ROUND ABOUT THE MEXICAN CAPITAL
Chapultepec, on the outskirts of Mexico City, was the summer home of
Montezuma. Now it contains the president’s handsome summer palace. There
is a wonderful park, and along the _paseo_ or boulevard between it and
the capital are fine statues of famous Aztecs and Mexicans. For a
century Chapultepec was the West Point of Mexico. Many of the cadets
were killed when American soldiers captured the place during the war
with Mexico. Now there is a larger military academy at San Jacinto.
The Valley of Mexico in which the Aztecs and the Spaniards built their
capitals was once a great lake, and there are six small lakes in it now.
When the Spanish _conquistadores_ first entered Anáhuac they found the
whole valley a network of canals and waterways. Tenochtitlan they
reached across a great causeway, a raised road with water on either
side. Some remnants of these great works still remain. In the days of
Montezuma what is now Mexico City was practically on an island, with
more traffic by water than by land.
On the lakes about Tenochtitlan floated rafts of interlaced branches,
covered with rich soil and blossoming flowers. The last survival of that
Aztec floral paradise is Xochimilco, a kind of picnic lake a few miles
outside the capital. Xochimilco means “Where the Flowers Are” and the
place is well named. Mexicans of all classes are so fond of flowers that
every day in the year great quantities of roses, carnations, double
violets, and other products of the floating gardens of Xochimilco are
sold in the capital.
The gardens do not really float now, or at least they do not move about,
as they did in Aztec days. But many of them bob up and down when one
steps on them. They are made of mats of interlaced branches covered with
a thin layer of rich soil in which plants are set out. Tiny huts for the
gardeners are built on the islands. Anchored with willow poles thrust
into the mud bottom, the islands often become fixed when the willow
takes root. Flat-bottomed boats are poled about by the Indian
descendants of those who established this watery kingdom in the
thirteenth century. Some boats are loaded with flowers or vegetables
until they look like floating farms; some carry whole families (as in
China); others are filled with picnickers, for Xochimilco is a favorite
outing place. Guitars and other instruments may be heard there any
moonlight evening. Peddlers of _tamales_, _tortillas_, _pulque_, and
other things to eat and drink move about in boats. The Indians who live
and work in the floating gardens are full-blooded Aztecs, still speaking
the ancient tongue. They are a cleaner and more independent people than
the city half-breeds, and are very proud of their ancestry.
The Famous Volcanoes
[Illustration:
Courtesy Ward Line. Photo by American Photo Co., Havana
Mt. Popocatepetl, the most famous mountain in Mexico, as seen from the
side of the Pyramid of Cholula. An ancient _adobe_ mound is in the
right foreground.
]
The springs which supply the lakes in the Valley of Mexico have their
source in the snows of the two great volcanoes that lift their white
heads into the sky above it. One of these mighty peaks, Popocatepetl
(17,543 feet), is known the world over. Its name means “Smoke Mountain.”
There have been a number of eruptions of this volcano since Cortés
reached Mexico; the most recent was in 1802. The mountain still smokes,
however, and some day it may again belch forth lava and ashes. Although
it is one of the mountain wonders of the continent, being surpassed in
height by only four mountains in North America, Popocatepetl belongs to
a Mexican general and has often been offered for sale! Perhaps if he
offered to deliver it wherever the purchaser wished, he could more
easily sell it. “Popo” furnishes ice, sulphur, and great parks. The
whole floor of its crater, which is a mile wide at the top and a
thousand feet deep, is covered with pure sulphur. It throws this out at
the rate of about a million tons a year; a hundred million tons of
sulphur have been taken from its crater in the period since the
Spaniards came. As the mountain produces more sulphur than the world can
use, and the United States obtains an ample supply from Texas, and
Louisiana, the general will probably have trouble in selling his
mountain.
[Illustration:
Courtesy “Picturesque America”
A wonderful view of Ixtaccihuatl, the “Sleeping White Woman,” as this
famous volcano appears from Amecameca.
]
Alongside Popocatepetl stands—or rather lies—Ixtaccihuatl, an extinct
volcano almost as high and nearly as beautiful as the other. We say
“lies” because the name means the “Sleeping White Woman.” The snowy
mountain does actually look much like a woman lying with her head
pillowed on one arm. A Mexican legend says that Popocatepetl was a god
and Ixtaccihuatl a maiden with whom he fell in love. She was not
faithful to him, however, so he turned her into a mountain. But “Old
Popo” himself froze with grief, though he still shows his anger now and
then by belching forth smoke and sulphur.
For the traveler there are few more beautiful sights in the world than
these two great snow and glacier-capped volcanoes, as seen from anywhere
in Mexico City. In the clear air of highland Mexico they seem almost
near enough to touch. They stand forth from any point in the Valley of
Mexico, and even from far beyond, though on the opposite side they do
not resemble the mythical characters.
