The poorer people build ranches
of long, slender canes or Indian cornstalks tied together by grass
and coated with mud. These are all erected around and about the most
imposing edifice in the place - the whitewashed adobe church.
All houses are hollow squares. The patio, with its well, is inside
this enclosure. Each house is lime-washed in various colors, and all
are flat-roofed and provided with grated windows, giving them a
prison-like appearance. The window-panes are sometimes made of mica.
Over the front doors of some of the better houses are pictures of the
Virgin. The nurse's house is designated by having over the doorway a
signboard, on which is painted a full-blooming rose, out of the
petals of which is peeping a little babe.
If you wish to enter a house, you do not knock at the door (an act
that would be considered great rudeness), but clap your hands, and
you are most courteously invited to enter. The good woman at once
sets to work to serve you with mate, and quickly rolls a cigar,
which she hands to you from her mouth, where she has already lighted
it by a live ember of charcoal taken from the fire with a spoon.
Matches can be bought, but they cost about ten cents a hundred.
