MEXICAN COSTUMES.
In the valley of Mexico the natives wear the ichapilli, or a sort of shirt without sleeves, made of white and blue striped cotton, which reaches to the knees and is gathered round the waist with a belt. This is frequently the only garment worn by the aborigines of the Mexican valley. In lieu of the ancient feather ornaments for the head, they now use large felt or straw hats, the rim of which is about nine inches in width; or they bind round the head a colored handkerchief. Most of the men and women go barefooted, and those who have coverings for their feet, use the cacles, or huaraches, (sandals) made of tanned leather and tied with thongs to the ankles. The dress of the women has undergone even less change than that of the men, since the time of the Spanish conquest. Many of them wear over the ichapilli a cotton or woolen cloth, bound by a belt just above the hips; this answers the purpose of a petticoat; it is woven in stripes of dark colors or embellished with figures. The ichapilli is white, with figures worked on the breast, and is longer than that worn by the men. In Puebla the women DRESS IN MICHOACAN. wear very narrow petticoats and elegant quichemels covering the breast and back and embroidered all over with silk and worsted. In the state of Vera Cruz and other parts of the tierra caliente the men's apparel consists of a short white cotton jacket or a dark-colored woolen tunic, with broad open sleeves fastened round the waist with a sash, and short blue or white breeches open at the sides near the knee; these are a Spanish innovation, but they continue to wear the square short cloak, tilma or tilmatli, with the end tied on one of the shoulders or across the breast. Sometimes a pair of shorter breeches made of goat or deer skin are worn over the cotton ones, and also a jacket of the same material. The women wear a coarse cotton shift with large open sleeves, often worked about the neck in bright colored worsted, to suit the wearer's fancy; a blue woolen petticoat is gathered round the waist, very full below, and a blue or brown rebozo is used as a wrapper for the shoulders. Sometimes a muffler is used for the head and face.900 They bestow great care on their luxuriant hair, which they arrange in two long braids that fall from the back of the head, neatly painted and interwoven with worsted of lively colors, and the ends tied at the waist-band or joined behind; others bind the braids tightly round the head, and occasionally add some wild flowers.901 In the tierra fria, a thick dark woolen blanket with a hole in the centre through which passes the head protects the wearer during the day from the cold and rain, and serves at night for a covering and often for the bed itself. This garment has in some places taken the place of the tilmatli. Children are kept in a nude state until they are eight or ten years old, and infants are enveloped in a coarse cotton cloth, leaving the head and limbs exposed. The Huicholas of Jalisco have a peculiar dress; the men wear a short tunic made of coarse brown or blue woolen fabric, tightened at the waist with a girdle hanging down in front and behind, and very short breeches of poorly dressed goat or deer skin without hair, at the lower edges of which are strung a number of leathern thongs. Married men and women wear straw hats with high pointed crowns and broad turned-up rims; near the top is a narrow and handsomely woven band of many colors, with long tassels. Their long bushy hair is secured tightly round the crown of the head with a bright woolen ribbon. Many of the men do up the hair in queues with worsted ribbons, with heavy tassels that hang below the waist.902 De Laet, describing the natives of Jalisco early in the seventeenth century, speaks of square cloths made of cotton and maguey tied on the right or left shoulder, and small pebbles or shells strung together as necklaces. Mota Padilla, in his history of New Galicia, says that the Chichimecs at Xalostitlan, in 1530, went naked. The inhabitants of Alzatlan about that time adorned themselves with feathers. In Zacualco, the common dress of the women about the same period, particularly widows, was the huipil, made of fine cotton cloth, generally black. The natives of the province of Pánuco, for many years after the Spanish Conquest, continued to go naked; they pulled out the beard, perforated the nose and ears, and, filing their teeth to a sharp point, bored holes in them and dyed them black. The slayer of a human being used to hang a piece of the skin and hair of the slain at the waist, considering such things as very valuable ornaments. Their hair they dyed in various colors, and wore it in different forms. Their women adorned themselves profusely, and braided their hair with feathers. Sahagun, speaking of the Matlaltzincas, says that their apparel was of cloth made from the maguey; referring to the Tlahuicas, he mentions among their faults that they used to go overdressed; and of the Macoaques, he writes: that the oldest women as well as the young ones paint themselves with a varnish called tecocavitl, or with some colored stuff, and wear feathers about their arms and legs. The Tlascaltecs in 1568 wore cotton-cloth mantles painted in various fine colors. The inhabitants of Cholula, according to Cortés, dressed better than the Tlascaltecs; the better class wearing over their other clothes a garment resembling the Moorish cloak, yet somewhat different, as that of Cholula had pockets, but in the cloth, the cut, and the fringe, there was much resemblance to the cloak worn in Africa. Old Spanish writers tell us that the natives of Michoacan made much use of feathers for wearing-apparel and for adorning their bodies and heads. At their later religious festivals, both sexes appear in white, the men with shirt and trowsers, having a band placed slantingly across the breast and back, tied to a belt round the waist, and on the head a small red cloth arranged like a turban, from which are pendent scarlet feathers, similar to those used by the ancient Aztec warriors. The man is also adorned with a quantity of showy beads, and three small mirrors, one of which is placed on his breast, another on his back, and the third invariably on his forehead. At his back he carries a quiver, and in his hand a bow, adorned with bright colored artificial flowers, or it may be the Aztec axe, so painted and varnished as to resemble flint. At the present time, a native woman, however poor, still wears a necklace of coral or rows of red beads. The unmarried women of Chilpanzinco used to daub their faces with a pounded yellow flower. In Durango, the natives were accustomed to rub their swarthy bodies with clay of various colors, and paint reptiles and other animals thereon.903
The dwellings of the Wild Tribes of Central Mexico vary with climate and locality. In the lowlands, sheds consisting of a few poles stuck in the ground, the spaces between filled with rushes, and the roof covered with palm-leaves, afforded sufficient shelter. In the colder highlands they built somewhat more substantial houses of trunks of trees, tied together with creeping plants, the walls plastered with mud or clay, the roof of split boards kept in place with stones. In treeless parts, houses were constructed of adobe or sun-dried bricks and stones, and the interior walls covered with mats; the best houses were only one story high, and the humbler habitations too low to allow a man to stand erect. The entire house constituted but one room, where all the family lived, sleeping on the bare ground. A few stones placed in the middle of the floor, served as a fireplace where food was cooked. In Vera Cruz there is a separate small hut for cooking purposes. The wild nomadic Chichimecs lived in caverns or fissures of rocks situated in secluded valleys, and the Pames contented themselves with the shade afforded by the forest-trees.904
FOOD AND AGRICULTURE.
Corn, beans, tomatoes, chile, and a variety of fruits and vegetables constitute the chief subsistence of the people, and in those districts where the banana flourishes, it ranks as an important article of food. The natives of Vera Cruz and Tamaulipas gather large quantities of the pitahaya, by means of an osier basket attached to a long pole; round the brim are arranged several forks, for the purpose of detaching the fruit, which then drops into the basket. From the blossoms and buds they make a ragout, and also grind the seeds for bread. From the sea and rivers they obtain a plentiful supply of fish, and they have acquired from childhood a peculiar habit of eating earth, which is said to be injurious to their physical development. It has been stated that in former days they used human flesh as food.
The Otomís and tribes of Jalisco cultivated but little grain, and consumed that little before it ripened, trusting for a further supply of food to the natural productions of the soil and to game, such as rabbits, deer, moles, and birds, and also foxes, rats, snakes and other reptiles. Corn-cobs they ground, mixed cacao with the powder, and baked the mixture on the fire. From the lakes in the valley of Mexico they gathered flies' eggs, deposited there