BY CHARLES E. HURD
The present volume in which Mr. Harper tells
the story of his personal experiences and
observations in a section of Mexico which is
now being cleverly exploited in the advertising
columns of the newspapers as the great
agricultural and fruit-growing region of the North
American continent, has a peculiar value, and
one that gives it a place apart from the ordinary
records of travel. The journey described was
no pleasure trip. The three who took part in it
were young, ambitious, and full of energy. Each
had a fair amount of capital to invest, and each,
inspired by the accounts of visitors and the
advertisements of land speculators setting forth
the wonderful opportunities for easy money
making in agricultural ventures along the eastern
coast of Mexico, believed that here was a
chance to double it. There was no sentiment in
the matter; it was from first to last purely a
business venture. The scenery might be
enchanting, the climate perfect, and the people
possessed of all the social requirements, but
while these conditions would be gratefully
accepted, they were regarded by the party as
entirely secondary—they were after money.
The recorded impressions are therefore the result
of deliberate and thoughtful investigation,—not
of the superficial sort such as one would
acquire on a pleasure-seeking trip. They differ
essentially from the unpractical views of the
writer who is sent into Mexico to prepare a
glowing account of the country's resources from
a casual and personally disinterested view of
conditions.
The story of the trip by land and water from
Tampico to Tuxpam is photographic in its
realism. In no book on Mexico has the character
of the peon been as accurately drawn as in this
volume. Most writers have been content to
sketch in the head and bust of the native
Mexican, but here we have him painted by the deft
hand of the author at full length, with all his
trickery, his laziness and his drunkenness upon
him. One cannot help wondering why he was
ever created or what he was put here for. In
this matter of character-drawing Mr. Harper's
book is unique.
The results of the investigations in this section
of the country to which the party had been
lured are graphically set forth by Mr. Harper in
a half-serious, half-humorous manner which
gives the narrative a peculiar interest. He
perhaps feels that he has been "stung," but yet
he feels that he can stand it, and enters no
complaint. Besides, the experience is worth
something.
Of course the volume does not cover all Mexico,
but its descriptions are fairly typical of
the larger portion of the country, particularly
as regards the people, their habits, morals and
methods of living. Aside from its interest as a
narrative the book has an important mission.
It should be in the hands of every prospective
investor in Mexican property, especially those
whose ears are open to the fascinating promises
and seductive tales of the companies formed for
agricultural development. A single reading will
make nine out of ten such restrap their
pocketbooks. The reader will be well repaid for the
time spent in a perusal of the volume, and it is
to be regretted that the author has determined
to print it only for private and restricted
distribution.
Boston, October 25, 1909.
There are few civilized countries where the
American pleasure-seeking traveler is so
seldom seen as in the rural districts of
southeastern Mexico, along the coast between
Tampico and Vera Cruz. The explanation for
this is doubtless to be found in the fact that
there is perhaps no other civilized country where
the stranger is subjected to so many personal
discomforts and vexations resulting from
incommodious facilities for travel, and from the
multiplicity of pests that beset his path.
The writers of books on Mexican travel usually
keep pretty close to the beaten paths of travel,
and discreetly avoid the by-ways in those
portions far removed from any railroad or highway.
They acquire their observations and impressions
chiefly from the window of the comfortable
passenger-coach or from the veranda of some hotel
where three good meals are served daily, or
from government reports and hearsay,—which
are often unreliable. It is only the more daring
fortune-hunters that brave the dangers and
discomforts of the remote regions, and from
these we are rarely favored with a line, either
because they have no aptitude for writing, or, as
is more likely, because, wishing to forget their
experiences as speedily as possible, they make no
permanent record of them. Tourists visiting Mexico
City, Monterey, Tampico and other large cities
are about as well qualified to discourse upon the
conditions prevailing in the agricultural sections
of the unfrequented country districts as a
foreigner visiting Wall Street would be to write
about the conditions in the backwoods of northern
Maine. I can readily understand the tendency
of writers to praise the beauty of Mexican
scenery and to expatiate upon the wonderful
possibilities in all agricultural pursuits. In
passing rapidly from one section to another without
seeing the multifarious difficulties encountered
from seedtime to harvest, they get highly exaggerated
ideas from first impressions, which in Mexico are
nearly always misleading. The first time I beheld
this country, clothed in the beauty of its
tropical verdure, I wondered that everybody
didn't go there to live, and now I marvel that
anybody should live there, except possibly for
a few months in winter. If one would obtain
reliable intelligence about Mexico and its
advantages—or rather its disadvantages—for
profitable agriculture, let him get the honest
opinion of some one who has tried the experiment
on the spot, of investing either his money
or his time, or both, with a view to profit.
In March, 1896, in company with two friends
and an interpreter, I went to Mexico, having been
lured there by numerous exaggerated reports of
the possibilities in the vanilla, coffee and rubber
industries. None of us had any intention of
remaining there for more than a few months,—long
enough to secure plantations, put them in charge
of competent superintendents, and outline the
work to be pursued. We shared the popular
fallacy that if the natives, with their crude and
antiquated methods could produce even a small
quantity of vanilla, coffee or rubber, we could,
by employing more progressive and up-to-date
methods, cause these staple products to be
yielded in abundant quantities and at so slight a
cost as to make them highly profitable. We had
heard that the reason why American investors
had failed to make money there was because they
had invested their funds injudiciously, through
intermediaries, and had no personal knowledge
of the actual state of affairs at the seat of
investment. We were therefore determined to
investigate matters thoroughly by braving the
dangers and discomforts of pestilence and insects
and looking the ground over in person. We had
no idea of forming any company or copartnership,
but each was to make his own observations
and draw his own conclusions quite independent
of the others. We agreed, however, to remain
together and to assist one another as much as
possible by comparing notes and impressions.
There was a tacit understanding that all ordinary
expenses of travel should be shared equally
from one common fund, to which each should
contribute his share, but that each one should
individually control his own investment, if such
were made. Each member of the party had endeavored
to post himself as best he could regarding
the necessities of the trip. We consulted
such accounts of travel in Mexico as were available
(nothing, however, was found relating to the
locality that we were to visit), conversed with a
couple of travelers who had visited the western
and central parts, and corresponded with various
persons in that country; but when we came together
to compare notes of our requirements for
the journey no two seemed to agree in any
particular. Our objective point was Tuxpam, which
is on the eastern coast almost midway between
Tampico and Vera Cruz, and a hundred miles
from any railroad center. As it was our intention
to barter direct with the natives instead of
through any land syndicate, we thought best to
provide ourselves with an ample supply of the
native currency. Out of the thousand and one
calculations and estimates that we all made, this
latter was about the only one that proved to be
anywhere near correct. In changing our money
into Mexican currency we were of course eager
to secure the highest premium, and upon learning
that American gold was much in demand at
Tampico (the point where we were to leave the
railroad) we shipped a quantity of gold coin by
express to that place.
Our journey to Tampico was by rail via Laredo
and Monterey, and was without special incident;
the reader need not therefore be detained by a
recital of what we thought or saw along this
much traveled highway. This route—especially
as far as Monterey—is traversed by many
Americans, and American industry is seen all
along the line, notably at Monterey.
Upon arriving at Tampico we were told by the
money-changers there that they had no use for
American gold coin. They said that the only way
in which they could use our money was in the
form of exchange on some eastern city, which
could be used by their merchants in making
remittances for merchandise; so we were obliged
to ship it all back to an eastern bank, and sold
our checks against a portion of it at a premium
of eighty cents on the dollar.
We stalked around town with our pockets
bulging out with Mexican national bank notes,
and felt quite opulent. Our wealth had suddenly
increased to almost double, and it didn't seem
as if we ever could spend it, dealing it out after
the manner of the natives, three, six, nine and
twelve cents at a time. We acquired the habit
of figuring every time we spent a dollar that we
really had expended only fifty cents. Our fears
that we should have difficulty in spending very
much money must have shone out through our
countenances, for the natives seemed to read
them like an open book; and for every article
and service they charged us double price and
over. We soon found we were spending real
dollars, and before returning home we learned
to figure the premium the other way.
The moment we began to transact business
with these people we became aware that we were
in the land of mañana (tomorrow). The natives
make it a practice never to do anything today
that can be put off until tomorrow. Nothing
can be done today,—it is always "mañana,"
which, theoretically, means tomorrow, but in
common practice its meaning is vague,—possibly
a day, a week, or a month. Time is reckoned as
of no consequence whatever, and celerity is a
virtue wholly unknown.
Our business and sightseeing concluded, we
made inquiry as to the way to get to Tuxpam,[2]
a small coast town in the State of Vera Cruz,
about a hundred miles further south. We
inquired of a number of persons and learned of
nearly as many undesirable or impossible ways
of getting there. There were coastwise steamers
from Tuxpam up to Tampico, but none down the
coast from Tampico to Tuxpam. After spending
a whole day in fruitless endeavor to find a means
of transportation we were returning to the hotel
late in the afternoon, when a native came
running up behind us and asked if we were the
Americans who wanted to go to Tuxpam. He
said that he had a good sailboat and was to sail for
Tuxpam mañana via the laguna,—a chain of lakes
extending along near the coast from Tampico to
Tuxpam, connected by channels ranging in
length from a hundred yards to several miles,
which in places are very shallow, or totally dry,
most of the time. We went back with him to
his boat, which we found to be a sturdy-looking
craft about thirty feet long, with perhaps a
five-foot beam. It was constructed of two large
cedar logs hewn out and mortised together. The
boatman said he had good accommodations
aboard and would guarantee to land us at Tuxpam
in seven days. He wanted two hundred dollars
(Mexican money, of course) to take our party of
four. This was more than the whole outfit was
worth, with his wages for three weeks thrown
in. We went aboard, and were looking over the
boat, rather to gratify our curiosity than with
any intention of accepting his monstrous offer,
when one of the party discovered a Mexican lying
in the bottom of the boat with a shawl loosely
thrown over him. Our interpreter inquired if
anyone was sick aboard, and was told by the
owner that the man was a friend of his who was
ill with the smallpox, and that he was taking him
to his family in Tuxpam. We stampeded in great
confusion and on our way to the hotel procured
a supply of sulphur, carbolic acid, chlorine, and
all the disinfectants we could think of. Hurrying
to one of our rooms in the hotel, we barred
the door and discussed what we should do to
ward off the terrible disease. Some one suggested
that perhaps the boatman was only joking,
and that after all the man didn't have
smallpox. It didn't seem plausible that he would
ask us to embark for a seven days' voyage in
company with a victim of an infectious disease.
But who would venture back to ascertain the
facts? Of course this task fell upon the
interpreter, as he was the only one who could
speak the language. While he was gone we began
preparing for the worst, and after taking account
of our stock of disinfectants the question was
which to use and how to apply it. Each one
recommended a different formula. One of the
party found some sort of a tin vessel, and
putting half a pound of sulphur into it, set it
afire and put it under the bed. We then took
alternate sniffs of the several disinfectants, and
debated as to whether we should return home
at once, or await developments. Meanwhile the
room had become filled almost to suffocation
with the sulphur fumes, the burning sulphur had
melted the solder off the tin vessel, and running
out had set the floor on fire. About this time
there was a vigorous rap at the door and some
one asked a question in Spanish; but none of us
could either ask or answer questions in that
language, so there was no chance for an argument
and we all kept quiet, except for the scuffling
around in the endeavor to extinguish the
fire. The water-pitcher being empty, as usual,
some one seized my new overcoat and threw it
over the flames. At this juncture our interpreter
returned and informed us that it was no
joke about the sick man, and that the police
authorities had just discovered him and ordered
him to the hospital. He found that the boatman
had already had smallpox and was not afraid of
it; he was quite surprised at our sudden alarm.
As the interpreter came in, the man who had
knocked reappeared, and said that having smelled
the sulphur fumes he thought someone was
committing suicide. When we told him what
had happened he laughed hysterically, but
unfortunately we were unable to share the funny
side of the joke with him.
That evening when we went down to supper
everybody seemed to regard us with an air of
curious suspicion, and we imagined that we were
tagged all over with visible smallpox bacteria.
We afterwards learned that the natives pay
little more heed to smallpox than we do to
measles; and especially in the outlying country
districts, they appear to feel toward it much as
we do toward measles and whooping-cough,—that
the sooner they have it and are over with
it (or rather, it is over with them), the better.[3]
One of the party vowed that he wouldn't go
to his room to sleep alone that night, because
he knew he should have the smallpox before
morning. After supper we borrowed a small
earthenware vessel and returning to our
"council chamber" we started another smudge with
a combination of sulphur and other fumigating
drugs. Someone expressed regret that he had
ever left home on such a fool's errand. During
the night it had been noised about that there
was a party of "Americanos ricos" (rich
Americans) who wanted to go to Tuxpam, and next
morning there were a number of natives waiting
to offer us various modes of conveyance, all alike
expensive and tedious. We finally decided to go
via the laguna in a small boat, and finding that
one of the men was to start that afternoon we
went down with him to see his boat, which proved
to be of about the same construction and dimensions
as the one we had looked at the previous
afternoon. He said that he had scarcely any
cargo and would take us through in a hurry;
that he would take three men along and if the
wind was unfavorable they would use the paddles
in poling the boat. His asking price for
our passage, including provisions, was $150,
but when he saw that we wouldn't pay that
much he dropped immediately to $75; so we
engaged passage with him, on his promising to
land us in Tuxpam in six days. He said there
was plenty of water in the channels connecting
the lakes, except at one place where there would
be a very short carry, and that he had arranged
for a man and team to draw the boat over. We
ordered our baggage sent to the boat and not
liking his bill of fare we set out to provide
ourselves with our own provisions for the trip.
