New Minister--San Angel--Profitable Pulque Estate--The Village--Surrounding
Scenery--The Indians--The Padre--The Climate--Holy Week in the
Country--Dramatic Representations--Coyohuacan--The Pharisees--Image of the
Saviour--Music and Dresses--Procession--Catholicism amongst the
Indians--Strange Tradition--Paul the Fifth--Contrast between a Mexican and
a New England Village--Love of Fireworks--Ferdinand the Seventh--Military
Ball--_Drapeaux_.
SAN ANGEL, March 30th.
It is a long while since I last wrote, but this week has been employed in
moving into the country, and making arrangements for the sale of our
furniture, in consequence of our having received official news from Spain
of the nomination of a new envoy extraordinary and Minister plenipotentiary
to the republic of Mexico. As, on account of the yellow fever at Vera Cruz,
we shall not wish to pass through that city later than May, it is necessary
to be in readiness to start when the new Minister arrives. On Thursday last
we came out to this place, within three leagues of Mexico, where Don
Francisco Tagle has kindly lent us his unoccupied country house. As we had
an infinity of arrangements to make, much to bring out, and much to leave,
and _all Mexico_ to see, you will excuse this long silence. Our house in
town we leave to the guardianship of the housekeeper; the other servants
follow us here.
This house is very large, and has a fine garden and orchard full of fruit,
with pretty walks all through it, and a sort of underwood of roses and
sweet peas. It is a great pulque hacienda, and, besides what is sent into
Mexico for sale, the court is constantly filled with the half-naked Indians
from the village, who come to have their _jarros_ filled with that
inspiring beverage. Then there is Doña Barbara (the guardian of the
pulque), a Spanish administrador, a number of good-looking Indian women,
and babies _à discrétion_. There is a small chapel, a piazza, with handsome
pillars going all round the interior courtyard of the house, a
billiard-table, and plenty of good rooms. In front of the house are the
maguey-fields, and the azotea commands a beautiful view of the neighbouring
villages, San Angel, Coyohuacan, Miscuaque, etc., with their woods and
gardens, as well as of the city itself, with its lakes and volcanoes.
As C---n's affairs take him to Mexico nearly every day, we feel a little
lonely in this large house, even though perfectly comfortable; and besides
the extreme stillness and solitude, it is not considered safe for us to
walk out alone; consequently the orchard must bound our wishes. And, of
course, being prohibited from going further, we have the greatest desire to
do so! In the evening, however, when our _caballeros_ return, we frequently
walk down to the village, where the English Minister has also a house.
San Angel is pretty in its own way, with its fields of maguey, its
scattered houses, that look like the _beaux restes_ of better days, its
market-place, parish church, church of El Carmen, with the monastery and
high-walled gardens adjoining; with its narrow lanes, Indian huts,
profusion of pink roses, little bridge and avenue, and scattered clusters
of trees; its houses for _temperamento_ (_constitution_, as they call those
where Mexican families come to reside in summer), with their grated
windows, and gardens and orchards; and then the distant view of Mexico,
with the cathedral towers, volcanoes, and lofty mountains, scattered
churches and long lines of trees; and nearer, the pretty villages of
Coyohuacan and Miscuaque; and everywhere the old church, the broken arch,
the ancient cross, with its faded flower-garlands, to commemorate a murder,
or erected as an act of piety--all is so characteristic of Mexico, that the
landscape could belong to no other part of the known world.
There is the Indian with his blanket, extracting the pulque from the
maguey; the ranchero, with her reboso and broad-brimmed hat passing by upon
her ass; the old lépero, in rags, sitting basking in the sun upon the stone
seat in front of the door; the poor Indian woman, with matted hair and
brown baby hanging behind her, refreshing herself by drinking three
_elacos_ (halfpence) worth of pulque from a _jarrito_ (little earthen jar);
the portly and well-looking padre prior del Carden (the Carmelite friar),
sauntering up the lane at a leisurely pace, all the little ragged boys,
down to the merest urchin that can hardly lisp, dragging off their large,
well-holed hats, with a "_Buenos días, padrecito!_" (Good-morning, little
father!)--the father replying with a benevolent smile, and a slight sound
in his throat intended for a _Benedicite;_ and all that might be dull in
any other climate brightened and made light and gay by the purest
atmosphere, and bluest sky, and softest air, that ever blew or shone upon a
naughty world.
We are now approaching the holy week once more--in Mexico a scene of
variety in the streets and of splendour in the churches; but in the country
a play, a sort of melodrama, in which the sufferings, death, and burial of
our Saviour are represented by living figures in pantomime. We have heard a
great deal of these representations, and are glad to have the opportunity
of seeing them, which we intend to do in the village of Coyohuacan, where
they are particularly curious. Besides this, our friends the A----s have a
house there for the season, and, as the city of Cortes's predilection, it
is classic ground. Meanwhile, for the last few days, the country has been
overrun with Pharisees, Nazarenes, Jews, and figures of the Saviour,
carried about in procession; all this in preparation for the holy week, a
sort of overture to the drama.
