The Rambler in Mexico/Letter V
LETTER V.
My last letter closed with the entry of our travel soiled and battered train into the city of Mexico. Such epithets may be well applied to us, for we were covered with white dust from head to foot; our faces were excoriated by the reflection of the sun's rays from the heated plains; and, contrasted with the splendour around us, it was impossible not to feel that there was something humiliating in our undisguisable shabbiness.
All things considered, we were not sorry to find ourselves speedily in possession of quarters in a species of lodging, gaming, eating, and club house, called the Gran Sociedad, at the corner of the two great streets, Espiritu Santo and del Refugio, and near the centre of the city. Here we hired badly furnished apartments, and eventually settled down for a month's residence.
A few days, and you may imagine us fairly inured to our new position.
Espindola having loyally performed his contract, and given up his charge, had clattered out of the gateway with his mules and bag of dollars; and, in high good humour with his late employers and himself, had set off to seek another engagement among the merchants of the city. He was of course followed by the valorous little Raphael. Our horses, and a fat saddle mule pertaining to our stud, were safely housed at a livery stable in the vicinity, yclept the "Washington;" where a tall, raw-boned Kentuckian, from the backwoods, presided, under the dignified and dulcet title of Don Floresco!
Garcia, a new equery and valet, knowing in the streets and resources of the capital, and in the most approved ways of emptying the purses of los signores estrangeros, had been hired to be our attendant.
Against honest Miguel we had no complaint to make, except that he was ill looking, and a borrachio, a title which may be applied without offence to many respectable gentlemen in the western hemisphere, as well as to a poor Mexican mestizzo. He had now exacted from us a precise document, bearing witness to his qualifications and character, and mounting his active pad, had turned his face towards the coast.
A fresh skin, the brush, and an English tailor, had done something towards making us presentable—in our own opinion. Letters of credence and introduction had been delivered; the proper visits made; and we were now at liberty, each to follow his own devices.
De Pourtales being somewhat indisposed, took it into his head to consult Dr. C——, to take exceeding care of his health, and to remain a great deal within doors, philosophizing and discussing unknown fruits—the sapote prieto, the sapote chico, the sapote borrachio, and the sapote blanco—the lucious avocate and mamei, the vaunted chirimoya, and the sweet grandita. He took siestas both before and after dinner, and he received visits. M'Euen also got a most unaccountable fit of the fine gentleman; reclined a great deal, and read considerably; and, for some days, except on extraordinary occasions, a lounge on the Alameda, or under the Portales de las Flores, was very hard to put in motion.
As for your humble servant, he was never in better health and spirits in his life; and knowing that the time was circumscribed, thought to make the best use of the opportunity. Being in a great degree left to chalk out and follow my own devices, I was abroad early and late. Thanks to active habits, the disregard of heat and dust, the occasional assistance of my steed Pinto, and a philosophic contempt of the chances of being lassoed and robbed—before half the period of our halt was at an end, I had contrived to see a great deal both within and without the city, and to learn something in spite of our disadvantages—and such there were. So far I am satisfied; at the same time that I have continually to keep in mind the latter, and the brevity of our visit, when I recollect how many and how interesting are the subjects and objects to which I have paid little or no attention.
But my preface is finished; and now, that I have actually glanced at Mexico, what kind of dish must I cook and serve up to you? Must I give you the literal and homely hodgepodge of my own hasty diary; daily notices of personal occurrences, personal observations, and personal reflections; with cuttings from the conversation and information of those with whom we came in contact? or shall I dress you a dish of historical and statistical information, served up with a garnish of apt quotations from Bullock and Poinsett, or still better, from Humboldt—the first, the best, and the only really philosophic modern traveller who ever visited New Spain, whose researches, written thirty years ago, still form the text book of every succeeding visiter!
Will you have a trifle, half indigestible solid, and half evanescent froth, prepared from the shadowy history and traditions of the aboriginal people; shrouded in the mist of hieroglyphic, emblematical, and enigmatical devices, rendered yet more dim by the misconception, the misinterpretation, and the bigotry of the conquerors; and still more by the stupidity of modern conjurers and expounders of enigmas: or a sober, well-seasoned regale from the tale of the conquest, marvellous, even when those large deductions which must be demanded, both by unimaginative common sense and evident truth, have been made? The choice is an embarrassing one; and allowing you to take full time for decision, I invite you to partake in the mean time of the pot pourri, which I forthwith serve up to you.
The general position and remarkable features of the valley and capital of New Spain, have been too often described not to have become familiar to you.
You have seen, how, in our ascent from the coast, after we had passed through the teeming and fertile uplands of the torrid region at the base of the mountains, we had mounted from one broad and varied step of this gigantic mountain mass to another, till we had gained the interior plateau, where, at the height of 7470 feet, girdled by the severed chain of the southern cordillera, the valley of Mexico, with its lakes, marshes, towns, villages, and noble city, opened upon our view.
The general figure of the valley is a broken oval of about sixty miles in length, by thirty-five in breadth. At the present day, even when divested of much that must have added to its beauty in the eyes of the great captain, and his eager followers, when, descending from the mountains in the direction of Vera Cruz, after overcoming so many difficulties, the view of the ancient city and its valley at length burst upon them like a beautiful dream—I never saw, and I think I never shall see on earth, a scene comparable to it. I often made this reflection, whenever my excursions over the neighbouring mountains led me to a point which commanded a general view.
