Sierra, together with a most courteous letter from ourselves, at
the House of the Governor. Not only did Señor Molina do nothing
for us; he had not even the courtesy to acknowledge the letters; a
breach of manners for which there could be no excuse.
We regret to tell Your Excellency that during the subsequent
months we spent in Yucatan we met with discourtesy, inhospitality
and neglect from the officials such as would be impossible here in
England if one of your people visited us. We went among the
Yucatecans with no feelings but those of kindliness, and an
enthusiastic interest in the attempt we were making to throw fresh
light upon the problem of Mayan archæology. But for those foolish
enough to take an interest in their country's past, Yucatecans,
rich and poor, appear to have no feelings but that of a pitying
contempt combined with an eager desire to share in "plucking"
them.
The only kindness we received was from Spanish Cubans attached to
the plantations, and Señores Aristegui and Augusto Peon, the
latter apologising to us for the gross rudeness of Señor Molina,
whom he declared to be an ill-bred parvenu.
We liked the Indians as much as we disliked the Yucatecans, and we
deeply regret the terrible cruelties and massacres which we know
have been and we fear still are being perpetrated in your name in
Quintana Roo. The state of that Territory, as we told Señor Peon
and reported by letter to Señor Sierra, could not possibly be
worse. General Bravo, who behaved to us in a singularly
discourteous and shuffling way, declares the war to be over. This
is absolutely untrue. We lived some time on the east coast and in
Cozumel, and we know that the war can never end except by a brutal
policy of extermination entirely unworthy of Your Excellency's
great record and of Mexico if she is to retain her place among
civilised Powers. General Bravo has no effective control over the
country, as we are prepared to and shall prove in the book which
we are about to publish.
Last, but not least, so-called civilised Yucatan is rotten with a
foul slavery, the blacker because of its hypocrisy and pretence.
We have gathered facts which make truly a sad story. The girls and
women on the haciendas are treated like cattle, a prey to the
detestable lusts of the haciendados and their sons; Indian workmen
are flogged, even to death, and in one case which came to our
knowledge those who attempted to expose such foul murder were put
into Merida prison without trial, and, as we are informed, are
still there. For the Indian there is no justice, and at his
expense the great henequen growers daily increase their millions,
some of which they lavishly used in their attempts to hide from
Your Excellency the utter rottenness and degradation of Yucatan's
social system. If Your Excellency desires particulars we shall
gladly give ourselves the honour of sending names and details.
We have the honour to avail ourselves of the opportunity which now
offers of expressing to you our sentiments of the highest
consideration and respect.
We have the Honour to Remain
Your Excellency's
Obedient and faithful Servants and Admirers
(_Signed_) C. A.
F. J. T. F.
HIS EXCELLENCY
SEÑOR GENERAL DON PORFIRIO DIAZ,
Chapultepec,
Mexico.
CHAPTER XXI
THE GREEN GOLD OF YUCATAN
Eight hundred million Mexican dollars!
Eighty million pounds sterling!
These are the profits which the score or so of Yucatecan henequen
growers are said to have divided in the last fifteen years. What then is
this Pactolus-plant from which has been crushed this river of wealth? It
is true enough that half the world does not know how the other half
lives, and this is a good example, for there is probably not 1 per cent.
of Englishmen, and scarcely more than 10 per cent. of Americans (though
the States is the main market for the staple product of Yucatan) who
could tell you to what botanical family it belongs, or indeed that it is
a plant at all.
Henequen (Spanish _jeniquen_ or _geniquen_) is a fibre commercially
known as Sisal hemp, from the fact that it is obtained from a species of
cactus, the _Agave Sisalensis_, first cultivated around the tiny port of
Sisal in Yucatan. The older Indian name for the plant is _Agave Ixtli_.
From its fleshy leaves is crushed out a fine fibre which, from the fact
that it resists damp better than ordinary hemp, is valuable for making
ships' cables, but the real wealth-producing use of which is so bizarre
that no one in a hundred guesses would hit on it. It is used in the
myriad corn-binding machines of America and Canada. They cannot use
wire, and cheap string is too easily broken. Henequen is at once strong
enough and cheap enough. Hence the piles of money heaping up to the
credit of Yucatecans in the banks of Merida.
There is no doubt that henequen was known to and possibly cultivated by
the ancient inhabitants of Yucatan; but its commercial value was not
discovered until late in the nineteenth century. The first henequen
plantation was formed in 1850. Soon there were several more, though they
were one and all on the humblest scale both as regards extent and
methods of cultivation. It was our good fortune to visit one of the very
earliest, that of Yaxche, now the property of Señor Augusto Peon, and
the photographs reproduced are of that estate. Señor Peon himself
conducted us over it, and told us that as a lad he remembered the first
clearing being made in the woods for the Eldorado-cactus about 1850. A
mere acre, that was all! To-day he has close on six thousand acres under
cultivation on this farm alone, with villages containing four thousand
souls, and it would be quite rash to hazard a guess at his wealth. He is
certainly a sterling millionaire three or four times over, and he told
us that his income had actually doubled in less than ten years. Such is
henequen!
But the plant was a long time winning its way to its present exalted
position. Until within the last thirty years the only market for the
fibre was the Mexican Republic itself, where fortunes were being coined
by the crushing of yet another cactus, the _Agave Americana_ or maguey,
from which is obtained the foul-smelling pulque, dearly loved drink of
all Mexicans. And then three decades back henequen began to win a
reputation abroad, particularly in the States. In 1880, 97,351 bales,
weighing 39,501,725 lb. and valued at about one and three-quarter
million dollars, were exported. In 1904, 627,700 bales, weighing about
207,141,000 lb. and valued at 15,629,730 dollars, were exported, and
during 1906 the amount shipped rose to 726,785 bales, each averaging 330
lb. in weight and totalling in value between twenty-five and twenty-six
million dollars. Of these, 595,024 bales were sent to the United States
(or 186,747 to New Orleans; 144,916 to Boston; 119,688 to New York;
63,620 to Texas City; 59,235 to Mobile; and 20,818 to Galveston); the
remaining 131,761 bales going to various ports in Canada, Europe, and
Cuba.
These amazing figures tell their own tale of the growth of the staple
industry of Yucatan. A local trade has in a few short years become
almost a world-monopoly, and from being a poor land the Peninsula has
become a Monte-Cristo territory. Once the fibre was discovered by the
corn growers, the trade went up by leaps and bounds; but it was the
Spanish-American War of 1898 which gave it its great boom, and it may be
said to be still "booming." The destruction and stoppage of the Manila
hemp crops in the Philippines during the conflict gave the Yucatecans
their chance. They met the shortage, and importers found that they had
in the henequen fibre at once a cheaper and a stronger corn-binder.
To-day Yucatan can sell all the henequen she can grow, and every month
sees more and more woodland reclaimed and prepared to bear its share in
swelling the receipts of the Meridan mushroom millionaires.
In North-West Yucatan you can travel mile after mile, league after
league, and see absolutely nothing but henequen. It seems to need no
soil. Out of the grey boulder-strewn ground stick the great green
pineapple-like stalks crowned with a widely parted bunch of fleshy green
leaves with black thorny points. Planted in even lines about four yards
apart, they stretch endlessly towards the horizon, the monotony broken
only here and there by the grey stone walls, like those of a Yorkshire
farm, which mark off and enclose each plantation. As we wandered round
his huge estate, Señor Peon explained to us the process through which
henequen goes from planting till it is fibre white and clean. In
preparing land for planting it must first be cleared of all timber, and
in the outlying districts from dawn till sundown one hears the ring of
the axe as the Indians fell the trees. After this clearing comes a
period, usually about a year, during which the land is allowed to lie
fallow, the fallen timbers rotting and everything preparing for the
flames. Towards the end of the dry season this burning takes place. This
is also the method of preparing the milpas or maize fields for their new
crops, and thus in April all over the country you see mighty columns of
black smoke rising into the cloudless blue, like the smoke of burnt
offerings to the Harvest-God. If rain does not come--and it very rarely
does--the fallen timber and dried undergrowth burn for days until there
is nothing left but a few black smouldering tree-trunks, which by
another season will have been effectually dealt with by the
broad-mandibled digging ant and the myriad woodlice. A second year is
allowed to pass before the henequen is planted. Usually maize is sown on
the clearing for the season, and then once again they set fire to it all
and with this second conflagration the ground is ready.
But the planter must wait for the rains. These come towards the end of
May. Dark clouds roll up, and between five and six o'clock each day a
sharp shower may be expected. By the middle of June the floods of the
sky break loose, and for hours each day and night the baked earth is
deluged. Now the haciendado must get his plants ready. This is an easy
matter if he has other plantations. In any of these where the agave is
old and has had most of its leaves cut away, he can find what he wants.
From some of the plants a long stalk-like stem will be seen shooting up
from the centre, and this will have thrown out branches from which the
seeds have grown and fallen to the ground. Thus around its base there
will be young seedlings in plenty sprouting. The largest of these are
taken. On the bigger haciendas there are regular nurseries for these
seedlings, which are carefully fostered for a year or so that they may
be of fair size when they are needed for planting out. These are planted
in the new clearing in rows about fourteen feet apart, each plantling
being eight feet from its neighbour.
