Isthmiana/Chitres

Chitres
The Padron offered to go up to the village, and send down animals to convey our traps. Meantime we waited on the bank. It was a forlorn place, and thickets shut off the view. We found a little opening of dried mud under a scrubby oak. Here we consumed an hour and the remainder of our grub, finishing also our last bottle of Chateau Margaux. I knew it was Chateau Margaux, because the label said so.

Then I drowsed. It was December. As extreme heat and cold are the same sensation, I was enjoying the same temperature as my friends north of the fortieth parallel. How charming is sympathy!

Pretty soon our messenger appeared with two animals. I am intentionally non-committal on the subject of their race. Their owners called them “bestias”; their brands gave no explanation; perhaps they were lamas. We placed our luggage on their backs, and walked forward. Our path soon brought us through the thicket on the river to a more open country. A thin, ferruginous soil supported a short, scanty herbage. Groups of shrubbery, with bushes of the fragrant flowering mimosa were scattered about. As we advanced, the landscape improved; we were entering Arcadia. Bright before us, verdant as a New-England valley in June, spread an emerald savanna. Its short grass was smooth as the turf of an English park. Trees of enormous shade stood in solitary expansiveness, or were grouped in graceful union. Under their shade the small but picturesque cattle of the country sheltered themselves from the ardent sun. Presently we began to see houses and corrals. These last were enclosed by stakes of the sidruelo, which, as soon as they are planted, sprout and grow up twenty or thirty feet in a single season, bunching at the top like pollard willows. The long shoots are trimmed off, and used in building huts, but the green tree palisade remains. Around these corrals the prickly pimula, or wild pine-apple, springs up, and, when they are neglected, this and larger plants form an impenetrable thicket. Within is the softest and most verdant grass; the cattle keep a narrow entrance open. When you find one of these deserted corrals far from any present settlement, it is like a fairy ring.

The houses were of most simple construction, — basket-work of withes covered with mud kneaded into consistency by means of long rushes. In the parching heats of the dry season, when everything green is gone, the cattle straying about find these rushes very convenient, and pulling away at them bring the houses down about the ears of the careless tenants, while often the rains of the rainy season do the same. Careless because it requires no heavy outlay of capital or labor to reconstruct. The owner goes to his corral, cuts down the tops of his fence in sufficient quantity, or cuts canes in the swamp. He then goes to the swamp and collects a boat-load of rushes. He builds a fire, puts on one enormous kettle of rice to boil and another of chicha, and calls in his neighbors to a raising-bee. They wattle the walls, and thatch the roof, and plaster the sides, all very speedily, and then sit down to a debauch on boiled rice, plantains, and chicha, Their revelry terminates, as in civilized countries, by a ball prolonged far into the night.

Near every house is a hanging garden on a small scale, a bed of earth raised six or seven feet on poles, for protection from cattle and reptiles, and planted with onions and vegetables. Occasionally, also, we found plantations of rice and maize. The latter gives three crops a year. Troops of pack animals constantly passed us, laden with enormous hide ceroons, filled with grain. The scene was pastoral.

Near the village we found a number of people collected for a raising-bee such as I have described, — a junto they would call it. The first operation was finished, and the house stood, a great square basket, like a crockery crate. A kettle four feet in diameter, filled with boiled rice, stood waiting the time of repose. In honor of the occasion, the women were freshly dressed in white, and decked with flowers.

It was now meridian; the sun came perpendicularly down; our shadows had sunk into our boots. Peter Schlemihl would have found fellowship among us. We were rejoiced to arrive at the Plaza of the village, and take refuge in the Padron’s hut, one of the principal houses of the town. The Plaza is a small square, surrounded by houses such as I have described, with tiled roofs extending down to form a porch. The church is distinguished from the others only by a cracked bell suspended outside.

The Padron was an excellent fellow, and merited his good fortune in having a most charming wife, one of the most exquisite persons I have ever seen, of delicate features, a pure, dark complexion, brilliant, with a dark flush. Her younger sister was even more delicate and sylph-like; I was tempted to stay and forget civilization in her society; I am sorry I did not.

They brought us oranges, and sounds of gasping chickens were heard from the poultry-yard. We hung our hammocks, and reposed. I have spoken of the compensations of Nature. Among these, and foremost, let me not forget the hammock. The hammock to a bed is what flying is to walking. Here a stratum of cool air surrounded us, and the close packing of the boat was forgotten.

From my hammock in the porch I could look out upon the fair landscape Arcadian, over the exquisitely undulating greensward, unbroken as far as the eye could reach, except by the scattered huts and their small enclosures. Each of these was marked by its rich grove of orangetrees, and its shading, ever-tremulous cocoa-palms. Cattle, droves of horses, and all the smaller domestic animals, strayed about. Among them tumbled nude children.