I could not look upon it as did the Spanish invaders, as the term of indescribable fatigues, and of dangers, known and unknown; the rich mine which should repay them for their nights of alarm and their days of toil, and compensate for their seemingly utter abandonment of home; the prize that should satisfy the cravings of the most inordinate, and fill their laps with that dear gold for which they had ventured all! I could not enter into the ecstasy of the moment, when, after pursuing their blind way to this paradise from the plains of Tlascala and Cholula, into the recesses of pine-clad and barren rocks, higher and higher towards the cold sky, till untrodden snow-covered peaks arose on either hand, and they marched within sight and hearing of the great volcano which menaced their path, they gained, in fine, the western slope, and saw the green and cultivated fields and gardens spreading like a carpet at their feet, round the bright and inland sea which then encircled the "Venice of the Aztecs!" With what ravishment must they have marked the thousand specks which moved upon the waters round that broad city spread below, with its white roofs, streets, temples, and edifices? what must have been their amazement at descrying the long and solid causeways dividing' the waters; the innumerable towns and villages scattered over the surface of the fertile plain; and the huge circle of mountains which appeared to form like a bulwark on every side? No! I could not realize all they felt—but, amid the desolation of most of the ancient fields and gardens; the aridity and utter barrenness of much of the broad plain which now girdles the city in every direction; the diminished extent of the lake; the solitude reigning on its waters; the destruction of the forests on the mountain slopes; I still felt that the round world can hardly match the beauty and interest of that landscape. Even if man had destroyed, without in some degree repairing the wrongs he had committed to that lovely scene, by the fruits of his industry and genius, there is that about the whole scenery which is above him, and beyond being affected by him. But let us do the stern old conquerors justice. Their minds appear to have been imbued with the pervading spirit of the land which they conquered. All around them was strange, and wonderful, and colossal—and their conceptions and their labours took the same stamp. Look at their works: the moles, aqueducts, churches, roads—and the luxurious City of Palaces which has risen from the clay-built ruins of Tenochtitlan, at a height above the ocean, at which, in the Old World, the monk of St. Bernard alone drags through a shivering and joyless existence!
If the general features of the valley of Mexico are thus striking, those presented by the capital are not less so. In both its general plan and position, and the solidity and grandeur of its details, it has impressed me with a greater idea of splendour than any city I have seen in either hemisphere.
It covers with its suburbs an area of probably upward of three miles square, occupying the central portion of that extended oval which was covered by Tenochtitlan at the time of the conquest.
The Plaza Major, or principal square of the new city, corresponds with that of the old. The cathedral is based on the ruins of the great temple or Teocallis; the palace of Cortez, the Casa del Estado, rises on the very spot on which Montezuma held his court; and many of the principal streets at the present day are conducted precisely over the same ground as the more noted of the ancient thoroughfares.
You see the broad and well-paved way sweep through the long vista of palaces and public and private edifices, from one end of the city to the other; and the contrast between the bright blue sky above, and the screen of mountains which form the background far in the distance, enveloped in the clear aerial tints of this transparent atmosphere, combined with the variety of colouring and graceful proportions of the architecture, is more magnificent and beautiful than I can describe.
At the time of our visit, the city may be said to have exhibited an aspect of extraordinary splendour, from the circumstance, that in consequence of the ravages of the cholera the preceding year, the inhabitants throughout its limits had been compelled by public ordinance to paint and clean their houses.
The general style of building is regular and symmetrical in its outlines. The better houses are nearly of the same height; strongly built of porphyry or porus amygdaloid; rising to the third story, with flat roofs, and having lofty apartments disposed round an interior quadrangle. At the same time, in the ornaments and details of the facades, the style of the elaborate carving, the form of the windows and balconies, and the colouring, the eye recognises an endless variety at every turn. Whether the style of embellishment is always in good taste or not, it is often very curious and always striking. Most of the facades are painted in distemper, white, orange, crimson, blue, and green or red; and many are overlaid with glazed and stained porcelain tiles of extremely beautiful design.
Such is the number of the churches, convents, and public buildings in the central part of the city, that you can hardly move without commanding a view of one or more edifices of this character, rising above the general line, and rearing a pile of stately architecture, with painted dome and towers in brilliant relief against the sky.
For the accommodation of a population estimated at one hundred and sixty thousand, you enumerate fity-six churches within the bounds of the city, in addition to the cathedral. The convents and monasteries are thirty-eight in number. Some of these are of very great extent. That of the San Francisco contains five churches within its walls.
Many of the ecclesiastical edifices are of very great size, and all more or less highly wrought and embellished interiorly, though the number of those which are distinguished for really good design and good taste is comparatively small. Santa Teresa, the Antigua, the Professa, San Augustin, the Incarnation, and one or two others, might be named as having some claim to be exempt from the general stricture of bad taste, false and gaudy ornament, tinsel and glitter, which applies to the majority, and which in many becomes absolutely offensive. Statuary, painting, and carving, are lavished upon all, but rarely of a character over mediocrity. In actual riches, display of gold, silver, and embroidery, Mexico far surpasses every city in Europe; and the value of precious metals which you have sometimes before you, in the shape of candelabras, vases, balustrades, shrines, and consecrated vessels, is incalculable.