Now there is a wait of five or six years before the first crop of leaves
can be cut. But if this is rather a wearily long time for the planter to
wait for his returns, at least it is not expensive. For the plants need
little or no attention: all that is necessary is to keep the spaces
between the rows fairly free from weeds which would otherwise smother
the young cactuses. At the end of the fifth year the plants are ready
for their first cutting, and the healthy ones will bear well for twelve
or fifteen years. The cutting is begun at the base of the stem, where
the leaves are more fully developed. Eight to ten are cut at a time, and
usually three or four cuttings are made each year, so that the average
yield of each plant is about thirty-two leaves annually. Slowly year by
year the cutting creeps nearer the top, and the space between the leaves
and the ground becomes greater. When the top is reached all the leaves
which will ever grow have grown and the plant is useless unless the
seed-stem has appeared, when it is left for the production of young
plants. If it has not run to seed, then it is cut down and left to rot,
the ground being ready again at once for replanting.
But the rearing and cutting of this "green gold of Yucatan" is not all.
There is a long process before it is ready to be sold under the hammer
of an American or European auctioneer, in much the same way as cotton is
dealt with on the Liverpool or Manchester Exchanges.
Crossing and recrossing each henequen plantation, small toy-like
two-foot gauge iron tracks are laid, on which small mule-drawn
trolley-cars convey the henequen leaves to the hacienda buildings. On
some of the larger of the haciendas these tracks often cover thirty or
forty miles, and at first sight it would seem an unnecessarily expensive
means of transit, and that it would be cheaper to cart it as an English
farmer does his corn. But when you remember the cost of making level
roads over miles of rock-strewn plantation, and that each fleshy leaf
represents an average weight of four or five pounds, and that on a
trolley-car drawn by one mule can be packed one thousand of these
weighing about two tons and needing four or five carts with mules and
men to match, you see that the trolley method, after the original
outlay, is far cheaper. On the trolleys, then, the henequen leaves are
conveyed to the hacienda buildings, where an elaborate machinery is
waiting to crush out the gold-yielding fibre. The track runs right into
the building, the mule is unhooked, and returns once more to the
plantation with an empty car for another load of fodder for the crusher.
And while the empty car is returning the leaves of the newly arrived
laden car are being dealt with.
Three or four Indians set to work to arrange the leaves so that their
black-pointed ends are all in one direction. Next these thorny points
are severed by a machete and in small bundles of six or eight the leaves
are handed to men who are feeding a sliding belt-like platform about a
yard wide, and on this they are conveyed to the machine. Before they
enter its great blunt-toothed, gaping jaws, they are finally arranged,
as the sliding belt goes its unending round, so that they do not enter
more than one at a time. Woe betide the Indian who has the misfortune to
get his fingers in these revolving jaws of the gigantic crusher, and
many indeed are there fingerless, handless, and armless from this cause.
The leaves enter broadways, for the blunt-toothed rollers are a little
wider than the longest leaves. On entering the first rollers the fleshy
leaf is crushed like sugar-cane in a crusher. The sappy juices fly
around, but the wet, dripping machine continues with its work and the
thick, greeny water runs into a trough below to be carried away in a
channel back to the fields. The leaf is passed from one to another, each
crushing away more fleshy matter until the fourth or fifth roller has
been reached, when it is no longer a leaf, but one mass of greeny-yellow
threads in the hands of an Indian who is kept continually receiving it
as it is thrown from the machine.
The next process is the drying of the fibre, which takes place in
drying-yards. From the machine to these another trolley-track is laid,
and there on wire lines, as will be seen in our illustration, the fibre
is hung in the scorching sun. The Yucatecan can always be sure of his
weather, and the fibre is no more bother to him until the sun has
thoroughly bleached the greeny-yellow threads. Two or three days of this
sunbath is quite enough, and then the last process, before the Yucatecan
rakes in his shekels, is the pressing of the fibre into bales ready for
transport. This final process is very similar to our English
hay-trussing. The fibre is placed in the press, weighed, and compressed
into the smallest possible space and bound with rope.
But what becomes of the green pulpy waste which forms 90 per cent. of
the fleshy leaves before it is put into the machine? Part of this is
water and the remainder, as the fibre is thrown off one roller to
another, falls through the machine into a truck-like trolley awaiting it
underneath. It is a mangled mass of verdure, and to the inexperienced
eye as useless as the green water running away in the narrow channel.
But the Yucatecan finds use for it, and it is carried to the corral,
where we find a herd of cattle making a meal off it amid myriads of
tormenting flies.
The fibre is not sent direct from the grower to the market, but is
passed through the hands of the large agents resident in the country,
who ship it to the various ports. This has become such a trade in itself
that one agent has grown so rich upon his commissions that he now runs a
special line of steamers between Progreso and New York for the traffic,
as well as holding the "lion's share" in the railway concerns of the
Peninsula. Owing to the shallow water at Progreso and the cost of
dredging on coral-beds, he has had to go to the expense of having his
boats built specially for the traffic. But his flat-bottomed
small-draught steamers have made his family one of the richest of the
money-grubbing ring in Yucatan. For there is money for every one who
touches the magic fibre except the miserable Indian, by whose
never-ending labours the purse-proud monopolists of the Peninsula are
enabled to be ever adding to their ill-gotten gold. There are in Yucatan
to-day some 400 henequen plantations of from 25 to 20,000 acres, making
the total acreage under cultivation some 140,000 acres. The cost of
production, including shipping expenses, export duties, etc., is now
about 7 pesos (14s.) per 100 kilogrammes. The average market price of
henequen is 28 pesos per 100 kilogrammes, so the planter gets a return
of 400 per cent. All this is obviously only possible as long as he can
get slave-labour and the hideous truth about the exploitation of the
Mayans is kept dark. The Indian gets a wage of 50 centavos for cutting a
thousand leaves, and if he is to earn this in a day he must work ten
hours. Near the big towns, 75 centavos are paid, but practically, on
many haciendas, it is so managed that the labour is paid for by his bare
keep.
[Illustration: HENEQUEN FIBRE IN DRYING-GROUND.]
[Illustration: THE FIBRE MILL.]
There is much in the henequen agave beside its fibre which might be
turned to commercial uses, but these side-products, such as alcohol made
from the juicy substance of the leaves, and paper made from the leafless
stems of the plants, have so far been neglected. An enterprising German
has started a rope factory near Merida with a capital of $2,500,000, but
this is the first attempt at working up the hemp in the country.
Henequen is cultivated in Cuba and the Bahamas and the Germans have
introduced its culture into East Africa, where they have planted 150,000
agaves. Whether it will thrive there is doubtful, but in both Cuba and
the Bahamas it has been a failure, the plant for some reason
degenerating and producing a poor fibre.
CHAPTER XXII
FLORA AND FAUNA
There is perhaps nothing which strikes one at first sight in travelling
through Yucatan so much as the absence of animal life. For the
stay-at-home the usual idea of the Tropics is that it is that part of
the earth where the deadliest serpents wait for you in the seclusion of
the bathroom, or twine round your legs while you breakfast; that such
cohorts of fearsome creatures watch for you with the patience of
writ-servers at the garden gate that it is a miracle if by lunch-time
you find you still "have the luck to live"; and that a reckless
indulgence in even moderate walking-exercise will most certainly end in
your falling a prey to one or more of those great beasts which, like the
troops of Midian in the hymn, "prowl and prowl around."
The truth is very disappointing. Nothing is ever so bad or so good as we
expect it to be. The Tropics, as far as Yucatan is concerned, are a case
in point, both as regards beauty and dangers. The most luxuriant of
Yucatecan woodland scenes would have real difficulty to hold its own in
a beauty competition against an English lane when June has lavished her
wild roses and her honeysuckle on the sunkissed hedgerows. And for the
matter of risk, a modern city infested with motor-cars is the "valley of
the shadow of death" compared with an average part of the tropics of
Central America. There are, of course, real dangers, but one usually
survives them, probably for the same reason that a dyspeptic lives so
long, because one takes care. The annual death-roll in Paris, London or
New York from motor-cars is far higher than the yearly toll of native
lives taken by the serpents of Yucatan.
Yet the country is famous for its snakes, but you do not see them. In
all our wanderings and campings in forests, in all our often foolhardy
explorations of weird caves and pot-holes, so frequented by snakes as
sleeping-places, we only saw seven, and none of them were large. The
most exciting adventure we had was in one of the islands. We were
following a very narrow Indian trail single file, when the one of us who
was leading ran his face right into a snake which was stretched across
the path at the height of one's eyes, its tail curled round a shrub on
one side, its head round one on the other side. It was a tree-climbing
species, a bright green, and looked evil enough, but was probably
harmless. We had but half an hour before seen the snake the Mayan
Indians call uolpoch (pronounced wolpoach), the deadliest of all New
World serpents, perhaps the deadliest in the world. It was among the
leaves at the side of the path, and wriggled away as we approached. It
is about two or at most three feet long, of a dirty brown-grey colour
with the belly a trifle lighter in tint, and is remarkable as having
both ends blunt like the slow-worm. It is said to be the only snake
known to attack before it is attacked, and is specially feared as being
most active at night when it wanders around. Another of its
accomplishments is an extraordinary power of leaping: it is alleged to
be capable of a jump of six feet high. We do not, however, guarantee
this serpentine high jump, as we never, thank goodness, saw it perform.
The uolpoch's bite is always fatal, and the Indians dread the little
blunt-nosed reptile, which sleeps the sunny hours away hidden in hollows
in rocks or in ditches.