The first evening we arrived here there was a representation of the
Pharisees searching for Christ. The Pharisees were very finely dressed,
either in scarlet stuff and gold or in green and silver, with helmets and
feathers, mounted upon horses which are taught to dance and rear to the
sound of music, so that upon the whole they looked like performers at
Astley's. They came on with music, riding up the lanes until they arrived
in front of this house, which being the principal place hereabouts, they
came to first, and where the Indian workmen and servants were all collected
to see them. They rode about for some time, as if in search of Christ,
until a full-length figure of the Saviour appeared, dressed in purple
robes, carried on a platform by four men, and guarded on all sides by
soldiers. It is singular, that after all there is nothing ridiculous in
these exhibitions; on the contrary, something rather terrible. In the first
place, the music is good, which would hardly be the case in any but a
Mexican village; the dresses are really rich, the gold all real, and the
whole has the effect of confusing the imagination into the belief of its
being a true scene.
The next evening the same procession passed, with some additions, always
accompanied by a crowd of Indians from the villages, men, women, and
children. Bonfires were made before the door of the hacienda, which were
lighted whenever the distant music was heard approaching, and all the
figures in the procession carried lighted lamps. The Saviour was then led
up to the door, and all the crowd went up to kiss his feet. The figure
which is carried about this evening is called "Our Saviour of the Column,"
and represents the Saviour tied to a pillar, bleeding, and crowned with
thorns. All this must sound very profane, but the people are so quiet, seem
so devout, and so much in earnest, that it appears much less so than you
would believe....
The cross was planted here in a congenial soil, and as in the Pagan East
the statues of the divinities frequently did no more than change their
names from those of heathen gods to those of Christian saints, and
image-worship apparently continued, though the mind of the Christian was
directed from the being represented to the true and only God who inhabits
eternity, so here the poor Indian still bows before visible representations
of saints and virgins, as he did in former days before the monstrous shapes
representing the unseen powers of the air, the earth, and the water; but
he, it is to be feared, lifts his thoughts no higher than the rude image
which a rude hand has carved. The mysteries of Christianity, to affect his
untutored mind, must be visibly represented to his eyes. He kneels before
the bleeding image of the Saviour who died for him, before the gracious
form of the Virgin who intercedes for him; but he believes that there are
many Virgins, of various gifts, and possessing various degrees of
miraculous power and different degrees of wealth, according to the quality
and number of the diamonds and pearls with which they are endowed--one even
who is the rival of the other--one who will bring rain when there is
drought, and one to whom it is well to pray in seasons of inundation.
Mexico owes much of its peculiar beauty to the religious or superstitious
feelings of its inhabitants. At every step we see a white cross gleaming
amongst the trees, in a solitary path, or on the top of some rugged and
barren rock--a symbol of faith in the desert place; and wherever the
footsteps of man have rested, and some three or four have gathered
together, there, while the ruined huts proclaim the poverty of the inmates,
the temple of God rises in comparative splendour.
It is strange, yet well authenticated, and has given rise to many theories,
that the symbol of the cross was already known to the Indians before the
arrival of Cortes. In the island of Cozumel, near Yucatan, there were
several; and in Yucatan itself, there was a stone cross; and there, an
Indian, considered a prophet among his countrymen, had declared that a
nation bearing the same as a symbol, should arrive from a distant country!
More extraordinary still was a temple dedicated to the Holy Cross by the
Toltec nation in the city of Cholula. Near Tulansingo also, there is a
cross engraved on a rock, with various characters, which the Indians by
tradition attribute to the apostle Saint Thomas. In Oajaca also there
existed a cross which the Indians from time immemorial had been accustomed
to consider as a divine symbol. By order of the Bishop Cervantes, it was
placed in a sumptuous chapel in the cathedral. Information concerning its
discovery, together with a small cross cut out of its wood, was sent to
Rome to Paul the Fifth, who received it on his knees, singing the hymn,
"_Vexilla Regis prodeunt_," etc.