The signs of the domination of the papal religion are to be seen everywhere in the streets, where pictures, shrines, and processions abound. Few are the palaces, on one part or another of the facades of which you do not descry a patron saint, "sanctified in stone;" and most of the houses which form the angle of the intersecting streets, are surmounted by little arabesque shrines rising above the level of the azotea or terraced roof.
I have hastily penned these brief outlines of the interior aspect of the city, intending, as I may feel tempted, to relate the events of the Holy Week which we are approaching, and fill you up the outlines here or there, and to people it, which you see I have omitted to do. Meanwhile, I would lead you without the walls, if a breastwork of hardened mud, stretching across the entrance of the causeways, deserves the name.
Round that nucleus of splendid streets and buildings which I have alluded to, in traversing the outskirts of the city, you find a large space occupied by buildings of a very inferior design, interspersed, however, by large and spacious churches. Beyond these, at least on the east and north sides, an exterior circle of scattered cabins is observable, constructed of the adaubi, or unburnt brick, prepared from the clay of the surface, and inhabited by the refuse of the populace. They are posted on the very limits of that plot of ground which, by an elevation of two or three feet over the surface of the lake, had been dignified by the erection of this great city. The whole of this space was probably thickly covered by the ancient capital.
Over these marshes in the times of Montezuma, covered as they then were by water, three causeways led to the firm land; namely, that of Tacuba to the west, Tepeaca on the northwest, and Cuoyacan towards the south. It was upon the latter that Cortez made his first entry into the capital. At that time the majority of the streets were intersected by canals; and the city being surrounded by water on every side, the principal communication with the surrounding districts, and between the different quarters, was carried on by light canoes. These canals are now almost all filled up; and except that of Chalco, there is no considerable canal in the city. On the other hand, the causeways are now above double their original number. The three ancient calzadas are still maintained; the first being still that of Tacuba, the second of Guadaloupe, and the third of San Augustin. There are then in addition, the great calzada running to the southeast over the flats, to the southern extremity of Lake Tezeuco, and thence to the new Vera Cruz road; that to Chapultepec, southwest: and lastly, one in the direction of the northwest, towards Guautitlan. Several of these causeways are planted with avenues of poplars and other trees, and along two of them, those of Chapultepec and Tacuba, the supply of fresh water is brought from the mountains to the capital by the aqueducts of Chapultepec and Santa Fe.[1]
Let us turn together for our first excursion to the southward, upon the great calzada, leading to Chalco and San Augustin, by a continuation of which, the traveller attains the eastern declivity of the Sierra Madre, and the Pacific at Acapulco. It was in this direction that two of our number made our first sortie, a few days after our arrival, early on a glorious morning, in whose brilliant sunshine the facades of the palaces shone like silver and enamel.
A light caleche with a couple of well-bitted horses soon bore us over the pavement of the long street: and passing the Garita, we entered upon the raised causeway, with the sterile tracts of the marshy flat surrounding the city on either hand—a vast tract of country with groups of volcanic hills in the middle ground—and in the distance a splendid semicircular range of mountains, comprising the highest summits of the great porphyritic chain. The Monte Ajusco, towards whose base we were bending our course, was comparatively at no great distance, while the two great volcanoes of Puebla towered, with their snowy caps, from a distance of sixty miles to the south. Beyond the flats in your immediate vicinity—over which the various causeways with their avenues of elm and poplar, and the aqueducts, are seen stretching for miles towards the base of the hills—the eye catches a glimpse of a lovely region of verdure and cultivation, studded with innumerable orchards, villas, and tasteful country houses; and many a village, indicated by the dome and tower of its church. In that direction the country appears like one vast garden, and the contrast between its verdure and gray tints, and the varied hue of both the intermediate plains and the slopes of the mountains beyond, is extremely beautiful.
A few miles from the mud barrier of the city, you have the ancient road to the lake of Chalco, stretching towards the village of Mejicalzingo, and the foot of the Cerro di I'Estrella, to the left. The latter strangely moulded ridge, heaving up from the surrounding plain, is noted as the spot from which Cortez enjoyed his first near view of Tenochtitlan. Such are the extreme dryness and transparency of the atmosphere on the table land of Mexico, that the traveller soon discovers that he is quite unable to form a just idea of the relative position and distance of the objects scattered over this great plateau. Indeed this deception surpasses anything which I have observed in any other country, and is heightened by the brilliancy of the colouring observable in the general tints of the landscape. Thus, in looking towards the hill I have just named, it appears to be but little in advance of a huge mass more to the eastward, whose steep purple sides, truncated summit, and yawning crater bespeak its volcanic origin. Yet as you proceed on your road, you see them remove from each other, leagues apart. On farther advance you see first one distinct cone disentangle itself from the bulk of the more remote, then another, and in the end discover a range of distinct cones increasing in height, and admit the complete fallacy of your first impressions.
For many miles after he has gained what might be called terra firma, the traveller is appalled by the sterility of the surrounding plain; at the same time that the signs of a past system of careful drainage, and the ruins of huts and haciendas, show you that this curse of barrenness has not been always the dowry of the soil. In truth, owing to causes which it is difficult to explain, some of the finest estates in the immediate vicinity of the capital have become absolutely desert, from the rapid spread of saline offlorescence formed upon the surface, which is more or less a main feature of all these great elevated plains.
