THE SHRINE OF GUADALUPE.
Three miles north of the City is the Hill of Tepeyacac. Leading from the
city is the ancient causeway built across the lake to Tepeyacac before
the Conquest. A street car now traverses this causeway to the town of
Guadalupe and the famous Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe, the holiest
fane in Mexico. The chain of mountains which bound the Valley of Mexico
on the north here project into the valley and terminate in the Hill of
Tepeyacac, in the Aztec language, “the termination.” Before the
Conquest, the Indians worshiped on this hill an idol called Tonantzin,
“The Mother of the Gods.” This deity seemed to have corresponded to the
Cybele of classical antiquity.
Father Florencia, who is the safest authority to follow on the
apparition up to the year 1688, when he published his book, “The
Northern Star of Mexico,” piously observes:--“The Virgin desired that
her miraculous appearance should take place on this hill to dispossess
the mother of false gods of the vain adoration rendered to the idol by
the Indians, and to show the latter that she alone was the Mother of the
true God, and the true mother of men, and that where crime and idolatry
and human sacrifice had abounded, grace should still more abound.
THE LEGEND.
Tradition says that an Indian neophyte, Juan Diego, was on his way on
the morning of Saturday, Dec. 9, 1531, to hear the Christian doctrine
expounded by the Franciscans of Santiago Tlalteloco. His home was at
Tolpetlac, and to reach the city he had to pass the Hill of Tepeyacac.
On reaching the eastern side of the hill, he heard strains of music
which seemed to him like the notes of a chorus of birds. He stood still
to listen, and then beheld on the hillside the vision of a beautiful
lady, surrounded by clouds, tinged with the colors of the rainbow.
The lady called Juan, and as her appearance was both commanding and
gracious he at once obeyed, and she addressed him as follows: “Know, my
son, that I am the Virgin Mary, mother of the true God. My will is that
a temple should be built for me here on this spot, where you and all
your race will be always able to find me and seek my aid in all your
troubles. Go to the Bishop and in my name tell him what you have seen
and heard. Tell him, too, that this is my wish, that a church be built
for me here, and for so doing I will repay you with many graces.”
Juan sought the Bishop, who was Juan de Zumarraga, a Franciscan, the
first and last Bishop of Mexico; for during the closing years of his
life, the see was raised to the rank of archbishop. Juan Diego had some
difficulty in gaining admission to the prelate’s presence, and when he
succeeded in delivering his message, small attention was paid to it, as
the Bishop was inclined to treat the story as an hallucination. Juan
Diego returned that afternoon to his village, and passed the same spot
where he had seen the vision in the morning.
The lady was again there, and asked him how he had sped. He related the
slight attention the Bishop had paid him, and asked the lady to be
pleased to choose another messenger. But she replied that he was not to
be dejected, but to return to the episcopal residence and deliver the
message the following day. The next day was Sunday and Juan rose early,
came in and heard mass at the parish church of Santiago Tlalteloco, and
then repaired to the house of the Bishop and repeated his errand with
great earnestness. This time the prelate paid more attention to the
Indian’s narrative, and told him if the lady appeared again, he was to
ask her for a sign. At this Juan was dismissed and the Bishop sent two
servants after him covertly, to observe what he did and whither he went.
The servants did as they were bidden, following Juan along the same road
that leads today from the City of Mexico to Tepeyacac, but when Juan
reached the Hill, he became invisible to their eyes, and though they
walked round and round the Hill they could not find him. Therefore they
returned to the Bishop and told him that in their opinion Juan was an
impostor and an embassador of the devil and not of the Virgin.
But while Juan was invisible to them he was once more in converse with
the lady, and told her the Bishop had commanded him to ask for a sign,
so she told him to return on the following morning and she would give
him a sign which would win him full credit for his mission.
On reaching home Juan found his uncle, Juan Bernadino, dangerously sick.
Instead of returning to the lady next day, he spent the time hunting
medicine-men among his tribe, and in gathering simple remedies for a
cure. But all day his uncle got steadily worse, and so the following
morning, Dec. 12, 1531, he started for the Franciscan convent of
Santiago Tlalteloco to fetch a confessor for his uncle. The road led by
the Hill of Tepeyacac, and fearful of meeting the vision again, he
determined to pass by another route. But this did not avail him, for
near the place where the spring now bubbles up, he saw the vision for
the fourth time. The lady did not seem at all offended at Juan for not
coming on the day she had commanded, but told him not to be anxious
about his uncle, as at that moment he was sound and well again. She then
spoke of the sign or token for the Bishop, and told Juan to climb to the
top of the hill (where the small chapel now stands) and that there he
should find a quantity of roses growing; that he should gather them all,
fill his tilma with them, and carry them to the Bishop.
