A PATRIARCH.
In the cool of the evening the whole party went down to the river bank, trusting to good fortune for transportation. Thus challenged, good fortune stood by us in the person of a citizen and his broncho. Chartering the latter, the Artist, his sketching haversack slung over his shoulder, mounted, and then the Madame was invited to ascend, the pillion being a shawl thrown over the horse’s haunches. When there she declared she could not stay—would certainly slip off the Gothic back of the beast the instant he moved.
“Then take it Anna Dickinson fashion,” remarked her unfeeling spouse; whereupon there was a frantic lurch, a twinkle of crimson suspected to be hosiery, and a cheery “All right!” to let us know she was ready to brave the passage. The landing was safe, and then the patient horse returned and repeated the fording until we all were across.
But our peace of mind, or our amour propre—which is much the same thing—was disturbed by a suspicion that we were being laughed at, for a party of Mexican women from Chamita came down to the brink while we were there, and, chattering merrily over our slow and undoubtedly ludicrous progress, unconcernedly pulled off their shoes and stockings, gathered their skirts in a bunch about their waists, and gaily waded through as though in contempt of our fear of water and the conventionalities.
MAID AND MATRON.
The large island was gravelly and liable to be inundated, so that it was given over to the pasturage of sheep, goats, cattle, horses and donkeys. On the eastern bank we found ourselves at once in the midst of grain fields and garden plats. Tall Indian corn alternated with short wheat, hay and alfalfa, or patches of potatoes, melons and vegetables. Fences were few, but the road was defined by a line of upright brush, bound into cohesion by withes of bark, so that it resembled a thoroughly dead hedge. Here and there stood a casa chiquita, but the main town was on the bluff marking the old bank of the river, half a mile from its present current.