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NOTES ON THE LANGUAGE AND 
 
 FOLK-USAGE OF THE RIO 
 
 GRANDE VALLEY 
 
 {WITH ESPECIAL REGARD TO SURVIVALS OF ARABIC CUSTOM) 
 
 BY 
 
 JOHN g; bourke 
 
 Reprinted from the Journal of American Folk-Lore, April-June, i8g6 
 
■^7 
 
 yl 
 
 THE JOURNAL OF 
 
 AMERICAN FOLK-LORE. 
 
 Vol. IX.— APRIL-JUNE, 1896. — No. XXXIII. 
 
 NOTES ON THE LANGUAGE AND FOLK-USAGE OF 
 THE RIO GRANDE VALLEY.i 
 
 (with especial regard to survivals of ARABIC CUSTOM.) 
 SYNOPSIS OF CONTENTS. 
 
 Introductory. 
 
 Dress of Mexicans. 
 
 Jewelry. 
 
 Houses, Architecture, etc. 
 
 Furniture. 
 
 Meals. 
 
 Foods. 
 
 Flowers, Fruits, Trees, etc. 
 
 Pack-trains. 
 
 Bull-fights. 
 
 Streets, Lamps, Watchmen, Baths. 
 
 Clocks and Watches. 
 
 The custom of Pelon. 
 
 Bakeries. 
 
 Baths. 
 
 Amusements. 
 
 Gambling. 
 Correr el Gallo. 
 Bailes and Tertulias. 
 Christenings. 
 Courtship and Marriage. 
 Mortuary Ceremonies. 
 Customs in Churches. 
 Almsgiving, Fasting, Pilgrimages, Ab- 
 lutions. 
 Penitentes. 
 
 Phrases and Catchwords. 
 Proverbs and Refrains. 
 Treatment of the Sick. 
 Miracle- Workers. 
 Laws and Regulative System. 
 Commerce. 
 
 INTRODUCTORY. 
 
 The term " Rio Grande Valley," as employed in this paper, must 
 be understood as applying to any part of the extreme southern 
 or Mexican boundary of the United States ; not alone the Brazos 
 River, which for so many hundreds of leagues of its turbid course 
 winds about amid the villages of a Mexican population, and is sup- 
 posed by some legal fiction to divide the soil of the two great repub- 
 lics of North America, but also the Gila of Arizona, and such sec- 
 tions of Mexican territory itself which may from time to time have 
 been visited by the writer. 
 
 The designation " Arabic " would be equally misleading were it 
 
 1 Paper presented at the Seventh Annual Meeting of the American Folk-Lore 
 Society, Philadelphia, Pa., December 28, 1895. 
 
■ 8 2 Journal of A merican Folk-Lore. 
 
 not understood at the outset that the so-called Arab domination in 
 Spain was a commingling, and not always a peaceful or happy one, 
 of Mahomedan sectaries from Arabia, Syria, Mesopotamia, and the 
 former Roman provinces of Mauritania and the Cyrenaica, in North- 
 ern Africa. For generations there does not seem to have been even 
 a semblance of amalgamation. The polished Syrian from Damascus 
 established himself in Cordova and Granada, revelling in the luxury 
 afforded by vine and olive and pomegrante, while the rude Moslem 
 Berber scowled upon the still ruder Christian in the mountains of 
 the Asturias. 
 
 But between 1492, the year which witnessed the surrender of El 
 Zogoybi and threw open the portals of the New World, and the year 
 1609 and 1610, which witnessed the eviction of the last armed body 
 of Moriscoes from the cliffs of the Alpucarras, it is not too much to 
 suppose that the pressure of Christian power had brought about a 
 ;more perfect fusion of the discordant elements formerly ruled by the 
 Caliphate of the West, and from the new sons of the Church gathered 
 up from all sections of Andalusia and Murcia and the Castiles, no 
 doubt, many bold spirits went to seek rest and better fortune beyond 
 the sea. 
 
 There having been no such thing as organized colonization in the 
 primitive period of Mexican history, it would, of course, be a hope- 
 less task at this late day to attempt to determine how great a per- 
 centage of Moorish blood was included in the Caucasian migration 
 to New Spain, but there is reason to regard it as having been of 
 considerable importance, either on account of self-imposed exile in 
 the years following the surrender of Granada to Ferdinand and Isa- 
 bella, or because of the gradual assimilation and intermarriage of 
 Arab-Moors and Christians which had been quietly going on from 
 the landing of Tarik el Tuerto in 710 or 711, and with accelerated 
 force from the day of the Christian victory of Navas de Tolosa in 
 12 1 2. 
 
 DRESS OF MEXICANS. 
 
 By inquiring what was the clothing of the Moorish working classes, 
 and then comparing it with that now in use among the Mexicans, 
 the exact amount of " survival " can at once be determined. 
 
 The adage that " the apparel doth oft proclaim the man " was as true 
 of the Arab-Moor and of the Mexican as of the Dane or the Angle. 
 " For the common people (males) the ordinary dress was a gown 
 or long sack, gathered with a belt at the waist ; beneath were loose 
 drawers gathered at the ankle, and the overdress was a large-sleeved 
 mantle, open in front. For the street or the field, sandals were usu- 
 ally worn ; but these were replaced in the house by heelless slippers 
 such as are still found in the bazaars of Tangiers and Morocco. . . . 
 
Language and Folk-Usage of the Rio Grande Valley. 83 
 
 For the people at large, no long time elapsed before the turban fell 
 into disuse in Spain." (Coppee, " Hist, of the Conq. of Spain by the 
 Arab-Moors," vol. ii. p. 313, Boston, 1881.) 
 
 We know that the dress of the Aztecs in Mexico — that is of the 
 common people — consisted in sandals, loin-cloth, and a loose cotton 
 mantle ; in winter, perhaps, they had a rabbit-skin mantelet or cloak, 
 the same as that until lately worn by Moquis, Zufiis, Hualpais, 
 Utes, and even Navajoes and Apaches. The Spaniards compelled 
 the natives to wear " clothing." (See " Laws of Spain in their Appli- 
 cation to the American Indians," Bourke, in ** American Anthropolo- 
 gist," 1893, quoting law of Emperor Charles V., a. d. 155 i. No. 22, 
 from the " Recopilacion de Leyes de los Reynos de las Indias," 
 Madrid, 168 1.) This clothing to-day consists of guarachis, or alpar- 
 gatas for the feet, calzoncillos, or loose drawers which are frequently 
 tied at ankle, a long white cotton shirt, camisa, worn outside the 
 drawers, and corresponding to the " gown or long sack " of Coppee ; 
 this is gathered by a faja or sash, generally of red cotton.^ The 
 serape, a bright-colored blanket, covers the shoulders. The sombrero 
 for the head seems to be a Spanish modification of a high, conical, 
 broad-brimmed straw hat worn by Tlascatlecs, Tarascos, and Otomies ; 
 but, on ceremonial occasions, the young bucks appear in a chaqueton, 
 which is adorned with everything in the way of buttons, frogging, 
 and cheap lace that money can buy, and closely corresponds to the 
 " large-sleeved mantle." 
 
 The sombrero is banded with a coiled rattlesnake in gold or silver 
 galloon, a survival, no doubt, from the real rattlesnake skin which 
 encircled the covering of more primitive times. 
 
 In the outlying cities of Mexico, such as Morelia, Patzcuaro, or 
 Monclova, elderly gentlemen of good social position still adhere to 
 the flowing capa or cloak, and, at rarer intervals, don a silver-handled 
 sword. This capa is generally believed to be the offspring of the 
 Roman toga, but, according to Coppee (ii. 312), "the famous Span- 
 ish capa or cloak of the present day owes its origin to no single 
 people." The word for waistcoat {chaleco) might be mentioned, but 
 the garment is not much used. 
 
 So much for the dress of the men. The Arab women in Spain 
 " wore two long robes, an inner and an outer one, the former only 
 confined at the waist ; the inner, close-fitting, with sleeves, and the 
 outer, a saya or mantle; they had, besides, full drawers and heelless 
 
 ^ There are some reasons for believing that both shirts and drawers were intro- 
 duced into Europe by the Arabs. Coppde's statement in regard to the disuse of 
 the turban is in apparent conflict with Eguilaz y Yanguas' Glosario, art. " Almai- 
 zal " and " Albengala," but the discordance may have arisen from a difference in 
 dates. 
 
84 yournal of American Fo Ik-Lore, 
 
 slippers. These robes were frequently striped and embroidered with 
 gold and silver. The long, oblong shawl, or outer veil, called izar, a 
 covering for concealment, now known and generally used in Spain as 
 the mantilla, was probably adopted from the Goths and Hispano-Ro- 
 mans." (Coppee, op. cit. ii. 315.) In America we have the enagiias, 
 or petticoats (also called cJmpa, French j'upon, an Arabic word), 
 chardas or slippers, and the reboso of Mexico, together with the 
 chala, or shawl. The robes, which "were frequently striped and 
 embroidered with gold and silver," find their counterpart in the 
 beautiful and expensive blankets of silk interwoven with gold thread 
 for which the lovely city of Saltillo, Mexico, was once famous. 
 
 But a distinctively Arabic origin cannot be claimed for them. 
 They may have come from Damascus, or may have been manufac- 
 tured in the Iberian peninsula during the time of Roman or Cartha- 
 ginian supremacy. 
 
 Gibbon indeed states that Roderic the Goth, at the battle of the 
 Guadalete, was " incumbered with a flowing robe of gold and silken 
 embroidery" ("Dec. and Fall," cap. 51), and Conde speaks of "gor- 
 geous tissues, the least valuable being textures of silk and gold," 
 sent as presents to the king of Castile by Jusef, king of Granada, 
 A. D. 1402. (" Domination of Arabs in Spain," vol. iii. p. 304.) The 
 same kind of precious fabrics will be found referred to on pages 313, 
 330, 334, and Z7^\ ^i^d under the name of algiiexi, such fabrics were 
 mentioned in a cJiarta of King Ferdinand, anno iioi, according to 
 Eguilaz y Yanguas, " Glosario." And Rockhill speaks of tirmas, or 
 garments made of gold and silken threads interwoven as in use to-day 
 in China, Thibet, and North India, (W. W. Rockhill, " Land of the 
 Lamas," p. 282, New York, 1891,) 
 
 Among Mahomedans of the present day, the reboso has been 
 superseded or supplemented hy tht yashmak ; in Spain the women 
 were allowed more freedom and were not always required to be 
 veiled. "The king's sister, Soura, was riding in the streets without 
 a veil, a common and not improper practice in the West," (Coppee, 
 ii. 231.) 
 
 There is an apparent antagonism between Copp6e's statement that 
 the Arabs in Spain soon discontinued the use of the turban (as 
 above repeated), and the remarks given by Stirling-Maxwell, who 
 tells us that in 15 18 the Moriscoes were commanded to "speak Cas- 
 tilian and dress like Spaniards," and that " in the name of the crazy 
 Queen Juana a decree was issued requiring the Moriscoes to lay 
 aside the robes and turbans of their ancient race and assume the 
 hated hats and breeches of their oppressors," ("Life of Don John 
 of Austria," vol, i, pp, 118, 119, London, 1873.) 
 
 It is quite likely that many of the Moriscoes, in the enthusiasm of 
 
Language and Folk-Usage of the Rio Grande Valley. 85 
 
 their final struggle with the Roman-Goth, may have readopted the 
 turban as a conspicuous and serviceable headdress. 
 
 Umbrellas and parasols are very rarely seen among Mexicans ; 
 their origin is distinctly Asiatic. When Mahomed entered Medina, 
 at end of the Hegira, "an umbrella shaded his head." (Gibbon, 
 "Decl. and Fall," cap. 50.) But, on the other hand, that dangerous 
 weapon, the Spanish fan, may be ascribed to the Romans, in whose 
 religious ceremonials two fans, made of white peacock feathers, were 
 borne before the Pontifex Maximus. They are said still to figure in 
 some of the more elaborate functions of the Vatican. 
 
