Guatemala

by William Tufts Brigham

CHAPTER VIII.
ESQUIPULAS AND QUIRIGUA.

I have grouped in this chapter two most interesting monuments of the past,—a Christian temple whose mission seems to have been fulfilled, and a pagan graveyard where stand the monuments of unknown kings or heroes. They are not inaptly joined; for in this busy, matter-of-fact, commercial age, it is well that the less perishable records of our brothers who have preceded us in the unending march of life upon this globe should detain us, if but for a moment, with the lessons they may teach to thoughtful minds,—the temple raised lay pious labor to signify that there is more than the present to live for, the monuments of the dead to carry on the personalities so soon lost in earthly life.

We gazed from the precipice at the white building, large even on so vast a plain, and began the steep descent. The little village was almost dead in appearance. There were many houses and rooms to let, but no posada; and as our mozos had not arrived, we rode to the Santuario down the single street of the town. It was wide, paved with cobbles, and bordered on either side by the booths and lodging-sheds for the merchants and devotees who still crowd the town at the festival season. Two streams, one the headwaters of the Rio Lempa, flowed across the road beneath solid masonry bridges. Into two of the posts of one of these were inserted two ancient sculptures, said to have been brought from Peten, but more probably from the neighboring ruins of Copan, just beyond the mountains. One was the grotesque head of a griffin, the other a small human figure with a preposterous head-dress. The Santuario is an imposing structure, massive rather than elegant, and dazzling in its whiteness. Towers rise at the four corners, divided into four stages, of which the lower one is broken only by a small oval window on the side; the second is pierced by an arched window and decorated with pilasters; the third, still square, rises above the general roof with two windows on each side; the fourth, octagonal in shape, has a single window on the alternate sides. A large dome rises in the midst, figures of saints and a clock mark the façade, and the whole structure rises from an extensive platform surrounded by an iron fence with masonry posts, and approached by a broad and easy flight of steps.

SANTUARIO AT ESQUIPULAS.

On entering, the first thing noticed was the immense thickness of the walls, ten or twelve feet at least,—a reminder that this is an earthquake country. The floor was paved with large red tiles, needing repairs in places. Among the pictures was one of the Last Supper, and near it a decidedly local one of people lassoing Christ. We had hardly glanced about, when a curious figure presented himself, speaking tolerable English very rapidly, and, after the usual interchange of compliments, introduced himself as Dr. José Fabregos y Pares, a traveller; and then presented his companion, the handsome young cura, Padre Gabriel Dávila, who welcomed us to his church and showed us the curiosities of the place. First, of course, we wanted to see the famous black Christ, “Our Lord of Esquipulas.” This miraculous image, to whose shrine devout pilgrims have gathered even from distant Mexico and Panama,—pilgrims numbered in former years as many as fifty thousand at a single festival,—was made in Guatemala City in 1594 by Quirio Cataño, a Portuguese, at the order of Bishop Cristobal de Morales, on the petition of the pueblo of Esquipulas. The sculptor was paid “cien tostones,”—a testoon being of the value of four reals, or half a dollar; and to meet this expense the Indios planted cotton on the very land where the sanctuary now stands. For more than a century and a half the image stood in the village church, where the miracles wrought spread its fame very far. The first archbishop of Guatemala, Pedro Pardo de Figueroa, laid the foundation of the present temple, which he did not live to finish, but died Feb. 2, 1751, praying with his last breath that his bones might rest at the feet of this image of his Lord. In 1759 Señor D. Alonso de Arcos y Moreno, President of the Real Audiencia of Guatemala, completed the great work, at a cost, it is said, of three million dollars; and on January 6 of that year the image was translated with all the pomp of the Romish Church. Twelve days later, the remains of the pious archbishop followed. The founder established a brotherhood of worthy people who should take upon themselves the material support of the edifice; but Padre Miguel Muñoz, writing in 1827, says that this laudable custom had died out among the whites, only the Indios holding to the compact. Those of Totonicapan furnish a certain amount of wax and provide for some offices of the Church; those of Mexico visit the shrine in Holy Week with offerings of wax; while from Salvador are brought wax, incense, balsam, oil, and brooms.

Now, with all this we expected to see something remarkable, but saw only an ordinary altar-piece, with plain curtains before the miraculous image. It was not a holy-service time, consequently the curtains could not be raised; the padre, however, after sending Frank’s revolver out of the holy place, took us behind the altar and admitted us to a small glass room where the black image stands. It was much less than life size, very black,—painted, however, only by time,—inferior in conception and execution, and wearing long female hair. Ex-voto pictures and gold and silver images and tokens hung upon and around this figure, and in the same chamber were figures of Joseph and Mary, together with angels with cotton-wool wings. It was impossible for me to feel any of the awe with which past generations of Indios have regarded this black Christ. My imagination is not wholly dulled, and I have felt curious sensations before the horrible idols of the Pacific islanders, before the placid features of a gigantic Buddha, in the Hall of Gods at Canton, and before the Jove of the Vatican. I have been in the holy places of many nations, and have felt a sympathy with the worshippers; even the black cliffs of the supposed Sinai have led my thoughts captive. But here in Esquipulas there was nothing but the husk,—nothing solemn, nothing holy; the portrait of Figueroa was the most respectable thing in the church. It was, moreover, no strange thing to pass into the vestry and overhaul the boxes of gold and silver ex-votos; these we could purchase at so much an ounce. They were indeed, as our new friend Dr. José declared, “very curibus.” All parts of the human body, healthy or diseased, many animals, and other objects of human desire or solicitude, were to be found here. To our matter-of-fact Northerners it may be necessary to explain the theory and object of these works of native platerías. Medical men and surgeons are almost unknown in the remote regions of Central America, and a sick or injured man, while applying all known remedies, sends also to the nearest platero, or silversmith (common enough among the aborigines), and has a model of the affected part made; this token some friend, if the patient be unable to make the journey himself, carries to the mysterious image, whose power to heal he devoutly believes in. It is a faith, rather than a mind, cure. The barren woman in the northern climes, instead of being bowed down with her sad lot, obtains an easy consolation in a pug or lap-dog; but her Indian sister takes a truer view of the purpose of her life, and in her prayerful longing devotes in effigy the coveted offspring,—much as Hannah, the wife of Elkanah, devoted the unbegotten Samuel to the Lord. Like the Hebrew barren wife, the Indian goes up on a pilgrimage to the most sacred shrine, makes her offering, and breathes her prayer. The Eli of the Sanctuary bids her “go in peace.”

The accumulated offerings of gold and silver images are sold to pay the charges of the Templo,—not always, however; for report has it that the Government some years ago seized fifty thousand dollars’ worth of this treasure and appropriated it to its own use.

Dr. José invited us to share his room, which we gladly did. He had just returned from Honduras, and was on his way to an Indian city in Guatemala where was buried, to his certain information, an immense treasure of the ancient kings. I will not tell my readers the exact locality, though I fear Don José will find no treasures greater than the beautiful opals he brought from beyond the Merendon Mountains. As we left the Templo I bought oranges of a little girl, giving her the price she asked,—ten for a cuartillo (three cents); and I almost believed in the miracle-working image when the girl brought me three more oranges! I ought to have insisted on having twenty for a cuartillo. Very late in the afternoon the mozos arrived, having been lost in the Cerros, where we strangers had found a plain path without guides. There was not enough daylight left to give us a photograph of the image, but we got the white Santuario. Even at the present day the annual festival, extending from the sixth to the ninth of January, brings together many people,—but perhaps quite as much for trade as for worship.