In New Mexico, during Lent and Holy Week each year, the Penitent Brotherhood enacts a primitive Passion Play, which in its traditional ritual of self-torture represents a curious survival of the Middle Ages. Much lurid journalism has been devoted to the Penitentes, but in this sympathetic account by Alice Corbin Henderson, an eye-witness, the ceremonies are presented in their true aspect, with the historic background and reason for the survival clearly indicated. From this it appears that the religious custom of self-inflicted penance was introduced into the Southwest as early as 1598 by the Franciscan priests who accompanied Don Juan de O