The rattlesnake is very common in Yucatan, especially in the south and
more marshy portions of the Peninsula. The python, too, is met with in
the lower-lying forests, though we did not have the luck to see one.
They never, however, attain the size of the monsters which infest the
valley of the Amazon and its tributaries. There are several of the
_Elaps_ genus of serpents in Yucatan, the most common being _Elaps
corallina_, or coral-snake, ringed with red and black. He is a pretty
fellow but highly venomous, and shows much fight if provoked. A friend
of ours trod on one which was asleep in the cab of an engine, of all
places in the world. He luckily had on top-boots, or probably he would
not have lived to tell the tale, for the little beast was round on him
and made a deep mark on the leather in a second. The _Spilotes Salvini_
(Greek [Greek: spilos], a spot), a large but quite harmless serpent, is
of spotted black with a yellowish belly, and attains almost pythonic
dimensions, the average specimens being about six and a half feet long.
Another harmless serpent family, the _Dipsadidæ_ (so called from the
Greek [Greek: dipsa], thirst, in allusion to an ancient superstition
that this genus of snakes caused a mortal thirst, to which Shelley
refers in his "Prometheus Unbound": "He thirsted, as one bit by a
dipsas"), is represented in Yucatan by the _Dipsas splendida_, a
tree-climbing reptile with bright mottled skin, averaging two to two and
a half feet in length. It is chiefly active at nights, when it climbs in
search of the insects which form its food.
In the larger mammals, particularly the carnivora, the Peninsula is
notably poor. Practically the only formidable creature is the jaguar,
which would, however, never deserve Bottom's immortal dictum anent the
king of carnivora, for it is in no sense "a terrible wild-fowl." _Felis
onca_, to give the animal the dignity of his full official title, is
most like the leopard or panther of the Old World. He is of a tawny
colour with spots which differ, however, from the true leopard inasmuch
as they are ocellated, _i.e._ eyed, black with a tawny eye of colour in
the centre, or are broken up into rosettes of black on a tawny ground.
Full-grown specimens measure between four and five feet in length with a
tail of some two feet. In Yucatan the jaguar is distinctly cowardly, and
will never attack unless in a corner or when attacked. We met one when
wandering one afternoon in the woods around Chichen, and though we were
unarmed, it fled incontinently and climbed a tree. This they are very
fond of doing, especially when pursued by dogs. The natives face them
with the machete as their only weapon, and show much courage often in
tracking them to the caves where they shelter. While even the biggest
jaguar will avoid an encounter with man, they are bold in their night
attacks upon cattle and pigs. At one settlement on the east coast which
we visited, thirteen porkers had disappeared in as many nights, and
though a hunt was organised in one expedition of which we took part, the
"tiger," as the natives insist on calling the jaguar, had not been found
when we left.
Allied to the _Felis onca_ are two other "cats," the _Felis pardalis_
and _Felis concolor_ or puma, which are both found in Yucatan and the
neighbouring parts of Central America. The former is far more rare than
the jaguar, and somewhat smaller, measuring seldom more than three feet
in length of body, with a two-foot tail. It is of a greyish-tawny colour
and is more like a wild cat than a leopard, its tail striped and coat
marked with small black spots. The puma is of a uniform greyish or
reddish-grey, and is between three and four feet in length. The young
are born marked with dark-brown spots in three rows on the back, and the
whole coat marked sporadically. The puma is greatly hated by
stock-breeders because of its habit of killing but not eating. One puma
has been known to kill many animals in a night, just lapping a little of
the blood of each and then leaving the carcase for a fresh prey.
The creature which is at once the largest and least offensive in Yucatan
is the tapir, a genus of _Ungulata_ or hoofed animals, in general
appearance looking much what one could imagine a cross between a
rhinoceros and a wild pig would be like. Indeed naturalists incline to
the belief that the tapir is somewhat closely allied to the former
animal. There are four known species, three American--viz. _Tapirus
terrestris_, _T. Bairdi_, and _T. Dowi_, and one Asiatic, _T.
malayanus_. Though the species differ somewhat in size, the tapir is
usually about the size of a small ass. The body, which in the adult is
of a uniform deep brown, though the young are marked with yellowish
spots and stripings, is short, stout and clumsy, with thick legs ending
in four small hoofs on the fore feet and three on the hind. It has small
piggy eyes, and its most characteristic feature is a queer flexible
snout prolonged some inches beyond the jaw, but apparently without the
prehensile powers of the elephant's trunk. The tapir loves water, and
when attacked by a jaguar will, where possible, take to a river or lake,
diving and plunging. It is quite inoffensive and never attacks man, but
when at bay will give ugly bites. It is very powerful, and has so thick
a skin that it can force its way through the densest forest. The
commonest tapir is the South American one, the _T. terrestris_, but this
is not found north of the Panama Isthmus. The tapir of Yucatan and
Guatemala is _T. Dowi_. This with _T. Bairdi_ is generally regarded as
generically separate from other tapirs, and they are scientifically
termed _Elasmognathus_. All tapirs are vegetarians, living on the shoots
of trees, on fruits and seeds; but they will eat almost any substance
which they come across. Thus pieces of wood, clay, and stones have been
found in their stomachs.
The liveliest sport in Yucatan is derived from the peccary, a kind of
swine, belonging to the genus _Dicotyles_, of which there are two
species. The name is probably from an American Indian word which is
cited by Pennant as _paquiras_. The peccary is the only indigenous
representative of the Old World _Suidæ_ or swine in the New World, and
both its species are found in Yucatan--_D. torquatus_ or _tajacu_, the
Texan or collared peccary, and _D. labiatus_, the white-lipped peccary.
The range of the former is from Arkansas to Patagonia, while the latter
are restricted to Central America and as far south as Brazil. The
generic name is from the Greek [Greek: dikotylos] ([Greek: di] two, and
[Greek: kotylê], a hollow), and was given the peccaries by Cuvier in
allusion to a curious glandular organ on the back which was regarded by
old travellers as a second navel. This gland secretes a foul-smelling
liquid, and unless quickly removed after the animal has been killed,
taints the flesh, making it almost uneatable. We hunted peccary and eat
them. The meat has a rather rich, spicy taste, like stuffed veal, and is
fairly tough. The two species breed freely together, but the true _D.
labiati_ are far the fiercer of the two, go about in small herds and are
known to attack man and even the jaguar. The Yucatecans hunt them with
dogs, and seldom does an expedition return without leaving two or three
of the latter dead in the woods, ripped up by the short tusks of the
peccary boars. The animals make their home in natural hollows and caves,
or in holes beneath large trees. In appearance they are like pigs, but
the bristles are coarser and variegated somewhat like a porcupine's.
They have fewer teeth than the ordinary pig--viz. thirty-eight as
against forty-four--and a very short tail.
The deer of Yucatan are quite small, about the size of our fallow-deer.
They are of two species, _Cervus virginianus_ and _Cariacas toltecus_,
the latter quite small. You see little or nothing of either in
North-Eastern Yucatan, but on the southern sierras there are a good many
in the thick woodland. Down south, too, but still further south, you
find the monkey most frequenting this part of Central America, of the
genus _Mycetes_, familiarly known as "the howler" or "howling monkey,"
in allusion to its strange, weird, and very loud cries, which can be
heard miles off. This peculiar vocal power is due to an extraordinary
development of the larynx, the hyoid bone in which is very much enlarged
and excavated, thus forming a hollow drum which acts as a reverberator.
The species of _Mycetes_ found in Yucatan and Guatemala is _M. villosus_
or _ursinus_. The _Mycetinæ_ are the largest monkeys of America, nearly
three feet in body length, with long prehensile tails. They are quite
black, and are almost entirely arboreal in habits, living in the trees.
The Indians regard their flesh as a great luxury, and white men agree
that it is very palatable. Another monkey, rare in Yucatan, but very
common in Guatemala, is the spider-monkey or sapajou (genus _Ateles_),
of which the species _A. vellerosus_ is the commonest.
Of smaller mammals there are a good number in Yucatan. There is the
coati, known to naturalists as _Nasua narica_, but always called by the
natives _pisote_. It is closely related to the racoons, but has a longer
body and tail and a thin and flexible snout, hence the generic name
_Nasua_ (Latin _nasus_, nose). It is of a dark-brown colour, and is thus
distinguished from its Brazilian cousin the red ring-tailed coati
(_Nasua rufa_). It is carnivorous, and is particularly fond of the large
lizards, the iguanas, which abound throughout the Peninsula. Birds, too,
fall prey to them. They are distinctly attractive-looking little
creatures and are readily tamed. We saw a pair in a courtyard of a
restaurant in Merida, which eagerly made friends with the guests in
return for a piece of meat or fruit. The Indians relish their flesh
greatly, and the animals have little chance if they are rash enough to
venture near a village. Sitting one night in the wonderful tropical
moonlight at a lonely settlement, suddenly an indescribable din of dogs
yelping and Indians shouting arose. We really thought the place was
about to be raided when we saw the women as well as the men and boys arm
themselves with cudgels and make for the wood. A yelp or two and a
piteous cry, and then with huge delight an Indian rushed back with the
still quivering furry body of the poor coati. A fire was built, and in a
very few minutes the creature had been dried into that most unappetising
mummification in which all Indian cooking of meat ends. The pisote
tastes much like an old rabbit.
