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He was mild in manner, gentle in speech, fond of brilliant plans and schemes, all of which, however, were to be put in operation to-morrow and not to-day. It was with difficulty that we impressed upon him our necessity. We told him that we wanted animals to carry us to Papalo.
At last our animals appeared. They had been sent from Papalo, and we made arrangements, as we supposed, for using them through to Cuicatlan. The animals arrived at 9:30 in the morning and the mozo with them reported that the roads were bad from the constant rains of the past several days.
Long before we reached Papalo, Manuel and Louis were on foot, rather than longer submit to the torture of riding their little burros. As we neared the town, we were surprised to find a cloud effect almost as fine as that near Juquila in the Mixe country. Had it had clearly defined banks on both sides, its resemblance to a cataract would have been complete.
There were scarce three hours of daylight in the afternoon, and night set in chilly and damp. Meantime, the secretario, the segundo, the presidente and the topils, all had disappeared. In vain we urged that arrangements should be made for fuel, for beds, and for a mozo, whom we had ordered should be supplied to accompany the man from Papalo back to that town with the horses.
Nowhere else have women and children showed so great a fear of us and our work. From the moment that I showed an interest in the mapaho, the beating of cotton ceased, and the village was quiet. At no time during our stay did women or children come to the town-house. Shortly after sending back our horses to Papalo, we found that there were no animals for riding in San Juan Zautla.
At two o'clock, Lucrezia, attired as a fiancee, and accompanied by her two brothers, the Dukes of Valentinois and Squillace, issued from the Vatican, followed by all the nobility of Rome, and proceeded to the church of the Madonna del Papalo, where the Duke of Gandia and Cardinal Gian Borgia were buried, to render thanks for this new favour accorded to her house by God; and in the evening, accompanied by the same cavalcade, which shone the more brightly under the torchlight and brilliant illuminations, she made procession through the whale town, greeted by cries of "Long live Pope Alexander VI! Lang live the Duchess of Ferrara!" which were shouted aloud by heralds clad in cloth of gold.
This was sheer blackmail, because there had been no misunderstanding in the matter, and a liberal price had been paid. After wrangling for an hour, we shook the dust of Papalo literally from our feet, and started to walk to Cuicatlan, telling the town authorities that our burdens must be taken by mozos to the cabecera before three o'clock, and that we should pay nothing for the service.
He proposed sending to-morrow to those towns, and assured us that, at the end of a week's time, we would have all the subjects we needed. So, when we suggested that this, too, was loss of time, he had other brilliant plans, all quite as useless. With the utmost difficulty we finally succeeded in getting him to arrange for animals to go to Papalo. From the very start, the road was up-hill.
In reply, he told us that Papalo was but a poor town, and he outlined a journey the traveling alone in which would occupy some eight or ten days. When we assured him that we had no time for such an enterprise, he said that it would be much better for the towns to come to us in Cuicatlan.
We had hoped to start our man from Papalo back with our horses early; the officials had promised that the mozo to accompany him should be ready; but, of course, neither breakfast nor mozo was to be seen. So we again started for the secretario's house. The secretario himself was lying drunk in bed, and the segundo was almost as bad. In vigorous words I made known my dissatisfaction.
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