Incidents of Travel in Yucatan, Vol. I.

by John L. Stephens

As a matter of professional etiquette, Doctor Cabot proposed to call upon the English physician. His house was shut up, and he was already in his hammock, being himself suffering from calentura, for which he had just taken a warm bath; but before the door was opened we were satisfied that he was really an Ingles. It seemed a strange thing to meet, in this little village in the interior of Yucatan, one speaking our own language, but the circuitous road by which he had reached it was not less strange.

Doctor Fasnet, or Fasnach as he was called, was a small man, considerably upward of fifty. Thirty years before he had emigrated to Jamaica, and, after wandering among the West India Islands, had gone over to the continent; and there was hardly a country in Spanish America in which he had not practised the healing art. With an uncontrollable antipathy to revolutions, it had been his lot to pass the greater part of his life in countries most rife with them. After running before them in Colombia, Peru, Chili, and Central America, where he had prescribed for Carrera when the latter was pursuing his honest calling as a pig-driver, unluckily he found himself in Salama when Carrera came upon it with twelve hundred Indians, and the cry of death to the whites. With a garrison of but thirty soldiers and sixty citizens capable of bearing arms, Doctor Fasnach was fain to undertake the defence; but, fortunately, Carrera drew off his Indians, and Doctor Fasnet drew off himself, came into Yucatan, and happened to settle in Tekax, the only town in the state that could get up a revolution. He was flying from it, and on his way to Merida, when he was arrested by the cura's illness. The doctor's long residence in tropical countries had made him familiar with their diseases, but his course of treatment would not be considered legitimate by regular practitioners. The cura's illness was cholera morbus, attended with excessive swelling and inflammation of the stomach and intestines. To reduce these. Doctor F. had a sheep killed at the door, and the stomach of the patient covered with flesh warm from the animal, which in a very few minutes became tainted and was taken off, and a new layer applied; and this was continued till eight sheep had been killed and applied, and the inflammation subsided.

From the house of Doctor Fasnet we went to the cura. The change which two weeks had made in his appearance was appalling. Naturally thin, his agonizing pains had frightfully reduced him, and as he lay extended on a cot with a sheet over him, he seemed more dead than living. He was barely able, by the feeble pressure of his shrunken hand, to show that he appreciated our visit, and to say that he had never expected to see us again; but the happy faces of those around him spoke more than words. It was actually rejoicing as over one snatched from the grave.

The next morning we visited him again. His sunken eye lighted up as he inquired about our excavations at Uxmal, and a smile played upon his lips as he alluded to the superstition of the Indians about digging up the bones in San Francisco. Our visit seemed to give him so much satisfaction, that, though we could not talk with him, we remained at the house nearly all day, and the next day we returned to Nohcacab on horseback. Our visit to Ticul had recruited us greatly, and we found Mr. Catherwood equally improved. A few days' rest had done wonders for us all, and we determined immediately to resume our occupations.

On leaving Uxmal we had directed our steps toward Nohcacab, not from any attractions in the place itself, but on account of the ruins which we had heard of as existing in that neighbourhood; and, after ascertaining their position, we considered that they could be visited to the best advantage by making this place our head-quarters. We had the prospect of being detained there some time, and, as the casa real was low, damp, and noisy, and, moreover, our apartment was wanted for the schoolroom, by the advice of the padrecito we determined to abandon it, and take up our abode in the convent.

This was a long stone building in the rear of the church, standing on the same high table-land, overlooking the village, and removed from its annoyances and bustle. In the part immediately adjoining the church were two large and convenient apartments, except that, quick in detecting all which could bring on a recurrence of fever and ague, we noticed on one side puddles of water and green mould, from the constant shade of the great wall of the church, and on the door of one of the rooms was written, "Here died Don José Trufique: may his soul rest in peace."

In these rooms we established ourselves. On one side of us we had the padrecito, who was always gay and lively, and on the other six or eight Indian sacristans, or sextons, who were always drunk. Before the door was a broad high platform, running all round the church, and a little beyond it was a walled enclosure for our horses. Opposite the door of the sacristia was a thatched cocina, or kitchen, in which these Indian church ministers cooked and Albino and Bernaldo slept.

It is ascertained by historical accounts, that at the time of the conquest an Indian town existed in this immediate neighbourhood, bearing the name of Nohcacab. This name is compounded of three Maya words, signifying literally the great place of good land; and from the numerous and extraordinary ruins scattered around, there is reason to believe that it was the heart of a rich, and what was once an immensely populous country. In the suburbs are numerous and large mounds, grand enough to excite astonishment, but even more fallen and overgrown than those of San Francisco, and, in fact, almost inaccessible.

The village stands in the same relative position to these ruins that Ticul does to the ruins of San Francisco, and, like that, in my opinion it stands on the offskirts of the old Indian town, or rather it occupies part of the very site, for in the village itself, within the enclosures of some of the Indians, are the remains of mounds exactly like those in the suburbs. In making excavations in the plaza, vases and vessels of pottery are continually brought to light, and in the street wall of the house where the padrecito's mother lived is a sculptured head dug up fifteen years ago.

The whole of this region is retired and comparatively unknown. The village is without the line of all the present main roads; it does not lie on the way to any place of general resort, and is not worth stopping at on its own account. Notwithstanding the commencement of improvements, it was the most backward and thoroughly Indian of any village we had visited. Merida was too far off for the Indians to think of; but few of the vecinos ever reached it, and Ticul was their capital. Everything that was deficient in the village they told us was to be had at Ticul, and the sexton, who went over once a week for the holy wafer, was always charged with some errand for us.