Story Stats:
Published: 1927; Word Count: about 5,310;
Reading Time: about 27 minutes silently, about 41 minutes aloud
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| An aerial view of Acoma Pueblo on its mesa; the church is at the left center (Marshall Henrie, Wikipedia) |
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Skip to:
- The Story: Part 1 - The Rock
- The Story: Part 2 - The Legend of Fray Balthazar
- The Characters
- Summary
- Questions
Her archbishop, Jean-Marie Latour, is a fictionalized version of the real French cleric, Jean Baptiste Lamy, who built the Romanesque Revival-style Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi in Santa Fe between 1869 and 1886. The book also features, as foil to the austere Latour, Lamy's assistant, Joseph Projectus Machebeuf (later the first Bishop of Denver) as the earthy Joseph Vaillant.
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| A statue of Archbishop Lamy stands in front of the cathedral he built. (author photo) |
While the career of the bishop-then-archbishop Latour and his building of the cathedral provides a framework, the "novel" can fairly be characterized as a gossipy string of more-or-less free-standing descriptions, anecdotes, and legends. I have chosen two of these: a description of the bishop's visit to Acoma Pueblo--a little over 100 miles southwest of his seat at Santa Fe--followed by a legend about Fray Baltazar Montoya who supposedly served that pueblo in around 1730. (I can find no evidence that a priest by that name ever served Acoma--it's a legend from the ground up.) These constitute Parts 3 ("The Rock") and 4 ("The Legend of Fray Baltazar") of the book's third chapter, "The Mass at Acoma."
I am calling them "Part 1" and Part 2" of this cobbled-together story I am calling "Acoma."
A few quick notes about the "real" Acoma before we get started on the text:
- The accent is on the first syllable: AH-koh-muh
- Wiki says the English name was borrowed from Spanish, which in turn was borrowed from a rendering of the people's own word for themselves. The meaning is unclear: "Some tribal authorities connect it to the similar word háák’u, 'preparedness, place of preparedness,'" but "tribal elders assert that it means 'place that always was,' while outsiders say it means 'people of the white rock.'"
- It's claimed that the Acoma have continuously occupied the area for over 2000 years, making it one of the oldest continuously inhabited communities in the United States.
- Although the 2010 United States Census says 4,989 people identified as members of the Acoma Pueblo tribe, only around 30 of those live on the mesa--called Old Acoma or "Sky City"--and the others reside in three nearby communities (Acomita, Anzac, and McCartys) or are scattered in a diaspora.
- "Sky City" receives around 55,000 tourists annually (I've been there several times).
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- Read more about Death Comes for the Archbishop , Acoma Pueblo, and Willa Cather at Wikipedia
- Read the entire novel FREE online
"Acoma," from Death Comes for the Archbishop by Willa Cather
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| (adapted from a public domain image at Wikimedia) |
Part 1: THE ROCK
A. The Way to Acoma
[1] AFTER early Mass the next morning Father Latour and his guide rode off across the low plain that lies between Laguna and Acoma. In all his travels the Bishop had seen no country like this. From the flat red sea of sand rose great rock mesas, generally Gothic in outline, resembling vast cathedrals. They were not crowded together in disorder, but placed in wide spaces, long vistas between. This plain might once have been an enormous city, all the smaller quarters destroyed by time, only the public buildings left--piles of architecture that were like mountains. The sandy soil of the plain had a light sprinkling of junipers, and was splotched with masses of blooming rabbit brush--that olive-coloured plant that grows in high waves like a tossing sea, at this season covered with a thatch of bloom, yellow as gorse, or orange like marigolds.
- the next morning: Latour had chosen to camp out north of Laguna Pueblo, after meeting the Governor there.
- mesas: a sort of flat-topped hill or mountain common in the southwestern U.S.
[2] This mesa plain had an appearance of great antiquity, and of incompleteness; as if, with all the materials for world-making assembled, the Creator had desisted, gone away and left everything on the point of being brought together, on the eve of being arranged into mountain, plain, plateau. The country was still waiting to be made into a landscape.
[3] Ever afterward the Bishop remembered his first ride to Acoma as his introduction to the mesa country. One thing which struck him at once was that every mesa was duplicated by a cloud mesa, like a reflection, which lay motionless above it or moved slowly up from behind it. These cloud formations seemed to be always there, however hot and blue the sky. Sometimes they were flat terraces, ledges of vapour; sometimes they were dome-shaped, or fantastic, like the tops of silvery pagodas, rising one above another, as if an oriental city lay directly behind the rock. The great tables of granite set down in an empty plain were inconceivable without their attendant clouds, which were a part of them, as the smoke is part of the censer, or the foam of the wave.
[4] Coming along the Santa Fé trail, in the vast plains of Kansas, Father Latour had found the sky more a desert than the land; a hard, empty blue, very monotonous to the eyes of a Frenchman. But west of the Pecos all that changed; here there was always activity overhead, clouds forming and moving all day long. Whether they were dark and full of violence, or soft and white with luxurious idleness, they powerfully affected the world beneath them. The desert, the mountains and mesas, were continually re-formed and re-coloured by the cloud shadows. The whole country seemed fluid to the eye under this constant change of accent, this ever-varying distribution of light.
