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prise that he indicates the year
1950 as the date of the "battle
of wi-Id beasts" that is to rage about
the revealed secret. There is also
this suggestive passage: "I want
only one thing: that in God's good
time, the enemies of our last king
shall know that he was not lost,
nor devoured by wild animals, but
was entombed like a true gentle–
man and the king of our Mexican
nation. Even though their history
is silent about our beloved king, he
is nonetheless with us, his dust and
his ashes are the very honor of
our Fatherland."
Is it not possible that this ardent
patriot might have acted to real–
ize, himself, the dream that
haunted his whole life?
Ichcateopan
I was recently commissioned by
the National Institute of Anthro–
pology to go to Ichcateopan to ob–
serve the ceremonies on the Day of
the Dead.
One arrives in the town after
three hours driving up a road cut
out of the rock that is just wide
enough for a car. The last twenty
kilometers are little more than
a goat's path that goes straight up
the side of the mountain; it takes
two hours to negotiate this dis–
tance. Apparently bottomless pre–
cipices line the road, and on some
turns the rear wheels of the car
seem to hang
in
the air. One of
the proofs of the authenticity of
the bones, I was told,
is
that not
one of the many thousands of pil–
grims to their shrine has had an
accident on this road.
The town itself has the secret
and withdrawn air that one might
expect in such an isolated place.
It
was All Saints' Night, and
they had begun already to cele–
brate the Day of the Dead. The
streets were stirring.
In
the moon–
light I made out little figures
moving about in graceful evolu–
tions: those in white were men,
those
in
black, women.
I approached one of those
splashes of golden light that were
the only illumination in the streets,
and I found myself in front of a
room, opened wide to the street,
in which they had constructed the
Offering for the soul of a dead
relative. At the door of the house,
a path had been made of yeIlow–
orange petals to guide the soul to
the altar set up in its honor. On
the altar, a glass of consecrated
wine, a glass of holy water, and a
glass filled with flour, flanked by
rolls baked in the forms of domes–
tic animals like horses and dogs.
A!t
the foot of the altar, a square
of moss decorated with flower–
petal designs, on which friends will
place their memorial offerings.
These are little baskets covered
with richly embroidered napkins
and containing bread, fruit or flow–
ers. At dawn tomorrow, after the
departure of the soul, each will
come to reclaim his basket, whose