About six miles from the city, we traversed the dry bed of the Chorubusco, passing along a ridge raised several feet above the general surface of the country, and formed by the debris brought down by the river from the mountains in the rainy season.
We now approached the noble estate and hacienda of San Antonio, covering a large tract of fertile country in advance, and admirably cultivated and governed by its noble proprietor, to whose family we had the advantage of being known; and I shall take occasion at once to make use of the knowledge gained by subsequent visits here, to allude to a few points of interest connected with agriculture in this part of Mexico.
The Hacienda San Antonio is situated at the distance of eight miles from the city, in the centre of a body of land of great fertility, extending from the line of the road far into the plain to the east and south, while exactly opposite a small picturesque church, surrounded by trees, marks the limit of a vast field of hard black lava of revolting sterility, deforming the country in the vicinity of San Augustin, and along the base of the neighbouring mountain of the Ajusco. It is known by the name of the Pedrigal.
The road and a rivulet in front of the hacienda are shaded by fine silver poplars, and other well-known trees; in addition to the schinus or Peruvian pepper tree, of which the bright green foliage, and pendant clusters of red berries, form such a graceful ornament of the upper regions of the country.
A deep archway on the left-hand side of the road introduces you to the courtyard. In common with all the haciendas we had seen on the table land, the mass of buildings here are imposing from their great size and solidity of structure. Besides the dwelling house of the proprietors, built like the town houses in a quadrangle round an interior open court, they comprise a church, dwellings for the dependants, stables, and other offices on a large scale, and a granary, which, for massive architecture and dimensions, might serve for a state prison. This granary is calculated to hold twelve thousand cargas of maize, each carga weighing one hundred and eighty English pounds.
The principal products of the estate are maize and pulque. Of the former the annual produce alone is estimated at eight thousand cargas. The whole domain is under excellent cultivation and management, and both from the excellent system of irrigation and drainage pursued, and its vicinity to the capital, is accounted one of the most lucrative in the whole valley.
The mode of culture of the maguey,[2] from which, as I have before mentioned, the pulque is derived, may demand a little further elucidation.
In appearance the great agave is a stately aloe of a dark green hue with leaves of great size and thickness. I have not unfrequently seen it rise higher than my head when seated on horseback.
Its culture is a very productive one. The prime cost and the whole expense of labour demanded by the plant from first to last, may be estimated at three dollars and a half, and the ultimate produce at ten. In the sale of land, the well grown maguey plants are computed at the average value of five dollars. They are set in regular rows, about three yards apart, and come to perfection in from eight to ten years; when, if left to themselves, they would flower.
This is the interesting moment for the cultivator. He watches the plant, till by well-known signs he sees that nature has completed her time, and that the maguey is upon the point of throwing up the high flowering stem. He then cuts deeply and systematically into the very heart of the plant, depriving it of the tight scroll of leaves which envelopes the embryo flower stalk, and scoops out a regular hollow of nearly a foot in diameter in the centre.
The sap vessels of the mutilated plant still perform their allotted duty, and pour into this artificial bowl such an abundant supply of juice, that it requires emptying two or three times a day for eight or ten successive weeks. It is computed that a single maguey will yield six hundred pounds of sap in the course of the season. This is the pulque. It is commodiously drawn from the reservoir by means of suction into a long gourd, and thence transferred to goatskin sacks, where it ferments slightly, and is then drinkable and pleasant enough, if not too old. When long bottled in these primeval receptacles, it takes a very peculiar schmaack, as a Dutchman would say, disagreeable to many foreigners, but I cannot say we found it sufficiently so to prevent our partaking of it with great satisfaction as long as we were in the country.
A brandy is distilled from the maguey, which is perniciously intoxicating when taken in too freely. The ordinary pulque is slightly so, and the Indians frequently render it highly deleterious by steeping the berries of the schinus in it.
It is hardly necessary to say that no maguey plant which has been mutilated lives; its uses are, however, still various and important. The dried fibres are of universal substitution for hemp, in the manufacture of cordage and packing-cloths.
There are estates in the valley of Mexico which return as much as thirty-six thousand dollars annually from the culture of the maguey alone.
This most useful plant comes to perfection on the various plateaux of the table land, from the height of five thousand feet to that of nearly nine thousand feet, but beyond a certain elevation it ceases to be so productive.
Besides the two principal products, the estates about Mexico furnish a large quantity of European grain, Mexican and European wheat, and abundance of beans, peas, Chili pepper, and vegetables, in addition to most of our European fruits.
Surely there is not on the face of the earth a country more highly favoured by nature than New Spain. You can hardly name a mineral product which it does not hide within its bosom, or a vegetable one, of whatever zone, which it might not, under proper management, be made to bring to perfection in one part or another of its varied surface. Yet how little has man hitherto done to improve these advantages!
But to return for an instant to the hacienda. It may be remarked, that in common with all its neighbours of the same class, there are signs of interior decay observable, consequent upon the altered circumstances of the country: and the general magnificence of the plan and the dimensions of the apartments, contrast disagreeably with the scanty character of the furniture. These country seats were once palaces, but they are no longer so; still there was a feudal air about the great hall of San Antonio, which for size and noble proportions might almost rival the ritter-saal of a German castle. The church had been completely despoiled of its ornaments, and now seemed to be utterly deserted.