- west of the Pecos: on the western side of a river that runs from north-central New Mexico into Texas. The phrase is sometimes used to mean "the Western U.S."
- they powerfully affected the world beneath them: A famous 1934 book on southwestern New Mexico by transplanted easterner Ross Calvin makes this point in its very title: Sky Determines.
[5] Jacinto interrupted these reflections by an exclamation.
- Jacinto: the 26-year-old Indian guide accompanying the Bishop on his journey to Acoma
[6] "Acoma!" He stopped his mule.
[7] The Bishop, following with his eye the straight, pointing Indian hand, saw, far away, two great mesas. They were almost square in shape, and at this distance seemed close together, though they were really some miles apart.
- they were really some miles apart: Two and a half, according to Google Maps
[8] "The far one"--his guide still pointed.
[9] The Bishop's eyes were not so sharp as Jacinto's, but now, looking down upon the top of the farther mesa from the high land on which they halted, he saw a flat white outline on the grey surface--a white square made up of squares. That, his guide said, was the pueblo of Acoma.
- pueblo: an Indian village
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| 1896 view of the "Enchanted Mesa" (La Mesa Encantada) in the center background, from the roof of the church at Acoma (a ruined bell tower is in the foreground) (public domain) |
B. Approaching the Mesa
[10] Riding on, they presently drew rein under the Enchanted Mesa, and Jacinto told him that on this, too, there had once been a village, but the stairway which had been the only access to it was broken off by a great storm many centuries ago, and its people had perished up there from hunger.
[11] But how, the Bishop asked him, did men first think of living on the top of naked rocks like these, hundreds of feet in the air, without soil or water?
[12] Jacinto shrugged. "A man can do whole lot when they hunt him day and night like an animal. Navajos on the north, Apaches on the south; the Acoma run up a rock to be safe."
- Navajos... Apaches: two closely-related native American tribes that entered the region of Acoma long after the Pueblo people, Being nomadic, they posed a threat to the settled communities.
[13] All this plain, the Bishop gathered, had once been the scene of a periodic man-hunt; these Indians, born in fear and dying by violence for generations, had at last taken this leap away from the earth, and on that rock had found the hope of all suffering and tormented creatures--safety. They came down to the plain to hunt and to grow their crops, but there was always a place to go back to. If a band of Navajos were on the Acoma's trail, there was still one hope; if he could reach his rock--Sanctuary! On the winding stone stairway up the cliff, a handful of men could keep off a multitude. The rock of Acoma had never been taken by a foe but once--by Spaniards in armour. It was very different from a mountain fastness; more lonely, more stark and grim, more appealing to the imagination. The rock, when one came to think of it, was the utmost expression of human need; even mere feeling yearned for it; it was the highest comparison of loyalty in love and friendship. Christ Himself had used that comparison for the disciple to whom He gave the keys of His Church. And the Hebrews of the Old Testament, always being carried captive into foreign lands--their rock was an idea of God, the only thing their conquerors could not take from them.
- the disciple to whom He gave the keys of His Church: That is, Peter. The Bishop tends to "baptize" many of his experiences, relating them to what he knows as a man of the church.
- their rock was an idea of God: The image occurs frequently in the Hebrew scriptures. Compare, for example, Psalms 95:1: "O come, let us sing unto the LORD: let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation."
[14] Already the Bishop had observed in Indian life a strange literalness, often shocking and disconcerting. The Acomas, who must share the universal human yearning for something permanent, enduring, without shadow of change--they had their idea in substance. They actually lived upon their Rock; were born upon it and died upon it. There was an element of exaggeration in anything so simple!
- without shadow of change: James 1:17 refers to God as "the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning." This alludes to the sun versus the moon.
C. Reaching the Top
[15] As they drew near the Acoma mesa, dark clouds began boiling up from behind it, like ink spots spreading in a brilliant sky.
[16] "Rain come," remarked Jacinto. "That is good. They will be well disposed." He left the mules in a stake corral at the foot of the mesa, took up the blankets, and hurried Father Latour into the narrow crack in the rock where the craggy edges formed a kind of natural stairway up the cliff. Wherever the footing was treacherous, it was helped out by little handholds, ground into the stone like smooth mittens. The mesa was absolutely naked of vegetation, but at its foot a rank plant grew conspicuously out of the sand; a plant with big white blossoms like Easter lilies. By its dark blue-green leaves, large and coarse-toothed, Father Latour recognized a species of the noxious datura. The size and luxuriance of these nightshades astonished him. They looked like great artificial plants, made of shining silk.
- the narrow crack in the rock: Like many modern visitors to Acoma, I have taken the shuttle up and returned down via the "treacherous" natural stairway.
- datura: a toxic plant with a dusky-gray vine and showy white flowers. It is sometimes called "jimsonweed" from "Jamestown-Weed," as it was commonly found around Jamestown, Virginia, when the English first settled there. Its psychoactive effect on humans and cattle has also earned it the nickname "loco [crazy] weed."
