THE REAL DE MINAS.
For some years past—that is to say, since the day when Captain Sutter, while digging a well at his plantation in San Francisco, accidentally found a lump of virgin gold—the discovery of the rich mines of the New World has so aroused interest and excited admiration, by giving a fresh impulse to avarice and covetousness, that we consider it necessary to say a few words here about the mines. Of course we shall allude to those situated in the country where our scene is laid—that is, in Sonora.
Sonora is the richest mining country in the world. We assured ourself by official data that six hundred bars of silver and sixty bars of gold, worth together a million of piastres, were brought to the Mint of Hermosillo in 1839. To this large amount a nearly equal sum must be added, which is not brought to be assayed, in order to avoid the payment of the duty, which is five per cent, on silver and four per cent, on gold. This country also possesses most valuable copper mines, but the population generally abandons the other metals to seek virgin gold.
No country in the world possesses auriferous strata so rich and so extensive (criaderos or placeres de oro). The metal is found in alluvial soil in ravines after rain, and always on the surface or at a depth of a few feet. In the north of the province of Arispe, the placers of Quitoval and Sonoitac, which were found again in 1836, and to which we shall soon have to allude more specially, produced for three years two hundred ounces of gold per day,—that is to say, reducing it to our money, the large sum of two hundred and fifty thousand pounds.
The gold seekers restrict themselves to turning up the soil with a pointed stick, and only collect the nuggets that are visible; but if the streams were diverted from their course, and large washings undertaken, the profits would be far more considerable. It is not rare to find nuggets weighing several pounds; we saw at Arispe, in the hands of a miner, one that was worth nine thousand piastres, or about eighteen hundred pounds; and the Royal Cabinet at Madrid contains several magnificent specimens. We will soon describe how and why the working of these strata was interrupted.
Most of the buildings of the pueblos, or Missions of Sonora, serve as the gathering place of the nomadic workmen and traders who collect round any important mine so soon as its working is begun. The place where the workmen assemble takes the name of Real de Minas or Mineral; and if the mine promises to be productive for any length of time, the population definitively settles round it. Many important towns of Mexico had no other origin. The facility with which the miners earn large sums explains the enormous consumption of European goods which takes place in the provinces. Simple rancheros may frequently be seen spending in a few days seven or eight pounds of gold, which only cost them a week's toil. Unhappily, the ruinous passion for gambling—that shameful leprosy of Mexico, whose inhabitants it degrades—prevents the great mine owners from keeping a large capital on their hands, and thus checks works on a great scale.
Before resuming our narrative, we must also give the reader certain information about the Indian nations that inhabit the territory of Sonora. There are in this province five distinct tribes; the Yaquis, the Opatas, the Mayos, the Gilenos, and the Apaches. The Yaquis and Mayos occupy the country to the south of Guaymas, as far as the Rio del Huerto; they let themselves out to the creoles as farm labourers, masons, servants, miners, and divers. Their number is about forty thousand. The Opatas reside along the bank of the San Miguel de Horcasitos, the Arispe, the Los Ures, and the Oposina; they are very good workmen and excellent soldiers. They have always served the government faithfully, both Spanish and Mexican, and their number is estimated at thirty thousand.
The Gilenos spread along the banks of the Gila and Colorado rivers. The Axuas and Apaches, who belong to the Sierra Madre, are confounded under the name of Papazos. These Indians are nomadic, and only live by hunting and plunder; they were formerly encamped to the north of Chihuahua and Sonora; but being driven back by the progress of the Americans and Texans, they threw themselves upon the Mexican territory, where they cause immense damage, for they are well supplied with firearms, which they obtained in exchange for peltry and cattle at the American establishments at the Arkansas, the Missouri, and the Rio Bravo del Norte. In order to complete this brief enumeration of the Indian nations of Sonora, we will mention a mission established at the gates of Hermosillo, and in which five hundred Seris Indians lived; a thousand members of the same tribe, formerly one of the most powerful in this country, but now almost extinct, dwelt on the coast to the north of Guaymas, and in Tiburón or Sharkesland.
We will now temporarily leave Stronghand and José Paredes at the top of the hill, where they found a shelter from the inundation, and lead the reader to the Real de Minas of Quitoval, where certain important events are about to take place.