Talking of rabbits, these ubiquitous rodents are found in Yucatan, but
in no great numbers. Hares are unknown. The common racoon (_Procyon
lotor_) is found, but there are no crab-eating racoons (_Procyon
cancrivorous_) in Yucatan: these are restricted to South America proper.
The racoon eats fruits and is fond of young maize; but he is also
carnivorous, and will attack fowls, biting their heads off and sucking
their blood. He feeds, too, on grubs and frogs, but he most enjoys
sugar-cane, to crops of which he is very destructive. In Yucatan is
found the grey fox of the States (_Urocyon virginianus_). A pretty
little fellow is the grey squirrel (_Sciurus carolinensis_), which
has a marvellously bushy tail. A species of the agouti (_Dasyprocta
punctata_ or _acouchy_) is found in Yucatan, a guinea-pig-like creature,
the size of a small rabbit, which when disturbed gives pig-like grunts.
There are many bats, the commonest being the so-called bulldog bat, in
allusion to the bulldog-like expression due to the pendulosity of the
skin around the snout and jaw. A genus of armadillos (_Tatusia
novemcincta_) usually called _Dasypus novemcinctus_, the only armadillo
found in the United States, is fairly common in the woods of Yucatan.
While writing of Mammalia we must not forget to mention that curious
creature the manatee, which is found fairly plentifully in the creeks
and shallow inlets around the coast of the Peninsula. In Guatemala and
Southern Yucatan it is called _Vaca de Agua_ (Sea-Cow). Its scientific
name is _Manatus americanus_ or _australis_. In shape it is something
like a small whale; but it belongs to a different order, though it was
once believed to be a herbivorous cetacean. It is some ten or twelve
feet in length with a stout naked body, fish-shaped, with no trace of
hind limbs, and ending in a wide shovel-shaped tail. The fore limbs are
paddles, on which there are rudimentary nails; the eyes and ears are
small; the neck short and thick. They live in either fresh or salt
water, but never far from land or far from sea. They feed on sea-grasses
and never leave the water. Their flesh, which is white and
sweet-tasting, is relished by the natives, who hunt them as did their
ancestors, usually with harpoon, for their fat and leather as well as
for the meat.
We have already spoken of the snakes in Yucatan, and now we must say a
few words as to other reptiles. Yucatan is the happy hunting ground for
the largest land lizard known to Natural History, the iguana. His
prevailing colour is grey, shading to a light green with a lighter tint
on the belly, and he has black markings crosswise his whole length to
his tail and a crest of spines down his back. The creature is
grotesquely ugly with his great pouched under-jaw and eyes snake-like in
their smallness, and as you often meet specimens upwards of three feet
long (they are known to attain five feet or more in length), one is apt
to hasten to the conclusion that they are fearsome foes. As a matter of
fact they are the most inoffensive of creatures unless molested, feeding
entirely on a vegetable diet. But they can and will bite, if annoyed,
and we came across cases of Indians whose fingers had been bitten off,
though of course there is no venom like that of a snake in the iguana's
teeth. They are arboreal in habits, but the Yucatecan iguanas love most
to make their homes in the ruined facades and roofs of Mayan palaces. We
hardly ever explored a building without one of these great clumsy
reptiles bustling out of its hiding-place and scurrying up the palace
front or the falling stairways, looking for all the world like a
gargoyle animated of a sudden. The flesh of these lizards is much
appreciated by the natives, and tastes like chicken. There are a great
quantity of smaller lizards in Yucatan; in fact, as you walk through the
woods the undergrowth, especially in the sunnier patches, seems
positively alive with them. Browns, greens, and yellows; mottled,
striped, and spotted; some of them are really very pretty, and all of
them quite harmless.
There are plenty of alligators to be found round the coasts,
particularly on the east, where they shelter in shallow muddy streams
and in the mangrove swamps, or bask on the landward side of the islets
which so often only lie a few yards from the mainland. The alligator is
a savage beast, more savage it is said than his congener the crocodile,
and will take the offensive often without provocation. If anything, they
look more repulsive in their habitat than they do in a Zoo, where they
are surrounded by the softening influences of civilisation and the sweet
simplicity of a cemented tank. We heard a story worth quoting, as at
once illustrating the brute's ferocity and the courage of the Indian.
Down in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec two Indians were floundering in a
swamp when one suddenly disappeared into a hole, to utter in a second a
howl of agony, while the water around him became tinged with blood. Down
in the hole an alligator had seized him by the leg, biting it off at the
knee. Without a moment's hesitation his comrade leapt into the pool and,
planting his foot firmly on the lizard's head, thus kept it from making
a second attack while he helped the exhausted, bleeding man to scramble
out.
The average alligator in Yucatan measures between seven and nine feet,
though the one typical of the genus, the _Alligator lucius_ or
_mississippiensis_ of the United States, attains a length of seventeen
or eighteen feet. In Guatemala and the Rio Hondu a special species is
found known as the _Alligator punctulatus_. Alligators differ from true
crocodiles in having a shorter and flatter head, cavities in the upper
jaw into which the long teeth of the under-jaw fit, and feet much less
webbed. It is a very common mistake to believe that the true crocodile
is unknown in the New World. As a matter of fact, a typical one, the
_Crocodilus americanus_, long confused with the alligator, has recently
been identified in Florida and the West Indies. The alligator feeds
chiefly on fish, and his voracity is such that he lives on very strained
relations with the inhabitants of his fishy world, which avoid him with
the same fanatical earnestness with which a Kaffir avoids his
mother-in-law. But the alligator is more than a glutton; he is a
cannibal, and does not, unfortunately, even respect the family circle.
His wife has to be very careful to put the children to bed before he
returns from his wanderings, for if he catches sight of them or gets the
least chance he instantly eats them. The female alligator lays a great
quantity of large eggs, dropping them in the sand, where they are left
to be hatched by the sun's heat. As many as sixty eggs may be found in
one nest arranged in separate layers.
We have spoken of the turtles which are found in huge quantities around
the coasts and in the islands. There are any number of their land
cousins, the tortoises, in the woods of Yucatan, most of them quite
small, among them the box tortoise (_Cinostemon leucostomum_), that
queer little reptile who has a kind of front door which he slams in your
face, shutting his head in so that there is no way of arguing with him.
Frogs and toads there are in plenty, too, some of the latter being very
large; but we must get on to the insects. Of these the most fearsome are
the tarantulas, the commonly used but incorrect name for the largest
spider known, the _Mygale Hentzi_, a black hairy creature with body
about the size of a two-shilling piece and black hairy legs two inches
long. The bite of these spiders is really dangerous, although seldom
fatal to adults. A friend of ours was bitten in the wrist by one some
three years ago. His arm became seriously inflamed and terribly painful,
and could not be used for some months; and even now he still suffers
pain at times in the neighbourhood of the wound. The ruins in Yucatan
are the happy hunting ground for these monsters, which will even attack
small birds. Scorpions are very common, too, hiding by day under stones
or logs or in the crevices of house walls. There are two kinds, a black
and a white, though the latter is more yellow than white. We never saw
any large specimens, but they are said to reach seven or eight inches in
length Their sting is distinctly dangerous, and we heard of cases of
Indians dying through it.
The jigger or chigoe (to give it the more correct native name from which
the first is a corruption), that detestable flea which burrows beneath
the toenails and there lays its eggs, is common in Yucatan, especially
on the east coast. It closely resembles the common flea in form, though
it is much smaller. The sandal-shod natives are particularly liable to
it, and of the Mexican troops at Chan Santa Cruz a large percentage have
one or two toes missing. In the south of the Peninsula you find that
curious insect the Praying Mantis, so called in allusion to the attitude
of its forelegs, which are held as are hands in prayer. These creatures
wage remorseless war on one another, and fight until the stronger
literally pulls its foe's head off. This was actually witnessed by a
friend of ours.
That detestable insect the centipede is common in Yucatan, and not the
harmless type to which one is accustomed in an English garden, but a
formidable creature half a foot or more long. You find the _Scolopendra
castaniceps_ of a greenish colour with a chestnut-tinted head averaging
six inches, and in the south the giant centipede (_Scolopendra gigas_)
which is sometimes a foot long. Humboldt, in his _Personal Narrative_,
says that he saw Indian children pull centipedes out of the ground and
eat them; but the present-day Indians fear and avoid them as much as
they do a scorpion. There is no doubt that their bite is very poisonous,
and even often dangerous.
The ants of Yucatan are wonderful, except when you have the misfortune
to get them on you, when you forget to admire them in the torrents of
blasphemy which their bites evoke. We came across four types, a
pitch-black small tree-ant, which appeared to live principally beneath
the shelter of the bark of rotting trees; a big yellow fellow often
nearly an inch long, a large black ant, and a smaller reddish black ant.
The third kind, a broad-mandibled digging ant, called by the Indians
_zay_ (pronounced _tzay_), infests the woods of Yucatan to an almost
incredible degree, honeycombing the roadways to such an extent in some
places that you sink almost to your knee in the loose red earth.
Sometimes in the woods you will come across patches an acre or two in
extent of loosened earth dotted here and there with hillocks thrown up
by these tiny excavators. They carry out their operations, too, among
the ruins; but their work is distinctly unscientific, and many
interesting memorials of the ancient Mayans have been destroyed by these
insect vandals.
