The Project Gutenberg eBook of In the Footprints of the Padres
Title: In the Footprints of the Padres
Author: Charles Warren Stoddard
Release date: August 29, 2004 [eBook #13321]
Most recently updated: October 28, 2024
Language: English
Credits: Produced by PG Distributed Proofreaders
Life at the Mission of Dolores, 1855
IN THE
FOOTPRINTS OF
THE PADRES
BY
CHARLES WARREN STODDARD
NEW AND ENLARGED EDITION
INTRODUCTION BY
CHARLES PHILLIPS
SAN FRANCISCO
A.M. Robertson
MCMXII
TO MY FATHER
SAMUEL BURR STODDARD, ESQ.
FOR HALF A CENTURY
A CITIZEN OF SAN FRANCISCO
THOUGH THE KINDNESS OF THE EDITORS
OF THE SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE,
THE CENTURY MAGAZINE, THE
OVERLAND MONTHLY, THE
AVE MARIA, NOTRE DAME, INDIANA,
THE VICTORIAN REVIEW, MELBOURNE
INTRODUCTION
INCE the first and second editions of "In the Footprints of the Padres" appeared, many things have transpired. San Francisco has been destroyed and rebuilt, and in its holocaust most of the old landmarks mentioned in the pages that follow as then existing, have been obliterated. Since then, too, the gentle heart, much of whose story is told herein, has been hushed in death. Charles Warren Stoddard has followed on in the footprints of the Padres he loved so well. He abides with us no longer, save in the sweetest of memories, memories which are kept ever new by the unforgettable writings which he left behind him. He passed away April 23, 1909, and lies sleeping now under the cypresses of his beloved Monterey.
Charles Warren Stoddard was possessed of unique literary gifts that were all his own. These gifts shine out in the pages of this book. Here we find that mustang humor of his forever kicking its silver heels with the most upsetting suddenness into the honeyed sweetness of his flowing poetry. Here, too, we find that gift of word-painting which makes all his writings a brilliant gallery of rich-hued and soft-lighted wonder. Of the green thickets of the redwood forests he says, in "Primeval California": "A dense undergrowth of light green foliage caught and held the sunlight like so much spray." So do Stoddard's pages catch and hold the lights and shadows of a world which is the more beautiful because he beheld it and sang of it—for sing he did. His prose is the essence of poetry.
In my autograph copy of "The Footprints of the Padres" Stoddard wrote: "A new memory of Old Monterey is the richer for our meeting here for the first time in the flesh. We have often met in spirit ere this." Whenever we would go walking together, he and I, through the streets of that old Monterey, old no longer save in memory, he would invariably take me to a certain high board fence, and looking through an opening show me the ruins of an adobe house—nothing but a broken fireplace left, moss-grown and crumbling away. "That is my old California," he would say, while his sweet voice was shaken with tears. That desolated hearth seemed to him the symbol of the California which he had known and loved.... But no, the old California that Stoddard loved lives on, and will, because he caught and preserved its spirit and its coloring, its light and life and music. As the redwood thicket holds the sunlight, so do Stoddard's words keep bright and living, though viewed through a mist of tears, the California of other days.
In this new edition of "The Footprints" some changes will be found, changes which all will agree make an improvement over the original volume. "Primeval California," first published in October, 1881, in the old Scribner's (now The Century) Magazine, when James G. Holland was its editor, is at times Stoddard at his best. "In Yosemite Shadows" shows us the young Stoddard full of boyish enthusiasm—he could not have been more than twenty when it was written and published, in the old Overland, then edited by Bret Harte. It is more than a gloriously poetic description of Yosemite, when Yosemite still dreamed in its virgin beauty; it is the revelation of a poet's beginnings, for it gives us in the rough, just finding their way to the light, all those gifts which later won Stoddard his fame.
The third addition to this volume is "An Affair of the Misty City," a valuable chapter, since it is wholly autobiographical, and at the same time embodies pen portraits of all the celebrities of California's first literary days, that famous group of which Stoddard was one. Of all the group, Ina Coolbrith was closest and dearest to Stoddard's heart. The beautiful abiding friendship which bound the souls of these two poets together has not been surpassed in all the poetry and romance of the world. These last added chapters are taken from "In the Pleasure of His Company," which is out of print and may never be republished.