[17] While they were ascending the rock, deafening thunder broke over their heads, and the rain began to fall as if it were spilled from a cloud-burst. Drawing into a deep twist of the stairway, under an overhanging ledge, they watched the water shaken in heavy curtains in the air before them. In a moment the seam in which they stood was like the channel of a brook. Looking out over the great plain spotted with mesas and glittering with rain sheets, the Bishop saw the distant mountains bright with sunlight. Again he thought that the first Creation morning might have looked like this, when the dry land was first drawn up out of the deep, and all was confusion.
[18] The storm was over in half an hour. By the time the Bishop and his guide reached the last turn in the trail, and rose through the crack, stepping out on the flat top of the rock, the noontide sun was blazing down upon Acoma with almost insupportable brightness. The bare stone floor of the town and its deepworn paths were washed white and clean, and those depressions in the surface which the Acomas call their cisterns, were full of fresh rain water. Already the women were bringing out their clothes, to begin washing. The drinking water was carried up the stairway in earthen jars on the heads of the women, from a secret spring below; but for all other purposes the people depended on the rainfall held in these cisterns.
- cisterns: reservoirs or tanks for storing water
- The drinking water was carried up the stairway in earthen jars... for all other purposes the people depended on the rainfall held in these cisterns: To this day there is no running water (nor electricity, nor sewage disposal) on the mesa.
D. The Top of the Mesa
[19] The top of the mesa was about ten acres in extent, the Bishop judged, and there was not a tree or a blade of green upon it; not a handful of soil, except the churchyard, held in by an adobe wall, where the earth for burial had been carried up in baskets from the plain below. The white dwellings, two and three storeyed, were not scattered, but huddled together in a close cluster, with no protecting slope of ground or shoulder of rock, lying flat against the flat, bright against the bright--both the rock and the plastered houses threw off the sun glare blindingly.
- about ten acres: the area of around nine American football fields
- adobe: sun-dried brick made of clay and straw
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| 1934 view of the church's "spacious interior" which " depressed the Bishop" (public domain) |
[20] At the very edge of the mesa, overhanging the abyss so that its retaining wall was like a part of the cliff itself, was the old warlike church of Acoma, with its two stone towers. Gaunt, grim, grey, its nave rising some seventy feet to a sagging, half-ruined roof, it was more like a fortress than a place of worship. That spacious interior depressed the Bishop as no other mission church had done. He held a service there before midday, and he had never found it so hard to go through the ceremony of the Mass. Before him, on the grey floor, in the grey light, a group of bright shawls and blankets, some fifty or sixty silent faces; above and behind them the grey walls. He felt as if he were celebrating Mass at the bottom of the sea, for antediluvian creatures; for types of life so old, so hardened, so shut within their shells, that the sacrifice on Calvary could hardly reach back so far. Those shell-like backs behind him might be saved by baptism and divine grace, as undeveloped infants are, but hardly through any experience of their own, he thought. When he blessed them and sent them away, it was with a sense of inadequacy and spiritual defeat.
- like a part of the cliff itself: see the photo before [30]
- nave: the long area of a church in which the congregation is usually seated
- antediluvian: ancient; literally, "[from] before the flood [of Noah]"
[21] After he had laid aside his vestments, Father Latour went over the church with Jacinto. As he examined it his wonder grew. What need had there ever been for this great church at Acoma? It was built early in sixteen hundred, by Fray Juan Ramirez, a great missionary, who laboured on the Rock of Acoma for twenty years or more. It was Father Ramirez, too, who made the mule trail down the other side--the only path by which a burro can ascend the mesa, and which is still called "El Camino del Padre."
- Fray: a Spanish word meaning "friar" (see note to [29])
- the only path by which a burro can ascend the mesa: but "...a road [was] blasted into the rock face during the 1950s" (according to Wikipedia)
- El Camino del Padre: "Camino" means road; "Padre" is a Spanish title for priests (meaning "Father"). So, "The Road of the Father."
[22] The more Father Latour examined this church, the more he was inclined to think that Fray Ramirez, or some Spanish priest who followed him, was not altogether innocent of worldly ambition, and that they built for their own satisfaction, perhaps, rather than according to the needs of the Indians. The magnificent site, the natural grandeur of this stronghold, might well have turned their heads a little. Powerful men they must have been, those Spanish Fathers, to draft Indian labour for this great work without military support. Every stone in that structure, every handful of earth in those many thousand pounds of adobe, was carried up the trail on the backs of men and boys and women. And the great carved beams of the roof--Father Latour looked at them with amazement. In all the plain through which he had come he had seen no trees but a few stunted piñons. He asked Jacinto where these huge timbers could have been found.
- to draft Indian labour: The Indians had been enslaved.
- piñons: or pinyons, a type of pine tree that produces edible nuts and fragrant firewood, but is not used for construction purposes
[23] "San Mateo mountain, I guess."
- "San Mateo mountain, I guess.": Modern scholarship affirms Jacinto's "guess"; it is now said the timber for the beams came from Mt. Taylor, highest peak in the San Mateo range.
