So we walked around the little deserted town. I could think only of the breakfast we were to have in the old man's casa. And it met and exceeded our wildest anticipations, for, just fancy! We were served with a delicious boullion, then chicken, perfectly cooked, accompanied by some dish flavored with chile verde, creamy biscuit, fresh butter, and golden coffee with milk. There were three or four women and several officers in the party, and we had a merry breakfast. We paid the old man generously, thanked him warmly, and returned to the ship, fortified to endure the sight of all the green ducks that came out of the lower hold.
You must remember that the "Newbern" was a small and old propeller, not fitted up for passengers, and in those days the great refrigerating plants were unheard of. The women who go to the Philippines on our great transports of to-day cannot realize and will scarcely believe what we endured for lack of ice and of good food on that never-to-be-forgotten voyage down the Pacific coast and up the Gulf of California in the summer of 1874.
CHAPTER V. THE SLUE
At last, after a voyage of thirteen days, we came to anchor a mile or so off Port Isabel, at the mouth of the Colorado River. A narrow but deep slue runs up into the desert land, on the east side of the river's mouth, and provides a harbor of refuge for the flat-bottomed stern-wheelers which meet the ocean steamers at this point. Hurricanes are prevalent at this season in the Gulf of California, but we had been fortunate in not meeting with any on the voyage. The wind now freshened, however, and beat the waves into angry foam, and there we lay for three days on the "Newbern," off Port Isabel, before the sea was calm enough for the transfer of troops and baggage to the lighters.
This was excessively disagreeable. The wind was like a breath from a furnace; it seemed as though the days would never end, and the wind never stop blowing. Jack's official diary says: "One soldier died to-day."
Finally, on the fourth day, the wind abated, and the transfer was begun. We boarded the river steamboat "Cocopah," towing a barge loaded with soldiers, and steamed away for the slue. I must say that we welcomed the change with delight. Towards the end of the afternoon the "Cocopah" put her nose to the shore and tied up. It seemed strange not to see pier sand docks, nor even piles to tie to. Anchors were taken ashore and the boat secured in that manner: there being no trees of sufficient size to make fast to.
The soldiers went into camp on shore. The heat down in that low, flat place was intense. Another man died that night.
What was our chagrin, the next morning, to learn that we must go back to the "Newbern," to carry some freight from up-river. There was nothing to do but stay on board and tow that dreary barge, filled with hot, red, baked-looking ore, out to the ship, unload, and go back up the slue. Jack's diary records: "Aug. 23rd. Heat awful. Pringle died to-day." He was the third soldier to succumb. It seemed to me their fate was a hard one. To die, down in that wretched place, to be rolled in a blanket and buried on those desert shores, with nothing but a heap of stones to mark their graves.
The adjutant of the battalion read the burial service, and the trumpeters stepped to the edge of the graves and sounded "Taps," which echoed sad and melancholy far over those parched and arid lands. My eyes filled with tears, for one of the soldiers was from our own company, and had been kind to me.