The "Mysterious History," included in the original editions of "The Footprints" has wisely been left out. It had no proper place in the book: Stoddard himself felt that. The additions which have been supplied by Mr. Robertson, who was for years Stoddard's publisher, and in whom the author reposed the utmost confidence, make a real improvement on the original book.
"We have often met in spirit ere this," Stoddard wrote me. We had; and we meet again and again. I feel him very near me as I write these words; and I feel, too, that his gentle soul will visit everyone who reads the chronicles he has here set down, so that even though no shaft rise in marble glory to mark his last resting place, still in unnumbered hearts his memory will be enshrined. With his poet friend, Thomas Walsh, well may we say:
To thee whom Youth anointed on the eyes?
We have but known the lesser heart of thee
Whose spirit bloomed in lilies down the ways
Of Padua; whose voice perpetual sighs
On Molokai in tides of melody."
September first,
Nineteen hundred and eleven.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
View of Montgomery, Post and Market Streets, San Francisco, 1858
Fort Point at the Golden Gate
The Outer Signal Station at the Golden Gate
City of Oakland in 1856
Interior of the El Dorado
Warner's at Meigg's Wharf
The Old Flume at Black Point, 1856
Lone Mountain, 1856
Russ Gardens, 1856
Certificate of Membership, Vigilance Committee, 1856
West from Black Point, 1856
"China is Not More Chinese than this Section of Our Christian City."
"Rag Alley" in Old Chinatown
The Farallones
Murre on their Nests, Farallone Islands
Monterey, 1850
San Carlos de Carmelo
"The Huge Court of that Luxurious Caravansary."
"The Gallery Among the Huge Vases of Palms and Creepers."
Meigg's Wharf in 1856
Telegraph Hill, 1855
Sentinel Hotel, Yosemite, in 1869
San Francisco in 1856
THE BELLS OF SAN GABRIEL
The blood of the grape that nourished;
The blossom and fruit of the vine
That was heralded far away.
These were thy gifts; and thine,
When the vine and the fig-tree flourished,
The promise of peace and of glad increase
Forever and ever and aye.
What then wert thou, and what art now?
Answer me, O, I pray!
Sang Gabriel! Rang Gabriel!
In the tower that is left the tale to tell
Of Gabriel, the Archangel.
Flood of the wine-press flowing;
Blood o' the Christ was the wine—
Blood o' the Lamb that was slain.
Thy gifts were fat o' the kine
Forever coming and going
Far over the hills, the thousand hills—
Their lowing a soft refrain.
What then wert thou, and what art now?
Answer me, once again!
Sang Gabriel! Rang Gabriel!
In the tower that is left the tale to tell
Of Gabriel, the Archangel.
Body of Him thus broken
And mingled with blood o' the vine—
The bread and the wine of life;
Out of the good sunshine
They were given to thee as a token—
The body of Him, and the blood of Him,
When the gifts of God were rife.
What then wert thou, and what art now,
After the weary strife?
Sang Gabriel! Rang Gabriel!
In the tower that is left the tale to tell
Of Gabriel, the Archangel.
Where are the fruits o' the mission?
Garnered, where no one dwells,
Shepherd and flock are fled.
O'er the Lord's vineyard swells
The tide that with fell perdition
Sounded their doom and fashioned their tomb
And buried them with the dead.
What then wert thou, and what art now?—
The answer is still unsaid.
Sang Gabriel! Rang Gabriel!
In the tower that is left the tale to tell
Of Gabriel, the Archangel.
The locusts and wild honey?
Where is the sacred dower
That the bride of Christ was given?
Gone to the wielders of power,
The misers and minters of money;
Gone for the greed that is their creed—
And these in the land have thriven.
What then wer't thou, and what art now,
And wherefore hast thou striven?
Sang Gabriel! Rang Gabriel!
In the tower that is left the tale to tell
Of Gabriel, the Archangel.
IN THE FOOTPRINTS OF THE PADRES
View of Montgomery, Post and Market Streets, San Francisco, 1858
OLD DAYS IN EL DORADO
I.
