flickering lamp, he announced simply that it was time to begin. 



Behind the house, on a sheltered porch six colonial swords 



stuck into the ground marked the outline of the mesa, or 



ceremonial alter, before which the patients were directed to sit. 



maestro 



mesa 



{mQmbnWo—Cydonia oblonga Mill., chonia—Bactris gasipaes 



HBK, ajohaspi— CortZ/fl sp.) whale bones, quartz crystals, 



colonial knives, plastic toy soldiers, pre-Columbian ceramics 



and huacas, brass lions and deer, antlers, wild boar tusks, silver 



plates, murex and helmet shells, dice, statues of the virgin and 



many photographs, paintings and figurines of the Roman 



Catholic saints. There was in the placement of these objects the 



care and the inherent eye for the sacred that characterises the 



true maestro (Sharon 1978: 159-176). A single item from the 



offerings of each patient was placed before the alter. 



The ceremony began with an invocation to Christ and the 

 Virgin: 



"Long live luck, work, fortune, business: obstacles, problems, 

 here I go stopping, I go dallying, in good times, in bad times, with 

 the grace of God and the most holy Virgin that this tobacco 

 provide my patients with all their solutions, with my good 

 tobacco, and the good mountains and lakes, the good herbs and 

 my good tobacco — leaf for leaf, vein for vein, root for root, shoot 

 for shoot, whether in Piura, in Lima or in Cajamarca where died 

 our King Atahualpa— pieces of gold, bells of silver. Likewise shall 

 ring out my name, the name of my family, my luck, my work, my 

 fortune and my business with the grace of God and the most Holy 

 virgin." 



Following the opening prayer, there must be a pago, a 

 payment, and hence the maestro sprayed alcohol and perfume to 

 the cardinal points and over each of the patients. During the 

 course of the ceremony, each patient's bottle of perfume would 

 be emptied and returned as a seguro, a sacred protection made 

 up of herbs gathered at Las Huaringas. Following the pago, don 

 Pancho brought out a large bowl in which tobacco leaves were 

 soaking in an alcohol/ perfume solution. He took a bottle of 

 aguardiente and poured the contents over the leaves, and then 

 massaged the leaves with his hands. Next he dipped a scallop 



373 