More than this, they actually make paths through the woods. As you
follow an Indian trail you will of a sudden come to a place where it is
crossed by quite a distinct path, traceable for yards. Sometimes you
actually find them travelling on these paths. One evening in the woods
near Occeh we came across a procession of ants or, to write correctly,
two processions of ants; for there was one set going in
"follow-my-leader" style across the road one way, and another set going
the other way. It was interesting to see that the insects never stepped
out of the ranks. One set were carrying each a piece of leaf which they
held up over them (it was about half an inch square) like a huge sail.
Some of them were literally staggering under the weight of the pieces of
leaf, but they never dropped them. The other set were returning into the
wood "empty-handed" to get fresh loads. For a long time we watched these
ordered ranks, and we had the curiosity to follow them into the wood,
where we found them actually at work on a leafy shrub, chewing off the
pieces and climbing down with them, and then without the least confusion
taking their places in the marching line of the loaded party. It is
possible that these ants are to be identified with those called by Henry
Walter Bates (_Naturalist on the Amazons_: 1863) the umbrella ant of
Brazil, which he says "thatches its large mansion (sometimes 40 yards in
circumference and 2 feet high) with circles of leaf cut with accurate
precision from coffee and orange trees, which they oftentimes strip bare
to carry out their bold architectural design." It seemed to us, however,
more likely that, as was observed by Thomas Belt (_Naturalist in
Nicaragua_: 1874), the leaves are gathered as provisions and are stored
till their decay generates a fungus upon which the ant feeds.
The cockroaches of Yucatan are truly tropical, and grow to a great
length. We saw some between two and three inches long. The little
village stores throughout Yucatan are infested with these pests, and one
day when purchasing some bananas, on the storekeeper lifting up the lid
of the wooden bin in which the fruit was kept, it sounds incredible, but
one could scarcely see the fruit, such hundreds of them filled the bin.
In the ruins you constantly find hornets' nests hanging against the
walls almost like swallows' nests, and if they happen to be "at home"
and do set about you, the only thing is to run. Yucatan is very rich in
dragonflies. They seem of almost all colours. Those we noticed most were
one of electric blue, one of grass green, and one, apparently rare,
almost red. At nights the trees are alight with fireflies. As we sat in
the clearing in our forest home on Cozumel, it looked as if armies of
Indians with lanterns were concentrating on us from all points of the
belt of dark woodland. The light these insects give is undoubtedly
strong, though we had not the luck to see, as did Stephens at Palenque,
"'lightning-bugs,' four of which together threw a brilliant light for
several yards around, and by the light of a single one we read
distinctly the finely printed pages of an American newspaper." No
account of a Yucatecan night would be complete without mentioning the
wonderful chorus of crickets which sing from sunset until the eastern
sky fades into the grey of dawn. It is literally a chorus, for there
must be thousands of the insects contributing to the endless serenading
of the lady crickets.
An hour after the sun is up and the dew has disappeared before the
rapidly increasing heat of the wonderful tropic sunshine, the Yucatecan
woodlands become beautiful with those most exquisite of all God's
creatures, the butterflies. There was a great deal in Yucatan which was
very disappointing; there was much which was actually heartbreaking; but
however footsore, tired, and hungry we were, we found it impossible not
to momentarily forget our troubles in our admiration for these flying
triumphs of Heaven's paint-box. Alas! we are not possessed of any
scientific knowledge, and all that this chapter attempts is to indicate
"the birds, beasts and fishes" one sees in travelling through the
Peninsula, and thus we cannot give the scientific names for these
marvellous insects. Perhaps it is as well, for it is really a kind of
desecration to label some fairy form of amber and blue with a
hendecasyllabic name, the pronunciation of which can only be mastered
after months of practice.
Most beautiful of all was a monster of sky blue, all four wings framed
with a delicate border of black. He must have measured five inches from
wing-point to wing-point. Exquisite, too, were the striped butterflies:
some striped scarlet and black, some white and black, some yellow and
black. The daintiness of these combinations was past all description.
The forest paths were bright, too, with wonders of yellow; amber and
orange, sulphur-tinted and palest lemon, huge butterflies fluttered
before our horses, such miracles of Nature's painting as made the
woodland seem a fairyland of colour. One of the commonest (it seems an
insult to use the adjective, it was so beautiful) of Yucatan's
butterflies was one with body and inner portions of the wings all black
and the outer parts a brilliant scarlet, a combination giving it as it
flew the appearance of a daintily slender bobbin or reel of vermilion.
And amid all this riot of colour were some quite as enchanting in the
Quaker-like sobriety of their tints. One specially struck us: a triumph
of silver greys and browns, a veritable incarnation of Autumn. But
enough! Neither glowing epithets nor the dry-as-dust names given them by
entomologists can do justice to Yucatan's butterflies: you must go and
see them for yourself to realise their beauty.
* * * * *
One of the most startlingly beautiful birds in Yucatan is the cardinal
bird, a large finch of a gorgeous red even to its beak, its face alone
being black around the base of the bill and on the upper throat. But the
full glories of its scarlet coat are the prerogative of the male, for
the female is a far duller colour. Species of the bird are common in the
warmer parts of the States, where it is often known as the Virginia
Nightingale, in allusion to its powers of song. The Yucatecan specimen,
about a foot long, makes a wonderful spectacle as it flashes through the
blaze of sunshine.
But if Yucatan has to share her cardinal bird with the more southern
States of America, she can claim to have all to herself, and the Central
American countries neighbouring her, perhaps one of the most beautiful
birds in the world, the _Meleagris ocellata_, the ocellated turkey, so
called in allusion to the _ocelli_ or eyes, much like those of a
peacock, marking its plumage, which is of blue, brown, and gold. Its
bare head is a deep blue studded with caruncles of an orange colour, and
it has no ugly dewlap as has the common turkey, than which it is much
smaller. This wonderful bird is fairly common in Yucatan, but is very
shy and keeps to the woods. A bird far more common, and a vivid contrast
in the sobriety of its feathering to this glorious fowl, is a species of
guan (_Ortalis vetula maccalli_), known in Spanish America as the
_chachalaca_ in allusion to its astoundingly loud cry. They are about
the size of a hen pheasant, the wings and body of a brown shading to a
greeny grey with a lighter grey-brown belly. They may be said to be the
great game birds of Yucatan as far as eating goes, and their flesh
tastes much like pheasant. They are pretty birds until they speak, and
one often sees them tame in the Indian villages. Of the same family of
gallinaceous birds (_Cracidæ_) to which the _chachalaca_ belongs, the
curassows and _hoccos_ found in Yucatan are members. Both the red
curassow and the globose curassow are fairly common; the natives call
them _kambūl_. Another type of curassow is the latter-mentioned
hocco, a name said to be a native word in Guiana. This bird we shot on
the east coast. It is a magnificent creature as big as a large turkey,
feathered in gold and brown, its head crested. Partridge and quail are
said to be plentiful, but we did not come across them.
One of the commonest yet one of the prettiest birds in the Peninsula is
a jay (_Cyanocitta yucatanica_) which goes about in small flocks. They
are about the size of a large blackbird, but with a longer tail. The
head and the belly are black and the back, wings, and tail are of a
beautiful electric blue. The legs are yellow, and, like the English
blackbird, the male has a yellow beak and the female a black one. The
Mayans call them _tchel_ and are always keen to kill them, for they are
very destructive to the crops; but nothing could well exceed the beauty
of a dozen of them darting from treetop to treetop in the early morning
sunshine.
Of hawks there are many species. One large black one found in Cozumel is
rare, but a common one which we specially noticed in that island is a
beautifully marked bird of black and brown which is said to belong to
the same division of hawks as the hobby-falcon of Europe. It is about a
foot long with a fairly long tail. The curious point about it was its
astounding boldness. It would sit on a tree a few yards ahead of you,
and when you came up and stood beneath it, refuse to be scared away. On
the eastern beach of Cozumel one of these birds settled on a fallen tree
near us, and refused to go although, of course without any desire to
actually hurt it, we pelted it with small pebbles. This hawk has a
curiously insistent and weirdly plaintive cry, with which the woods of
Cozumel echo all day. We never saw it actually strike at small birds,
and certainly its warning scream was calculated to give the most
careless finch a good chance of escape.
Of owls there was one of the large wood variety, and there are said to
be two peculiar to the country, neither of them much more than six
inches long, of a generally tawny colour and lighter on the bellies. In
parrots Yucatan is rich, the finest being the white-crowned parrot, its
plumage being green, blue, red, white, and yellow. The red-and-blue
macaw is known, though rare; but the woods are everywhere full of the
green parrot or parakeet, dainty little creatures who usually go about
in pairs, but sometimes are seen flocking and are for ever screaming and
chattering as they fly.
You see the common American kingfisher, some twelve inches long with
plumage of blue, white, spotted and barred, the head crested, sitting
sometimes above the cenotes. Of woodpeckers there are several varieties,
the commonest appearing to be the red-headed or crested woodpecker. If
you have luck (we did not have it), you can see in the Yucatecan
woodland the wonderful _Trogon resplendens_, scientifically associated
with the family of woodpeckers. There are some fifty species of Trogons,
but the most remarkable is the Yucatecan one, the Quetzal, a sacred bird
in Central America, the plumage of which is a gorgeous golden green, its
tail being in the male nearly three feet long, though the bird is about
the size of a pigeon. This Trogon in the sheen of its plumage almost
rivals the beauty of the humming-birds. Of the latter there are many to
be seen in Yucatan, but it really needs a poet to describe these winged
jewels of the woodland. As we sat on the verandah at Chichen prosaically
eating breakfast, amid the pink San Diego blossoms which clustered round
the house was a perpetual whirr of
"Pinions of pale green, melting to black
By bronze and russet passages."
