When ready to set off ourselves, rain had again began to pour; and for a time the prospect of being able to start was unpromising. The drunken doctor, once more in attendance, persisted in assuring us that it would rain thus all the afternoon; and said it would be madness to think of leaving. His urgency for our stay was an additional motive for us to be off; and as soon as there was a slight improvement in the weather we mounted, and after making up a purse, much to the delight of our host, as a gratuity to the sixth-born son, bade adieu to San Pedro d’Alcantara. It was now four o’clock, and Adams said we could not reach San José at the earliest before nine. We started notwithstanding, with the will and purpose of making the shortest possible work of the intervening distance; and certain of our road, left our guide to gossip by the way as he chose, with the many friends hailing him from the heights above or the valleys below, as far as the voice could be carried, while we rode pell-mell, up hill and down dale, often slipping and sliding for long distances, at the seeming hazard of both limbs and neck. In this way, we accomplished half the distance before nightfall, and reached a lower region of country, where there had been little or no rain.
During the ride, we met several troupes of mules, and their muleteers, returning with empty pack-saddles from the bay. Among others, one belonging to our host of San Pedro, which we had seen setting off in the early morning with articles for the market of Desterro. Occasionally, too, we overtook, and, after riding for a time side by side, passed horsemen and mule riders going the same way with ourselves. Just as darkness was beginning to fall rapidly around, we thus fell in with a well-mounted, fine-looking Brazilian, having the appearance of a respectable planter. Adams was far behind, and S—— had the lead of our party, his horse being a tolerably good traveller. My mule, a sure-footed beast, came next, and then G——’s. The Brazilian, after riding side by side with each of us in turn, by degrees got in advance of all three. As he was evidently well acquainted with the road, S—— and I made up our minds to follow him closely, as the pioneer in the darkness for any unsafe spot ahead. As both man and horse appeared fresh, however, this required pretty brisk riding. With the thickening of the night, our new friend accelerated his speed; and the faster he led, the faster we followed. Presently it was impossible to discern a trace of the road, or to discover whether it were smooth or rough, tending up hill or down. The white Guayaquil hat of the Brazilian, was all that was left visible to S—— of horse, or rider, and a line of deeper darkness hastening from me ahead, was all that I, with the most fixed gaze, could perceive of S——. I lashed my mule to keep up in the chase, S—— kept snapping his riding whip in the fashion of a French postilion, while the Brazilian seemed to be spurring on his steed at full tilt. Away we thus went, S—— managing to keep before him the vision of a white hat, which threatened each moment to be lost in the darkness, and I at an equal remove from him, with all the powers of sight intently fixed, to follow a moving speck of concentrated blackness. To make sure of the identity of the phantom of my own chase, I occasionally called out, “S——, do you still see him?” to which the reply would come, “Yes! but I tell you he is going it: but I’ll take good care not to lose him,—there can be but one road, and I’ll make sure of so good a lead.”
It was amusing, though it might have proved no joke, to be thus trotting at full speed in impenetrable night, and that on a hard-motioned animal at the end of a thirty-miles’ ride. We had kept the gait for an hour perhaps, without venturing to slacken its pace for a moment, or to take our eyes from the respective points, white and black, before us, when all at once, that on which mine were fixed was gone: urging my mule forward, in the attempt to regain it, I perceived him begin to stumble, and found that he was off the path. Reining him up, I called out for S——. He, I discovered, was at a stand also at no great distance, and in answer to the question, “Have you lost your guide?” answered, “He has just vanished like a veritable ghost—he disappeared in a moment in a mass of blackness, and but for the creaking of a gate, I should have been headforemost into a hedge after him.” The darkness was so great that it was impossible to move with safety without some indication of the direction in which we ought to go, and we had patiently to wait the approach of G—— and Adams to relieve us from our dilemma. Soon the whip of the former, urging on his little mule, and the jingling of the stirrups and heavy iron spurs of the latter were heard at no great distance; and giving place in the lead to Adams, at the end of a half hour we alighted safely at the point from which we started. I was too much fagged to care for any refreshment but that of sleep; and, while S—— and G—— sat down to a supper of “pain perdu” and green tea, made my way to a clean and comfortable cot beneath the tiled roof of the garret, and was soon lost in a repose—
“above
The luxury of common sleep.”
CHAPTER XXVIII.
Desterro.
May 24th.—Mr. Wells, an American gentleman of wealth, long resident in Desterro, is a person of leading influence in the commerce and society of the place. For many years he held the office of American consul with honor and popularity; but was superseded two or three years ago, through the political influence of a partisan office-seeker at home. The new incumbent, disappointed in the profits expected from the office, soon resigned it. Through private pique against Mr. Wells, he left the papers of the consulate and an acting appointment to the office with Captain Cathcart, though he is in no way qualified for the duties or honor of the situation.
Among others to whom Mr. Wells, as the only representative of the United States here, has at different times extended his hospitality, are the present Emperor and Empress. Their majesties and suite were entertained by him at a magnificent fête, in their progress through this section of the Empire in 1845. I was furnished with letters to him by Dr. C——, an old friend, and by F—— of the Congress. These I delivered before making the excursion to San Pedro; and on my return, became a guest beneath his roof. His house is on the palace square, in the immediate neighborhood of the residence of the President of the Province. It is one of the finest dwellings in the place, and commands from the windows and balconies of the drawing-roomy an extensive view of the town, bay, and surrounding mountains. It has been my lot to occupy a great variety of sleeping rooms, from those of the palace to the wigwam, but I think the bed assigned to me here must have precedence, in its dimensions at least, above all I have before met. It is truly regal, taking even that of his majesty of Bashan in the days of his overthrow, as a model. I have not measured it, and its area may not quite be, as his was, “nine cubits by four;” but its elevation I suspect is quite as great; the upper mattress, as I stand beside it, being nearly on a level with my shoulders, and accessible only by a flight of mahogany steps. The canopy is of proportionate altitude. The dignified feeling with which one ascends to this place of rest, is not a little increased by the remembrance that it was by these very steps their Imperial Majesties, when in St. Catherine’s, mounted to their couch.