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[Illustration: RICHARD]
THE PURPLE LAND
Being the Narrative of One Richard Lamb’s Adventures in The Banda Oriental, in South America, as Told By Himself
BY
W. H. Hudson
ILLUSTRATED BY
Keith Henderson
Second Edition, 1904
NEW YORK
PREFACE
This work was first issued in 1885, by Messrs. Sampson Low, in two slim volumes, with the longer, and to most persons, enigmatical title of _The Purple Land That England Lost_. A purple land may be found in almost any region of the globe, and ’tis of our gains, not our losses, we keep count. A few notices of the book appeared in the papers, one or two of the more serious literary journals reviewing it (not favourably) under the heading of “Travels and Geography”; but the reading public cared not to buy, and it very shortly fell into oblivion. There it might have remained for a further period of nineteen years, or for ever, since the sleep of a book is apt to be of the unawakening kind, had not certain men of letters, who found it on a forgotten heap and liked it in spite of its faults, or because of them, concerned themselves to revive it.
We are often told that an author never wholly loses his affection for a first book, and the feeling has been likened (more than once) to that of a parent towards a first-born. I have not said it, but in consenting to this reprint I considered that a writer’s early or unregarded work is apt to be raked up when he is not standing by to make remarks. He may be absent on a journey from which he is not expected to return. It accordingly seemed better that I should myself supervise a new edition, since this would enable me to remove a few of the numerous spots and pimples which decorate the ingenious countenance of the work before handing it on to posterity.
Besides many small verbal corrections and changes, the deletion of some paragraphs and the insertion of a few new ones, I have omitted one entire chapter containing the Story of a Piebald Horse, recently reprinted in another book entitled _El Ombù_. I have also dropped the tedious introduction to the former edition, only preserving, as an appendix, the historical part, for the sake of such of my readers as may like to have a few facts about the land that England lost.
W. H. H.
_September, 1904._
[FOR THE SECOND EDITION]
[Illustration: MARGARITA]
[Illustration: DOLORES]
[Illustration: PAQUÍTA]
[Illustration: TORIBIA]
[Illustration: MONICA]
[Illustration: ANITA]
[Illustration: SANTA COLOMA]
[Illustration: CANDELARIA]
[Illustration: DEMETRIA]
[Illustration: HILARIO]
CHAPTER I
Three chapters in the story of my life–three periods, distinct and well defined, yet consecutive–beginning when I had not completed twenty-five years and finishing before thirty, will probably prove the most eventful of all. To the very end they will come back oftenest to memory and seem more vivid than all the other years of existence–the four-and-twenty I had already lived, and the, say, forty or forty-five–I hope it may be fifty or even sixty–which are to follow. For what soul in this wonderful, various world would wish to depart before ninety! The dark as well as the light, its sweet and its bitter, make me love it.
Of the first of these three a word only need be written. This was the period of courtship and matrimony; and though the experience seemed to me then something altogether new and strange in the world, it must nevertheless have resembled that of other men, since all men marry. And the last period, which was the longest of the three, occupying fully three years, could not be told. It was all black disaster. Three years of enforced separation and the extremest suffering which the cruel law of the land allowed an enraged father to inflict on his child and the man who had ventured to wed her against his will. Even the wise may be driven mad by oppression, and I that was never wise, but lived in and was led by the passions and illusions and the unbounded self-confidence of youth, what must it have been for me when we were cruelly torn asunder; when I was cast into prison to lie for long months in the company of felons, ever thinking of her who was also desolate and breaking her heart! But it is ended–the abhorrent restraint, the anxiety, the breedings over a thousand possible and impossible schemes of revenge. If it is any consolation to know that in breaking her heart he, at the same time, broke his own, and made haste to join her in that silent place, I have it. Ah no! it is no comfort to me, since I cannot but reflect that before he shattered my life I had shattered his by taking her from him, who was his idol. We are quits then, and I can even say, “Peace to his ashes!” But I could not say it then in my frenzy and grief, nor could it be said in that fatal country which I had inhabited from boyhood and had learned to love like my own, and had hoped never to leave. It was grown hateful to me, and, flying from it, I found myself once more in that Purple Land where we had formerly taken refuge together, and which now seemed to my distracted mind a place of pleasant and peaceful memories.
During the months of quietude after the storm, mostly spent in lonely rambles by the shore, these memories were more and more with me. Sometimes sitting on the summit of that great solitary hill, which gives the town its name, I would gaze by the hour on the wide prospect towards the interior, as if I could see, and never weary of seeing, all that lay beyond–plains and rivers and woods and hills, and cabins where I had rested, and many a kindly human face. Even the faces of those who had ill-treated or regarded me with evil eyes now appeared to have a friendly look. Most of all did I think of that dear river, the unforgettable Yí, the shaded white house at the end of the little town, and the sad and beautiful image of one whom I, alas! had made unhappy.
So much was I occupied towards the end of that vacant period with these recollections that I remembered how, before quitting these shores, the thought had come to me that during some quiet interval in my life I would go over it all again, and write the history of my rambles for others to read in the future. But I did not attempt it then, nor until long years afterwards. For I had no sooner begun to play with the idea than something came to rouse me from the state I was in, during which I had been like one that has outlived his activities, and is no longer capable of a new emotion, but feeds wholly on the past. And this something new, affecting me so that I was all at once myself again, eager to be up and doing, was nothing more than a casual word from a distance, the cry of a lonely heart, which came by chance to my ear; and, hearing it, I was like one who, opening his eyes from a troubled doze, unexpectedly sees the morning star in its unearthly lustre above the wide, dark plain where night overtook him–the star of day and everlasting hope, and of passion and strife and toil and rest and happiness.
I need not linger on the events which took us to the Banda–our nocturnal flight from Paquíta’s summer home on the pampas; the hiding and clandestine marriage in the capital and subsequent escape northwards into the province of Santa Fé; the seven to eight months of somewhat troubled happiness we had there; and, finally, the secret return to Buenos Ayres in search of a ship to take us out of the country. Troubled happiness! Ah, yes, and my greatest trouble was when I looked on her, my partner for life, when she seemed loveliest, so small, so exquisite in her dark blue eyes that were like violets, and silky black hair and tender pink and olive complexion–so frail in appearance! And I had taken her–stolen her–from her natural protectors, from the home where she had been worshipped–I of an alien race and another religion, without means, and, because I had stolen her, an offender against the law. But of this no more. I begin my itinerary where, safe on our little ship, with the towers of Buenos Ayres fast fading away in the west, we began to feel free from apprehension and to give ourselves up to the contemplation of the delights before us. Winds and waves presently interfered with our raptures, Paquíta proving a very indifferent sailor, so that for some hours we had a very trying time of it. Next day a favourable north-west breeze sprang up to send us flying like a bird over those unlovely red billows, and in the evening we disembarked in Montevideo, the city of refuge. We proceeded to an hotel, where for several days we lived very happily, enchanted with each other’s society; and when we strolled along the beach to watch the setting sun, kindling with mystic fire heaven, water, and the great hill that gives the city its name, and remembered that we were looking towards the shores of Buenos Ayres, it was pleasant to reflect that the widest river in the world rolled between us and those who probably felt offended at what we had done.
This charming state of things came to an end at length in a somewhat curious manner. One night, before we had been a month in the hotel, I was lying wide awake in bed. It was late; I had already heard the mournful, long-drawn voice of the watchman under my window calling out, “Half-past one and cloudy.”
Gil Blas relates in his biography that one night while lying awake he fell into practising a little introspection, an unusual thing for him to do, and the conclusion he came to was that he was not a very good young man. I was having a somewhat similar experience that night when in the midst of my unflattering thoughts about myself, a profound sigh from Paquíta made me aware that she too was lying wide awake and also, in all probability, chewing the cud of reflection. When I questioned her concerning that sigh, she endeavoured in vain to conceal from me that she was beginning to feel unhappy. What a rude shock the discovery gave me! And we so lately married! It is only just to Paquíta, however, to say that had I not married her she would have been still more unhappy. Only the poor child could not help thinking of father and mother; she yearned for reconciliation, and her present sorrow rose from her belief that they would never, never, never forgive her. I endeavoured, with all the eloquence I was capable of, to dispel these gloomy ideas, but she was firm in her conviction that precisely because they had loved her so much they would never pardon this first great offence. My poor darling might have been reading _Christabel_, I thought, when she said that it is toward those who have been most deeply loved the wounded heart cherishes the greatest bitterness. Then, by way of illustration, she told me of a quarrel between her mother and a till then dearly loved sister. It had happened many years ago, when she, Paquíta, was a mere child; yet the sisters had never forgiven each other.
“And where,” I asked, “is this aunt of yours, of whom I have never heard you speak until this minute?”
“Oh,” answered Paquíta, with the greatest simplicity imaginable, “she left this country long, long ago, and you never heard of her because we were not even allowed to mention her name in the house. She went to live in Montevideo, and I believe she is there still, for several years ago I heard some person say that she had bought herself a house in that city.”
“Soul of my life,” said I, “you have never left Buenos Ayres in heart, even to keep your poor husband company! Yet I know, Paquíta, that corporeally you are here in Montevideo, conversing with me at this very moment.”
“True,” said Paquíta; “I had somehow forgotten that we were in Montevideo. My thoughts were wandering–perhaps it is sleepiness.”
“I swear to you, Paquíta,” I replied, “that you shall see this aunt of yours to-morrow before set of sun; and I am positive, sweetest, that she will be delighted to receive so near and lovely a relation. How glad she will be of an opportunity of relating that ancient quarrel with her sister and ventilating her mouldy grievances! I know these old dames–they are all alike.”
Paquíta did not like the idea at first, but when I assured her that we were getting to the end of our money, and that her aunt might be able to put me in the way of obtaining employment, she consented, like the dutiful little wife she was.
Next day I discovered her relation without very much trouble, Montevideo not being a large city. We found Doña Isidora–for that was the lady’s name–living in a somewhat mean-looking house at the eastern extremity of the town, farthest away from the water. There was an air of poverty about the place, for the good dame, though well provided with means to live comfortably, made a pet of her gold. Nevertheless, she received us very kindly when we introduced ourselves and related our mournful and romantic story; a room was prepared for our immediate reception, and she even made me some vague promises of assistance. On a more intimate acquaintance with our hostess we found that I had not been very far out in guessing her character. For several days she could talk of nothing except her immemorial quarrel with her sister and her sister’s husband, and we were bound to listen attentively and to sympathise with her, for that was the only return we could make for her hospitality. Paquíta had more than her share of it, but was made no wiser as to the cause of this feud of long standing; for, though Doña Isidora had evidently been nursing her wrath all those years to keep it warm, she could not, for the life of her, remember how the quarrel originated.