One really is obliged to fall back upon quotation in speaking of these
tiny creatures, which seem veritably "plumaged from rainbows."
We have spoken of the sleek little _piches_ which chattered in the trees
of the plaza at Vera Cruz. There were any number of these in Yucatan,
and a much larger black bird, probably akin, infesting gardens and
distinguished by the most liquid and mellifluous note it is possible to
imagine. Swallows, too, though they seemed somewhat larger than the
ordinary swallow, were common everywhere; while a bird, which we think
belonged to the cuckoo family, often startled us when at work on the
ruins by a reiterated whistle which sounded like mocking laughter dying
away in a choking spasm of mirth.
The coasts of the Peninsula are rich with seafowl, so many and so
varied that it would need a skilled ornithologist and many pages to
chronicle them accurately. There are duck of all kinds, mallard, teal,
widgeon; wild geese, bitterns, herons, snipe, sandpipers, plovers,
curlews, and gulls galore. The bays and inlets are beautified by the
stately ibis, snowy white or slate-grey. Flamingoes are rarer; and
indeed a flamingo standing is not an object of beauty, for he is
altogether too long in the legs. Moreover his beautiful pink plumage is
seen at its best when he is in flight. As hideous as they are common are
the brown pelicans. In their way they are as detestable as the zopilotes
which we were at pains to describe in our first chapter, though their
habits are not so filthy.
We really have no space to say much of the fishes (pelicans naturally
suggest fishiness); but we ought to say that the brightest jewel in the
fishy crown of the Gulf of Mexico, at least from the gastronomic point
of view, is that fish which rejoices in the name of Red Snapper. At all
times and in all places you can get it. It appears to have no close
season, and whether in the smart restaurants of Mexico or Merida or in
the little coast cabins of the fishing Indians, you eat it, or try to
till nauseated. The Indians are clever fishermen, and catch with both
hook and net, but their most picturesque method is spearing. They paddle
their dug-out into shallow waters, stand on the end of the canoe, and
thrust a spear at the fish. This spear has a detachable point to which a
cord is fastened. They scarcely ever miss, and the struggling prey is
hauled in by the string. We saw a man land half a dozen big fish in
little more than as many minutes. The natives of Chiapas shoot the fish
from the end of the canoe with bow and arrow.
If a hundred people who have not travelled, or whose travels have been
confined to the typical Rhine, Switzerland and Riviera tours of modern
life, were asked what was their idea of a primeval forest in the
tropics, eighty per cent. at least would declare for a woodland notable
for giant trees beside which the forests of civilised countries would
seem mere park enclosures. Nothing could be further from the truth. The
average primeval forest in the tropics, of which the boundless woodlands
of Eastern Yucatan are a fair example, are disappointing in the extreme
from the very fact that, though dense to a degree that is heartbreaking,
you never see really noble trees. One of the largest trees in Yucatan is
the sapota (_Achras sapota_). This is an evergreen with thick shiny
leaves, and is said to sometimes reach a height of a hundred feet, but
we cannot say that we ever saw one so high. It is from the sapota that
there is obtained the chicle, the milky juice of the tree which forms
the basis of all American chewing-gums. The chicleros, as the cutters
are called, climb the tree, cut broad arrow-shaped grooves through the
bark pointing groundward, the shaft of the arrows making a drainage
groove down the full length of the tree, a vessel being placed at the
foot under this groove to catch the sap. But the Mayans do not care
about chicle. They like the sapota because it produces a fruit of which
they are passionately fond. And no wonder, for it is really very
pleasant eating. About the size of a small apple and the colour of a
medlar, the inside is a reddish-brown pulp, which has a delicious
flavour.
The woods of Yucatan are full of acacias of many species, among them the
logwood (_Hæmatoxylon campechianum_). Mahogany is found and is
especially common in the south, where it is much used by the Indians for
canoes, the whole trunk being hollowed out. The leafiest tree in the
country is the ceiba (_Bombax ceiba_), called by the Mayans _yaxche_ or
_yastse_. This noble tree often attains a considerable height, gives an
extraordinary shade, and has ever been held as sacred by the Mayans. It
figures in their mythology. Their ancestors believed that there were
seven heavens, each having a hole in the centre and each immediately
above the other. A ceiba was believed to stand in the centre of the
earth, and its branches grew through the successive holes in the seven
heavens until the leaves reached the highest. By the branches of the
tree the dead climbed through the series of heavens until they reached
the utmost Mayan paradise. There is a tradition that a ceiba grew in
Valladolid. It was cut down but sprouted again, having this time four
boughs each directed to a cardinal point. A hawk had its home on the
highest branch, and the bird was considered to be the spirit of the
tree, its cry of "_suki, suki_," it is said, having given the ancient
Indian town Zaci, on the site of which Valladolid was built, its name.
There is another tree which rivals the ceiba in shadiness, but this you
only see on the haciendas which have been long in cultivation. It is a
laurel introduced into the Peninsula from Cuba some forty years ago by a
Spaniard named Cervera. His grandson, appropriately enough, showed us at
Yaxche near Merida the finest examples we saw, laurels so large and
leafy as to rival in size and shade our forest beech. They were
probably the Portugal Laurel (_Cerasus lusitanica_ or _Ficus
laurifolia_).
A fairly large tree is the mamey (_Lucuma mammosa_), belonging to the
same family as the sapota, and bearing a fruit almost rivalling that of
the latter in popularity among the Indians. It is egg-shaped, with a
rough brown skin, and inside is a pinky pulp tasting like quince
marmalade with a distinct flavour of almond-paste about it. By a
beneficent dispensation of Providence in a country where grass cannot
grow, there does grow a tree, the ramon (_Alicastrum Brownei_), called
by the Mayans _ŏs_, upon which Yucatecan horses thrive. It is
certainly very comforting when you camp for the night in the forest to
be able to send the Indians to cut an armful of the branches thus
generously provided by Nature's baiting stable, and to hear your cattle
contentedly munching it while you sup. The ramon grows fifty to sixty
feet high and has an abundance of evergreen leaves which form the
fodder. The fruit of the ramon is eaten boiled either alone or mixed
with honey or Indian corn, and the milky juice is used medicinally in
cases of asthma. Tree-palms grow everywhere in the woods, some of them
reaching eighty feet. The more common kinds, notably the _Sabal
mexicana_, called by the Mayans _x̆aan_, are used to thatch the Indian
huts. There are cocoanut palms in plenty, particularly on the islands.
From the _Lignum vitæ_ the Indians make bows. From a small tree
(_Pretium heptaphyllum_) the ancient Mayans obtained the incense used in
their temples which they called _pom_ and which the Mexicans call
_copal_.
In fruit trees Yucatan is fairly rich. She has the sweet and sour orange
in plenty and the lemon and lime, the latter of which often grows wild
in the woods. Bananas and plantains are everywhere. A small variety of
the former, the banana-apple (_Musa paradisiaca_), has a flavour finer
than the Canary banana. Then there is the _Anona squamosa_ or
custard-apple, the _Anona muricata_ or guanabana, the aguacate,
alligator pear (_Persea gratissima_), the caumita and the papay (_Carica
papaya_), called by the Mayans _put_, of which the fruit is pear-shaped,
about a foot long, of an orange-salmon colour and deliciously juicy. The
finest pineapples in the whole of the Mexican Republic are said to be
those grown in Cozumel, and the cultivation of cocoa, which grows wild
throughout Yucatan, is being seriously taken up. There are one or two
types of plums cultivated by the Mayans, and figs, tamarinds and
mangoes are grown. _Camote_, a kind of sweet potato, and tomatoes are
produced, usually in the milpas with the maize. Tobacco, sugar-cane, and
cotton are agricultural products to which increasing attention is being
given. Many kinds of gourds are grown by the Mayans. Chief among these
is the calabash tree (_Crescentia cujete_), the gourd of which is
universally used in Yucatan in its entirety as a drinking-bottle--the
Indians carrying them slung over their backs full of water--and halved
as drinking-cups or dippers, and is often elaborately carved or painted.
The Spanish name for these drinking-gourds is _jicaras_, the Mayans
calling them _luts_.
The flowers of Yucatan are disappointing. They suffer, as do the larger
plants, from the dryness of the soil, due to the fact that, heavy as the
rains are when they come, they rapidly drain away through the porous
limestone. In the gardens of cities and villages you see roses, the
gorgeous scarlet trumpet-shaped tulipans, magnolias, vari-coloured
irises, clematis and other bright-tinted creepers, red and yellow
foxglove-like flowers, and over all and everywhere convolvuluses, white,
purple, and blue. Some of these latter are cultivated by the Mayans in
the fields, as for instance a small white one which they call
_x̆taventun_, from the honey collected from which the Indians distil
an alcoholic drink which has a soft aromatic smell of the flower, and
the intoxicating effect of which (it is enough to make the mouth of the
dipsomaniac water) lasts for three days and leaves no headache behind
it!
