"They'll need more grave-diggers than mud-diggers, if they try it on," was Bill's emphatic reply. "White men can't stand the climate nohow. And as for niggers—well, all you can git out o' 'em's clear gain, like lickin' a mule," he added, biting off a chew of tobacco as he spoke.
On the afternoon of the third day the passengers were landed at the foot of the Castillio Rapids, so named from an old Spanish fort commanding the passage of the river at this point, though many years gone to ruin and decay. Walter and Bill climbed the steep path leading up to it. The castle was of great age, they were told, going back to the time of the mighty Philip II of Spain perhaps, who spent such vast sums in fortifying his American colonies against the dreaded buccaneers. Walter could not help feeling awe-struck at the thought that what he saw was already old when the Pilgrims landed on Plymouth Rock. Some one asked if this was not the place where England's naval hero, Lord Nelson, first distinguished himself, when the castle was taken in 1780.
Leaving these crumbling ruins to the snakes, lizards, and other reptiles which glided away at their approach, the two went back to the clump of rough shanties by the river, and it was here that Walter made his first acquaintance with that class of adventurers who, if not buccaneers in name, had replaced them, to all intents, not only here but on all routes leading to the land of gold.
There was a short portage around the rapids. A much larger and more comfortable boat had just landed some hundreds of returning Californians at the upper end of this portage, and a rough-and-ready looking lot they were, betraying by their talk and actions that they had long been strangers to the restraints of civilized life. Of course every word they dropped was greedily devoured by the newcomers, by whom the Californians were looked upon as superior beings.
The two sets of passengers were soon exchanging newspapers or scraps of news, while their baggage was being transferred around the portage. Giving Walter a knowing wink, Bill accosted one of the Californians with the question, "I say, mister, is it a fact, now, that you can pick up gold in the streets in San Francisco?"
"Stranger," this individual replied, "you may bet your bottom dollar you can. It's done every day in the week. You see a lump in the street, pick it up, and put it in your pocket until you come across a bigger one, then you heave the first one away, same's you do pickin' up pebbles on the beach, sabe?" Giving a nod to the half-dozen listeners, who were eagerly devouring every word, the fellow turned on his heel and walked off to join his companions.
The run across Lake Nicaragua was made in the night. When the passengers awoke the next morning the steamer was riding at anchor at a cable's length from the shore, on which a lively surf was breaking. Behind this was a motley collection of thatched hovels known as Virgin Bay. The passengers were put ashore in lighters, into which as many were huddled as there was standing-room for, were then hauled to the beach by means of a hawser run between boat and shore, and, with their hearts in their mouths while pitching and tossing among the breakers, at last scrambled upon the sands as best they might, thanking their lucky stars for their escape from drowning.[2]
[2] The picture is by no means overdrawn, as on a subsequent occasion, by the capsizing of a lighter in the surf, many passengers were drowned.
Walter and Bill found themselves standing among groups of chattering half-breeds, half-nude children, dried-up old crones, and hairless, dejected-looking mules, whose shrill hee-haws struck into the general uproar with horribly discordant note. It was here bargains were made for the transportation of one's self or baggage across the intervening range of mountains to the Pacific. Secure in their monopoly of all the animals to be had for hire, the avaricious owners did not hesitate to demand as much for carrying a trunk sixteen miles as its whole contents were worth—more indeed than a mule would sell for.