After breakfast each morning I would kiss her and hand her over to the tender mercies of her Isidora, then go forth on my fruitless perambulations about the town. At first I only acted the intelligent foreigner, going about staring at the public buildings, and collecting curios–strangely marked pebbles, and a few military brass buttons, long shed by the garments they once made brave; rusty, misshapen bullets, mementoes of the immortal nine or ten years’ siege which had won for Montevideo the mournful appellation of modern Troy. When I had fully examined from the outside the scene of my future triumphs–for I had now resolved to settle down and make my fortune in Montevideo– Ibegan seriously to look out for employment. I visited in turn every large mercantile establishment in the place, and, in fact, every house where I thought there might be a chance of lighting on something to do. It was necessary to make a beginning, and I would not have turned up my nose at anything, however small, I was so heartily sick of being poor, idle, and dependent. Nothing could I find. In one house I was told that the city had not yet recovered from the effects of the late revolution, and that business was, in consequence, in a complete state of paralysis; in another that the city was on the eve of a revolution, and that business was, in consequence, in a complete state of paralysis. And everywhere it was the same story–the political state of the country made it impossible for me to win an honest dollar.
Feeling very much dispirited, and with the soles nearly worn off my boots, I sat down on a bench beside the sea, or river–for some call it one thing, some the other, and the muddied hue and freshness of the water, and the uncertain words of geographers, leave one in doubt as to whether Montevideo is situated on the shores of the Atlantic, or only near the Atlantic and on the shores of a river one hundred and fifty miles wide at its mouth. I did not trouble my head about it; I had other things that concerned me more nearly to think of. I had a quarrel with this Oriental nation, and that was more to me than the greenness or the saltness of the vast estuary that washes the dirty feet of its queen–for this modern Troy, this city of battle, murder, and sudden death, also calls itself Queen of the Plata. That it was a very just quarrel on my part I felt well assured. Now, to be even with every human being who despitefully uses me has ever been a principle of action with me. Nor let it be said that it is an unchristian principle; for when I have been smitten on the right or left cheek (the pain is just the same in either case), before I am prepared to deliver the return blow so long a time has often elapsed that all wrathful or revengeful thoughts are over. I strike in such a case more for the public good than for my own satisfaction, and am therefore right in calling my motive a principle of action, not an impulse. It is a very valuable one too, infinitely more effective than the fantastical code of the duellist, which favours the person who inflicts the injury, affording him facilities for murdering or maiming the person injured. It is a weapon invented for us by Nature before Colonel Colt ever lived, and it has this advantage, that one is permitted to wear it in the most law-abiding communities as well as amongst miners and backwoodsmen. If inoffensive people were ever to cast it aside, then wicked men would have everything their own way and make life intolerable. Fortunately the evil-doers always have the fear of this intangible six-shooter before them; a wholesome feeling, which restrains them more than reasonableness or the law courts, and to which we owe it that the meek are permitted to inherit the earth. But now this quarrel was with a whole nation, though certainly not with a very great one, since the population of the Banda Orientál numbers only about a quarter of a million. Yet in this sparsely settled country, with its bountiful soil and genial climate, there was apparently no place for me, a muscular and fairly intelligent young man, who only asked to be allowed to work to live! But how was I to make them smart for this injustice? I could not take the scorpion they gave me when I asked them for an egg, and make it sting every individual composing the nation. I was powerless, utterly powerless, to punish them, and therefore the only thing that remained for me to do was to curse them.
Looking around me, my eyes rested on the famous hill across the bay, and I all at once resolved to go up to its summit, and, looking down on the Banda Orientál, pronounce my imprecation in the most solemn and impressive manner.
The expedition to the _cerro_, as it is called, proved agreeable enough. Notwithstanding the excessive heats we were just then having, many wild flowers were blooming on its slopes, which made it a perfect garden. When I reached the old ruined fort which crowns the summit, I got upon a wall and rested for half an hour, fanned by a fresh breeze from the river and greatly enjoying the prospect before me. I had not left out of sight the serious object of my visit to that commanding spot, and only wished that the malediction I was about to utter could be rolled down in the shape of a stupendous rock, loosed from its hold, which would go bounding down the mountain, and, leaping clear over the bay, crash through the iniquitous city beyond, filling it with ruin and amazement.
“Whichever way I turn,” I said, “I see before me one of the fairest habitations God has made for man: great plains smiling with everlasting spring; ancient woods; swift, beautiful rivers; ranges of blue hills stretching away to the dim horizon. And beyond those fair slopes, how many leagues of pleasant wilderness are sleeping in the sunshine, where the wild flowers waste their sweetness and no plough turns the fruitful soil, where deer and ostrich roam fearless of the hunter, while over all bends a blue sky without a cloud to stain its exquisite beauty? And the people dwelling in yon city–the key to a continent–they are the possessors of it all. It is theirs, since the world, out of which the old spirit is fast dying, has suffered them to keep it. What have they done with this their heritage? What are they doing even now? They are sitting dejected in their houses, or standing in their doorways with folded arms and anxious, expectant faces. For a change is coming: they are on the eve of a tempest. Not an atmospheric change; no blighting simoom will sweep over their fields, nor will any volcanic eruption darken their crystal heavens. The earthquakes that shake the Andean cities to their foundations they have never known and can never know. The expected change and tempest is a political one. The plot is ripe, the daggers sharpened, the contingent of assassins hired, the throne of human skulls, styled in their ghastly facetiousness a Presidential Chair, is about to be assaulted. It is long, weeks or even months, perhaps, since the last wave, crested with bloody froth, rolled its desolating flood over the country; it is high time, therefore, for all men to prepare themselves for the shock of the succeeding wave. And we consider it right to root up thorns and thistles, to drain malarious marshes, to extirpate rats and vipers; but it would be immoral, I suppose, to stamp out these people because their vicious natures are disguised in human shape; this people that in crimes have surpassed all others, ancient or modern, until because of them the name of a whole continent has grown to be a byword of scorn and reproach throughout the earth, and to stink in the nostrils of all men!
“I swear that I, too, will become a conspirator if I remain long on this soil. Oh, for a thousand young men of Devon and Somerset here with me, every one of them with a brain on fire with thoughts like mine! What a glorious deed would be done for humanity! What a mighty cheer we would raise for the glory of the old England that is passing away! Blood would flow in yon streets as it never flowed before, or, I should say, as it only flowed in them once, and that was when they were swept clean by British bayonets. And afterwards there would be peace, and the grass would be greener and the flowers brighter for that crimson shower.
“Is it not then bitter as wormwood and gall to think that over these domes and towers beneath my feet, no longer than half a century ago, fluttered the holy cross of St. George! For never was there a holier crusade undertaken, never a nobler conquest planned, than that which had for its object the wresting this fair country from unworthy hands, to make it for all time part of the mighty English kingdom. What would it have been now–this bright, winterless land, and this city commanding the entrance to the greatest river in the world? And to think that it was won for England, not treacherously, or bought with gold, but in the old Saxon fashion with hard blows, and climbing over heaps of slain defenders; and after it was thus won, to think that it was lost–will it be believed?–not fighting, but yielded up without a stroke by craven wretches unworthy of the name of Britons! Here, sitting alone on this mountain, my face burns like fire when I think of it–this glorious opportunity lost for ever! ‘We offer you your laws, your religion, and property under the protection of the British Government,’ loftily proclaimed the invaders–Generals Beresford, Achmuty, Whitelocke, and their companions; and presently, after suffering one reverse, they (or one of them) lost heart and exchanged the country they had drenched in blood, and had conquered, for a couple of thousand British soldiers made prisoners in Buenos Ayres across the water; then, getting into their ships once more, they sailed away from the Plata for ever! This transaction, which must have made the bones of our Viking ancestors rattle with indignation in their graves, was forgotten later on when we seized the rich Falklands. A splendid conquest and a glorious compensation for our loss! When yon queen city was in our grasp, and the regeneration, possibly even the ultimate possession, of this green world before us, our hearts failed us and the prize dropped from our trembling hands. We left the sunny mainland to capture the desolate haunt of seals and penguins; and now let all those who in this quarter of the globe aspire to live under that ‘British Protection’ of which Achmuty preached so loudly at the gates of yon capital, transport themselves to those lonely antarctic islands to listen to the thunder of the waves on the grey shores and shiver in the bleak winds that blow from the frozen south!”
After delivering this comminatory address I felt greatly relieved, and went home in a cheerful frame of mind to supper, which consisted that evening of mutton scrag, boiled with pumpkin, sweet potatoes, and milky maize–not at all a bad dish for a hungry man.
CHAPTER II
Several days passed, and my second pair of boots had been twice resoled before Doña Isidora’s schemes for advancing my fortunes began to take form. Perhaps she was beginning to think us a burden on her somewhat niggardly establishment; anyway, hearing that my preference was for a country life, she gave me a letter containing half a dozen lines of commendation addressed to the Mayordomo of a distant cattle-breeding establishment, asking him to serve the writer by giving her _nephew_–as she called me–employment of some kind on the _estancia_. Probably she knew that this letter would really lead to nothing, and gave it merely to get me away into the interior of the country, so as to keep Paquíta for an indefinite time to herself, for she had become extremely attached to her beautiful niece. The _estancia_ was on the borders of the Paysandù department, and not less than two hundred miles from Montevideo. It was a long journey, and I was advised not to attempt it without a _tropilla_, or troop of horses. But when a native tells you that you cannot travel two hundred miles without a dozen horses, he only means that you cannot do the distance in two days; for it is hard for him to believe that one may be satisfied with less than one hundred miles a day. I travelled on one horse, and it therefore took me several days to accomplish my journey. Before I reached my destination, called Estancia de la Virgin de los Desamparados, I met with some adventures worth relating, and began to feel as much at home with the _Orientáles_ as I had long been with the _Argentinos_.
Fortunately, after I left the town, a west wind continued blowing all day, bringing with it many light, flying clouds to mitigate the sun, so that I was able to cover a good number of leagues before the evening. I took the road northwards through Camelones department, and was well on into the Florida department when I put up for the night at the solitary mud _rancho_ of an old herdsman, who lived with his wife and children in a very primitive fashion. When I rode up to the house, several huge dogs rushed out to attack me: one seized my horse by the tail, dragging the poor beast about this way and that, so that he staggered and could scarcely keep his legs; another caught the bridle-reins in his mouth; while a third fixed his fangs in the heel of my boot. After eyeing me for some moments, the grizzled old herdsman, who wore a knife a yard long at his waist, advanced to the rescue. He shouted at the dogs, and finding that they would not obey, sprang forward and with a few dexterous blows, dealt with his heavy whip-handle, sent them away howling with rage and pain. Then he welcomed me with great courtesy, and very soon, when my horse had been unsaddled and turned loose to feed, we were sitting together enjoying the cool evening air and imbibing the bitter and refreshing _maté_ his wife served to us. While we conversed I noticed numberless fireflies flitting about; I had never seen them so numerous before, and they made a very lovely show. Presently one of the children, a bright little fellow of seven or eight, came running to us with one of the sparkling insects in his hand, and cried:
“Look, _tatita_, I have caught a _linterna_. See how bright it is!”
“The Saints forgive you, my child,” said the father. “Go, little son, and put it back on the grass, for if you should hurt it, the spirits would be angry with you, for they go about by night, and love the _linterna_ that keeps them company.”
What a pretty superstition, I thought; and what a mild, merciful heart this old Oriental herdsman must possess to show so much tenderness towards one of God’s tiny creatures. I congratulated myself on my good fortune in having fallen in with such a person in this lonely place.