In the heats of the dry season, when all verdure is destroyed, and all the houses that can be spared are eaten up, the cattle are driven, as in cold Switzerland, high up on the sides of the mountains.

One of the enclosures struck me as having a more finished air than its neighbors. A cart, like a degraded omnibus, stood before it. Have Yankee pedlers penetrated even here? I rolled out of my hammock, and approached.

Surrounded by its little grove of trees, was an octagonal pavilion, not unlike a Dutch summerhouse, — Mon repos, &c., — architecturally constructed of wood, and painted green. In front, guarding the entrance, and frowning perpetually, upon the pigs and chickens, was a colossal wooden statue of Napoleon, in typical attire (il avait son petit chapeau, and all). My astonishment at meeting an old friend in such a spot must have been expressed audibly, for from under the shade of this most gigantic and terrible of Penates appeared the unmistakable nationality of a Gaul. He invited me in, told me his history, and introduced me to Madame. He was a Bordelais, and after many vicissitudes had provided himself a little schooner, and was marketing for Panama along the coast. This was his country retreat. His household god had been the figure-head of a condemned vessel. His omnibus was a speculation, a failure in Panama, for transporting freight over the savanna to the landing. The whole style of the thing was original and inattendu. How little did I suppose, when I trained my Yankee tongue to Parisian accents, that I should use them in the wilds of South America, and pay compliments to a Bordeaux grisette, promoted to a bourgeoise, in the land of the banana and the cocoa-nut.

The hospitable wife of our hospitable Padron had meantime prepared us a most acceptable meal in the cookery school of the country, of which more anon. In the cool of the afternoon we walked over to the neighboring town of La Villa de los Santos, where my companions had business, and we hoped to find horses for our farther progress.

Over savannas sprinkled with plantations of plantain patches, we came to La Villa. Though only caballeros are respected in Spanish towns, here strangers were too important to have it very particularly inquired into how they came. Some one had arrived; it might be easily inferred that the steeds had been left in the suburbs.

A quiet, convulsive tremor of excitement ran along the grass-covered streets. Mild-eyed, melancholy women greeted our Spanish friend, and the impassive men came out to meet him, and to hope he brought no news, and that nothing new had happened. It was evident, without inquiry, that nothing had or ever would happen here, except the two great events of life.

The tiled roofs of the houses projected over the street, and, supported by wooden pillars, formed an arcade, under which, tilted back in their hide-seated chairs, sat the natives. All the interiors consisted of a large room, with high ceiling, paved floor, and scantily furnished, as is the manner of the country, with a few chairs, a hammock, and a table.

The Governor of the Province of Azmero, of which this is the capital, received us most kindly, and made us his guests for the night. He was a progressive, intelligent, gentlemanly fellow, and felt sadly isolated where he was. B. and I strolled out to see the town. The church was filled with the fresh toilettes of the ladies in the peculiarly graceful attire of the country. It consists of a skirt of some light-figured or embroidered muslin, often made with two or more flounces. There is no waist nor sleeves; but a large cape, of the same or some lighter material, is thrown over the shoulders, gathered by a ribbon about the neck more or less closely, as the wearer pleases. There is a most graceful ease and abandon in the attire. As the climate is warm, the ladies are décolletées enough to suit the most “emancipated” taste, and the row of bright shoulders, as they all kneel in church, is worthy of a full-dress occasion. All had fresh flowers in their hair. I was charmed then and the whole evening.

The imbecile old priest insisted upon embracing the strangers after mass. Padre Agriol was seventy-five, so he told us. He was snuffy as a cardinal, and redolent of agua diente. The church has retained some valuable silver candelabra and ornaments. In general, these have been all taken or plundered from the churches of New Granada.

Horses strayed in herds unheeded about the town, but no one would take the trouble to get them for us. We spent next day lounging about La Villa. I, susceptible fellow, was in ecstasies all the while with the beauty of the ladies, and accused my English companion of failing in the true cosmopolitan spirit when he refused to colonize with me.

In the afternoon we started on our return. When we reached the suburb, down came a tropical torrent. The roads were impassable. We impressed a little ragamuffin, who had come into town on a nag between two hide ceroons, full of mami apples (at twelve reals per hundred); he offered to provide us with horses. A good-natured man is always the scapegoat. It was determined that I should mount with him, and be deposited, and he return with two animals for the others. I essayed to mount, and, seizing the saddle, sprung up; but the saddle was merely placed on the back of the beast. The balance of power was no longer preserved. I was at once deposited sooner than I expected. I found myself immersed in the pool before the door, and emerged more or less muddy. After sympathy, and much rubbing and brushing, a second attempt was more successful. I mounted, and, grasping the neck of the animal with my legs, started. The boy was placed dos à dos to me, that no requirement of pilotage might interfere with his proper duties as locomotive agent. A sound as if of battered bones was heard; we were en route. I found our charming hostess and her sister as kind as before. The Padron promised us horses early next morning for our ride to Parita.