[24] "But the San Mateo mountains must be forty or fifty miles away. How could they bring such timbers?"
[25] Jacinto shrugged. "Acomas carry." Certainly there was no other explanation.
[26] Besides the church proper there was the cloister, large, thick-walled, which must have required an enormous labour of portage from the plain. The deep cloister corridors were cool when the rock outside was blistering; the low arches opened on an enclosed garden which, judging from its depth of earth, must once have been very verdant. Pacing those shady passages, with four feet of solid, windowless adobe shutting out everything but the green garden and the turquoise sky above, the early missionaries might well have forgotten the poor Acomas, that tribe of ancient rock-turtles, and believed themselves in some cloister hung on a spur of the Pyrenees.
- cloister: an enclosed courtyard or walkway in a church or other religious institution
- the Pyrenees: a mountain range between Spain and France
[27] In the grey dust of the enclosed garden two thin, half-dead peach trees still struggled with the drouth, the kind of unlikely tree that grows up from an old root and never bears. By the wall yellow suckers put out from an old vine stump, very thick and hard, which must once have borne its ripe clusters.
- ...two thin, half-dead peach trees ...an old vine stump...: Part 2 explains this "mystery."
- drouth: another spelling of "drought"
[28] Built upon the north-east corner of the cloister the Bishop found a loggia--roofed, but with open sides, looking down on the white pueblo and the tawny rock, and over the wide plain below. There he decided he would spend the night. From this loggia he watched the sun go down; watched the desert become dark, the shadows creep upward. Abroad in the plain the scattered mesa tops, red with the afterglow, one by one lost their light, like candles going out. He was on a naked rock in the desert, in the stone age, a prey to homesickness for his own kind, his own epoch, for European man and his glorious history of desire and dreams. Through all the centuries that his own part of the world had been changing like the sky at day-break, this people had been fixed, increasing neither in numbers nor desires, rock-turtles on their rock. Something reptilian he felt here, something that had endured by immobility, a kind of life out of reach, like the crustaceans in their armour.
- a loggia: This open-air "room" will be of great significance in the next section. See especially the photo before [37]
- rock-turtles on their rock: One must forgive the Bishop--and Cather--for their non-PC language here and elsewhere.
E. Leaving Acoma
[29] On his homeward way the Bishop spent another night with Father Jesus, the good priest at Isleta, who talked with him much of the Moqui country and of those very old rock-set pueblos still farther to the west. One story related to a long-forgotten friar at Acoma, and was somewhat as follows:
- the Moqui country and of those very old rock-set pueblos still farther to the west: That is, the Hopi
- friar: a male member of a religious order such as the Franciscans; he may be an ordained priest or a non-ordained lay brother.
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| Detail of the above aerial view. Note the churchyard in the foreground, "where the earth for burial had been carried up in baskets from the plain below" [19]. Also note the loggia on the front right corner. (Marshall Henrie, Wikipedia) |
F. Meet Fray Baltazar of Acoma
[30] SOME time in the very early years of seventeen hundred, nearly fifty years after the great Indian uprising in which all the missionaries and all the Spaniards in northern New Mexico were either driven out or murdered, after the country had been reconquered and new missionaries had come to take the place of the martyrs, a certain Friar Baltazar Montoya was priest at Acoma. He was of a tyrannical and overbearing disposition and bore a hard hand on the natives. All the missions now in ruins were active then, each had its resident priest, who lived for the people or upon the people, according to his nature. Friar Baltazar was one of the most ambitious and exacting. It was his belief that the pueblo of Acoma existed chiefly to support its fine church, and that this should be the pride of the Indians as it was his. He took the best of their corn and beans and squashes for his table, and selected the choicest portions when they slaughtered a sheep, chose their best hides to carpet his dwelling. Moreover, he exacted a heavy tribute in labour. He was never done with having earth carried up from the plain in baskets. He enlarged the churchyard and made the deep garden in the cloister, enriching it with dung from the corrals. Here he was able to grow a wonderful garden, since it was watered every evening by women--and this despite the fact that it was not proper that a woman should ever enter the cloister at all. Each woman owed the Padre so many ollas of water a week from the cisterns, and they murmured not only because of the labour, but because of the drain on their water-supply.
- the great Indian uprising: that is, the "Pueblo Revolt" of 1680, which drove the Spanish out of all New Mexico for 12 years.
- martyrs: people who have died for a cause, especially religious faith
- corn and beans and squashes: three of the four "sacred plants"; the fourth is tobacco.
- the churchyard: that is, the cemetery
- ollas: ceramic pots or jars
[31] Baltazar was not a lazy man, and in his first years there, before he became stout, he made long journeys in behalf of his mission and his garden. He went as far as Oraibi, many days' journey, to select their best peach seeds. (The peach orchards of Oraibi were very old, having been cultivated since the days of the earliest Spanish expeditions, when Coronado's captains gave the Moquis peach seeds brought from Spain.) His grape cuttings were brought from Sonora in baskets on muleback, and he would go all the way to the Villa for choice garden seeds, at the season when pack trains came up the Rio Grande valley. The early churchmen did a great business in carrying seeds about, though the Indians and Mexicans were satisfied with beans and squashes and chili, asking nothing more.