The dogs, after their rude behaviour to me and the sharp punishment they had suffered in consequence, had returned, and were now gathered around us, lying on the ground. Here I noticed, not for the first time, that the dogs belonging to these lonely places are not nearly so fond of being noticed and caressed as are those of more populous and civilised districts. On attempting to stroke one of these surly brutes on the head, he displayed his teeth and growled savagely at me. Yet this animal, though so truculent in temper, and asking for no kindness from his master, is just as faithful to man as his better-mannered brother in the more settled country. I spoke on that subject to my gentle herdsman.
“What you say is true,” he replied. “I remember once during the siege of Montevideo, when I was with a small detachment sent to watch the movements of General Rivera’s army, we one day overtook a man on a tired horse. Our officer, suspecting him to be a spy, ordered him to be killed, and, after cutting his throat, we left his body lying on the open ground at a distance of about two hundred and fifty yards from a small stream of water. A dog was with him, and when we rode off we called it to follow us, but it would not stir from its dead master’s side.
“Three days later we returned to the same spot, to find the corpse lying just where we had left it. The foxes and birds had not touched it, for the dog was still there to defend it. Many vultures were near, waiting for a chance to begin their feast. We alighted to refresh ourselves at the stream, then stood there for half an hour watching the dog. He seemed to be half-famished with thirst, and came towards the stream to drink; but before he got half-way to it the vultures, by twos and threes, began to advance, when back he flew and chased them away, barking. After resting a few minutes beside the corpse, he came again towards the stream, till, seeing the hungry birds advance once more, he again flew back at them, barking furiously and foaming at the mouth. This we saw repeated many times, and at last, when we left, we tried once more to entice the dog to follow us, but he would not. Two days after that we had occasion to pass by that spot again, and there we saw the dog lying dead beside his dead master.”
“Good God,” I exclaimed, “how horrible must have been the feelings you and your companions experienced at such a sight!”
“No, señor, not at all,” replied the old man. “Why, señor, I myself put the knife into that man’s throat. For if a man did not grow accustomed to shed blood in this world, his life would be a burden to him.”
What an inhuman old murderer! I thought. Then I asked him whether he had ever in his life felt remorse for shedding blood.
“Yes,” he answered; “when I was a very young man, and had never before dipped weapon in human blood; that was when the siege began. I was sent with half a dozen men in pursuit of a clever spy, who had passed the lines with letters from the besieged. We came to a house where, our officer had been informed, he had been lying concealed. The master of the house was a young man about twenty-two years old. He would confess nothing. Finding him so stubborn, our officer became enraged, and bade him step out, and then ordered us to lance him. We galloped forty yards off, then wheeled back. He stood silent, his arms folded on his breast, a smile on his lips. Without a cry, without a groan, with that smile still on his lips, he fell pierced through with our lances. For days afterwards his face was ever present to me. I could not eat, for my food choked me. When I raised a jug of water to my lips I could, señor, distinctly see his eyes looking at me from the water. When I lay down to sleep, his face was again before me, always with that smile that seemed to mock me on the lips. I could not understand it. They told me it was remorse, and that it would soon leave me, for there is no ill that time will not cure. They spoke truth, and when that feeling left me I was able to do all things.”
The old man’s story so sickened me that I had little appetite for supper, and passed a bad night thinking, waking or sleeping, of that young man in this obscure corner of the world who folded his arms and smiled on his slayers when they were slaying him. Very early next morning I bade my host good-bye, thanking him for his hospitality, and devoutly hoping that I should never look upon his abhorred face again.
I made little progress that day, the weather proving hot, and my horse lazier than ever. After riding about five leagues, I rested for a couple of hours, then proceeded again at a gentle trot till about the middle of the afternoon, when I dismounted at a wayside _pulpería_ or store and public-house all in one, where several natives were sipping rum and conversing. Standing before them was a brisk-looking old man–old, I say, because he had a dark, dry skin, though his hair and moustache were black as jet–who paused in the discourse he appeared to be delivering, to salute me; then, after bestowing a searching glance on me out of his dark, hawk-like eyes, he resumed his talk. After calling for rum and water, to be in the fashion, I sat down on a bench, and, lighting a cigarette, prepared to listen. He was dressed in shabby gaucho habiliments–cotton shirt, short jacket, wide cotton drawers, and _chiripa_, a shawl-like garment fastened at the waist with a sash, and reaching down half-way between the knees and ankles. In place of a hat he wore a cotton handkerchief tied carelessly about his head; his left foot was bare, while the right one was cased in a colt’s-skin stocking, called _bota-de-potro_, and on this distinguished foot was buckled a huge iron spur, with spikes two inches long. One spur of the kind would be quite sufficient, I should imagine, to get out of a horse all the energy of which he was capable. When I entered he was holding forth on the pretty well-worn theme of fate _versus_ free will; his arguments were not, however, the usual dry philosophical ones, but took the form of illustration, chiefly personal reminiscences and strange incidents in the lives of people he had known, while so vivid and minute were his descriptions–sparkling with passion, satire, humour, pathos, and so dramatic his action, while wonderful story followed story–that I was fairly astonished, and pronounced this old _pulpería_ orator a born genius.
His argument over, he fixed his keen eyes on me and said:
“My friend, I perceive you are a traveller from Montevideo: may I ask what news there is from that city?”
“What news do you expect to hear?” said I; then it came into my thought that it was scarcely proper to confine myself to more commonplace phrases in replying to this curious old Oriental bird, with such ragged plumage, but whose native woodnotes wild had such a charm in them. “It is only the old story over again!” I continued. “They say there will be a revolution some day. Some of the people have already retired into their houses, after chalking in very big letters on their front doors, ‘Please come into this house and cut the owner’s throat for him, so that he may rest at peace, and have no fear of what may happen.’ Others have climbed on to their roofs, and occupy themselves there looking at the moon through spy-glasses, thinking that the conspirators are concealed in that luminary, and only waiting for a cloud to obscure it, in order to descend upon the city unobserved.”
“Hear!” cried the old man, rapping delighted applause on the counter with his empty glass.
“What do you drink, friend?” I asked, thinking his keen appreciation of my grotesque speech deserved a treat, and wishing to draw him out a little more.
“Rum, friend, thank you. They say it warms you in winter, and cools you in summer–what can you have better?”
“Tell me,” said I, when his glass had been refilled by the storekeeper, “what I shall say when I return to Montevideo, and am asked what news there is in the country?”
The old fellow’s eyes twinkled, while the other men ceased talking, and looked at him as if anticipating something good in reply to my question.
“Say to them,” he answered, “that you met an old man–a horse tamer named Lucero–and that he told you this fable for you to repeat to the townspeople: Once there was a great tree named Montevideo growing in this country, and in its branches lived a colony of monkeys. One day one of the monkeys came down from the tree and ran full of excitement across the plain, now scrambling along like a man on all fours, then erect like a dog running on its hind legs, while its tail, with nothing to catch hold of, wriggled about like a snake when its head is under foot. He came to a place where a number of oxen were grazing, and some horses, ostriches, deer, goats, and pigs. ‘Friends all,’ cried the monkey, grinning like a skull, and with staring eyes round as dollars, ‘great news! great news! I come to tell you that there will shortly be a revolution.’ ‘Where?’ said an ox. ‘In the tree–where else?’ said the monkey. ‘That does not concern us,’ said the ox. ‘Oh, yes, it does!’ cried the monkey, ‘for it will presently spread about the country and you will all have your throats cut.’ Then the ox replied, ‘Go back, monkey, and do not molest us with your news, lest we get angry and go to besiege you in your tree, as we have often had to do since the creation of the world; and then, if you and the other monkeys come down to us, we will toss you on our horns.'”
This apologue sounded very well, so admirably did the old man picture to us with voice and gesture the chattering excitement of the monkey and the majestic _aplomb_ of the ox.
“Señor,” he continued, after the laugh had subsided, “I do not wish any of my friends and neighbours here present to fly to the conclusion that I have spoken anything offensive. Had I seen in you a Montevidean I should not have spoken of monkeys. But, señor, though you speak as we do, there is yet in the pepper and salt on your tongue a certain foreign flavour.”
“You are right,” I said; “I am a foreigner.”
“A foreigner in some things, friend, for you were doubtless born under other skies; but in that chief quality, which we think was given by the Creator to us and not to the people of other lands–the ability to be one in heart with the men you meet, whether they are clothed in velvet or in sheep-skins–in that you are one of us, a pure Oriental.”
I smiled at his subtle flattery; possibly it was only meant in payment of the rum I had treated him to, but it pleased me none the less, and to his other mental traits I was now inclined to add a marvellous skill in reading character.
After a while he invited me to spend the night under his roof. “Your horse is fat and lazy,” he said with truth, “and, unless you are a relation of the owl family, you cannot go much farther before to-morrow. My house is a humble one, but the mutton is juicy, the fire warm, and the water cool there, the same as in another place.”
I readily accepted his invitation, wishing to see as much as I could of so original a character, and before starting I purchased a bottle of rum, which made his eyes sparkle so that I thought his name–Lucero–rather an appropriate one. His _rancho_ was about two miles from the store, and our ride thither was about as strange a gallop as I ever took. Lucero was a _domador_, or horse-tamer, and the beast he rode was quite unbroken and vicious as it could be. Between horse and man a fierce struggle for mastery raged the whole time, the horse rearing, plunging, buck-jumping, and putting into practice every conceivable trick to rid itself of its burden; while Lucero plied whip and spur with tremendous energy and poured out torrents of strange adjectives. At one moment he would come into violent collision with my old sober beast, at another there would be fifty yards of ground between us; still Lucero would not stop talking, for he had begun a very interesting story at starting, and he stuck to his narrative through everything, resuming the thread after each tempest of execration vented on his horse, and raising his voice almost to a shout when we were far apart. The old fellow’s staying powers were really extraordinary, and when we arrived at the house he jumped airily to the ground, and seemed fresh and calm as possible.
In the kitchen were several people sipping _maté_, Lucero’s children and grandchildren, also his wife, a grey old dame with dim-looking eyes. But then my host was old in years himself, only, like Ulysses, he still possessed the unquenched fire and energy of youth in his soul, while time bestowed infirmities together with wrinkles and white hairs on his helpmate.
He introduced me to her in a manner that brought the modest flame to my cheeks. Standing before her, he said that he had met me at the _pulpería_ and had put to me the question which a simple old countryman must ask of every traveller from Montevideo–What the news was? Then, assuming a dry, satirical tone, which years of practice would not enable me to imitate, he proceeded to give my fantastical answer, garnished with much original matter of his own.
“Señora,” I said, when he had finished, “you must not give me credit for all you have heard from your husband. I only gave him brute wool, and he has woven it for your delight into beautiful cloth.”
“Hear him! Did I tell you what to expect, Juana?” cried the old man, which made me blush still more.
We then settled down to _maté_ and quiet conversation. Sitting in the kitchen on the skull of a horse–a common article of furniture in an Oriental _rancho_–was a boy about twelve years old, one of Lucero’s grandchildren, with a very beautiful face. His feet were bare and his clothes very poor, but his soft dark eyes and olive face had that tender, half-melancholy expression often seen in children of Spanish origin, which is always so strangely captivating.