When we arrived at the boat we found our
baggage stored away, with a variety of merchandise,
including a hundred bags of flour, piled on
top of it. There was not a foot of vacant space
in the bottom of the boat, and we were expected
to ride, eat and sleep for six days and nights on
top of the cargo. The boatman had cunningly
stored our effects underneath the merchandise
hoping that we would not back out when we saw
the cargo he was to take. However, we had
become thoroughly disgusted with the place and
conditions (the hotel man having arbitrarily
charged us $25 for the hole we burned in his
cheap pine floor), and were glad to get out of town
by any route and at any cost. We all clambered
aboard and were off at about three p.m. As we
sat perched up on top of that load of luggage and
merchandise when the boat pulled out of the
harbor we must have looked more like pelicans
sitting on a huge floating log than like
"Americanos ricos" in search of rubber, vanilla and
coffee lands. We didn't find as much rubber in
the whole Republic of Mexico as there appeared
to be in the necks of those idlers who had
gathered on the shore to see us off.
The propelling equipment of our boat consisted
of a small sail, to be used in case of favorable
breezes—which we never experienced—and
two long-handled cedar paddles. The blades of
these were about ten inches wide and two and a
half feet long, while the handles were about
twelve feet long. The natives are very skillful
in handling these paddles. They usually work
in pairs,—one on each side of the boat. One
starts at the bow by pressing the point of the
paddle against the bottom and walks along the
edge of the boat to the stern, pushing as he
walks. By the time he reaches the stern his
companion continues the motion of the boat by
the same act, beginning at the bow on the
opposite side. By the time the first man has
walked back to the bow the second has reached
the stern, and so on. The boats are usually run
in the shallow water along near the shore of the
large bodies of water in the chain of lakes, so
that the paddles will reach the bottom. The
boatman had three men besides himself in
order to have two shifts, and promised that the
boat should run both night and day. This plan
worked beautifully in theory, but how well it
worked out in practice will be seen later on.
We glided along swimmingly until we reached the
first channel a short distance from Tampico, and
here we were held up for two hours getting over
a shoal. That seemed a long wait, but before
we reached our destination we learned to measure
our delays not by hours but by days. After
getting over the first obstruction we dragged
along the channel for an hour or so and then
came to a full stop. We were told that there
was another shallow place just ahead and that
we must wait awhile for the tide to float us over.
We prepared our supper, which consisted of
ham, canned baked beans, bread, crackers, and
such delicacies as we had obtained at the stores
in Tampico. The supper prepared by the natives
consisted of strips of dried beef cut into small
squares and boiled with rice and black beans.
At first we were inclined to scorn such fare as
they had intended for us, but before we reached
Tuxpam there were times when it seemed like
a Presidential banquet. After supper three of
the boatmen went ahead, ostensibly to see how
much water there was in the channel, while the
fourth remained with the boat. After starting
a mosquito smudge and discussing the situation
for a couple of hours, we decided to "turn in"
for the night. The interpreter asked the
remaining Mexican where the bedding was. His
only response was a sort of bewildered grin. He
didn't seem to understand what bedding was,
and said they never carried it. We were expected
to "roost" on top of the cargo without
even so much as a spread over us,—which we did.
It was an eventful night,—one of the many of
the kind that were to follow. After the fire
died out we fought mosquitoes—the hugest I
had ever seen—until about three o'clock in the
morning, when I fell asleep from sheer exhaustion.
There being no frost in this section to kill
these venomous insects, they appear to grow
and multiply from year to year until finally they
die of old age. A description of their size and
numbers would test the most elastic human
credulity. Webster must have had in mind this
variety when he described the mosquito as having
"a proboscis containing, within the sheathlike
labium, six fine sharp needlelike organs
with which they puncture the skin of man and
animals to suck the blood."
I had been asleep but a short time when the
party returned from the inspection of the
"water" ahead, and if the fire-water they had
aboard had been properly distributed it would
almost have floated us over any shoal in the
channel. They brought with them two more
natives who were to help carry the cargo over
the shallow place, but all five of them were in the
same drunken condition. In less than ten minutes
they all were sound asleep on the grass beside
the channel. We were in hopes that such a
tempting bait might distract some of the
mosquitoes from ourselves, but no such luck. The
mosquitoes had no terrors for them and they
slept on as peacefully as the grass on which they
lay. All hands were up at sunrise and we supposed
of course we were to be taken over the
shoal; but in this we were disappointed, for this
proved to be some saint's day, observed by all
good Mexicans as a day of rest and feasting.[4] We
endeavored to get them to take us back to town,
but no one would be guilty of such sacrilege as
working on a feast-day. When asked when we
could proceed on the journey they said "Mañana."
After breakfast our party strolled off
into the pasture along the channel and when we
returned to the boat a few minutes later the
Mexicans shouted in a chorus "Garrapatas!
mucho malo!" at the same time pointing to our
clothes, which were literally covered with small
wood-ticks, about half the size of an ordinary
pinhead.
Garra—pronounced gar-r-r-ra—means to
hook or grab hold of, and patas means "feet," so
I take it that this pestilential insect is so named
because it grabs hold and holds tight with its feet.
If this interpretation be correct, it is well named,
because the manner in which it lays hold with
its feet justifies its name, not to mention the
tenacity with which it hangs on with its head.
It is very difficult to remove one from the skin
before it gets "set," and after fastening itself
securely the operation of removing it is both
irritating and painful. If it should ever need
renaming some word should be found that signifies
"grab hold and hang on with both head
and feet."
They cling to the grass and leaves of bushes
in small clusters after the manner of a swarm of
bees, and the instant anything touches one of
these clusters they let go all hold and drop off
onto the object, and proceed at once to scatter in
every direction; taking care, however, not to fall
a second time. We had noticed a few bites, but
paid no special attention to them, as we were
becoming accustomed to being "bitten." Many
of them had now reached the skin, however, and
they claimed our particular attention for the
remainder of the day. We inquired how best to
get rid of them and were told that our clothes
would have to be discarded. The loss of the
clothes and the wood-ticks adhering to them
was not a matter of such immediate consequence
as those which had already found their way
through the seams and openings and reached the
skin. We were told that to bathe in kerosene or
turpentine would remove them if done before
they got firmly set, and that if they were not
removed we would be inoculated with malaria and
thrown into a violent fever, for being unacclimated,
their bite would be poisonous to our systems.
Of course there was not a drop of kerosene
or turpentine aboard, so the direst consequences
were inevitable. Our trip was fast becoming
interesting, and with the cheering prospects of
malarial fever and smallpox ahead, we began to
wonder what was next! All interest in the progress
of the journey was now entirely subverted,
and, with the mosquitoes and garrapatas to play
the accompaniment to other bodily woes and
discomforts, sufficient entertainment was in
store for the coming night.
After digging out our trunks and changing our
clothes we thoughtlessly laid our cast-off garments
on top of the cargo, with the result that
in a short time the whole boat was infested with
the little pests. Our one comforting hope was
that they might torture the Mexicans, but this
proved to be a delusive consolation, for we found
that the natives were accustomed to their bites
and paid but little attention to them. I refrain
from detailing the events and miseries of the
night following, because I wish to forget them.
Not least among our annoyances was the evident
relish with which the Mexicans regarded our
discomforts during daylight, and the blissful
serenity with which they slept through it all
at night. As they lay there calmly asleep while
we kept a weary vigil with the mosquitoes and
ticks, I was strongly tempted to push one of
them off into the water just to disturb his
aggravating rest. They laughed uproariously at
our actions and imprecations over the wood-ticks,
but the next laugh was to be at their expense,
as will be seen further along.
Next morning at sunrise (from sunrise to sunset
is regarded by the Mexicans as the duration of
a day's work) they began unloading the cargo
and carrying it half a mile over the shoal. The
strength and endurance of the men were remarkable,
considering their meagre fare. Each man
would carry from two to three hundred pounds
on the back of his neck and shoulders the entire
distance of half a mile without stopping to rest.
By two o'clock in the afternoon the cargo was
transferred and the boat dragged over the shoal.
In this latter undertaking we all lent a hand.
If any of our friends at home could have
witnessed this scene in which we took an active
part, with our trousers rolled up, wading
in mud and water nearly up to our knees, they
might well have wondered what Eldorado we
were headed for. By the time the boatmen got
the cargo reloaded it was time for supper, and
they were too tired to continue the voyage that
night.
We slept intermittently during the night, and
fought mosquitoes between dozes. We started
next morning about five o'clock. This was the
beginning of the fourth day out and we had
covered less than six miles. One of the men
told us that on the last trip they took ten days
in making the same distance. It began to look
as though we would have to go on half rations
in order to make our food supply last through
the journey. We moved along the channel without
interruption during the day, and late in the
afternoon reached the point where the channel
opened into a large lake several miles long. We
camped that night by the lakeside,—the Mexicans
having apparently forgotten their promise
to pursue the journey at night. They slept on
the bare ground, while we remained in the boat.
A brisk breeze blew from the lake, so we had no
mosquitoes to disturb the first peaceful night's
sleep we had enjoyed since the smallpox scare.
During the night we made the acquaintance of
another native pest, known as the "army-ant,"
a huge black variety measuring upwards of half
an inch in length, the bite of which produces
much the same sensation as the sting of a hornet
or scorpion, though the pain is of shorter
duration. The shock produced by the bite, even
of a single one, is sudden and violent, and there
is nothing that will cause a Mexican to disrobe
with such involuntary promptness as the attack
of one of these pestiferous insects. They move
through the country at certain seasons in great
bodies, covering the ground for a space of from
fifty feet to a hundred yards wide, and perhaps
double the length. If a house happens to stand
in their way they will rid it completely of rats,
mice, roaches, scorpions, and even the occupants.
They invade every crevice from cellar to garret,
and every insect, reptile and animal is compelled
either to retreat or be destroyed. Nothing will
cause a household to vacate a dwelling more suddenly
at any time of the night or day, than the
approach of the dreaded army-ant.
The boatmen were all asleep on the bank
of the lake, while we, remaining aboard the boat,
had finished our after-supper smoke and were
preparing to retire. Suddenly our attention was
attracted by a shout from the four Mexicans almost
simultaneously, which echoing through the
woods on the night air, produced the weirdest
sound I had ever heard. It was a cry of sudden
alarm and extreme pain. In an instant the four
natives were on their feet, and their shirts were
removed with almost the suddenness of a flash
of lightning. They all headed for the boat and
plunged headlong into the water. The army-ant
being unknown to us, and not knowing the
cause of their sudden alarm, we were uncertain
whether they had all gone crazy or were fleeing
from some wild beast. They scrambled aboard
the boat, and one of the regrets of my life was
that I couldn't understand Spanish well enough
to appreciate the full force of their ejaculations.
All four of them jabbered in unison—rubbing
first one part of the body and then another—for
fully ten minutes, and judging from their
maledictions and gestures, I doubt if any of them
had a good word to say about the ants. It was
now our turn to laugh. In half an hour or so
they ventured back to the land and recovered
their clothes, the army of ants having passed on.
They were up most of the night nursing their
bites, and once our interpreter called out and
asked them if ants were as bad as garrapatas.
One of the men was so severely poisoned by
the numerous bites that he was obliged to return
home the next day.
At about eight o'clock next morning we arrived
at a little village, or settlement, and after
wandering around for half an hour our party
returned to the boat, but the boatmen were nowhere
to be seen. We waited there until nearly noon,
and then started out in search of them. They
were presently found in the store, all drunk and
asleep in a back room. We aroused them, but
they were in no condition to proceed, and had no
intention of doing so. We remained there just
twenty-eight hours, and when we again started
on our journey it was with only three boatmen,
none of them sober enough to work. The wind
blew a steady gale in our faces all the afternoon,
and we had traveled only about four miles by
nightfall. We had now been out more than six
days and had not covered one quarter of the distance
to Tuxpam. At this rate it would take us
nearly a month to reach there.
About three o'clock next day we went ashore
at a little settlement, and upon learning that
there was to be a baile (a dance) that night, the
boatmen decided to stay until morning. It was
an impoverished looking settlement of perhaps
forty huts, mostly of bamboo with thatched roofs
of grass. A hut generally had but one room,
where the whole family cooked, ate and slept on
the dirt floor. This room had an aperture for
ingress and egress, the light and ventilation
being admitted through the cracks. We did not
see a bed in the entire village, and in passing
some of the huts that night we observed that
the entire family slept on the hard dirt floor in
the center of the room with no covering. In one
hovel, measuring about 12 x 14 feet, we counted
eleven people asleep on the floor,—three grown
persons and eight children, while the family pig
and the dog reposed peacefully in one corner.
All were dressed in the same clothes they wore
in the daytime, including the dog and pig. The
garments of the men usually consist of a pair
of knee-drawers,—generally of a white cotton
fabric,—a white shirt-waist, leather sandals
fastened on their feet with strings of rawhide,
and a sombrero, the latter usually being more
expensive than all the rest of the wearing apparel.
The natives here are generally very cleanly, and
change and wash their garments frequently. The
women spend most of their time at this work,
and when we landed we counted fourteen women
washing clothes at the edge of the lake.
The dance began about nine o'clock and most
of the participants, both men and women, were
neatly attired in white garments. The men
were very jealous of their girls, though for what
reason it was hard to understand. Many writers
rhapsodise over the beauty and loveliness of the
Mexican women, but I couldn't see it. There
are rare exceptions, however. The dance-hall
consisted of a smooth dirt floor with no
covering overhead, and the orchestra—a violin
and some sort of a wind-instrument—was
mounted on a large box in the center. A row of
benches extended around the outside of the
"dancing-ground." The men all carried their machetes
(large cutlasses, the blades of which range from
eighteen to thirty-six inches in length) in sheaths
at their side, and two or three of the more gaily
dressed wore colored sashes around their waists.
