CHAPTER XXIV.
YELLOW FEVER—A WOODEN HEAD—HARD TIMES—A GALE—WE SPRING A LEAK—ACAPULCO—SMUGGLING—CHOLERA—CONCLUSION.
Christmas, 1852.
“I’ll soon be back, boys,� was my last remark, it will be remembered, as I parted from the Tuttletonians on the road; consequently, in the winter of 1852 I found myself at the Island of St. Thomas, on my way back to the scrofulous pigs, the Carpenter Judge, and Constable Rowe. I had made up my mind that for the time being I would have no more to do with quartz mining. I saw that there was much respecting it that would remain enigmatical until the application of capital and science had produced results; so as the English Mining Companies appeared to possess both capital and science in abundance, I determined to wait and learn something from their operations, and for that matter I am waiting still. As my wife accompanied me I had made up my mind to jog on by easy stages to San Francisco, and when arrived there, visit either Southern California or the Great Salt Desert. Having had a rough passage out we were resting for a few days at St. Thomas, when the yellow fever broke out with great violence; soon the ships in harbour lost all their crews, and the population ashore became panic-struck with the virulence and suddenness of the disease. I was glad when the Company’s steamer, Dee, arrived to take us on to Aspinwall; and as this ship was considered healthy, we congratulated ourselves as we left the anchorage on having left Yellow Jack behind us; but, unfortunately, we had embarked on board the very ship that was doomed to suffer the most of all the steamers of the mail line. We had scarcely been forty-eight hours out, when the funeral service was read over nine of the ship’s crew; arriving next day at Carthagena, we landed there about a dozen hopeless cases. The day after, my servant died in great agony.
The features of the yellow fever, as then exemplified, were very horrible. I shall not, therefore, describe them, but merely mention that the disease commenced with a bleeding from the nose and gums, and this hemorrhage in many cases could not be checked whilst life remained.
We had about twelve passengers on board, all English but one; five of them were sturdy Cornish miners proceeding to California. The first passenger attacked was Mr. Adams, an American, and as we were then in sight of Aspinwall, we hoped to land in an hour or two, and fly from the epidemic, which had not as yet appeared on the Isthmus. We left Mr. Adams bleeding profusely from the nose, and we afterwards heard of his death. There was a vague fear among us that we were not quite safe, so we hurried on to Gorgona, which village we reached that night. The rain descended without cessation, and we had arrived at the close of one of the heaviest wet seasons that had been known for years. The roads were described as being in many places impassable, and such mules as we could hire were so worn out by the winter’s work that they could scarcely bear our weight when we mounted. The luggage was charged at the rate of a shilling a pound, and the muleteers would not engage to take it through in safety. Much trouble there was, I believe, in starting from Gorgona in the early morning; much falling of mules and immersion of riders in thick ponds of mud, ere our party had proceeded a mile on the road. The rain, I believe, fell as if it would blind one, and as the thunder reverberated through the dark forest of palm trees, the lightning made the darkness of the black covered road before us more horrible.
Had not the yellow fever been behind us, our party would, I believe, have turned back to spare the women such a fearful trial. I say, believe, for the night before I had been attacked by yellow fever, and now as we stumbled and slid, and scrambled and swam through the red fat mud, I knew nothing.
My head was of wood, as it were, or lead, and if any one had chopped it off I should not have known it, but have gone on quite as comfortably. I had but one fixed idea, and that was that I wanted water; sometimes I got it, oftener it was not to be had, and I have no doubt that I pondered dreamily over this circumstance as something remarkable.
Of course I tumbled off a great many times, but not so often as was expected; a habit of riding enabled me to keep a certain kind of seat even under such trying circumstances. I cared little for tumbling off, but was roused to anger at being lifted on again; however, my wife did the best she could for me, and by night-fall we arrived at a hut on the side of the road to sleep. There was no Californian traffic on the road at this period, and our party consisted but of three men and two women, the Cornish miners having proceeded on foot the day previously. They placed us in a small loft, through the chinks of which could be perceived some half dozen ruffian-looking armed natives, who had congregated below. I suppose they did not murder us because they thought we had no money, otherwise they would have done so, unless they made an exception in our favour over other unarmed passengers who got benighted at these seasons. It rained still as we plodded on next day, and we passed a slough where, a day or two before, a woman had fallen off her mule and was suffocated before assistance reached her. My head was, if possible, more wooden than ever, and I became much distressed at one place where I lost my boots in the mud; for the moment I argued quite reasonably on this subject, but soon becoming unmanned, I burst into tears, and proceeded on my way, stolid, stupid, and bootless. Our party arrived at Panama half dead with fatigue, draggled with mud, and shivering in the torn clothes that for nearly sixty hours had been drenched in rain. I was placed in bed; the other male passengers—all of whom had arrived in good health—made themselves comfortable, and thought no more of the Dee, or the rain, or the mud. In less than ten days they all died of yellow fever but one, and I alone of those attacked recovered.