Page:Incidents of travel in Central America, Chiapas and Yucatan.djvu/346

268 with which our friends abandoned us, and the risk we ran of being identified with them. There were three brothers, the only lancers who did not go out with Figoroa, white men, young and athletic, the best dressed and best armed in the company, swaggering in their manner, and disposed to cultivate an acquaintance with us. They told us that they purposed going to Guatimala; but I shrank from them instinctively, eluded their questions as to when we intended to set out, and I afterwards heard that they were natives of the town, and had been compelled to leave it on account of their notorious characters as assassins. One of them, as we thought, in a mere spirit of bravado, provoked a quarrel with the aide-de-camp, strutted before the quartel, and, in the hearing of all, said that they were under no man's orders; they only joined General Figoroa to please themselves, and would do as they thought proper. In the meantime, a few of the townsmen who had nothing to lose, among them an alguazil, finding there was no massacring, had returned or emerged from their hiding-places; and we procured a guide to be ready the moment General Figoroa should return, went back to the house, and to our surprise found the widow Padilla there. She had been secreted somewhere in the neighbourhood, and had heard, by means of an old woman-servant of the general's breakfasting with us, and our intimacy with him. We inquired for her daughters' safety, but not where they were, for we had already found that we could answer inquiries better when we knew nothing.

We waited till four o'clock, and hearing nothing of General Figoroa, made up our minds that we should not get off till evening. We therefore strolled up to the extreme end of the street, where Figoroa had entered, and where stood the ruins of an old church. We sat on the foundation walls, and looked through the long and desolate street to the plaza, where were a few stacks of muskets and some soldiers. All around were mountains, and among them rose the beautiful and verdant volcano of Chingo. While sitting there, two women ran past, and, telling us that the soldiers were returning in that direction, hid themselves among the ruins. We turned down a road, and were intercepted on a little eminence, where we were obliged to stop and look down upon them as they passed. We saw that they were irritated by an unsuccessful day's work, and that they had found agua ardiente; for many of them were drunk. A drummer on horseback, and so tipsy that he could hardly sit, stopped the line to glorify General Carrera. Very soon they commenced the old touchstone, "Viva Carrera!" and one fellow, with the strap of his knapsack across his naked shoulders, again stopped the whole line, and turning round, with a ferocious expression, said, "You are counting us, are you?"