"STRANGE COUNTRIES FOR TO SEE"
OW, the very first book was called "Infancy"; and, having finished it, I closed it with a bang! I was just twelve. 'Tis thus the twelve-year-old is apt to close most books. Within those pages—perhaps some day to be opened to the kindly inquiring eye—lie the records of a quiet life, stirred at intervals by spasms of infantile intensity. There are more days than one in a life that can be written of, and when the clock strikes twelve the day is but half over.
The clock struck twelve! We children had been watching and waiting for it. The house had been stripped bare; many cases of goods were awaiting shipment around Cape Horn to California. California! A land of fable! We knew well enough that our father was there, and had been for two years or more; and that we were at last to go to him, and dwell there with the fabulous in a new home more or less fabulous,—yet we felt that it must be altogether lovely. We said good-bye to everybody,—getting friends and fellow-citizens more or less mixed as the hour of departure from our native city drew near. We were very much hugged and very much kissed and not a little cried over; and then at last, in a half, dazed condition, we left Rochester, New York, for New York city, on our way to San Francisco by the Nicaragua route. This was away back in 1855, when San Francisco, it may be said, was only six years old.
It seemed a supreme condescension on the part of our maternal grandfather that he, who did not and could not for a moment countenance the theatre, should voluntarily take us, one and all, to see an alleged dramatic representation at Barnum's Museum—at that time one of the features of New York city, and perhaps the most famous place of amusement in the land. Four years later, when I was sixteen, very far from home and under that good gentleman's watchful supervision, I asked leave to witness a dramatic version of "Uncle Tom's Cabin," enacted by a small company of strolling players in a canvas tent. There were no blood-hounds in the cast, and mighty little scenery, or anything else alluring; but I was led to believe that I had been trembling upon the verge of something direful, and I was not allowed to go. What would that pious man have said could he have seen me, a few years later, strutting and fretting my hour upon the stage?
Well, we all saw "Damon and Pythias" in Barnum's "Lecture Room," with real scenery that split up the middle and slid apart over a carpet of green baize. And 'twas a real play, played by real players,—at least they were once real players, but that was long before. It may be their antiquated and failing art rendered them harmless. And, then, those beguiling words "Lecture Room" have such a soothing sound! They seemed in those days to hallow the whole function, which was, of course, the wily wish of the great moral entertainer; and his great moral entertainment was even as "the cups that cheer but not inebriate." It came near it in our case, however. It was our first matinee at the theatre, and, oh, the joy we took of it! Years afterward did we children in our playroom, clad in "the trailing garments of the night" in lieu of togas, sink our identity for the moment and out-rant Damon and his Pythias. Thrice happy days so long ago in California!
There is no change like a sea change, no matter who suffers it; and one's first sea voyage is a revelation. The mystery of it is usually not unmixed with misery. Five and forty years ago it was a very serious undertaking to uproot one's self, say good-bye to all that was nearest and dearest, and go down beyond the horizon in an ill-smelling, overcrowded, side-wheeled tub. Not a soul on the dock that day but fully realized this. The dock and the deck ran rivers of tears, it seemed to me; and when, after the lingering agony of farewells had reached the climax, and the shore-lines were cast off, and the Star of the West swung out into the stream, with great side-wheels fitfully revolving, a shriek rent the air and froze my young blood. Some mother parting from a son who was on board our vessel, no longer able to restrain her emotion, was borne away, frantically raving in the delirium of grief. I have never forgotten that agonizing scene, or the despairing wail that was enough to pierce the hardest heart. I imagined my heart was about to break; and when we put out to sea in a damp and dreary drizzle, and the shore-line dissolved away, while on board there was overcrowding, and confusion worse confounded in evidence everywhere,—perhaps it did break, that overwrought heart of mine and has been a patched thing ever since.
We were a miserable lot that night, pitched to and fro and rolled from side to side as if we were so much baggage. And there was a special horror in the darkness, as well as in the wind that hissed through the rigging, and in the waves that rushed past us, sheeted with foam that faded ghostlike as we watched it,—faded ghostlike, leaving the blackness of darkness to enfold us and swallow us up.
