'
"By the time the questions were all answered there was no chance for
more sleep."
Nothing was taken with the morning coffee but the tortilla. This was a
thin cake made of meal from corn ground by Indian women who used for the
grinding either a stone mortar and pestle, or a metate. The metate was a
three-legged stone about two feet in length and one in breadth, slightly
hollowed out in the center; grain was ground in this by rubbing with a
smaller stone. It took a great number of tortillas to serve the large
household. One Indian maid, kneeling beside a large white stone which
served as table, mixed the meal, salt, and water into balls of dough.
These she handed to another girl, who spatted them flat and thin by
tossing them from one of her smooth bare arms to the other until they
were but a little thicker than a knife blade. The cook then baked them
on a hot dry stone or griddle, turning them over and over to keep them
from burning.
El Patron (the master) usually rose early, and after his coffee, put on
his high, wide-brimmed sombrero, and, attended by his sons, if they were
old enough, and his mayordomo, rode over his estate, looking after the
Indian vaqueros and workmen.
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