From the hacienda of San Antonio, the route continues to run, in nearly a straight line, to Tlalpam or San Augustin de las Cuevas, a town with a large church and plaza, most delightfully situated among gardens and groves, at the very foot of the hills in advance of the Ajusco. It is a favourite resort of the citizens of all classes from the capital, many of the wealthier of whom have country seats here, to which they repair to enjoy fine air and verdure, in exchange for the heat and glare of the city.
Among these, the country seat and gardens of the exiled General Moran are particularly beautiful. The whole country in the neighbourhood is under high cultivation. At Whitsuntide a great fair is held at the town, when thousands assemble hither from Mexico and the adjoining district. The lengths to which gambling is carried on at the monte tables of St. Augustin, at that season of festivity, are almost incredible. Many of the once wealthy families of this country have been beggared by giving themselves up to a taste for this witless game of headlong chance.
No language of mine can give you a just idea of the scene from the neighbouring heights. They command a view of vast extent over the southern portion of the valley, with the broad plain, the distant lakes Xochimilco and Chalco, various groups of volcanic hills in the middle ground, and the wall of mountains surmounted by the snowy summits of Iztaccihuatl and Popocatepetl on the horizon.
The Ajusco, a compact mass of porphyritic rock, soaring to the height of thirteen thousand feet above the Pacific, rises directly in the rear. It is the highest point of the eastern wall of the cordillera which girdles the valley.
In the view from this point, which I had more than once the opportunity of examining in detail, nothing struck me more than the great number of truncated cones and volcanic summits within sight.
Though there exists throughout this portion of the continent positive proofs of the agency of internal fire, in upheaving the whole of the table land of the Mexican cordillera to its present extraordinary level, an examination of the continent would seem to indicate that the forces set in action by igneous agency, have been more active in one particular direction than another; that is, along a nearly right line of no great breadth, enclosed between 18° and 20° of north latitude. Commencing with the volcano of San Martin de Tuxtla, on the shore of the gulf, thirty-six leagues south of Vera Cruz, and moving across the surface of the country, a little to the northwest you find in succession—the gigantic cone of Orizaba, and its neighbour the Coffre de Perote, the volcano of Tlascala, the great volcano of Puebla or Popocatepetl, the valley of Mexico with its innumerable cones, the Ajusco, the Nevada of Toluca, and the active volcanoes of Jorullo and Colima; while report would incline you to pursue the same general direction over the Pacific ocean, for upward of three hundred miles, to the islands of Revillagigedo, which are said to be attributable to the same cause. Of the central group, Popocatepetl, the Ajusco, and the volcano of Toluca, are exactly upon the same line. I do not name Iztaccihuatl, "the Indian with snowy breasts;" because, though supposed to be, and generally called a volcano, I have heard the fact of its possessing a crater repeatedly denied on such respectable authority, that I almost doubt whether it has been justly named such.
Of these volcanoes, that of Tuxtla was in eruption about the commencement of the century. Orizaba, or Citlat tepetl—"the star mountain" was in violent eruption, according to Humboldt, between 1545—1566. Of the eruptions of the Coftre de Perote, and of the volcano of Tlascala, no tradition exists to my knowledge. Popocatepetl, "the mountain casting out smoke," has shown signs of slight combustion at times during the present century, and was in active eruption at the time of the Spanish invasion, when Diego Ordaz, a Spanish officer, attempted to ascend it. The Nevada of Toluca has been long extinct. The crater, if report says true, contains a lake abounding in fish.
The eruptions of the Ajusco, and the long chain of volcanic heights to the southward, are without record: though tradition says that the Chicli, signifying, in the Indian language, "the hill that casts up sparks," an inferior cone at its base, from which the huge stream of the Pedrigal probably proceeded, was in partial eruption at the emigration of the Aztecs into Anahuac, in the beginning of the fourteenth century.
The two last upon my list, those of Colima and Jorullo, are still active, and were, in fact, the only active volcanoes in Mexico at the time of our visit. Though, therefore, there exists but little outward sign of the present activity of the internal fires which are still surely smouldering beneath the surface of the earth in this part of the world, and occasionally shake the mountain-piled continent from its foundation; the signs of their past power are such as to strike the observer with great wonder and awe.
To me the whole of the hollow valley of Mexico, with its ramparts of porphyric rocks, gave the idea of a vast crater, which had been, in ages of which no human tradition remains, the grand and principal vent through which the pent-up element, after, by repeated efforts, heaving up the continent step by step from its primeval level, finally escaped through the crust of the earth.