The wild flowers are for the most part small. Amid the ruined cities you
almost always find quantities of the small yellow flower, called by the
Mayans _x̆canlol_, of the _Tecoma stans_, a shrubby climber. The
woodland paths everywhere are bright with the jasmine-like amapola;
while the roadsides are made more picturesque by a climber bearing white
sweet-smelling flowers. At Chichen there was much _Salvia coccinea_, a
small brilliant scarlet-flowered shrub called by the natives _zic
x̆in_. Here again we saw _Heliotropium parviflorum_, which the Indians
call _xnaheax_. In the woods you see many orchids growing like mistletoe
on the trees. Among the genera met with, the _Oncidium_ and _Epidendrum_
are the commonest, and of these the species _Schomburgkia tibicina_ and
the _Epidendrum bicoruntum_ are those oftenest found. We saw very few
wild ferns. Here and there are beautiful flowering cactuses.
[Illustration: YUCATAN
BY THE AUTHORS]
INDEX
Acacia, 384
Acanceh, village, Indian ruins at, 188
_Agave Americana_ (Maguey), 20, 362
_Agave Sisalensis._ _See_ Henequen
Agouti, 374
Aguilar, Jeronimo, 48, 82
Akad-zib, Chichen, 103
Algonkins and Toltec Theory, 246
Alligators, 375;
carved heads of, in ruins, importance of, 268
Alphabet, Mayan, attempts to compose, 299
America's first architects, Who were?, 257
American Man, age of, 260
Ants, 377
Anuradhapura, ruins of, Ceylon, 263
Apalachians, 245;
Mayans branch of, 254
Arawaks, in Cuba, 254
Armadillos, 374
Astronomy, Mayan knowledge of, 314
Athapascans, Aztecs branch of, 245
Aztecs, arrival in Mexico, 247;
raids into Honduras, 225;
influence on Mayans, 296
Bancroft, H., on Mexican priests, 275
Bats, 374
Behring Straits, Was America peopled via?, 260
Bharahat, Stupa of, hand as symbolic decoration on, 266
_Biologia Centrali Americana_, A. P. Maudslay's account of Quirigua
in, 213;
Mayan decorative art in, 269
Birds of Yucatan, 380
Boro Budor, Palenque resembles, 263;
date of building, 280
Bourbourg, Abbé Brasseur de, Mayan Alphabet of, 299;
on Day Signs, 304
Bramhanan, Java, Crawfurd on methods of building at, 264;
ground plan similar to Copan, 285
Brigands in Yucatan, 112
Brinton, Dr. D. G., on tapir worship, 239;
on baselessness of Toltec Theory, 244;
on Mexican traditions, 249;
on Mayan origin, 254;
on sacred footprints in Central America, 276;
on Mayan MSS., 277;
on Day Signs, 304;
on meaning of glyphs, 312;
on "Drum Signs," 314
British Government and Mexico, agreement as to Mayans, 156
British Honduras, Mayans and, 156
Brooks, C. Waldcott, on ocean currents, 278
Buddhist ruins resemble Central American buildings, 263
Bull-fighting in Yucatan, 356
Butterflies, 379
Caciques, Ancient Mayan, 227
Calotmul, village, 115
Campeachy, Spaniards discover, 50
Cancun Island, 147;
ruins on, 149
Caracol ("Winding Staircase"), Chichen, 100
Cardinal Bird, 380
Caroline Islands, ruins on, 281
Casa de las Monjas, Chichen, 101
Castes, Mayan system of, 277
Castillo, El, Chichen, 87;
sacrifices at, 88
Castillo, Uxmal, 201
Catoche, Cape, origin of name, 50;
visit to, 136
_Caumila_, fruit, 73
Cave, H. W., on ruined cities of Ceylon, 269
Caves in Yucatan, 251
Ceibo tree, legend of, 384
Cenote of Sacrifice, Chichen, 89;
Spanish report on, 90;
dredging, 92;
skulls found in, 92
Centipedes, 377
Chachalaca, bird, 380
_Chac_, Mayan god, 239
_Chac Mool_, discovered at Chichen, 30, 99
Chansenote, Indian village, 122;
destruction of, 157
Chapultepec, 26;
park of, 31
Chaques, priestly order, 240
Charnay, D., visit to Menché, 222
Chichanchob, Chichen, 100
Chichen Itza, Spaniards reach, 51;
history of, 85;
description of ruins, 87-103;
probable age of, 290
Chicle, gum of Sapota tree, 128
Chilan Balam, books of, 54, 315
Chilans, priestly order, 240
China, Mayan architecture and, 261
Christian, F. W., on ruins of Caroline Islands, 281
_Chultunes_, subterranean rooms in ruins, 195
Citas, village, 83
Coati, 231, 373
Cocomes, Caciques of Mayapan, 56
Cockroaches, 378
_Codex Cortesianus_, "snouted mask" in, 267
_Codex Ramirez_, date of fall of Tula in, 245 note
Codices, Mayan, 315
Columbus, Yucatan first heard of by, 47
Cones, Temple of, Chichen, 98
Copal as offering to gods, 93;
shrub from which obtained, 385
Copan, ruins of, 204;
Buddhist survivals at, 269;
Asiatic influence at, 284;
absurdity of Itza Theory, 284;
probable date of, 287
Cordoba, Hernandez de, 50
Cortes, expedition to Yucatan, 51;
scene of first landing on American mainland, 137
"Cozumel Cross," 79
Cozumel Island, 164 _et seq._;
ruins in forest, 180
Crawfurd, John, on Buddhist structures in Indian Archipelago, 264;
on ruins of Bramhanan, Java, 285
Cresson, Dr. Hilbone T., theory as to glyphs, 300
Crickets, 379
Cross, Tablet of the, Palenque, 219;
probable explanation, 270
Cuba, antiquities of, 255
Cuculcan, Mayan legendary hero, 239
Cunningham, Sir A., discovery of Bharahat Stupa by, 266
Curasson, 154, 381
Customs House, Mexican, 7;
dishonesty of, 355
Cuyo, El, Yucatan, 127
Deer in Yucatan, 372
Deschnev, Russian navigator, discovers Behring Straits, 260
Diaz, President Porfirio, genius of, 34;
sketch of, 37-40;
signs peace with Yaquis, 161;
letter of authors to, 358
Dogs of ancient Mayans, 231;
Yucatecan cruelty to, 347
Dragonflies, 379
Dupaix, report on Palenque, 216
Egypt, Mayan architecture and, 259
Elephant? Did Mayans worship, 273
Eskimos, suggested affinity with Japanese, 260
Espita, town, 186
_Euryalus_, H.M.S., dunned by Mexicans, 354
Evans, Sir John, on stone implements, 261
Farming, methods of, in Yucatan, 323
Fireflies, 379
Fishing, 383
Flamingoes, 383
Flora and fauna of Yucatan, 368 _et seq._
Flowers of Yucatan, 386
Foliated Cross, Temple of, Palenque, 219;
probable origin of design, 270
Footprints, sacred, in Central America, 276
Forstemann, Prof. E., on tablet of Cross, Palenque, 220;
on glyphs, 300;
on similarities in glyphs, 311
Fournereau, Lucien, on ruins of Angkor, 272
Foxes, 373
Fruit-trees of Yucatan, 385
Fuentes y Guzman, F. A., historian, 204
Fusang, "Land of the, fable" as to, 262
Galindo, Copan first surveyed by, 208
Gann, Dr. T. W., discovery of Aztec wall-paintings in Honduras by, 225,
296
Garrapatas, cattle-louse, 112
Garudas in Hindu myth, replicas of in Mayan carvings, 271
Glyphs, Mayan, 298 _et seq._
Goodman, J. T., on Mayan Calendar, 304;
on date of Copan, 310
"Green Gold of Yucatan." _See_ Henequen.
