Page:Letters from the Battle-fields of Paraguay (1870).djvu/378



348 TIMBO ESTABELECIMENTO NOVO.

ran past Humaita_, Marshal Caxias attacked it with about 6000 troops. The Brazilians charged gallantly, facing a storm of grape and canister at close quarters, up to the trench, and were four times beaten back with the loss of some 476 hors de combat. After exhausting his ammu- nition, Major Olabarrieta retreated on board the Tacuari and Ygurei steamers, and landed his men at Humaita. He lost his guns and about 150 soldiers : but he will be remem- bered by this beau fait d'armes. There is nothing to be described in the earthworks; they were Â«3ven more broken than those of Timbo. The land around was a desert ; not a living Paraguayan remained in this part of Paraguay ; it was odorous of carnage, like the Crimea, and the enceinte showed only two long lines of graves.

Evening came on in the deepest silence, and


 * ' calm was all nature as a resting wheel."

Towards sunset, however, the air became alive with mosqui- toes, which replaced the swarming sandflies, and which piped a treble to the hoarse bass whoop of the frog. The sanguinary culex punctured us with her bundle of stilet- toes, till we were obliged to defend ourselves with twig wisps. The plagues are said to bite through the closest cloth, and the soldiers must have suffered tortures from them in this campaign of swamps.

My companion was a keen sportsman, and he had lately had an adventure which recals the Spanish proverb, '^ Escaping from the bull one falls into the brook.^"* The land now begins to be rich in game. As a rule, the Para- guayan guardias and piquetes were not allowed to waste ammunition. The sky, which contains too much vapour ever to be dark blue, became vocal with the whistling duck {Fato Silbador or Anas Penelope) and its congeners, now emigrating southwards. Blue-rocks clove the air high