Waikna

by E. G. Squier

It would naturally be supposed that a decoction so powerful as to affect the water of a large stream, would also damage the fish, and unfit them for food. But such is not the case. The effect seems to be precisely that of temporary intoxication, and the fish, if left in the water, would soon recover from its influence.

Time passed pleasantly among the hospitable Poyers, and I was treated with such ceremonious deference and respect, that I began to think that a far worse fortune might befall me, than that of becoming a member of this peaceful and prosperous community, on the banks of the Guallambre. In fact, I finally detected myself speculating upon the possibility of promoting one of the dark Naiads, whom I every morning watched sporting in the river, to the occupancy of the vacant crickery in my apartment. And then the fact that there were two crickeries—was not that intended as a delicate suggestion on the part of the Poyers, whose ideas of hospitality might be less circumscribed than my own? The thought that they might imagine me dull of apprehension, and slow to improve upon a hint, grew upon me with every new and nearer contemplation of the Naiads, and I began seriously to think of submitting a formal proposition on the subject, to the monexico. But men’s fates often hinge upon trifling circumstances, and had I not detected a deepening shadow of anxiety on the face of Antonio, I might have become a patriarch in Poyerdom! Who knows?

Early after our arrival at the Foyer village, I was surprised to observe Antonio in close consultation with the old men, in the nightly monexico. They seemed to be deeply interested in his communications, and I imagined that they became daily more thoughtful. But now, whatever purpose Antonio might have had in view, it appeared to have been accomplished.

So, one evening, I called him aside, and announced that I was ready to depart. He grasped my hand, pressed it to his heart, and said, in a tone of emotion—“The voice of the tiger is loud in the mountain, and the sons of the Holy Men are waiting by the lake of the Itzaes!”

I comprehended the latent meaning of these poetical words, for I had already seen enough of Antonio to discover that his absence from Yucatan was in some way connected with a concerted movement of the aborigines, and that now some crisis was approaching which drew him irresistibly toward his native land. Resolved not to be instrumental in delaying him for an hour unnecessarily, and half repenting that I had detained him so long—for his attachment and gratitude were too real to permit him to abandon me in the wilderness—I at once communicated my intention of leaving to the old men. They took it under serious deliberation, which resulted in their dispatching some men before daybreak, on the following morning, to prepare a canoe for our descent of the Patuca. The canoes, I found, were not kept on the Guallambre, for two reasons: first, that its course is circuitous, and second, and principally, because it runs through the settlements of the Spaniards of Olancho, with whom the Indians avoid all relations which are not absolutely necessary. Their boats were therefore kept half a day’s journey distant, beyond a chain of high hills, on a large tributary of the Patuca, called Amacwass.

I verily believe I would have been a welcome guest among my Poyer friends, so long as I might have chosen to remain; yet they did not urge me to stay, but hastened to help me off, as if my intimations were to be regarded as commands.

During the day a large quantity of provisions were dispatched to the boat, and at night the monexico selected two men, and my old companion the Poyer boy, to accompany us to the coast. We took our departure early in the morning, while it was yet dark, without creating the slightest disturbance in the establishment. Only the old men, who had come out to meet us two weeks before, now went ahead with large brands of fire, to light the way; but, when the day broke, they again touched their foreheads to my knee, and returned, leaving us to prosecute our journey alone.

We reached the Amacwass in the afternoon, and found a boat, twice as large as the canoe in which we had navigated the lagoons, all prepared for instant departure. A space near the middle was covered with a thatch of palm branches, to protect me from the sun, and altogether it promised a degree of comfort and convenience to which I had been a stranger, in my previous voyagings.

We embarked at once, and dropped rapidly down with the current, the Indians only using their paddles to direct the boat, and keep it clear of the rocks which obstructed the channel. The water was wonderfully clear, every where revealing the bottom with the greatest distinctness. The banks were covered with a heavy forest, in which the eye was often arrested by the stately forms of the mahogany-tree, with its massive foliage, rising high above the general level; or by the still taller and more graceful plumes of the palmetto-royal. Vegetation seemed to have a more vigorous, but less redundant life, than on the Mosquito Shore; that is to say, it assumed more compact and more decided forms, occasioned, probably, by the comparative absence of jungle, not less than by peculiarities of soil.

There was something exhilarating in our rapid course; and the voice of the waters, here murmuring over a pebbly bottom, and yonder breaking hoarsely over the obstructing rocks, reminded me of my distant New England home, and recalled the happy hours which I had spent in the sole companionship of its merry mountain streams. It was, after all, by the standard of my youthful experiences, that I measured my present enjoyments; and it was rare indeed, even in my most cheerful moods, that the comparison was favorable to the latter. The senses blunted by years, and the memory crowded with events, fails to appreciate so keenly or record so deeply, the experiences of middle life, and pure happiness, after all, dwells chiefly in the remembrance of the distant past.