It was the evening: the streets and plazas of the pueblo were crowded with individuals of every description: Yaquis Indians, hunters, miners, gambusinos, monks, and adventurers, who composed the motley population of the Mineral, mounted and foot, incessantly jostled each other, and bowed, spoke, laughed, or quarrelled. Some were returning from the placer, where they had been at work all day; others were leaving their houses to enjoy the evening breeze; others, and they were the larger number, were entering the drinking shops, through whose doors could be heard the songs of the topers, and the shrill, inharmonious tinkling jarabes and vihuelas.
One of these tendajos, of a more comfortable and less dirty appearance than the rest, seemed to have the privilege of attracting a greater number of customers than all the rival establishments. After passing through a low door and descending two steps of unequal height, the visitor found himself in a species of hideous den, resembling at once a cellar and a shed, whose earthen flooring, rendered uneven by the mud constantly brought in by customers, caused persons to stumble at each step who visited the place for the first time! A hot heavy vapour, impregnated with alcoholic fumes and mephitic exhalations, escaped through the door of this den, as from the mouth of Hades, and painfully affected mouth and eyes, before the latter became accustomed to the close, obscure aspect of the place, and were enabled to pierce the thick curtain of vapour, which was constantly drawn from one side to the other by the movements of the customers. They perceived, by the dubious light of a few candils scattered here and there, a large and lofty room, whose once whitewashed walls had become black at the lower part by the constant friction of heads, backs, and shoulders, to which they served as a support.
Facing the door was a dais, raised about a foot above the ground; this dais occupied the entire width of the room, and was divided into two parts; that on the right contained a table forming a bar, behind which stood a tall, active fellow, with false look and ill-tempered face, the master of the tendajo. Above the head of this respectable personage, who answered to the harmonious name of Cospeto, a niche had been made in the wall, in which was a statue of the Virgin, holding the Holy Infant in her arms; in front of the statue a dozen small wax tapers, fixed on a row of iron points, were burning. The left hand portion of the dais was occupied by the musicians, or performers on jarabes and vihuelas.
On each side of the room, the centre of which remained free for the dancers, ran rickety, badly made, and dirty tables, occupied at this moment by a crowd of customers, some seated on benches, others standing, laughing, talking, shouting, quarrelling; drinking mezcal, refino, pulque, or infusion of tamarinds, or else staking at monte the gold earned during the day at the mine, and which their dirty hands fetched from the pockets of the shapeless rags that served them as garments. A few women, creatures without a name, whose features were sodden with debauchery, and eyes deep sunk with drinking, were mingled with the crowd; and all, both men and women, were smoking either cigars or husk cigarettes.
Nothing can describe the hideous aspect of this infamous Pandemonium, the refuge of all the vices of the province, overlooked by the gentle, smiling face of the statue of the Virgin, whose features, in the light of the tapers, assumed an expression of wondrous pity and sorrow.
At the moment when we invite the reader to enter this drinking shop with us the fun was at its height, the room was full of drinkers and dancers, and the whole mob laughed, yelled, and made a row which would have rendered the saint herself deaf. On the left, near the door, a man, wrapped up in a thick cloak, one end of which was raised to his face, and completely concealed his features, was sitting motionless at a separate table, looking absently and carelessly at the dancers who whirled round him. When a newcomer entered the tendajo, this man looked toward the door, and then turned his head away with an air of ill humour when he perceived that the newcomer was not the person that he had been so long expecting, for he had been sitting alone at this table for upwards of two hours. Still no one paid, or seemed to pay, any attention to him—all were too much absorbed in their own occupations to think about a man who obstinately remained gloomy and silent amid this revelry. The stranger, so often deceived in his expectations, at length gave up looking toward the door; he let his head fall on his chest and went to sleep, or pretended to do so, either for the sake of not attracting attention, or else to indulge with greater freedom in his reflections.
All at once a formidable disturbance broke out at one end of the room; a table was upset by a vigorous blow; oaths crossed each other in the air, and knives were drawn from boots; musicians and dancers stopped short, and a circle was formed round two men who, with frowning brows, eyes sparkling with intoxication and passion, a zarapé rolled as a buckler round the left arm, and a navaja in their right hand, were preparing, according to all appearance, to attack each other vigorously. The tendajero, or master of the house, then proved himself equal to the position he occupied—he leaped like a jaguar over the counter behind which he had hitherto stood coldly and indifferently, merely engaged in watching his waiters and serving customers; he closed the front door, against which he leant his powerful shoulders, in order to prevent any customer bolting without payment of his score, and prepared with evident interest to witness the fight.
