“Well, in faith, Master Hector, they’re the quarest people to deal with I ever met with. One while ye’r drinking with them fair and asy; the next jumping into a river to save ye’r life. Here, half-a-score of men are shot: there, another batch are hanged. The fellow that sleeps beside you to-night is dead as a mackarel the next morning. All—hanging and shooting—and you can nather make head nor tail of what it’s all about. That critch * they call El Manco strings up the postmaster, I suppose, because he mislays a letter; and the Curate throttles the mule-driver for no other reason than that he delivered another safely. Troth, I’m right glad that we have parted company, although grately obliged to Mr. Diez for his civility. Indeed, I think he’s the best of the batch. El Manco has the gallows in his face; and if it wouldn’t be sinful to spake ill of the clargy, that father what-do-ye-call-him in the colonel’s coat, is one of the loosest-looking parish-priests I ever came across. But, come, let us jog on; the evening appears gloomy, and the Lord only knows where we are to put up to-night. If one could get into some quiet house for a wonder—not that I expect to sleep—for sorra thing I’ll drame of for a month of Sundays, but gallowses, guerillas, dead men, and every kind of divilry besides.”
* Anglice—“cripple.”
Before Mark Antony had done speaking, the partida rode up, pointed to the dark appearance of the sky, and intimated that we had three leagues to ride before we should reach our intended quarters. We took the hint accordingly’, and spurred forward in the hope of reaching our halting place before the rain came on.
We were disappointed. On the verge of the horizon, distant lightning began to scintillate like northern-lights; and, hardly audible, now and again the growl of a coming storm fell upon the ear. Momentarily the flashes became more vivid, the thunder became more distinct, large drops fell, and the guide declared that the tempest must burst immediately, and the first shelter we could reach would be a happy deliverance. There was a venta immediately beside us. It was remote, ill-kept, and bore but an indifferent reputation. If we could put up with bad fare and other inconveniences, there we would find shelter. If, however, we would risk a drenching for more comfort, we must abide the storm, and push on. We held a brief consultation. Suddenly the sky appeared to open; a flash of blue lightning issued from the riven cloud—we felt its heat distinctly; a peal of thunder, such as I had never heard before, succeeded; and with one voice we cried out for the neighbouring venta. The guerilla turned instantly sharp off into a narrow and neglected road, diverging on the left from the main route. We followed on the spur, and just as the rain began to fall we galloped into the yard of an inn, which had been once an establishment of considerable extent.
Unpromising as it might appear, that evening it was eagerly desired. A furlong off we saw half-a-dozen horsemen spurring down the hill, and evidently bound for the same destination. As precedency belongs to the first comers, we were determined to secure that best point in law—possession; and while the guerilla and Mark Antony led the horses to the stable, the French voltigeur and I entered the house, occupied the best corners of a bad kitchen, and made immediate inquiries into the actual state of the larder and wine bins. Alas! neither question was replied to satisfactorily. All was answered in the past. On Tuesday, there had been a side of goat—three travelling merchants pronounced it excellent; on Wednesday, the same trwellers finished a pig—the best the landlord had killed since St. Stephen’s; on Thursday, there had been partridges; (Friday, being a meagre day, was omitted in the account;) on Saturday, pigeons and a podrida. Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday, every thing was also excellent, and so varied that the host could not correctly enumerate the delicacies under which the table groaned. But, unluckily, to-day, and by a most calamitous fatality, nothing was to be had, good, bad or indifferent!
Before this miserable report had been concluded, a bustle in the yard announced the arrival of the wayfarers whom we had observed pricking down the hill; and while we were still listening to some wretched expedients which the landlord was proposing as an apology for a supper, two of the new comers made their entrée. They approached the fire, after having laid their wet riding cloaks aside; and the difference between the external appearances of the twain was so very ridiculous, that, by mutual impulse, Cammaran and I interchanged a smile.
One seemed an hildalgo of the Quixotic school—a thin, tall, shabby half-starved looking gentleman. His gait was stiff and lofty; and at first, the unhappy man seemed to labour under a delusion that we would resign a corner in his favour. Speedily that error of opinion was removed; and he ascertained, that upon us the imprint of his dignity was lost. He therefore contented himself with taking a place before the fire, demanding, in lordly tones, attendance, and more fuel,—“but none did come, though he did call for them.”
The other was a round, stumpy, well-fed, happy-looking little man, now touching close upon the grand climacteric. The world had evidently gone well with him, to judge by what, in Ireland, they would term “a cozey-character” of countenance. He poked the fire, but complained not; talked of the wild evening, and blessed the saints he was under shelter; hoped, rather than expected, that we might obtain a supper; concluding with a Christian-like expression of resignation, that really would have done honour to a Turk. New appeals were in the interim made to the landlord. The hidalgo swaggered; well, as the fancy say, it was “no go.” The voltigeur stormed—the answer invariably was, “I don’t understand ye.” The little man was responded to by a shrug; and all we could learn from him of the posada was, that the past had been a land of Goshen—the future bade fair to exceed it—but that the present was a dreary blank, which might be beneficially employed for the soul’s health in the shape of mortification. As for me, I should have objected, in Falstaff’s vein, to fast “upon compulsion,” when the door opened, and in came our partida escort, the fosterer, and three of the most ferocious-looking scoundrels I ever laid an eye upon, “armed to the teeth.”
“Why, how now,” exclaimed one of them,—“nothing like supper yet?”’
“Don’t be in any hurry.” said the little man; “Senhor!—there was one here, I think last Tuesday, and very excellent—roast pig, a podrida, and some partridges; and should you happen to pass this way within a fortnight, you’ll come in for a leg of a very promising porker, provided they can only catch him in the beech-wood.”