All wore their sombreros. The dance had not
progressed for more than an hour when one of
the villagers discovered that his lady was
engaging too much of the attention of one of our
boatmen, and this resulted in a quarrel. Both
men drew their machetes and went at one
another in gladiator fashion. It looked as if
both would be carved to pieces, but after slashing
at each other for awhile they were separated
and placed under arrest. It was discovered that
one of them had received an ugly, though not
dangerous, wound in his side, while the other
(our man) had the tendons of his left wrist
severed. The men were taken away and the
dance proceeded as orderly as before. We now
had only two boatmen left. In discussing the
matter at home a year later a member of our
party remarked that "it was a great pity that
the whole bunch wasn't put out of commission;
then we would have returned to Tampico, and
from there home." One of the natives very
courteously invited us to get up and take part
in the dance, but after the episode just
mentioned we decided not to take a chance.
Our boatmen spent all the next day in fruitless
endeavor to secure another helper, and we
did not start until the day after at about nine
o'clock—a needless delay of forty-two hours;
but they were apparently no more concerned
than if it had been ten minutes. We were learning
to measure time with an elastic tape. Ober
complains of the poor traveling facilities in Mexico,
and says that "in five days' diligent travel"
he accomplished but 220 miles. We had been
out longer than that and had not covered twenty
miles.
The wind remained contrary all day, as usual,
and having but two men, our progress—or lack
of progress—was becoming painful. Our provisions,
too, were exhausted, and we were reduced
to the regular Mexican fare of dried beef and
boiled rice. We took a hand at the paddles, but
our execution was clumsy and the work
uncongenial. Someone suggested that in order to
make our discomfiture complete it ought to rain
for a day or two, but the boatman reassured us
upon this point, saying that it never rained there
at that season of the year,—about the only
statement they made which was verified by facts.
Having made but little progress that day, we
held a consultation after our supper of dried beef
and rice, and decided that the order of procedure
would have to be changed. The wind had ceased
and the mosquitoes attacked us in reinforced
numbers. We were forced to remain in a much
cramped position aboard the boat on top of the
cargo, because every time we attempted to stretch
our legs on shore we got covered with wood-ticks.
It occurred to some of us to wonder what
there could possibly be in the whole Republic
that would compensate us for such annoyance
and privation, and even if we should happen to
find anything desirable in that remote district,
how could we get in to it or get anything out
from it? Certainly none of us had any intention
of ever repeating the trip for any consideration.
Thus far we had not seen a rubber-tree, vanilla-vine,
coffee-tree, or anything else that we would
accept as a gift.
Next morning we went over to a nearby hut,
and our interpreter calling in at the door asked
of the woman inside if we could get some breakfast.
"No hay" (none here) said she, not even
looking up from her work of grinding corn for
tortillas.[5] He then asked if we could get a cup of
hot coffee, to which she again replied "No hay."
In response to a further inquiry if we could get
some hot tortillas he got the same "No hay,"
although at that moment there was one baking
over the fire and at least a dozen piled up on a
low bench, which, in lieu of a table, stood near
the fireplace,—which consisted of a small
excavation in the dirt floor in the center of the
room. The fire was made in this, and the tortillas baked
on a piece of heavy sheetiron resting on four stones.
The interpreter said that we were hungry and had
plenty of money to pay for breakfast, but the only
reply he got was the same as at first. We therefore
returned to the boat and breakfasted on boiled rice
and green peppers, the dried beef strips having
given out. Soon after our meal I had a severe chill,
followed by high fever. Of course we all feared that
it was the beginning of smallpox or malaria, or both.
Another member of the party was suffering from a
racking headache and dizziness, which, he declared,
were the first symptoms of smallpox. There was no
doctor nearer than Tuxpam or Tampico. The aspect was
therefore gloomy enough from any point of view.
We made but little progress during the day.
That night after going over the various phases
of the situation and fighting mosquitoes—which
would bite through our garments at any point
where they happened to alight—with no prospect
of any rest during the entire night, we found
ourselves wrought up to such a mutinous state
of mind that it appeared inevitable that
something must be done, and that quickly. We
directed our interpreter to awaken the owner of
the boat and explain the facts to him, which he
did. He told him that we had become desperate
and that if not landed in Tuxpam in forty-eight
hours we purposed putting both him and his
man ashore, dumping the cargo, and taking the
boat back to Tampico; that we would not be
fooled with any longer, and that if he offered any
resistance both he and his man would be ejected
by main force. The interpreter was a tall, powerful
man, standing six feet and two inches in his
stocking feet, and had a commanding voice. He
had spent several years on the Mexican frontier
along the Rio Grande, and understood the Mexicans
thoroughly. He needed only the suggestion
from us in order to lay the law down to them in
a manner not to be mistaken for jesting. This
he did for at least ten minutes with scarcely a
break of sufficient duration to catch his breath.
The boatman, thinking that we were of easy-going,
good-natured dispositions, had been quite
indifferent to our remonstrances, but he was now
completely overwhelmed with astonishment at
this sudden outburst. He begged to be given
another trial, and said he would not make
another stop, except to rest at night, until we
reached Tuxpam. We passed a sleepless night
with the mosquitoes, frogs, cranes, pelicans,
ducks—and perhaps a dozen other varieties of
insects and waterfowl—all buzzing, quacking and
squawking in unison on every side. In the
morning my physical condition was not improved.
A little after noon we approached a small
settlement on the border of the lake, and
stopped to see if we could obtain some medicine
and provisions. Our interpreter found what
seemed to be the principal man of the place, who
took us into his house and provided us with a very
good dinner and a couple of quart bottles of Madeira.
I had partaken of no food for nearly thirty-six
hours, and was unable now to eat anything.
We explained to him about the smallpox episode
and he agreed that I had all the customary
symptoms of the disease. I wrote a message to
be despatched by courier to Tampico and from
there cabled home, but on second thought it
seemed unwise to disturb my family when it was
utterly impossible for any of them to reach me
speedily, so I tore it up. We arranged for a
canoe and four men to start that night and
hurry us back to Tampico with all possible speed.
The member of our party who had been suffering
with headache and dizziness had eaten a
hearty dinner, and having had a few glasses of
Madeira he was indifferent as to which way he
went. During the afternoon I slept for several
hours and about seven o'clock awoke, feeling
much better. Not desiring to be the cause of
abandoning the trip, I had them postpone the
return to Tampico until morning. Meanwhile
we paid off our boatman, as we had determined
to proceed no further with him under any
conditions. He remained over night, however. In
the morning I felt much better and the fever had
left me. We decided to change our plans for
return, and to go "on to Tuxpam;" in fact this
had now become our watchword. We had had
enough of travel by water, and finding a man
who claimed to know the route overland we
bargained with him to furnish us with four
horses and to act as guide, the price to be $100.
He also took along an extra guide. The distance,
he said, was seventy-five miles, and that we
would cover it in twenty-four hours. The highest
price that a man could ordinarily claim for
his time was fifty cents per day, and the rental
of a horse was the same. Allowing the men
double pay for night-travel each of them would
earn $1.50, and the same returning, making in
all $6 for the men; and allowing the same for
six horses, their hire would amount to $18, or
$24 in all. We endeavored to reason him down,
but he was cunning enough to appreciate the
urgency of our needs, and wouldn't reduce the
price a penny.
It is worthy of note that in this part of the
country there is no fixed value to anything when
dealing with foreigners. If you ask a native the
price of an article, or a personal service, he will
very adroitly measure the pressure of your need
and will always set the figure at the absolute
maximum of what he thinks you would pay, with
no regard whatever for the value of the article
or service to be given in exchange. If you need
a horse quickly and are obliged to have it at any
cost, the price is likely to be four times its value.
In bartering with the natives it is wise to assume
an air of utter indifference as to whether you
trade or not. I once gave out notice that I
wanted a good saddle-horse, and next morning
when I got up there were seventeen standing at
my front door, all for sale, but at prices ranging
from two to five times their value. I dismissed
them all, saying that I didn't need a horse at
the time, and a few days later bought the best
one of the lot for exactly one quarter of the
original asking-price. We were told in Tampico of
a recent case where an American traveler
employed a man to take his trunk from the
hotel to the depot, a distance of less than half a
mile, without agreeing upon a price, and the
man demanded $10 for the service, which the
traveler refused to pay, as the regular and
well-established price was but twenty-five cents.
The trunk was held and the American missed his
train. The case was taken to court and the
native won,—the judge holding that the immediate
necessity of getting the trunk to the station
in time to catch the train justified the
charge, especially in that it was for a personal
service. The native had been cunning enough
to carry the trunk on his back instead of hauling
it with his horse and wagon, which stood at the
front door of the hotel. The traveler was detained
four days in trying the suit, and his lawyer
charged him $50 for services. In these parts
it is therefore always well to make explicit
agreements on prices in advance, especially for
personal service to be performed.
In purchasing goods in large quantities one is
always expected to pay proportionately more,
because they reason that the greater your needs
the more urgent they are. I discovered the
truth of this statement when purchasing some
oranges at the market-place in Tampico. The
price was three cents for four oranges. I picked
up twelve and gave the man nine cents, but he
refused it and asked me for two reals, or
twenty-five cents. I endeavored to reason with him,
by counting the oranges and the money back and
forth, that at the rate of four for three cents, a
dozen would come to medio y quartilla (nine
cents), and nearly wore the skin off the oranges
in the process of demonstration; but it was of
no use. Finally I took four, and handing him
three cents took four more, paying three cents
each time until I had completed the dozen. I
put them in my valise and left him still counting
the money and remonstrating.
We agreed to the extortionate demand of $100
for the hire of the horses and men, only on
condition that we were to be furnished with ample
provisions for the trip. Leaving our baggage
with the boat to be delivered at Tuxpam we
started on our horseback journey just after
sunset, expecting to reach Tuxpam by sunset next
day. The trail led through brush and weeds for
several miles, and in less than ten minutes we
were covered with wood-ticks from head to foot.
Shortly after nightfall we entered a dense forest
where the branches closed overhead with such
compactness that we couldn't distinguish the
movement of our hands immediately before our
eyes. The interpreter called to the guide in front
and asked if there were any wild animals in these
woods; in response we received the cheering
intelligence that there were many large panthers
and tigers, and that further on along the coast
there were lions. After that we momentarily
expected to be pounced upon by a hungry tiger
or panther from some overhanging bough. The
path was crooked, poorly defined, and very
rugged. Our faces were frequently raked by the
branches of trees and brush, and the blackness
seemed to intensify as we progressed. We
loosened the reins and allowed the horses to take
their course in single file. The guide in front
kept up a weird sort of yodling cry which must
have penetrated the forest more than a mile. It
was a cry of extreme lonesomeness, and is said
by the natives to ward off evil spirits and wild
animals. I can well understand the foundation
for such a belief, particularly in regard to the
animals. The pestiferous wood-ticks were
annoying us persistently, and it looked as though
we had changed for the worse in leaving the boat.
At length we came out into the open along the
Gulf, and traveled several miles down the coast
by the water's edge. It was in the wooded
district at our right along here that the lions were
so abundant, but I have my doubts if there was
a lion, or tiger, or panther anywhere within a
mile of us at any time. In my weakened physical
condition the exertion was proving too
strenuous, and at three o'clock in the morning
we all stopped, tied the horses at the edge of the
thicket and lay down for a nap beside a large log
that had been washed ashore on the sandy beach.
The natives assured us that the lions were less
likely to eat us if we remained out in the open.
A stiff breeze blowing from off the water whirled
the dry sand in eddies all along the beach. We
nestled behind the log to escape the wind and
sand, and in a few minutes were all fast asleep.
When we awoke a couple of hours later we were
almost literally buried in sand. The wag of the
party said it would be an inexpensive burial, and
that he didn't intend ever to move an inch from
the position in which he lay.
Unaccustomed as we were to horseback riding,
it required the most Spartanlike courage to
mount our horses again. After going a few miles
it came time for breakfast and our interpreter
asked one of the guides to prepare the meal.
He responded by reaching down into a small bag
hanging at his saddle-horn and pulling out four
tortillas, one for each of us. This was the only
article of food they offered us.
It may be explained that the tortilla (pronounced
torteeya) is the most common article of
food in Mexico. It is common in two different
senses,—in that it is the cheapest and least
palatable food known, and also that it is more
generally used than any other food there. In
appearance the tortilla resembles our pancake,
except that it is thinner, tougher, and usually
larger around. The size varies from four to
seven inches in width, and the thickness from an
eighth to a quarter of an inch. It is made of
corn, moistened in limewater in order to remove
the hulls, then laid on the flat surface of a metate
(a stone-slab prepared for the purpose), and
ground to a thick doughy substance by means
of a round stone-bar held horizontally with one
hand at each end and rubbed up and down the
netherstone, washboard fashion. The women
usually do this work, and grind only as much at
a time as may be required for the meal. The
dough—which contains no seasoning of any
kind—not even salt—is pressed and patted into
thin cakes between the palms of the hand, and
laid on a griddle or piece of sheetiron (stoves
being seldom seen) over a fire to bake. They are
frequently served with black beans—another
very common article of food in Mexico—and by
tearing them into small pieces they are made to
serve the purpose of knives, forks and spoons in
conveying food to the mouth,—the piece of
tortilla always being deposited in the mouth with
the food which it conveys. Among the poorer
classes the tortilla is frequently the only food
taken for days and perhaps weeks at a time. It
is never baked crisp, but is cooked just enough
to change the color slightly. When served hot,
with butter—an extremely rare article in the
rural districts—it is rather agreeable to the
taste, but when cold it becomes very tough and in
taste it resembles the sole of an old rubber shoe.
