly, this love of flowers having existed along
with their sanguinary worship and barbarous sacrifices.
We went the other evening on the canal, in a large canoe with an awning, as
far as the little village of Santa Anita, and saw, for the first time, the
far-famed Chinampas, or floating gardens, which have now become fixtures,
and are covered with vegetables, intermingled with flowers, with a few poor
huts beside them, occupied by the Indians, who bring these to the city for
sale. There were cauliflowers, chili, tomatoes, cabbages, and other
vegetables, but I was certainly disappointed in their beauty. They are
however curious, on account of their origin. So far back as 1245, it is
said the wandering Aztecs or Mexicans arrived first at Chapultepec, when,
being persecuted by the princes of Taltocan, they took refuge in a group of
islands to the south of the lake of Tezcuco. Falling under the yoke of the
Tezcucan kings, they abandoned their island home and fled to Tezapan,
where, as a reward for assisting the chiefs of that country in a war
against other petty princes, they received their freedom, and established
themselves in a city to which they gave the name of Mexicalsingo, from
Mejitli, their god of war--now a collection of strong barns and poor huts.
But they did not settle there, for to obey an oracle they transported
themselves from this city to the islands east of Chapultepec to the western
side of the lake of Tezcuco. An ancient tradition had long been current
amongst them, that wherever they should behold an eagle seated upon a nopal
whose roots pierced a rock, there they should found a great city. In 1325
they beheld this sign, and on the spot, in an island in the lake, founded
the first house of God--the Teocalli, or Great Temple of Mexico. During all
their wanderings, wherever they stopped, the Aztecs cultivated the earth,
and lived upon what nature gave them. Surrounded by enemies and in the
midst of a lake where there are few fish, necessity and industry compelled
them to form floating fields and gardens on the bosom of the waters.
They weaved together the roots of aquatic plants, intertwined with twigs
and light branches, until they had formed a foundation sufficiently strong
to support a soil formed of the earth which they drew from the bottom of
the lake; and on it they sowed their maize, their chili, and all other
plants necessary for their support. These floating gardens were about a
foot above the water, and in the form of a long square. Afterwards, in
their natural taste for flowers, they not only cultivated the useful but
the ornamental, and these small gardens multiplying were covered with
flowers and aromatic herbs, which were used in the worship of the gods, or
were sent to ornament the palace of the emperor. The Chinampas along the
canal of the Viga are no longer floating gardens, but fixed to the mainland
in the marshy grounds lying between the two great lakes of Chalco and
Tezcuco. A small trench full of water separates each garden; and though now
in this marshy land they give but a faint idea of what they may have been
when they raised their flower-crowned heads above the clear waters of the
lake, and when the Indians, in their barks, wishing to remove their
habitations, could tow along their little islands of roses, it is still a
pretty and a pleasant scene.
We bought numerous garlands of roses and poppies from the Indian children,
both here and at Santa Anita, a little village where we landed, and as we
returned towards evening we were amused by the singing and dancing of the
Indians. One canoe came close up to ours, and kept beside it for some time.
A man was lying lazily at the bottom of the boat tingling his guitar, and
one or two women were dancing monotonously and singing at the same time to
his music. Sundry jars of pulque and earthen dishes with tortillas and
chili and pieces of _tasajo_, long festoons of dried and salted beef,
proved that the party were not without their solid comforts, in spite of
the romantic guitar and the rose and poppy garlands with which the dancing
nymphs were crowned. Amongst others they performed the _Palomo_, the Dove,
one of their most favourite dances. The music is pretty, and I send it to
you with the words, the music from ear; the words are given me by my friend
the Señora A---d, who sings all these little Indian airs in perfection. If
we may form some judgment of a people's civilization by their ballads, none
of the Mexican songs give us a very high idea of theirs. The words are
generally a tissue of absurdities, nor are there any patriotic songs which
their new-born freedom might have called forth from so musical a people. At
least I have as yet only discovered one air of which the words bear
reference to the glorious "Grito de Dolores," and which asserts in rhyme
that on account of that memorable event, the Indian was able to get as
drunk as a Christian! The translation of the Palomo is as follows:
"What are you doing, little dove, there in the wineshop? Waiting for my
love until Tuesday, my life. A dove in flying hurt her little wing.