 It is only necessary to add that the word sombrero is of Latin 
 origin, and equivalent to "shader," -&. prima facie proof that the Span- 
 iards derived head-gear from the Romans ; while the origin of the 
 word corresponding to " shoe," zapato, is doubtful, the reputation of the 
 Moslem for skill in all that relates to leather goods is perpetuated in 
 the name " cordwainer " (from " cordovan," leather made in Cordova). 
 
 The clothing of the smaller Mexican children in the Rio Grande 
 valley will not occupy much of our space ; nearly all of them dress 
 a r Aztecque, which does not mgan much of a toilette. 
 
 JEWELRY. 
 
 No paper treating even superficially of the apparel of women can 
 afford to ignore the jewels and other adornment in which they so 
 greatly delight. 
 
 The "filagree" or "filagrana" work in silver and gold of the Mexi- 
 can //^/i^wi- was one of the features of border life which first attracted 
 the attention of Americans and others who some twenty-five or 
 thirty years ago had ventured out to the then remote cities of Santa 
 Fe, Albuquerque, San Antonio, Los Angeles, or Tucson. It has 
 since become too well known to need description. Its derivation is 
 undoubtedly Arab-Moorish. 
 
 "The Arab-Moors were also very skilful in the fabrics of the jew- 
 eller and the goldsmith, the art of which they brought from Damascus, 
 and to-day shops, differing very slightly from those of the Moorish 
 period, may be seen in that city, where various and delicate patterns 
 of filagree-work in gold and silver attract a populace very fond of 
 rather glaring ornaments." (Coppee, vol. ii. p. 400.) "Among the 
 joyas, brilliant earrings and curiously wrought necklaces always find 
 a prominent place " {loc. cit), just as they do on the Mexican fron- 
 tier to-day. Salajas mean jewelry of all kinds ; prendedor^ a breast- 
 pin : sortijas, earrings. 
 
 Not only the filagree jewelry, but the dainty, filmy deshilada, or 
 drawn work, may claim an Arabic origin, and this in face of the fact 
 that the word itself is a Latin compound meaning "unthreaded." 
 
86 yournal of American Folk-Lore. 
 
 In the privacy of the Arab-Moor seraglio this dainty art may have 
 been fostered, to receive its highest development afterwards in the 
 seclusion of the Christian cloister. The names of the different pat- 
 terns are in several cases Christian and in no case Mahomedan. 
 Thus, we have the crown of Christ {corona de Cristo), the cross {ia 
 cruz), the cross with stars (Ja cruz con estrellas), the rain of gold {la 
 lliLvia de oro) the wheel {la ritedd), make me if you can {Jiazme si 
 puedes) the footprint of the water-carrier {el tacon del barrilero), and 
 very many others. 
 
 HOUSES, ARCHITECTURE, ETC.^ 
 
 Mexican houses have been so often described that it is not worth 
 while to say much about them. In one word, they are generally of 
 one story, offering to the street either no opening at all, or else a 
 series of high, narrow windows, heavily guarded by rejas or grills 
 made of rods of wrought iron disposed vertically. These long, nar- 
 row windows betray a people accustomed for generations to intense 
 heat and anxious so to arrange their habitations that the smallest 
 possible amount of solar rays may enter. 
 
 All rooms open out upon an inner court, or patio, which is very 
 generally filled with flowers, vines, and palms ; in the ceutre will be 
 found an alj'ibe, or cistern (Arabic word). Entrance from the street 
 is through a high-arched and stone-paved porte-cochere, called the 
 zaguan (Arabic word). The rooms to right and left of the zaguan 
 are devoted to household administration, reception of guests, and 
 such purposes — the flanking rooms are sleeping-apartments ; in the 
 rear line are the kitchen, store-rooms, and servants' rooms. Back of 
 the kitchen comes the corral, with sheds for horses, cows, burros, 
 and sometimes with a blacksmith's forge. Postigo is the name of 
 the little sliding door which admits of a look-out from the heavily- 
 barred gate that closes the zaguan. 
 
 In the mansions of the wealthy living in cities, or on the large 
 haciendas, two stories are introduced, the upper surrounded on the 
 inner side by a corridor open to the side of ^^a^ patio and supported 
 upon pillars. In these large houses, and in the old monasteries one 
 comes across miradores (observation-places on the flat roofs), and 
 azoteas, or terraces, which are Arabic and not Gothic in origin. The 
 material of construction is stone, very rarely brick, and more gener- 
 ally adobe and cajon, the last-named being practically a large adobe. 
 The name for an ordinary burned brick is ladrillo ; tapia means 
 rubble masonry. 
 
 ^ The description of a Spanish-Arab house given by Henry Copp^e, History 
 of the Conquest of Spain by the Arab-Moors, vol. ii. pp. 307, 308, in most of its 
 features applies to the greater portion of the better class of houses in Mexico 
 to-day. 
 
Language and Folk- Usage of the Rio Grande Valley. Z"] 
 
 Both the outside and inside walls of houses are most frequently 
 stuccoed in bright colors and pleasing patterns. 
 
 Roofs are of tile, of thatch, sometimes of shingles and sometimes 
 of earth covered over with a coating of plaster. In the material of 
 construction, in the roofing and stuccoing, no less than in the 
 ground-plan, most of these abodes could replace those described in 
 books upon Arabia and Morocco. 
 
 When they can obtain these easily, Mexicans are as lavish in the 
 use of whitewash and plaster as were the Arab-Moors of Spain. 
 
 In Cadiz (a Spanish city tracing back to the early centuries of 
 Phoenician and Carthaginian occupancy) it is related that whitewash 
 is kept in constant readiness in every household. 
 
 One of the grandest creations of Moorish architectural genius, — 
 the Alhambra, — is a monument in stucco. 
 
 The churches of Mexico follow after the model of those in Spain, 
 which, as has been shown, was not much interfered with during the 
 centuries of Arab-Moorish contact. Nevertheless, the little half- 
 orange {medio-naranja) domes of the Moors are to be seen in some 
 of the beautiful mission churches like that of San Xavier del Bac, 
 near Tucson, Arizona, and the artesonado, or bread-tray roof, is not 
 unknown, but the beautiful, convoluted, double horseshoe arch or 
 ajimez never was adopted. 
 
 The canopy used in religious processions is still called by the term 
 baldachm (baldachino, stuff made in Bagdad). 
 
 It may be of interest to know that Moorish convicts were em- 
 ployed in the construction of the castle of San Juan de Alloa, in the 
 harbor of Vera Cruz, Mexico. 
 
 FURNITURE. 
 
 Among the poorest class of Mexicans, those who live in squalid 
 huts of thatch, with floors of earth, the custom obtains of sleeping 
 on the floor while wearing the clothes of the day. 
 
 This custom is not peculiar to any one nation. It was known to 
 the Aztec ; it obtains among the Apache and was not unknown to 
 Goth and Arab. " Spaniards of more than one rank sleep in their 
 clothes," says C. Bogue Luffmann, in "A Vagabond in Spain," 
 p. 257. (New York, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1895.) 
 
 Cond6 says, "Les Espagnols vivent comme des betes sauvages, 
 entrant les uns chez les autres sans demander permission, et ne 
 lavent ni leurs corps ni leurs habits, qu'ils n'otent que lorsqu'ils 
 tombent en lambeaux." (Viardot, "Essais," vol. i. pp. 191-192, 
 quoted by Burke, "History of Spain," vol. i. p. 158 footnote.) 
 
 " I have been told that many Portuguese peasants dislike the 
 inconvenience of undressing at night, so that no time is lost in mak- 
 
88 Journal of American Folk-Lore. 
 
 ing a toilet in the morning. My informant further stated that night 
 and day for weeks many wear the same garments, trusting to showers 
 to cleanse and sun to bleach their scanty garb." (Letter signed 
 "Professor," in "Citizen," Brooklyn, N. Y., November 25, 1895.) 
 "El acostarse en el suelo es comun entre los Celtos y los Espanoles." 
 (Padre Florez, "Espaiia Sagrada," vol. xv. p 30.) 
 
 "An Oriental, going to sleep, merely spreads a mat and adjusts 
 his clothes in a certain position and lays himself down." (" Encyc. 
 of Geog." Philadelphia, 1845, vol. ii. p. 227, article "Asia.") 
 
 " The Tibetans are dirty. They wash once a year, and, except 
 for festivals, never change their clothes till they begin to drop off." 
 (Isabella Bird Bishop, "Among the Tibetans," p. 45, New York, 
 1875.) 
 
 MEALS. 
 
 The different meals of the Mexicans are the early breakfast or 
 desayuno, now made of bread and coffee or chocolate, and two other 
 meals bearing Latin names, and apparently of Latin origin, the 
 comida or dinner, and the cena or supper. But to these have been 
 added the full breakfast or almuerzo, and the evening collation or 
 merienda. 
 
 The Mexican manner of eating, in which all those at table dip 
 their hands into a common dish, is still to be noted in the small vil- 
 lages off the lines of railroad. 
 
 It was commented upon at length in a previous article (" Folk- 
 Foods of the Rio Grande," in Journal of American Folk-Lore), in 
 which it was shown that the same custom must have been followed 
 by our Saviour. 
 
 It has been transmitted down to the Mahdi, so conservative are 
 the tribes of the East of all ancient usages. Father Bonomi, a bold 
 priest, who very recently made his escape from the Soudan, says : 
 " Sometimes we dined at the Mahdi's table, which was very scanty. 
 A dish contained a curious mixture from which each took with his 
 fingers the portions he liked." (Reported in " Times," New York, 
 September 7, 1895.) 
 
 In Madame Calderon de la Barca's day this custom was almost 
 general in Mexico. "All common servants in Mexico and all com- 
 mon people eat with their fingers." ("Life in Mexico," p. 392, 
 London, 1843.) 
 
 Describing his dinner with a lawyer and his family at Andujar, in 
 Spain, C. Bogue Luffmann says : " There was no tablecloth, no nap- 
 kins, no plates, no knives, forks, or spoons. We ate from one dish." 
 (" A Vagabond in Spain.") 
 
 And Richard Ford, the great authority, says that in Spain " chairs 
 are a luxury ; the lower classes sit on the ground as in the East, or on 
 
Language and Folk- Usage of the Rio Grande Valley. 89 
 
 low stools, and fall to in a most Oriental manner, with an un-Euro- 
 pean ignorance of forks, for which they substitute a short wooden or 
 horn spoon, or dip their bread into the dish, or fish up morsels with 
 their long pointed knives. . . . Forks are an Italian invention . . . 
 introduced into Somersetshire about 1690." (" Gatherings in Spain," 
 p. 181, London, 1846.) 
 
 FOODS. 
 
 An examination of Mexican foods cannot fail to be of interest and 
 importance, no matter from what point of view it may be made. 
 
 Leaving out of consideration those which, like chocolate, are of 
 distinctly American lineage, it will be found that the Roman Goth 
 has left a very large heritage of food to his American descendants, 
 but that the Arab-Moorish sire has also been generous. 
 
 Thus coffee, cafe, comes from the Arab-Moor, and is still served 
 in the coffee districts of Mexico as an extracto, precisely as it is 
 served and has been served, by the Moors for centuries. Asucar 
 (sugar) 1 is not only Arabic itself, but many things connected with 
 its manufacture suggest the same derivation. Connected terms are : 
 trapiche, a sugar-mill ; chancaca, crude brown sugar ; bagaza, bagasse ; 
 cande, candy ; pelonce, peloncillo, sugar in the loaf, and almibar, the 
 generic name for preserves of all kinds. 
 
 But, with the exception of course of the national beverages, /?//^?/^ 
 and mescal, it is in his drinks rather than in his solid foods that the 
 Mexican shows how much he has taken from the customs of the 
 Moslem. 
 
 Aloque, red wine, jarabe, syrup (from Arabic schardb, a sweet 
 drink), elixir, sorbete, sherbet, and orcJiata, orgeat, are words con- 
 stantly to be heard from the smallest pueblo at the source of the 
 Rio Grande to the smallest on the Isthmus of Tehuantepec.^ 
 
 FLOWERS, FRUITS, TREES, ETC.^ 
 
 Entering the patio of a well-kept Mexican home, one cannot 
 restrain a feeling of surprise at the many evidences of transplanta- 
 tion. 
 
