Women of America / Woman: In all ages and in all countries Vol. 10 (of 10)

by John Ruse Larus

THE BEAUTIFUL MAIDENS PRESENTED TO THE SPANIARDS
Reproduced from the "Lienzo de Tlaxcala"

Muñoz Camargo relates hot their Tlaxcalan allies presented the Spaniards a large number of "beautiful maidens." This native representation of the scene shows Cortés seated, with his followers behind him, and at his side Marina, a young native woman who was his companion and interpreter. The Lienzo de Tlaxcala was a long strip of canvas, containing forty-eight representations of scenes of the early Spanish invasions. The original was destroyed during the revolution following the downfall of Maximilian, but a copy had fortunately been made before the destruction.

Shortly before the marriage of Doña Marina, Cortés's legal wife a woman of low birth and a drag upon him in his upward career had come over from the Islands to New Spain, but she did not live long after her arrival, and her death furnished the later detractors of Cortés with a pretext to attack him in the way that could most deeply and yet safely pierce his defence. This was absurd enough, since Cortés had always treated his wife with affection and consideration; but suspicion was never entirely allayed. The facts of having thus influenced in some degree the fortunes of the Conqueror and of having been one of the first ladies of Spain to die on the shores of New Spain form the only title to mention in this history of Doña Catalina Xuarez.

There are indeed but few names of women associated with the conquest of Mexico, that of Marina standing out preeminent. Yet there were women not a few who exercised a certain influence on the fortunes of the Conqueror and his army, though their names are generally unknown to us. In the second march upon the Mexican capital many of the soldiers had brought their wives with them, and during the stress and storm of the days when Guatemozin was hurling his forces again and again upon the fearfully outnumbered but better armed Spaniards, these women did service in true Amazon style. Not only did they cheer and encourage the downhearted and prick the cowards--though there were very few of the latter in that little army--with the needle of their scorn, but they actually did soldier service as well. When Cortés had besought these women to remain at Tlascala, they had replied that "It was the duty of Castilian wives not to abandon their husbands in danger, but to share it with them, and, if necessary, to die with them." Though some of the names of these heroines have been embalmed in history by Herrera, they have but little meaning for us now; it is more to the point to know that one and all acted to the utmost of their conception of duty and that some of them mounted guard on the walls in the place of their husbands, while one was said actually to have donned mail at a time of disaster and rallied the retreating troops against the enemy. It cannot be said, however, that even these gallant dames showed a higher spirit than did the native women during the same time of battle. The Aztecs were suffering from many evils during the conflict when the Spaniards strove, for long in vain, to take from them their beautiful city. The plague of small-pox was abroad, brought to the Aztecs by a dying negro in the train of Cortés; and that unknown negro proved the most terrible foe of the Aztec nation. Yet, even though they were now dying by hundreds in the streets, while their thinning ranks were being swept by the fire-speaking tubes that weaponed the army of their foes, they fought fiercely on, and their women gave them noble aid and incitement. They stood by the side of the warrior in battle, strung his bow, filled his quiver, gave him fresh stones for his sling; they nursed the sick through all the horrors of the loathsome disease which had fastened upon them; and they did yet more, for they kept their hearts high with hope and determination when even the noblest warriors failed of these things, and so they upheld the hands of Guatemozin, their beloved but most unhappy chief, and upbore the standard of their country to the very end. It was all in vain; the Mexico of that civilization was doomed; but none the less did the women of that day, both pagan and Christian, display qualities which in the fusion of the races in after years should have borne noble fruit.

