Vagabond Life in Mexico

by Gabriel Ferry

I could never resist the attraction of a bull-fight, and I found an advantage in having the company of Fray Serapio while traversing in security those suburbs which surround Mexico in a formidable belt. The neighborhood of the Necatitlan Square is more dreaded than any, and it is almost always dangerous to appear there in a European garb; indeed, I never passed through it alone without uneasiness. The cowl of the monk would be a safeguard to me in my European dress. I accepted his offer with pleasure, and we set out. For the first time, I viewed with a tranquil mind the narrow, dirty, and unpaved streets, the blackened houses full of cracks running over the walls in all directions, lurking-places of the thieves and robbers who ply their calling on the streets, and who sometimes even break into houses in the city. Swarms of one-eyed léperos, their faces cut and scarred with the knife, were drinking, whistling, and shouting in the taverns, clad in dirty cotton clothes, or enveloped in their frazadas.[4] Their wives, dressed in tatters, stood in the doorways, watching their naked children, who were sporting in the mud, and laughing and shouting merrily. In passing through these haunts of cut-throats, the terror of the police, the judge mutters a prayer, the alcalde crosses himself, the corchete (bailiff) and the regidor shuffle humbly along with downcast eye but watchful look, and the honest man shudders, but the monk stalks along with lofty brow and serene face, and the creak of his sandals is more respected there than the clink of the celador's sabre; sometimes, even, like tame tigers who recognize their master, the bandits emerge from their lurking-places, and come and kiss his hand.

The Necatitlan Square presented an appearance at once strange and novel. On one side, where the sun darted his unpitying rays upon the palcos de sol,[5] stood the people, with cloaks and rebozos hung over their heads as a shade, clustered in noisy, animated groups on the steps of the circus, and keeping up a lively concert of whistling and groaning. On the shady side, the nodding plumes of the officers' hats, and the variegated silk shawls of the ladies, presented to the eye an appearance which contrasted strongly with the wretchedness and misery of the rabble in the palcos de sol. I had witnessed bull-fights a hundred times. I had seen this dirty mass of people, wearied and exhausted in body, but with as keen a relish for slaughter as ever, their tongues sticking to the roofs of their mouths, and their throats dry and parched as the sand, when the setting sun darted his long rays through the ill-joined boards of the amphitheatre, and when the scent of the blood lured the hungry vultures who were sailing in the air above, but I never saw the arena so transformed as it was at that time. Numerous wooden erections filled the space ordinarily devoted to the bull-fights; these, covered with grass, flowers, and sweet-smelling branches of trees, made the whole place assume the appearance of a vast hall, growing, as it were, out of the ground, and forming a series of shady groves, with paths winding through them. Little booths were dispersed here and there through the groves, some intended for the preparation of delicate articles of Mexican cookery, others for the sale of cool, refreshing drinks. In the cookery booths you could indulge in the luxury of nameless ragouts of pork, seasoned with pimenta. In the puestos[6] glittered immense glasses filled with beverages of all the colors in the rainbow, red, green, blue, and yellow. The mob in the palcos de sol snuffed up greedily the nauseous smell of the fat pork, while others, more lucky, seated in this improvised elysium, under the shade of the trees, discussed patés of the wild duck of the lakes.

"Look!" said the Franciscan, pointing with his finger to the throng seated at the tables in the ring; "that's what we call a Jamaïca."

"And that?" said I, showing him a tree five or six yards high, fixed in the ground, with all its leaves, in the middle of the arena, quite covered with handkerchiefs of every hue, which fluttered from the branches.

"That is a Monte Parnaso," said the Franciscan.

"Probably poets are to ascend it?"

"No; but léperos, and such like uneducated persons—which will be a great deal more diverting."

The monk had hardly given me this answer, which but half enlightened me, when cries of toro, toro, from the rabble in the palcos de sol became louder and more overpowering; the pastry cooks' booths and the puestos were suddenly deserted; the revelers were suddenly interrupted by the sudden rush of a band of léperos from the highest boxes round the inclosure, who, sliding down by means of their cloaks, made a terrific onslaught on the green booths inside. Among the crowd who were yelling and kicking down the booths, and strewing the whole ring with their remains, I recognized my old friend Perico. Indeed, without him the fête would have been incomplete. The Monte Parnaso, with its cotton handkerchiefs, stood alone in the midst of the wreck, and soon became the only object to which the looks and aims of the rabble were directed. All tried to be the first to ascend the tree, and get possession of such handkerchiefs as took their fancy; but the struggles of the one impeded the efforts of the other; the tree still remained standing, and not a single claimant had yet succeeded in even touching its trunk. At the same moment the bugle sounded in the box of the alcalde, the door of the toril was thrown open, and a magnificent bull, the best that the neighboring haciendas could furnish, came thundering into the arena. The spectators, who expected a more formidable animal, were somewhat disappointed when they saw an embolado.[7] The aspiring laureates of Monte Parnaso were nevertheless somewhat scared and frightened. The bull, after standing with some hesitation, bounded with a gallop toward the tree, which was still standing. Some of the léperos ran away, and the others took refuge, one after another, in the branches of Monte Parnaso. The bull, having come to the foot of the tree, butted at it with repeated blows of his horns; it tottered; and at the very moment Perico was busily engaged in reaping an abundant harvest of pocket-handkerchiefs, it fell, dragging with it the men who were entangled in the branches. Roars of laughter and enthusiastic cheering arose from the ten thousand spectators in the galleries and boxes at sight of the unfortunate wretches, who, bruised and lamed, were seeking to escape from each other's grasp, and from the branches in which they were entangled. To add to the confusion, the bull, seeking no doubt to separate the black mass struggling on the ground, butted several of the unfortunate léperos with his horns, and, to my great sorrow, I saw Perico, launched ten feet into the air, fall to the ground in such a state of insensibility as to deprive me of all hope of completing my studies of Mexican life under so skillful a master.