Legends of the City of Mexico/La Cruz Verde (Notes)
NOTE IV
LEGEND OF THE CALLE DE LA CRUZ VERDE
Señor Arellano has documented the legend of the Green Cross by adding to his sympathetic version of it the following note: "Some years ago I saw in either the church of San Miguel or the church of San Pablo, set aside in a corner, a bronze tablet that once had rested upon a tomb. On it was the inscription, 'Doña María de Aldarafuente Lara y Segura de Manrique. Agosto 11 de 1573 años. R. I. P.'; and beneath the inscription was a large Latin cross. Probably the tablet was melted up. When I went to look for it, later, it was not to be found."
This record testifies to the truth of the pretty legend to the extent that it proves that the hero and the heroine of it were real people, and that their wedding really took place; and it also testifies to the melancholy fact—since Don Alvaro came to Mexico in the train of the Viceroy Don Gastón de Peralta, whose entry into the Capital was made on September 17, 1566—that their wedded life lasted less than seven years. The once stately but now shabby house whereon the cross is carved is in what anciently was a dignified quarter of the City; and the niche for a saint, vacant now, above the cross is one of the characteristics of the old houses in which people of condition lived. The cross is unique. No other house in the City is ornamented in this way.