At noon we reached Las Godinas and halted at a rancho to get breakfast, and to give our mules a feed of sacate, which is an excellent and nutritious fodder composed of the stalks of maize. At this hamlet were assembled a large number of Indians who had come there from the adjoining highlands. The men were in many respects like the North American Indians. They were of a deep copper colour, and had black hair, and large, well shaped noses, broad faces and peculiarly long upper lips. Their eyes were round, black, furtive and restless. They belonged to the Kachiquel tribe, and spoke a dialect of the Quiché language.
After a few hours’ rest we proceeded. Suddenly we opened upon a magnificent view. Two thousand feet below us was the great Lake of Atitlan, five thousand feet above the sea. It was a bright, calm, sunny afternoon, and the still waters, reflecting the colour of the sky, were as blue as a sapphire. On the opposite shore, overlooking the lake, was the Volcano of Atitlan, eleven thousand, eight hundred feet high, and beyond was a continuous chain of volcanoes stretching westwards towards Quezaltenango. As we descended the hills the points of view kept changing. It would be difficult to surpass these marvellously beautiful combinations of lake and volcanic mountain scenery.
In the afternoon we reached Panajachel, and after having found a place of shelter for the mules, I asked the way to the house of a lady to whom I had a letter of introduction. The envelope bore the address of Doña Aña Gertrudio Leon de Montalban. I was told that I should find her at home, and that I was to make inquiries at the small grocer’s shop in the main street. Accordingly I went to the shop and asked the old woman behind the counter, who was at the time employed in selling tallow candles, if she could kindly tell me where Doña Aña de Montalban was to be found. She said “Señor, permit me to look at the letter,” and putting on her spectacles, she gazed at the envelope, opened it and slowly read what was inside. After having grasped the meaning of the writing, she smiled and said—“I am Doña Aña and this letter is written by a very good friend of mine, and Señor, my house is very much at your service; if you will wait for a few minutes until I have closed the shop, I will give you a room, the cook shall prepare a supper this evening, and I hope you will make yourself as comfortable as the poor means at my disposal will permit.”
Panajachel was crowded with Indians. It was the day of the festival of the Patron Saint of an adjacent church, and they had all been to there present offerings and light their candles at the shrines. In the evening numerous Indian women dressed in white passed through the village, carrying candles home to place before the altar of their own house idol.
The cura of the district, Padre Pedro, asked me to join him, after his duties were concluded, and talk about the events of the day. The Padre was evidently a capable and zealous priest. He had the reputation of having studied the character and language of his Indian congregations, and of being acquainted with their habits and traditions. I was therefore glad to have an opportunity of obtaining from such a good authority some well-founded information respecting the reports of sacrifices to the lake and volcano.
Father Pedro said that the ancient custom of sacrificing maidens at Atitlan, was also followed at the mountain near Quezaltenango. Whenever the rumbling noises were heard, threatening an eruption, a maiden was offered as a sacrifice to the angry god by throwing her into the crater. There used also to be performed some sacrificial ceremonies connected with the worship of the goddess of the lake, but he did not know what were the customs upon those occasions. The Abbé Brasseur de Bourbourg relates, in his notes of a journey through S. Salvador, that the lake of Xilopango was originally consecrated to the goddess of water, and that in each year, when the maize was about to ripen, four young girls were sacrificed.
It was reported that, in some remote districts, sacrifices were still offered, but this is very doubtful. The Padre observed that the Indians at Panajachel, and in the villages bordering on the lake were excessively superstitious. In their houses or huts they usually had a room or space set apart for the abode of their saint’s image. This image would sometimes be carried to the parish church and be left there for a time, and then would be taken back to the house again with ceremonies and lighted candles. I mentioned to the Padre how I had noticed that the Indian women here had a habit of talking together in a low tone. He said this was chiefly owing to the dialect of the Quiché language which was spoken in this district, in which many of the sounds were expressed like a whisper.
At daybreak Augustin was at the door with the mules, and my kind hostess prepared for me a cup of chocolate which she said would fortify me for the journey. We then left for Sololá, and soon were watching a glorious sunrise. The lake of Atitlan is irregular in its shape. According to my travelling map it has a circumference exceeding thirty miles. The most remarkable features are its great depth, and the almost perpendicular cliffs on the northern side which seem to be of volcanic formation. The deep blue of its waters is possibly owing to their depth, and the rarefied state of the atmosphere at this altitude. Our road led us through several villages containing chiefly Indian populations, and then we ascended a long and abrupt hill. As the day advanced we were joined by bands of Indians with cargo mules, travelling to the market.
Sololá is the chief town of the Department, and the Corregidor was good enough to add some recommendations to my government letter. We stopped there long enough to rest the mules, and then proceeded on our way to San Tomas, eight leagues distant. Upon reaching the upper slopes of the hill I dismounted, in order to visit some Indian farm buildings that occupied several acres of rising ground near our path. Although there were evidences of what may be called comparative wealth, these Indians—like all others that I had seen—only possessed a single hut with one large room in it. Men, women and lads were all busy; the boys cleaning and spinning wool for their black ponchos or cloaks, and the women, as usual, engaged in grinding maize and making tortillas.
We followed a steep ascent. The path was cut into broad steps, up which my excellent mule clambered with the utmost ease and rapidity, and in a manner which brought back to the memory many rides amongst the Druse villages in the mountains of the Lebanon. Upon reaching the summit of the sierra, I turned the mule’s head round to enable me to look at the lake and the group of volcanoes beyond it. It was then a scene of great beauty, but at some remote period in the world’s history, it must have been a centre of great volcanic violence and devastation.