- Oraibi: on the Hopi (Moqui) mesas in north-central Arizona, about 200 miles from Acoma.
- Sonora: the Mexican border state that lies mainly south of Arizona, plus a bit of New Mexico. Its capital and largest city, Hermosillo, was founded in 1700, and lies about 450 miles from Acoma.
- the Villa: That is, Santa Fe, the capital of New Mexico. It was founded in 1610, and is a little over a hundred miles from Acoma.
[32] Friar Baltazar was from a religious house in Spain which was noted for good living, and he himself had worked in the refectory. He was an excellent cook and something of a carpenter, and he took a great deal of trouble to make himself comfortable upon that rock at the end of the world. He drafted two Indian boys into his service, one to care for his ass and work in the garden, the other to cook and wait upon him at table. In time, as he grew more unwieldy in figure, he adopted a third boy and employed him as a runner to the distant missions. This boy would go on foot all the way to the Villa for red cloth or an iron spade or a new knife, stopping at Bernalillo to bring home a wineskin full of grape brandy. He would go five days' journey to the Sandia mountains to catch fish and dry or salt them for the Padre's fast-days, or run to Zuñi, where the Fathers raised rabbits, and bring back a pair for the spit. His errands were seldom of an ecclesiastical nature.
- refectory: the dining room in institutions such as monasteries
- one to care for his ass: That is, his donkey. But could Cather have been having a little fun with us? Why not donkey? Or burro?
[33] It was clear that the Friar at Acoma lived more after the flesh than after the spirit. The difficulty of obtaining an interesting and varied diet on a naked rock seemed only to whet his appetite and tempt his resourcefulness. But his sensuality went no further than his garden and table. Carnal commerce with the Indian women would have been very easy indeed, and the Friar was at the hardy age of ripe manhood when such temptations are peculiarly sharp. But the missionaries had early discovered that the slightest departure from chastity greatly weakened their influence and authority with their Indian converts. The Indians themselves sometimes practised continence as a penance, or as a strong medicine with the spirits, and they were very willing that their Padre should practise it for them. The consequences of carnal indulgence were perhaps more serious here than in Spain, and Friar Baltazar seems never to have given his flock an opportunity to exult over his frailty.
[34] He held his seat at Acoma for nearly fifteen prosperous years, constantly improving his church and his living-quarters, growing new vegetables and medicinal herbs, making soap from the yucca root. Even after he became stout, his arms were strong and muscular, his fingers clever. He cultivated his peach trees, and watched over his garden like a little kingdom, never allowing the native women to grow slack in the water-supply. His first serving-boys were released to marry, and others succeeded them, who were even more minutely trained.
- yucca: a plant commonly found in the dry lands of the West; it is now the State Flower of New Mexico. The use of its roots for soap has earned it the nickname "soap weed."
G. The "holy picture of St. Joseph"
[35] Baltazar's tyranny grew little by little, and the Acoma people were sometimes at the point of revolt. But they could not estimate just how powerful the Padre's magic might be and were afraid to put it to the test. There was no doubt that the holy picture of St. Joseph had come to them from the King of Spain by the request of this Padre, and that picture had been more effective in averting drouth than all the native rain-makers had been. Properly entreated and honoured, the painting had never failed to produce rain. Acoma had not lost its crops since Friar Baltazar first brought the picture to them, though at Laguna and Zuñi there had been drouths that compelled the people to live upon their famine store--an alarming extremity.
- the holy picture of St. Joseph: see after [36]
[36] The Laguna Indians were constantly sending legations to Acoma to negotiate terms at which they could rent the holy picture, but Friar Baltazar had warned them never to let it go. If such powerful protection were withdrawn, or if the Padre should turn the magic against them, the consequences might be disastrous to the pueblo. Better give him his choice of grain and lambs and pottery, and allow him his three serving-boys. So the missionary and his converts rubbed along in seeming friendliness.
- The Laguna Indians were constantly sending legations to Acoma...: In point of fact, the Lagunas, after being refused a loan of the picture, broke into the Acoma church and stole it! The case to recover it, The Pueblo of Acoma v. the Pueblo of Laguna, went all the way to the Supreme Court of New Mexico. It was settled in Acoma's favor. There's quite a story here: As L. Bradford Prince writes in Spanish Mission Churches of New Mexico (1915): "When the decision became known, [Acoma] appointed a delegation to bring the saint home. While they were on their journey half way to Laguna they found the saint resting against a mesquite tree. They considered this a miracle, and the people still believe that when St. Joseph heard of the decision of the court he was in such a hurry to get back to his home in Acoma that he started out by himself. This extraordinary picture still hangs over the altar of the little chapel at Acoma, and the faith in its virtues has never failed."