Such was the food that was offered us in
fulfillment of the promise to supply us with an
abundance of good provisions for the journey.
I had eaten scarcely anything for three days, and
with the improvement in my physical condition
my appetite was becoming unmanageable. We
found that it would probably be impossible to
obtain food until we reached Tamiahua, a small
town about thirty miles down the coast. It
would be tiresome and useless to dwell further
upon the monotony of that day's travel along the
sands of the barren coast, with nothing to eat
since the afternoon before. Suffice it to say that
we all were still alive when we arrived at
Tamiahua at about three o'clock in the afternoon.
Meanwhile we had been planning how best to
get even with the Mexicans for having bled us
and then starved us. Fortunately, we had paid
only half the sum in advance, and the remaining
half would at least procure us a good meal.
We went to a sort of inn kept by an accommodating
native who promised to get up a good
dinner for us. We told him to get everything
he could think of that we would be likely to
enjoy, to spare no expense in providing it, and
to spread the table for six.
Tamiahua is situated on the coast, cut off
from the mainland by a small body of water
through which the small freight-boats pass in
plying between Tampico and Tuxpam. There
happened to be a boat at the wharf, just arrived
from Tampico with a load of groceries destined
for Tuxpam. The innkeeper suggested that
there might be some American goods aboard, and
we all went down to interview the boatman.
He informed us that the cargo was consigned to
a grocer in Tuxpam and that he couldn't sell
anything, but when our interpreter slipped a
couple of silver pesos (dollars) into his palm he
told us to pick out anything we wanted. We
took a five-pound can of American butter, at $1
a pound, an imported ham at fifty cents a pound,
a ten-pound tin box of American crackers at
fifty cents a pound, four boxes of French
sardines, two cans of evaporated cream, and a
selection of canned goods, the bill amounting in
all to $22.25. This was all taken to the inn and
opened up. The innkeeper was instructed to
keep what we couldn't eat. The butter was so
strong that he kept the most of that, with more
than half of the crackers. At five o'clock we
were served with a dinner of fried chicken, fried
ham and eggs, canned baked beans, bread and
butter, coffee, and native fruit. The two guides
were invited to sit down with us to what was
doubtless the most sumptuous feast ever set
before them. After dinner we called for a dozen
of the best cigars that the town afforded, and
two were handed to each one, including the
guides. After lighting our cigars we called for
the bill of the entire amount, which, including
the sum of $22.25 for the boatman, came to
$38.50. We called the innkeeper into the room,
counted out $50 on the table, and paid him $38.50
for the dinner and the boatman's bill; then gave
him $5 extra for himself, while the remaining
$6.50 was handed to the head guide. He almost
collapsed with astonishment, and wondered what
he had done to deserve such a generous
honorarium; but his amazement was increased ten-fold
when the interpreter informed him that this was
the balance due him. A heated argument ensued
between them, and the guide drawing his machete
attempted to make a pass at the interpreter,
with the remark that he would kill every gringo
(a vulgar term applied to English-speaking people
by the Mexicans in retaliation for the term
greaser) in the place. The innkeeper pounced
upon him with the quickness of a cat and pinioned
his arms behind him. His companion seeing
that he was subdued made no move. The
innkeeper called for a rope and in less than five
minutes the belligerent Mexican was bound hand
and foot and was being carried to the lockup.
The interpreter explained the whole matter to
the innkeeper, who sided with us, of course.
The effect of the five-dollar tip was magical.
He went to the judge and pleaded our case so
eloquently that that dignitary called upon us in
the evening and apologized on behalf of his
countrymen for the indignity, assuring us
incidentally that the offender would be dealt with
according to the law. We presented him with
an American five-dollar gold piece as a souvenir.
He insisted that we remain over night as his
guests, and in the morning piloted us through
the village. The first place visited was the
cathedral, a large structure standing in the center
of the principal street. Its seating capacity was
perhaps five times greater than that of any
other building in the village. It contained a
number of pieces of beautiful old statuary, and
on the walls were many magnificent old
paintings, of enormous dimensions, with splendid
frames. They are said to have been secretly
brought to this obscure out-of-the-way place
from the City of Mexico during the French
invasion, but for what reason they were never
removed seems a mystery.
A fiesta was in progress in honor of the
birthday of some saint, and it was impossible to get
anyone to take us to Tuxpam, only a few miles
distant. We desired to continue via the laguna,
and engaged two men to take us in a sort of
gondola, with the understanding that we should
leave just after sunset. We gave the men a
dollar apiece in advance, as they wished to purchase
a few articles of food, etc., for the journey, and
they were to meet us at the inn at sunset. Neither
of them appeared at the appointed time, and
in company with the innkeeper we went in
search of them. In the course of half an hour
we found one of the men behind a hut, drunk,
and asleep. He had drank a whole quart of
aguardiente and the empty bottle lay at his side.
We left him and went to the boat, where we
found the other man stretched out full length
in the bottom with a half-filled bottle beside him.
We concluded to start out and to put the man
at the paddle as soon as he became sufficiently
sober. The innkeeper directed us as
best he could and we pushed off from the shore
about an hour after nightfall, expecting to reach
Tuxpam by eight o'clock next morning. We
were told to paddle out across the lake about a
mile to the opposite shore, where there was a
channel leading into a large lake beyond. The
water was very shallow most of the way, and
filled with marshgrass and other vegetation,
which swarmed with a great variety of waterfowl.
Disturbed by our approach they kept up
a constant quacking, squawking and screeching
on all sides, which, reverberating on the still
night-air, made the scene dismal enough. There
was a baile in progress near the shore in the
village and as we paddled along far out in the
lake we could see the glimmer of the lights
reflected along the surface of the water and could
hear the dance-music distinctly. When we had
gotten well out into the lake the drunken man
in the bottom of the boat waked up and inquired
where he was and where we were taking him.
Seeing the lights in the distance and hearing
the music he suddenly remembered that he had
promised to take his girl to the dance, and
demanded that he be taken back to shore. Upon
being refused he jumped out into the water and
declared that he would wade back. We had
great difficulty in getting him back into the boat
and came near capsizing in the operation. The
ducking he got sobered him up considerably and
at length we got him at the helm with the paddle
and told him to head for the mouth of the channel.
He neared the shore to the right of the channel
and following along near the water's edge was
within a quarter of a mile of the village before
we realized what his trick was. The interpreter
took the paddle away from him and told him of
the dire consequences that would follow if he
didn't settle down and behave himself. After
turning the boat around and following along the
shore for half a mile he promised to take us to
Tuxpam if we would agree to get him another
bottle of aguardiente there and also a present
with which to make peace with his girl. Upon
being assured that we would do this he seemed
quite contented and set to work in earnest.
As we entered the narrow channel a large dog
ran out from a nearby hut, and approaching the
boat threatened to devour us all. Provoked at
this interference the Mexican made a swish at
him in the dark with the paddle, but missing the
dog he struck the ground with such violence
that the handle of the paddle broke off near the
blade, and both Mexican and paddle tumbled
headlong into the water with a splash. This
provoked the dog to still greater savagery, and
jumping from the bank into the boat he attacked
the interpreter with the ferocity of a tiger. He
was immediately shot and dumped into the
water. Meanwhile our gondolier had clambered
up on the bank and the two pieces of the paddle
had floated off in the darkness. What to do
was a serious question. The native at the hut
had probably been aroused by the shot and was
likely to come down on us with more ferocity
than the dog. We could not therefore appeal to
him for another paddle. It was so dark that we
could scarcely see one another in the boat, and
it was exceedingly fortunate that none of the
party was shot instead of the dog. While we
were debating the various phases of our
predicament the Mexican—who had now become quite
sober after his second sousing—unsheathed his
machete and cut a pole, with the aid of which he
soon had us a safe distance down the channel.
A few miles further on we got out at a hut by
the side of the channel and bought a paddle, for
which we paid three times its value.
The channels from here on were generally
overhung on both sides with brush and the
boughs of trees, and the darkness was so intense
that it was impossible to distinguish any object
at a distance of three feet. The man at the
paddle set up the same doleful yodling cry that
we had heard in the woods, and continued it at
intervals all through the night. He advised us
to be careful not to allow our hands to hang
over the edge of the boat, as the channel
abounded with alligators. As a matter of fact,
I doubt if there was an alligator within miles of
us. The native was doubtless sincere in his
statement, because he had perhaps heard others
say that there were alligators there. The story
of the lions, tigers and panthers in the woods
along the coast was also undoubtedly a myth
which like many other sayings had become a
popular belief from frequent repetition. The
same is true of dozens of tales one hears in
Mexico, and about Mexico when at home. For
example, the fabulous stories about the vast
fortunes to be made in planting vanilla, rubber
trees and coffee; but I shall treat of these
matters in their proper place further on.
We finally arrived at Tuxpam in the morning
at nine o'clock. As I reflected upon the
experiences of the past two weeks I shuddered at
the very thought of returning. It is doubtful if
all the riches in this tropical land could have
tempted me again to undergo the tortures and
anxiety of body and mind that fell to my portion
on that journey. It was an epoch long to be
remembered.[6]
Tuxpam is a pleasant sanitary town of perhaps
five thousand inhabitants situated on the banks
of the beautiful Tuxpam River a few miles inland
from the coast. The town is built on both sides
of the river, which carries off all the refuse and
drainage to the ocean below. This being a
narrative of experiences rather than a history of
towns and villages, I have purposely refrained
from long-drawn-out topographical descriptions.
The reader is doubtless familiar with the general
details of the crude architecture that characterizes
all Mexican villages and cities, and a detailed
recital of this would be a needless repetition of
well-known facts, for there is a monotonous
sameness in the appearance of all Mexican towns
and villages. For the purpose of this narrative
it matters little to the reader whether the people
of Tuxpam are all Aztecs, Spaniards, French or
Indians, though in point of fact they consist of a
sprinkling of all of these. Tuxpam itself is
simply a characteristic Mexican town, but it
should be here permanently recorded that it has
within its precincts one of the most adorable
women to whom the Lord ever gave the breath
of life: Mrs. Messick, the widow of the former
American consul, is a native Mexican of ebony
hue, but with a heart as large and charitable and
true as ever beat in a human breast. She is far
from prepossessing in appearance, and yet to
look upon her amiable features and to converse
with her in her broken English is a treat long to
be remembered. Her commodious home is a
veritable haven for every orphan, cripple, blind
or otherwise infirm person that comes within
her range of vision, and her retinue of servants,
with herself at their head, are constantly engaged
in cooking, washing and otherwise caring
for the comforts and alleviating the sufferings of
those unfortunates who are her special charges.
She furnishes an illustrious example of the spirit
of a saint inhabiting a bodily form, and it is
almost worth the trip to Mexico to find that the
native race can boast a character of such noble
instincts.
Arriving at this picturesque town we went at
once to the hotel. This hostelry consisted of a
chain of rooms built upon posts about nine feet
from the ground, and extending around the
central market-place. There is a veranda around
the inside of the square, from which one may
obtain a good view of the market. The stands,
or stalls, are around the outer edge under the
tier of rooms, while in the center men and
women sit on the ground beside piles of a great
variety of fresh vegetables and other perishable
articles for household use. There is perhaps no
better selection of vegetables to be found in any
market in America than we saw here.
The partitions dividing the tier of rooms were
very thin and extended up only about two-thirds
of the way from the floor to the ceiling, so
there was an air-space connecting all the rooms
overhead. One could hear every word spoken in
the adjoining room on either side. The furniture
consisted of a cot-bed, a wash-stand and a
chair. We each procured a room, and as we
looked them over and noted the open space
overhead, someone remarked that "it would be
a great place for smallpox." Having had no
sleep the night before, and being very tired
after sitting in a cramped position all night in
the boat, we retired shortly after reaching town.
At about four o'clock in the afternoon I was
awakened by a vigorous pounding at my door,
and my two companions, who were outside,
shouted, "Get up quick! there is a case of
smallpox in the next room!" I jumped up quickly
and in my dazed condition put on what clothing
I could readily lay my hands on, and snatching
up my shoes and coat ran out on the veranda.
After getting outside I discovered that I had
gotten into my trousers hind side before and
had left my hat, collar, shirt and stockings
behind, but did not return for them. We all
beat a hasty retreat around the veranda to the
opposite side, of the court, or square, and the
people in the market-place below having heard
the pounding on the door, and seeing me
running along the veranda in my déshabillé
concluded that the place was afire. Someone
gave the alarm of fire, and general pandemonium
ensued. The women-peddlers and huxsters in
the market hastily gathered up such of their
effects as they could carry and ran out of the
inclosure into the street. In remarkable contrast
to the usual solicitude and thoughtfulness
of motherhood, I saw one woman gather up a
piece of straw-matting with about fifty pounds
of dried shrimp and scurry out into the street,
leaving her naked baby sitting howling on the
bare ground. Vegetables and all sorts of truck
were hurriedly dumped into bags and carried
out. Happily this episode occurred in the
afternoon when there was comparatively little doing,
and very few pedestrians in the place; for had it
happened in the early morning when all the
people are gathered to purchase household
necessities for the day, a serious panic would
have been inevitable. About this time our
interpreter appeared, and three soldiers in white
uniforms came rushing up to us and enquired
where the fire was. My companions explained
to the soldiers, through the interpreter, that it
was only a practical joke they had played on
me. It now became my turn to laugh, for they
were both placed under arrest and taken before
the magistrate, charged with disturbing the
peace and starting a false alarm of fire. When
the interpreter explained the matter to the
magistrate that official lost his dignity for a
moment and laughed outright. He was a good-natured
old fellow (an unusual characteristic, I
understand, among Mexican magistrates) and
appreciated the joke even more than I did. He
recovered his dignity and composure long enough
to give us an impressive warning not to play
any more such pranks, and dismissed the case.