Day after day for a dozen days we ploughed that restless sea. There were days into which the sun shone not; when everybody and everything was sticky with salty distillations; when half the passengers were sea-sick and the other half sick of the sea. The decks were slimy, the cabins stuffy and foul. The hours hung heavily, and the horizon line closed in about us a gray wall of mist.
Then I used to bury myself in my books and try to forget the world, now lost to sight, and, as I sometimes feared, never to be found again. I had brought my private library with me; it was complete in two volumes. There was "Rollo Crossing the Atlantic," by dear old Jacob Abbot; and this book of juvenile travel and adventure I read on the spot, as it were,—read it carefully, critically; flattering myself that I was a lad of experience, capable of detecting any nautical error which Jacob, one of the most prolific authors of his day, might perchance have made. The other volume was a pocket copy of "Robinson Crusoe," upon the fly-leaf of which was scrawled, in an untutored hand, "Charley from Freddy,"—this Freddy was my juvenile chum. I still have that little treasure, with its inscription undimmed by time.
Frequently I have thought that the reading of this charming book may have been the predominating influence in the development of my taste and temper; for it was while I was absorbed in the exquisitely pathetic story of Robinson Crusoe that the first island I ever saw dawned upon my enchanted vision. We had weathered Cape Sable and the Florida Keys. No sky was ever more marvellously blue than the sea beneath us. The density and the darkness that prevail in Northern waters had gone out of it; the sun gilded it, the moon silvered it, and the great stars dropped their pearl-plummets into it in the vain search for soundings.
Sea gardens were there,—floating gardens adrift in the tropic gale; pale green gardens of berry and leaf and long meandering vine, rocking upon the waves that lapped the shores of the Antilles, feeding the current of the warm Gulf Stream; and, forsooth, some of them to find their way at last into the mazes of that mysterious, mighty, menacing sargasso sea. Strange sea-monsters, more beautiful than monstrous, sported in the foam about our prow, and at intervals dashed it with color like animated rainbows. From wave to wave the flying fish skimmed like winged arrows of silver. Sometimes a land-bird was blown across the sky—the sea-birds we had always with us,—and ever the air was spicy and the breeze like a breath of balm.
One day a little cloud dawned upon our horizon. It was at first pale and pearly, then pink like the hollow of a sea-shell, then misty blue,—a darker blue, a deep blue dissolving into green, and the green outlining itself in emerald, with many a shade of lighter or darker green fretting its surface, throwing cliff and crest into high relief, and hinting at misty and mysterious vales, as fair as fathomless. It floated up like a cloud from the nether world, and was at first without form and void, even as its fellows were; but as we drew nearer—for we were steaming toward it across a sea of sapphire,—it brooded upon the face of the water, while the clouds that had hung about it were scattered and wafted away.
Thus was an island born to us of sea and sky,—an island whose peak was sky-kissed, whose vales were overshadowed by festoons of vapor, whose heights were tipped with sunshine, and along whose shore the sea sang softly, and the creaming breakers wreathed themselves, flashed like snow-drifts, vanished and flashed again. The sea danced and sparkled; the air quivered with vibrant light. Along the border of that island the palm-trees towered and reeled, and all its gardens breathed perfume such as I had never known or dreamed of.
For a few hours only we basked in its beauty, rejoiced in it, gloried in it; and then we passed it by. Even as it had risen from the sea it returned into its bosom and was seen no more. Twilight stole in between us, and the night blotted it out forever. Forever?
I wonder what island it was? A pearl of the Antilles, surely; but its name and fame, its history and mystery are lost to me. Its memory lives and is as green as ever. No wintry blasts visit it; even the rich dyes of autumn do not discolor it. It is perennial in its rare beauty, unfading, unforgotten, unforgettable; a thing immutable, immemorial—I had almost said immortal.
Whence it came and whither it has gone I know not. It had its rising and its setting; its day from dawn to dusk was perfect. Doubtless there are those whose lives have been passed within its tranquil shade: from generation to generation it has known all that they have known of joy or sorrow. All the world that they have knowledge of has been compassed by the far blue rim of the horizon. That sky-piercing peak was ever the centre of their universe, and the wandering sea-bird has outflown their thoughts.