If you have your dove I have my little dove too. A dove in flying all her
feathers fell off. Women pay badly; not all, but some of them. Little dove
of the barracks, you will tell the drummers when they beat the retreat to
strike up the march of my loves. Little dove, what are you doing there
leaning against that wall? Waiting for my dove till he brings me something
to eat." At the end of each verse the chorus of "Palomita, palomo, palomo."
Yet, monotonous as it is, the air is so pretty, the women sang so softly
and sleepily, the music sounded so soothingly as we glided along the water,
that I felt in a pleasant half-dreamy state of perfect contentment, and was
sorry when, arriving at the landing-place, we had to return to a carriage
and civilized life, with nothing but the garlands of flowers to remind us
of the Chinampas.
Unfortunately these people generally end by too frequent applications to
the jarro of pulque, or what is worse to the pure spirit known by the name
of _chingturite;_ the consequence of which is, that from music and dancing
and rose-becrowning, they proceed to quarrelling and jealousy and
drunkenness, which frequently terminates in their fighting, stabbing each
other, or throwing each other into the canal. "The end crowns the work."
Noble as this present city of Mexico is, one cannot help thinking how much
more picturesque the ancient Tenochtitlan was, and how much more fertile
its valley must have been, on account of the great lakes. Yet even in the
time of Cortes these lakes had no great depth of water, and still further
back, in the time of the Indian Emperors, navigation had been so frequently
interrupted in seasons of drought, that an aqueduct had been constructed in
order to supply the canals with water.
After this, the Spaniards, like all new settlers, hewed down the fine trees
in this beautiful valley, both on plain and mountain, leaving the bare soil
exposed to the vertical rays of the sun. Then their well-founded dread of
inundation caused them to construct the famous _Desague_ of Huehuetoca, the
drain or subterranean conduit or channel in the mountain for drawing off
the waters of the lakes; thus leaving marshy lands or sterile plains
covered with carbonate of soda, where formerly were silver lakes covered
with canoes. This last was a necessary evil, since the Indian emperors
themselves were sensible of its necessity and had formed great works for
draining the lakes, some remains of which works still exist in the vicinity
of the Penon. The great Desague was begun in 1607, when the Marquis of
Salinas was viceroy of Mexico; and the operations were commenced with great
pomp, the viceroy assisting in person, mass being said on a portable altar,
and fifteen hundred workmen assembled, while the marquis himself began the
excavation by giving the first stroke with a spade. From 1607 to 1830,
eight millions of dollars were expended, and yet this great work was not
brought to a conclusion. However, the limits of the two lakes of Zumpango
and San Cristobal, to the north of the valley, were thus greatly reduced,
and the lake of Tezcuco, the most beautiful of all the five, no longer
received their contributions. Thus the danger of inundations has
diminished, but water and vegetation have diminished also, and the suburbs
of the city, which were formerly covered with beautiful gardens, now
present to the eye an arid expanse of efflorescent salt. The plains near
San Lazaro especially, in their arid whiteness, seem characteristic of the
unfortunate victims of leprosy enclosed in the walls of that hospital.
We rode out the other day by the _barrio_, or ward of Santiago, which
occupies part of the ancient Tlatelolco, which once constituted a separate
state, had kings of its own, and was conquered by a Mexican monarch, who
made a communication by bridges between it and Mexico. The great market
mentioned by Cortes was held here, and its boundaries are still pointed
out, whilst the convent chapel stands on the height where Cortes erected a
battering engine, when he was besieging the Indian Venice.