 ^ In Mexico " the first sugar-canes were planted in 1 520 by Don Pedro Alienza." 
 Cortds "left sugar plantations near Cuyoacan in the Valley of Mexico." Madame 
 Calderon de la Barca, Life in Mexico, p. 244, London, 1843. 
 
 2 The Mexican custom of selling all kinds of cooked food on little tables in the 
 market-places is distinctively Arabic. " En los socos que los Arabes de Espana 
 tenian en sus poblaciones, se vendia toda suerte de manjares y aun comidas 
 aderezadas." Eguilaz y Yanguas, Glosario, p. 39, under " A^ouque." 
 
 3 From the very earliest days of Spanish domination, Mexico became a garden 
 of all the fruits and flowers mentioned in this paper, while she in return favored 
 the Europeans with her own delicious pineapple. Roses, jasmines, and others of 
 Flora's choicest treasures, bloomed in the gardens of every Franciscan monastery. 
 
90 Journal of American Folk-Lore. 
 
 Here is the castor-oil plant, a wanderer from Northern Africa and 
 the Nile valley. Next to it, the stately red-flowered oleander; the 
 rose, the queen of the garden ; the date, the solace of the great 
 Abdu-r-rahman ; the jasmin, oi delicate odor; the pomegranate, which 
 did not give its name to Granada; the apricot, albericoqite, and peach, 
 diirazno, known to the Romans as the Persicus or Persian fruit ; occa- 
 sionally the almond, almejidra, and at all times the orange, naranjo, 
 with its redolent flower, azahar ; the lemon, Ihnon ; the shaddock, 
 toronja ; the olive, aceituno ; the quince, ineinbrillo ; the apple, man- 
 zana ; the succulent watermelon, sandia ; rice, arroz ; the poppy, 
 amdpola ; the musk-flower, almizcle ; tulip, tidipan; barley, cebada ; 
 bran, salvado ; shorts, asemilla, from Arabic acemita ; saffron, aza- 
 fran ; anemone ; verbena ; cork, corcho ; ebony, ebano ; lily, azucena ; 
 cotton, algodon; hemp, cdnamo ; myrtle, array an ; acorn, bellota ; 
 odlk, roble ; juniper, sabina ; poplar, alamo; luzerne grass, alfalfa; 
 grass, sacate ; forage, /brr^V / prickly pear, tuna; bamboo, bambu. 
 Grapes grow wild in all parts of our own Southwest, and in every 
 section of the great Mexican republic, yet the Spaniards introduced 
 new varieties. The celebrated mission grape of California was 
 introduced by Franciscan monks from Malaga. (Madame Calderon 
 de la Barca, "Life in Mexico," p. 174.) 
 
 The name for fig is higo, Latin ficus ; this would seem to- show 
 that the Roman-Goths had this fruit before the Arab-Moors over- 
 whelmed them ; and the suspicion is aroused that they must have 
 had many others ; indeed, Eguilaz y Yanguas says that the Arab 
 word coti meant " fig of the Goths." There is no lack of historical 
 authority to support the suspicions aroused by philology. It should 
 be remembered that Spain, as far back as the days of Solomon, was, 
 at least along its seacoast, a province of the first importance in the 
 eyes of Phoenicians, Carthaginians, and Romans. Its cities were 
 hives of industry and marts of trade. Its wool, its cloth, its oil, 
 wine, flour, and minerals of all kinds were famous. Its people were 
 luxurious, refined, and scholarly. If dancing-girls from Cadiz clicked 
 their castanets in the theatres of voluptuous Capua, the Roman 
 Bishop of Cordova — Hosius, the friend of Constantine — was one 
 of the guiding spirits at the Council of Nice. 
 
 Spain furnished the first foreign emperor, Trajan, to Rome, and 
 the first foreign consul, Balbutius. Her citizens were the first, out- 
 side of Italy, to have Roman citizenship generally accorded them. 
 The list of orators, poets, and philosophers furnished by Spain to 
 
 Francis Parkman, in his Life of Champlain, gives to that great Frenchman the 
 credit of planting the first European roses in North America in his garden at 
 Quebec, Canada (circa A. d. 1609). But Parkman's works do not apply to Mex- 
 ico or the Mexican border. 
 
Language and Folk- Usage of the Rio Grande Valley, g i 
 
 Rome is long and distinguished. All this glory, all this luxury faded 
 under the continuous raiding of Alan, Sueve, Vandal, and Goth. 
 When the Vandals left for Africa they were charged with a ruthless 
 destruction and extirpation of gardens and vineyards. All these 
 facts should be present in mind in reading that the Arab-Moors 
 introduced certain fruits and flowers into Spain ; what they did, no 
 doubt, was to restock the country. 
 
 Coppee (i. 158) says that the peach, pomegranate, and date-palm 
 were introduced into Spain by Abdu-r-rhaman I. about 76y-y'jo 
 A. D. "The pomegranate was introduced by a specimen brought 
 from Damascus." (Stanley Lane-Poole, p. 132.) The same king 
 " himself planted a palm-tree, which was at that time a new thing 
 in Spain — this being the first and only one in all the land." (Conde, 
 "Dom. Arabs in Spain," vol. i. p. 182. See, also, Stanley Lane-Poole, 
 "Arabs in Spain," p. 132.) He adds : "He sent agents all over the 
 world to bring him the rarest exotics," which speedily spread from 
 the palace all over the land. " Dates of very rare kinds . . . 
 transported into Spain by Zeiria ben Atia," A. p. 987. (Cond6, vol. 
 ii. p. 21.) Another Abdu-r-rhaman (third of the name) planted 
 orange-groves at Cordova, in a. d. 957, although we are not told that 
 these were the first. (Conde, vol. i. p. 443.) In another place Conde 
 mentions "orange-trees and jasmines " in Cordova in 987. (Conde, 
 vol. ii. p. 13.) 
 
 From what may be read in Theophile Gautier, "Wanderings in 
 Spain," Harrison, "Spain in Profile," Fincke, " Spain and Morocco," 
 and others, the oleander must have come to the Rio Grande Valley 
 from Spain and Morocco. 
 
 The Mexicans of to-day are very fond of preserves, dried fruits of 
 all kinds, and various confections for the preparation of which the 
 Carmelite nuns were famous. There is reason to believe that this 
 dexterity came down from the Arabs of Spain. " The conserves and 
 fruits of all kinds" served to King Almansor in Murcia, in a. d. 984, 
 "were matters of marvel," so Conde tells us, vol. ii. p. 5, and again, 
 he speaks of " a thousand loads of dried fruits of different kinds " 
 (a. d. 987). (Conde, "Dom. Arabs in Spain," vol. ii. p. 17.) 
 
 It would take up too much space to go into the nomenclature of 
 garden vegetables ; few, if any, of those known to the Moors of 
 Spain were unknown to the Romans. With the exception of pota- 
 toes, one of the most important gifts of the New World, and the 
 scarcely less important tomato of the Aztecs, and maize, nearly every 
 vegetable in the Mexican gardens bears a Latin name, — onions, 
 garlic, cabbage, peas, beans, lettuce, turnips, mushrooms, celery. 
 The palatable /ny<7/<?, which forms the plato nacional of the repub- 
 lic, is a Mexican product. Only three plants are involved in doubt : 
 
92 Journal of American Folk- Lore. 
 
 the zanahoria or carrot, which would seem to be Arabic, the acelga 
 or beet, and the garbanzo or chicharron, a species of pea, said to be 
 the cicer of the Romans. 
 
 The bufiuelo, or fritter, made by the Mexican woman at Christmas, 
 has been derived from Spain. Its resemblance to the crispillac of 
 the Normans has been elsewhere noted.^ Doughnuts fried in sweet 
 oil, which are the same as the bunuelos, are much used in Spain at 
 Corpus Christi, according to John Hay in " Castilian Days," p. 107, 
 Boston, Osgood, 1871. 
 
 The Mexican fondness for iced cream and ices of all kinds, when 
 they can be had, is Oriental. A deadly compound called amanteqiii- 
 lladoy and which has been fully described in " Folk-Foods of the Rio 
 Grande," is largely composed of frozen butter, cinnamob, and nutmeg. 
 It is to be hoped that the responsibility for its paternity rests upon 
 the Mahomedan Moor and not upon the Christian Goth. It is still 
 to be found in Spain. Theophile Gautier found such " ices " made 
 either of cream, milk, butter, or cheese, during his " Wanderings in 
 Spain" (pp. 31, 32, London, 1853). Harrison also describes them 
 in his " Spain in Profile." 
 
 So, too, let us trust that the responsibility for the horny, indiges- 
 tible goat's cheese of Mexico may be shifted from Christian shoul- 
 ders. Its name, queso, controverts the assumption that it is of Arabic 
 origin, and it is made from the milk of the cabrita, or she-goat, which 
 bears a Latin name ; nevertheless, further investigation may show 
 that its present mode of manufacture is Arabic or Moorish. 
 
 PACK-TRAINS. 
 
 Nearly all domestic animals in Mexico bear Latin names. This 
 would show that before the Arab invasion the Roman Goths pos- 
 sessed all these. 
 
 When we come to the names used in herds of horses and pack- 
 mules the case changes at once. The Arabs were a nation of cav- 
 alry and mule or camel packers, and the language of to-day retains 
 indications of the fact. So most of the names for the colors of 
 horses are Arabic. 
 
 In regard to pack-trains, one of the most interesting cases of 
 transplantation confronts us. Not only are all, or very nearly all the 
 words in the packer's vocabulary Arabic, but the whole organization 
 is Andalusian. 
 
 To begin with the superintendent of the pack-train ; it is true that 
 he bears the Roman title oi patron, and his first assistant the equally 
 Roman one of the cargador ; but the pack-train itself is an atajo, 
 
 1 " Medicine Men of the Apache," Burke, in vol. ix. Anmial Report, Bureau of 
 Ethnology, Smithsonian, Washington, D. C. 
 
Language and Folk-Usage of the Rio Grande Valley. 93 
 
 the bell is cencerro, the bell-mare ac^mila, the individual pack-mules 
 are machos ; when mules are used outside of a pack-train they go by 
 the Latin name of imdo. The pack-saddle is aparejo, sometimes 
 albarda ; the pack-cover is sobre-en-jalma, in which y^/w^ is Arabic ; 
 the packer himself is arriero, from the Arabic arrcy go 'long, ad- 
 dressed to his mules ; the eye-blind is tapojo ; the canteen is guaje ; 
 the saddle-bags, alforjas ; currycomb, almohaza. 
 
 Pack-trains grew up from the necessities of the case. Spain is a 
 country of elevated mountain-ranges in which the still unconquered 
 Christians had taken refuge. To pursue them, pack animals of 
 some kind were necessary for transportation purposes. Mules being 
 sure-footed, alert, comparatively small, and therefore better suited 
 for work in narrow, winding defiles, and being also able to move 
 about on rocky trails and in the cold climate of the plateaux of 
 Estremadura, the Castilles, and the Asturias, were naturally chosen 
 in place of elephants or camels. 
 
 No Spanish treatise upon the art of packing, or the management 
 of pack-trains, can be found in the catalogues of the Ticknor or 
 Marsh collections or the library of Congress. Three have been pub- 
 lished in the United States, all based upon the work of Mr. Thomas 
 Moore, chief of transportation for General Crook during his Indian 
 campaigns in Arizona, Wyoming, and Montana, and instructed in his 
 business by expert Mexican and Chilian packers on the Pacific 
 coast. 
 
 Pack-trains will, however, be found mentioned from the earliest 
 days of the Arab invasion of Spain. When Tarik's army was ad- 
 vancing through Spain, "rations for immediate use were carried 
 upon mules, the arrieros or drivers of which were chosen from the 
 number of those least capable of bearing arms." (Copp6e, " History 
 of the Conquest of Spain by the Arab-Moors," vol. i. p. 333.) 
 
