Prayers, wailing chants and the mournful notes of reed pipes sounded last week in many a dusty, sparsely settled district of New Mexico and southern Colorado. On Ash Wednesday swart, hot-eyed Mexicans and half-breeds ceased their labors, stole into the moradas which are the secret churches of Los Hermanos Penitentes—the Penitent Brothers. In each morada the Elder Brother of the community presided over ceremonies which were a prelude to the 40 days of Lent, spent by all Penitentes in bloody emulation of the sufferings of Christ. One by one the brothers bowed before...
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