Page:Our Neighbor-Mexico.djvu/348

336 Rain had fallen in the night, and clouds, as the morning broke, appeared, hugging the bases of the hills. They almost swept down on us with their wet wings. Had they been in action they would have done so. Low to us, they were high in the heavens, being two miles above Vera Cruz or London, a high point for raining clouds to hang.

They do not hide the landscape, which lies wide, and level, and rich, and cultivated, a grand plain, like so many of Mexico. Soldiers pass us, dressed in the white costume of the country; artillery-men follow, five cannon, drawn each by ten mules, and their attendant caissons; cavalry and commandery—quite a detachment of an army. Their faces and shoulders are wrapped in their bright zerapes, not so soldier-like as comfortable. Following them are a score and more of heavily laden wagons, each drawn by a like number of mules, and each having a goodly company of men, women, and babies on the top of the baggage, one woman sitting on the beam (I know not its farmer name) that passes from the wagon to the oxen's yoke, as I have seen many a farmer at home ride, but never before, his spouse.

Following these are the other mule wagons of ordinary luggage, a baggage-wagon like that of the States, except that this is half as long and well-nigh twice as high. Perched up on tall wheels, and its maguey-cloth roof, covering wide flaunting bows, it seems a monstrous affair, till you get close to it, when you find all this enormous height and swell is only two wheels long—half the length you