 " Many sumpter mules laden with bales of delicate cloth " are 
 mentioned by Conde under date of a. d. 987 (vol. ii. p. 17). "Bag- 
 gage mules to carry off the spoils " were supplied by the discom- 
 fited Christians to Almanzor (circa A. d. iooo). (Stanley Lane-Poole, 
 "Moors in Spain," p. 166, New York.) "The tents and pavilions 
 were packed on mules and camels, as were also certain parts of the 
 provisions," by the army of the Arab King Abdelmemumen ben Ali 
 (a. d. 1 158). (Conde, vol. ii. p. 487.) And so it goes ; in every war 
 in Spain the pack-mule and the pack-train are prominently men- 
 tioned. When Queen Isabella established the city of Santa Fe in 
 the Vega of Granada (a. d. 1491-1492), her army was kept supplied 
 by a train of no less than fifteen thousand pack-mules. 
 
 At a somewhat later date, when Don John of Austria prosecuted 
 his campaign against the revolted Moors in the Alpuxarras, a. d. 
 
94 Journal of American Folk-Lore. 
 
 1 569-1 5 70, one of his divisions, that of Manuel, had no less than 
 "fourteen hundred pack-mules." (Stirling-Maxwell, "Life of Don 
 John of Austria," vol. i. p. 221, London, 1873.) In the same campaign 
 he also refers to " fifteen hundred sumpter mules." {Idem, p. 276.) 
 
 It is pretty evident from the evidence of history that the Goths 
 had no pack-trains, although they had the animals required of them 
 by the Moors. The Goths were a slow-moving people with wagons. 
 Their king, Roderic, at the battle of the Guadalete, rode in a car 
 of ivory, drawn by two white oxen. 
 
 There are pack-trains in Spain at the present hour, but the best 
 belong to the Maragatos of Galicia, who are reputed to be of Moor- 
 ish blood. (See Ford's " Hand-Book of Spain," " Maragatos.") 
 
 A recent and trustworthy authority speaks of pack-trains in remote 
 Thibet. " I saw one caravan leave for Shi-gat-za, in which were over 
 3,000 pack-animals, mostly mules." (W. W. Rockhill, " Land of the 
 Lamas," p. 284, New York, 1891.) 
 
 The great value of pack-trains in military operations against the 
 Apaches and other savage tribes in the Rocky Mountain region west 
 of the Missouri has been recognized in " On the Border with Crook ; " 
 but were all notes and memoranda on the subject to be presented 
 they would make a volume of themselves. 
 
 Even in personal characteristic, the Mexican arriero is identical 
 with his Hispano-Moresque prototype. Like him he indulges in 
 simple ballads and songs of love, drawled out in a heart-rending 
 nasahzed prolongation. 
 
 "The Spanish muleteer has an inexhaustible stock of songs and 
 ballads with which to beguile his incessant wayfaring. His airs are 
 rude and simple, consisting of but few inflections, , . . These he 
 chants forth with a loud voice and long, drawling cadence. . , , This 
 talent of singing and improvising is frequent in Spain, and is said to 
 have been inherited from the Moors," Washington Irving, " Alham- 
 bra," pp. 16, 17, New York, 1865.^ Something might be said about 
 the cooking in pack-trains a quarter of a century ago presenting 
 quaint and highly spiced dishes, but only one reference can now 
 be made to such matters. The packers habitually employed sour 
 dough as a leaven. This method, described in a little pamphlet the 
 manuscript for which was submitted to and published by Brigadier- 
 General John R Hawkins, lately Commissary-General U, S, Army, 
 
 1 As illustrative of the tenacity of life shown by the ballads of a people, read 
 what is said by Mr. Alfred M. Williams about American sea-ballads : " They are 
 likely to be lost with the chants of the Phoenician sailors, or the rowers of the 
 galley of Ulysses, which they succeeded and some of whose melody they have 
 perhaps reproduced," Studies in Folk-Lore and Popular Poetry^ p. 10, Boston, 
 Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1894. 
 
Language and Folk-Usage of the Rio Grande Valley. 95 
 
 is Spanish, perhaps Moorish, in origin. It is noted by only one 
 author, C. Bogue Luffmann, as seen by him in Spain. (" A Vaga- 
 bond in Spain," p. 237, New York, Scribners, 1895.) 
 
 BULL-FIGHTS. 
 
 Beyond a mere statement of the fact that the bull-fight is a well- 
 established form of public entertainment in the cities of Mexico 
 nearest to the valley of the Rio Grande, and that it adheres with 
 fidelity to the model set in old Spain, nothing will be said in this 
 paper. The subject is too vast. Contrary to the opinion maintained 
 by most writers, that the bull-fight was of Arabic origin, there are 
 grounds for believing that it was a Roman institution, taking on life 
 in the days of imperial decadence, eagerly adopted and to a consid- 
 erable extent modified by the Moslems of Andalusia.^ 
 
 Should opportunity present, these views, with the authorities for 
 and against them, will be elaborated in another article. 
 
 STREETS, LAMPS, WATCHMEN, BATHS. 
 
 From the house to the street is the most natural order of progres- 
 sion in treating of a people, their homes, manners, and customs. 
 The streets of Mexican towns present strong resemblances to those 
 of Arabic Spain and Morocco in being narrow and hemmed in by 
 houses with zaguanes, iron-railed windows, projecting balconies, and 
 walled patios. There is no general rule as regards paving, some 
 streets in the town being empedrados (cobble-stoned), some paved 
 with the Arabic giiijas, or gravel, others unpaved ; in some there is a 
 gutter in the middle, in others there are gutters on each side. Gen- 
 erally there are very narrow footways on one or both sides ; their 
 presence cannot always be depended upon. Where muddy seasons 
 are to be expected, as in Pazcuaro, near the Hotel Ybarra, a line of 
 elevated foot-stones runs down the centre. If the promenade be 
 made by night, one meets at every second or third corner the sereno, 
 or watchman, who derives his name from the cry he was wont to 
 give until very recently of sere-e-n-0-0-0 (clear weather). He is a son 
 
 1 There is another side to the story : " Bull-fights appear to have been a favor- 
 ite amusement from the earliest time in the Spanish peninsula. It is evident that 
 this custom existed before the Romans entered Spain, for it is represented upon 
 ancient medals of a period earlier than their arrival." Edward Everett Hale and 
 Susan Hale, The Story of Spain, p. 8, New York, Putnams, 1886. 
 
 Padre Francisco Florez, in his great work, Espaha Sagrada (Madrid, 1750), 
 tome xix. p. 75 et seq., mentions a Gothic Bishop Ataulpho, accused of crime, 
 ordered by King Ordono I. to fight a wild bull in the arena of Compostella in 
 Galicia, Spain, circa A. D. 851 — "que el Obispo fuese echado d las fieras, esto es, 
 que, poniendole en sitio publico, le arrojasen un toro de los mas feroces que fuese 
 el verdugo de tal culpa." 
 
96 yournal of American Folk-Lore. 
 
 of Islam on the wrong side of the Atlantic. The Arab emirs had 
 watchmen in all their villages. They are directly mentioned in 
 Granada as early as a. d. 1343. (Conde, vol. iii. p. 267.) London and 
 Paris did not have any at that date.^ 
 
 Coppee states that under Arab rule in Spain watchmen with lan- 
 terns patrolled the cities at night, calling from hour to hour, Allah 
 il Allah. {" Conq. Spain by the Arab-Moors," vol. ii. p. 326.) These 
 cries were naturally superseded in Spain and her colonies by Ave 
 Maria Purisiina, which in its turn gave way to the shrill drone of 
 the reed whistle to be heard in our day. 
 
 The electric light is playing havoc with much of the poetry of 
 Mexican evening life, in which the old-time oil-lamp, suspended 
 from wires crossing diagonally from corner to corner, was a conspic- 
 uous feature. 
 
 For this, also, Mexico was indebted to the Moors. The streets 
 of Arabic Cordova "might be traversed at night by the light of 
 lamps placed close to each other." (Copp6e, vol. ii. p. 306.) This was 
 about A. D. 1 100, when neither London nor Paris were Hghted. No 
 systematic attempt was made to light the city of London until after 
 the plague and the great fire, and even until the days of the French 
 Revolution "link-boys" stood ready to escort carriages and pedes- 
 trians home through dingy, badly-paved alleys. 
 
 Were it not for this fine regulative system derived from the Arabs, 
 we might be in danger of assault from gangs {garillas) of ruffians 
 {rufianes) and assassins {asesinos), who would at least make a great 
 tumult or alhoroto in the street. 
 
 CLOCKS AND WATCHES. 
 
 The world has benefited beyond calculation by the Arabic inven- 
 tion of these articles. It might almost be said that a revolution was 
 brought about in social economy. One of the Roman pontiffs, Ger- 
 bert, who assumed the tiara under the name of Sylvester II., was a 
 student at Cordova before the year 1000, and there learned the art 
 of making watches, an accomplishment which placed him under sus- 
 picion of witchcraft. 
 
 . The clocks and watches to be seen in Mexico in this generation 
 are not from Morocco or Cordova, but from Massachusetts and Con- 
 necticut, localities which manufacture more of them in a month 
 than were made under the Califate in one hundred years. The 
 
 1 The cry of the mueddins (of Tangier) is precisely like that of the Spanish 
 sereiios, who must have learned it, as they did so many other things, from the 
 Moors — a long chant on one note, sometimes shortened, sometimes prolonged." 
 Margaret Thompson, A Scamper throttgh Spain and Tangier, p. 278, New York, 
 Dodd, Mead & Co., 1892. 
 
Language, and Folk-Usage of the Rio Grande Valley. 97 
 
 arched market-places, the little stands heaped high with fruits and 
 vegetables and guarded by crouching figures wrapped in rebosos and 
 serapes, which distinguish the towns of Mexico might be inserted as 
 pictures to illustrate volumes of travel in Northern Africa or the 
 Levant. 
 
 And the book-venders who in those markets repeat aloud an out- 
 line of the plot of the dog-eared books and pamphlets they have to 
 sell, are they not the improvisatori of Cordova, Seville, and Toledo, 
 of whom we all have read so much ? 
 
 And this party of professional serenaders, wandering from zaguan 
 to zaguan, droning amatory ditties, and bearing the emblem of a ship 
 ablaze with light, do they not replace the gay troubadours of Gra- 
 nada ? 
 
 THE CUSTOM OF " PELON." 
 
 The stores, especially in the smaller towns, are Oriental in the 
 hyperbole of their titles and the tenuity of their stocks. They are 
 generally small and contracted and much behind the times. A very 
 curious custom, that of pelon, obtains, by which after a certain 
 amount of purchase the buyer receives a rebate or gratuity, either 
 in money or goods. The word pelon means a stone or weight of 
 some kind used to balance the crude scales in the country parts of 
 Spain. The custom of pelon as it exists along the Rio Grande is 
 analogous to that of Vagniappe in Louisiana. 
 s 
 
 BAKERIES. 
 
 The bakeries of Mexico are entitled to the grateful remembrance 
 of every traveller, and the bread is of the best. The wheat is ground 
 between stones in tiny mills whose wheels are turned by the water 
 of aceqidas, much as in Andalusia and Murcia the grist was made 
 ready for the Almanzors and Abdelmelics of centuries past. 
 
 The Arabian fashion of selling bread from trays carried through 
 the streets of Jerusalem and other cities (see Gilman, " Story of the 
 Saracens," p. 435, New York, 1887) is paralleled in most of the Mexi- 
 can villages, and there is rather more than an accidental resemblance 
 between the street cries of this part of the New World and those of 
 the land of the Moslem. " In the name of the Prophet ! Figs," is a 
 cry no longer heard by Christian ears, and which has fallen back 
 before the ear-piercing " Algo defruta! Algo de didce !'' of the itin- 
 ant candy and fruit peddlers of Monclova, Celaya, Morelia, Quere- 
 taro, Laredo, and elsewhere. 
 
 The caldero, or wandering mender of brass pans and kettles, is 
 another type of street-industry which may have come to Mexico 
 from Cordova or Bagdad. 
 
 VOL. IX. — NO. 33. 7 
 
98 Journal of American Folk-Lore. 
 
 BARBER-SHOPS. 
 
 The peluquerias or barber-shops of the larger towns recall, in their 
 neatness and good taste, the great care bestowed by Arabs upon 
 hair and beard. 
 
