5. To remain on the _finca_ eleven months of each year.
6. To subject himself to all articles of the law of labourers decreed by the government.
7. The loan is given not to the man alone but to his entire family; and each and every one will be individually responsible for what they receive.
8. The _mozo_ who becomes security for another _mozo_ (be it man or woman) assumes the same responsibilities as the one who receives the loan.
This latter clause is inserted because in most instances one labourer goes security for another by guaranteeing that the latter will carry out his part, or he himself will assume it. If the _mozo_ flees, an order of arrest will issue and an officer sent after him. For this purpose an _alcalde_, or justice, is usually kept on each plantation.
When the labourer once assumes this condition he is generally bound for life, as few of them ever succeed in paying back the loan, and the plantation owner never encourages him to do it for he would lose his labourer. On his part he is obliged to furnish medical attendance, advance wedding, baptismal and burial fees, and, on the larger plantation, to furnish a spiritual guide and teacher for the youth. It is a sort of patriarchal relationship that exists between employer and employee. The native will not work more than about two hundred days in the year because of the numerous church and national holidays which he must celebrate; likewise, every birth, death, and baptism in the family gives another occasion for a holiday, and the saint’s day of each member of his family as well as those of the master must be celebrated. Every person is named after a saint, and they are surprised to find an American who has not been named after any. “Who will protect and keep you from harm?” they will ask.
The Indians in the hot country are less inclined to work than those on the uplands, and one sees much of them. In fact you could not look in their direction without seeing a great deal of them, for they wear no superfluous clothing. The men frequently wear only a breech-cloth, the women a short skirt, and no more. In fact, in travelling from the coast to capital you pass through an entire evolution in the matter of clothing from practical nakedness to a complete suit of sandals, trousers and shirt. The dictator Barrios issued a decree requiring all natives to wear sufficient clothes, or his market produce would be confiscated when he entered a town. Even to this day it is not an uncommon sight in some places to see the aborigine sitting by the roadside near Retalhuleu, or Mazatenango, and enveloping himself, or herself, in sufficient clothing to pass municipal inspection. In the colder altitudes where clothing is more necessary for physical comfort, each tribe has a distinct dress and the district from which the Indian comes can be told by a glance at his outfit. In the hot country, those who dress at all wear simply a white cotton shirt and trousers.