Expedition in Southwestern Mexico 



355 



and exported to the United States for 

 making pillows and mattresses. 



Before reaching Acapulco we stopped 

 for more than a week at the small village 

 of Papayo. It is a characteristic hot- 

 country village, made up of a collection 

 of palm-thatched houses with walls of 

 adobe brick or wattle. The center of 

 the village is occupied by a large wide- 

 spreading ceiba, while surrounding it 

 for some distance in various directions 

 is a magnificent forest of nut palms. 

 The main industry of the people here 

 is gathering the palm nuts and ex- 

 tracting the kernels. Every morning 

 the village women went out into the 

 forest with baskets to gather the nuts. 

 The kernels are sent on pack-mules to 

 Acapulco, where the oil is extracted and 

 used in a soap factory conducted by 

 Americans. 



Our quarters were in an open thatched 

 shed, which served as the living room 

 for the family of the chief man of the 

 village. It was a very comfortable place 

 during the day, but at night the half- 

 starved village dogs swarmed in and 

 searched minutely for every edible scrap 

 or fought and howled just outside. 



Among all the forms of vegetable life 

 in the Mexican tropics the wild fig trees 

 are the most remarkable. There are 

 many species, and they vary much in 

 habits, and appearance. Some of them 

 show such apparent intelligence in their 

 mode of growth and their readiness to 

 meet emergencies that it is difficult to 

 not credit them with powers of volition. 

 In the tropics, where the wild figs flour- 

 ish, there is a constant struggle for life 

 among numberless species of plants. 

 Seedlings on the ground have a hard 

 time to reach an age of comparative 

 safety. Certain of the wild figs appear 

 to have learned this, and provide a fruit 

 which is a favorite food for many birds; 

 then an occasional seed is dropped by a 

 bird where it finds lodgment in the axil 

 of a palm frond high in the air. There, 

 sheltered from danger, the seed takes 



root and is nourished by the little accu- 

 mulation of dust and vegetable matter. 

 It sends forth an aerial root, which 

 creeps down the palm, sometimes coil- 

 ing about the trunk on its way. When 

 this slender, cord-like rootlet reaches 

 the ground, it secures foothold and be- 

 comes the future trunk of the fig tree. 

 After the descending rootlet has secured 

 itself in the ground, a branch, bearing 

 a few leaves, springs from the seed in 

 the palm top, and a vigorous growth 

 begins. Then the fig gradually en- 

 larges and encloses the supporting palm 

 trunk until the latter is completely shut 

 in the heart of its foster child and even- 

 tually strangled. 



All along the dry coast plains a spe- 

 cies of large-thorned acacia is abundant. 

 The great thorns are hollow, and each 

 is pierced by a small round hole, which 

 is the doorway of a fiery-tempered little 

 ant-like insect which makes its home 

 within. These thorns are so numerous 

 and such singular-looking things that 

 the new comer is always tempted to ap- 

 proach and take hold of a branch to get 

 a closer view. Instantly the occupants 

 of the thorn swarm out with marvelous 

 rapidity over the offending hand. Each 

 one seizes the skin in its jaws and then 

 works a highly spiced sting so vigor- 

 ously that one's curiosity is satisfied 

 without delay. 



The approach to Acapulco is com- 

 manded by bold and rugged headlands 

 with many large cactuses on their sea- 

 ward faces. This port has been of im- 

 portance since earl) 7 in the Spanish 

 occupation. It is the best available 

 harbor on the Pacific coast of Mexico 

 and is an important coaling station. 

 The town has long borne an evil repu- 

 tation for its climate. It has about 

 4,000 inhabitants and a most flourish- 

 ing graveyard. 



The coast belt in both directions from 

 Acapulco, especially to the south, is 

 largely peopled by descendants of ne- 

 groes who must have obtained foothold 