 BATHS, 
 
 No Mexican municipality which can possibly provide baths for the 
 people neglects that solemn duty. In many of the smaller towns, 
 these are noticeably fine and well arranged. There is an absence 
 of unnecessary ornamentation, but no material comfort is forgotten. 
 
 The baths are not free, the price being two cents for poor people, 
 ranging from that up to dos reales, or twenty-five cents for the more 
 affluent. For the smallest figure, one gets nothing but an abundance 
 of clean, cold (or hot) water, and the tank to bathe in ; for dos reales 
 there are attendants at hand with towels, soap, brushes, mirrors, 
 and anything else that may be needed ; economy in varying degrees 
 may be consulted in the intermediate prices, 
 
 San Miguel de Allende is perhaps as good a specimen of what a 
 Mexican bath-house should be as can be found within the republic. 
 
 The attendants are very strict in preserving order and in seeing 
 that each bather is provided with his own key and tank. One half 
 the building is reserved for men, the other for women. 
 
 Not a drop of water is wasted. After leaving the bath-houses, it 
 runs down the side of the hill into a line of stone troughs, alongside 
 which patient lavanderas are washing clothes from morning until 
 night ; from the laundresses it runs down into larger pools, where 
 the casincas or sheep shearers and dyers are sousing sheep, great 
 hanks of woollen yarn, and piles of blankets. Farther down, it is 
 contained in an aceqida deeply shaded by orange, lemon, banana, 
 pecan, pomegranate, rose, willow, and oleander ; next it courses 
 through one of the streets, to keep it refreshed and free from dust, 
 and finally meanders across the prolific fields beyond the town. 
 
 That the Mexican has derived his bath from the Roman, language 
 tells most plainly. Everything connected with the bath is desig- 
 nated by a Latin derivative. The Arabs found the bath most highly 
 developed in Syria, Palestine, North Africa, and Spain, and quietly 
 adopted it. They became as passionately addicted to its use as 
 Romans and Greeks had been, and in their earliest chronicles accuse 
 their Christian enemies of an indifference to its benefits. "It is 
 related of these people of Galicia, who are all Christians, that they 
 are the bravest of all the land of Afranc, but they live like savages 
 or wild beasts; they never wash their persons or their garments, 
 nor do they change the latter until they fall in pieces from their 
 
Language and Folk-Lore of the Rio Grande Valley. 99 
 
 limbs, a mere heap of rags and tatters." ^ (Conde, "Dom. Arabs in 
 Spain," vol. i. p. 203, quoting an Arabic authority, temp. Abdu-r- 
 rahman I., circa 800 a. d.) 
 
 The observation of the Mahomedans at that epoch had proba- 
 bly been restricted to war parties of Christians, poorly provided, in 
 the Asturian Mountains ; in the course of several centuries it is 
 related that the Moorish king, Ismail of Granada, a. d. 13 16, "com- 
 manded that the Christians should wear marks on their clothing 
 whereby they might be distinguished from the Moslemah, and laid 
 on them an impost for their dwellings and baths which they had not 
 previously paid." (Conde, iii. p. 226.) 
 
 Coppee unfairly accuses the Spaniards of destroying the baths of 
 the Moors, because the religion of the Spaniards was largely a reli- 
 gion of personal uncleanness. This matter is rather too delicate for 
 discussion here, but certainly the monks of Spain were no more 
 untidy than the fakirs and morabith of the Arab-Moor. Some 
 other reason must be assigned for their suppression. They nat- 
 urally would become and undoubtedly were places of political 
 assignation, and the following from Stirling-Maxwell bears out this 
 conclusion. In 15 18, this eminent author says, "The Moriscoes 
 were commanded to lay aside their ancient language and customs : 
 to speak Castilian and dress like Spaniards ; to give up bathing and 
 destroy their baths ; to keep the doors of their houses open on Satur- 
 days and feast days ; to renounce their national songs, dances, and 
 I marriage ceremonies ; to lay down their Arabic names, and to enter- 
 
 Vt tain among them no Moors from Barbary, whether slaves or free- 
 men." (Stirling-Maxwell, " Life of Don John of Austria," vol. i. pp. 
 118, 119.) He also says that they constantly entertained pirates 
 from Barbary and aided them in assaults upon Christian commerce. 
 The dress of the pirates of Barbary being exactly the same as that 
 of the Moors, it was difficult to detect them, and many Christians 
 were kidnapped. 
 
 Having said that the Moor found the bath much as the Roman 
 left it, it is easy to show that through the Spaniard he bequeathed 
 it to the Mexican with little if any change, as suggested by language. 
 
 AMUSEMENTS. 
 
 What are the amusements, diversions, entertainments, religious 
 or secular, of the Mexicans } What great religious festivals are 
 observed at the mutations of the seasons? By observing closely 
 
 1 Speaking of the Russian moujiks, Edna Dean Proctor says that their clothes 
 " are worn without washing, night and day for months, and perhaps years, until 
 they become rags and are exchanged for new." A Russian Journey, p. 52, Bos- 
 ton, Houghton, Mifflin & Co. 
 
I oo yournal of A merican Folk-L ore. 
 
 such matters, in which mankind is most eminently conservative, 
 would it not be possible to pick up here and there a shred of some 
 long-forgotten wardrobe ? The task is at least worth the effort. An 
 examination should be made into those amusements which are pub- 
 lic and those entertainments which are more restricted in character, 
 such as christenings, weddings, funerals, balls, and all functions 
 which for any reason draw together the friends of a family. 
 
 The Mexican is endowed with a great fund of good common-sense. 
 He does not believe in the cheerless existence of his Yankee brother 
 who works himself to death or decrepitude before he is forty, and he 
 will not follow such an example. Therefore, as a matter of duty, he 
 devotes a portion of his life to rational enjoyment, and as a conse- 
 quence neurasthenia is a disease unknown in Mexico, and one whose 
 character it would be difficult to make a Mexican understand. 
 
 Scarcely a town in the republic is so poor or so small that it has 
 not its alaineda or its public garden, with its winding paths or rambles 
 {rambla, Arabic), in which twice a week one can listen to fairly 
 good music, and witness the promenade of sedate men who march 
 leisurely, arm in arm, two by two, in one direction, while sefioras and 
 sejioritas, equally sedate, march with equal leisure in the opposite. 
 
 Once a week there is a performance, generally by local talent, in 
 the teatro. The Mexican theatre, or the Spanish theatre, its parent, 
 is a subject too vast for any such treatment as can be given here. 
 
 The prologue to a Spanish drama is called the loa, a word meaning 
 praise or eulogy. This refers to the flattering phrases addressed 
 by the leading actor, in minor affairs by the clown, who is known by 
 the name of payaso, to the audience. It is a sine qua non in the 
 Mexican rustic representations. 
 
 In Burgos in Spain " the prompter is protected by a sort of tin 
 shell arched like the roof of an oven, to protect him against t\\& pata- 
 tas, manzanas, and cdscaras de 7taranja, potatoes, apples, and orange- 
 peel, with which the Spanish public — as impatient a public as ever 
 existed — never fails to bombard those actors who displease them. 
 . . . The actors did not know a word of their parts, and the prompter 
 spoke so loudly that he completely drowned their voices." (Theo- 
 phile Gautier, "Wanderings in Spain," p. 42, London, 1853.) Every 
 word of the above applies to the Rio Grande. The miracle-play, 
 still maintained in Mexico, has been mentioned in a previous paper. 
 
 Other public diversions of the Mexican frontier are nmrromas, or 
 tight -rope walking, with acrobatic feats, matachines, harlequins, and 
 Uteres, or puppet-shows. They are too much like exhibitions of the 
 same kind in other parts of the world to need description. 
 
Language and Folk-Usage of the Rio Grande Valley, loi 
 
 GAMBLING. 
 
 The Mexican, of whatever degree, has a natural fondness for gam- 
 bling. All the elements which united to form the Mexican social 
 structure, — American Indian, Arab, or Teuton, — were addicted to 
 the same vice. The favorite games are monte, of two kinds, con 
 qiden, roulette, chusas, keno, chess, dominoes, and some others. 
 For the monte game, the terms employed do not appear to be Latin. 
 Thus the cards themselves are called naipes, to shuffle is barajar, the 
 knave is sota, the ace is as, and to cut is alee. Ajedrez, chess, is an 
 Arabic word, "King Hixem played, as usual, his game of chess." 
 (Conde, vol. i. pp. 239, 2^6) 
 
 No Mexican house on the Rio Grande is complete without its 
 ordculo or dream-book, and the women are as devoted to chiromancy 
 or palmistry as the Arabs were in Cordova. (See Coppee, vol. ii. p, 
 442.) The fourth council of Toledo (a. d. 633) punished with depo- 
 sition any priest who consulted soothsayers. " Que sea depuesto de 
 su honor el eclesiastico que consulte a agoreros 6 supersticiosos." 
 (Padre Florez, "Espafia Sagrada," vol. vi. p. 164.) 
 
 CORRER EL GALLO. 
 
 Chicken fighting is freely indulged in by the Mexicans, as it was 
 by the Arabs, but it was probably played by Romans and Carthagin- 
 ians in Spain long before the Arabs landed ; therefore not much stress 
 need be laid upon its existence. The Romans caused to fight both 
 chickens and quails. 
 
 There is another form of diversion with fowl which must, how- 
 ever, be mentioned, although it too, in one shape or another, has 
 spread over much of the surface of the earth, and that is the great 
 sport of eorrer el gallo, or "running the rooster," which strictly 
 speaking is more frequently an old hen. The victim selected is 
 buried up to its neck in sand, and then horsemen dash at full speed 
 up to the chicken, lean out from the saddle and try to grasp it. 
 There are many failures, involving ludicrous mishaps and perilous 
 tumbles, but finally some rider, bolder or more dextrous than his 
 comrades, seizes the hen by the neck and gallops down the valley, 
 followed by all the other contestants. The hen is usually torn to 
 pieces in the struggle. This was the method observed at the Indian 
 pueblo of Santo Domingo, New Mexico, in the month of August, 
 after harvest, in 1881. ("Snake-Dance of the Moquis," Bourke, 
 London and New York, 1884.) 
 
 In the lower Rio Grande, on St. John's Day (June), the young 
 men engage in eorrer el gallo, but instead of a living bird make use 
 
I02 journal of American Folk-Lore. 
 
 of an image of paper, ribbon, and feathers. In both cases the riding 
 is superb, and there are not a few accidents.^ 
 
 BAILES AND TERTULIAS. 
 
 When a dancing party is decided upon in a Mexican village, the 
 affair takes shape by a sort of spontaneous generation. The young 
 men display an activity not usual with them and busy themselves in 
 putting the selected room to rights. There is not very much to be 
 done, and yet there is always something. The musicians must be 
 notified, the earthen floor must be wet down, tallow candles are 
 needed in the tin sconces attached to the walls, the saints' pictures 
 require dusting, rawhide^seated chairs are to be borrowed, two and 
 three from this neighbor and two and three from that, and then 
 everybody has to be invited. In the really good old times, this was 
 done hy 2l pregonero, or crier, who bawled the welcome notice through 
 the streets ; later on, when society began to divide up into classes, 
 the select few were called upon by some of the self-appointed com- 
 mittee of young men having the funcion in charge ; but in these 
 days of degeneracy there are few villages along the border which do 
 not aspire to printed forms of invitation. But the Mexican baile is 
 not what it used to be twenty-five or thirty years ago. Board floors 
 and kerosene-lamps, cottage-organs, ready-made gowns, and hand- 
 me-down suits have wrought destruction upon its erewhile beauties 
 and knocked all the poetry out of it. 
 
 The dancing would begin very soon after dark and last until all 
 hours of the next morning. The young ladies were not escorted 
 from their homes by gentlemen, but came under the guardianship of 
 aged female relatives or attendants, called dttenas, and the older, 
 uglier, and more crabbed a dueha happened to be the more highly 
 was her efficiency regarded. The duena possibly was known to the 
 Romans ; she certainly was known to the Arab-Moors in Spain, who 
 allowed their women a freedom entirely distinct from the seclusion 
 enforced in other sections of the Mahomedan world. 
 