All this came to me as a child, when the first island "swam into my ken." It was a great discovery—a revelation. Of it were born all the islands that have been so much to me in later life. And even then I seemed to comprehend the singular life that all islanders are forced to live: the independence of that life—for a man's island is his fortress, girded about with the fathomless moat of the sea; and the dependence of it—for what is that island but an atom dotting watery space and so easily cut off from communication with the world at large? Drought may visit the islander, and he may be starved; the tornado may desolate his shore; fever and famine and thirst may lie in wait for him; sickness and sorrow and death abide with him. Thus is he dependent in his independence.
And he is insecluded in his seclusion, for he can not escape from the intruder. He should have no wish that may not be satisfied, provided he be native born; what can he wish for that is beyond the knowledge he has gained from the objects within his reach? The world is his, so far as he knows it; yet if he have one wish that calls for aught beyond his limited horizon he rests unsatisfied.
All that was lovely in that tropic isle appealed to me and filled me with a great longing. I wanted to sing with the Beloved Bard:
In the blue summer ocean, far off and alone!
And yet even then I felt its unutterable loneliness, as I have felt it a thousand times since; the loneliness that starves the heart, tortures the brain, and leaves the mind diseased; the loneliness that is exemplified in the solitude of Alexander Selkirk.
Robinson Crusoe lived in very truth for me the moment I saw and comprehended that summer isle. He also is immortal. From that hour we scoured the sea for islands: from dawn to dark we were on the watch. The Caribbean Sea is well stocked with them. We were threading our way among them, and might any day hear the glad cry of "Land ho!" But we heard it not until the morning of the eleventh day out from New York. The sea seemed more lonesome than ever when we lost our, island; the monotony of our life was almost unbroken. We began to feel as prisoners must feel whose time is near out. Oh, how the hours lagged!—but deliverance was at hand. At last we gave a glad shout, for the land was ours again; we were to disembark in the course of a few hours, and all was bustle and confusion until we dropped anchor off the Mosquito Shore.
II.
CROSSING THE ISTHMUS
E approached the Mosquito Shore timidly. The shallowing sea was of the color of amber; the land so low and level that the foliage which covered it seemed to be rooted in the water. We dropped anchor in the mouth of the San Juan River. On our right lay the little Spanish village of San Juan del Norte; its five hundred inhabitants may have been wading through its one street at that moment, for aught we know; the place seemed to be knee-deep in water. On our left was a long strip of land—the depot and coaling station of the Vanderbilt Steamship Company.
It did not appear to be much, that sandspit known as Punta Arenas, with its row of sheds at the water's edge, and its scattering shrubs tossing in the wind; but sovereignty over this very point was claimed by three petty powers: Costa Rica, Nicaragua, and "Mosquito." Great Britain backed the "Mosquito" claim; and, in virtue of certain privileges granted by the "Mosquito" King, the authorities of San Juan del Norte—the port better known in those days as Graytown, albeit 'twas as green as grass—threatened to seize Punta Arenas for public use. Thereupon Graytown was bombarded; but immediately rose, Phoenix-like, from its ashes, and was flourishing when we arrived. The current number of Harper's Monthly, a copy of which we brought on board when we embarked at New York, contained an illustrated account of the bombardment of Graytown, which added not a little to the interest of the hour.
While we were speculating as to the nature of our next experience, suddenly a stern-wheel, flat-bottom boat backed up alongside of the Star of the West. She was of the pattern of the small freight-boats that still ply the Ohio and Mississippi rivers. If the Star of the West was small, this stern-wheel scow was infinitely smaller. There was but one cabin, and it was rendered insufferably hot by the boilers that were set in the middle of it. There was one flush deck, with an awning stretched above it that extended nearly to the prow of the boat. It was said our passenger list numbered fourteen hundred. The gold boom in California was still at fever heat. Every craft that set sail for the Isthmus by the Nicaragua or Panama route, or by the weary route around Cape Horn, was packed full of gold-seekers. It was the Golden Age of the Argonauts; and, if my memory serves me well, there were no reserved seats worth the price thereof.
