If the wife thinks her husband long in bringing the
evening meal, she has informed me, a word with Saint Anthony is
sufficient, and she hears the sound of his horse's hoofs.
Saint
Anthony seems to be useful on many occasions of distress. One evening
I called at a rancho made of dry thistle-stalks bound together with
hide and thatched with reeds, Finding the inmates very hospitable, I
stayed there two or three hours to rest. Coming out of the house
again, I found to my dismay that during our animated gossip my horse
had broken loose and left me. Now the loss of a horse is too trivial
a matter to interest Anthony the saint, but a horse having saddle and
bridle attached to him makes it quite a different matter, for these
often cost ten times the price of the horse. One of the saint's
especial duties is to find a lost saddled horse, if the owner or
interested one only promises to burn a candle in his honor. The night
was very dark, and no sign of the animal was to be seen. Mine host
laid his ear to the ground and listened, then, leaping on his horse,
he galloped into the darkness, from whence he brought my lost animal.
I did not learn until afterwards that Mrs. Jesus, for such was the
woman's name, had sought the help of Saint Anthony on my behalf. I am
sure she lost her previous good opinion of me when I thanked her
husband but did not offer a special colored candle to her saint.
Among these strange people I commenced a school, and had the joy of
teaching numbers of them to read the Spanish Bible. Boys and girls
came long distances on horseback, and, although some of them had
perhaps never seen a book before, I found them exceedingly quick to
learn. In four or five months the older ones were able to read any
ordinary chapter. In arithmetic they were inconceivably dull, and
after three months' tuition some of them could not count ten.
I have said the saints are greatly honored among these people. My
Christmas cards generally found their way to adorn their altars.
Every house has its favorite, and some of these are regarded as
especially clever in curing sickness. It being a very unhealthful,
low-lying district where my school was, I contracted malarial fever,
and went to bed very sick. Every day some of the children would come
to enquire after me, but Celestino, one of the larger boys, came one
morning with a very special message from his mother. This
communication was to the effect that they did not wish the school-
teacher to die, he being "rather a nice kind of a man and well
liked." Because of this she would be pleased to let me have her
favorite saint. This image I could stand at the head of my bed, and
its very presence would cure me. When I refused this offer and smiled
at its absurdity, the boy thought me very strange. To be so wise in
some respects, and yet so ignorant as to refuse such a chance, was to
him incomprehensible. The saints, I found, are there often lent out
to friends that they may exercise their healing powers, or rented out
to strangers at so much a day, When they are not thus on duty, but in
a quiet corner of the hut, they get lonely. The woman will then go
for a visit, taking her saint with her, either in her arms or tied to
the saddle. This image she will place with the saint her host owns,
and they will talk together and teach one another. A saint is
supposed to know only its own particular work, although one named
Santa Rita is said to be a worker of impossibilities. Some of them
are only very rudely carved images, dressed in tawdry finery. I have
sometimes thought that a Parisian doll of modern make, able to open
and close its eyes, etc., would in their esteem be even competent to
raise the dead! [Footnote: Writing of Spanish American Romanism,
Everybody's Magazine says: "To the student of human nature, which
means the study of evil as well as good, this religious body is of
absorbing interest. One would look to find these enthusiasts
righteous and virtuous in their daily life; but, apart from the
annual week of penance, their religion influences them not at all,
and on the whole the members of the Brotherhood constitute a
desperate class, dangerous to society."]
In cases of sickness very simple remedies are used, and not a few
utterly nonsensical. To cure pains in the stomach they tie around
them the skin of the comadreka, a small, vile-smelling animal. This
they told me was a sovereign remedy. If the sufferer be a babe, a
cross made on its stomach is sufficient to perfectly cure it. I have
seen seven pieces of the root of the white lily, which there grows
wild, tied around the neck of an infant in order that its teeth might
come with greater promptitude and less pain. A string of dog's teeth
serves the same purpose. To cure a bad wound, the priest will be
called in that he may write around the sore some Latin prayer
backwards. Headache is easily cured by tying around the head the
cast-off skin of a snake. Two puppies are killed and bound one on
each side of a broken limb. If a charm is worn around the neck no
poison can be harmful. For a sore throat it is sufficient to
expectorate in the fire three times, making a cross. Lockjaw is
effectually stopped by tying around the sufferer's jaws the strings
from a virgin's skirt; and they say also that powdered excrement of a
dog, taken in a glass of water, cures the smallpox patient,
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