Our baggage did not arrive until five days
later, and was soaking wet, as the boatman said
he had encountered a gale in which he had
barely escaped inundation.
There was an American merchant in Tuxpam
by the name of Robert Boyd, whose store was
the headquarters of all Americans, both
resident and traveling. Had we talked with Mr.
Boyd before going to Mexico there would have
been no occasion for writing this narrative. He
was an extremely alert trader and in his thirty
years' residence, by conducting a general store
and trafficking in such native products as chicle
(gum,—pronounced chickly), hides, cedar, rubber
and vanilla, which he shipped in small quantities
to New York, he had accumulated about
$50,000 (Mexican). We had expected to make on
an average that sum for every day we spent in
Mexico, and were astonished that a man of his
commanding appearance and apparent ability
should be running a little store and doing a
small three-penny[7] business. Three months
later we would have concluded that any American
who could make fifty thousand dollars by
trading with Mexicans for thirty years is highly
deserving of a bronze monument on a conspicuous
site. For clever trading in a small way,
the Mexican is as much ahead of the average
Yankee as our present methods of printing are
ahead of those employed in Caxton's time. They
are exceedingly cunning traders and will thrive
where even the Italian fruit-vender would starve.
When we informed Mr. Boyd that we had come
in search of vanilla, rubber and coffee lands he
must have felt sorry for us; in fact he admitted
as much to me a few months later when I knew
him better. With his characteristic courtesy,
however, he told us of several places that we
might visit. We learned for the first time that
the three industries require entirely different
soils and altitudes. For coffee-land he recommended
that we go up the Tuxpam River to what was known
as the Mesa (high table-lands) district, while for
vanilla-land he recommended either Misantla or
Papantla, further down the coast; and rubber trees,
he said, could be grown with moderate success in
certain localities around Tuxpam. He did not
discourage us, because it was not consonant with
his business interests to dissuade American
enterprise and investments there, no matter how
ill-advised the speculation might be. Others
before us had come and gone; some had left their
money, while others had been wise enough to get
back home with it, and stay there. Some investors
had returned wiser, but never was one known to
return richer. All this, however, we did not
learn until later. We made several short
journeys on horseback, but found no lands that
seemed suitable for our purposes. There were
too many impediments in the vanilla industry,—not
least among which was the alacrity with
which the natives will steal the vanilla-beans
as fast as they mature. In fact, a common
saying there is, "catch your enemy in your
vanilla-patch,"—for you would be justified in
shooting him at sight, even though he happened
there by accident. It requires a watchman to
every few dozen vines (which are grown among
the trees) and then for every few watchmen it
needs another watchman to keep an observing
eye on them. Again, the vanilla country is
uncomfortably near the yellow fever zone.
As to rubber, we found very few trees in
bearing, and the few scattering ones we saw that
had been "tapped," or rather "gashed," in order
to bleed them of their milk, were slowly dying.
True, the native method of extracting the milk
from the trees was crude, but they did not
appear hardy.
One of the principal articles of export from
this section is chicle. The reader may not be
aware that a great deal of our chewing-gum
comes from this part of Mexico, and that it is a
thoroughly pure and wholesome vegetable product.
The native Chiclero is the best paid man
among the common laborers in Mexico. Tying
one end of a long rope around his waist he climbs
up the tree to the first large limb—perhaps
from thirty to sixty feet—and throwing the other
end of the rope over the branch lets himself
down slowly by slipping the rope through his left
hand, while with the right hand he wields a short
bladed machete with which he chops gashes in
the tree at an angle of about forty-five degrees,
which leading into a little groove that he makes
all the way down, conducts the sap down to the
base of the tree, where it is carried into a basin
or trough by means of a leaf inserted in a gash
in the tree near the ground. This is a very
hazardous undertaking and requires for its
performance a dexterous, able-bodied man. A
single misstroke may sever the rope and
precipitate the operator to the ground. In this way
a great number of men are killed every year. The
sap is a thick, white creamy substance, and is
boiled down in vats the same as the sap from the
maple tree. When it reaches a certain thickness
or temperature it is allowed to cool, after which
it is made up into chunks or squares weighing
from ten to forty pounds each. It is then
carried to market on mule-back. The crude
chicle has a delightful flavor, which is entirely
destroyed by the gum-manufacturers, who mix
in artificial flavors, with a liberal percentage of
sugar. If the gum-chewer could obtain crude
chicle with its delicious native flavor he (or she)
would never be content to chew the article as
prepared for the trade.
Rubber is produced in the same way as chicle,
and the milk from the rubber tree is scarcely
distinguishable, except in flavor, from that of
the chicle-producing tree. The latter, however,
grows to much greater size and is more hardy.
It abounds throughout the forests in the lowlands.
The native rubber trees die after being
gashed a few times, and those we saw in bearing
were very scattering. You might not see a
dozen in a day's travel.
The easiest way to make money on rubber
trees is to write up a good elastic article on the
possibilities of the industry, form a ten or twenty
million dollar corporation and sell the stock to
the uninitiated,—if there are any such left. It
would be a debatable question with me, however,
which would be the more attractive from an
investment point of view,—stock in a rubber
company in Mexico, or one in Mars. Both would have
their advantages; the one in Mexico would possess
the advantage of closer proximity, while the
one in Mars would have the advantage of being
so far away that one could never go there to be
disillusioned. The chances for legitimate returns
would be about the same in both places. It
seems a pity that any of those persons who ever
bought stock in bogus Mexican development
companies should have suffered the additional
humiliation of afterwards going down there to see
what they had bought into.
It is surprising that up to the present time no
one has appeared before the credulous investing
public with a fifty-million dollar chicle
corporation, for here is a valuable commodity that
grows wild in the woods almost everywhere, and
a highly imaginative writer could devote a whole
volume to the unbounded possibilities of making
vast fortunes in this industry.
While I was in Mexico a friend sent me some
advertising matter of one of these development
companies that was paying large dividends on
its enormous capital stock from the profits on
pineapples and coffee, when in point of fact there
was not a coffee-tree on its place, and it was
producing scarcely enough pineapples to supply
the caretaker's family.
In regard to coffee, we found that some American
emigration company appeared to be making
a legitimate effort to test the productivity of
that staple, and had sent a number of thrifty
American families into Mexico and settled them
at the mesa,[8] several miles inland from Tuxpam.
They had cleared up a great deal of land and put
out several thousand coffee-plants. There are
many reasons why this crop cannot be extensively
and profitably raised in this part of Mexico,—and
for that matter, I presume, in any other
part. Foremost among the many obstacles is
the labor problem. The native help is not
only insufficient, but is utterly unreliable.
It is at picking-time that the greatest amount of
help is required, and even if it were possible to
rely upon the laborers, and there were enough
of them, there would not be sufficient work to
keep them between the harvest-seasons. It
would be totally impracticable to import
laborers; the expense and the climate would both
be prohibitive. Again, the price of labor here
has increased greatly of late years, without a
corresponding appreciation in the price of coffee.[9]
Neither vanilla, coffee nor rubber had ever been profitably
raised in large quantities and we therefore decided that
under the existing circumstances and hindrances we would
dismiss these three articles from further consideration.
If we had been content to return home and
charge our trip to experience account, all would
have been well,—but we pursued our investigations
along other lines. The possibilities of
the tobacco industry claimed our attention for
awhile—it also claimed a considerable amount
of money from one of my companions. Someone
(perhaps the one who had the land for sale)
had recently discovered that the ground in a
certain locality was peculiarly suited to the
growth of fine tobacco, which could be raised at
low cost and sold at fabulous prices. We learned
that a large tract of land in this singularly-favored
district was for sale; so thither we went
in search of information. The soil was rich and
heavily wooded; it looked as though it might
produce tobacco or almost anything else. I
neither knew nor cared anything about tobacco-raising
and the place did not therefore interest
me in the least. One of my companions, however,
had been doing a little figuring on his own
account, and had calculated that he could buy
this place, hire a foreman to run it, put in from
five to eight hundred acres of tobacco that year,
and that the place would pay for itself and be
self-sustaining the second year. By the third
year he would have a thousand acres in tobacco,
and the profits would be enormous. It would
not require his personal attention, and he could
send monthly remittances from home for expenses,
and probably come down once a year on
a pleasure trip. Parenthetically, by way of
assurance to the reader that the man had not
entirely lost his reason, I may say that we
learned in Tuxpam that of all routes and modes
of travel to that place we had selected by far
the worst; that the best way was to take a
Ward Line Steamer from New York to Havana,
and from there around by Progreso, Campeche,
and up the coast to Vera Cruz, thence to
Tuxpam. From Tuxpam the steamers go to
Tampico, then back to Havana and New York.
However, one cannot count with certainty on
landing at Tuxpam, as the steamers are obliged
to stop outside the bar and the passengers and
cargo have to be lightered over. The steamers
often encounter bad weather along the coast,
and it frequently happens that passengers and
freight destined for Tuxpam are carried on up
to Tampico.
My friend had gotten his money easily and was
now unconsciously planning a scheme for spending
it with equal facility. The more we tried to
dissuade him the more convinced he was of the
feasibility of the plan. We argued that no one
had ever made any money in tobacco there, and
that it was an untried industry. He said that
made no difference; it was because they didn't
know how to raise tobacco. He would import a
practical tobacco-man from Cuba—which he
finally did, under a guarantee of $200 a month
for a year—and that he would show the Mexicans
how to raise tobacco. He bought the place,
arranged through a friend in Cuba for an expert
tobacco-raiser, and sent couriers through the
country to engage a thousand men for chopping
and clearing. He was cautioned against attempting
to clear too much land, as it was very late.
The rainy season begins in June, and after that
it is impossible to burn the clearings over. The
method of clearing land here is to cut down the
trees and brush early in the spring, trim off the
branches and let them lie until thoroughly dry.
In felling a forest and chopping up the brush
and limbs it forms a layer over the entire area,
sometimes five or six feet deep. Under the hot
sun of April and May, during which time it
rarely rains more than a slight sprinkle, this
becomes very dry and highly inflammable. Early
in June the fires are set, and at this season the
whole country around is filled with a hazy
atmosphere. The heat from the bed of burning
tinder is so intense that most of the logs are
consumed and many of the stumps are killed; thus
preventing them from sprouting. Every foul
seed in the ground is destroyed and for a couple
of years scarcely any cultivation is required.
Our would-be tobacco-raiser paid no heed to
advice or words of warning; he was typical of
most Americans who seek to make fortunes in
Mexico,—they have great difficulty in getting
good advice, but it is ten times more difficult
to get them to follow it. You rarely obtain
trustworthy information from your own
countrymen who have investments there, for the
chances are fifty to one that they are anxious to
sell out, and will paint everything in glowing hues
in the hope that they may unload their burdens
on you. Even if they have nothing to sell, they
are none the less optimistic, for they like to see
you invest your money. Wretched conditions
are in a measure mitigated by companionship;
in other words, "Misery loves company."
Hereafter I shall refer to the man who bought
the tobacco land as Mr. A., and to my other
companion as Mr. B.
Mr. A. was delayed in getting his foreman and
had the customary difficulty in hiring help.
Three hundred men was all he could muster at
first, and they were secured only by paying a
liberal advance of twenty-five per cent. over the
usual wages. They began cutting timber about
the 28th of April,—the season when this work
should have been finished, and continued until
the rainy season commenced, when scarcely any
of the clearing had been burned; and after the
rains came it was impossible to start a fire, so
the whole work of felling upwards of four hundred
acres of forest was abandoned. Every stub
and stump seemed to shoot up a dozen sprouts,
and growing up through the thick layer of brush,
branches and logs, they formed a network that
challenged invasion by man or beast. The labor
was therefore all lost and the tobacco project
abandoned in disgust.
I was told by one of the oldest inhabitants—past
ninety—that it had never once failed to
rain on San Juan's (Saint John's) Day, the 24th
of June. Sometimes the rainy season begins a
little earlier, and occasionally a little later, but
that day never passes without bringing at least
a light shower. Of course it was in accord with
my friend's run of luck that this should be the
year when the rainy season began prematurely;
but the truth of the matter is, it was about the
most fortunate circumstance that could have
occurred; for as it turned out he lost only the
money laid out for labor, together with the
excess price paid for the land above what it was
worth; whereas, had everything gone well he
was likely to have lost many thousands of dollars
more.[10]
In the meantime I had been looking the field
over industriously, and had concluded that the
sugar and cattle industries promised the surest
and greatest returns. I heard of a ranch, with
sugar-plantation, for sale up in the Tuxpam
valley. It was owned by an American who had
occupied it forty-seven years, during which time
he had made enough to live comfortably and
educate two sons in American schools. He was
well past seventy and wished to retire from the
cares of active business,—which I regarded as a
justifiable excuse for selling. We visited the
place and found the only American-built house
we had seen since leaving home. The place was
in a fairly good state of repair, though the
pasture lands and canefields had been allowed to
deteriorate. The whole place was for sale,
including cattle, mules, wagons, sugar-factory,
tenement houses, machinery and growing crops;
in fact, everything went. The price asked
appeared so low that I was astonished at the
owner's modesty in estimating its value. I
accepted his offer on the spot, paying a small
sum down to bind the bargain,—fearing that he
would change his mind. It was not long,
however, before I changed my estimate of his
modesty, and marveled at his boldness in having
the courage to ask the price he did. On our way
back to town my companions argued that I was
foolish to try to make money in sugar or cattle
raising; that there was no nearby market for
the cattle, and that the Cuban sugar was
produced so abundantly and so cheaply that
there would be no profit in competing with it in
the American market. This was perfectly sound
logic, as testified to by later experiences, but it
fell upon deaf ears. I had been inoculated with
the sugar and cattle germ as effectively as my
friend had been with the tobacco germ, and
could see nothing but profit everywhere. Mr. A.
was to have a Cuban tobacco man, and why
couldn't I have an experienced Cuban sugar
man? I expected to double the magnitude of
the canefields, as the foreman—who promised
to remain—had declared that this could be done
without crowding the capacity of the factory. I
would also import some shorthorn cattle from
the United States, and figured out that I should
need a whole carload of farming implements.