Would you accuse me of yielding too freely to the play of imagination, when I thought that I could read in the sublime features of the vast scene before me, the unrecorded history of past centuries; and faintly picture to myself the convulsions of which the valley around me must assuredly have been the theatre? At the time when the earthquake was bursting those innumerable fissures and barrancas which are observable in the surface of the lower districts; raising one sheet of level country after another to its ordained elevation; and sending up one long, towering range of porphyritic mountains after another from the abyss to the sky: how little can the fancy paint the scenes of awful desolation which must have existed here—the great combustion which may have given birth to the valley, with its basins of saline waters—and the successive formation and appearance of the numberless cones before me. The world has grown old, but the records of that age are fresh around us. What must have been the signs in the earth and sky, as the ungovernable and subtle element destroyed the unseen obstacles to its escape into the upper air, and the surface began to yield to the tremendous force exerted by the internal fires underneath. Here rose the huge pyramid, based upon the wall of the surrounding mountains; growing, day by day and year by year, by the accumulation of its own refuse, amid the showers of its own ashes, the flow of its lavas, and amid the sound of its own fearful thunders, till it soared to where its summit now glistens, in the cold region of ice and snow. There an abrupt cone, bursting through the level plain, or from the bosom of the waters; disgorging its load of lava and cinder: and then another, and yet a third—a cluster of smoking mountains! Here a shapeless mass of molten rock and lava, bubbling above the surface, then cooling, and as it cooled, so remaining for ages, a black and steril monument, amid the landscape, of the forgotten reign of fire: and there again, a sudden throe at the base of some labouring mountain, opening a yawning abyss, from which, amid fire and smoke, the seething lava would ran down like oil upon the plain, or to the far distant sea.
This is no overwrought fancy; there can be no doubt but these things were, though perhaps no eye, but His who "looketh on the earth, and it trembleth," and "toucheth the hills, and they smoke," bore witness to them!
The road which ascends the steep pile of hills and mountains behind San Augustin, is that of the Cruz del Marques, one of the six great routes which traverse the Cordillera, and form the connection between the city, and the vast extent of country on every side, of which it is the metropolis. The others are, the two routes to Puebla, and Vera Cruz—the more ancient of which passes over the elevated ridge, between the two great volcanoes; and the other, which is the new and ordinary line, to the north of Iztaccihuatl. Fourthly, the route of the interior, keeping the general level of the table land, to Queretaro, Guanaxuato, and Durango. Fifthly, that of Real del Monte, by which we approached; and, sixthly, that of Toluca to the west.
In recollecting the localities worthy of attention, in the more immediate vicinity of Mexico, which we repeatedly visited, I feel quite at a loss which to bring into the greater prominence.
I cannot forget the great interest which hangs over the vicinity of Tacuba, and the road leading to it: the scene of the disastrous flight of Cortez, with his handful of troops and allies, on the night of the first of July, 1520, long known and deplored as La Noche Triste.
It was not unusual among the European residents in Mexico, to ride at an early hour out to the village of San Cosmo, to an olive garden attached to a meson, situated two miles from the west gate, and probably on the very verge of what was once the lake, and the termination of the ancient causeway, on which the roused vengeance of the Mexican cost the invader half his comrades. Within the bounds of the city, and close to the foreign cemetery, you are shown the dike over which Alvarado made his celebrated leap in his extremity. It is now a ditch of about three yards across, and is still called the Salto de Alvarado.
The views along this route towards Chapultepec on the left, and Guadaloupe on the right, are exquisitely beautiful.
Another hamlet, Apopotla, which you pass half a mile before you reach Tacuba, contains, within the enclosure of its churchyard, one of those noble cypresses of the country, which you still find scattered here and there, of a size which warrants their being considered monuments of an age anterior to the earliest traditions of the continent. That at Apopotla is a mighty wreck, with a bole fifty feet in diameter at the height of a man, and of much greater girth above.
The size to which this noble species, the cupressus disticha, attains in some parts of New Spain, is almost incredible. There is one at Atlixco, in the intendency of Puebla, measuring seventy-six feet in circumference; and the largest known, is to be seen at Mitla, in Oaxaca; which, still in its prime, is no less than ninety-two feet round the trunk. The largest in the vicinity of Mexico, are those in the ancient garden, at the foot of Chapultepec, of which the most remarkable may be sixty feet in circumference.
Tacuba lies near the foot of the hills, and is at the present day chiefly noted for the large and noble church which was erected there by Cortez. A little in the rear, the ruins of an ancient Mexican pyramid are discernible, constructed of regular courses of unburnt bricks, six inches in thickness; and hard by, you trace the lines of a Spanish encampment. I do not hazard the opinion, but it might appear by the coincidence, that this was the very position chosen by Cortez for his intrenchment, after the retreat just mentioned, and before he commenced his painful route towards Otumba.
Immediately behind Tacuba and San Joachim, you reach a range of high grounds, which, like the lower portions of the mountains surrounding the valley, are perfectly denuded of the wood which once covered them, and even of soil. They exhibit no vegetation, but scattered bushes of cactus and schinus, except in the vicinity of the great Hacienda Morales, and other farms scattered at intervals on the rising ground. From the extremity of the Alameda, you may easily fall into the causeway to Tacuba, by turning to the left; or yet better, to Chapultepec, by following the Paseo Nuevo, an open road raised a few feet above the level of the surrounding meadows, and used as a public evening drive, in rotation with the Paseo de las Vigas, at the southeastern extremity of the city. But I soon got tired of the stately recreation of the Promenade; and after a few experiments at playing "l'aimable" among its stiff walks and stiffer statues, I constantly turned my horse's head in one or the other direction.