It is not very difficult to climb to the top of “Old Popo” or the “White
Woman”—and it is very easy to come down again. The ascent takes about
three days, fifty dollars, strong shoes, warm clothing, and good guides.
A railroad carries us to Amecameca, a mile and a half above sea level
and about forty miles from Mexico City. Horses may be used up to the
first rest house. From there the climb is on foot, first in loose
shifting black sand, then in snow and ice. On a clear day the view of
the Valley of Mexico, with its great capital and its lake-dotted basin,
is worth walking many a mile to see. In every direction lie those great
hills that are the most striking feature of the Mexican plateau. For a
time we struggle upward in the clouds, which move about as if they were
living things. The wet snow grows harder; the glare of reflected
sunshine hurts our eyes. At last we drop down exhausted at the mouth of
“Popo’s” crater.
Its walls, we see as soon as we are rested enough to peep over, are of
black obsidian, that flint-hard stone of which the Aztecs made
arrowheads and knives. Far below are acres of yellow sulphur, and gases
rise from the crevices in the crater floor. It is so very cold up here,
more than three miles high, that we soon decide to go down again. Once
we have made up our minds, that is easy. We sit down on a straw mat,
with a guide who carries an iron-pointed staff as a rudder and brake,
and away we go! It is the toboggan slide of a lifetime. Rocks and
crevices must be dodged while coasting at a rate that carries us farther
in a minute than we could climb in an hour. The sulphur is brought down
in this same speedy way.
There are many other volcanoes in Mexico, the highest among them Orizaba
(18,654 feet) which is the third highest mountain in North America. Most
of the volcanoes seem to be extinct, but one can never be sure.
Earthquakes are quite frequent.
A Place of Pilgrimage
Mexico has almost numberless churches. It has been called the land of
domes, because most of the Mexican churches are built in a style of
which the dome is a conspicuous feature. In olden days men who became
rich, especially in the mines, erected churches as thank offerings. In
some old towns there almost seems to be a church for each inhabitant!
Perhaps the most famous church in Mexico, and certainly the one
considered most holy by the Mexican masses, is Guadalupe. It is three
miles out of the capital. One can cover the distance by street car or
automobile, or, better still, on foot. Thousands of pilgrims come to
pray at this greatest shrine in Mexico, and often they have to camp in
the streets of the holy village. Guadalupe is to the Mexicans what
Benares is to the Hindus, Mecca to the Mohammedans, and Jerusalem to the
Jews and Christians.
To reach the church we climb a stairway cut in solid rock. On the way we
pass the stone-carved sails and mast of a vessel—a memorial erected more
than two centuries ago by sailors who, having prayed to the Virgin of
Guadalupe during a storm, had been saved. This is the most important of
many similar thank offerings. Some grateful people send crude pictures,
showing themselves being dragged out from under the wheels of a train or
a truck, or they donate the crutches they no longer need after a
miraculous cure. The church and its chapels are hung with rich offerings
of draperies and banners given by the wealthy, and the life-size image
of the Virgin glitters with jewels and precious stones. The chapels are
crowded from morning until night, every day in the year. The Indians and
peons of Mexico are very religious; they almost always raise their hats
when they pass a church door. I have seen all the people of a town
kneel, their hats laid on the cobblestone pavement before them, when a
bishop went by. But the Indians cling so closely to tradition that even
after four centuries many old pagan rites remain and form part of their
Christian worship. A Catholic visitor would not recognize all the rites
performed by the pilgrims at Guadalupe.
Whatever else they do, all drink the waters of a certain spring that
flows down the sacred hill. It is a sulphur spring that boils and
bubbles and has a very unpleasant odor. There are no individual cups;
instead there are copper dippers, chained to a rail. It is a very rare
pilgrim who does not carry home some of the holy water for his family
and friends, or even to sell; and as most of the pilgrims are too poor
to bring worthy receptacles, many of them use old bottles.
[Illustration:
Keystone View Co., Inc.
Devout Mexicans climbing the stone stairs at Guadalupe. The famous
stone sails mentioned in the text stand beside the stairs.
]
According to a legend, the Virgin appeared to a poor Indian named Juan,
and commanded him to build a church where she left a bunch of roses. The
priests and the people accepted his story, and joined forces to erect a
church that has become the pilgrim center of Mexico. In it may be seen
candles of every size, burning before the altars at which pilgrims have
prayed for some blessing. To reach the shrine many crawl on hands and
knees all the way up the stone steps cut in the rock hill where Juan
found the roses.
[Illustration:
Underwood & Underwood
Interior of the famous Cathedral at Guadalupe. Around the altar is a
silver railing.
]