It may be remarked that almost without exception
the American visitor here is immediately
impressed with the unbounded possibilities
of making vast fortunes. The resources of the
soil appear almost limitless. The foliage of the
trees and shrubs is luxuriant the year round, and
the verdure of the pastures and all vegetation is
inspiring at all seasons. The climate is delightful,
even in midsummer, and with such surroundings
and apparent advantages for agricultural
pursuits one marvels at the inactivity and
seeming stupidity of the natives. After a few
months' experience in contending with the
multiplicity of pests and perversities that stand
athwart the path of progress, and becoming
inoculated with the monotony of the tropical
climate, one can but wonder that there should be
any energy or ambition at all. The tendency of
Americans is always to apply American energy
and ideas to Mexican conditions, with the result
that nothing works harmoniously. The country
here is hundreds of years behind our times, and
cannot be brought into step with our progressiveness
except by degrees. Our modern methods
and ideas assimilate with those of Mexico very
slowly, if at all. It is almost impossible to
develop any one locality or industry independent of
the surroundings. The truth is, if you would
live comfortably in Mexico (which in these parts
is quite beyond human possibility) you must live
as Mexicans do, for they are clever enough, and
have lived here long enough, to make the best of
conditions. If you would farm successfully in
Mexico, you must farm precisely as they do, for
you will eventually find that there is some
well-grounded reason for every common usage; and
if you would make money in Mexico, stay away
entirely and dismiss the very thought of it.
Pure cream cannot be extracted from chalk and
water,—though it may look like milk,—because
the deficiency of the necessary elements forbids
it; no more can fortunes be made in this part
of Mexico, because they are not here to be made,
as every condition forbids their accumulation.
The impoverished condition of the people is such
that a large percentage of the families subsist
on an average income of less than ten cents a
day, silver.
Although the peon class are indigent, lazy
and utterly devoid of ambition they are so by
virtue of climatic and other conditions that
surround them, and of which they can be but the
natural outgrowth. The debilitating effects of
the climate, and the numberless bodily pests
draw so heavily upon human vitality that it is
surprising that any one after a year's residence
there can muster sufficient energy to work at
all. The natives, after a day's labor will throw
themselves upon the hard ground and fall asleep,
calmly submitting to the attack of fleas and
wood-ticks as a martyrdom from which it is
useless to attempt to escape. It is a labored
and painful existence they lead, and it is not to
be wondered at that smallpox, pestilence and
death have no terror for them; indeed, they
hail these as welcome messengers of relief.
When by the pangs of hunger they are driven
to the exertion of work they will do a fair day's
labor, if kept constantly under the eye of a
watchman, or capitan, as he is called. One of
these is required for about every ten or twelve
workmen; otherwise they would do nothing at
all. If twenty workmen were sent to the field
to cut brush, without designating someone as
captain, they would not in the course of the
whole day clear a patch large enough to sit
down on. The best workmen are the Indians
that come down from the upper-country
settlements. Upon leaving home they take along
about twelve days' rations, usually consisting
of black beans and corn ground up together into
a thick dough and made into little balls a trifle
larger than a hen's egg, and baked in hot ashes.
They eat three of these a day,—one for each
meal,—and when the supply is exhausted they
collect their earnings and return to their homes,
no matter how urgent the demand for their
continued service may be. In two or three
weeks they will return again with another supply
of provisions and stay until it is consumed,
but no longer. If Thoreau could have seen how
modestly these people live he would have learned
a lesson in economic living such as he never
dreamed of. The frugality of his meagre fare
at his Walden pond hermitage would have
appeared like wanton luxury by comparison. If
the virtue of honesty can be ascribed to any of
these laborers the Indians are entitled to the
larger share of it. They keep pretty much to
themselves and seldom inter-marry or mingle
socially with the dusky-skinned Aztecs.
It is difficult to get the natives to work as
long as they have a little corn for tortillas or
a pound of beans in the house. I have known
dozens of instances where they would come at
daylight in search of a day's work, leaving the
whole family at home without a mouthful of
victuals. If successful in getting work they
would prefer to take their day's pay in corn, and
would not return to work again until it was
entirely exhausted. Hundreds of times at my
ranch men applying for work were so emaciated
and exhausted from lack of nourishment that
they had to be fed before they were in a fit
condition to send to the field.
The basic element of wealth is money, and it
is impossible to make an exchange of commodities
for money in great quantity where it exists
only in small quantity. In other words, if you
would make money it is of first importance that
you go where there is money. If—as is the
case—a man will labor hard from sunrise to
sunset in Mexico, and provision himself, for
twenty-five cents in gold, it would indicate either
a scarcity of gold or a superabundance of willing
laborers, and it must be the former, for the latter
does not exist. Some have argued that money
is to be made in Mexico by producing such articles
as may be readily exchanged for American
gold, but there are very few articles of
merchandise for which we are obliged to go to
Mexico, and these cost to produce there nearly
as much or more than we have to pay for them.
For example, a pound of coffee in Mexico[11] costs
fifty cents, the equivalent in value to the labor
of an able-bodied man for twelve hours. There
is some good reason for this condition, else it
would not exist. In other words, if it didn't
cost the monetary value of twelve hours' work
(less the merchant's reasonable profit, of
course) to produce a pound of coffee, it would
not cost that to buy it there. It does not seem
logical, therefore, that it can be produced and
sold profitably to a country where a pound of
this commodity is equal in value to less than
two hours of a man's labor. If it were so easy
and profitable to raise coffee, every native might
have his own little patch for home use, and
possibly a few pounds to sell. In order to be
profitable, commodities must be turned out at a
low cost and sold at a high cost; but here is a
case where some visionary Americans have
thought to get rich by working directly against
the order of economic and natural laws. I have
not consulted statistics to ascertain how the
Mexican exports to the United States compare
with their imports of our products, but it is a
significant fact, as stated at the beginning of
this narrative, that the highest premium
obtainable for American money is for eastern
exchange, used in settling balances for imports
of American goods. The needs of the average
Mexican are very small beyond the products of
his own soil, and if the agricultural exports from
their eastern ports were large the merchants
would have but little difficulty in purchasing
credits on New York, or any important eastern
or southern seaport.
I had the good fortune not to be able to make
any satisfactory arrangement for a practical
sugar-maker from Cuba. I was more fortunate
than my friend Mr. A., in not having any
friend there to look out for me. Thus I saved
not only the cost of an expert's services, which,
comparatively speaking, would have been a
trifling item, but was held up in making the
contemplated extensions and improvements until
my sugar-fever had subsided and I had regained
my normal senses, after which I was quite
contented to conduct the place in its usual way
with a few slight improvements here and there.
I had not in so short a time become quite
reconciled, however, to the idea that the place could
not be run at a profit; but figured that it could
be made to yield me a considerable revenue
above expenses, and that it would afford a
desirable quartering-place for my family on an
occasional tropical visit in winter. After
returning home later in the season I induced my
family to return with me in the fall and spend
a part of the following winter there; and although
we experienced the novelty on Christmas-day
of standing on our front porch and picking
luscious ripe oranges from the trees,—one of
which stands at each side of the steps,—I have
never again been able to bring my persuasive
powers to a point where I could induce them to
set foot on Mexican soil. It is largely due to
the abhorrence of smallpox, malaria, snakes,
scorpions, tarantulas, garrapatas, fleas, and a
few other minor pests and conditions to which
they object. Mosquitoes, however, did not molest
us at the ranch.
Once while we were at the ranch my wife
was told by one of the servants that there was
a woman at the front door to see her. Upon
going into the hall she found that the woman
had stepped inside and taken a seat near the
door. She arose timidly, with a bundle in her
arms—which proved to be a babe—and spoke,
but Mrs. Harper could not understand a word
she said. The maid had entered the hall
immediately behind my wife, and, as she spoke both
Spanish and English, the woman explained
through her that the baby was suffering with
smallpox, and that she had heard that there
was an American woman there who could cure
it. The resultant confusion in the household
beggars description. Every time I mention
Mexico at home I get a graphic rehearsal of this
scene. The poor woman had walked ten miles,
carrying her babe, and thought she was doing
no harm in bringing it in and sitting down to
rest for a moment. She was put into a boat
and taken down the river to Tuxpam by one of
the men on the place who had already passed
through the stages of this disease, and under
the treatment of a Spanish physician whom I
had met there the child recovered and was sent
back home with its mother.
It may be observed that since arriving at
Tuxpam I have appeared to neglect my friend
Mr. B., but, although so far as this narrative is
concerned he has not as yet been much in evidence,
he was by far the busiest man in the party.
Being the only unmarried man in our company
he had not been long in Mexico when
he began to busy himself with an industry in
which single men hold an unchallenged monopoly,
and one that is far more absorbing than
vanilla, rubber, coffee, sugar and tobacco all
combined. The immediate cause of his diversion
was due to a visit that we all made to the
large hacienda of a wealthy Spanish gentleman of
education and refinement, who had a very beautiful
and accomplished daughter but recently
returned home with her mother from an extended
tour through Europe, following her
graduation from a fashionable and well-known
ladies' seminary in America. I have made the
statement in the foregoing pages that no
American fortune-hunter had been known to
return home from here richer than when he
came, but later on we shall see that this no
longer remains a truth. For the present, however,
as long as we are now discussing problems
of vulgar commerce, we shall leave Mr. B.
undisturbed in his more engaging pursuit, and
return to his case later.
Next to silver, corn is the staple and standard
of value in Mexico, though its price fluctuates
widely. Everybody, and nearly every animal,
both untamed and domestic, and most of the insects,
feed upon this article. It is the one product
of the soil that can be readily utilized and
converted into cash in any community and at
any season. The price is usually high, often
reaching upwards of the equivalent of $1 a
bushel. It is measured not by the bushel, but
by the fanega, which weighs 225 pounds. It may
appear a strange anomaly that the principal
native product should be so high in a soil of such
wonderful productivity. An acre of ground will
produce from fifty to seventy-five bushels, twice
a year. It is planted in June as soon as the rains
break the long, monotonous dry season which
extends through March, April and May, and is
harvested early in October; then the same
ground is planted again in December for
harvesting early in April. The ground requires
no plowing and, if recently cleared, no weeding;
so all that is necessary to do is to plant the corn
and wait for it to mature. It sounds easy and
looks easy, but, as with everything else, there
are a few obstacles. Corn is planted in rows,
about the same distance apart as in America, and
is almost universally of the white variety, as
this is the best for tortillas. The planting is
accomplished by puncturing the ground with a
hardwood pole, sharpened at one end. The hole
is made from four to six inches deep, when the
top of the pole is moved from one side to another
so that the point loosens up the subsoil and
makes an opening at the bottom of the hole the
same width as that at the top. The corn is
then dropped in and covered with a little dirt
which is knocked in by striking the point of the
pole gently at the opening. The moisture, however,
would cause it to sprout and grow even if
not covered at all. The difficulties now begin
and continue successively and uninterruptedly
at every stage of development to maturity, and
even until the corn is finally consumed. The
first of these difficulties is in the form of a small
red ant which appears in myriads and eats the
germ of the kernels as soon as they are planted.
When the corn sprouts there is a small cut-worm
that attacks it in great numbers. When the
sprouts begin to make their appearance above
the ground there is a blackbird lying in wait at
every hill to pull it up and get the kernel. These
birds, which in size are between our crow and
blackbird, appear in great numbers and would
destroy a ten-acre field of corn in one day if not
frightened away. They have long sharp beaks,
and insatiable appetites. Following these the
army-worm attacks the stalk when knee high,
and penetrating it at the top or tassel-end stops
its growth and destroys it. These ravages continue
until the corn begins to tassel, if any is so
fortunate as to reach that stage. When the
ears appear another worm works in at the silk,
and a little later a small bird resembling our
sapsucker puts in his claim to a share in the
crop. Beginning at the outer edge of the field
and proceeding down the row from one hill to
another, he penetrates the husks of almost every
ear with his needlelike bill, and the moment the
milky substance of the corn is reached the ear
is abandoned and another attacked. When punctured
in this way the ear withers and dries up
without maturing. The succession is then taken
up by the parrots and parrakeets, which abound
in Mexico. They may be seen in flocks flying
overhead or hovering over some field, constantly
chattering and squawking, at almost any hour
of the day. When the corn begins to mature
the raccoons appear from the woods, and entering
a field at night they eat and destroy the corn
like a drove of hogs. As a means of protection
against these pests many of the natives keep a
number of dogs, which they tie out around the
field at night, and which keep up an almost
constant barking and howling. Finally, just as the
corn has matured and the kernels are hardening
the fall rains begin, and often continue for days
and even weeks with scarcely an interruption.