“Where is your guitar, Cipriano?” said his grandfather, addressing him, whereupon the boy rose and fetched a guitar, which he first politely offered to me.
When I had declined it, he seated himself once more on his polished horse-skull and began to play and sing. He had a sweet boy’s voice, and one of his ballads took my fancy so much that I made him repeat the words to me while I wrote them down in my notebook, which greatly gratified Lucero, who seemed proud of the boy’s accomplishment. Here are the words translated almost literally, therefore without rhymes, and I only regret that I cannot furnish my musical readers with the quaint, plaintive air they were sung to:
O let me go–O let me go,
Where high are born amidst the hills The streams that gladden all the south, And o’er the grassy desert wide,
Where slakes his thirst the antlered deer, Hurry towards the great green ocean.
The stony hills–the stony hills,
With azure air-flowers on their crags, Where cattle stray unowned by man;
The monarch of the herd there seems No bigger than my hand in size,
Roaming along the tall, steep summit.
I know them well–I know them well, Those hills of God, and they know me;
When I go there they are serene,
But when the stranger visits them Dark rain-clouds gather round their tops– Over the earth goes forth the tempest.
Then tell me not–then tell me not
‘Tis sorrowful to dwell alone;
My heart within the city pent
Pines for the desert’s liberty;
The streets are red with blood, and fear Makes pale and mournful women’s faces.
O bear me far–O bear me far,
On swift, sure feet, my trusty steed: I do not love the burial-ground,
But I shall sleep upon the plain, Where long green grass shall round me wave– Over me graze wild herds of cattle.
CHAPTER III
Leaving the eloquent old horse-tamer’s _rancho_ early next morning, I continued my ride, jogging quietly along all day and, leaving the Florida department behind me, entered upon that of the Durazno. Here I broke my journey at an _estancia_ where I had an excellent opportunity of studying the manners and customs of the Orientals, and where I also underwent experiences of a mixed character and greatly increased my knowledge of the insect world. This house, at which I arrived an hour before sunset to ask for shelter (“permission to unsaddle” is the expression the traveller uses), was a long, low structure, thatched with rushes, but the low, enormously thick walls were built of stone from the neighbouring sierras, in pieces of all shapes and sizes, and presenting, outwardly, the rough appearance of a stone fence. How these rudely piled-up stones, without cement to hold them together, had not fallen down was a mystery to me; and it was more difficult still to imagine why the rough interior, with its innumerable dusty holes and interstices, had never been plastered.
I was kindly received by a very numerous family, consisting of the owner, his hoary-headed old mother-in-law, his wife, three sons, and five daughters, all grown up. There were also several small children, belonging, I believe, to the daughters, notwithstanding the fact that they were unmarried. I was greatly amazed at hearing the name of one of these youngsters. Such Christian names as Trinity, Heart of Jesus, Nativity, John of God, Conception, Ascension, Incarnation, are common enough, but these had scarcely prepared me to meet with a fellow-creature named–well, Circumcision! Besides the people, there were dogs, cats, turkeys, ducks, geese, and fowls without number. Not content with all these domestic birds and beasts, they also kept a horrid, shrieking paroquet, which the old woman was incessantly talking to, explaining to the others all the time, in little asides, what the bird said or wished to say, or, rather, what she imagined it wished to say. There were also several tame young ostriches, always hanging about the big kitchen or living-room on the look-out for a brass thimble, or iron spoon, or other little metallic _bonne bouche_ to be gobbled up when no one was looking. A pet armadillo kept trotting in and out, in and out, the whole evening, and a lame gull was always standing on the threshold in everybody’s way, perpetually wailing for something to eat–the most persistent beggar I ever met in my life.
The people were very jovial, and rather industrious for so indolent a country. The land was their own, the men tended the cattle, of which they appeared to have a large number, while the women made cheeses, rising before daylight to milk the cows.
During the evening two or three young men–neighbours, I imagine, who were paying their addresses to the young ladies of the establishment– dropped in; and after a plentiful supper, we had singing and dancing to the music of the guitar, on which every member of the family–excepting the babies–could strum a little.
About eleven o’clock I retired to rest, and, stretching myself on my rude bed of rugs, in a room adjoining the kitchen, I blessed these simple-minded, hospitable people. Good heavens, thought I to myself, what a glorious field is waiting here for some new Theocritus! How unutterably worn out, stilted, and artificial seems all the so-called pastoral poetry ever written when one sits down to supper and joins in the graceful _Cielo_ or _Pericon_ in one of these remote, semi-barbarous South American _estancias_! I swear I will turn poet myself, and go back some day to astonish old _blasé_ Europe with something so–so–What the deuce was that? My sleepy soliloquy was suddenly brought to a most lame and impotent conclusion, for I had heard a sound of terror–the unmistakable _zz-zzing_ of an insect’s wings. It was the hateful _vinchuca_. Here was an enemy against which British pluck and six-shooters are of no avail, and in whose presence one begins to experience sensations which are not usually supposed to enter into the brave man’s breast. Naturalists tell us that it is the _Connorhinus infectans_, but, as that information leaves something to be desired, I will proceed in a few words to describe the beast. It inhabits the entire Chilian, Argentine, and Oriental countries, and to all the dwellers in this vast territory it is known as the _vinchuca_; for, like a few volcanoes, deadly vipers, cataracts, and other sublime natural objects, it has been permitted to keep the ancient name bestowed on it by the aborigines. It is all over of a blackish-brown colour, as broad as a man’s thumb-nail, and flat as the blade of a table-knife–when fasting. By day it hides, bug-like, in holes and chinks, but no sooner are the candles put out, than forth it comes to seek whom it may devour; for, like the pestilence, it walks in darkness. It can fly, and in a dark room knows where you are and can find you. Having selected a nice tender part, it pierces the skin with its proboscis or rostrum, and sucks vigorously for two or three minutes, and, strange to say, you do not feel the operation, even when lying wide awake. By that time the creature, so attenuated before, has assumed the figure, size, and general appearance of a ripe gooseberry, so much blood has it drawn from your veins. Immediately after it has left you the part begins to swell up and burn as if stung by nettles. That the pain should come after and not during the operation is an arrangement very advantageous to the _vinchuca_, and I greatly doubt whether any other blood-sucking parasite has been equally favoured by nature in this respect.
Imagine then my sensations when I heard the sound of not one, but two or three pairs of wings! I tried to forget the sound and go to sleep. I tried to forget about those rough old walls full of interstices–a hundred years old they were, my host had informed me. Most interesting old house, thought I; and then very suddenly a fiery itching took possession of my great toe. There it is! said I; heated blood, late supper, dancing, and all that. I can almost imagine that something has actually bitten me, when of course nothing of that kind has happened. Then, while I was furiously rubbing and scratching it, feeling a badger-like disposition to gnaw it off, my left arm was pierced with red-hot needles. My attentions were quickly transferred to that part; but soon my busy hands were called elsewhere, like a couple of hard-worked doctors in a town afflicted with an epidemic; and so all night long, with only occasional snatches of miserable sleep, the contest went on.
I rose early, and, going to a wide stream, a quarter of a mile from the house, took a plunge which greatly refreshed me and gave me strength to go in quest of my horse. Poor brute! I had intended giving him a day’s rest, so pleasant and hospitable had the people shown themselves; but now I shuddered at the thought of spending another night in such a purgatory. I found him so lame that he could scarcely walk, and so returned to the house on foot and very much cast down. My host consoled me by assuring me that I would sleep the siesta all the better for having been molested by those “little things that go about,” for in this very mild language he described the affliction. After breakfast, at noon, acting on his hint, I took a rug to the shade of a tree and, lying down, quickly fell into a profound sleep, which lasted till late in the afternoon.
That evening visitors came again, and we had a repetition of the singing, dancing, and other pastoral amusements, till near midnight; then, thinking to cheat my bedfellows of the night before, I made my simple bed in the kitchen. But here also the vile _vinchucas_ found me, and there were, moreover, dozens of fleas that waged a sort of guerilla warfare all night, and in this way exhausted my strength and distracted my attention, while the more formidable adversary took up his position. My sufferings were so great that before daybreak I picked up my rugs and went out a distance from the house to lie down on the open plain, but I carried with me a smarting body and got but little rest. When morning came I found that my horse had not yet recovered from his lameness.
“Do not be in a hurry to leave us,” said my host, when I spoke of it. “I perceive that the little animals have again fought with and defeated you. Do not mind it; in time you will grow accustomed to them.”
How _they_ contrived to endure it, or even to exist, was a puzzle to me; but possibly the _vinchucas_ respected them, and only dined when, like the giant in the nursery rhyme, they “smelt the blood of an Englishman.”
I again enjoyed a long siesta, and when night came resolved to place myself beyond the reach of the vampires, and so, after supper, went out to sleep on the plain. About midnight, however, a sudden storm of wind and rain drove me back to the shelter of the house, and the next morning I rose in such a deplorable state that I deliberately caught and saddled my horse, though the poor beast could scarcely put one foot on the ground. My friends laughed good-humouredly when they saw me making these resolute preparations for departure. After partaking of bitter _maté_, I rose and thanked them for their hospitality.
“You surely do not intend leaving us on that animal!” said my host. “He is unfit to carry you.”
“I have no other,” I replied, “and am anxious to reach my destination.”
“Had I known this I would have offered you a horse before,” he returned, and then he sent one of his sons to drive the horses of the _estancia_ into the corral.
Selecting a good-looking animal from the herd, he presented it to me, and as I did not have money enough to buy a fresh horse whenever I wanted one, I accepted the gift very gladly. The saddle was quickly transferred to my new acquisition, and, once more thanking these good people and bidding adieu, I resumed my journey.
When I gave my hand before leaving to the youngest, and also, to my mind, the prettiest of the five daughters of the house, instead of smiling pleasantly and wishing me a prosperous journey, like the others, she was silent, and darted a look at me, which seemed to say, “Go, sir; you have treated me badly, and you insult me by offering your hand; if I take it, it is not because I feel disposed to forgive you, but only to save appearances.”
At the same moment, when she bestowed that glance on me which said so much, a look of intelligence passed over the faces of the other people in the room. All this revealed to me that I had just missed a very pretty little idyllic flirtation, conducted in very novel circumstances. Love cometh up as a flower, and men and charming women naturally flirt when brought together. Yet it was hard to imagine how I could have started a flirtation and carried it on to its culminatory point in that great public room, with all those eyes on me; dogs, babes, and cats tumbling about my feet; ostriches staring covetously at my buttons with great vacant eyes; and that intolerable paroquet perpetually reciting “How the waters came down at Lodore,” in its own shrieky, beaky, birdy, hurdy-gurdy, parrot language. Tender glances, soft whispered words, hand-touchings, and a thousand little personal attentions, showing which way the emotions tend, would scarcely have been practicable in such a place and in such conditions, and new signs and symbols would have to be invented to express the feelings of the heart. And doubtless these Orientals, living all together in one great room, with their children and pets, like our very ancient ancestors, the pastoral Aryans, do possess such a language. And this pretty language I should have learnt from the most willing of teachers, if those venomous _vinchucas_ had not dulled my brain with their persecutions and made me blind to a matter which had not escaped the observation of even unconcerned lookers-on. Riding away from the _estancia_, the feeling I experienced at having finally escaped from these execrable “little things that go about” was not one of unmixed satisfaction.