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| 1941 Ansel Adams photo of San Esteban Church, Acoma. Note the loggia on the far right (public domain) |
H. Baltazar's Dinner
[37] One summer the Friar, who did not make long journeys now that he had grown large in girth, decided that he would like company--someone to admire his fine garden, his ingenious kitchen, his airy loggia with its rugs and water jars, where he meditated and took his after-dinner siesta. So he planned to give a dinner party in the week after St. John's Day.
- siesta: the custom of taking an afternoon nap
- St. John's Day: June 24, just after the summer solstice
[38] He sent his runner to Zuñi, Laguna, Isleta, and bade the Padres to a feast. They came upon the day, four of them, for there were two priests at Zuñi. The stable-boy was stationed at the foot of the rock to take their beasts and conduct the visitors up the stairway. At the head of the trail Baltazar received them. They were shown over the place, and spent the morning gossiping in the cloister walks, cool and silent, though the naked rock outside was almost too hot for the hand to touch. The vine leaves rustled agreeably in the breeze, and the earth about the carrot and onion tops, as it dried from last night's watering, gave off a pleasant smell. The guests thought their host lived very well, and they wished they had his secret. If he was a trifle boastful of his air-bound seat, no one could blame him.
[39] With the dinner, Baltazar had taken extravagant pains. The monastery in which he had learned to cook was off the main highway to Seville; the Spanish nobles and the King himself sometimes stopped there for entertainment. In that great kitchen, with its multiplicity of spits, small enough to roast a lark and large enough to roast a boar, the Friar had learned a thing or two about sauces, and in his lonely years at Acoma he had bettered his instruction by a natural aptitude for the art. The poverty of materials had proved an incentive rather than a discouragement.
[40] Certainly the visiting missionaries had never sat down to food like that which rejoiced them to-day in the cool refectory, the blinds open just enough to admit a streak of throbbing desert far below them. Their host was telling them pompously that he would have a fountain in the cloister close when they came again. He had to check his hungry guests in their zeal for the relishes and the soup, warning them to save their mettle for what was to come. The roast was to be a wild turkey, superbly done--but that, alas, was never tasted. The course which preceded it was the host's especial care, and here he had trusted nothing to his cook; hare jardinière (his carrots and onions were tender and well flavoured), with a sauce which he had been perfecting for many years. This entrée was brought from the kitchen in a large earthen dish--but not large enough, for with its luxury of sauce and floating carrots it filled the platter to the brim. The stable-boy was serving to-day, as the cook could not leave his spits, and he had been neat, brisk, and efficient. The Friar was pleased with him, and was wondering whether he could not find some little medal of bronze or silver-gilt to reward him for his pains.
- close: (pronounced with a hard s, to rhyme with dose) an enclosed place
- jardinière: with a garnish of mixed vegetables, from the French word for "gardener"
[41] When the hare in its sauce came on, the priest from Isleta chanced to be telling a funny story at which the company were laughing uproariously. The serving-boy, who knew a little Spanish, was apparently trying to get the point of the recital which made the Padres so merry. At any rate, he became distracted, and as he passed behind the senior priest of Zuñi, he tipped his full platter and spilled a stream of rich brown gravy over the good man's head and shoulders. Baltazar was quick-tempered, and he had been drinking freely of the fiery grape brandy. He caught up the empty pewter mug at his right and threw it at the clumsy lad with a malediction. It struck the boy on the side of the head. He dropped the platter, staggered a few steps, and fell down. He did not get up, nor did he move. The Padre from Zuñi was skilled in medicine. Wiping the sauce from his eyes, he bent over the boy and examined him.
- malediction: a curse
I. Disaster Strikes
[42] "Muerto," he whispered. With that he plucked his junior priest by the sleeve, and the two bolted across the garden without another word and made for the head of the stairway. In a moment the Padres of Laguna and Isleta unceremoniously followed their example. With remarkable speed the four guests got them down from the rock, saddled their mules, and urged them across the plain.
- Muerto: that is, dead
[43] Baltazar was left alone with the consequences of his haste. Unfortunately the cook, astonished at the prolonged silence, had looked in at the door just as the last pair of brown gowns were vanishing across the cloister. He saw his comrade lying upon the floor, and silently disappeared from the premises by an exit known only to himself.
[44] When Friar Baltazar went into the kitchen he found it solitary, the turkey still dripping on the spit. Certainly he had no appetite for the roast. He felt, indeed, very remorseful and uncomfortable, also indignant with his departed guests. For a moment he entertained the idea of following them; but a temporary flight would only weaken his position, and a permanent evacuation was not to be thought of. His garden was at its prime, his peaches were just coming ripe, and his vines hung heavy with green clusters. Mechanically he took the turkey from the spit, not because he felt any inclination for food, but from an instinct of compassion, quite as if the bird could suffer from being burned to a crisp. This done, he repaired to his loggia and sat down to read his breviary, which he had neglected for several days, having been so occupied in the refectory. He had begrudged no pains to that sauce which had been his undoing.
