ON THE GREAT TABLE-LAND
South of San Luis Potosí there was some dry and shriveled corn, standing
in shocks. The first planted fields of maguey appeared. As we rose to
the mile-and-a-half altitude this source of Mexico’s chief beverage
became more and more frequent, until maguey lined the railway and
covered the rolling plains to the distant mountain rim. Sometimes the
long, straight, emerald-green rows climbed broad high ridges, and
vanished. Near at hand each plant resembled a huge artichoke, more blue
than green, thus adding another color to the landscape. The maguey and
cactus belong to related families.
When the maguey plant is about seven years old it flowers and
dies—though its roots live and develop into another plant. Just before
blossoming time, the base of the plant is cut out in the shape of a
great bowl. The sap or juice runs into this rapidly, five or six quarts
a day, and flows for three or four months, giving barrels of a milky
fluid. The Mexicans call this _agua-miel_ or “honey water.” Hawkers go
about the streets and along the platforms of railroad stations shouting
“Agua-miel!” For the twelve hours before it begins to ferment, this
juice of the maguey is sweet and clear, and can do no one any harm.
In some of the maguey fields along the railroad I saw peons with
untanned pigskin sacks over their backs, trot from plant to plant, part
the pulpy leaves, and bend over the central pool in the hollow of the
maguey. Each carried a long gourd, and when he had sucked this full of
the sap he poured it into the pigskin sack. As soon as the sack was
full, he trotted away to the plantation house with it.
The Best-Known Mexican Beverage
A little of the fermented “honey water” is added to the fresh juice,
which then ferments very rapidly, and quickly becomes what the Mexicans
call _pulque_. If left to ferment naturally, the maguey juice, for a day
after the process begins, looks like skim milk and tastes rather like
buttermilk. During that time it becomes more and more intoxicating.
After thirty-six hours it is fit only to be thrown away. In some cities
_pulque_-vendors are not allowed to sell it after it is twenty-four
hours old. But most of them disobey the law and keep it much too long.
When it is highly fermented, _pulque_ becomes a poison that makes those
who drink it want to go out and kill someone—unless they first fall
stupefied in the gutter. A blind man could find a _pulquería_ (_pulque_
saloon) by the sour stench of _agua-miel_ that has been kept too long,
and only a man with the taste of a Mexican peon could drink it after it
has reached that stage.
[Illustration:
Keystone View Co., Inc.
The Mexican extracts _agua-miel_ from the maguey by sucking it up into
a gourd. It is this juice which ferments and becomes _pulque_.
]
Early-morning trains loaded with _pulque_ roll into the capital and the
other large cities of Mexico. They are like our milk trains, but seem
even more numerous. Two hundred thousand gallons of _pulque_ are drunk
in Mexico City every twenty-four hours. That means an average of six
glasses a day for every man, woman and child in the capital; and as few
foreigners or well-to-do Mexicans drink it, those who do must surely
drink more than six glasses.
Every day more than $10,000 in Mexican money, all from the pockets of
the poor, passes over the counters of Mexico City’s two thousand
_pulquerías_. The saloons have gaudy fronts, crude paintings, and vulgar
or blasphemous names, such as “The Rest-House of St. Peter.” About them
gather ragged Indians who look as if they had not had a real meal for
weeks, but had spent for _pulque_ everything they could earn, beg,
borrow or steal.
Luckily _pulque_ comes only from the highlands, and sours too quickly to
be transported very far. It spoils even more quickly than milk, so that
it is unknown in the lowlands, and even in some parts of the plateau.
The contrast between the gloomy people of the Mexican highlands and the
more cheerful ones of the tropical regions is not due entirely to the
difference in natural surroundings, but is accounted for partly by the
fact that the former have _pulque_ and the latter do not.
The Mexicans made _pulque_ before the Spaniards came. Drunkenness was
not unknown even then; it is very common now. If _pulque_ cannot be
widely distributed, the Mexicans know how to make other liquor that can
be. They boil the lower leaves of the maguey and distill from them
_mescal_ or _tequila_. This drink, a stimulant as strong as whiskey or
brandy, is held responsible for most of the acts of violence committed
in Mexico.
[Illustration:
A street stand where _pulque_, the Mexican maguey beer, is sold. In
the background is an election poster.