 With the arrival of the young men the fun began. Scarcely had a 
 gallant put his foot across the threshold before some young lady 
 would assail him with a cascaron. To make the cascaron (lit. egg- 
 shells) an egg is carefully blown of its meat and then filled with 
 cologne, or essence of musk, or finely chopped gold and silver tissue 
 paper. The aperture is then sealed up, the egg-shell decorated, and 
 
 ^ Correr el gallo seems to be the same, or of the same general nature, as the 
 French yV?^ du canard^ in which a duck, head downward, is suspended from a rope 
 or a limb of a tree, and a blindfolded boy tries to cut off its head with a sabre. 
 See A Tour through the Pyrennees^ Hyppolite Adolphe Taine, Fiske's transla- 
 tion, pp. 92, 93, New York, Holt &: Co., 1874. 
 
Language and Folk-Usage of the Rio Grande Valley. 103 
 
 the cascaron is ready for business. A lady takes one and approach- 
 ing a cavalier breaks it on his head, rubbing the pieces well into his 
 hair. The etiquette of the border requires the swain to provide 
 himself with a cascaron (there is a table loaded with them in one cor- 
 ner), and to return the compliment in kind, being careful not to rub 
 the fragments too deep into the lady's tresses, as they are not easy 
 to get out. Then he is expected to lead her out upon the floor and 
 dance with her. The dance ended, he escorts her to a table upon 
 which are refreshments of different kinds, syrups, and didces. The 
 senorita very generally helps herself to a portion of fruit, cakes, or 
 pasas (raisins of the country), and puts it away in a large handker- 
 chief to be carried home when the entertainment is over. 
 
 There may be many means of determining who has been the belle 
 of some particular ball, but there has never been a surer indication 
 than the size of the bundle the Rio Grande girl had to carry home a 
 generation ago. 
 
 In England, as late as 1677, it was the custom for guests at chris- 
 tenings to carry home what they could not eat. (See Brand, " Pop. 
 Antiq.," vol. ii. p. 80, article "Christening," London, 1872.) 
 
 The origin of the cascaron is obscure ; in the light of evidence 
 now available it would be going too far to say that it was Arabic, 
 and yet only in that direction can any trace of its paternity be found. 
 
 At the marriage of Molmun, son of Haroun al Raschid, which 
 occurred at Wasit, a suburb of Bagdad, about 825 a. d., we read that 
 " balls of amber or musk were thrown among the attendant throngs. 
 . . . Coins of gold and silver, and eggs of amber woxt. also lavishly 
 cast about to be picked up by whoever would." (Arthur Oilman, 
 "The Story of the Saracens," p. 303, New York, 1887.) 
 
 The Mahomedans in Spain are reported to have had two, some say 
 four festivals corresponding to Easter. There was certainly one, the 
 Alfitra, at close of the Ramazan, and another, that of the Victims. 
 "During both these solemnities, profane and worldly follies had 
 been permitted to creep in — the people going about the streets 
 like madmen, casting oranges and other fruits at each other, and 
 every one besprinkling his neighbor with odorous waters." (Conde, 
 " Dom. Arabs in Spain," vol. iii. p. 263.) These " disorders " were 
 suppressed by Jusef in a. d. 1343. 
 
 There are no formal presentations at these Mexican parties be- 
 cause none are needed ; each guest knows his neighbor. Consid- 
 erable liberty of action is conceded, and all who so desire, men or 
 women, smoke, and there is much gossip and abuse of the neighbors 
 who are absent, and sometimes much carcajada or noisy laughter 
 (an Arabic word). Mexican courtesy attracts the respectful atten- 
 tion of every observer. It is not put on as a garment to be worn at 
 
I04 yournal of American Folk-Lore. 
 
 balls and on occasions of ceremony, but is ever present, and has 
 become as it were a second nature. Mexicans, in meeting, embrace 
 each other as the Moors and Arabs do. The proudest gentleman in 
 the land will take off his hat to return the salutation of the beggar 
 who begs a light for his cigaridto, or will beg his pardon in the name 
 of God when declining his supplication for charity. 
 
 CHRISTENINGS. 
 
 The Mexican comadre or gossip appears to the best advantage 
 when a new baby is to be admitted into the fold of the church. The 
 party having returned from the sanctuary, the house is thrown open 
 to friends, there are music, conversation, and dancing, with refresh- 
 ments to which all are made welcome, even the beggars on the 
 streets. 
 
 Conde remarks that hcLcer buenas fadas was the phrase used to 
 express the festival always held on giving a child its name, which 
 was done on the eighth day after its birth. ..." A part of the 
 food prepared for the occasion was then given to the poor." (Conde, 
 "Dom. Arabs in Spain," vol. i. p. 478.) 
 
 It should be borne in mind that name-^dcj^ not birtk-didiys, are cel- 
 brated along the Rio Grande ; invitations are extended for celebra- 
 tions on the day of the saint whose name is borne by the host ; and 
 thus it often happens that on the same evening one may have the 
 opportunity to enjoy the hospitality of several Juans, Anitas, or Gua- 
 dalupes, as the case may be. The greatest term of endearment that 
 can be given to a neighbor is tocallo, namesake. When the infant 
 son of Abdur-r-rhaman I. received the name of Hixem, " that auspi- 
 cious event was celebrated with many rejoicings, the king Abdur-r- 
 rhaman dispensing alms very liberally and giving food to the poor in 
 adundance." (Conde, vol. i. p. 182.) 
 
 COURTSHIP AND MARRIAGE. 
 
 Of the customs connected with courtship and weddings among 
 the Mexicans much of a most interesting nature might be written. 
 In an outline description of this nature nothing more than a refer- 
 ence to salient features is permissible. The relations between the 
 sexes being under strict surveillance among the Mexicans, young 
 men and women have not the same opportunities for becoming 
 acquainted as have been found of advantage in the United States. 
 
 AJoven who feels the first impulses of the tender passion has few 
 if any opportunities for meeting the object of his affections alone, 
 much less of conversing with her save in the presence of parent or 
 grim duena. 
 
 He may dance with her at parties, speak to her at christening, 
 
Language and Folk-Usage of the Rio Grande Valley. 105 
 
 kneel near her at mass or vespers, perhaps enjoy the bliss of sprink- 
 ling her with holy water, but his chief pleasure or his chief misery, 
 as one may choose to regard such matters, is to be found in " play- 
 ing the bear" {jiigando el oso, or oseando, as the term goes). The un- 
 fortunate young man takes station close to the lattice of the young 
 senorita, and there remains until by accident she approaches and 
 looks down upon him, and by accident drops a flower or a handker- 
 chief, — accidents of this kind are constantly happening in the best 
 Mexican families, — and then, animated by hope, he may venture 
 to send some female relative to sound the girl's parents as to their 
 disposition. 
 
 Among the rural Mexicans who adhere most obstinately to old 
 usages, a betrothal is an affair of some formality. The aspirant 
 makes evident the sincerity of his declaration by the tender of the 
 do7ieSy presents of some value, generally jewelry, which, if accepted, 
 give him the right to walk with the young lady and her family to 
 church and places of entertainment. 
 
 As the wedding day approaches, he buys the trousseau for the 
 bride. This custom is now dying out in all but the remote Mexican 
 districts, yet it is still noted in Cuba. 
 
 The parents of the bride generally provide a dowry and arrange a 
 wedding-feast which is as elaborate and bountiful as their means 
 will permit, and liquor in abundance may always be looked for. 
 The entertainment is most frequently held out of doors, the climate 
 favoring such a course, but the wedding itself, when possible, must 
 be held in the church. At the words in the ritual, " with all my 
 worldly goods," the bridegroom casts thirteen pieces of money upon 
 a plate held by one of the officiating priest's assistants. This money 
 is blessed by the celebrant, and restored to the donor, who replaces 
 it with its equivalent in coin of the realm and has the original pieces 
 made into 2cpulsera or bracelet for his bride. This custom, known 
 as the arras, is explained by local wiseacres to represent our Saviour 
 and the twelve apostles, but what our Saviour and the twelve apos- 
 tles, including Judas, have to do with a Mexican wedding would be 
 hard to say. 
 
 On the contrary, the ceremony is a Moorish one, and the name 
 arras itself is Moorish, given by Eguilaz y Yanguas in " Glosario," 
 with a definition sustaining the above description. 
 
 At a very elegant wedding in Laredo, Texas, the bride sent for all 
 the gentlemen present and graciously conferred upon each one a 
 rosebud from the bouquet which she had carried to the altar. 
 
 At another, in Saltillo, although the bridal couple and their imme- 
 diate attendants returned home in carriages, the spectators streamed 
 in procession on foot to the bride's house, where they were met by 
 
io6 Journal of American Folk- Lore. 
 
 an orchestra, and in a few minutes afterwards by a procession of 
 servants bearing platters in each of which was a roasted chicken 
 or duck, whose head had been replaced and gilded with an effect 
 decidedly barbaric and magnificent. 
 
 To compare all the above with Arabic or Moorish ceremonials, 
 extracts can be taken from excellent authorities ; thus, Cond6 says 
 that at the marriage of Abdelmelic and Habiba, a. d. 989, "the 
 wedding festival was held in the beautiful gardens of the Almunia." 
 ("Dom. Arabs in Spain," vol. ii. p. 13.) 
 
 A recent writer in "All the Year Round," describing a wedding 
 among the Kabyles of North Africa, has this to tell. The bride " is 
 led to the bridegroom to the accompaniment of more tambor music. 
 He opens the door, takes her by the hand, makes her sit by him on 
 the cushions, after which he lifts her veil, and for the first time looks 
 upon his wife's face. The lady says not a word to her husband until 
 he has made her a present, either of jewelry or gold pieces. The 
 next day there is a great deal of fritter-making in the new establish- 
 ment, for distribution among the various friends and relatives on 
 both sides." 
 
 The writer in commenting upon his own description adds : "Here 
 it is the girl's father who exacts a wedding portion." 
 
 Thus far there has been demonstrated a surprising similarity in 
 the existence of customs like the arras, wedding festivities out of 
 doors, and the eating of fritters corresponding to the bimuelos men- 
 tioned in foregoing pages. Among the " Arabs the marriage con- 
 tract might be only verbal ; but the better classes confirmed it before 
 the kadi, and for them the ceremonies of betrothal and espousal 
 were elaborate and splendid." (Coppee, "Hist. Conq. Spain," vol. 
 
 ii- P- 33I-) 
 
 That wine flowed as freely at the weddings of the Arab-Moors in 
 Spain as it does in those of the wealthy Mexicans of to-day is beyond 
 question. 
 
 That curious system, " marriage by capture," prevailed in almost 
 all primitive society, as may be learned by an examination of McLen- 
 non's "Primitive Marriage." It certainly prevailed among the Ara- 
 bians of early times. Oilman says that "the ferocious custom of 
 burying female offspring aUve as soon as born was followed, either 
 as considering women not worth bringing up, or from an exaggerated 
 sense of honor, as though fearing that the helpless ones might some 
 day be carried off by an enemy" (Arthur Oilman, "The Story of 
 the Saracens," p. 63, New York, Putnams, 1887), while Conde, 
 describing the marriage of Abdelmehc and Habiba, refers to " the 
 feigned defence made by the damsels " composing the retinue of 
 the bride. ("Dom. Arabs in Spain," vol. ii. p. 13.) He also speaks 
 
Lafiguage and Folk-Usage of the Rio Grande Valley. 107 
 
 of the "delightful music which sounded through the night." (Idem, 
 vol. ii. p. 13.) 
 
 A suggestion of this form of wife-capture could be found among 
 the Mexicans less than a generation ago, in the city of Tucson, Ari- 
 zona. 
 
 On Saint John's Day, or more strictly on the night of that day, the 
 young bucks of the city and vicinity, dressed in their best, and 
 mounted upon prancing plugs gayly caparisoned, rode up to the doors 
 of their dulcineas, where those blushing senoritas in their finest rai- 
 ment awaited the great honor of being lifted up on the pommel of 
 the saddle, where, firmly encircled by one stout arm of their cavaliers, 
 they enjoyed the eagerly sought privilege conceded for that occasion 
 only of riding up and down the streets unattended in the company 
 of a man. 
 