CHAPTER IV
Continuing my journey through the Durazno district, I forded the pretty River Yí and entered the Tacuarembó department, which is immensely long, extending right away to the Brazilian frontier. I rode over its narrowest part, however, where it is only about twenty-five miles wide; then, crossing two very curiously named rivers, Rios Salsipuedes Chico and Salsipuedes Grande, which mean Get-out-if-you-can Rivers, Little and Big, I at length reached the termination of my journey in the province or department of Paysandù. The Estancia de la Virgen de los Desamparados, or, to put it very shortly, Vagabonds’ Rest, was a good-sized, square brick house built on very high ground, which overlooked an immense stretch of grassy, undulating country.
There was no plantation about the house, not even a shade tree or cultivated plant of any description, but only some large _corrales_, or enclosures, for the cattle, of which there were six or seven thousand head on the land. The absence of shade and greenery gave the place a desolate, uninviting aspect, but if I was ever to have any authority here this would soon be changed. The Mayordomo, or manager, Don Policarpo Santierra de Peñalosa, which, roughly done into English, means Polycarp of the Holy Land abounding in Slippery Rocks, proved to be a very pleasant, affable person. He welcomed me with that quiet Oriental politeness which is never cold and never effusive, and then perused the letter from Doña Isidora. Finally he said, “I am willing, my friend, to supply you with all the conveniences procurable at this elevation; and, for the rest, you know, doubtless, what I can say to you. A ready understanding requires few words. Nevertheless, there is here no lack of good beef, and, to be short, you will do me a great favour by making this house with everything it contains your own, while you honour us by remaining in it.”
After delivering himself of these kindly sentiments, which left me rather in a mist as to my prospects, he mounted his horse and rode off, probably on some very important affair, for I saw no more of him for several days.
I at once proceeded to establish myself in the kitchen. No person inthe house appeared ever to pay even a casual visit to any other room. This kitchen was vast and barn-like, forty feet long at least, and proportionately wide; the roof was of reeds, and the hearth, placed in the centre of the floor, was a clay platform, fenced round with cows’ shank-bones, half buried and standing upright. Some trivets and iron kettles were scattered about, and from the centre beam, supporting the roof, a chain and hook were suspended to which a vast iron pot was fastened. One more article, a spit about six feet long for roasting meat, completed the list of cooking utensils. There were no chairs, tables, knives, or forks; everyone carried his own knife, and at meal-time the boiled meat was emptied into a great tin dish, whilst the roast was eaten from the spit, each one laying hold with his fingers and cutting his slice. The seats were logs of wood and horse-skulls. The household was composed of one woman, an ancient, hideously ugly, grey-headed negress, about seventy years old, and eighteen or nineteen men of all ages and sizes, and of all colours from parchment-white to very old oak. There was a _capatas,_ or overseer, and seven or eight paid _peones,_ the others being all _agregados_–that is, supernumeraries without pay, or, to put it plainly, vagabonds who attach themselves like vagrant dogs to establishments of this kind, lured by the abundance of flesh, and who occasionally assist the regular _peones_ at their work, and also do a little gambling and stealing to keep themselves in small change. At break of day everyone was up sitting by the hearth sipping bitter _maté_ and smoking cigarettes; before sunrise all were mounted and away over the surrounding country to gather up the herds; at midday they were back again to breakfast. The consumption and waste of meat was something frightful. Frequently, after breakfast, as much as twenty or thirty pounds of boiled and roast meat would be thrown into a wheelbarrow and carried out to the dust-heap, where it served to feed scores of hawks, gulls, and vultures, besides the dogs.
Of course, I was only an _agregado_, having no salary or regular occupation yet. Thinking, however, that this would only be for a time, I was quite willing to make the best of things, and very soon became fast friends with my fellow _agregados_, joining heartily in all their amusements and voluntary labours.
In a few days I got very tired of living exclusively on flesh, for not even a biscuit was “procurable at this elevation”; and as for a potato, one might as well have asked for a plum-pudding. It occurred to my mind at last that, with so many cows, it might be possible to procure some milk and introduce a little change into our diet. In the evening I broached the subject, proposing that on the following day we should capture a cow and tame her. Some of the men approved of the suggestion, remarking that they had never thought of it themselves; but the old negress, who, being the only representative of the fair sex present, was always listened to with all the deference due to her position, threw herself with immense zeal into the opposition. She affirmed that no cow had been milked at that establishment since its owner had paid it a visit with his young wife twelve years before. A milch-cow was then kept, and on the señora partaking of a large quantity of milk “before breaking her fast,” it produced such an indigestion in her that they were obliged to give her powdered ostrich stomach, and finally to convey her, with great trouble, in an ox-cart to Paysandù, and thence by water to Montevideo. The owner ordered the cow to be released, and never, to her certain knowledge, had cow been milked since at La Virgen de los Desamparados.
These ominous croakings produced no effect on me, and the next day I returned to the subject. I did not possess a lasso, and so could not undertake to capture a half-wild cow without assistance. One of my fellow _agregados_ at length volunteered to help me, observing that he had not tasted milk for several years, and was inclined to renew his acquaintance with that singular beverage. This new-found friend in need merits being formally introduced to the reader. His name was Epifanio Claro. He was tall and thin, and had an idiotic expression on his long, sallow face. His cheeks were innocent of whiskers, and his lank, black hair, parted in the middle, fell to his shoulders, enclosing his narrow face between a pair of raven’s wings. He had very large, light-coloured, sheepish-looking eyes, and his eyebrows bent up like a couple of Gothic arches, leaving a narrow strip above them that formed the merest apology for a forehead. This facial peculiarity had won for him the nickname of Cejas (Eyebrows), by which he was known to his intimates. He spent most of his time strumming on a wretched old cracked guitar, and singing amorous ballads in a lugubrious, whining falsetto, which reminded me not a little of that hungry, complaining gull I had met at the _estancia_ in Durazno. For, though poor Epifanio had an absorbing passion for music, Nature had unkindly withheld from him the power to express it in a manner pleasing to others. I must, however, in justice to him, allow that he gave a preference to ballads or compositions of a thoughtful, not to say metaphysical, character. I took the trouble of translating the words of one literally, and here they are:
Yesterday my senses opened,
At a rap-a-tap from Reason,
Inspiring in me an intention
Which I never had before,
Seeing that through all my days
My life has been just what it is. Therefore when I rose I said,
To-day shall be as yesterday,
Since Reason tells me I have been From day to day the self-same thing.
This is very little to judge from, being only a fourth part of the song; but it is a fair specimen, and the rest is no clearer. Of course it is not to be supposed that Epifanio Claro, an illiterate person, took in the whole philosophy of these lines; still, it is probable that a subtle ray or two of their deep meaning touched his intellect, to make him a wiser and a sadder man.
Accompanied by this strange individual, and with the grave permission of the _capatas_, who declined, however, in words of many syllables, all _responsabilidad_ in the matter, we went out to the grazing grounds in quest of a promising-looking cow. Very soon we found one to our liking. She was followed by a small calf, not more than a week old, and her distended udder promised a generous supply of milk; but unfortunately she was fierce-tempered, and had horns as sharp as needles.
“We will cut them by and by,” shouted Eyebrows.
He then lassoed the cow, and I captured the calf, and lifting it into the saddle before me, started homewards. The cow followed me at a furious pace, and behind came Claro at a swinging gallop. Possibly he was a little too confident, and carelessly let his captive pull the line that held her; anyhow, she turned suddenly on him, charged with amazing fury, and sent one of her horrid horns deep into the belly of his horse. He was, however, equal to the occasion, first dealing her a smart blow on the nose, which made her recoil for a moment; he then severed the lasso with his knife, and, shouting to me to drop the calf, made his escape. We pulled up as soon as we had reached a safe distance, Claro drily remarking that the lasso had been borrowed, and that the horse belonged to the _estancia_, so that we had lost nothing. He alighted, and stitched up the great gash in the poor brute’s belly, using for a thread a few hairs plucked from its tail. It was a difficult task, or would have been so to me, as he had to bore holes in the animal’s hide with his knife-point, but it seemed quite easy to him. Taking the remaining portion of the severed lasso, he drew it round the hind and one of the fore feet of his horse, and threw him to the ground with a dexterous jerk; then, binding him there, performed the operations of sewing up the wound in about two minutes.
“Will he live?” I asked.
“How can I tell?” he answered indifferently. “I only know that now he will be able to carry me home; if he dies afterwards, what will it matter?”
We then mounted and rode quietly home. Of course, we were chaffed without mercy, especially by the old negress, who had foreseen all along, she told us, just how it would be. One would have imagined, to hear this old black creature talk, that she looked on milk-drinking as one of the greatest moral offences man could be guilty of, and that in this case Providence had miraculously interposed to prevent us from gratifying our depraved appetites.
Eyebrows took it all very coolly.
“Do not notice them,” he said to me. “The lasso was not ours, the horse was not ours, what does it matter what they say?”
The owner of the lasso, who had good-naturedly lent it to us, roused himself on hearing this. He was a very big, rough-looking man, his face covered with an immense shaggy black beard. I had taken him for a good-humoured specimen of the giant kind before, but I now changed my opinion of him when his angry passions began to rise. Blas, or Barbudo, as we called the giant, was seated on a log sipping _maté_.
“Perhaps you take me for a sheep, sirs, because you see me wrapped in skins,” he observed; “but let me tell you this, the lasso I lent you must be returned to me.”
“These words are not for us,” remarked Eyebrows, addressing me, “but for the cow that carried away his lasso on her horns–curse them for being so sharp!”
“No, sir,” returned Barbudo, “do not deceive yourself; they are not for the cow, but for the fool that lassoed the cow. And I promise you, Epifanio, that if it is not restored to me, this thatch over our heads will not be broad enough to shelter us both.”
“I am pleased to hear it,” said the other, “for we are short of seats; and when you leave us, the one you now encumber with your carcass will be occupied by some more meritorious person.”
“You can say what you like, for no one has yet put a padlock on your lips,” said Barbudo, raising his voice to a shout; “but you are not going to plunder me; and if my lasso is not restored to me, then I swear I will make myself a new one out of a human hide.”
“Then,” said Eyebrows, “the sooner you provide yourself with a hide for the purpose, the better, for I will never return the lasso to you; for who am I to fight against Providence, that took it out of my hands?”
To this Barbudo replied furiously:
“Then I will have it from this miserable starved foreigner, who comes here to learn to eat meat and put himself on an equality with men. Evidently he was weaned too soon; but if the starveling hungers for infant’s food, let him in future milk the cats that warm themselves beside the fire, and can be caught without a lasso, even by a Frenchman!”