The water runs down into the ear through the
silks and rots the corn. In order to prevent this
it is necessary to break every stalk just below
the ear and bend the tops with the ears down so
the water will run off. Later it is husked and
carried to the crib, when it is subjected to the
worst of all the evils, the black weevil. The
eggs from which this insect springs are deposited
in the corn while in the field and commence
to hatch soon after it is harvested. I have
personally tested this by taking an ear of corn from
the field and after shelling it placed the corn in
a bottle, which was corked up and set away. In
about three weeks the weevils began to appear,
and in six weeks every kernel was destroyed.
At first I wondered why the Mexicans usually
planted their corn in such small patches and so
near the house, but in view of the foregoing facts
this is easily explained. Almost the same vexatious
conditions prevail in nearly everything that
one attempts to do in this country, the variety
and numbers of enemies and hindrances varying
with each undertaking. There is a hoodoo lurking
in every bush, and no matter which way the
stranger turns he finds himself enmeshed in a
veritable entanglement of impediments and
aggravations.
All along and up and down the banks of the
Tuxpam River, and in other more remote
localities, there are countless wrecks and ruins
of sugar mills, distilleries and other evidences
of former American industry, which mark the last
traces of blighted ambitions and ruined fortunes
of investors. The weeds and bushes have
overgrown the ruins and tenderly sheltered them
from the sun's rays and the view of the
uninquisitive passer-by. They have become the
silent haunts of wild animals, scorpions and
other reptiles. At the visitor's approach a flock
of jaybirds will immediately set up a clamorous
chattering and cawing in the surrounding trees,
as if to reproach the trespasser who invades the
lonely precincts of these isolated tomb-like
abodes. They tell their own tale in more
eloquent language than any writer could
command. With each ruin there is a traditional
and oftentimes pathetic story. In some cases
the investor was fortunate enough to lose only
his money, but in many instances the lives along
with the fortunes of the more venturesome were
sacrificed to some one or other of the various
forms of pestilence which from time to time
sweep over the country.
Among the native fruit products in this
section the orange and the mango hold first
rank, with bananas and plantains a close second.
In close proximity to almost every native hut
one will find a small patch of plantain and
banana stalks. The plantain is made edible by
roasting with the skin on, or by peeling and
splitting it in halves and frying it in lard or
butter.
Of all tropical fruits the mango is perhaps the
most delicious. Its tree grows to enormous
size and bears a prolific burden of fruit. In front
of my house are a great number of huge mango
trees which are said to have been planted more
than two hundred years ago. The fruit picked
up from under a single tree amounted to a trifle
over one hundred and sixty-one bushels. Unlike
the banana or even our American peaches, pears
and plums, the mango is scarcely fit to eat unless
allowed to ripen and drop off the tree. Much of
the delicacy of its flavor is lost if plucked even
a day before it is ready to fall. When picked
green and shipped to the American markets it
is but a sorry imitation of the fruit when allowed
to ripen on the tree. It ripens in June, and it
is almost worth one's while to make a flying
trip to the tropics in that month just to sit
beneath the mango tree and eat one's fill of this
fruit four or five times a day.
The only native fruit that ever could be profitably
raised here for the American market is the
orange. The Mexican orange is well known for
its thin, smooth skin and superior flavor and
sweetness. The trees thrive in the locality of
Tuxpam, and bear abundantly from year to year
without the least cultivation or attention. On
my place thousands of bushels of this fruit drop
off the trees and go to waste every year, there
being no market for it. I made an experimental
shipment of 1,000 boxes to New York on one of
the Ward Line Steamers. After selecting, wrapping
and packing them with the greatest care,
and prepaying the freight, in due time I received
a bill from the New York commission house
for $275 (gold) for various charges incidental to
receiving and hauling them to the public dump.
The steamer, however, had been delayed several
days. The ratio of profit on this transaction is
a fair example of the returns that one may
reasonably expect from an investment in any
agricultural enterprise in Mexico.[12] If ever we
get rapid steamer service between Tuxpam and
Galveston or New Orleans, it is my belief that
orange-growing could be made profitable in this
country, but until then it would be useless to
consider the orange-growing industry.
Having had some experience in farming in my
boyhood, I thought I knew more about corn-raising
than the natives did and that I would
demonstrate a few things that would be useful
to them; so I instructed my foreman to procure
a cultivator and cornplanter from the United
States. At Tuxpam I found an American plow
which had been on hand perhaps for some years,
and was regarded by the natives as a sort of
curiosity. No merchant had had the rashness,
however, to stock himself with a cultivator or
cornplanter. The foreman was ordered to plow
about fifteen acres of ground and plant it to corn
as an experiment. The natives hearing of the
undertaking came from a distance to see the
operation. They thought it was wonderful, but
didn't seem to regard it with much favor. The
piece was planted in due season, and the rows
both ways were run as straight as an arrow. It
required the combined efforts of all the extra
help obtainable in the neighborhood to rid the
corn of the pests that beset it, but after
cultivating it three times and "laying it by," the
height and luxuriance of growth it attained were
quite remarkable. Standing a trifle over six
feet tall I could not reach half the ears with the
tips of my fingers. The ground was rich, and as
mellow as an ash-heap and appeared to rejoice
at the advent of the plow and cultivator. One
night in August there came a hard rain,
accompanied by the usual hurricanes at this season,
and next morning when I went out, imagine my
astonishment to find that not a hill of corn in
the whole field was standing! Its growth was
so rank and the ground so mellow that the
weight of one hill falling against another bore
it down, and the whole field was laid as flat as
though a roller had been run over it. It was
all uprooted and the roots were exposed to
the sun and air. We didn't harvest an ear
of corn from the whole fifteen acres. The
other corn in the neighborhood withstood the
gale without any damage. This experience
explained why it is that the natives always
plant corn in hard ground, and also furnishes
additional proof that it is usually safe to
adhere pretty closely to the prevailing customs,
and exercise caution in trying any innovations.
After clearing a piece of land for corn the natives
will plant it for a couple of years, then
abandon it to the weeds and brush for awhile.
They then clear another piece, and in two or
three years the abandoned piece is covered with
a growth of brush sufficiently heavy so that
when cut and burned the fire destroys such
seeds as have found their way into the piece.
After land here has been planted for a few years
it becomes so foul with weeds that it would be
impossible for a man with a hoe to keep them
down on more than an acre. It is surprising
how rapidly and thickly they grow. The story
of the southern gentleman who said that in his
country the pumpkin vines grew so fast that
they wore the little pumpkins out dragging them
over the ground would seem like a plausible
truth when compared with what might be said
of rapid growth in Mexican vegetation. They
say that the custom of wearing machetes at all
times is really a necessity, as when a man goes
to the field in the morning there is no knowing
but that it may rain and the weeds grow up and
smother him before he can get back home. I
am, however, a little skeptical on this point.
A serious difficulty which has to be reckoned
with in Mexico is the utter disregard that many
of the natives have for the property rights of
others. Pigs, chickens, calves, and even grown
cattle, are constantly disappearing as quietly and
effectually as though the earth had opened in the
night and swallowed them. One evening a native
came in from a distance of twelve miles to
purchase six cents' worth of mangos, and being
otherwise unencumbered in returning home he
took along a calf which he picked up as he passed
the outer gate. At another time when the cane
mill was started in the morning, it was
discovered that a large wrench, weighing probably
twenty pounds, was missing. There being no
other mill of similar construction in the
community, it was inconceivable that anyone could
have had any use for the wrench. The foreman
called the men all together and told them of the
disappearance. He discharged the whole force
of more than a hundred men, and said there
would be no more work until the wrench was
returned. Next morning it was found in its
accustomed place at the mill, and every man was
there ready to go to work.
Shortly after buying the ranch I was spending
the night there, and went out to hunt deer by
means of a jack,—a small lamp with a reflector,
carried on top of the head, and fastened around
the hatband. Assuming that the reader may
not have had any experience in this lonesome
sport, I would explain that on a dark night the
light from the jack being cast into the eyes of
an animal in the foreground produces a reflection
in the distance resembling a coal of fire. If
the wind is favorable, one can approach to within
thirty to fifty yards of a deer, which will stand
intently gazing at the light. The light blinds
the eye of the animal so that the person beneath
cannot be seen even at a distance of twenty
feet. The hunter can determine how near he is
to the game only by the distance that appears
to separate the eyes. For instance, at 125 to 150
yards the eyes of a deer will shine in the
darkness as one bright coal of fire, and as one
approaches nearer they slowly separate until at
fifty to sixty paces they appear to be three or
four inches apart, depending upon the size of
the animal. It is then time to fire. It is always
best to proceed against the wind, if there is any,
otherwise the deer will scent your presence.
The eye of a calf or burro will shine much the
same as that of a deer, and one must be cautious
when hunting in a pasture. I took my shotgun
with a few shells loaded with buckshot, and
passing through the canefield came to a clearing
about half a mile from the house. As I
approached the opening I sighted a pair of eyes
slowly moving towards me along the edge of a
thicket next the clearing, apparently at a
distance of about seventy-five yards. I knew it
was not a deer, because that animal will always
stand still as soon as it sights a lamp. It was
too large for a cat, and did not follow the
customary actions of a dog; but what it was I
couldn't imagine. The two enormous eyes
came nearer and nearer, moving to first one side
and then the other, the animal appearing to be
unaware of my presence. When it approached
to within perhaps fifty yards of where I stood, I
thought it was time to shoot, and so cocking
both hammers of my gun I blazed away, intending
to fire only one barrel and keep the other
for an emergency. In my excitement I must
have pulled both triggers, as both cartridges
went off with a terrific bang. The recoil sent
me sprawling on my back in the brush, the gun
jumping completely out of my hands and landing
several feet distant. The light was extinguished
by the fall, and I lay there in utter blackness.
When I fired, the animal lunged into the thicket
with a crash, and in the confusion of my own
affairs immediately following, I heard no more
sounds. I discovered that I had thoughtlessly
come away without a match, and being unfamiliar
with the territory, had no idea in which
direction the house stood. Groping around in
the dark I finally located the gun and struck
back into the brush in what I supposed to be the
direction I came. Presently I ran into a dense
jungle of terrible nettles, which the natives call
mala mujer (bad woman). They are covered
with needlelike thorns and their sting is
extremely painful and annoying. I was also
covered with wood-ticks, which added appreciably
to my misery. It was cloudy and the night was
as dark as death. Realizing that I was on the
wrong route it seemed necessary to spend the
night there, but I could neither sit nor stand
with comfort amid the nettles. After proceeding
five or six hundred yards through these
miserable prickly objects (which in height ranged
from two to thirty feet, thus pricking and
stinging me from my face to my knees) I suddenly
plunged headlong over a steep embankment into
the water, when I became aware that I had reached
the river; but whether I was above or below the
house (which stands back about a thousand
yards from the river) I couldn't tell. After groping
my way along under the river bank for nearly
half a mile, during the space of which I again fell
in twice, I concluded that with my customary luck
I was headed the wrong way, and so retraced my
steps and proceeded along down the river for
nearly a mile, when I came to a landing-place.
Leaving the river I went in the opposite direction
a short distance, and soon bumped into some sort
of a habitation. After feeling my way more than
half-way around the hut and locating an aperture
(the door) I hallooed at the top of my voice
four or five times, and receiving no response I
ventured in only to find the place vacant.
Returning to the open I manœuvred around until
I found another hut, where I proceeded to howl
until the natives woke up. I couldn't imagine
how I was to make myself understood, as of course
they could not understand a word of English. The
man struck a match and seeing me standing in the
door with a gun in my hand, and with my face all
scratched and swollen to distortion from my
explorations in the nettle patch, both he and his
wife took fright and jumping through an opening on
the opposite side of the room disappeared in the
darkness, leaving me in sole possession of the
place. After groping around the room in vain search
of a match, and falling over about everything in
the place, I returned to the open air. Meantime the
clouds had begun to break away and I could see the
dim outline of a large building a short distance
beyond, which proved to be the sugar-mill. I was
now able to get my bearings, and discovered that
the hut from which the two people had fled was one
of a number of a similar kind which belonged to
the place and which were provided free for the
workmen and their families that they might be kept
conveniently at hand at all times. I was not long
in finding the main road leading to the house, and
when I arrived there everybody was asleep. After
fumbling around all over the place in the dark
I found a match and discovered that it was
twenty-five minutes of three. Thus ended my
first deer-hunt in Mexico. In the morning I
noticed the zopilotes (vultures) hovering over
the field in the direction I had taken the night
before, and upon going to the spot I found an
enormous full-grown jaguar lying dead about ten
feet from the edge of the clearing. Several shot had
penetrated his head and body, and luckily, one
entering his neck had passed under the shoulder-blade
and through the heart. The natives said it was the
only jaguar that had been seen in that locality for
years, and it was the only one I saw during the whole
of my travels in Mexico.
That morning it was discovered that every
hut in the settlement at the mill had been
vacated during the night, and there was not a
piece of furniture or a native anywhere in
sight; the place looked as desolate as a
country-graveyard. Later in the day we found the
whole crowd encamped back in the woods, and
were told that during the night an Evil Spirit
in the form of a white man with his face and
clothes all bespattered with blood, had visited
the settlement, and wielding a huge machete,
also covered with blood, had threatened to kill
every man, woman and child in the place. A
few years prior to that an American had been
foully murdered at the mill by a native, who
used a machete in the operation, and this, they
said, was the second time in five years that the
murdered man had returned in spirit-form to
wreak vengeance on the natives. It was more
than three months before they could all be induced
to return to the houses. I cannot imagine
what sort of an apparition it was that
molested them the first time. The frightened
native and his wife had doubtless returned and
alarmed the others with a highly exaggerated
story, and gathering up their few belongings
they had fled for their lives. I told the foreman
the circumstances, but he strongly advised me
not to attempt to undeceive them, because they
had a deepseated superstition about the mill,
and no amount of explanation would convince
them that the place was not haunted by the
spirit of the murdered man, especially as this
was their second alarm.