 As it happened, there were not enough girls or not enough horses 
 to go around, and some of the gay cavaliers had to enjoy themselves 
 as best they might on foot, and this they did by throwing firecrack- 
 ers at the horses of their luckier rivals as the latter, holding their 
 gentle burdens, cantered up and down the streets. Why there were 
 no necks or limbs broken will always remain one of those mysteries 
 for which no solution can be offered. 
 
 This knowledge of and love for fireworks and illuminations was 
 duly transmitted to Mexico and the Mexicans, and may be seen 
 reflected in the civic and religious celebrations of all the cities and 
 towns from the Rio Nueces to Tehuantepec. 
 
 Still another observance connected with St. John's Day on the 
 lower Rio Grande is that of taking a bath in the stream and putting 
 on new clothes. Here is something closely akin to the ceremonial 
 ablutions enjoined by the Prophet upon his followers. 
 
 MORTUARY CEREMONIES. 
 
 When little children died among the Mexicans, the body neatly 
 dressed in white, with a helmet of gilt paper, or else with a garland 
 of artificial flowers, was laid upon a board, or upon a temporary bier, 
 and borne to the church and thence to the grave by surviving com- 
 rades, preceded by musicians playing waltzes or soft, sad music. 
 
 Grown people were buried in much the same manner. The corpse 
 was not preceded by music, but it was laid upon a rude bier, clad in 
 its best apparel. Wood was extremely dear, and coffins were within 
 reach of only the very wealthy. The object seemed to be so to hurry 
 matters that the remains might be interred within less than twenty- 
 four hours after decease. The male mourners, wearing above their 
 elbows tiny bows of black crape, marched two and two, each bearing 
 a candle which was lit as the procession entered the church. The 
 
io8 Journal of American Folk-Lore. 
 
 women, also two by two, and bearing candles, followed after the 
 men, but their candles remained unlit. The evening after the fu- 
 neral they would meet in some designated house, light their candles, 
 and talk about the defunct and his virtues until the candles burned 
 away. On ranches at a distance from towns, rockets were sent up, 
 to warn the neighbors that the funeral was about to start, to ward 
 off evil influences, or for both purposes. 
 
 These mortuary ceremonies of the Mexicans, with only slight 
 allowance for time and distance, are found among the Moors to-day. 
 Speaking of the Moors of Tangiers, Miss Margaret Thompson says : 
 "They carry their dead to the grave with a triumphant march, 
 chanting all the way a joyous air. The bodies are buried without 
 coffins, wrapped in linen." ("A Scamper through Spain and Tan- 
 giers," p. 265, New York, 1892.) 
 
 Conde, when treating of the funerals of the Arabs in the first cen- 
 turies after their arrival in Spain, never mentions coffins, but always 
 speaks of the dead being carried on biers. The Spanish word for 
 coffin is the Arabic ataud, but that meant the plank on which the 
 corpse was carried. When he speaks of Christian funerals he always 
 mentions coffins. After the Moors had mingled with their former 
 foemen, and become their vassals, references will be found to their 
 use of coffins and caskets. 
 
 CUSTOMS IN CHURCHES. 
 
 Upon first entering a Mexican church, an American accustomed 
 to the comfortably, gayly dressed congregations of women of his 
 own section will be impressed by the absence of pews or seats of 
 any kind, and by the numbers of women who, closely wrapped in 
 black rebosos or tapalos, kneel on the floor of earth and cough inces- 
 santly during the service. 
 
 This uniform method of covering the heads and shoulders is Moor- 
 ish : " No maiden went to a mosque where there was not a place set 
 apart for the virgins ; and every woman was carefully wrapped up 
 and covered with her veil." (Conde, "Dom. Arabs in Spain," vol. 
 ii. p. 3, footnote.) 
 
 This custom became a matter of obligation under King Juzef, who 
 in A. D. 1343, ordered that when women entered mosques "all were 
 to be carefully veiled." (Conde, vol. iii. p. 262.) To enter a church 
 unveiled signified, during Moorish times, that a woman was a Chris- 
 tian. Such an act led to the detection of two young Moorish girls, 
 Sabagotha and Liliosa, who had secretly become Christians (a. d. 
 852). (Padre Florez, "Espana Sagrada," vol. x. p. 381.) 
 
 " The men very frequently, when impelled by an excess of devotion, 
 will pray stretched at full length, or bent low to the floor, or with 
 
Language and Folk-Usage of the Rio Grande Valley. 109 
 
 arms extended in form of a cross. This method of " prayer with 
 prostrations " is mentioned by Cond6, vol. ii. p. 6-^, and again in vol. 
 iii. p. 272, where he calls it aiiata. At the doors of Mexican 
 churches, in the republic of Mexico itself, are still to be found ven- 
 ders of wax tapers and small candles which are purchased by the pious 
 and burned in front of the altars, sometimes held by the devout sup- 
 pliant, sometimes placed upon the altar itself. 
 
 This practice was prevalent in Moorish Spain, where we read of 
 a youth " whose father was a lamplighter, or burner of tapers at the 
 shrines of saints in the great Aljama.''^ (Coppee, "History of 
 the Conq. of Spain by the Arab-Moors," vol. ii. p. 229.) As is well 
 known, there is sacred dancing in the Cathedral of Seville, tolerated 
 by the Papal authorities, on the feasts of the Immaculate Concep- 
 tion, Corpus Christi, and the last three days of the carnival. The 
 ten dancers wear costumes of the time of Philip II., and move to the 
 sound of castanets. In the time of Philip II., the Moors were still a 
 potent social element in and around Seville, the castanet was a 
 Moorish instrument of music, or at least they inherited it from 
 Carthaginians and Romans, and the feasts mentioned were as 
 much Moorish as they were Christian. 
 
 No dancing is held in any other church in Europe, Catholic or 
 Protestant, or in any in America, so far as known, excepting in that 
 of Madalena, Sonora, Mexico, where as late as 1873 the Yagui Indi- 
 ans, then at peace with the Mexicans, executed a stately dance to 
 the music of rattles on the feast-day of Saint Francis of Assisi, 
 October 4. Dancing in churches was prohibited by third Council of 
 Toledo {a. d. 589). "Que en las fiestas no se permitiesen danzas 
 ni cantares torpes," (Padre Florez, " Espana Sagrada," vol. vi. p. 
 144.) 
 
 ALMSGIVING, FASTING, PILGRIMAGES, ABLUTIONS. 
 
 " Prayer, fasting, and alms are the religious duties of a Mussul- 
 man," according to Gibbon, in "Decline and Fall," chap. 50. To 
 these he adds pilgrimages and ceremonial ablutions. 
 
 Conde tells the same story. Mahomed " commended the use of 
 certain practices of ablution and purification, enjoining likewise daily 
 prayers, almsgiving, and religious pilgrimages to the temple of 
 Alharem." (Conde, vol. i. p. 34.) Had the same ordinances been 
 given direct to the Mexicans, they could not be observed more strictly 
 than they are at the present day. Of prayer enough has been said. 
 
 1 Padre Florez mentions a Moorish prince, an ambassador to Queen Urraca, 
 who knelt at the shrine of St. James of Compostella, with a wax taper {ci7-io) in 
 hand to implore a cure for a tumor in his chest (a. d. 1122). {^Espana Sagrada, 
 vol. xix. p. 277.) 
 
no yottrnal of American Folk-Lore. 
 
 Of ceremonial ablutions it has been intimated that the annual lustra- 
 tion of the Mexicans in the Rio Grande on St. John's Day might be 
 regarded as having such a character. Pilgrimages in Mexico are 
 made with frequency to such shrines as Madalena, the chorro, which 
 is an old pagan place of worship, to Guadalupe, outside of the city of 
 Mexico, where the Aztecs in prehistoric ages adored their goddess 
 Tepeayac, to Agualeguas and many others. 
 
 To all these cities and towns, and to all others, such as Tucson, 
 when celebrating their saint's day, flock scores of petty merchants, 
 peddlers, buyers, sellers, tramps, cripples and beggars, confident of a 
 satisfactory harvest. Certain exemptions and commercial privileges 
 attached to these gatherings during the years of the Spanish vice- 
 regal rule, and the custom would seem to have been inbred. 
 
 Alms were distributed by the Moslem on Fridays. (Conde, vol. 
 ii. p. 134.) By the ordinances of King Juzef (a. d. 1243-1250) "the 
 believers were enjoined to employ the leisure of that day (Friday) in 
 visiting and relieving the poor." (Conde, vol. iii. p. 262.) 
 
 Friday, as is well understood, was the Mahomedan Sabbath. The 
 beggars of Mexico do not restrict their importunities to any one day, 
 but impartially distribute their favors, and at church doors, or za- 
 guanes of private mansions, from Monday morning until Saturday 
 night, whine their dolorous appeals for "a little alms for the love of 
 God." 
 
 A Mexican may give in a number of different ways. There is the 
 usual limosnita or alms to beggars, the regalo or ordinary present, 
 the recuerdo or souvenir, the dones (pi. of doii), gift made to affianced 
 wife, estrena Christmas gift, albricias (Arabic), present made to 
 bringer of glad tidings, aguinaldo or New Year's gift, a word which 
 has been shown to be allied to the French aguilanneuf and to em- 
 body the cry of the Keltic Druids at opening of the new year, and 
 propina much like our philopoena. 
 
 PENITENTES. 
 
 It might be well to say a word about the penitentes, or contrite 
 sinners, who only a few years ago publicly whipped and otherwise 
 mortified themselves in the streets of every village along the Rio 
 Grande and throughout the republic. They were of the very same 
 class as thQ Jlagelantes of Spain, and grew out of the same morbid 
 and atonic spirituality which had surrounded the Moorish sant07tes 
 with the halo of godliness. 
 
 In the church of St, Gines, in Madrid, in " the boveda or dark 
 vault, . . . during Lent, flagellants whip themselves, the sexton fur- 
 nishing the cats ; some have nine tails and are really stained with 
 blood. In the good old times of Philip IV. Spaniards whipped them- 
 
Language and Folk- Usage of the Rio Grande Valley. 1 1 1 
 
 selves publicly in the streets." (Richard Ford, "Hand-Book of 
 Spain," p. 79, London, 1882.) 
 
 Similar scenes have been enacted very recently in the old temple 
 of Atotonilco, and one of the disciplinas there employed is now in 
 the United States National Museum, Washington, D. C, and every 
 army officer who served on the Rio Grande a quarter of a century 
 ago can recall many remarkable incidents transpiring during Holy 
 Week. The power of the church has been exercised remorselessly 
 and in most of the villages effectually to stamp out this survival of 
 savagery and barbarism. But from time to time they are again heard 
 of and described. Within a few months, " Harper's Weekly " has 
 published Mr. D. J. Flynn's illustrated description of those seen by 
 him in Taos, New Mexico, at the head of the Rio Grande, which 
 region, it may be noted, is a hotbed of penitente-ism. Another 
 recent and lifelike article upon the same subject is from the pen of 
 Charles F. Lummis. 
 
 Madame Calderon de la Barca describes those seen by her in the 
 city of Mexico ("Life in Mexico," pp. 213, 214, London, 1843), and 
 Colonel John Hay, in his " CastiUan Days," speaks of them as still 
 existing in the outlying districts of Spain.^ 
 
 PHRASES AND CATCHWORDS. 
 
 From prayers in churches to prayers, ejaculations, and oaths in 
 conversation is an easy transition. The most ordinary prayer of 
 
 1 Flagellants. — M. I'Abbd Boileau, Docteur de la Sorbonne, in his VHistoire des 
 Flagellants, 2d, ed., Amsterdam, 1732, says that flagellation found no authority for 
 its existence in either the Old or New Testament, or in Patristic teachings, unless 
 as a punishment duly inflicted upon conviction for adultery, fornication, larceny, 
 or such offences. 
 
 The early Christians observed with honor the recklessness with which the 
 Romans beat their slaves, and recoiled with disgust from the voluntary flagellations 
 of the Lupercalia. From the time of St. Augustine, the lash was administered to 
 heretics and criminals. 
 
