Page:Our Sister Republic - Mexico.djvu/503

Rh bales of goat skins, salt fish, boxes and strings of dried sausages, rolls of "tamals" turkeys in groups all around the decks tied by the legs, parrots of every hue and size all talking and scolding at once, crates of small, long-legged ducks of a peculiar kind such as I have never seen outside of Mexico, sweet potatoes, garden vegetables of almost every variety, and fruits of which I can give no description; oranges, lemons, limes, wooden-ware, and a variety of utterly indescribable manufactured articles of the country. The passengers were required to handle their own baggage, and owners of freight had to do the same.

All the passengers, crew, and outsiders were talking at once, though in the best of humor, and altogether, they made more noise than would have been kicked up in New York over the arrival of a Spanish fleet of war steamers, charged with the trifling task of bombarding all the forts and capturing all the fleets and sea-ports of the United States. But I must say in justice to them all, that no such scenes of ruffianism and rowdyism as we are accustomed to witness in New York, on the arrival of even a ferry-boat, took place, or ever take place here.

My stay in Vera Cruz was prolonged far beyond the limit we had fixed when leaving Puebla. At that time, we intended to leave for Havana, by the British steamer Tyne, on the 1st of January; but Mr. Seward having changed his mind, and determined to wait for the American steamer Cleopatra, ten days later, and a heavy norther delaying that steamer a day or two longer, I had considerable time to kill—as it turned out, time and the malarious atmosphere of the Gulf Coast got the best of it, and came very near killing me.