No traveller, ancient or modern, has failed to notice the beauty and singularity of position of Chapultepec—the hill of the grasshopper—at three miles distance from the city. It is an insulated rock of porphyry, springing up upon what was the margin of the lake, and now surrounded on all sides by fields and meadows overspread by luxuriant vegetation. That it was a favourite place of resort of the Aztec monarchs, there is no doubt; and its foot is still clothed with an ancient garden in which they sought repose and solace from the heats of their shadeless city. And though, at the present day, neglect and ruin are evident on every hand; and their pleasant palaces are all destroyed, their fish ponds and baths broken down, and scarcely discernible—though their aviaries, and thickets of sweet-smelling flowers and medicinal herbs, have disappeared, and their shady groves are despoiled of many a noble tree; yet there is still a majesty in these shades, all tangled and neglected, and overgrown as they are, which is exciting to the fancy, and dear to the imagination; and no one will enter these thickets, shaded by the graceful pepper tree, and linger at the foot of those giant cypresses, without recollecting the strange and sad fate of him who was here accustomed to pass his hours of retirement.
Of all the royal gardens in the immediate vicinity, which were maintained by Montezuma, this at Chapultepec is the only one which retains its original form and destination. It girdles the rock, which may be about a mile in circuit, and is truly a delicious locality for one who, like myself, is fond of shade and quiet. The rock above is now crowned by a large and palacious building of noble design, erected by the Viceroy Galvez; half country seat, half castle; and made to suit either the purposes of war or peace, as might happen. It is now rapidly falling to decay. The view from its platform is undoubtedly one of the most delicious and complete among the numberless beautiful points of view in the basin of Mexico, partly from the isolated position of the hill, and the near vicinity of the numberless domes and towers of the city, with the aqueducts and causeways, and the blue lake beyond—and partly from the extreme fertility and loveliness of the region stretching from hence along the base of the mountains towards the Pedrigal. In this direction, the town of Tacubaya, with its churches, villas, and the former archiepiscopal palace, is the most conspicuous object. The great church there is a large and splendid edifice; and the palace, even in the state of utter decay and neglect which has overtaken its courts, galleries, and lovely gardens, is well worth visiting. The gardens present a sad but beautiful scene, with their tangled labyrinths of myrtle, jessamine, and sweet pease, and their stained and voiceless fountains; and the view from them is such as none can picture to themselves who have not gazed upon it.
I had a partiality for my early rides in the direction which I have just been describing, both from the extreme beauty of the views, and because they were the most accessible from the centre of the city where we had our quarters. But as I desire to give you some idea of the country on every side, I may mention that on several occasions I did not fail to return upon my steps through the tedious length of suburb to the north, and regaining the calzada in that direction, proceed to visit the shrine and rock of the patron saint of Mexico, Nuestra Señora de Guadaloupe.
There are three churches here; that on the rock; the splendid and spacious Collegiate Church, at the foot of the mountain, one of the most costly in New Spain, teeming with massive silver ornaments—and the Capella del Pozo, a richly decorated chapel covered by a dome, built over a mineral spring.
The more ancient church is erected upon the barren rock of Tepeyayac, which forms the most southerly spur of a range of high mountains, which rise, as it were, in the very midst of the valley of Mexico, and may be called insulated, since they are only united to the sierra on the west, by an inconsiderable ridge lying between Guautitlan and Tanepantla.
I here picked up acquaintance with a dapper little priest, one of the canons of the great church, celebrated among the Europeans for keeping the best pulque in the whole country, a bottle of which he never failed to produce on receiving the compliment of a visit. Under shadow of his favour, I had several opportunities of seeing the shrine and its riches at my leisure. Neustra Señora of Guadaloupe, whose worship on this rock has succeeded to that of the goddess Tonantzin—the Mexican Ceres—is the patron saint of the city of Mexico. The clumsy imposture to which she owes her elevation to this dignity is not worth recounting. There is only one rival to her dominion in the affections of the common people in the valley of Mexico, and that is Nuestra Señora de los Remedios, whose shrine is to be seen in a village near the base of the mountains to the west of the city. The leperos and poblanitas of the city pin their faith, in case of any impending danger, upon her wonder-working image; and in cases of great emergency—as during the prevalence of the cholera, last year—she is brought with great pomp into the metropolis. On one occasion it was settled that she should pass the night in town, as the weather was unfriendly, and a suitable lodging was provided: but when morning dawned she had vanished. The fact was, that nothing could keep her away from her own flock at los Remedios, where accordingly she was found at dawn in her usual place; covered with mud, however, with having walked a number of leagues in a dark and rainy night. And this miracle is believed! Alas! poor human nature!
Wherever I go, I carry about with me an Englishman's weakness, and am particularly observant of climate and weather. This may be pardonable in a locality so peculiar as that of Mexico, where you are raised far above the ordinary region of mists and vapours, into that of frost and snow, and yet, from local and extraordinary causes, enjoy a climate of peculiar beauty and salubrity.[3]
The thermometer in the city of Mexico very seldom falls to the freezing point, and as rarely rises to a degree of oppressive heat; the usual range throughout the year being from 50 to 80° of Fahrenheit.
During our month's residence, the weather was extremely unsettled; and twice during a few rainy days, when the temperature was remarkably chill, we saw the snow-line descend several thousand feet upon the great volcanoes.