Juan knew well that December was not the time of year for roses, and
besides that bare rock never produced flowers at any time of year, but
he immediately did as the lady told him, and found the spot aglow with
the most beautiful roses blossoming. He gathered them one by one and
immediately repaired to the Bishop’s residence. Juan told him what had
happened, and opened out his tilma. The flowers fell to the ground, when
it was seen that a representation of the vision had been miraculously
painted on the coarse fabric of the tilma. The Bishop fell on his knees
and spent some time in prayer. He then untied the tilma from the
Indian’s neck, and placed it temporarily over the altar of his private
oratory.
Such is the tradition, believed by the majority, though not by all
Mexican Catholics. I shall not treat of the legend theologically, but as
a traveler interested in all traditions and monuments so abundant in
this historic land.
The apparition of the Virgin of Guadalupe belongs not to that class of
beliefs in the Catholic Communion which are articles of faith binding on
the conscience of all Catholics, but to those pious popular traditions
which have received a more or less direct sanction from the
ecclesiastical authorities, and which it is considered improper in
members of the Catholic Church to doubt or call in question, at least
publicly. This may satisfy the curiosity of a number of people who
profess no particular belief, but are anxious for impartial information.
Bishop Zumarraga at once set to work to build a hermitage or small
chapel at the foot of the hill of Tepeyacac for the reception of the
miraculous painting, and, as Father Florencia observes, “_Bis dat qui
cito dat_,” the work was pushed so rapidly that the building was ready
Dec. 26, 1531, fourteen days after the vision appeared on the _tilma_.
The painting was transported to the chapel with great pomp, and the
occasion forms the subject of one of the wall paintings in the present
_basilica_, executed by Father Gonzalo Carrasco, and to which allusion
will be made in the description of the edifice. For ninety years the
piety of the Mexicans was displayed towards the image in this small
chapel. But such was the quantity of alms deposited by the worshipers,
that enough money was soon available to erect a sumptuous shrine for the
reception of the venerated image. This church was dedicated by Juan de
La Cerna, Archbishop of Mexico, November 1622. In this church the image
was venerated 350 years, and is substantially the same as the present
_basilica_ in spite of external repairs and internal alterations.
In 1629 occurred the great inundation in Mexico City, and it was
determined by the Archbishop Francisco Manso y Zuniga and the Marquis de
Ceralvo, to bring the image of the Virgin to the city to procure a
subsidence of the waters.
Quite a fleet of barges and gondolas, with the civil and ecclesiastical
dignitaries on board, started fer the sanctuary of Guadalupe, as it was
not possible to reach it on foot on account of the inundation. The image
on the _tilma_ was taken on board the barge of the archbishop, which, as
evening approached was lighted, as were the gondolas, with Chinese
lanterns. Musicians played sacred music as the fleet moved over the
placid waters. On arriving in the city, the image was placed in the
archiepiscopal mansion, whence, on the following day, it was carried to
the Cathedral, where it remained four years, the inundation lasting that
long. However, the Mexicans assert that it was the intercession of the
Virgin that caused the subsidence of the water after all.
In 1666, the Dean of the Cathedral of Mexico, D. Francisco Siles,
determined to collect the floating traditional evidence of the
apparition in a clear and methodical form. Quite a number of witnesses
were examined by the tribunal, composed of the following
ecclesiastics:--Juan de Poblete, Juan de la Camara, Juan Deiz de la
Barrera and Nicolas del Puerto.
Canons Siles and Antonio de Gama went to the village of Cuantitlan,
where Juan Diego was supposed to have been born, to look up witnesses.
Some of the witnesses examined were over a hundred years old. All of the
witnesses testified to having, in childhood, heard the tradition from
their parents. It was then attempted on the strength of the evidence
thus collected, to obtain the approval of Rome for the apparition, but
the attempt was then unsuccessful.