- breviary: a book used for daily prayers
[45] The airy loggia, where he customarily took his afternoon repose, was like a birdcage hung in the breeze. Through its open archways he looked down on the huddled pueblo, and out over the great mesa-strewn plain far below. He was unable to fix his mind upon his office. The pueblo down there was much too quiet. At this hour there should be a few women washing pots or rags, a few children playing by the cisterns and chasing the turkeys. But to-day the rock top baked in the fire of the sun in utter silence, not one human being was visible--yes, one, though he had not been there a moment ago. At the head of the stone stairway, there was a patch of lustrous black, just above the rocks; an Indian's hair. They had set a guard at the trail head.
[46] Now the Padre began to feel alarmed, to wish he had gone down that stairway with the others, while there was yet time. He wished he were anywhere in the world but on this rock. There was old Father Ramirez's donkey path; but if the Indians were watching one road, they would watch the other. The spot of black hair never stirred; and there were but those two ways down to the plain, only those ... Whichever way one turned, three hundred and fifty feet of naked cliff, without one tree or shrub a man could cling to.
[47] As the sun sank lower and lower, there began a deep, singing murmur of male voices from the pueblo below him, not a chant, but the rhythmical intonation of Indian oratory when a serious matter is under discussion. Frightful stories of the torture of the missionaries in the great rebellion of 1680 flashed into Friar Baltazar's mind; how one Franciscan had his eyes torn out, another had been burned, and the old Padre at Jamez had been stripped naked and driven on all fours about the plaza all night, with drunken Indians straddling his back, until he rolled over dead from exhaustion.
- Franciscan: a member of the Franciscan order of friars, founded by St. Francis of Assisi (see note to [29])
- Jamez: presumably a misspelling for Jemez, called by the people there Walatowa
[48] Moonrise from the loggia was an impressive sight, even to this Brother who was not over-impressionable. But to-night he wished he could keep the moon from coming up through the floor of the desert--the moon was the clock which began things in the pueblo. He watched with horror for that golden rim against the deep blue velvet of the night.
J. The End of Fray Baltazar
[49] The moon came, and at its coming the Acoma people issued from their doors. A company of men walked silently across the rock to the cloister. They came up the ladder and appeared in the loggia. The Friar asked them gruffly what they wanted, but they made no reply. Not once speaking to him or to each other, they bound his feet together and tied his arms to his sides.
[50] The Acoma people told afterwards that he did not supplicate or struggle; had he done so, they might have dealt more cruelly with him. But he knew his Indians, and that when once they had collectively made up their pueblo mind ... Moreover, he was a proud old Spaniard, and had a certain fortitude lodged in his well-nourished body. He was accustomed to command, not to entreat, and he retained the respect of his Indian vassals to the end.
[51] They carried him down the ladder and through the cloister and across the rock to the most precipitous cliff--the one over which the Acoma women flung broken pots and such refuse as the turkeys would not eat. There the people were assembled. They cut his bonds, and taking him by the hands and feet, swung him out over the rock-edge and back a few times. He was heavy, and perhaps they thought this dangerous sport. No sound but hissing breath came through his teeth. The four executioners took him up again from the brink where they had laid him, and, after a few feints, dropped him in mid-air.
[52] So did they rid their rock of their tyrant, whom on the whole they had liked very well. But everything has its day. The execution was not followed by any sacrilege to the church or defiling of holy vessels, but merely by a division of the Padre's stores and household goods. The women, indeed, took pleasure in watching the garden pine and waste away from thirst, and ventured into the cloisters to laugh and chatter at the whitening foliage of the peach trees, and the green grapes shrivelling on the vines.
[53] When the next priest came, years afterward, he found no ill will awaiting him. He was a native Mexican, of unpretentious tastes, who was well satisfied with beans and jerked meat, and let the pueblo turkey flock scratch in the hot dust that had once been Baltazar's garden. The old peach stumps kept sending up pale sprouts for many years.
The following characters appear or are mentioned in this story. Their first appearance is in the paragraph indicated in the [brackets].
Part 1: The Rock
- Father Latour [1]: fictionalized Bishop of Santa Fe, who in this story sets out to visit the church at Acoma Pueblo
- Jacinto [1]: [hah-SEEN-toh] the Bishop's Indian guide
- Native people of Acoma [20]: "some fifty or sixty silent faces"
- Fray Juan Ramirez [21]: [hwan rah-MEE-rezz] a historical missionary priest who built Acoma Church many years before this story begins, and served there for over 20 years. The mule trail he built to the top of the mesa will be mentioned again in Part 2 [46].
- Father Jesus [29]: [hay-SOOS] "the [fictional] good priest at Isleta," who told Bishop Latour the story of Fray Balthazar
Part 2: The Legend of Fray Balthazar
- Friar Baltazar Montoya [30]: [BAHL-tah-zar] the priest at Acoma, whose pride and ambition cause him to be hard on the people. A fit of anger leads to the end of his nearly fifteen-year tenure at Acoma. He is almost certainly an entirely fictional/legendary character.
- four other priests [38]: two from Zuñi, and one each from Laguna and Isleta, guests at Fray Baltazar's feast
- Indians:
- three boys [32]: Friar Balthazar's servants
- the unfortunate stable boy [40]
- a cook [43]
- a guard [45]
- a company of men [49]: They visit the priest near the end.
