Page:Our Neighbor-Mexico.djvu/474

462 little farther on a village of Otomies—this medley being seen in the neighborhood of all large cities, and each town preserves its distinctive language and customs, and even style and color of dress—the women of one town adopting one uniform shape and color of garments. But, at a greater distance from the cities, we find large districts occupied wholly by Indians of one tribe or another. The Indian lives generally in a rude hut of shingles, or of sun-dried mud bricks, and roofed with shingles or grass according to the supply at hand; but such huts are low-roofed, the bare earth the only carpet, and wind and rain finding free entry by a thousand openings in walls and roofs. The one room serves for every purpose, and often affords shelter to pigs and poultry, as well as to the family. The staple food is the maize cake (tortilla), the Indian very rarely tasting animal food—many not once a month, and thousands not once a year. Their costume is also simple. The men wear a simple shirt and a pair of cotton drawers; the women, a thin chemise, and a colored 'enagra' (skirt) rolled around their waist; and the children, as a rule, in unhampered freedom. A 'petate' (rush mat) for a bed when obtainable, and a'zerape' (blanket) as overcoat by day and bed-clothes by night, complete the Indian's outfit. These Indians supply the towns with poultry, vegetables, pottery, eggs, mats, and other similar corn materials, which they carry for many leagues.

"For instance, an Indian starts from his home loaded with goods weighing, on an average, five arrobas (one hundred and twenty-five pounds), and sometimes eight arrobas, and will travel a week, and often two or three weeks, before disposing of his wares. He calculates how many days the journey will last, and takes a stock of tortillas to last the whole time, allowing six tortillas a day, which he divides into three portions of two tortillas each, for morning, noon, and evening meal. And this is his only subsistence. So ignorant and stubborn are these Indians that they oftentimes refuse to sell their goods on the road. I have seen many carrying fowls, for instance, to sell in Mexico city; I have met them a week's journey from Mexico, and have proposed to buy the entire lot at the same price they hoped to realize at their journey's end; but no, he was bound for the city, and all my arguments were vain: not a chick would he sell. This has occurred on various occasions. Charcoal, plants, etc., are all supplied to the towns by the Indians, and it is astonishing to see their patient endurance. A man will spend, at least, four days in the mountains burning the charcoal; then carries it on his back a day's journey, sometimes more, and sells it for thirty-seven cents, thus realizing from six to seven cents a day. In the same way the poor creature fares with all else. If he sells planks or 'vigas,' he has first to pay for liberty to fell timber, if he happens not to belong to a town rich in forests. Felling the tree and hewing out the log with his hatchet occupies a day. In four days he has four 'vigas' ready. The whole family is then assembled, and the logs are dragged down to the plain and placed on two rude wheels—