Cardinal Julio Rospillozi, who in 1667 was elected Pope under title of
Clement IX., wrote in 1666 to Dr. Antonio de Peralta y Castaneda, of the
Cathedral of Puebla, saying it would be impossible to obtain the
countenance of Rome. He said that as the image seemed to be identical
with the Immaculate Conception, it seemed superfluous to grant a special
office for the festival of Guadalupe. Afterwards, being elected Pope, he
granted some favors to this devotion.
In 1740, Boturini obtained the papal authority for crowning the image,
but his failure and subsequent disgrace are well known. In 1751, the
Jesuit priest, Juan Francisco Lopez, was sent to Rome on a special
mission, both to confirm the choice of Mexico of the Virgin of Guadalupe
as its special patron, and to obtain a special mass and office for the
feast of the 12th of December. He took with him two copies of the image,
said to have been made by the celebrated artist Miguel Cabrera. Lopez
performed his mission with great energy and success. He obtained an
audience with the reigning Pope, Benedict XIV., showed him the copies
and gained all his requests. When, in 1756, he returned to Mexico
bearing the papal briefs, he was received with immense honors and
rejoicings.
To come to a later date, in 1886, the archbishops of Mexico, Michoacan
and Guadalajara applied to the Pope for permission to crown the image.
This privilege can be granted only by the Pope, and the crowning is
theoretically done by him. Leo XIII. made favorable answer in February
1887, and in August 1894 granted some additions to the office and
lessons for the day. The ceremony of the coronation took place at last,
Oct. 12, 1895, in the presence of thirty-seven Mexican, American,
Canadian and other prelates, and a large concourse of the clergy and the
most prominent citizens of Mexico. When the crown was raised to its
position above the image, the congregation broke into loud acclamations.
The crown itself is a miracle of the jeweler’s art, and with its galaxy
of gems--diamonds, rubies and sapphires--is worth a king’s ransom.
Early in 1887 Father Antonio Plancarte y Labastida, a nephew of the then
archbishop of Mexico, prepared to carry out a long cherished design for
the renovation and embellishment cf the church of Our Lady of Guadalupe.
For this purpose, the image, after much opposition on the part of the
Indians, was conveyed to the neighboring Church of Capuchinas, and the
extensive plans were then initiated. The architect first employed was
Emilio Donde, but he was soon superseded by Juan Agea. At an early hour
on the morning of Sept. 30, 1895, the image was carried back to the
_basilica_, and the restored building was consecrated Oct. 1.
The first impression on entering is an ensemble of gorgeous and
harmonious coloring, and it is some time before the eye can rest on
individual objects. Naturally the raised Presbyterium and High Altar
claim attention. The Presbyterium is reached by four separate flights of
twelve steps. It is paved with diamond slabs of white and black Carrara
marble. The altar and reredos, the latter affecting the form of a frame
for the painting of the Virgin, are severe and classical in design. The
only material used is the finest Carrara marble known as “Bianco P.,”
and exquisitely wrought gilded bronze. All the marble of the altar is
monolithic, and was executed at Carrara by the sculptor Nicoli, the
Mexican architects Juan Agea and Salome Pina. All the bronze work is
from Brussels. On either side of the altar is a figure kneeling in
adoration; that on the left, or Gospel side, is Bishop Zumarraga, that
on the Epistle side is Juan Diego, who is represented as making an
offering of roses. Both are of Carrara marble. At the top of the reredos
are three angels, representing the archdioceses of Mexico, Michoacan and
Guadalajara, which applied to Pope Leo XVI. for permission to crown the
image. The central one holds out a crown of singularly pure and chaste
design. Below them and immediately above the frame is a cherub in
relief, holding the jeweled crown. The High Altar is double, there being
slabs for the celebration of mass, both before and behind. Over the High
Altar is a handsome Byzantine baldachin sustained by pillars of Scotch
granite from Aberdeen, and the baldachin is surmounted by a gilded cross
formed of roses. The rose occurs in all the decorations, as it is the
symbol of the Virgin of Guadalupe.
On the top of the front arch of the baldachin are the arms of Pope Leo
XIII. and the apices of the other three arches are filled with the arms
of the Archbishops of Mexico, Michoacan and Guadalajara. On the vault of
the baldachin, in Gothic letters are the Latin distiches, composed for
the image by Pope Leo XIII. and which are as follows:--
_Mexicus heic populus mira sub Imagine gaudet_
_Te colere, alma Parens, praesidioque frui_
_Per te sic vigeat felix, teque auspice, Christe_
_Immotam servet firmior usque fidem._
Leo P. P. XIII.
