Anahuac | Page 3

the Ethnographical value of Popular Tales and
Legends.

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS:
PLATES:
Cascade of Regla. _From a photograph by J. Bell, Esq. (To face
title-page.)_
Porter and Baker in Mexico.
Indians bringing Country Produce to Market.
Indians in a Rancho, making and baking Tortillas.
Map to illustrate Messrs. Tylor and Christy's journeys and excursions
In Mexico.

WOODCUTS:
_(The cuts of smaller objects of antiquity, and articles at present in use,
have been drawn from specimens in the Collection of Henry Christy,
Esq.)_
Indian Tlachiquero, collecting juice of the Agave for Pulque.
View of Part of the Valley of Mexico.
Water-carrier and Mexican Woman at the Fountain.
Group of Mexican Ecclesiastics.
Stone Spear-heads, and Obsidian Knives and Arrow-heads, from
Mexico.
Fluted Prism of Obsidian, and Knife-flakes.
Mexican Arrow-heads of Obsidian.
Aztec Stone-knife, with wooden handle, inlaid with mosaic work.
Aztec Head in Terra-cotta.
The Rebozo and the Serape.
Aztec Bridge near Tezcuco.
Spanish-Mexican Saddle and appendages.
Spanish-Mexican Bit, with ring and chain.
Sculptured Panel, from Xochicalco. _(After Nebel)_.
Small Aztec Head in Terra-cotta.
Ixtacalco Church.
Spanish-Mexican Spurs.
Goddess of War. _(After Nebel)_.
Three Views of a Sacrificial Collar or Clamp, carved out of hard stone.
Two Views of a Mask, carved out of hard stone.
Ancient Bronze Bells.
Spanish-Mexican Cock-spurs.

Leather Sandals.
Mexican Costumes. _(After Nebel)_.
View of Orizaba.
Indians of the Plateau. _(After Nebel)_.

[Illustration: MAP OF PART OF MEXICO TO ILLUSTRATE A
JOURNEY FROM VERA CRUZ TO MEXICO AND BACK &
EXCURSIONS IN THE COUNTRY, By Messrs. E.B. Tylor and H.
Cristy.]

CHAPTER I
.

THE ISLE OF PINES.
In the spring of 1856, I met with Mr. Christy accidentally in an
omnibus at Havana. He had been in Cuba for some months, leading an
adventurous life, visiting sugar-plantations, copper-mines, and
coffee-estates, descending into caves, and botanizing in tropical jungles,
cruising for a fortnight in an open boat among the coral-reefs, hunting
turtles and manatis, and visiting all sorts of people from whom
information was to be had, from foreign consuls and Lazarist
missionaries down to retired slave-dealers and assassins.
As for myself, I had been travelling for the best part of a year in the
United States, and had but a short time since left the live-oak forests
and sugar-plantations of Louisiana. We agreed to go to Mexico together;
and the present notes are principally compiled from our
memorandum-books, and from letters written home on our journey.
Before we left Cuba, however, we made one last excursion across the
island, and to the _Isla de Pinos_--the Isle of Pines--off the southern
coast. A volante took us to the railway-station. The volante is the
vehicle which the Cubans specially affect; it is like a Hansom cab, but
the wheels are much taller, six and a half feet high, and the black driver
sits postillion-wise upon the horse. Our man had a laced jacket, black
leather leggings, and a pair of silver spurs fastened upon his bare feet,
which seemed at a little distance to have well polished boots on, they
were so black and shiny.

The railway which took us from Havana to Batabano had some striking
peculiarities. For a part of the way the track passed between two walls
of tropical jungle. The Indian fig trees sent down from every branch
suckers, like smooth strings, which rooted themselves in the ground to
draw up more water. Acacias and mimosas, the seiba and the mahagua,
with other hard-wood trees innumerable, crowded close to one another;
while epiphytes perched on every branch, and creepers bound the
whole forest into a compact mass of vegetation, through which no bird
could fly. We could catch the strings of convolvulus with our
walking-sticks, as the train passed through the jungle. Sometimes we
came upon a swamp, where clusters of bamboos were growing,
crowned with tufts of pointed leaves; or had a glimpse for a moment of
a group of royal palms upon the rising ground.
We passed sugar-plantations with their wide cane-fields, the
sugar-houses with tall chimneys, and the balconied house of the
administrador, keeping a sharp look out over the village of
negro-cabins, arranged in double lines.
In the houses near the stations where we stopped, cigar-making seemed
to be the universal occupation. Men, women, and children were sitting
round tables hard at work. It made us laugh to see the black men rolling
up cigars upon the hollow of their thighs, which nature has fashioned
into a curve exactly suited to this process.
At Batabano the steamer was waiting at the pier, and our passports and
ourselves were carefully examined by the captain, for Cuba is the
paradise of passport offices, and one cannot stir without a visa. For
once everybody was _en règle_, and we had no such scene as my
companion had witnessed a few days before.
If