[XXIX-19] Belly, who wrote before the upsetting of the old conservative régime, says: 'Un population que son beau climat sollicite à l'inertie, et qui sort a peine de la plus abominable éducation religieuse et morale que jamais un peuple ait subie.' A trav. l'Amér. Cent., i. 153-4. Laferrière visited the country some years later, and fully confirms the above. De Paris à Guatém., 263.
[XXIX-20] 'Those of the better class will compare well with any people for good morals, discreet conduct, and admirable behavior.' Min. Hudson's Rept, in U. S. Gov. Doc., H. Ex. Doc., Cong. 43, Sess. 1, i. 446.
[XXIX-21] Most of the women smoke, the elder ones cigars, and the young cigarettes. They do it, however, in a pretty and refined manner. Stephens' Trav. Cent. Am., i. 256.
[XXIX-22] 'A natural roving appetite inclines them to favor and to freely indulge such intercourse.' Min. Hudson's Rept, in U. S. Gov. Doc., H. Ex. Doc., Cong. 43, Sess. 1, i. 445.
[XXIX-23] Every Ind. village has its own authorities, most of whom are chosen from among the inhabitants.
[XXIX-24] The old system attempted to improve their condition by enacting laws believed to be conducive to that end. Witness clauses of a decree of the constituent assembly of Nov. 8, 1851, giving force to certain laws of 1839, and reviving others of the old Spanish Recop. de Indios, which were intended to prevent the maltreatment of Indians. Guat., Recop. Ley., i. 246, 512-15, 846-53. On the 6th of Sept., 1879, a decree was passed, acknowledging the lamentable condition of ignorance and abjectedness the Indian had been kept in, and providing that at least a portion of them should attend the pub. schools already established in nearly all the departments. Salv., Diario Ofic., Sept. 20, 1879.
[XXIX-25] The German writers Scherzer and Von Tempski, and the American Stephens, have occupied themselves with those people. According to them the inhabitants live isolated, and render no service to Guat. They practise a religion which is a mixture of catholic and heathen rites. The only ladinos allowed to live with them are the priest and his attendants.
[XXIX-26] The towns conquered by the Spaniards did not contain all the Lacandones. According to Pinelo, the Lacandones and Manchés were computed, in 1637, at 100,000. This was subsequent to the invasion of their territory by Quiñones. Squier, Cent. Am., 568-72, gives much information on the subject.
[XXIX-27] Now and then a few of them visit the Mexican states of Chiapas, Tabasco, and Campeche to procure tobacco and other things, and suddenly disappear by unknown paths, and never allow strangers to visit them.
[XXIX-28] The eastern Lacandones are tillers of the soil, hunters, and fishermen. Though occasionally baptized by catholic missionaries, and fond of saying prayers, they still adhere to their old heathen worship, and indulge in polygamy. They visit the whites and settled Indians to sell their produce. Berendt's Explor. in Cent. Am., in Smithsonian Rept, 1867, 425.