The peon class in Mexico are exceedingly
superstitious and there is scarcely an act or
circumstance but what portends some evil in
the mind of one or another. About the only
thing about which they have no superstitious
misgivings is the act of carrying off something
that does not belong to them.
Late one afternoon, while on a trip out
through the country, we met an American in
charge of two Mexican soldiers (in citizen's
dress) who were returning with him to Tuxpam.
They said he was a desperate character who had
broken jail while awaiting trial for murder. He
was seated astride a bare-backed horse and his
legs were securely leashed to the body of the
animal, while his feet were tied together
underneath. His arms were tied tightly behind his
back, and altogether his situation seemed about
as secure and uncomfortable as it could be made.
He was not allowed to talk to us, but the officers
talked rather freely. They said he had recently
killed an officer who pursued him after breaking
jail. The poor fellow looked harmless and
passive, and had a kind, though expressionless,
face. His eyes and cheeks were deeply sunken
and he showed unmistakable evidence of long
suffering. They had captured him by a stratagem,
having overtaken him on the road and
pretending to be amigos (friends) they offered
to trade horses with him. His steed being much
fatigued he eagerly grasped the opportunity to
procure a fresh one, and as soon as he
dismounted he was seized and overpowered. The
vacant and hopeless expression of the prisoner
as he sat there bound hand and foot, and unable
to converse with his own countrymen was
indeed pathetic, and judging by his looks we
were convinced that he was not a hardened
criminal. We therefore determined to look him
up on our return to town and ascertain the
facts. Three days later upon returning to
Tuxpam we learned that soon after we passed
the party the officers had camped for the night,
and tying their victim to a tree had taken turns
at guard duty during the night. At about three
o'clock in the morning the prisoner had managed
to work himself free from the bonds and
while the officer on watch was starting a fire to
warm the breakfast for an early morning start
the prisoner pounced upon him and seizing his
revolver struck him a blow on the head which
laid him out. At this juncture the other officer
woke up just in time to receive a bullet in his
breast which despatched him to the other
world. Taking one of the horses the fugitive
fled, and up to the time I left Mexico he had not
sent his address to the police authorities; nor
did any of them appear very anxious to pursue
him further. The officer who was first attacked
came to his senses a little later, but he was
perhaps more interested in looking to his own
comfort and safety than in attempting to follow
the fugitive, with the prospect of sharing the
fate of his fellow-officer. We were informed
that the prisoner had been a poor, hard-working,
and law-abiding resident who had migrated
to this country from Texas several years before,
bringing with him his wife and one child. He
had brought about $1,000 American money,
which had been sunk in a small farm near
Tuxpam where he had cast his lot, hoping to
make a fortune. One night his home was invaded
by a couple of drunken natives who were
determined to murder the whole family on
account of some imaginary grievance. In
defending his family and himself he killed one
of them, and wounded the other, and next day
was cast into prison, where he was kept for
almost two years—until his escape—without an
opportunity to have his case heard. Meanwhile
both his wife and child died of smallpox without
being permitted to see him, and were buried
without his knowledge. It was reported that
after his incarceration his wife and child had
moved into a hovel in town, and that when
the coffin containing his child's body was borne
past the jail on the shoulders of a native, en
route to its last resting-place, by a most singular
and unhappy coincidence he happened to be
peering out through a small hole in the stone
wall, and saw the procession. He is said to
have remarked to another prisoner that some
poor little one had been freed from the sorrows
of life.
How any white man can survive two years'
imprisonment in a Mexican jail is beyond human
comprehension; in fact we were informed that
it is not intended that one should. I heard it
remarked that "if a prisoner has plenty of
money it is worth while hearing his case, but if
he is poor, what profit is there in trying him?"
The judges and lawyers are not likely to go
probing around the jails merely for the sake
of satisfying their craving for the proper
dispensation of justice. We were told by one of the
oldest resident Americans that if in the defense
of one's own life it becomes necessary here to
take the life of another, the safest thing to do
is to collect such arms, ammunition and money
as may be immediately at hand and make
straight through the country for the nearest
boundary line, never submitting to detention
until the ammunition is exhausted and life is
entirely extinct. The filthiness and misery
within the walls of a Mexican jail exceed the
powers of human tongue to describe, and tardy
justice in seeking a man out in one of these
Plutonic holes is generally scheduled to arrive a
day too late.
With the exception of wood-ticks, the crop
that thrives best of all in this part of Mexico,
all the year round, is grass. There are two
notable varieties; one is known as the South
American Paral grass, and the other as Guinea
grass. Both are exceedingly hardy and grow to
great height. The Paral grass does not make
seed in Mexico, but is generated from the green
plant by taking small wisps of a dozen or more
pieces, doubling them two or three times, after
which they are pressed into holes made in the
ground with a sharp stick, much after the manner
of planting corn, and in rows about the same
distance apart. Three or four inches of the
wisp is allowed to protrude above the ground.
It is generally planted thus in the latter part of
May,—though at this season the ground is very
dry,—because when the rains begin everybody
is so busy planting and caring for the corn-crop
that everything else is dropped. As soon as
seasonable weather begins the grass sprouts
and sends out shoots along the ground in
every direction, much like a strawberry-vine.
From each joint the roots extend into the
ground, and a shoot springs up. By the early
fall the ground is completely covered, and by the
first of January it is ready to pasture lightly.
The growth is so thick and rapid that it smothers
the weeds and even many of the sprouts that
spring up from the stubs and stumps. I saw a
small patch of this grass that had been planted
early in April when the ground was so dry that
it was impossible to make openings more than
two or three inches deep with the sharp-pointed
sticks, as the holes would fill up with the dry
loose earth. This patch was planted by a native
who wished to test the hardiness of the grass,
and with little expectation that it would survive
the scorching sun of April, May and a part of
June, until rain came. It was in May that I
examined this patch, and pulling up several wisps
I did not find a single spear that had sprouted
or appeared to have a particle of life or moisture
in it. But when the rainy season commenced
every hill of it sprouted and grew luxuriantly.
During the rainy season in the fall it will readily
take root when chopped into short pieces and
scattered broadcast on the ground.
The Guinea grass is almost as hardy as the
Paral, but is planted only from the seed. It
grows in great clusters, often to a height of six
feet, and soon covers the ground. These two
grasses seem to draw a great deal of moisture
from the air, and stand the dry season almost
as well as the brush and trees. The cattle
fatten very quickly on them and never require
any grain. Beef-cattle are always in good
demand at high prices, and there is no other
industry so profitable here as cattle-raising.
The deadly tarantula is as common here as
crickets are in the United States, but to my
astonishment the natives have no fear of them,
and I never heard of anyone being bitten by one
of these, perhaps the most venomous of all
insects. They abound in the pastures and live
in holes which they dig, two to four inches in
the ground. One can always tell when the
tarantula is at home, for the hole is then
covered with a web, while if he is out there is no
web over the hole. I have dug them out by
hundreds, and one forenoon I dug out and killed
seventy-two, often finding two huge monsters
together. They sometimes bite the cattle when
feeding, and the bite is usually fatal. Their
deadly enemy is the wasp (Pompilus formosus)
by which they are attacked and stung to death
if they venture out into the open roadway or
other bare ground.
The most deadly reptile is the four-nosed
snake; it usually measures from four to six feet
in length and from 2½ to four inches in diameter
at the largest part, with sixteen great fangs,
eight above and eight below. They have the
ferocity of a bulldog and the venom of the
Egyptian asp. The natives fear them next to
the evil spirit. The most remarkable feat of
human courage that I ever witnessed was a
battle between an Indian workman and one of
these snakes. In company with a number of
other workmen the Indian was chopping brush
on my place around a clearing that was being
burned, and the snake sprang at him from a
clump of bushes as he approached it. The
Indian struck at the snake with his machete, at
the same time jumping aside. The snake, narrowly
missing his mark, landed four or five feet
beyond. Immediately forming in a coil he
lunged back at the Indian, catching his bare leg
just below the knee, and fastening his fangs
into the flesh like a dog. The Indian made a
quick pass with his machete and severed the
snake's body about four inches from the head,
leaving the head still clinging to his leg. He
stuck the point of the machete down through
the snake's mouth, and twisting it around pried
the jaws apart, when the head dropped to the
ground. Four of the workmen and myself stood
within fifty feet of the scene, all petrified with
amazement. The Indian realizing that his doom
was sealed stood for a moment in silent
contemplation, then walked directly to where the fire
was burning and picking up a burning stick he
applied the red-hot embers on the end to the
affected part, holding it tightly against his leg
and turning it over and over until the flesh was
seared to the bone. After completing the operation
he fell in a dead faint. He was carried
to the house and revived. His grit and courage
saved his life, and in less than three weeks he
was at work again. I offered a bounty of one
dollar apiece for every snake of this variety
killed on my ranch, and the natives would form
hunting-parties and look for them on Sundays
and rainy days. They were brought in in such
numbers that I began to think the whole place
was infested with them, when presently I
discovered that they were killing and bringing
them from all the surrounding country. They
were so cunning that they would bring a snake
and hide it somewhere on the place, then coming
to the house they would announce that they
were going snake-hunting, and in fifteen or
twenty minutes would march in triumphantly
dragging the snake, usually by a string of green
bark.
There is in Mexico a small tree called palo de
leche (milk tree) which produces a milk so
poisonous that the evaporation will sometimes
poison a person at a distance of several feet. The
smallest infinitesimal part coming in contact
with the mucous membrane of the eye will produce
almost instant blindness, accompanied by
the most excruciating pain. The only antidote
known to the natives is to grind up peppers of
the most powerful strength—as strong as those
of which tabasco sauce is made—and pour the
liquid into the affected eye. I saw this
distressing operation performed twice while in
Mexico. The natives naturally dread to encounter
these trees when clearing.
There is an abundance of scorpions in Mexico.
They are to be found under rocks and logs, and
particularly throughout the house. One morning
I found four snugly housed in one of my
shoes. After putting my foot into the shoe the
instinctive promptness with which I removed it
from my foot reminded me of the army-ant
episode when the boatmen so hastily removed
their shirts. In putting on my shoes after that
I learned to "shake well before using."
Among the nuisances in Mexico the fleas take
their place in the first rank. They appear to
thrive in every locality and under all conditions.
Like vicious bulldogs, they are especially fond
of strangers, and never lose an opportunity of
showing their domestic hospitality. In connection
with the flea family there is a very small
black variety, the name of which in Spanish is
pronounced nēwaw. They usually attack the
feet, especially of the natives—for they wear
no shoes—and burrow in under the skin around
the toenails or at the bottom of the foot, and
remaining there they deposit a great number of
eggs which are surrounded by a thin tissue
similar to that which covers a ball of spider
eggs. The presence of this troublesome insect
is not noticeable until the eggs begin to enlarge,
when there is an irritating itching sensation
followed by pain and swelling. The skin has to
be punctured and the sack of eggs removed,—not
a pleasant operation, especially when there
are forty or fifty at one time. These insects
thrive at all seasons, and, next to the
omnipresent wood-tick, are one of the worst torments
extant. I have frequently seen natives whose
feet were so swollen and sore that they could
scarcely walk. At recurrent seasons there is a
fly that deposits a diminutive egg underneath
the skin of human beings by means of a needlelike
organ, and the larva of which produces an
extremely disagreeable sensation, sometimes
followed by fever.
This does not by any means exhaust the list
of disagreeable insects and reptiles, but enough
are mentioned to give the reader some idea
of the bodily torments to which both the
inhabitants and the visitor are constantly
subjected.
Having obtained a fair idea of the existing
conditions we may now return to our friend
Mr. B., and then wend our journey homeward.
After the visit to the hacienda of the wealthy
Spanish gentleman (who, by the way, brought
most of his wealth from Spain), he was perhaps
the least concerned of any man in Mexico as to
whether vanilla, rubber, coffee or anything else
could be profitably grown there. Like Dickens
with his Dora, he could see nothing but
"Carmencita" everywhere, and no matter upon what
line or topic the conversation turned it was sure
to end in the thought of some new charm in
the black-eyed beauty. She was not only a
flower, but a whole garden of flowers, too
beautiful and too delicate to subsist long in that
vulgar soil. She longed for the life, excitement
and companionship of the friends of her schooldays
in America, compared with which the humdrum
monotony of a Mexican hacienda seemed
like exile. With ample means and social standing
as an armor the conquest was therefore a
predestined conclusion. The conquering knight
returned home with me, but in less than seven
weeks he was back again, though not by the way
of the loitering route down the laguna. In the
following November he returned again to America,
bringing with him the coveted treasure
whom he installed in a beautiful home in
America's greatest metropolis. The union of
these two kindred souls was a happy event.
Their home has since been blessed with the
advent of two lovely girls and one boy. It is
therefore no longer true that no American
fortune-hunter has ever returned from the
rural districts of southeastern Mexico richer
than when he went there; for here is an instance
where one of the most priceless of all gems was
captured and borne triumphantly away from a
land which appears to abound in nothing but
pestilence and torment.
Verily may it be said that this part of Mexico
whose people, possibilities, peculiarities,
pestilences and pests I have briefly sketched in the
foregoing pages, was made for Mexicans, and so
far as I am personally concerned, they are
everlastingly welcome to it.
