CHAPTER XXII.
CATTLE—BUTTER AND CHURN—OVERRUN WITH CATS—CURIOUS VOLCANO—MAJA AND JUTIA.
Although the draught cattle on the island are large and well-proportioned, the cows are poor milkers, partially from the fact that the cane-tops on which they are fed in winter are not productive of milk. The scanty product of five cows furnished us with a small pat of butter daily. Of course, nobody there ever saw a churn, and Lamo had to go to the carpenter-shop, make a dasher, and fit it to the top of a two-gallon stone jar, to provide me with one. With great care, keeping the milk-pans placed in cold water, skimming the little film of cream, and churning before the sun was up, we managed to have the unheard-of delicacy of butter.
In return for a neighbor’s courtesy in sending me pineapples quite out of season, I sent her a pat of butter. Immediately she called in her volante, and was so earnest in her inquiries that I showed her the bowl of cream and the churn, and explained the process. Butter was to be obtained in Havana in small glass jars, with open mouths; occasionally it was brought to the plantations, but during the transit, through lack of facilities for protection from heat, it was reduced so nearly to a liquid state that a broad knife or spoon offered the most convenient means of removing it from the jar.
Families relied greatly upon goat’s milk as nourishment for their children; so they were frequently trained for wet-nurses. While calling on a family in our neighborhood, the young baby cried; immediately a goat ran into the room, laid itself on the floor in a convenient position for the child to get its nourishment, and the baby availed itself of the opportunity as readily as it would from its own mother. After the goat had fulfilled the maternal duties, she walked carefully over the child and disappeared. A goat so well trained is greatly appreciated, and is passed from family to family like a monthly nurse.
Native sheep have no coat of wool, and at a little distance look like a pack of cur-dogs. We imported a few Southdowns from New York, hoping to improve the breed; in two or three generations they, too, lost their wool, and presented no better appearance than the old stock. The flesh deteriorated with equal rapidity, and was little prized for the table. The securing of variety of meats for table use was a constant household care. At certain seasons Henry’s gun furnished us with quail, wild Guinea-fowls, and occasionally venison. Chickens were always abundant, but beef and mutton were poor; and the great reliance was pork, which was really more savory than one would imagine it could be in the tropics, with the mercury at 90° in the shade. The hogs are fed almost entirely on grass and the berries of the palm-trees—a food easily obtained, each tree yielding a cart-load—and the pork was so rich and delicate that it was the pièce de résistance at every household feast.
One obstacle in keeping fresh meats was the intolerable nuisance of cats, that had their retreats in crevices of the stone fences, and, as any number of rats lived thereabout, I think they fraternized. They never came about the house during the day, but were seen scudding and scampering over the fences and darting into the cane. They broke up hens’ nests, destroyed the eggs, devoured the young chickens, and often made night hideous with battles and concerts while roaming through the house, to which the open windows afforded free access, knocking china off the sideboard and lamps off the table, and doing so much damage in the kitchen that Ciriaco’s life was made a burden.
In a fit of desperation I offered to pay five cigars for every deceased feline that was brought to the house. It was fun for Zell and Ciriaco. Zell had his old blunderbuss always loaded and conveniently hidden, and between times took quiet little hunts. Ciriaco, like a patient Chinese as he was, would sit for hours at night in a dark corner of the court, immovable as a sphinx, with a few billets of wood ready, and he rarely hurled a missile that missed its mark. “Here’s dat ole yaller cat; I hit him dis time: he’s de very varmint dat broke Marthy’s lamp—you kin smell de ile on his fur yit.” And Zell proudly held up to view a magnificent feline. “Ciriaco ’lows he kin tan dese skins, and, I tell you, some is beauties.” So Ciriaco soon had the west side of the cooper-shop adorned with skins in process of curing. When about fifty of the choicest were ready, I determined to make a rug, and for days had them spread over the veranda floor, fitting the various shapes together like a dissecting map. Some were quite complete, even to the head; others were minus a leg or a tail. They were of every conceivable color—“ring-streaked, speckled, and spotted”—some young and little, some old and big. This sewing of cat-skins was not a dainty job, albeit Ciriaco had cured them very thoroughly; but I persevered unto the end, stimulated by the admiring remarks of the various members of the family, who were more liberal in their suggestions as to tones and contrasting colors than willing to lend helping hands. Soon the rug was completed; it was both curious and beautiful. Bound and lined with red, and spread upon the dark polished floor before an inviting sofa, it challenged the instant admiration of every one entering the parlor. But, alas! when flea-time came in the spring, and those intolerable pests were so numerous that even the dust in the fields furnished a quota, the soft, thick fur became such a resort for the nimble acrobats that it had to be entirely discarded.
Legions of bats came about the building in the witching hours of night. We rarely saw one, but the disagreeable odor pervading the veranda in the early morning gave unmistakable indications of their visits while we slept. We were for a long time at a loss to know whence they came, for there was no appearance of bats’ nests in the buildings. Several evenings at dusk, when Henry chanced to be on the mountain, he noticed from a distant point a small, smoky column rise, gradually increasing in circumference as it ascended, till it floated away like a cloud. One of the neighboring guajiros gravely informed him that it was a volcano, that smoked only for a few moments every evening.
Not content with this explanation, Henry’s curiosity tempted him to visit a volcano that performed its operations with such strange and unaccountable uniformity. So one summer evening he rode in the direction, timing himself to arrive at “the rising of the curtain,” and found a bat-cave. Every night at dusk the animals rushed out by myriads, with a whirring, pouring noise, in so dense a mass that the column rose straight in the air a considerable distance before they could disentangle themselves. As they became free, they spread in every direction, flying over miles of territory. They lived in this cave during the day, hanging together like a swarm of bees, were on the wing all night, gradually returning toward morning, and by the first light of dawn were again within their rocky home.
It is generally conceded that every animal on the island was brought there, except the jutia and the maja (pronounced hootia and mahar), the first a species of mammoth field-rat, the latter a snake; both live in the rocky crevices and infest the cane-fields. Both are occasionally used for food by the poorer classes; the Chinese, especially, enjoying them.