The two men, with outstretched legs, left arm advanced, bodies bent forward, and knife held by the middle of the blade, were standing looking in each other's eyes, ready for attack, defence, or parry. All at once the mysterious sleeper appeared to wake with a start, as if surprised by the voice of one of the adversaries, took a hasty glance at the combatants, and then darted between them.
"What is the matter?" he asked, in a firm voice, the sound of which affected the duellists, who were astounded at an interference they had been far from expecting.
"This man," one of them answered, "has lost three ounces to me at monte, through the unexpected turn up of the ace of spades."
"Well?" the stranger interjected.
"He refuses to pay me," the gambler continued; "because he declares that the cards were packed, and that consequently I cheated him, which is not true, for—viva Dios; I am known to be a caballero."
At this affirmation, which was slightly erroneous, a smile of singular meaning, but which no one saw, curled the stranger's lip; he continued, in a more serious voice—"It is true that you are a caballero, and I would affirm it were it necessary; but the most honest man is subject to deceive himself, and I am convinced that this has happened to you. Hence instead of fighting with this caballero, whose honour and loyalty cannot either be doubted, prove to him that you recognise your error by paying him the three ounces, which you claimed of him through an oversight; this gentleman will apologize for having used certain ugly expressions, and all will then be settled to the general satisfaction."
"Certainly, I am convinced that this caballero is a man of honour; I am ready to proclaim it anywhere, and I regret with all my soul the misunderstanding which momentarily divided us," said the individual who had not yet spoken, though he remained on the defensive, a position that slightly contradicted the apparent good humour of his remark.
The stranger then turned to the man whose friend he had so unexpectedly made himself, and gave him a sign which the other appeared to understand.
"Well, caballero," he said, with an irony whose expression was hardly noticeable, "what do you think of this apology? For my part, I consider it complete and most honourable."
The man thus addressed hesitated for a moment; a combat was evidently going on in his mind; his furious glances seemed to challenge the company; and had he perceived on the face of one of the spectators an expression of contempt, however fugitive it might have been, he would doubtless have immediately picked another quarrel. But all the persons who surrounded him were cold and indifferent; curiosity alone was legible on their features. He unrolled his cloak, returned the knife to his boot, and held out his hand to his adversary at the same time that he gave him three ounces.
"Pardon me an involuntary error at which I am trully confused," he said, with a courteous bow, but with a sigh he could not restrain.
The other took the ounces without pressing, thrust them away in his capacious pockets with far from ordinary dexterity, returned the salute, and mingled with the crowd, who, through a lengthened acquaintance with the two men, did not at all comprehend this peaceful result.
"Now, Master Kidd," the stranger continued, as he laid his hand on the shoulder of the adventurer, who stood motionless in the middle of the room, "I suppose that all your business here is settled; so, with your permission, we will withdraw."
"As you please," Kidd answered, carelessly, for this man was no other than the bandit we came across in the opening of our story.
The groups had broken up, the crowd had dispersed, musicians and dancers had returned to their places, and the two men could consequently leave without attracting attention. The stranger, when he reached the purer atmosphere of the street, took several deep inspirations, as if trying to expel from his lungs the vitiated air he had been constrained to swallow for so long. Then he turned to his companion, who was walking silently by his side.
"¡Cuerpo de Cristo! Master Kidd," he said, in a tone of ill humour, "you are, it must be confessed, a singular fellow; you compel me, the commandant of this pueblo, to come and hunt you up at this filthy den, where, on your entreaty, I consented to meet you, and instead of watching for my arrival, you leave me among the most perfect collection of bandits I ever saw in my life."
"Excess of zeal, captain; so you must not be angry with me for that," the bandit answered, with a cunning look. "In order to be punctual at the rendezvouz I gave you, I had been for nearly four hours at worthy Señor Cospeto's. Not knowing how to spend my time, I played at cards. You know what month is; once I have the cards in my hand, and the gold on the table, I forget everything."
"Good, good," the stranger answered. "I am willing to believe you. Still, I pledge you my word, that if you dupe me in the affair you have proposed, and the information you offer to sell me is false, you will repent it. You know me, I think, Master Kidd?"
"Yes, Captain Don Marcos de Niza, and I suppose that you know me too; but of what use is this discussion? Let us settle our business first, and then you can act as you think proper."
The Captain gave him a suspicious glance. "It is well," he said, as he rapped at the door; "come in, this is my house; I prefer treating with you here to the tendajo."
"As you please," the bandit said, and followed the Captain into his house, the doors of which were closed behind them.