Passing through Zanatepec, we stopped for Sunday at Tanatepec. Here we found ourselves again upon the low coast road. It was, however, our last point of low altitude, as from there we struck inland over a higher, cooler, and more interesting mountain road. At Zanatepec we first saw the marimba played. This musical instrument, unquestionably African in name and origin, is hardly found north of Chiapas, but is extremely common through Central America. It consists of a wooden frame supporting keys made of wood and metal, each of which gives forth its own note when struck with small hammers. Below the keys of lowest tone are hung tubes, pipes, or gourds, as sounding boxes to increase the sound produced by striking the key. Usually four players perform at one time, each using two or more little hammers. The music is rapid and brilliant, somewhat resembling that of the piano. The instrument usually has some fanciful name, which is painted upon it. The one at Tanatepec was La Azteca (The Aztec Lady), while our next one was La reina de las flores (The queen of the flowers). At Zanatepec, La Azteca was an advertising part of a traveling circus. The troupe consisted of three men and three women, the latter of whom seemed to be mulattos. The men were ridiculously garbed and painted to represent wild indians. The real, live indians, who followed these clowns in delighted crowds, enjoyed thrills of terror at their whoops, fierce glances, and wild antics, and assured us that these actors were, if not the real thing, at least wonderfully accurate impersonations of the natives of the Estados unidos (United States)—the land of the "Apaches."
From Tanatepec we were in Chiapas, the southernmost state of the republic. We struck out over a fine mountain road, passable for carts all the way to Tuxtla Gutierrez, the capital of the state. Our first ascent was over a magnificent mountain mass of syenite, which at some places seemed to be as fine as our own Quincy stone. The road, with many short zigzags, made a remarkably abrupt ascent, and, having reached the crest, wound like a vast serpent along the summit. As we descended into the following valley, we encountered a beautiful deer, which stood in the middle of the road, eyeing us with curiosity, until we were almost upon it, when it dashed into the thicket and then stopped to again eye us. Upon attaining the second summit we were amid pines. All day we had had a wind in our faces, cold and so strong as to almost blow us from the narrow ridge, yet the sky was cloudless. Looking back from our summit, a magnificent view to the ocean was spread before us. Below us were the mountains over which we had come, then a valley broken with mountains of a lesser size; beyond, was the dry, coastal plain, and yet beyond it, the sea. The dark green pines, the blue sky, the brown hills, the gray plain, the stretch of blue-green waters, made a wonderful color combination.
The next two days were most uninteresting. We were often reminded of the recent threat of war between Mexico and Guatemala, the disputed border-line between which we were now nearing. We met marching bands of soldiers who were returning to Juchitan. Officers were on horses, common soldiers on foot, pack-mules were laden with luggage, the women (accompanying their husbands) were weighed down with coffee-pots, bundles of clothes, and babies, all strapped on their backs together. They were a motley crew. At Jiquipilas a company was encamped in the plaza. Our mule, Chontal, took particular delight in running into such bands of marching soldiers as we encountered, causing no end of trouble. On one occasion, as a group approached us, he ran forward at a lively pace into their midst and tangled himself up with a party of prisoners,—apparently soldiers in disgrace,—who, tied together with ropes, were under guard. As we rode up to capture him, I felt a hand at that coat pocket which contained our money-bag and, turning suddenly, found one of the guard trying to draw the bag of money from my pocket. I struck at him with my whip and he slunk away.
The last day of travel before reaching Tuxtla Gutierrez, we passed one of the few pretty places on this dreary road, Agua Bendita. At this point the road makes a great curve, almost like a horseshoe; at the middle of this curve there rises to the right of the road a wall of limestone rock the plainly defined strata of which are thrown into a gentle anticlinal fold. The upper layers of this arch were covered with shrubs, clinging to its face, while the lower layers were tapestried with a curtain of delicate ferns, which hung down over the open arch below, under which the road passed. Water trickled through this limestone mass and dripped and collected in little basins, which had been excavated in the ledge close by the roadside. Some grateful passer had set up little crosses by the water pools, and they were gay that day with purple orchids plucked from a near-by tree. In this tree, amid the brilliant clumps of yet unplucked blossoms of the orchids, were a number of toucans with their enormous, brightly colored bills—the picos de canoa (canoe beaks) of the people.
Tuxtla Gutierrez is a town of some thousands population, with a central plaza where the local band plays almost every evening, and a market place of exceptional interest. Here, as nowhere else, we saw crowds of the purest indians in native dress. Chiapas is the home of at least thirteen tribes, each with its own language. Among the most interesting indians we saw in the market were the Tzotzils, from Chamula, who wore heavy, black woolen garments. The indians of the town and its immediate vicinity are Zoques.
Few Mexican governors possess the breadth of view and the intelligent enterprise of Governor Leon, whom we encountered here. A man of middle age, of fair stature though slight in build, with dark complexion, iron-gray hair, beard and whiskers carefully trimmed after the French fashion, his appearance creates a favorable impression. He did everything in his power for our comfort and assistance, and supplied us with letters to the jefes politicos of the districts through which we were to pass. We congratulated him upon the cart-road over which we had come from Zanatepec, an important public work for this part of the world; he told us he began it three years ago with a force of but nine men; that it would be extended to San Cristobal and San Bartolome; that he was no engineer, but that he could tell quite well when a road was passable for a cart. We found him greatly interested in a congress which he had called of persons interested in labor questions. Among the questions which he hoped to see considered was the abolition of the system of peonage, which still exists in full development in the state.
Less than three leagues from Tuxtla Gutierrez is Chiapa, famous for the brightly painted gourds and calabash vessels there manufactured and sent out to all parts of the republic. Toys, rattles, cups, and great bowl-basins are among the forms produced. We visited a house where five women were making pretty rattles from little crook-necked gourds. The workers sat upon the floor, with their materials and tools before them. The first one rubbed the body of the dry gourds over with an oil paint. These paints are bought in bulk and mixed upon a flat slab, with a fine-grained, smooth, hard pebble as a grinder, with aje and a white earth dug near the road between Chiapa and Tuxtla Gutierrez. The aje is a yellow, putty-like mass which gives a brilliant, lacquer-like lustre; the white earth causes the color to adhere to the surface to which it is applied. The second woman rubbed the neck of the gourd with green paint; the third painted the line of junction of the two colors with white, using a brush; the fourth brought out the lustre of the before dull object by rubbing it upon a pad of cotton cloth upon her knee, giving a final touch by careful rubbing with a tuft of cotton-wool; with a brush, the final worker rapidly painted on the lustrous surface delicate floral or geometric decoration. Though representing so much delicate and ingenious labor, these pretty toys were sold at the price of two for a medio (three cents in United States currency).
The aje which gives the brilliant lustre to this work deserves more than a passing notice. It is made chiefly at San Bartolome and is secured from an insect, a sort of plant-louse, which lives upon the blackthorn and related trees. The insect is found only in the wet season, is small, though growing rapidly, and is of a fiery-red color, though it coats itself over with a white secretion. It lives in swarms, which form conspicuous masses. These are gathered in vessels, washed to remove the white secretion, boiled, crushed, and strained through a cloth; an oily matter, mixed with blood (?) and water passes out, which is boiled to drive off the water and to concentrate the oily mass. This is then washed in trays, to rid it of the blood, and made up into balls, which are sold at ten or twelve centavos (five or six cents) a pound. It is a putty-like substance, with a handsome yellow color. We have already stated that it is ground up with dry paints to be rubbed on the object which is to be adorned, and that the brilliant lustre is developed by gentle and rapid friction.
ZAPOTEC WOMAN; SAN BLAS