The Salvia divinorum Research and Information Center - Shroomery

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bright garments adorned with colored borders, the coffee sacks carried on
their backs by headbands. Dona Donata also managed a type of grocery store, in
which her husband, Don Eduardo, stood behind the counter.
In the evening by candlelight, Dona Donata, who besides Mazatec also spoke
Spanish, told us about life in the village; one tragedy or another had already
struck nearly every one of the seemingly peaceful huts that lay surrounded by
this paradisiacal scenery. A man who had murdered his wife, and who now sits
in prison for life, had lived in the house next door, which now stood empty.
The husband of a daughter of Dona Donata, after an affair with another woman,
was murdered out of jealousy. The president of Ayautla, a young bull of a
mestizo, to whom we had made our formal visit in the afternoon, never made the
short walk from his hut to his "office" in the village hall (with the
corrugated iron roof) unless accompanied by two heavily armed men. Because he
exacted illegal taxes, he was afraid of being shot to death. Since no higher
authority sees to justice in this remote region, people have recourse to
self-defense of this type.
Thanks to Dona Donata's good connections, we received the first sample of the
sought-after plant, some leaves of hojas de la Pastora, from an old woman.
Since the flowers and roots were missing, however, this plant material was not
suitable for botanical identification. Our efforts to obtain more precise
information about the habitat of the plant and its use were also fruitless.
The continuation of our journey from Ayautla was delayed, as we had to wait
until our boys could again bring back the mules that they had taken to pasture
on the other side of Rio Santo Domingo, over the river swollen by intense
downpours.
After a two-day ride, on which we had passed the night in the high mountain
village of San MiguelHuautla, we arrived at Rio Santiago. Here we were joined
by Dona Herlinda Martinez Cid, a teacher from Huautla de Jimenez. She had
ridden over on the invitation of Gordon Wasson, who had known her since his
mushroom expeditions, and was to serve as our Mazatec and Spanish-speaking
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