It is not the purpose of this work to trace the history of any country, save at the points where such history touches the universal story of woman; and so there exists no obligation to present to the reader even the most fragmentary sketch of the progress of Mexico from the rule of the barbarism of the Aztecs to that of the civilization of the Spaniards. The latter brought with them their own feminine culture, and for long held it apart from the conditions existing among the indigenous inhabitants of the land. Among the women of Spain who took up their abode in Mexico there are names which lend themselves to story; but their histories touched Mexico only as a scenic background, and, moreover, it would be an unfruitful digression to attempt to find any feminine history in the days of Spain's first occupation of Anahuac. The vice-roys held their courts with little less than regal splendor, and it cannot be that those courts were unadorned by the presence of women of high claim to remembrance; yet there comes down to us no name of those days touched with the halo of romance or in any way made worthy of memoir. Doubtless the ladies of the viceregal courts flaunted as costly attire and held themselves as haughtily as their sisters in the court of Spain itself; but they passed away and left no trace, even as an influence. For years of varying fortunes but of constant prosperity in high places, Spain held Mexico under dominance, until the oppression of the lower classes began to bear its invariable fruit, and there came first threats, and then acts of rebellion. There was revolution after revolution; but although the unsuccessful revolts bequeathed to history the names of such men as Hidalgo and Morelos, and the successful attempt to throw off the galling yoke of Spain, the names of Yturbide and Santa Anna, there comes down to us even from these later times the name of not one woman of renown. Moreover, there is but little in the way of development and change which is found for record. Long before the expulsion of the Spaniard, the Mexican people had come to be recognized as a nation, not merely descendants of the Spaniards, but a people of self-gained characteristics. Mexico was no longer New Spain; she was herself, even as, a few years before, a greater country on her borders had come to be itself in the matter of nationality, even before it had gained autonomy. To be a Mexican woman was not merely to be a lesser Spaniard, but to be something definite, something individual. Some of the older national traits had become developed, some atrophied; but long before Mexico had achieved her independence, the Mexican woman had attained her own freedom from Spanish dominance in matters of custom, thought, and even heredity.

Yet it cannot be said that there was progress. There was fixed development of nationality as displayed in the establishment of a characteristic femininity, but there was no evolution toward a higher type of individual or of civilization than had been known in the days of the coming of the Spaniards. On the contrary, there may be said to have been retrogression. The woman of Mexico--by which name we must now distinguish the descendants of the Spaniards, while those of Aztec blood, or descendants from any of the native tribes, may be called generically Indians--retained as a rule neither the activity and courage of the wives of the conquistadores nor the graces and dignity of the dames of the viceregal courts. After the establishment of Mexican independence there came as first ambassador from Spain, in 1839, Señor Don Calderon de la Barca; and this gentleman brought with him his very accomplished wife. Madame Calderon, as is the case with most women, was an indefatigable letter-writer, especially when she was amid new conditions; and to a number of her letters, written with no intent of publication, but most vivid and entertaining in their presentation of the chief characteristics of Mexican social life, is owing much of the present-day knowledge of Mexican existence in the early part of the nineteenth century, when that existence had begun to be acknowledged as national and individual. There is no period better adapted than this to the purpose of finding and fixing a typical Mexican woman, for it was the time when the women of Anahuac had emerged from the imitation of Spanish characteristics and customs into a national female existence as well as type, and it was before their briefly held individuality failed beneath the incursions of a northern civilization which has been so universally destructive of national type wherever it has set foot.

Consideration of the characteristics of the Mexican woman of the forties may be begun with an extract from the letters of Madame Calderon. She is speaking of society women in Mexico, and she says: "I must put aside exceptions which are always rising up before me, and write en masse. Generally speaking, the Mexican señoras and señoritas write, read, and play a little; sew, and take care of their houses and children. When I say they read, I mean they know how to read; when I say they write, I do not mean that they can always spell; and when I say they play, I do not assert that they have a general knowledge of music. The climate inclines everyone to indolence, both physical and moral. One cannot pore over a book when the blue sky is constantly smiling in at the open windows." This language reads as the words of one who is reluctantly compelled to tell the whole truth and then seeks to withdraw or at least palliate the accusation which she has brought. It is entirely plain that at the time of Madame Calderon ignorance and sloth were the prevailing feminine characteristics among those who sat in high places. It is true that the chronicler goes on to say that the Mexican women generally made good wives and affectionate mothers; but even in this matter she does not strike us as speaking from conviction. However this may be, she is certainly at no loss to characterize the taste in dress displayed by the "fine ladies" upon festal occasions. Describing one of these, she writes: "Here was to be seen a group of ladies, some with black gowns and mantillas, others, now that their church-going duty was over, equipped in velvet or satin, with their hair dressed--and beautiful hair they have; some leading their children by the hand, dressed--alas, how were they dressed! Long, velvet gowns trimmed with blonde, diamond earrings, high French caps furbelowed with lace and flowers, or turbans with plumes of feathers. Now and then, the head of a little thing that could hardly waddle alone might have belonged to an English dowager-duchess in her opera-box. Some had extraordinary bonnets, and as they toddled along, top-heavy, one would have thought they were little old women, without a glimpse caught of their lovely little brown faces and blue eyes."

Though again Madame Calderon very kindly bestows her criticism upon the dresses of the children rather than those of the mothers, even a mere man can guess what must have been the appearance of the mothers who had chosen thus to dress their offspring.