Chapter Five tells how many kinds of drunkards there were.
The wine, pulque made from the sweet water of the maguey cactus, was known as Four Hundred Rabbits.
Some drinkers did not harm or belittle their day sign. The wine did not cause him irritation or make a fool of him. He only went to sleep, and continued to sleep. He became pale, sitting with drooping head. He sat rolled up like a ball, and remained coiled; he sat embracing himself, hugging himself; he rested on his shins, and remained on his shins; he squatted on his heels and remained on his heels. He was by himself, and calmly went off by himself. Peacefully he stretched out; quietly he fell down exhausted. In no way did he offend one. He stretched out, rumbling as he slept, groaning, snoring, as if he had torn off his nose, as if enjoying the sleep.
Some only wept. He loosed tears as if bringing good to himself, sobbing as he pressed them out. Like hail stones they showered down, a great course of water simply streaming down. His tears buried him. He could not stop. Verily, that which the wine made him remember ate his heart out.
Some derived joy and pleasure from singing. He wished not to talk; he neglected listening to jests, to counsel, to stories. As if it unleashed his song, when he drank the wine, he so recalled his song, as if it engulfed him. So the wine worked on him.
Others did nothing but talk. Uncontrolled he talked; he spoke much. He chattered, jabbered, gibbered, and mumbled. With ill?will he eavesdropped and betrayed others. He blustered, vaunted, and sang praises of himself; he esteemed and made himself out as great. He belittled what others said, speaking deceitfully and constantly shaking his head. He pretended to be rich and reprimanded the poor; he pretended to be superior, to be one in authority. Haughtily, he thought well of himself. He did not deflate himself; he did not overcome nor chastise his tongue. No one could force him to recant. He thought himself superior, better than others.
Indistinct was his speech. What did he say? He was as if stirred, and his words bubbled up and burst forth. It was as if he argued, harangued, enforced silence, and drove all people away, put them to flight, numbed them with terror, visited them with afflictions, made them shrink with fright, and assailed them with his words.
It seemed that he disgusted others, and did not inquire what they said. Wherever they may have spoken, or undertaken something, he seemed to make little of it and kick it aside. But when he had drunk nothing, he seemed to be dumb, one who whispered, fearful of people, quite frightened.
For all this he excused himself by saying: ¡°It is because I no longer knew what I said; for I was drunk. The wine had taken effect upon me; I was overwrought.¡±
And another drunkard was very suspicious. He misunderstood; not as things were did he hear them. Often he blamed his wife. It anyone only looked at her, he then said to him: ¡°Why dost thou make eyes at my wife?¡± Then he gave rise to hatred, fury, and murder, etc. And all that which was spoken he took as applying to him. He suspected that when there was occasion for mirth, he was thereby being defamed, the object of ridicule. Without reason he belabored the people. The wine and drinking cursed him.
And if it were a woman, she simply went to her knees; she remained on her knees. No longer was she rational. She sat and remained with legs outstretched. And if she were much besotted, if she were much affected, her hair simply formed a mantle over her. She tumbled there, with hair streaming out.
All of these kinds of drunkenness, each one, showed upon and were the doing of the drunkard. It was said: ¡°So is his rabbit. Thus was his day sign: in this way did the wine gods manifest themselves on him.¡± And if a drunkard fell over a precipice, or somewhere else, it was said: ¡°He was affected by the wine gods.¡± Because in many ways the wine showed its power, it was called the Four Hundred Rabbits; for very few did it affect favorably.
And when, it was said, the day Two Rabbit set in, then they celebrated the feast day of the principal wine god, Izquitecatl. And although only he alone was named, yet at that time they remembered all the wine gods, who became the wine. They greatly revered Izquitecatl. They set up his image in his temple and laid gifts before him. For him they sang and provided music with gourd tubes. Before him stood a stone basin, called two-rabbit basin, filled with pulque. Into the wine dipped the drinking tubes, extending from it so that those who sampled the wine stood drinking it: but only those who could drink, the old men, the old women, the intrepid warriors, the bold, the foolish, who paid the debt with their heads and t heir breasts. That is, they would be captured sometime when war was declared; or else on issuing forth to battle, they would capture others and take prisoners. So by drinking they went about mocking death.
And the wine which they drank never came to an end; the basin never stood empty. The wine makers, the wine making officials, continued pouring it into the basin. All came assembling there where they cut the maguey, when everywhere it was the time and season for breaking into the maguey, he first poured the extracting material there. Thus they said he poured out wine and offered the wine-pouring to Izquitecatl; they gave him wine to drink.
But not only at this time did they pour wine; rather, always were offerings so made in his temple.