I could not endure the brute’s insults, and sprang up from my seat. I happened to have a large knife in my hand, for we were just preparing to make an assault on the roasted ribs of a cow, and my first impulse was to throw down the knife and give him a blow with my fist. Had I attempted it I should most probably have paid dearly for my rashness. The instant I rose Barbudo was on me, knife in hand. He aimed a furious blow, which luckily missed me, and at the same moment I struck him, and he reeled back with a dreadful gash on his face. It was all done in a second of time, and before the others could interpose; in another moment they disarmed us, and set about bathing the barbarian’s wound. During the operation, which I daresay was very painful, for the old negress insisted on having the wound bathed with rum instead of water, the brute blasphemed outrageously, vowing that he would cut out my heart and eat it stewed with onions and seasoned with cummin seed and various other condiments.
I have often since thought of that sublime culinary conception of Blas the barbarian. There must have been a spark of wild Oriental genius in his bovine brains.
When the exhaustion caused by rage, pain, and loss of blood had at length reduced him to silence, the old negress turned on him, exclaiming that he had been rightly punished, for had he not, in spite of her timely warnings, lent his lasso to enable these two heretics (for that is what she called us) to capture a cow? Well, his lasso was lost; then his friends, with the gratitude only to be expected from milk-drinkers, had turned round and well-nigh killed him.
After supper the _capatas_ got me alone, and with excessive friendliness of manner, and an abundance of circumlocutory phrases, advised me to leave the _estancia_, as it would not be safe for me to remain. I replied that I was not to blame, having struck the man in self-defence; also, that I had been sent to the _estancia_ by a friend of the Mayordomo, and was determined to see him and give him my version of the affair.
The _capatas_ shrugged his shoulders and lit a cigarette.
At length Don Policarpo returned, and when I told him my story he laughed slightly, but said nothing. In the evening I reminded him of the subject of the letter I had brought from Montevideo, asking him whether it was his intention to give me some employment on the _estancia_.
“You see, my friend,” he replied, “to employ you now would be useless, however valuable your services might be, for by this time the authorities will have information of your fight with Blas. In the course of a few days you may expect them here to make inquiries into that affair, and it is probable that you and Blas will both be taken into custody.”
“What then would you advise me to do?” I asked.
His answer was, that when the ostrich asked the deer what he would advise him to do when the hunters appeared, the deer’s reply was, “Run away.”
I laughed at his pretty apologue, and answered that I did not think the authorities would trouble themselves about me–also that I was not fond of running away.
Eyebrows, who had hitherto been rather inclined to patronise me and take me under his protection, now became very warm in his friendship, which was, however, dashed with an air of deference when we were alone together, but in company he was fond of parading his familiarity with me. I did not quite understand this change of manner at first, but by and by he took me mysteriously aside and became extremely confidential.
“Do not distress yourself about Barbudo,” he said. “He will never again presume to lift his hand against you; and if you will only condescend to speak kindly to him, he will be your humble slave and proud to have you wipe your greasy fingers on his beard. Take no notice of what the Mayordomo says, he also is afraid of you. If the authorities take you, it will only be to see what you can give them: they will not keep you long, for you are a foreigner, and cannot be made to serve in the army. But when you are again at liberty it will be necessary for you to kill someone.” Very much amazed, I asked him why. “You see,” he replied, “your reputation as a fighter is now established in this department, and there is nothing men envy more. It is the same as in our old game of _pato,_ where the man that carries the duck away is pursued by all the others, and before they give up chasing him he must prove that he can keep what he has taken. There are several fighters you do not know, who have resolved to pick quarrels with you in order to try your strength. In your next fight you must not wound, but kill, or you will have no peace.” I was greatly disturbed at this result of my accidental victory over Bias the Bearded, and did not at all appreciate the kind of greatness my officious friend Claro seemed so determined to thrust upon me. It was certainly flattering to hear that I had already established my reputation as a good fighter in so warlike a department as Paysandu, but then the consequences entailed were disagreeable, to say the least of it; and so, while thanking Eyebrows for his friendly hint, I resolved to quit the _estancia_ at once. I would not run away from the authorities, since I was not an evil-doer, but from the necessity of killing people for the sake of peace and quietness I certainly would depart. And early next morning, to my friend’s intense disgust, and without telling my plans to anyone, I mounted my horse and quitted Vagabond’s Rest to pursue my adventures elsewhere.
CHAPTER V
Faith in the _estancia_ as a field for my activities had been weak from the first; the Mayordomo’s words on his return had extinguished it altogether; and after hearing that ostrich parable I had only remained from motives of pride. I now determined to go back towards Montevideo, not, however, over the route I had come by, but making a wide circuit into the interior of the country, where I would explore a new field, and perhaps meet with some occupation at one of the _estancias_ on the way. Riding in a south-westerly direction towards the Rio Marlo in the Tacuarembó department, I soon left the plains of Paysandù behind me, and, being anxious to get well away from a neighbourhood where I was expected to kill someone, I did not rest till I had ridden about twenty-five miles. At noon I stopped to get some refreshment at a little roadside _pulpería_. It was a wretched-looking place, and behind the iron bars protecting the interior, giving it the appearance of a wild beast’s cage, lounged the storekeeper smoking a cigar. Outside the bar were two men with English-looking faces. One was a handsome young fellow with a somewhat worn and dissipated look on his bronzed face; he was leaning against the counter, cigar in mouth, looking slightly tipsy, I thought, and wore a large revolver slung ostentatiously at his waist. His companion was a big, heavy man, with immense whiskers sprinkled with grey, who was evidently very drunk, for he was lying full-length on a bench, his face purple and swollen, snoring loudly. I asked for bread, sardines, and wine, and, careful to observe the custom of the country I was in, duly invited the tipsy young man to join in the repast. An omission of this courtesy might, amongst proud and sensitive Orientals, involve one in a sanguinary quarrel, and of quarrelling I had just then had enough.
He declined with thanks, and entered into conversation with me; then the discovery, quickly made, that we were compatriots gave us both great pleasure. He at once offered to take me to his house with him, and gave a glowing account of the free, jovial life he led in company with several other Englishmen–sons of gentlemen, every one of them, he assured me–who had bought a piece of land and settled down to sheep-farming in this lonely district. I gladly accepted the invitation, and when we had finished our glasses he proceeded to wake the sleeper.
“Hullo, I say, Cap, wake up, old boy,” shouted my new friend. “Quite time to go home, don’t you know. That’s right–up you come. Now let me introduce you to Mr. Lamb. I’m sure he’s an acquisition. What, off again! Damn it, old Cloud, that’s unreasonable, to say the least of it.”
At length, after a great deal of shouting and shaking, he succeeded in rousing his drunken companion, who staggered up and stared at me in an imbecile manner.
“Now let me introduce you,” said the other. “Mr. Lamb. My friend, Captain Cloudesley Wriothesley. Bravo! Steady, old cock–now shake hands.”
The Captain said nothing, but took my hand, swaying forwards as if about to embrace me. We then with considerable difficulty got him on to his saddle and rode off together, keeping him between us to prevent him from falling off. Half an hour’s ride brought us to my host Mr. Vincent Winchcombe’s house. I had pictured to myself a charming little homestead, buried in cool greenery and flowers, and filled with pleasant memories of dear old England; I was, therefore, grievously disappointed to find that his “home” was only a mean-looking _rancho,_ with a ditch round it, protecting some ploughed or dug-up ground, on which not one green thing appeared. Mr. Winchcombe explained, however, that he had not yet had time to cultivate much. “Only vegetables and such things, don’t you know,” he said.
“I don’t see them,” I returned.
“Well, no; we had a lot of caterpillars and blister beetles and things, and they ate everything up, don’t you know,” said he.
The room into which he conducted me contained no furniture except a large deal table and some chairs; also a cupboard, a long mantelpiece, and some shelves against the walls. On every available place were pipes, pouches, revolvers, cartridge-boxes, and empty bottles. On the table were tumblers, cups, a sugar-basin, a monstrous tin teapot, and a demijohn, which I soon ascertained was half-full of Brazilian rum, or caña. Round the table five men were seated smoking, drinking tea and rum, and talking excitedly, all of them more or less intoxicated. They gave me a hearty welcome, making me join them at the table, pouring out tea and rum for me, and generously pushing pipes and pouches towards me.
“You see,” said Mr. Winchcombe, in explanation of this convivial scene, “there are, altogether, ten of us settlers here going in for sheep-farming and that sort of thing. Four of us have already built houses and bought sheep and horses. The other six fellows live with us from house to house, don’t you know. Well, we’ve made a jolly arrangement–old Cloud–Captain Cloud, don’t you know, first suggested it–and it is that every day one of the four–the Glorious Four we are called–keeps open house; and it’s considered the right thing for the other nine fellows to drop in on him some time during the day, just to cheer him up a bit. Well, we soon made the discovery–old Cloud, I fancy, made it–that tea and rum were about the best things to have on these occasions. To-day it was my day, and to-morrow it will be some other fellow’s, don’t you know. And, by Jove, how lucky I was to meet you at the _pulperia!_ It will be ever so much jollier now.”
I had certainly not stumbled upon a charming little English paradise in this Oriental wilderness, and as it always makes me uncomfortable to see young men drifting into intemperate habits and making asses of themselves generally, I was not rapturously delighted with “old Cloud’s” system. Still, I was glad to find myself with Englishmen in this distant country, and in the end I succeeded in making myself tolerably happy. The discovery that I had a voice pleased them greatly, and when, somewhat excited from the effects of strong cavendish, rum, and black tea, I roared out:
And may his soul in heaven dwell
Who first found out the leather botél,
they all got up and drank my health in big tumblers, and declared they would never let me leave the colony.
Before evening the guests departed, all except the Captain. He had sat with us at the table, but was too far gone in his cups to take part in the boisterous fun and conversation. Once in about every five minutes he had implored someone in a husky voice to give him a light for his pipe, then, after two or three ineffectual puffs, he would let it go out again. He had also attempted two or three times to join in the chorus of a song, but soon relapsed again into his imbecile condition.
Next day, however, when he sat down refreshed by a night’s sleep to breakfast, I found him a very agreeable fellow. He had no house of his own yet, not having received his money from home, he confidentially informed me, but lived about, breakfasting in one house, dining in a second, and sleeping in a third. “Never mind,” he would say, “by and by it will be my turn; then I will receive you all every day for six weeks to make it all square.”
None of the colonists did any work, but all spent their time lounging about and visiting each other, trying to make their dull existence endurable by perpetual smoking and tea and rum drinking. They had tried, they told me, ostrich-hunting, visiting their native neighbours, partridge-shooting, horse-racing, etc.; but the partridges were too tame for them, they could never catch the ostriches, the natives didn’t understand them, and they had finally given up all these so-called amusements. In each house a peon was kept to take care of the flock and to cook, and as the sheep appeared to take care of themselves, and the cooking merely meant roasting a piece of meat on a spit, there was very little for the hired men to do.
“Why don’t you do these things for yourselves?” I innocently asked.
“I fancy it wouldn’t quite be the right thing, don’t you know,” said Mr. Winchcombe.
“No,” said the Captain gravely, “we haven’t quite come down to that yet.”
I was greatly surprised to hear them. I had seen Englishmen sensibly roughing it in other places, but the lofty pride of these ten rum-drinking gentlemen was quite a new experience to me.