Grijalva, Juan de, 51;
report on Cozumel by, 168
Grünwedel, Prof. A., on Buddhist art in India, 272
Hardy, R. Spence, on American and ancient Buddhist ruins, 262;
on Buddhist wall-paintings, 265
Haritri, Hindu Goddess on Palenque carvings, 272
Hawks, 381
Henequen, cultivation of, 361 _et seq._
Hermit Crabs, 145
Herrera, historian, on Aztec ball-game, 94
Hieroglyphics, Mayan, 298 _et seq._
Hoco, bird, 154
Holboch, island, 132
_Holpop_, Mayan official, 228
Huastecas, Panuco River tribe, origin of, 253
Huitzopochtli, Mexican War-God, 88, 296
_Hulneb_, Mayan God, 239
Humboldt, collection of Mexican pictographs by, 299
Humming-birds, 382
_Hunab Ku_, Mayan Supreme God, 239
Ibis, 383
Iguana, 374
India, Mayan architecture and, 262
Itzamna, Mayan deity, tapir as symbol, 239;
importance in Mayan problem, 313
Ixtlilxochitl, on Tula, 245 note;
on downfall of Toltecs, 246 note;
credibility of, 249
Jade carvings at Copan, 208;
burial with dead by Mayans, 277
Jaguar, 370
Japan Current, the, importance in Mayan problem, 278
Japan, Mayan architecture and, 261
Japanese, suggested affinity with Eskimos, 260
Jays, 381
Jigger flea, 377
Juarros, Domingo, historian, 210
Kabah, ruins of, 199
Kantunil, Indian town and district, 121
Khmers, 280
Kikil, village, 122
_Kinch Ahau Haban_, Mayan God, 239
Kingfisher, 382
Klaproth, H. J. von, on "Land of the Fusang," 262
_Kuro Siwa_, the Japan Current, in Mayan problem, 278
Labcah, village, 128
Labna, ruins of, 194
Lacandone Indians, 222
Landa, Bishop, on evils of Spanish Conquest, 54;
on sacrifices at Chichen, 90;
destruction of Mayan MSS. by, 298 note;
Mayan alphabet of, 299
Laurels, 384
Le Plongeon, Dr., theory as to Mayan civilisation, 258;
on existence of "red hand" in India, 265;
Mayan alphabet of, 300
Li Yen, Chinese historian, on "Land of the Fusang," 262
"Lion-seat" (_Simhasana_) of Buddhism in Central America, 271, 288
Lizards, 374
Lotus, Buddhist, in Central American carvings, 269
Lund, Dr., on age of American Man, 260
Madura, ruins of, Dutch Government Report on, 270
Maguey, cactus, 20
Malay Peninsula, Mayan architecture and, 262
Maler, Teobert, at Piedras Negras, 224
Mamey tree, 385
Mammoth, existence of in America, 274
Manatee, 374
Manco Capac, first Inca King, 259 note
Marriage among ancient Mayans, 234;
among Yucatecans, 341, 357
Marshall Islands, 281
Maudslay, A. P., on ruins of Copan, 211;
on Quirigua, 213;
discovers Menché, 222;
on Mayan decorative art, 269;
on age of ruins, 286
Mayan alphabet, attempts to form, 299
-- arch, diagram and description, 264
-- paintings compared with Buddhistic, 265;
description of, 316
-- priests and Buddhism, 275
Mayans, Ancient, 226 _et seq._;
Who were they?, 254 _et seq._;
army, 227;
law and justice, 228;
social castes, 230;
slavery, 230;
domesticated animals, 231;
housing, 231;
hammock unknown to, 231;
common lands, 231;
as hunters, 232;
adornment, 233, 318;
food, 233;
marriage, 234;
education, 235;
status of women, 235;
trade, 236;
dancing, 237;
burial customs, 237;
religion, 238;
calendar, 240, 301;
problem as to cradle-land, 242;
priests, 240, 275;
system of castes, 277;
customs evidencing Eastern influence, 277;
building methods of, 290;
hieroglyphics, 298;
knowledge of astronomy, 313
Mayans, Modern, physical appearance of, 118;
War of Extermination against, 156;
independence recognised, 156;
Mexican criminals employed against, 159
Mayan War, Story of, 156
Mayapan, ancient Indian capital, 56, 188
Mecca, The Mayan, in Cozumel, 164
Meco, El, ruins of, 143
Menché, ruins of, 222;
probable date of, 288
Mercer, H. C., on caves of Yucatan, 252;
on Mayan methods of building, 292
Merida, City of, 59;
cabs, 59;
bells in, 62;
cathedral, 64;
life in plaza, 66;
old street signs, 67;
water supply, 68;
prison, 74-8;
museum, 78-80
Mexico, relations with United States, 42;
future of, 43;
government of, 37;
war of extermination of Mayans started by, 157;
Mexico City, 21 _et seq._;
cathedral, 24;
Paseo de la Reforma, 26;
hotels, 27;
police, 28;
Guard, Republican, 28, 31;
funeral cars, 29;
streets, 29;
tramways, 29, 31;
museum, 30;
officials, 33, 39;
justice, administration of, 35;
prisons 36
Mississippi district, Mounds of, 255
Molas, pirate, Cozumel headquarters of, 166
Monkeys, 372
Monuments, Conservator of, in Yucatan, 81
Montejo, Francisco de, 51
Morality, Mayan, 334
Morse, Prof. E., on American ethnology, 258;
pamphlet quoted, 262;
on Asiatic invasion of Central America, 278
Mosquitoes at El Meco, 144;
terrible nights with, 174
Mounds on East Coast, 127
Mounds, Ohio, Prof. Thomas on, 255
Mujeres, Isla de, 50, 140
Nacomes, Mayan priestly order, 240
Nahuatl, D. G. Brinton on derivation of, 248 note
_Naual_, Mayan dance, 236
Newberry, Prof., on prehistoric man in America, 274
"Norther," caught in a, 138
Nunnery, Chichen, 101;
Uxmal, 200
Nuns in Mayan religion, 275
Occeh, sepulchral mounds at, 125
Ocean Currents, importance in Mayan problem, 278
Ohio Mounds, problem of, 255
Olas, Buddhist, on Copan and Quirigua stelæ, 269;
and Mayan MSS., 277
Opichen, carvings in cave of, 252
Orange Walk, Mayan trade with, 156
Owls, 381
Paintings, Mayan and Buddhist compared, 265
Palacio, Diego, report on Copan, 205
Palenque, ruins of, 214;
"Crosses" at, possible explanation of, 270;
Orientalism of, 271;
probable date of, 287;
like Boro Budor, 287
Palms, 385
Panuco River, Huastecan settlement on, 253
Parrots, 382
Pearson, Sir Weetman, 5, 42
Peccary, 371
Pelicans, 383
Peonage System, abuses of, 324
Peru, ruins in, probable date of, 259 note
Picuda, fish, 146
Piedras Negras, ruins of, 224;
probable date of, 287
Pigeons, House of, Uxmal, 200
Pinzon, Vincente Yañez, discovers Yucatan, 47
Pisote. _See_ Coati.
Poey, Andres, on Cuban antiquities, 255
Polonnaruwa, Ceylon, ruins of, 268
Praying mantis, 377
Prea Khane, Cambodian ruins, 288
Progreso, Port of Yucatan, 57
Puerto Morelos, 156;
burning of woods by Indians at, 158
Pulque, 20, 362
Pyramids, Buddhistic and Central American, 263
Quetzalcoatl, 97;
self-torture by priests of, 224
Quintana Roo, Territory of, 158
Quirigua, ruins of, 212;
Buddhist survivals at, 269;
probable date of, 287
Racoon, 373
Ramon, tree, 385
"Red Hand," importance of, 265
Reefs, Coral, dangerous passage through, 138
Rio, Antonio del, report on Palenque, 214
Rurales, Mexican country police, 9, 20, 35
Sahagun, Father, historian, on Tula, 245 note
San Miguel, Cozumel, 166;
ruins at, 169
Sapota tree, 383;
as lintels, 294
Sayil, ruins of, 196
Schellhas, P., on Mexican MSS., 289
Schoolcraft, H. R., on "red hand," 266
Scorpions, 376
Sea-fowl, 382
Seler, Prof. E., on Mayan Calendar, 304
Sharks, 136
Shell-heaps, Japanese and American, 261
Shoshonees, Aztecs akin to, 254
Sisal hemp, 361
Slavery among Ancient Mayans, 230;
in Yucatan to-day, 321 _et seq._
Snakes in Yucatan, 368
"Snouted Mask" on Mayan ruins, 267
Squirrels, 373
Solis, Diaz de, discovers Yucatan, 47
Stephens, J. L., on "Cozumel Cross," 79;
on sealed rooms, Sayil, 197;
on Copan ruins, 205 _et seq._;
on Palenque, 216;
on "red hand," 266
Sugar-growing in Yucatan, 128
Sun, Temple of, Palenque, 219
Sunda script and Mayan glyphs, 319
Tables, Temple of, Chichen, 98
Tapir, 371;
worshipped, 105, 239;
"snouted mask" symbol of, 267;
was its worship a Buddhist survival?, 374
Tarantula, 376
_Tel Cuzaan_, god, 239
Tennis Court, Chichen, 93
Tenochtitlan, founding of, 249 note
Thomas, Prof. Cyrus W., on Ohio Mounds, 255;
theory as to glyphs, 300
Thompson, Edward A., 86;
work at Chichen, 96
Ticul, town, 189
Tigers, Temple of, Chichen, 95
Tikal, wood lintel at, 271
Tissandier, A., on Boro Budor and Cambodian ruins, 268
Tizimin, town, 116
Tlachtli, Aztec game, 94
Toltec Theory, 243
Toltecs, no evidence for existence of, 246;
Who were they?, 247
Torrell, Dr., on affinity of Eskimos and Japanese, 260
Tortoises, 376
Trees of Yucatan, 383
_Trogon resplendens_, 382
Tula, place in Toltec Theory, 243;
site of, 244;
Brinton on, 244;
date of, 245 note
Tuloon, Indians encamped at, 157
_Tunkul_, Mayan sacred drum, 228
Turkey, ocellated, 380
Turtles, trade in, 152
Usumacinta, ruins on, 222
Uxmal, ruins of, 200
Valentini, Dr. Ph. J. J., on Toltecs, 246
Valladolid, town, 104
Vega, Garcilaso de, on Peruvian ruins, 259
Vera Cruz, 5-11
Vietia, Spanish chronicler, credibility of, 249
Volan, Yucatecan carriage, terrors of riding in, 185
Waldeck on tapir worship, 239
Williams, Sir Monier, on Buddhist monks, 275
Woodpeckers, 382
Writing, Mayan, Was it indigenous?, 319
Yaqui Indians, story of persecution of, 160
Yaxchilan, tower like those at Angkor, 272
"Yucatan Channel," graveyard of, 140
Zapotecan priests, trances of, 276;
calendar of, 304
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