Page:Letters from the Battle-fields of Paraguay (1870).djvu/386



356 THE HUMAITA "QUADRILATERAL."

here. The guns are wretched 3.2-pounders_, and each had 300 rounds of gunpowder^ grape,, case^ and shell ; solid shot being little used. Embrasures are wanting^ and the maga- zines are round-topped like ovens, so as to hold the bomb and to admit rain water. Some are open; others have been exploded by shells ; and the trench shows the usual waste of cartridges and powder-bags.

Issuing from the enceinte^ we turned down south upon the Curupaity^ or rather the Angulo road. It was crowded with cartSj horses, and camp followers, all moving up to Humaita. The tanks, large and small, were beautiful with the waterlily, which grows even in the trenches ; and the long-legged Parra trotted over the broad fleshy leaves of the Victoria Regia. This splendid nymphsea, the abati irupe or water-maize of the Guaranis, produces an edible fecula, like those of the Sind talabs. It is astonishing that the Brazilians, as they were regularly besieging the " stronghold," did not lay out approaches and flying zigzags. They excused themselves by declaring the land too swampy ; but the lines of thorny trees that streaked the grass and reeds of the baiiados, proved that solid ground, if sought for, might have been found.

After a mile and a half we reached the Brazilian lines of circumvallation thrown up by General Argolo : they were on a much more extensive scale than the works of the place invested. The embrasures stood faced with fascines, and their cheeks were revetted with sods; the berm was care- fully traced, and the expense magazines (Polvorinas), though wanting the sloping roof, appeared sufficiently solid. As the lines were never made a base of operations, the labour was wantonly wasted — it beat even the Russian batteries in the Crimea.

A hand-gallop of half an hour took us to Paso Pucu, alias Brites, from a hacienda or estate that once was here. Mar-