Having spent a somewhat listless morning, I was invited to accompany them to the house of Mr. Bingley, one of the Glorious Four. Mr. Bingley was really a very nice young fellow, living in a house far more worthy of the name than the slovenly _rancho_ tenanted by his neighbour Winchcombe. He was the favourite of the colonists, having more money than the others, and keeping two servants. Always on his reception-day he provided his guests with hot bread and fresh butter, as well as with the indispensable rum-bottle and teapot. It therefore happened that, when his turn came round to keep open house, not one of the other nine colonists was absent from his table.
Soon after our arrival at Bingley’s the others began to appear, each one on entering taking a seat at the hospitable board, and adding another cloud to the dense volume of tobacco smoke obscuring the room. There was a great deal of hilarious conversation; songs were sung, and a vast amount of tea, rum, bread and butter, and tobacco consumed; but it was a wearisome entertainment, and by the time it was over I felt heartily sick of this kind of life.
Before separating, after “John Peel” had been sung with great enthusiasm, someone proposed that we should get up a fox-hunt in real English style. Everyone agreed, glad of anything, I suppose, to break the monotony of such an existence, and next day we rode out, followed by about twenty dogs, of various breeds and sizes, brought together from all the houses. After some searching about in the most likely places, we at length started a fox from a bed of dark-leafed _mio-mio_ bushes. He made straight away for a range of hills about three miles distant, and over a beautifully smooth plain, so that we had a very good prospect of running him down. Two of the hunters had provided themselves with horns, which they blew incessantly, while the others all shouted at the top of their lungs, so that our chase was a very noisy one. The fox appeared to understand his danger and to know that his only chance of escape lay in keeping up his strength till the refuge of the hills was reached. Suddenly, however, he changed his course, this giving us a great advantage, for by making a short cut we were all soon close at his heels, with only the wide level plain before us. But reynard had his reasons for what he did; he had spied a herd of cattle, and in a very few moments had overtaken and mixed with them. The herd, struck with terror at our shouts and horn-blowing, instantly scattered and flew in all directions, so that we were able still to keep our quarry in sight. Far in advance of us the panic in the cattle ran on from herd to herd, swift as light, and we could see them miles away fleeing from us, while their hoarse bellowings and thundering tread came borne by the wind faintly to our ears. Our fat lazy dogs ran no faster than our horses, but still they laboured on, cheered by incessant shouts, and at last ran into the first fox ever properly hunted in the Banda Orientál.
The chase, which had led us far from home, ended close to a large _estancia_ house, and while we stood watching the dogs worrying their victim to death, the _capatas_ of the establishment, accompanied by three men, rode out to inquire who we were, and what we were doing. He was a small dark native, wearing a very picturesque costume, and addressed us with extreme politeness.
“Will you tell me, señores, what strange animal you have captured?” he asked.
“A fox,” shouted Mr. Bingley, triumphantly waving the brush, which he had just cut off, over his head. “In our country–in England–we hunt the fox with dogs, and we have been hunting after the manner of our country.”
The _capatas_ smiled, and replied that, if we were disposed to join him, it would afford him great pleasure to show us a hunt after the manner of the Banda Orientál.
We consented gladly, and, mounting our horses, set off at a swinging gallop after the _capatas_ and his men. We soon came to a small herd of cattle; the _capatas_ dashed after them, and, unloosening the coils of his lasso, flung the noose dexterously over the horns of a fat heifer he had singled out, then started homewards at a tremendous pace. The cow, urged forward by the men, who rode close behind, and pricked it with their knives, rushed on, bellowing with rage and pain, trying to overtake the _capatas_, who kept just out of reach of its horns; and in this way we quickly reached the house. One of the men now flung his lasso and caught the beast’s hind leg; pulled in two opposite directions, it quickly came to a standstill; the other men, now dismounting, first ham-strung, then ran a long knife into its throat. Without removing the hide, the carcass was immediately cut up, and the choice pieces flung on to a great fire of wood, which one of the men had been making. In an hour’s time we all sat down to a feast of _carne con cuero_, or meat roasted in the hide, juicy, tender, and exquisitely flavoured. I must tell the English reader who is accustomed to eat meat and game which has been kept till it is tender, that before the tender stage is reached it has been permitted to get tough. Meat, game included, is never so tender or deliciously flavoured as when cooked and eaten immediately after it is killed. Compared with meat at any subsequent stage, it is like a new-laid egg or a salmon with the cream on, compared with an egg or a salmon after a week’s keeping.
We enjoyed the repast immensely, though Captain Cloud bitterly lamented that we had neither rum nor tea to wash it down. When we had thanked our entertainer and were about to turn our horses’ heads homewards, the polite _capatas_ once more stepped out and addressed us.
“Gentlemen,” he said, “whenever you feel disposed to hunt, come to me and we will lasso and roast a heifer in the hide. It is the best dish the republic has to offer the stranger, and it will give me great pleasure to entertain you; but I beg you will hunt no more foxes over the ground belonging to this _estancia,_ for you have caused so great a commotion amongst the cattle I am placed here in charge of, that it will take my men two or three days to find them all and bring them back again.”
We gave the desired promise, plainly perceiving that fox-hunting in the English fashion is not a sport adapted to the Oriental country. Then we rode back, and spent the remaining hours at the house of Mr. Girling, of the Glorious Four, drinking rum and tea, smoking unlimited pipes of cavendish, and talking over our hunting experience.
CHAPTER VI
I spent several days at the colony; and I suppose the life I led there had a demoralising effect on me, for, unpleasant as it was, every day I felt less inclined to break loose from it, and sometimes I even thought seriously of settling down there myself. This crazy idea, however, would usually come to me late in the day, after a great deal of indulgence in rum and tea, a mixture that would very soon drive any man mad.
One afternoon, at one of our convivial meetings, it was resolved to pay a visit to the little town of Tolosa, about eighteen miles to the east of the colony. Next day we set out, every man wearing a revolver slung at his waist, and provided with a heavy _poncho_ for covering; for it was the custom of the colonists to spend the night at Tolosa when they visited it. We put up at a large public-house in the centre of the miserable little town, where there was accommodation for man and beast, the last always faring rather better than the first. I very soon discovered that the chief object of our visit was to vary the entertainment of drinking rum and smoking at the “Colony,” by drinking rum and smoking at Tolosa. The bibulous battle raged till bedtime, when the only sober member of our party was myself; for I had spent the greater part of the afternoon walking about talking to the townspeople, in the hope of picking up some information useful to me in my search for occupation. But the women and old men I met gave me little encouragement. They seemed to be a rather listless set in Tolosa, and when I asked them what they were doing to make a livelihood, they said they were _waiting._ My fellow-countrymen and their visit to the town was the principal topic of conversation. They regarded their English neighbours as strange and dangerous creatures, who took no solid food, but subsisted on a mixture of rum and gunpowder (which was the truth), and who were armed with deadly engines called revolvers, invented specially for them by their father the devil. The day’s experience convinced me that the English colony had some excuse forits existence, since its periodical visits gave the good people of Tolosa a little wholesome excitement during the stagnant intervals between the revolutions.
At night we all turned into a large room with a clay floor, in which there was not a single article of furniture. Our saddles, rugs, and _ponchos_ had all been thrown together in a corner, and anyone wishing to sleep had to make himself a bed with his own horse-gear and toggery as best he could. The experience was nothing new to me, so I soon made myself a comfortable nest on the floor, and, pulling off my boots, coiled myself up like an opossum that knows nothing better and is friendly with fleas. My friends, however, were evidently bent on making a night of it, and had taken care to provide themselves with three or four bottles of rum. After conversation, with an occasional song, had been going on for some time, one of them–a Mr. Chillingworth–rose to his feet and demanded silence.
“Gentlemen,” he said, advancing into the middle of the room, where, by occasionally throwing out his arms to balance himself, he managed to maintain a tolerably erect position, “I am going to make a what-d’ye-call-it.”
Furious cheers greeted this announcement, while one of the hearers, carried away with enthusiasm at the prospect of listening to his friend’s eloquence, discharged his revolver at the roof, scattering confusion amongst a legion of long-legged spiders that occupied the dusty cobwebs above our heads.
I was afraid the whole town would be up in arms at our carryings on, but they assured me that they all fired off their revolvers in that room and that nobody came near them, as they were so well known in the town.
“Gentlemen,” continued Mr. Chillingworth, when order had been at length restored, “I’ve been thinking, that’s what I’ve been doing. Now let’s review the situation. Here we stand, a colony of English gentlemen: here we are, don’t you know, far from our homes and country and all that sort of thing. What says the poet? I daresay some of you fellows remember the passage. But what for, I ask! What, gentlemen, is the object of our being here? That’s just what I’m going to tell you, don’t you know. We are here, gentlemen, to infuse a little of our Anglo-Saxon energy, and all that sort of thing, into this dilapidated old tin-pot of a nation.”
Here the orator was encouraged by a burst of applause.
“Now, gentlemen,” he continued, “isn’t it hard–devilish hard, don’t you know, that so little is made of us? I feel it–I feel it, gentlemen; our lives are being frittered away. I don’t know whether you fellows feel it. You see, we ain’t a melancholy lot. We’re a glorious combination against the blue devils, that’s what we are. Only sometimes I feel, don’t you know, that all the rum in the place can’t quite kill them. I can’t help thinking of jolly days on the other side of the water. Now, don’t you fellows look at me as if you thought I was going to blubber. I’m not going to make such a confounded ass of myself, don’t you know. But what I want you fellows to tell me is this: Are we to go on all our lives making beasts of ourselves, guzzling rum–I–I beg your pardon, gentlemen. I didn’t mean to say that, really. Rum is about the only decent thing in this place. Rum keeps us alive. If any man says a word against rum, I’ll call him an infernal ass. I meant to say the country, gentlemen–this rotten old country, don’t you know. No cricket, no society, no Bass, no anything. Supposing we had gone to Canada with our–our capital and energies, wouldn’t they have received us with open arms? And what’s the reception we get here? Now, gentlemen, what I propose is this: let’s protest. Let’s get up a what-d’you-call-it to the thing they call a government. We’ll state our case to the thing, gentlemen; and we’ll insist on it and be very firm; that’s what we’ll do, don’t you know. Are we to live amongst these miserable monkeys and give them the benefit of our–our–yes, gentlemen, our capital and energies, and get nothing in return? No, no; we must let them know that we are not satisfied, that we will be very angry with them. That’s about all I have to say, gentlemen.”
Loud applause followed, during which the orator sat down rather suddenly on the floor. Then followed “Rule Britannia,” everyone assisting with all the breath in his lungs to make night hideous.
When the song was finished the loud snoring of Captain Wriothesley became audible. He had begun to spread some rugs to lie on, but, becoming hopelessly entangled in his bridle-reins, surcingle, and stirrup-straps, had fallen to sleep with his feet on his saddle and his head on the floor.
“Hallo, we can’t have this!” shouted one of the fellows. “Let’s wake old Cloud by firing at the wall over him and knocking some plaster on to his head. It’ll be awful fun, you know.”
Everybody was delighted with the proposal, except poor Chillingworth, who, after delivering his speech, had crept away on all fours into a corner, where he was sitting alone and looking very pale and miserable.
The firing now began, most of the bullets hitting the wall only a few inches above the recumbent Captain’s head, scattering dust and bits of plaster over his purple face. I jumped up in alarm and rushed amongst them, telling them in my haste that they were too drunk to hold their revolvers properly, and would kill their friend.
