Page:Life in Mexico vol 1.djvu/289

Rh torrents of rain. It was a superb storm. The lightning flashed amongst the trees, the wind howled furiously, while

After resting and dining amidst a running accompaniment of splashing rain, roaring wind, and deeptoned thunder, we found that it was in vain to wait for a favorable change in the weather; and certainly with less experienced drivers, it would have been anything but safe to have set oft' amidst the darkness of the storm, down precipitous descents and over torrents swelled by the rain. The Count de Regla. who, attracted by the plentiful supply of water in this ravine, conceived the idea of employing part of his enormous fortune in the construction of these colossal works, must have had an imagination on a large scale. The English directors, whose wives consent to bury themselves in such abysses, ought to feel more grateful to them than any other husbands towards their sacrificing better halves. For the men, occupied all day amongst their workmen and machinery, and returning late in the evening to dine and sleep, there is no great self-immolation; but a poor woman, living all alone, in a house fenced in by gigantic rocks, with no other sound in her ears from morning till night but the roar of thunder or the clang of machinery, had need, for her personal com-, fort, to have either a most romantic imagination, so that she may console herself with feeling like an