Page:Incidents of travel in Central America, Chiapas and Yucatan.djvu/268

190 we heard an uproar in the street, and a man ran in to tell us that a mob was murdering our muleteer. The captain, a frequent visitor to the country, said it was probably a general sword fight, and cautioned us against going out. While in the corridor, hesitating, the uproar was hurrying toward us; the gate burst open, and a crowd rushed in, dragging with them our muleteer, that respectable husband and father, with his machete drawn, and so tipsy that he could hardly stand, but wanting to fight all the world. With difficulty we got him entangled among some saddle-gear, when he dropped down, and, after vain efforts to rise, fell asleep.

I awoke the next morning with violent headache and pain in all my bones. Nevertheless, we started at daylight, and rode till five o'clock.

The sun and heat increased the pain in my head, and for three hours before reaching Escuintla I was in great suffering. I avoided going to the corregidor's, for I knew that his sleeping apartment was open to all who came, and I wanted quiet; but I made a great mistake in stopping at the house of the captain's friend. He was the proprietor of an estanco, or distillery for making agua ardiente, and gave us a large room directly back of a store, and separated from it by a low board partition open over the top; and this store was constantly filled with noisy, wrangling, and drinking men and women. My bed was next to the partition, and we had eight or ten men in our room. All night I had a violent fever, and in the morning I was unable to move. Captain de Nouvelle regretted it, but he could not wait, as his ship was ordered to lie off and on without coming to anchor. Mr. Catherwood had me removed to a store-room filled with casks and demijohns, where, except from occasional entries to draw off liquor, I was quiet; but the odour was sickening.

In the afternoon the fever left me, and we rode to Masaya, a level and shady road of four leagues, and, to our surprise and great satisfaction, found the captain at the house at which I had stopped on my return from Istapa. He had advanced two leagues beyond, when he heard of a band of robbers at some distance further on, and returned to wait for company, sending, in the mean time, to Escuintla for a guard of soldiers. We afterwards learned that they were a body of exiles who had been expelled from Guatimala, and were crossing from Quezaltenango to San Salvador; but, being in desperate circumstances, they were dangerous persons to meet on the road.

The hut at which we stopped was hardly large enough for the family that occupied it, and our luggage, with two hammocks and a catré, drove them into a very small space. Crying children are said to be healthy; if so, the good woman of the house was blessed: besides this,