A. The Way to Acoma [1-9]
Jean-Marie Latour, fictional Bishop of Santa Fe, New Mexico, is traveling with his Indian guide to faraway Acoma Pueblo. After stopping at Laguna Pueblo for the night, they set out across "the low plain that lies between Laguna and Acoma." The flat terrain and its scattered mesas are described (and reflected on), as is the sky. Jacinto, the guide, points out Acoma from a distance.
B. Approaching the Mesa [10-14]
Brief mention is made of "the Enchanted Mesa," and the bishop questions how mere humans could have built on such lofty heights. Jacinto explains it was done in order to survive attacks from other tribes. The bishop then reflects on the Biblical imagery of "the rock."
C. Reaching the Top [15-18]
Jacinto notes an approaching storm. As the pair climbs the natural stairway in the narrow cleft to reach the top of the mesa, the clouds burst and they must wait as the water rushes down past them. After half an hour, they push on and reach the top.
D. The Top of the Mesa [19-25]
The mesa and the features on it are described, including "the old warlike church of Acoma." The bishop considers the interior depressing, so much so that he finds it hard to say mass there. He doubts that the faith of the "antediluvian" natives is any more developed than that of infants. It makes him feel inadequate. Yet he marvels at the church's construction, wondering if it was made to serve the people--or the priests' vanity. He questions Jacinto about the source of the great roof beams; the guide guesses they were hand-carried from a place that the bishop recognizes as "forty or fifty miles away." The bishop finds the cloister to be peaceful, despite its neglected garden, and decides to spend the night in the loggia above it, watching the sun go down and the stars come out. He reflects that the people are like "rock-turtles on their rock," something "reptilian."
E. Leaving Acoma [29]
On his way from Acoma back to Santa Fe, the bishop stops again at Isleta, where the friendly priest tells him the following legend.
Part 2: THE LEGEND OF FRAY BALTAZAR
F. Meet Fray Baltazar of Acoma [30-34]
Friar Baltazar was the "ambitious and exacting" priest at Acoma in the 1720s. He was "tyrannical and overbearing" and "bore a hard hand on the natives." He took the best of the people's crops and flocks, and "exacted a heavy tribute in labour," especially to maintain the garden in his cloister. Before growing fat, he had traveled widely to gather seeds and cuttings for this purpose. "He was an excellent cook and something of a carpenter," and drafted two (later, three) Indian boys to serve him. "It was clear that the Friar at Acoma lived more after the flesh than after the spirit"--but only in regards to food and physical comfort, not women. He successfully served at Acoma for 15 years.
G. The "holy picture of St. Joseph" [35-36]
The people tolerated him largely because they believed in his powerful magic. He had brought them a rain-generating painting of St. Joseph that prevented drought at Acoma when other pueblos suffered. He also prevented other pueblos from borrowing the painting. The natives decided to tolerate his excesses to keep his protection.
H. Baltazar's Dinner [37-40]
Somewhat lonely because he was too portly to travel, and wanting to show off the splendors he had created at Acoma, he invited the priests from Zuni, Laguna, and Isleta (two from Zuni, so four total) to a sumptuous dinner he would prepare at the time of the summer solstice. After showing them around--and evoking their envy--he sat down with them to dinner.
I. Disaster Strikes [41-48]
Unfortunately, the serving boy, straining to understand the priests' conversation, became distracted and dumped an overly-full platter of gravy over the head of the senior priest from Zuni. Baltazar reflexively picked up a pewter mug and threw it at the boy's head--knocking him dead. The gravy-soaked priest, upon discovering the boy's state, "plucked his junior priest by the sleeve, and the two bolted across the garden without another word," followed quickly by the other two priests. Baltazar checked the empty kitchen, "took the turkey from the spit... from an instinct of compassion... and repaired to his loggia and sat down to read his breviary." He became aware of plans afoot: an unusual stillness in the pueblo, a guard positioned at the top of the mesa's egress, the murmur of "Indian oratory [as] when a serious matter is under discussion." He remembered stories of the Indians' abuse of missionaries during the 1680 rebellion and "watched with horror" for the rising of the moon, "the clock which began things in the pueblo."
J. The End of Fray Baltazar [49-53]
And sure enough, when the moon came, so did a delegation of men. Silently they bound his feet and arms, which he took stoically (thereby probably preventing worse mistreatment). They carried him (probably not without some effort) down the ladder from the loggia, through the cloister, and across the mesa, to the cliff from which the women tossed the pueblo's refuse. There, after removing the ropes, they took him by the hands and feet and, "after a few feints," heaved him off the cliff. "So did they rid their rock of their tyrant, whom on the whole they had liked very well." They did not subsequently damage the church or its equipment, but did split the priests' household goods among them. The women, especially, were pleased to see his garden waste away to the condition it was in when Bishop Latour visited years later. The next priest, who came years after the demise of Baltazar, was a Mexican who was satisfied to eat what the people ate.
Feel free to answer any of these questions (or ask a question of your own) in the comments below.
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