When the lord of the manor arrived the following day, I immediately went to see him. As I passed through the enclosure he was scolding the superintendent, but on perceiving me he stepped forward to receive me. This modern Fra Diavolo was about thirty years old, rather short of stature, but unusually well built. He wore an embroidered brown jacker and a blue waistcoat, and around his neck was thrown a many-coloured scarf. On one side of his sombrero was a scarlet rosette. Under it gleamed brown, piercing eyes. His hair was cut short. Altogether he was quite good-looking, except for a cruel, sensual expression of the features. His entire manner, erect carriage, and quick, decisive movements told me he was a man of violent temper and extreme determination.
He led the way into a room, and I handed him my letter of recommendation from the Mexican Government, and explained what I was doing in the sierra. After he had read the letter, he said that he was my friend. I told him that I had heard there were robbers in the vicinity, and in case I was molested I should apply to him for assistance, since he was a very influential man. Of course I knew as long as he did not rob us we were quite safe. I then photographed him and his house, and he evidently felt quite flattered. He accompanied me for a mile down the road, and then, taking me aside, handed me back the paltry sum I had paid for the provisions, saying he did not accept payment from his guests. This was rather embarrassing, but there was no way out of it, and I had to accept it. I afterward sent him a copy of his photograph to even up matters.
The guide with whom Don Teodoro had provided me pointed out to us a place where his master last year killed and robbed a man. “He is a poor shot,” he added, “except at close range, and he generally travels at night.” In 1895 Don Teodoro Palma himself was killed by the Indians. If half the rumours about him are true, he certainly deserved his fate. He never dared to go down to the lowlands, because “he owed so many dead,” as the saying goes. A few years before my visit, an American had been killed and robbed in the vicinity, and his countrymen in Chihuahua offered a reward for the apprehension of the murderer, dead or alive. Don Teodoro knew that a certain friend of his had perpetrated the crime, and in order to secure the reward he invited him to his house and shot him down in cold blood.
I arrived safely in Guadalupe y Calvo, a once flourishing place, but now quite dead, since the mines have ceased to be worked. There are large Mexican ranches southeast of the town, and whatever Tarahumares live hereabout are servants of the Mexicans and frequently intermarry with the Tepehuanes.
I thus traversed from north to south the country over which the Tarahumares once held sway. To-day we find this tribe, approximately, between Guadalupe y Calvo and Temosachic; roughly speaking, between the twenty-sixth and twenty-ninth degrees northern latitude.
Civilisation, as brought to the Tarahumare, is not fraught with benefits for him. It rudely shakes the columns of the temple of his religion. The Mexican Central Railroad crushes his sacred plants without thought of its anger, which is vented on the poor Tarahumare by sending him bad years and ill-luck. While the Indians deny themselves the pleasure of smoking tobacco in the daytime for fear of offending the sun with the smoke, the white men’s furnaces and engines belch forth black clouds of smoke day after day, keeping the people out of the sight of Tara Dios, and thus preventing him from guarding them. In the engine itself they see the Devil with a long tongue and a big beard.
Worse than that, the foot of civilisation destroys his home; for the whites draw the boundary line of his country closer and closer. The better class of Mexicans keep to themselves, and seldom, if ever, bother about the Indians at their doors, whose mode of living and way of thinking are so different from their own. The class of whites on the borderland of such civilisation as the Tarahumare comes in contact with is not the kind that will or can improve him, being ignorant and unscrupulous. The Indian civilised by them is a very unpleasant person to deal with. He has learned to cheat and to steal, and he no longer carries out his contracts and agreements. Having learned the value of money, his greed is awakened, and he begins to look out only for his own profit.
The first white men with whom the Indian gets acquainted are the traders who speak his language, and whose sole aim is to enrich themselves at his expense and compel him to deal with them. If the Indian does not want to sell, the lenguaraz loses his patience, throws a few dollars toward him, takes the ox, and goes off. Many will go still further. They force the native to borrow from them, whether he wants the money, the cloth, the mescal, or the use of the horse, or not. Many Indians would refuse mescal, satisfied with their native stimulants, but see no other way of getting rid of the unwelcome and obtrusive white than by yielding to his demand. The agreement is made that he must return the so-called loan on a certain date, two or three months hence; the Indian, of course, having no almanac, easily makes a mistake in his calculation, and the date passes. The dealer has gained his point. He saddles his horse, looks up the Indian, and makes a great to-do about all the trouble he is put to in collecting the debt, charging not only enormous interest for overtime, but adding exorbitant travelling expenses and fees. He succeeds by threats and intimidation in getting his damages adjusted in such a way that, in return for the paltry sum he lent the Indian, he now drives off two or three oxen.
The Indians, being honourable in their dealings, do not at first contact with the whites suspect rascality, and many stories are told illustrating the ease with which they have been cheated.
Once a Mexican bought a sheep from a native on credit, and, after killing it, paid for it with the head, the skin, and the entrails. Another man did still better. He paid for his sheep with the same valuables, and “spoke so well” that the Indian was content to remain in his debt as the final result of the transaction. On another occasion a native was induced to sell eleven oxen, almost his entire stock, to a Mexican. It was agreed that the latter should pay two cows for each ox, but not having any cows with him he left his horse and saddle as security. The Indian is still waiting for the cows. When I expressed my surprise at the ease with which he allowed himself to be swindled, he replied that the Mexican “spoke so well.” They are so delighted at hearing their language spoken by a white man, that they lose all precaution and are completely at the mercy of the wily whites, who profit by their weakness.