If any one wishes to try the effect of strong contrast, let him come direct
from the United States to this country; but it is in the villages
especially that the contrast is most striking. Travelling in New England,
for example, we arrive at a small and flourishing village. We see four new
churches, proclaiming four different sects; religion suited to all
customers. These wooden churches or meeting-houses are all new, all painted
white, or perhaps a bright red. Hard by is a tavern with a green paling, as
clean and as new as the churches, and there are also various smart _stores_
and neat dwelling-houses; all new, all wooden, all clean, and all
ornamented with slight Grecian pillars. The whole has a cheerful, trim, and
flourishing aspect. Houses, churches, stores, and taverns, all are of a
piece. They are suited to the present emergency, whatever that may be,
though they will never make fine ruins. Everything proclaims prosperity,
equality, consistency; the past forgotten, the present all in all, and the
future taking care of itself. No delicate attentions to posterity, who can
never pay its debts. No beggars. If a man has even a hole in his coat, he
must be lately from the Emerald Isle.
Transport yourself in imagination from this New England village to that
of -----, it matters not which, not far from Mexico. "Look on this picture,
and on that." The Indian huts, with their half-naked inmates, and little
gardens full of flowers; the huts themselves either built of clay, or the
half-ruined _beaux restes_ of some stone building. At a little distance an
hacienda, like a deserted palace, built of solid masonry, with its inner
_patio_ surrounded by thick stone pillars, with great walls and
iron-barred windows that might stand a siege. Here a ruined arch and
cross, so solidly built, that one cannot but wonder how the stones ever
crumbled away. There, rising in the midst of old faithful-looking trees,
the church, gray and ancient, but strong as if designed for eternity; with
its saints and virgins, and martyrs and relics, its gold and silver and
precious stones, whose value would buy up all the spare lots in the New
England village; the lépero with scarce a rag to cover him, kneeling on
that marble pavement. Leave the enclosure of the church, observe the stone
wall that bounds the road for more than a mile; the fruit trees overtopping
it, high though it be, with their loaded branches. This is the convent
orchard. And that great Gothic pile of building, that stands in hoary
majesty, surmounted by the lofty mountains, whose cloud-enveloped summits,
tinged by the evening sun, rise behind it; what could so noble a building
be but the monastery, perhaps of the Carmelites, because of its exceeding
rich garden, and well-chosen site, for they, of all monks, are richest in
this world's goods. Also we may see the reverend old prior riding slowly
from under the arched gate up the village lanes, the Indians coming from
their huts to do him lowly reverence as he passes. Here, everything reminds
us of the past; of the conquering Spaniards, who seemed to build for
eternity; impressing each work with their own solid, grave, and religious
character; of the triumphs of catholicism; and of the Indians when Cortes
first startled them from their repose, and stood before them like the
fulfilment of a half-forgotten prophecy. It is the present that seems like
a dream, a pale reflection of the past. All is decaying and growing
fainter, and men seem trusting to some unknown future which they may never
see. One government has been abandoned, and there is none in its place. One
revolution follows another, yet the remedy is not found. Let them beware
lest half a century later, they be awakened from their delusion, and find
the cathedral turned into a meeting-house, and all painted white; the
_railing_ melted down; the silver transformed into dollars; the Virgin's
jewels sold to the highest bidder; the floor washed (which would do it no
harm), and round the whole, a nice new wooden paling, freshly done in
green--and all this performed by some of the artists from the _wide-awake_
republic farther north.
Just as I wrote these words, a shower of crackers startled me from the
profane ideas in which I was indulging, and the prancing of the horses of
Jews and Pharisees, and the crackling of bonfires, warn me that it is time
to take an evening stroll, that the sun is down, and the air refreshing.
However, as to crackers and rockets, the common people enjoy them by day as
much as by night. It is their favourite method of commemorating any event,
evil or religious. "What do you suppose the Mexicans will be doing now?"
said King Ferdinand to a Mexican who was at the Spanish court, shortly
after the final success of the Revolutionists. "Letting off rockets, your
Majesty," answered the Mexican. "Well--I wonder what they are doing now in
Mexico!" said the King in the afternoon. "_Tirando cohetes_--letting off
rockets, your Majesty." His Majesty chose to repeat the question in the
evening. "What will your countrymen be doing now?" "The same thing, your
Majesty. Still letting off rockets."
Yesterday we drove into Mexico, to see how matters stood in our house, and
received a number of visitors in our deserted apartments. Just before we
left Mexico for this place, three very magnificent aides-de-camp brought us
an invitation from General Valencia, to attend a ball to be given by him
and other officers, in the theatre, to the president, on the occasion of
his excellency's being declared "benemerito de la patria." We did not go,
as we were setting off for the country, but C---n being requested, as were
the other Ministers, to send the colours of his nation, did so, and to-day
there is much talk in Mexico, besides a paragraph in the newspapers,
connected with these matters. It appears that the _drapeaux_ whether by
accident or design, were improperly placed, and these faults in etiquette
are not uncommon here. The English Minister having observed that his
_drapeau_ was placed in a subordinate rank, and finding that his warnings
beforehand on the subject, and his representations on seeing it were
neglected, cut it down and left the ballroom, followed by all the English
who were there.