For the remainder of the short period alluded to, the weather was warm, and occasionally hot; with partial thunder showers, during the passage of which the streets of the city were deluged by water to that degree that the crossings would have been impracticable for fine gentlemen and ladies with shoes and stockings, were it not for the cargadores and Indians, upon whose backs we were taught to mount without scruple, in order to save ourselves a wetting.
As to the rest, we could not be insensible to the peculiar rarity and dryness in the atmosphere, for which the table land is remarkable. The sensation of the heat on the skin is far greater than the degree of warmth indicated by the thermometer would appear to warrant, owing to the astonishing degree of reflection of the sun's rays, which is produced by the vast and naked spread of the plains, the masses of mountains by which they are surmounted, and the diminished pressure which the rarified air exerts upon the moisture given forth by the body. The most violent exercise never produces the slightest sign of perspiration; at the same time that you can ascend no elevation, not even the steps of houses, without being sensible of an unusual shortness of breath.
But while I have dipped my pen in my inkstand to allude to natural phenomena, I must not forget to mention the earthquakes, from which the city is rarely exempt at this season of the year.
I omitted to mention at the close of the preceding letter, that when we arrived at our last halting place before entering the city, we heard that the first earthquake of the season had been felt at ten the preceding night; and that more than usual alarm had been excited, on account of the duration, force, and the character of the shock. This I am convinced I felt at San Mateo, where we slept on the night in question: though it was shrouded in the dreaming fancy of finding myself suddenly trotting among broken rocks on the back of our fat mule.
When we arrived at the city we heard that another had occurred at six o'clock that very morning; though we, who, at that very time, were getting to horse in the courtyard of the meson at three leagues' distance, had been totally unconscious of it. These were the first; and glancing over my diary I see notices of daily shocks occurring, at different intervals, for about ten days after our arrival.
According to many who had the means of making the observations, for several entire days the earth was found to exhibit a tremulous motion, with very short intervals of complete repose.
The strongest shock of which I was myself aware, was felt about eleven a. m. on the 22d, when I was roused from the perusal of a newspaper in the apartments of the American charge d'affaires, by a sensation of confusion and giddiness; and, on raising my eyes, saw the curtains and candelabras in motion. On going to the elevated balcony, the scene presented by the broad and spacious thoroughfare below was one of the most striking I ever saw. There was no terror and no confusion in the street. Each individual of the passing multitude, as far as we could see, was on his knees—each in the spot where he had become sensible of the terrible phenomenon—the half-naked Indian beside the veiled dama, and the loathsome leper beside the gaudily dressed official. The rider kneeled beside his horse, and the arriero among his mules; the carriages had halted, and their gay contents bent in clusters in the centre of the pavement. The bustle of the crowded thoroughfare had become hushed, and nothing was heard but a low murmur of pattered prayers; while, with a slow, lateral motion from north to south, the whole city swung like a ship at anchor, for about the space of a minute and a half. When the shock was over, the multitude rose; and each went about his business with a nonchalance which proved how the frequent recurrences of this phenomenon had nerved the public mind. In fact, it is seldom that they are of a violence to injure the massive structure of the city; and the alluvial and elastic soil upon which it is based is much in its flavour.
Nevertheless, many of the churches show how much repeated shocks have injured them; and though the appalling inclination from the perpendicular, noticeable in many towers and facades, is rather attributable to the badness of the foundations, yet during these days there was enough to make a brave man pause for an instant before passing under certain churches—such as the Profesa for instance, which looks as if it would fall upon the slightest provocation.
Most of these shocks were very trivial, and scarcely perceptible. The first I have noticed was by far the most serious, and considerably damaged several of the churches and the aqueducts. It began with the usual lateral swing from east to west, and then suddenly took the perpendicular movement, which is always the most dreaded. We found ultimately that it was experienced about the same time at Guadalaxara; and very severely at Vera Cruz, and at Acapulco, having thus upheaved and agitated the whole continent, with its enormous pile of mountains, from sea to sea—a fact which may give you an idea of the great depth at which the seat of this tremendous power must be situated.
There is, however, a caprice in the effects produced which it is difficult to explain. The same earthquake which I have thus noticed as so sensibly felt at Mexico, was not observable at Guadaloupe, within a mile of the city; while at Tacuba it was yet more severe. It was felt neither at Real del Monte, nor at Regla, while a hacienda situated between those two places was shaken to its foundation. It was rumoured that the hot baths situated on the Peñon, an isolated mass of lava between the city and the lake, had increased in heat since the commencement of the shocks; and further, that Popocatepetl had shown slight signs of combustion; but the most careful observation and attention could detect nothing of the kind from the terraces of the city. Morning after morning I directed my glass to him, but no perceptible vapour dimmed the clear silver outline of his snowy summit. He was at rest, and he may perhaps sleep for ages.
- ↑ The aqueduct of Chapultepec counts 904 arches, and is 10,828 feet in length; that of Santa Fe, 33,464 feet.
- ↑ Agave Americana.
- ↑ The city of Mexico was nevertheless visited by the cholera in the course of the preceding year 1833. Out of a population of 160,000, 15,000 are stated to have fallen victims to its virulence. At the height, as many as 1400 deaths occurred in the course of twenty-four hours. Very few cases were spasmodic. Laudanum was found to be the most effectual remedy. Of the English residents all escaped with one single exception, while a considerable number of the French were carried off.