 There was no voluntary flagellation among the anchorites of the East. About 
 the year A. D. 1000, when the idea first began to take shape that the end of the 
 world was approaching, flagellants began to appear, and in 1047 or 1056 they 
 assumed an organization largely because their cause had been espoused by S. 
 Peter Damien, although no less an authority than Bruno, the grim Carthusian, 
 fought them with might and main. 
 
 These Flagellants were condemned by the Church, and almost suppressed, but 
 with the outbreak of the plague in the thirteenth century there was a recrudescence 
 of this fanatical idiocy which perpetuated it until the agitation of the Reformation 
 gave the ecclesiastical authorities more important matters to think about. The 
 parliament of Paris formally interdicted the Flagellants in 1601. During the 
 years of the plague, droves of Flagellants, numbering hundreds, marched through 
 Germany, Italy, and France, halting but one night in each village, and scourging 
 themselves three times a day. 
 
1 1 2 journal of American Folk-Lore. 
 
 Mexican life is one of Moorish origin, Ojald ! or Would to God ! that 
 is to say, Would to Allah ! The original of this is said to have been : 
 en schd allah, if God would. (G. Korting, Lat.-rom. Wort., 1891.) 
 
 Recognizing this as having been in its origin a prayer, and realiz- 
 ing that in the expressions, Ojald que sea ! and Ojald que fuei'e ! 
 (Would to God it may be ! and Would to God it might be !) it is con- 
 stantly on the lips of Mexican men and women, it is not too much 
 to assert that within the territorial limits of the United States to-day, 
 in the ratio of population, more prayers ascend to the prophet of the 
 Moslem than are offered to Jesus Christ. 
 
 This pious " God knows how that may be ! " of the Arabic chron- 
 iclers is literally translated into the Mexican Dios solo sabe ! 
 
 PROVERBS AND REFRAINS. 
 
 The dignified sedateness of Mexican conversation is spiced and 
 enlivened by an Attic salt of bright, pungent, and philosophical 
 refranes not a few of which seem to have a distinctly Moorish flavor, 
 but a full treatment of this part of the subject would fill a volume by 
 itself. 
 
 "But, besides the lexical tributes, we must include the forms of 
 thought and modes of proverbial expression of which the Spanish 
 is full and which are the vehicle of ' the wit and wisdom ' of Don 
 Quixote. The traveller in Spain, as he listens to the proverbs, in 
 the mouth of every peasant, seems transplanted to the land and 
 period of the Arabian Nights." (Coppee, " Hist. Conq. Spain," vol. 
 ii. p. 344.) 
 
 SUPERSTITIONS. 
 
 An attempt at an outline description of the popular superstitions 
 and folk-medicine of the Mexican population of the Rio Grande Val- 
 ley was published about one year ago in the Journal of American 
 Folk-Lore. At the present time nothing will be done beyond indi- 
 cating wherein certain of those superstitions had their analogues 
 among the Arab-Moors. Mahomed was a firm believer in the evil 
 eye. (See Gilman, " Story of the Saracens," p. 166.) 
 
 During thunder-storms it was narrated that sand was thrown in 
 the air to avert bad luck. At his first battle with the people of 
 Medina, " the prophet (Mahomed) started from his throne, mounted 
 his horse, and cast a handful of sand into the air." (Gibbon, "Decline 
 and Fall," chap. 50. See, also, "Medicine Men of the Apache," 
 Bourke.) 
 
 The dread of the bruja or witch indicates the fear which the Arab 
 had of the same class of malefactors. 
 
 The Mexican fear of cross-eyed or one-eyed men may embalm a 
 vague tradition of the conquest of Spain by Tarik el Tuerto (Tarik 
 
Language and Folk- Usage of the Rio Grande Valley. 1 1 3 
 
 the one-eyed or twisted-eyed). Richard Ford mentions the Roman 
 emperor Theodosius (a Spaniard by birth) and the great Moorish 
 king Abdu-r-rahman as having also been ttierto. 
 
 King Juzef, in A. d. 1343, "forbade the circulation through the 
 streets and markets of those who put up prayers for rain. . . . He 
 commanded that when excess of drought or want of rain should 
 appear to necessitate prayer, those who made that offering should go 
 forth to the fields with much devotion and humility, entreating par- 
 don many times for their sins, and uttering the following words with 
 sincerity and cordial devotion." (Here follows a long prayer which, 
 with appropriate modifications, could be recited to-day in Taos or 
 Rio Grande city. (See Conde, vol. iii. pp. 263, 264.) 
 
 " The last two suras of the Koran . . . are written out and worn 
 as amulets or committed to memory and repeated as charms." (Gil- 
 man, "The Story of the Saracens," p. 167, New York, 1887.) 
 
 This , is done every day on the Rio Grande, substituting verses 
 from the Bible, or prayers to saints for the suras. 
 
 The Arabs have a superstition that " prosperity is with sorrel 
 horses." Mishkat-el-Masabreb H., quoted by Coppee, " Conq. of 
 Spain by the Arab-Moors," vol. i. p. 8, Boston, Little, Brown & Co., 
 1881. 
 
 Compare with this the Mexican refran, — 
 
 Alazan tostddo, 
 
 Antes muerto que consado. 
 
 The toasted sorrel [horse] 
 Will fall dead before he '11 tire. 
 
 TREATMENT OF THE SICK. 
 
 The Mexicans are pronounced fatalists; few Mahomedans could 
 excel them in that direction. If one of a family of children be taken 
 down with the smallpox, the mother will put the others to bed with 
 it, and if they also be stricken will resignedly murmur, "Dios lo 
 quiere," God wills it. The Arab use of hasheesh (see " Alhaxix " and 
 "Bange" in Eguilaz y Yanguas, "Glosario") is paralleled by the Mex- 
 ican use of the tolvaichi, a plant also of the hemp family. Tolvaichi, 
 it is said, can make people crazy, and there are some Mexicans who 
 affect to believe that the unfortunate Carlota was loco'ed by having 
 it administered to her in coffee. Some confidence in the remedial 
 powers of United States Army surgeons has been developed in the 
 minds of educated Mexicans during the past generation, but the 
 ignorant masses still consult the curanderas, who are ostensibly 
 herbalists, but in reality deal in all sorts of charms and trash. 
 
 Mexicans of this class place more reliance upon pilgrimages, 
 
 VOL. IX. — NO. 33. 8 
 
114 journal of A merican Folk-Lore. 
 
 :amulets, talismans, novenas, candles, and aids of this kind than in 
 all the medicaments and all the physicians in the world. 
 
 MIRACLE WORKERS. 
 
 The Rio Grande is the land of the supernatural. The Mexican 
 government has had its share of trouble in suppressing insurrections 
 incited by rehgious enthusiasts. Only three years since, troops in 
 solid battalions were sent to Tomasichi in the Sierra Madre on the 
 line between Chihuahua and Sonora, to reduce to reason and obe- 
 dience to law the untamed enthusiasts who rallied round a miracle- 
 working "Santa Teresa." 
 
 The " San Pedro " of the town of Olmos, whose therapeutical 
 antics were alluded to in "The American Congo," paid a visit to the 
 highly refined and intellectual city of San Antonio, Texas, only last 
 spring, and as the local papers stated was called upon by "thousands 
 of people," while "letters and telegrams began pouring in upon him 
 from all quarters." ^ 
 
 Such prophets, semi-prophets, and inspired healers correspond 
 closely to the Mahdis who since a. d. 685 have arisen periodically 
 among the Moslems ; have under the name of the alnioravides and 
 ahnohades twice regenerated Spain, which was supposed to be grow- 
 ing lukewarm in the interests of Islam, and have within our own 
 generation driven the English out of the Soudan. (See Cond^, 
 " Dom. Arabs in Spain," vol. ii. p. 354; Oilman, "Story of the 
 Saracens," p. 414.) 
 
 LAWS AND REGULATIVE SYSTEM. 
 
 It is not to be expected that the regulative system of Mexico should 
 preserve anything but the laws and decrees issuing from time to 
 time from the Spanish crown direct, or intermediately through the 
 viceroys. 
 
 The basis of this system should be sought for in the antique 
 fueros in the " Siete Partidas," and the recopilaciSnes, inspired by the 
 humane sentiments in the last will of Isabella the Catholic. Never- 
 theless, some few relics exist which speak plainly of the presence 
 and influence of the Arab-Moor. 
 
 For example, the presiding judge in little Mexican communities is 
 still designated by the Arabic name of alcalde, and his executive 
 
 ^ As these notes reach a conclusion, the press dispatches report the presence in 
 Denver, Colorado of one Schlatter, a "divine healer" who has also been sur- 
 rounded by thousands of devout admirers. Little did the projectors of the Union 
 Pacific Railway imagine, thirty-five years ago, that special trains would in our day 
 run over that superb highway of travel carrying the rich and credulous to be 
 "healed " by such an impostor as Schlatter ; but the world moves. 
 
Language and Folk- Usage of the Rio Grande Valley. 1 1 5 
 
 ofificer is called in some places the alguazil, in others the xerife 
 (both Arabic names), and a man entering the court might do so in 
 his shirt sleeves, but if he kept on his spurs he became liable to pun- 
 ishment for contempt, a reminiscence of the Arab idea of the neces- 
 sity of taking off the shoes before entering a holy place. 
 
 Irrigation being essentially an Arab-Moorish introduction into 
 Spain, there should be found traces of its parentage in the nomen- 
 clature and rules governing it. And this is so. Not only are the 
 great irrigating ditches known as acequias and zanjas (Arabic words), 
 but the officer in charge is called the acequiador or zmijero, and is 
 clothed with peculiar powers. Whenever the ditches break, his rule 
 is supreme and overrides that of alcalde, priest, or doctor ; he can 
 impose corves of labor upon the population and make everything 
 bend to his will. In the distribution of the water, he gives first to 
 the oldest settler, without regard to the position of his fields along 
 the line of the ditch. When farms and pasturage are subdivided, 
 the Mexican rule is to have this so done that each porcion shall have 
 free access to ditch or river, and on the Rio Grande there are such 
 porciones, suitable principally for grazing, which are fifteen miles 
 deep, with a frontage of one hundred varas or a little over 300 feet 
 along the acequia tnadre. 
 
 Peonage, or slavery for debt, has only within the present genera- 
 tion been abolished in Mexico and the Mexican parts of the United 
 States. The Mexican peon was not a slave in the English interpre- 
 tation of the term ; he had many privileges and full protection in 
 most of his rights; was always treated with kindness, and corre- 
 sponded fully to the Arabic mauli mentioned by Coppee, "Hist. 
 Spain," vol. i. p. 63, and Stanley Lane-Poole, " Story of the Saracens," 
 p. 48. 
 
 COMMERCE, 
 
 Among the Pueblo Indians of Arizona and New Mexico, the word 
 for borax (used as a flux by their silversmiths) is tinea. This word 
 came to them from the Moors through the Spaniards. It is a Thi- 
 betan word, and tincal is still an article of Thibetan export. (W. W. 
 Rockhill, "Land of the Lamas," pp. 272 and 339, New York, 1891, 
 footnote.) It was used by Arab silversmiths, according to Eguilaz y 
 Yanguas. These same Pueblo Indians learned the art of knitting 
 from the Spaniards. The men do the knitting, just as they do in 
 Spain and in Mahomedan countries to-day. In Leon, in Spain, "the 
 men spin and the women delve." (Richard Ford, Hand-Book of 
 Spain," vol. i. p. 201, London, 1882.) 
 
 Bayard Taylor saw Turkish men knitting in Phrygia, in Asia 
 Minor. (" Lands of the Saracens," p. 282, New York, Putnams, 
 1873.) 
 
 yohn G. Bourke. 
 
1 1 6 journal of American Fo Ik-Lore. 
 
 Editor's Note. — The printed form of this article never met the eyes of its au- 
 thor. The President of the American Folk-Lore Society died at Philadelphia, 
 June 8, 1896. Of the irreparable loss which his departure will be to the Society, 
 and of the grief which it will bring to many devoted friends, this is not the place 
 to speak. The life and services of Captain Bourke will receive memorial mention 
 in another part of the present number.