The plaza filled up imperceptibly, and the short grass was covered by a white-clad throng of Indians. The heat increased, and all the time the bells rang out, pulled vigorously by relays of Indians, and at a given signal the people turned and trooped towards the church, all carrying flowers in their hands.
As there was no one to sing Mass, and as the organ long had been neglected, the congregation listened to some prayers, read from a book of Hours by an old Indian, who pronounced the Latin, of which most likely he did not understand a word, as if it had been Guarani. They sang “Las Flores á Maria” all in unison, but keeping such good time that at a little distance from the church it sounded like waves breaking on a beach after a summer storm.
In the neglected church, where no priest ministered or clergy prayed, where all the stoops of holy water had for years been dry, and where the Mass had been well-nigh forgotten as a whole, the spirit lingered, and if it quickeneth upon that feast day in the Paraguayan missions, that simple congregation were as uplifted by it as if the sacrifice had duly been fulfilled with candles, incense, and the pomp and ceremony of Holy Mother Church upon the Seven Hills.
As every one except the Correntinos went barefooted, the exit of the congregation made no noise except the sound of naked feet, slapping a little on the wooden steps, and so the people silently once again filled the plaza, where a high wooden arch had been erected in the middle, for the sport of running at the ring.
The vegetable sellers had now removed from the middle of the square, taking all their wares under the long verandah, and several pedlars had set up their booths and retailed cheap European trifles such as no one in the world but a Paraguayan Indian could possibly require. Razors that would not cut, and little looking-glasses in pewter frames made in Thuringia, cheap clocks that human ingenuity was powerless to repair when they had run their course of six months’ intermittent ticking, and gaudy pictures representing saints who had ascended to the empyrean, as it appeared, with the clothes that they had worn in life, and all bald-headed, as befits a saint, were set out side by side with handkerchiefs of the best China silk. Sales were concluded after long-continued chaffering—that higgling of the market dear to old-time economists, for no one would have bought the smallest article, even below cost price, had it been offered to him at the price the seller originally asked.
Enrique Clerici, from Itapua, had transported all his pulperia bodily for the occasion of the feast. It had not wanted more than a small wagon to contain his stock-in-trade. Two or three dozen bottles of square-faced gin of the Anchor brand, a dozen of heady red wine from Catalonia, a pile of sardine boxes, sweet biscuits, raisins from Malaga, esparto baskets full of figs, and sundry pecks of apricots dried in the sun and cut into the shape of ears, and hence called “orejones,” completed all his store. He himself, tall and sunburnt, stood dressed in riding-boots and a broad hat, with his revolver in his belt, beside a pile of empty bottles, which he had always ready, to hurl at customers if there should be any attempt either at cheating or to rush his wares. He spoke the curious lingo, half-Spanish, half-Italian, that so many of his countrymen use in the River Plate; and all his conversation ran upon Garibaldi, with whom he had campaigned in youth, upon Italia Irredenta, and on the time when anarchy should sanctify mankind by blood, as he said, and bring about the reign of universal brotherhood.
He did a roaring trade, despite the competition of a native Paraguayan, who had brought three demi-johns of Caña, for men prefer the imported article the whole world over, though it is vile, to native manufactures, even when cheap and good.
Just about twelve o’clock, when the sun almost burned a hole into one’s head, the band got ready in the church porch, playing upon old instruments, some of which may have survived from Jesuit times, or, at the least, been copied in the place, as the originals decayed.
Sackbuts and psalteries and shawms were there, with serpents, gigantic clarionets, and curiously twisted oboes, and drums, whose canvas all hung slack and gave a muffled sound when they were beaten, and little fifes, ear-piercing and devilish, were represented in that band. It banged and crashed “La Palomita,” that tune of evil-sounding omen, for to its strains prisoners were always ushered out to execution in the times of Lopez, and as it played the players slowly walked down the steps.
Behind them followed the alcalde, an aged Indian, dressed in long cotton drawers, that at the knees were split into a fringe that hung down to his ankles, a spotless shirt much pleated, and a red cloak of fine merino cloth. In his right hand he carried a long cane with a silver head—his badge of office. Walking up to the door of his own house, by which was set a table covered with glasses and with homemade cakes, he gave the signal for the running at the ring.