The first river boat at our disposal was for the exclusive accommodation of the cabin passengers, or as many of them as could be crowded upon her—and we were among them. Other steamers were to follow as soon as practicable. Hours, even days, passed by, and the passengers on the ocean steamers were sometimes kept waiting the arrival of the river boats that were aground or had been belated up the stream.
About two hundred of us boarded the first boat. Our luggage of the larger sort was stowed away in barges and towed after us. The decks were strewn with hand-bags, camp-stools, bundles, and rolls of rugs. The lower deck was two feet above the water. As we looked back upon the Star of the West, waving a glad farewell to the ship that had brought us more than two thousand miles across the sea, she loomed like a Noah's Ark above the flood, and we were quite proud of her—but not sorry to say good-bye.
And now away, into the very heart of a Central American forest! And hail to the new life that lay all before us in El Dorado! The river was as yellow as saffron; its shores were hidden in a dense growth of underbrush that trailed its boughs in the water, and rose, a wall of verdure, far above our smokestacks. As we ascended the stream the forest deepened; the trees grew taller and taller; wide-spreading branches hung over us; gigantic vines clambered everywhere and made huge hammocks of themselves; they bridged the bayous, and made dark leafy caverns wherein the shadows were forbidding; for the sunshine seemed never to have penetrated them, and they were the haunts of weirdness and mystery profound.
Sometimes a tree that had fallen into the water and lay at a convenient angle by the shore afforded the alligator a comfortable couch for his sun-bath. Shall I ever forget the excitement occasioned by the discovery of our first alligator! Not the ancient and honorable crocodile of the Nile was ever greeted with greater enthusiasm; yet our sportsmen had very little respect for him, and his sleep was disturbed by a shower of bullets that spattered upon his hoary scales as harmlessly as rain.
Though the alligator punctuated every adventurous hour of that memorable voyage in Nicaragua, we children were more interested in our Darwinian friends, the monkeys. They were of all shades and shapes and sizes; they descended in troops among the trees by the river side; they called to us and beckoned us shoreward; they cried to us, they laughed at us; they reached out their bony arms, and stretched wide their slim, cold hands to us, as if they would pluck us as we passed. We exchanged compliments and clubs in a sham-battle that was immensely diverting; we returned the missiles they threw at us as long as the ammunition held out, but captured none of the enemy, nor did the slightest damage—as far as we could ascertain.
Often the parrots squalled at us, but their vocabulary was limited; for they were untaught of men. Sometimes the magnificent macaw flew over us, with its scarlet plumage flickering like flame. Oh, but those gorgeous birds were splashes of splendid color in the intense green of that tropical background!
There were islands in this river,—islands that seemed to have no shores, but lay half submerged in mid-stream, like huge water-logged bouquets. There were sand-bars in the river, and upon these we sometimes ran, and were brought to a sudden stand-still that startled us not a little; then we backed off with what dignity we might, and gave the unwelcome obstructions a wide berth.
Perhaps the most interesting event of the voyage was "wooding up." A few hours after we had entered the river our steamer made for the shore. More than once in her course she had rounded points that seemed to block the way; and occasionally there were bends so abrupt that we found ourselves apparently land-locked in the depths of a wilderness which might well be called prodigious. Now it was evident that we were heading for the shore, and with a purpose, too. As we drew nearer, we saw among the deep tangle of leaves and vines a primitive landing. It was a little dock with a thatched lodge in the rear of it and a few cords of wood stacked upon its end. There were some natives here—Indians probably,—with dark skins bared from head to foot; they wore only the breech-clout, and this of the briefest. Evidently they were children of Nature.
Having made fast to this dock, these woodmen speedily shouldered the fuel and hurried it on board, while they chanted a rhythmical chant that lent a charm to the scene. We were never weary of "wooding up," and were always wondering where these gentle savages lived and how they escaped with their lives from the thousand and one pests that haunted the forest and lay in wait for them. Every biting and stinging thing was there. The mosquitoes nearly devoured us, especially at night; while serpents, scorpions, centipedes, possessed the jungle. There also was the lair of larger game. It is said that sharks will pick a white man out of a crowd of dark ones in the sea; not that he is a more tempting and toothsome morsel—drenched with nicotine, he may indeed be less appetizing than his dark-skinned, fruit-fed fellow,—but his silvery skin is a good sea-mark, as the shark has often confirmed. So these dark ones in the semi-darkness of the wood may, perhaps, pass with impunity where a pale-face would fall an easy prey.