]
There has been some agitation for prohibition in Mexico. All the efforts
are directed against _pulque_, the poor man’s drink. The big
_hacendados_, or landowners, are nearly all opposed to what they call a
“fool reform” because they make their fortunes from the _pulque_ which
they send to the capital. A recent law makes it illegal to plant any
more maguey, and perhaps the time will come when the stuff that
befuddles the people of the Mexican highlands will be as unknown there
as it is elsewhere.
My First Tramp in Mexico
I left the train one morning at the station of Dolores Hidalgo. The town
itself, I found, was several miles from the station. A tiny mule-drawn
street car covered the distance, but I preferred to walk. On the way I
met a beggar riding a donkey. He answered my “Buenos dias” (“Good
morning”) with a whine of “A little alms, _caballero_.” As _caballero_
is the Spanish word for horseman (though it has come to mean
“gentleman”) it seemed strange to me to be called that by a man who was
riding while I was on foot.
[Illustration:
In this house in the town of Dolores Hidalgo lived the priest who in
1810 started the revolution against Spanish rule.
]
Dolores Hidalgo is named for the priest who began the Mexican revolution
against Spanish rule. He lived in this quiet little town with its two
enormous churches, and travelers may still see his house, where most of
the furniture is just as he left it when he was captured and executed by
the Spaniards. From Dolores Hidalgo I struck off across the country
toward the important city of Guanajuato. There was no road except a
trail or path that now and then seemed to lose itself. Fences are almost
as unknown in Mexico as they are in China, and when I heard bulls
bellowing savagely not far from me, I looked about for a tree to climb
in case of need. However, the region resembled China in its treelessness
as well as in the scarcity of fences. There were forests of cactus
almost as big as trees, but it would have been a painful job to climb
one of those spiny things.
[Illustration:
A Mexican village in which I spent a night. Such _adobe_ (mud-brick)
houses roofed with thatch are found in many parts of Mexico.
]
I saw that the ground along the way was dotted with tunas, which we call
cactus apples. These are bright red when ripe, very full of seeds, but
quite juicy and rather good, at least for thirst. But you must not
forget to peel off the thick outside rind, or you will think you are
eating a cushion full of pins. Before it is peeled the tuna is harder to
handle than a porcupine, leaving the fingers full of little spines that
are very hard to remove. A curious thing about the cactus apple is that
it grows on the edge of the plant’s leaves, sometimes a dozen apples
encircling one leaf.
A Cold Lodging
That night I slept in an Indian hut made of _adobe_ (mud and straw
bricks baked in the sun) and grass. My lodging cost me three Mexican
cents. The Mexican dollar and cent, by the way, are worth only half as
much as our own. My bed was a reed mat about three feet long, and my
room was really the family barnyard, with chickens and donkeys all about
me. For supper the woman served me a bowl of _sopita_ (called “little
soup” because it is so thin), corn _tortillas_, white cheese, and boiled
peppers. The boy of the family wandered about eating cornstalks as if
they were sugar cane. I shivered nearly all night, though I was far down
in the tropics.
Long before daylight the woman of the house got up and began making
_atole_. She took some shelled corn and sprinkled it in the hollow of a
large stone. Then she crushed it with a stone rolling-pin, strained it
through a sieve, and threw it into boiling water. It took her a whole
hour to make the _atole_, and it certainly was not worth the trouble. It
was hot, but it tasted like water in which corn husks had been boiled.
That was even sadder than the ordinary scant Mexican breakfast. But my
bill for supper, lodging and breakfast was only six cents!
All that morning and half the afternoon I tramped along a trail that was
sometimes deep in sand or sticky mud, and sometimes a slope of
cobblestones thrown together on a steep hillside. I met or overtook many
donkeys, loaded with crates of cactus-fruit, railroad ties, ears of
corn, and sometimes with women and children. By and by peons or workmen
in American overalls began to appear.
Most of them were quite friendly, but some had been drinking, and acted
as if they wanted to pick a quarrel. Once, when I sat resting at a high
spot on the trail, three drunken peons came stumbling over toward me.
One of them, about forty years old, thrust his _pulque_-scented face
into mine and demanded a cigarette. But I was watching one of the
others, a ragged youth who slowly walked in my direction, with one arm
held behind him. He had a very wicked gleam in his eye. Suddenly I
jumped up and snatched the hidden hand into sight. It held a large,
sharp-pointed piece of broken rock. I knocked this out of his hand, but
instead of trying to fight he let his two companions drag him away down
the trail. I strolled on after this incident and a few minutes later
came out high above the famous mining city of Guanajuato.