TRANSLATED.
“The Mexican people rejoice in worshiping Thee, Holy Mother, under this
miraculous image, and in looking to Thee for protection may that people
through Thee, flourish in happiness, and ever, under Thy auspices, grow
stronger in the faith of Christ.”
The four angels of the baldachin between the arches are occupied with
allegorical bronze statues of the four cardinal virtues, Prudence,
Justice, Fortitude and Temperance.
Underneath the High Altar is a crypt, the vaulted iron roof of which is
capable of sustaining a weight of three hundred thousand pounds. This
crypt contains four altars underneath the high altar, also urns or
cinerariums for the reception of the thirty persons who contributed
$5000 each to $150,000 for the High Altar.
The railing around this altar is of solid silver, and weighs fifty-two
thousand pounds, or twenty-six tons. Immediately in front of the High
Altar, but below the Presbyterium is a kneeling marble statue of Mgr.
Labastida y Davalos, late archbishop of Mexico, and underneath the
statue rests the ashes of his parents. His own are soon to be removed
here.
The vaults of the roof are painted blue with gold stars in relief. The
stars are of cedar, gilded over and screwed into the roof. The ribs of
the vaulting are beautifully decorated in the Byzantine style, and the
dome is a rich mass of gilding festooned with pink roses. The several
divisions of the dome are occupied alternately by frescoes of the Virgin
of Guadalupe and of angels bearing scrolls. In each division is one of
the poetical avocations in which the Catholics impetrate the Virgin,
such as “Seat of Wisdom,” “Mirror of Justice,” “Mystical Rose,” “Ask for
the Covenant,” etc. The windows of the dome, of stained glass, were
given by the College of the Sacred Heart of San Cosme.
The most striking of the interior decorations are the fine large wall
frescoes. The one on the right represents the conversion of the Indians
through the Virgin of Guadalupe. Groups of friars are preaching and
baptizing, while hovering in the air is the figure of the Virgin. This
is by the artist Felipe S. Gutierrez. The next represents the image
being carried to the small chapel, December 26, 1531. This is a
brilliant piece of work, and reflects great credit upon the young
artist, a young Jesuit priest, Fr. Gonzalo Carrasco. The image is
carried beneath a canopy, and attended by gorgeously arrayed priests and
prelates. Then there are the friars and Indians and Spanish cavaliers,
and acolytes bearing candles, flabelli, etc. In the lower right-hand
corner is represented the first miracle alleged to have been wrought by
the Virgin of Guadalupe. The Indians, in honor of the procession are
letting off arrows, and one of them enters the neck of an Indian. His
mother begs the procession to turn back, and as it passes her son, so
goes the story, he is healed.
On the western side, nearest the High Altar, is the fresco of the taking
of evidence for the Apparition in 1666. This is by Ibarraran y Ponce.
The next is by Felix Parra, and is called a gorgeous poem in color. It
represents the period of “Matlazahuatl,” the dread pestilence which
devastated the city in 1737, when the Archbishop Antonio Bizarron y
Equiarreta solemnly put the city under the protection of the Virgin and
immediately the plague departed. In the foreground is an Indian stricken
with the plague. The last fresco represents the presentation of a copy
of the image to Pope Benedict XIV. The Pontiff is in the act of
exclaiming: “_Non fecit taliter omni Nationi!_” Between the first two
frescoes is a mural inscription in Latin: “The Mexican people, in honor
of the Virgin of Guadalupe, who in old time appeared on the hill of
Tepeyacac to Juan Diego, erected a holy temple, and with all piety
venerated the ancient image. One of the most conspicuous in its cult,
was the Archbishop Pelagio Antonio de Labastida y Davalos, a most
munificent restorer of the Collegiate Church. Now at length, as all had
wished, and as the Chapter of the Vatican Basilica had decreed in A. D.
1740, the famous image, with the sanction of the Supreme Pontiff, Leo
XIII., was crowned with a diadem of gold, on the fourth day before the
Ides of October 1895, Prospero M. Alarcon being Archbishop of Mexico, to
stand forever as a shield, the protection and the honor of the Mexican
people.”
