It was a bright, warm day in October when José set out for the Huichol country. Josefa had filled his sack with gordas and his bule[15] with water. Tobacco, matches, his machete and blanket were the rest of his equipment. He waved farewell to his wife and started up the hills to the west. Higher and higher he climbed, now scrambling up a slope of rock talus, now following a trickling stream up a ravine, now skirting a fertile hill with the hay still slightly greenish from the recent rains. The little river in the bottom of the great barranca grew smaller and smaller, until at last it was lost to sight entirely, behind the hills of the upper edge. The heat grew perceptibly less as he climbed and the pine trees appeared singly and then in groups. The first night he spent by the side of a blazing pine fire on the edge of the mountain forests, while he listened to the howl of the wolves or the snarl of a jaguar or mountain lion.
Early in the morning he was off again, still going westward through the pine groves until at last he began to see the fields and houses of the Huichol. The houses were much like those of his tribe except that none was of adobe. They were also arranged in villages, but in every village was one larger house which served as the temple, in place of the open-air altars to which he was accustomed. The people looked very much the same, but their dress was different. They wore scarfs, belts and little pouches woven in designs of bright colors, wide hats with feathers, and their legs were bare to the knees. They looked askance at the traveler in the conventional cotton trousers of the Mexican peon. One or two accosted him in the Huichol language. It was a queer tongue to him, with many sounds he had never heard before and was confident no civilized man could ever reproduce. He replied in Spanish, but was not understood until one of the middle-aged men who had worked in the nearby mining town, and there acquired a small Spanish vocabulary, happened along. From him José learned that Benito Torres lived on a little ranch a few miles beyond the village. Arriving there about sunset he kicked aside the snarling dogs which, as everywhere in Mexico, prowled about the house, and called aloud. A middle-aged man came out of the house.
“Cafhövan, armano!” Jose greeted him. The man, after a moment of silent surprise, smiled and countered:
“Cafhövan api! It is a long time since I have heard that greeting in Tepecano,” he continued in Spanish, “and the language has about failed me. Enter! Enter! Here is your home! Julia! Bring food and drink for my brother Waköri!” Waköri is the name given the Tepecanos by the Huicholes.
“I am called José Aguilar,” said the traveler, “the son of Francisco and grandson of Nestor.”
“Ah, yes! Francisco and I were boys together, and many pranks we played on Nestor. He himself was a young man then. How long ago that was! But when I was younger than you, I saw the way things were going. The Mexicans were encroaching on our lands, the cura came and built the church and we were made to give up our communal land and each man take a piece for himself. As if the Gods ever intended their land to be owned like a machete or a hat! As well divide up the air and the water in the river and make the new-born babe pay to breathe and drink! Ave Maria! And then they began to bring in strong drinks; they wanted us to put our legs in those long trousers you wear now, to give up our old language and speak Spanish and to foreswear the old religion. I saw the way it was going and said, ‘Not for me! Not for Benito Torres!’ And I took my blanket as you have done and came up here with the Huicholes where I have spent a long, happy life following the mandates of the Gods. You are wise to have done likewise. I welcome you!” And he threw his arms around the younger man in a welcoming embrace.
José was pleased and yet troubled.
“Yes, little uncle,” he replied at last, “it is quite true. There is little of the old left now in Azqueltán. Only old Nestor and a few of the other old men keep to the old faith. But I am of the new order. These are the clothes I have always worn; Spanish is my language, Catholicism my religion. I cannot change to the old order any more than you to the new. And yet the new is inevitable; I see it even here.”
Benito nodded a sad acquiescence. “Yes, it is a losing fight. Even here the old is passing. I have not postponed it for these people, but only for myself by coming here. In a century or so there will be no Huicholes, no Tepecanos, no Coras, only Mexican peones of Indian blood. But why then have you come here?”
José explained his mission, at which the sad face lighted up again.