Towards nightfall, when dinner, with its indispensable accompaniments of café and cigars, is over, our host invites the gentlemen to accompany him to the plantations of a few friendly neighbours. Horses are accordingly saddled, spurs are affixed to our boots, and away we gallop.
Our first halt is made at a grazing-farm belonging to Don Benigno, and kept by his mayoral, or overseer, a stout, bronze-faced man, who, we are told, rarely moves during the day from a leather-bottomed chair, which he places slopingly against a post of the verandah. After inspecting Don Benigno's cattle, which consist chiefly of oxen, cows, and goats, we ride over to some coffee estates and tobacco farms, whose owners, or representatives, give us a hearty welcome, and are lavish of their hospitality, offering for our acceptance everything they possess except their wives and families, whom they, however, present to us as our 'servants.'
Our time being limited, we cannot partake of their bounty to-night, but promise to return another day. On the road homewards, we dismount at a coffee estate belonging to Don Benigno's kinsman, Don Felipe, where we remain for an hour or so, and watch the performances of a crowd of black labourers, who are keeping holiday in honour of some favoured saint. Dancing, with 'tumba' or drum accompaniments, forms the leading feature in the entertainments. The negroes, in turn, take part in the drumming, which is performed by bestriding barrel-shaped tambours, and beating the parchment side rapidly with their hands. The strange measure of the dance is so varied and well sustained, that the outline of an air may be easily distinguished. This primitive music is accompanied by a performance on rattles, by singing, and by scraping the güiro. This instrument is, in the country, roughly made from a dry calabash, notched in such a manner that a hollow grating sound is produced by scraping the rough surface with a fragment of bone. The dancers warm to their work in every sense. Only two couples volunteer at one time, and when they are utterly exhausted, others take their place. The partners dance independently of one another, and only join hands occasionally. The women, attired in long cotton gowns and coloured turbans, assume a short, shuffling kind of step, which gives them the appearance of gliding on wheels, while the upper parts of their persons oscillate, or sway to and fro in a manner peculiar to their tribe. The men, whose evening costume consists of buttonless shirts and short canvas trousers, are more demonstrative than their partners. Sometimes they throw up their arms in wild ecstacy, or leap madly into the air; varying these gymnastic performances by squatting, frog-fashion, near the ground, or turning pirouettes. They get so excited and warm over their gyrations, that their Panama hats, which have been doffed and donned fifty times, are thrown away, their buff-coloured shoes are kicked off, and finally their shirts are disposed of in a similar manner.
Nicasio and I contemplate the animated scene with painters' eyes, and during the pauses of the dance, we mix and fraternise with the swarthy company.
Having expressed a wish to immortalise on canvas a couple of brown divinities, picturesquely attired, our hospitable host, Don Felipe, who has already offered us his country residence, together with the surroundings, including horses, cattle, tobacco, coffee, and all that is his, does not hesitate to add to his list of gifts, the model-ladies that have attracted our observation; so, after his accustomed declaration, 'They are at your disposal,' he promises to have them 'forwarded' to Don Benigno's hacienda without much delay.
The lateness of the hour warns us that we must be moving, so after a parting cup with our host and his family, we remount our steeds, and turn homewards.
During our absence, the ladies and children have been playing the old-fashioned round game of loto, over which they are intently occupied when we join them.
Doña Mercedes is calling the numbers from a bag, but not in the orthodox way. In order to increase the excitement and confusion of the game, the playful lady invents noms de guerre for some of the numbers. Number one is by her transformed into 'el único' (the only one); number two, when drawn, is termed 'el par dichoso' (the happy pair); and number three, 'las Gracias' (the Graces). Similarly, number fifteen becomes 'la niña bonita' (the pretty girl); number thirty-two, 'la edad de Cristo,' and so on up to number sixty-nine, which she describes as 'el arriba para abajo' (the upside down number). All the tens she gives in their numerical form, coupled with the creolised adjective 'pelao,' or shaven, because the ciphers in these numbers are thought to resemble a bald head.
When 'Loteria!' has been at last shouted by a successful winner, loto is abandoned, and cards, in which the gentlemen take the lead, are substituted. Don Benigno proposes the exciting and speculative game of monté, and all the ready cash of the company is forthwith exhibited on the table. Long after the children and ladies have retired, the males of our party continue to gamble over this fascinating game.
While we are finishing our last round but six, a slave enters the broad airy balcony where we are assembled, and approaching our host, whispers mysteriously in his ear. Don Benigno directs a look at my companion and me, and observes, with a smile, 'Señores artistas, your models have arrived.'