At the Rapids of Machuca we debarked. Here was a miry portage about a mile in length, through which we waded right merrily; for it seemed an age since last we had set foot to earth. Our freight was pulled up the Rapids in bongas (row-boats), manned by natives; but our steamer could not pass, and so returned to the Star of the West for another load of passengers.
There was mire at Machuca, and steaming heat; but the path along the river-bank was shaded by wondrous trees, and we were overwhelmed with the offer of all the edible luxuries of the season at the most alarming prices. There was no coin in circulation smaller than a dime. Everything salable was worth a dime, or two or three, to the seller. It didn't seem to make much difference what price was asked by the merchant: he got it, or you went without refreshments. It was evident there was no market between meals at Machuca Rapids, and steamer traffic enlivened it but twice in the month.
What oranges were there!—such as one seldom sees outside the tropics: great globes of delicious dew shut in a pulpy crust half an inch in thickness, of a pale green tinge, and oozing syrup and an oily spray when they are broken. Bananas, mangoes, guavas, sugar-cane,—on these we fed; and drank the cream of the young cocoanut, goat's milk, and the juices of various luscious fruits served in carven gourds,—delectable indeed, but the nature of which was past our speculation. It was enough to eat and to drink and to wallow a muddy mile for the very joy of it, after having been toeing the mark on a ship's deck for a dozen days or less, and feeding on ship's fodder.
Our second transport was scarcely an improvement on the first. Again we threaded the river, which seemed to grow broader and deeper as we drew near its fountain-head, Lake Nicaragua. Upon a height above the river stood a military post, El Castillo, much fallen to decay. Here were other rapids, and here we were transferred to a lake boat on which we were to conclude our voyage. Those stern-wheel scows could never weather the lake waters.
We had passed a night on the river boat,—a night of picturesque horrors. The cabin was impossible: nobody braved its heat. The deck was littered with luggage and crowded with recumbent forms. A few fortunate voyagers—men of wisdom and experience—were provided with comfortable hammocks; and while most of us were squirming beneath them, they swung in mid-air, under a breadth of mosquito netting, slumbering sonorously and obviously oblivious of all our woes.
If I forget not, I cared not to sleep. We were very soon to leave the river and enter the lake. From the boughs of overarching trees swept beards of dark gray moss some yards in length, that waved to and fro in the gathering twilight like folds of funereal crape. There were camp-fires at the wooding stations, the flames of which painted the foliage extraordinary colors and spangled it with sparks. Great flocks of unfamiliar birds flew over us, their brilliant plumage taking a deeper dye as they flashed their wings in the firelight. The chattering monkeys skirmished among the branches; sometimes a dull splash in the water reminded us that the alligator was still our neighbor; and ever there was the piping of wild birds whose notes we had never heard before, and whose outlines were as fantastic as those of the bright objects that glorify an antique Japanese screen.
Once from the shore, a canoe shot out of the shadow and approached us. It was a log hollowed out—only the shell remained. Within it sat two Indians,—not the dark creatures we had grown familiar with down the river; these also were nearly nude, but with the picturesque nudeness that served only to set off the ornaments with which they had adorned themselves—necklaces of shells, wristlets and armlets of bright metal, wreaths of gorgeous flowers and the gaudy plumage of the flamingo. They drew near us for a moment, only to greet us and turn away; and very soon, with splash of dipping paddles, they vanished in the dusk.
These were the flowers of the forest. All the winding way from the sea the river walls had been decked with floral splendor. Gigantic blossoms that might shame a rainbow starred the green spaces of the wood; but of all we had seen or heard or felt or dreamed of, none has left an impression so vivid, so inspiring, so instinct with the beauty and the poetry and the music of the tropics, as those twilight mysteries that smiled upon us for a moment and vanished, even as the great fire-flies that paled like golden rockets in the dark.