The White Chief: A Legend of Northern Mexico

by Mayne Reid

The rancho in question was ornamented neither with wash nor windows. It stood under the cliff, its brown mud walls scarce contrasting with the colour of the rock; and, instead of windows, a pair of dark holes, with a few wooden bars across them, gave light to the interior.

This light, however, was only a supplement to that which entered by the door, habitually kept open.

The front of the house was hardly visible from the valley road. A traveller would never have noticed it, and even the keen eye of an Indian might have failed to discover it. The singular fence that surrounded it hid it from view,—singular to the eye of one unaccustomed to the vegetation of this far land, it was a fence of columnar cacti. The plants that formed it were regular fluted columns, six inches thick and from six to ten feet high. They stood side by side like pickets in a stockade, so close together that the eye could scarce see through the interstices, still further closed by the thick beard of thorns. Near their tops in the season these vegetable columns became loaded with beautiful wax-like flowers, which disappeared only to give way to bright and luscious fruits. It was only after passing through the opening in this fence that the little rancho could be seen; and although its walls were rude, the sweet little flower-garden that bloomed within the enclosure told that the hand of care was not absent.

Beyond the cactus-fence, and built against the cliff, was another enclosure—a mere wall of adobe of no great height. This was a “corral” where cattle were kept, and at one corner was a sort of shed or stable of small dimensions. Sometimes half-a-dozen mules and double the number of oxen might be seen in that corral, and in the stable as fine a horse as ever carried saddle. Both were empty now, for the animals that usually occupied them were out. Horse, mules, and oxen, as well as their owner, were far away upon the prairies.

Their owner was Carlos the cibolero. Such was the home of the buffalo-hunter, the home of his aged mother and fair sister. Such had been their home since Carlos was a child.

And yet they were not of the people of the valley nor the town. Neither race—Spanish nor Indian—claimed them. They differed from both as widely as either did from the other. It was true what the padré had said. True that they were Americans; that their father and mother had settled in the valley a long time ago; that no one knew whence they had come, except that they had crossed the great plains from the eastward; that they were hereticos, and that the padrés could never succeed in bringing them into the fold of the Church; that these would have expelled, or otherwise punished them, but for the interference of the military Comandante; and furthermore, that both were always regarded by the common people of the settlement with a feeling of superstitious dread. Latterly this feeling, concentrated on the mother of Carlos, had taken a new shape, and they looked upon her as a hechicera—a witch—and crossed themselves devoutly whenever she met them. This was not often, for it was rare that she made her appearance among the inhabitants of the valley. Her presence at the fiesta of San Juan was the act of Carlos, who had been desirous of giving a day’s amusement to the mother and sister he so much loved.

Their American origin had much to do with the isolation in which they live. Since a period long preceding that time, bitter jealousy existed between the Spano-Mexican and Anglo-American races. This feeling had been planted by national animosity, and nursed and fomented by priestcraft. Events that have since taken place had already cast their shadows over the Mexican frontier; and Florida and Louisiana were regarded as but steps in the ladder of American aggrandisement; but the understanding of these matters was of course confined to the more intelligent; but all were imbued with the bad passions of international hate.

The family of the cibolero suffered under the common prejudice, and on that account lived almost wholly apart from the inhabitants of the valley. What intercourse they had was mostly with the native Indian population—the poor Tagnos, who felt but little of this anti-American feeling.

If we enter the rancho of Carlos we shall see the fair-haired Rosita seated upon a petaté, and engaged in weaving rebosos. The piece of mechanism which serves her for a loom consists of only a few pieces of wood rudely carved. So simple is it that it is hardly just to call it a machine. Yet those long bluish threads stretched in parallel lines, and vibrating to the touch of her nimble fingers, will soon be woven into a beautiful scarf to cover the head of some coquettish poblana of the town. None in the valley can produce such rebosos as the cibolero’s sister. So much as he can beat all the youth in feats of horsemanship, so much does she excel in the useful art which is her source of subsistence.

There are but two rooms in the rancho, and that is one more than will be found in most of its fellows. But the delicate sentiment still exists in the Saxon mind. The family of the cibolero are not yet Indianised.