The apse behind the High Altar is elaborately decorated and contains
many mural paintings of popes and archbishops. In the apse is the chapel
and family vault of Mr. Antonio de Mier y Celis. This chapel is a
perfect gem of the decorative art and is dedicated to St. Joseph. The
crypt underneath is an exact reproduction of the Escorial at Madrid. The
three stained glass windows are from Munich and cost $17,000. There are
in all, ten altars in the church, and its total cost is nearly four
million dollars. During all the revolutions and political upheavals in
Mexico, the sanctity of Guadalupe has immured it from plunder; the most
reckless freebooters forbearing to invade the hallowed ground of the
Virgin.
You leave this place weighed down with impressions of magnificence,
wealth and beauty. Outside the door of this four million dollar church
you step over a hundred naked, starving beggars, holding their skeleton
fingers for coppers. One cent seems to be the regulation fee expected,
and if you give a beggar five cents he returns four cents change.
Near by is the government building in which the treaty of peace was
signed between Mexico and the United States. Guadalupe Hidalgo is what
the treaty is called in history, out of patriotism for the memory of
Hidalgo. By the little chapel is a geranium plant in full bloom. Its
stem is five inches in diameter, and the top is thirty feet in the air.
I suppose the Virgin exercises an influence over it as with every thing
else here. Across the little plazuela is another miracle attributed to
the image. At the foot of the rocky hill where the vision appeared the
last time, boils up a spring of water that is a veritable geyser. It is
said to have appeared after the apparition had vanished. It is covered
with a pavilion, _Capillo del Pocito_, and is about ten feet in
diameter, and about the same from the curb to the water. The dangerous
pit is fenced in with an iron railing, and as you gauze into its
chalybeate depths surging below, an attendant draws up a basin of water
and passes it to you with a wonderful narrative of its curative
properties for unfruitful women, and the large number of such women who
annually resort to it for relief with the Virgin’s blessing.
This is the Indian’s Mecca, and on December 12, all Indians make a
pilgrimage here in honor of Juan Diego, the only Indian saint in the
calendar. The encircling town of ten thousand devotees with a permanent
residence here is an earnest of the strong hold it has upon them. It is
said that whoever drinks from this miraculous spring is compelled to
return again, no matter how far he may wander. And so I was impelled to
drink of the vile smelling water with the hope that at some time it will
carry me to Guadalupe again without the necessity of a yard and a half
of railroad ticket which gets punched into fragments on a ninety day
circular tour. I stayed the violent eruption which the medicated water
threatened within, and turned to the broad stone steps that led to the
top of the hill where Juan plucked the roses. The beautiful line of
steps leads up the basaltic cliff to a height of a hundred and fifty
feet, and where the roses grew is a little chapel, “La Capilla de
Cerrita,” crowning the summit of Tepeyacac. Though nearly four hundred
years old, the chapel is in good repair, and is still the holiest shrine
in Mexico. The entire walls are covered with pictures of the miraculous
cures by the image.
There is a picture of a man falling from a church steeple, and
afterwards brought to life by the passage of the image, and a
bull-fighter impaled on the horns of the enraged bull, and a hundred
similar scenes where the image had asserted itself.
It was worth much to see the adoration and utter abandon lavished upon
this image. Pilgrims from everywhere stretched themselves prone upon the
floor, and the look of resignation said as plainly as the words could,
“Now Lord lettest Thou Thy servant die in peace.”
I shook myself up to see if I could awaken a little devotion within
myself, but the only feeling I had was borrowed from that little
incident on Mount Carmel, when that rugged old spokesman, Elijah, the
Tishbite called down fire to consume the worshipers of Baal.
The faithful looked up as I wandered among them with note-book and
pencil. They did not speak, but that look would have filled three
columns of close printed small pica type if translated, about the
unregenerate heathen that did not bow to the sacred image nor cross
himself when he passed by the holy water. The scribe was there solely in
pursuit of knowledge, and when he had all the little chapel contained,
he stepped over the prostrated forms on the floor and passage-way and
went out to see some more miracles performed by the Virgin.
Ten steps from the door loomed up another miracle as big as life and
almost as natural. This was the old stone sail and ship’s mast, and
thereby hangs a tale, to wit, namely, as follows:
“Once upon a time,” as the story-books go, a very rich family owned a
ship which was long over-due at Vera Cruz, so this family went to the
Virgin, or to the image rather, and laid the case before it. They said
the ship’s cargo was worth almost its weight in Spanish doubloons, and
if she would bring that ship to port, they would make her an _ex voto_
offering of the ship, if she would let them have the cargo. The image
listened and concluded that the bargain was fair enough, so she let the
ship come to port. True to their promise, the owner had the mast, sails
and cordage brought across the Cordillera Mountains 265 miles to
Guadalupe and set them up in front of the church and then encased the
whole in stone just as you see it today, and if any one doubts that the
Virgin saved the ship, why, “there stands the mast itself to prove it.”
