"They were preparing to commit every sort of crime, and dancing like madmen round a magician who broke forth into frightful lamentations, crying 'Galatha! Galatha!'"
"Well, it was some poor man who was mourning the death of his wife, his galatha. And you were witnessing a sort of mass for the repose of her soul. . . . May Goudon protect her and defend us from Yoloch! It takes very little to astonish you."
During the remainder of the day Chéri-Bibi gave particular attention to the physical features of the country through which they were passing. In the afternoon his face lit up with a smile; and the Nut surmised that all was as well as well could be with them.
They left the Pupa and were following the course of another river which flowed towards the north-east. Strangely enough the forest was no longer inimical to them. Everything, on the contrary, seemed to assist them in their purpose. They came across a path which enabled them to cover a considerable tract of ground without unduly fatiguing themselves.
At last, in the evening, they reached the top of a wooded height, from which Chéri-Bibi could point out to the Nut the gold diggings and the village in which the prospectors lived.
[CHAPTER VIII]
THE GOLD-SEEKERS
The bar and store which Señor Sanda had set up in the heart of the gold-prospecting district stood on the banks of a stream which, some three days' march farther on emptied itself into the Oyapok, a river which constituted the frontier between French Guiana and Brazil. The bar was an establishment similar to those, called albacen, which are to be found in the forest solitudes of Gran Chaco.
Here everything was sold that could be of use to the worker in the forest—tools, provisions, preserves, tinware, clothes, arms, munitions and every variety of alcohol. It was at once a bar and a grocer's shop. It was likewise a gaming-house. Men entered it with their pockets well filled with gold dust, and left it to work in the "sluices," having lost their all. Other men quickly made a fortune, but they did not keep it long. Truth to tell, Señor Sanda was the only man in the place who grew rich.
One Sunday, in the large saloon bar, constructed of wooden planks with a corrugated iron roof, men were having an exciting game at the table, at the far end of the room, near the counter behind which Sanda, assisted by his "boys," was serving out rum and Indian spirits to chance customers.