My interference raised a loud, angry remonstrance, in the midst of which the Captain, who was lying in a most uncomfortable position, woke, and, struggling into a sitting posture, stared vacantly at us, his reins and straps wound like serpents about his neck and arms.
“What’s all the row ’bout?” he demanded huskily. “Getting up rev’lution, I s’pose. A’right; only thing to do in this country. Only don’t ask me to be pres’dent. Nor good enough. Goo’ night, boys; don’t cut my throat by mistake. Gor bless you all.”
“No, no, don’t go to sleep, Cloud,” they shouted. “Lamb’s the cause of all this. He says we’re drunk–that’s the way Lamb repays our hospitality. We were firing to wake you up, old Cap, to have a drink–“
“A drink–yes,” assented the Captain hoarsely.
“And Lamb was afraid we would injure you. Tell him, old Cloud, whether you’re afraid of your friends. Tell Lamb what you think of his conduct.”
“Yes, I’ll tell him,” returned the Captain in his thick tones. “Lamb shan’t interfere, gentlemen. But you know you took him in, didn’t you, now? And what was my opinion of him? It wasn’t right of you fellows, was it, now? He couldn’t be one of us, you know, could he now? I’ll leave it to you, gentlemen; didn’t I say the fellow was a cad? Why the devil doesn’t he leave me alone then? I’ll tell you what I’ll do with Lamb, I’ll punch his damned nose, don’t you know.”
And here the gallant gentleman attempted to rise, but his legs refused to assist him, and, tumbling back against the wall, he was only able to glare at me out of his watery eyes.
I went up to him, intending, I suppose, to punch _his_ nose, but, suddenly changing my mind, I merely picked up my saddle and things, then left the room with a hearty curse on Captain Cloudesley Wriothesley, the evil genius, drunk or sober, of the colony of English gentlemen. I was no sooner outside the door than the joy they felt at being rid of me was expressed in loud shouts, clapping of hands, and a general discharge of firearms into the roof.
I spread my rugs out of doors and soliloquised myself to sleep. “And so ends,” said I, fixing my somewhat drowsy eyes on the constellation of Orion, “adventure the second, or twenty-second–little does it matter about the exact number of them, since they all alike end in smoke–revolver smoke–or a flourish of knives and the shaking of dust from off my feet. And, perhaps, at this very moment Paquíta, roused from light slumbers by the droning cry of the night-watchman under her window, puts out her arms to feel me, and sighs to find my place still vacant. What must I say to her? That I must change my name to Ernandes or Fernandes, or Blas or Chas, or Sandariaga, Gorostiaga, Madariaga, or any other ‘aga,’ and conspire to overthrow the existing order of things. There is nothing else for me to do, since this Oriental world is indeed an oyster only a sharp sword will serve to open. As for arms and armies and military training, all that is quite unnecessary. One has only got to bring together a few ragged, dissatisfied men, and, taking horse, charge pell-mell into poor Mr. Chillingworth’s dilapidated old tin-pot. I almost feel like that unhappy gentleman to-night, ready to blubber. But, after all, my position is not quite so hopeless as his; I have no brutalised, purple-nosed Briton sitting like a nightmare on my chest, pressing the life out of me.”
The shouts and choruses of the revellers grew fainter and fewer, and had almost ceased when I sank to sleep, lulled by a solitary tipsy voice droning out in a lugubrious key:
We won’t go–home till morning.
CHAPTER VII
Early next morning I left Tolosa and travelled the whole day in a south-westerly direction. I did not hurry, but frequently dismounted to give my horse a sip of clear water and a taste of green herbage. I also called during the day at three or four _estancia_ houses, but failed to hear anything that could be advantageous to me. In this way I covered about thirty-five miles of road, going always towards the eastern part of the Florida district in the heart of the country. About an hour before sunset I resolved to go no farther that day; and I could not have hoped to find a nicer resting-place than the one now before me–a neat _rancho_ with a wide corridor supported by wooden pillars, standing amidst a bower of fine old weeping-willows. It was a calm, sunshiny afternoon, peace and quiet resting on everything, even bird and insect, for they were silent, or uttered only soft, subdued notes; and that modest lodge, with its rough stone walls and thatched roof, seemed to be in harmony with it all. It looked like the home of simple-minded, pastoral people that had for their only world the grassy wilderness, watered by many clear streams, bounded ever by that far-off, unbroken ring of the horizon, and arched over with blue heaven, starry by night and filled by day with sweet sunshine.
On approaching the house I was agreeably disappointed at having no pack of loud-mouthed, ferocious dogs rushing forth to rend the presumptuous stranger to pieces, a thing one always expects. The only signs of life visible were a white-haired old man seated within the corridor smoking, and a few yards from it a young girl standing under a willow-tree. But that girl was a picture for one to gaze long upon and carry about in his memory for a lifetime. Never had I beheld anything so exquisitely beautiful. It was not that kind of beauty so common in these countries, which bursts upon you like the sudden south-west wind called _pampero_, almost knocking the breath out of your body, then passing as suddenly away, leaving you with hair ruffled up and mouth full of dust. Its influence was more like that of the spring wind, which blows softly, scarcely fanning your cheek, yet infusing through all your system a delicious, magical sensation like–like nothing else in earth or heaven. She was, I fancy, about fourteen years old, slender and graceful in figure, and with a marvellously clear white skin, on which this bright Oriental sun had not painted one freckle. Her features were, I think, the most perfect I have ever seen in any human being, and her golden brown hair hung in two heavy braids behind, almost to her knees. As I approached, she looked up to me out of sweet, grey-blue eyes; there was a bashful smile on her lips, but she did not move or speak. On the willow-branch over her head were two young doves; they were, it appeared, her pets, unable yet to fly, and she had placed them there. The little things had crept up just beyond her reach, and she was trying to get them by pulling the branch down towards her.
Leaving my horse, I came to her side.
“I am tall, señorita,” I said, “and can perhaps reach them.”
She watched me with anxious interest while I gently pulled her birds from their perch and transferred them to her hands. Then she kissed them, well-pleased, and with a gentle hesitation in her manner asked me in.
Under the corridor I made the acquaintance of her grandfather, the white-haired old man, and found him a person it was very easy to get on with, for he agreed readily with everything I said. Indeed, even before I could get a remark out he began eagerly assenting to it. There, too, I met the girl’s mother, who was not at all like her beautiful daughter, but had black hair and eyes, and a brown skin, as most Spanish-American women have. Evidently the father is the white-skinned, golden-haired one, I thought. When the girl’s brother came in, by and by, he unsaddled my horse and led him away to pasture; this boy was also dark, darker even than his mother.
The simple spontaneous kindness with which these people treated me had a flavour about it the like of which I have seldom experienced elsewhere. It was not the common hospitality usually shown to a stranger, but a natural, unstrained kindness, such as they might be expected to show to a beloved brother or son who had gone out from them in the morning and was now returned.
By and by the girl’s father came in, and I was extremely surprised to find him a small, wrinkled, dark specimen, with jet-black, bead-like eyes and podgy nose, showing plainly enough that he had more than a dash of aboriginal Charrua blood in his veins. This upset my theory about the girl’s fair skin and blue eyes; the little dark man was, however, quite as sweet-tempered as the others, for he came in, sat down, and joined in the conversation, just as if I had been one of the family whom he had expected to find there. While I talked to these good people on simple pastoral matters, all the wickedness of Orientals–the throat-cutting war of Whites and Reds, and the unspeakable cruelties of the ten years’ siege–were quite forgotten. I wished that I had been born amongst them and was one of them, not a weary, wandering Englishman, overburdened with the arms and armour of civilisation, and staggering along, like Atlas, with the weight of a kingdom on which the sun never sets on his shoulders.
By and by this good man, whose real name I never discovered, for his wife simply called him Batata (sweet potato), looking critically at his pretty girl, remarked: “Why have you decked yourself out like this, my daughter–it is not a Saint’s day?”
His daughter indeed! I mentally ejaculated; she is more like the daughter of the evening star than of such a man. But his words were unreasonable, to say the least of it; for the sweet child, whose name was Margarita, though wearing shoes, had no stockings on, while her dress–very clean, certainly–was a cotton print so faded that the pattern was quite undistinguishable. The only pretence of finery of any description was a narrow bit of blue ribbon tied about her lily-white neck. And yet, had she been wearing richest silks and costliest gems, she could not have blushed and smiled with a prettier confusion.
“We are expecting Uncle Anselmo this evening, _papita_,” she replied.
“Leave the child, Batata,” said the mother. “You know what a craze she has for Anselmo: when he comes she is always prepared to receive him like a queen.”
This was really almost too much for me, and I was powerfully tempted to jump up and embrace the whole family on the spot. How sweet was this primitive simplicity of mind! Here, doubtless, was the one spot on the wide earth where the golden age still lingered, appearing like the last beams of the setting sun touching some prominent spot, when elsewhere all things are in shadow. Ah, why had fate led me into this sweet Arcadia, since I must presently leave it to go back to the dull world of toil and strife.
That vain low strife
Which makes men mad, the tug for wealth and power, The passions and the cares that wither life And waste its little hour?
Had it not been for the thought of Paquíta waiting for me over there in Montevideo, I could have said, “O good friend Sweet Potato, and good friends all, let me remain for ever with you under this roof, sharing your simple pleasures, and, wishing for nothing better, forget that great crowded world where all men are striving to conquer Nature and death and to win fortune; until, having wasted their miserable lives in their vain endeavours, they drop down and the earth is shovelled over them!”
Shortly after sunset the expected Anselmo arrived to spend the night with his relations, and scarcely had he got down from his horse before Margarita was at his side to ask the avuncular blessing, at the same time raising his hand to her delicate lips. He gave his blessing, touching her golden hair; then she lifted her face bright with new happiness.
Anselmo was a fine specimen of the Oriental gaucho, dark and with good features, his hair and moustache intensely black. He wore costly clothes, while his whip-handle, the sheath of his long knife, and other things about him were of massive silver. Of silver also were his heavy spurs, the pommel of his saddle, his stirrups, and the headstall of his bridle. He was a great talker; never, in fact, in the whole course of my varied experience have I encountered anyone who could pour out such an incessant stream of talk about small matters as this man. We all sat together in the social kitchen, sipping _maté_; I taking little part in the conversation, which was all about horses, scarcely even listening to what the others were saying. Reclining against the wall, I occupied myself agreeably watching the sweet face of Margarita, which in her happy excitement had become suffused with a delicate rosy colour. I have always had a great love for the beautiful: sunsets, wild flowers, especially verbenas, so prettily called margaritas in this country; and beyond everything the rainbow spanning the vast gloomy heavens, with its green and violet arch, when the storm-cloud passes eastward over the wet sun-flushed earth. All these things have a singular fascination for my soul. But beauty when it presents itself in the human form is even more than these things. There is in it a magnetic power drawing my heart; a something that is not love, for how can a married man have a feeling like that towards anyone except his wife? No, it is not love, but a sacred ethereal kind of affection, resembling love only as the fragrance of violets resembles the taste of honey and the honey-comb.