It is useless to argue against facts. A single look of interest draws a
half dozen guides who want to explain all about the Virgin and the
image. I give them enough money to get drunk on and die if they will
leave me alone and tell me no more about the wonder. After they are gone
I turn to the Campo Santo, just behind the chapel. This is the
Westminster of Guadalupe, full to running over with illustrious
pilgrims, bandits and all.
At the barred gate I was met by a tall pirate who claimed my camera. I
told him I had passed the custom-house with that box, and that there was
nothing seditious in it but a half dozen exposures of his
fellow-citizens, and from the scarcity of clothes they had on they were
really exposed before I found them, and besides, I had a deed and title
to that camera stretching all the way to Boston. He said that was all
_bueno_, but he did not care a _hot tamale_ about that, but he would
swear by all the saints and the Virgin herself that I and my camera
would part company before I entered that gate. “Why sir, don’t you know
that you stand on holy ground, right on the Hill of Tepeyacac itself,
and right in that gate is the tomb of Santa Anna?” I told him that was
all _bueno_, too, but we had Santa Anna’s wooden leg in the Smithsonian
Institution, and I was not afraid of any one-legged man hurting me,
especially one that had been planted twenty-six years. And besides, I
told him the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo was signed right here February
2, 1848, and if I remembered correctly the treaty acknowledged that he
got licked, and we could lick him again and tie one hand behind our
backs. I did not want to trouble the Virgin to bring this gate-keeper
back to life, so I gave him my camera.
Among the Indians of our country one can hardly ever get an Indian’s
picture; they think you can “hoodoo” them if you once get their picture.
Perhaps they think the same here, for I have never found a Campo Santo
unguarded, and they all draw the line between me and my camera.
I went in and saw that Santa Anna was still dead, and his grave was
covered with the same wonderful roses that the Virgin ordered here four
hundred years ago. Then I began to figure out what right that old
brigand had to be buried here on this holy hill.
He was five times president of Mexico, four times Military Dictator, and
was twice banished to the West Indies, “For his own and for his
country’s good.” “Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna, February 21, 1798.” So
his birth-day just lacked one day of making him Father of his Country,
but seven times with the reins of government in his hands, nearly
qualified him to be step-father anyway. He ought to have come to the
United States and entered politics.
When the War of Independence began in 1821, he joined the Mexican forces
under Iturbide, but quarreled with him the next year and put himself at
the head of a new party, and seeing which was the winning side, he
joined Guerrera and soon became Commander-in-chief of the army. He then
overthrew Guerrera in favor of Bustamente, then overthrew Bustamente in
favor of Pedraza, and in 1833 he sat down on Pedraza and modestly made
himself president.
Then he told the dear people that it was time to elect a new president,
and that there was only one candidate, and the first two letters of his
name were Santa Anna. Incidentally, he reminded the people that he had
the army to back him.
They say he was elected by a large majority, (so was Cromwell.) Having
settled that little matter, he went over in Texas and chased the Texas
army all over the state for two years, till he got it corraled in a bend
of the San Jacinto River, and then sat down to supper, but during the
night the Texans broke out and to their great surprise captured Santa
Anna himself. He never forgave the Texans for that.
The Texans wanted to barbecue him just as he had done the Texans at the
fall of the Alamo in San Antonio, and the massacre at Galiad, but
General Sam Houston saved his neck. He went back home in disgrace and
was banished, but he would not stay banished. He came back and made
himself president in 1846.
When Texas entered the Union he started over to chase Texans again, but
at the battle of Cerro Gordo, General Scott got his wooden leg and he
had to give up the chase. When the French put Maximilian on the Mexican
throne in 1861, Santa Anna was an exile in the West Indies. He wrote a
letter of congratulation to Maximilian, and said, “If you want a man to
wipe up the earth with General Juarez’ army I am the man to do it.”
Maximilian declined with thanks. Then he wrote a letter to Juarez and
said, “If you want a man to wipe up the earth with that French army, I
am the man.” Juarez declined with thanks. Santa Anna had his feelings
hurt, so he came home, raised an army and licked both Maximilian and
Juarez for snubbing him. In 1867, Mexico got too small for him, so he
was asked to consider himself banished for an indefinite period.
