The West Indies and the Spanish Main

by Anthony Trollope

We had brought with us a wallet of provisions, certainly not too well arranged by Sir William Ouseley's most reprehensible butler. Travellers should never trust to butlers. Our piece de résistance was a ham, and lo! it turned out to be a bad one. When the truth of this fact first dawned upon us it was in both our minds to go back and slay that butler: but there was still a piece of beef and some chickens, and there had been a few dozen of hard-boiled eggs. But Fitzm—— would amuse himself with eating these all along the road: I always found when the ordinary feeding time came that they had not had the slightest effect upon his appetite.

On the next morning we again ascended for about a couple of leagues, and as long as we did so the road was still good; the surface was hard, and the track was broad, and a horseman could wish nothing better. And then we reached the summit of the ridge over which we were passing; this we did at a place called Desenganos, and from thence we looked down into vast valleys all running towards the Atlantic. Hitherto the fall of water had been into the Pacific.

At this place we found a vast shed, with numberless bins and troughs lying under it in great confusion. The facts, as far as I could learn, were thus: Up to this point the government, that is Don Juan Mora, or perhaps his predecessor, had succeeded in making a road fit for the transit of mule carts. This shed had also been built to afford shelter for the postmen and accommodation for the muleteers. But here Don Juan's efforts had been stopped; money probably had failed; and the great remainder of the undertaking will, I fear, be left undone for many a long year.

And yet this, or some other road from the valley of San José to the Atlantic, would be the natural outlet of the country. At present the coffee grown in the central high lands is carried down to Punta-arenas on the Pacific, although it must cross the Atlantic to reach its market; consequently, it is either taken round the Horn, and its sale thus delayed for months, or it is transported across the isthmus by railway, at an enormous cost. They say there is a point at which the Atlantic may be reached more easily than by the present route of the Serapiqui river; nothing, however, has as yet been done in the matter. To make a road fit even for mule carts, by the course of the present track, would certainly be a work of enormous difficulty.

And now our vexations commenced. We found that the path very soon narrowed, so much so that it was with difficulty we could keep our hats on our heads; and then the surface of the path became softer and softer, till our beasts were up to their knees in mud. All motion quicker than that of a walk became impossible; and even at this pace the struggles in the mud were both frequent and uncomfortable. Hitherto we had talked fluently enough, but now we became very silent; we went on following, each at the other's tail, floundering in the mud, silent, filthy, and down in the mouth.

"I tell you what it is," said Fitzm—— at last, stopping on the road, for he had led the van, "I can't go any further without breakfast." We referred the matter to the guide, and found that Careblanco, the place appointed for our next stage, was still two hours distant.

"Two hours! Why, half an hour since you said it was only a league!" But what is the use of expostulating with a man who can't speak a word of English?

So we got off our mules, and draped out our wallet among the bushes. Our hard-boiled eggs were all gone, and it seemed as though the travelling did not add fresh delights to the cold beef; so we devoured another fowl, and washed it down with brandy and water.

As we were so engaged three men passed us with heavy burdens on their backs. They were tall, thin, muscular fellows, with bare legs, and linen clothes,—one of them apparently of nearly pure Indian blood. It was clear that the loads they carried were very weighty. They were borne high up on the back, and suspended by a band from the forehead, so that a great portion of the weight must have fallen on the muscles of the neck. This was the post; and as they had left San José some eight hours after us, and had come by a longer route, so as to take in another town, they must have travelled at a very fast pace. It was our object to go down the Serapiqui river in the same boat with the post. We had some doubt whether we should be able to get any other, seeing that the owner of one such canoe had been drowned, I believe in an endeavour to save the unfortunate lady of whom I have spoken; and any boat taken separately would be much more expensive.

So, as quick as might be, we tied up our fragments and proceeded. It was after this that I really learned how all-powerful is the force of mud. We came at last to a track that was divided crossways by ridges, somewhat like the ridges of ploughed ground. Each ridge was perhaps a foot and a half broad, and the mules invariably stepped between them, not on them. Stepping on them they could not have held their feet. Stepping between them they came at each step with their belly to the ground, so that the rider's feet and legs were trailing in the mud. The struggles of the poor brutes were dreadful. It seemed to me frequently impossible that my beast should extricate himself, laden as he was. But still he went on patiently, slowly, and continuously; splash, splash; slosh, slosh! Every muscle of his body was working; and every muscle of my body was working also.