In 1874 he asked his country to let him come home to die, and the
country graciously granted him the privilege and welcome, if he would
promise to die. So he came home and met all the agreement and died, and
here he is.
His grave-stone had R. I. P. and the boy said it was, “Let her rip,” but
a few had “perpituidad” which meant that they had paid their rent till
the final resurrection. The others were, “Rest in Peace,” for five
years, and if the rent is not paid, the resurrection takes place
immediately.
At Saltillo, the cemetery has two heaps of grinning skulls and bones
that will measure 25,000 cubic feet of dead people who did not pay rent
and were evicted.
A hundred dollars will buy the little word “perpituidad” on your
tombstone, which will protect you till Gabriel sounds the final
reveille.
I went back to my gate-keeper and said: “Now my good fellow, laying
aside all jokes, what has Santa Anna done so noble as to give him a
grave on this hill?”
He said this hill was a regular boom in real estate and that all his
renters paid gilt-edge prices for beds, and as S. A. had the shekels, he
got the bed. “And sir, if you have got the rocks, you can get lodging
here.”
I declined with thanks, and told him I always carried a Coffin with me.
The road from Mexico to Guadalupe is three miles long, and has twelve
stone shrines to commemorate the stations of the cross. All the pilgrims
venerate these shrines on the march to Guadalupe. When Maximilian was
meeting with such cool reception by the Mexicans, he walked the whole
distance barefooted, in December, to win the good will of the Mexicans
by apparent conformity to their customs. The Mexicans took him down to
Queretaro and shot him.
I have gone thus minutely, and perhaps tediously, into the details of
this legend to “find a moral and adorn the tale;” to expose the
fraudulent practices and glaring deceit which the priest-hood has
foisted upon the ignorant people. Whenever their hold upon the people
seems to weaken, a cock-and-bull story like the one just told will awe
the superstitious people by thousands to the rescue. Think of that
humbug when the water was four years falling, and then the image getting
the credit for it!
As a matter of fact, Mexico City was built upon an island only two feet
higher than Lake Texcoco, a salt lake with no outlet, and both lake and
city are in a crater, and all the water that falls in that forty mile
valley must remain until evaporated, even though it takes four years to
lower the height of a broken cloud-burst. After the water has evaporated
to its usual level, why, the “Virgin lowered the water.”
Every priest in Mexico knows the geography of the valley and why the
lake is salt, and why inundations take place even today in the principal
streets of the city. In the light of this knowledge, their duping
practices seem more reprehensible. Such is their hold, however, that
since the church and state have been separated by law, several
revolutions have been threatened because the state has attempted to
interdict some of the senseless customs of the fiestas. Even within the
last six years, the state proposed to put restrictions upon some of the
ceremonies of Guadalupe, and had to recall the proposition to prevent a
revolution.
It is encouraging to know that you never see an intelligent Mexican
making a door-mat of himself before these shrines. He knows it is not
worship as well as the priest, but there are thousands who are yet in
the dark and the only hope of the priest-hood is continual ignorance of
the masses, but education is weakening that every year. It is said that
when an Indian earns two dollars, he gives one to the priest, forty-five
cents for pulque, and supports his family with the remainder. As bad as
that may look in print, I can say it is not far from an actual fact.
Stand in front of that four million dollar church with all its useless
finery, and then gaze at the thousands of beggars that crowd its steps
and overflow to the street, who have to sit down to hide their nakedness
and to better support their weak stomachs, and draw your own conclusion.
And who ever heard of a Mexican church supporting a charity or raising a
poor fund? Not I, and I have seen all of it. If these people had one
tenth of the intelligence of the French Communes, they would walk into
those churches and have a grand lottery drawing with no blanks.
As I have seen it, the whole thing is a whited sepulcher. I mingled with
ten thousand French on July 14 when they celebrated the fall of the
Bastile, and sang with them the Marseillaise, not because I was French,
but because it was an effort and a successful one of establishing
individual freedom; and it pleased me, and I wondered when I might join
with Mexico and help them sing La Golondrina and celebrate the Fall of
Guadalupe.
Old Cato’s climax in his Roman speech-making could well be paraphrased
for the nineteenth century, and when thinking of the incubus of Mexican
progress, would fit well with a change of one word when we say:
“_Carthago delenda est._”
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