Page:The Romance of Isabel, Lady Burton.djvu/359

Rh the hole representing a window. Every day, on arriving at my ranch, I first looked after the animals and their comforts, for on this all depends; then settled my own, wrote up this journal, saw that the men had all they wanted, dined, and then inspected the place, and read till falling asleep, always rising at 1 or 2 a.m. This evening I took a stroll down the partially dried-up bed of the river by twilight, and met herds of cattle being driven home. The picture would have made a good Turner. On my return Chico brought me a caxassi bath; this is, literally, a grog of native rum and hot water, without sugar, which gives a refreshing sleep. In these countries there is a minute tick, which covers you by millions, burrowing into your flesh; you cannot extract it, and it maddens you. At night you derive an inexpressible relief from having the grog bath.

Next morning we rose at 2.20, but did not get off till 4 a.m. It was pitch dark, raining, with high wind, and altogether a decidedly suicidal kind of morning. Instead of going down the bed of the river, we struck away to the right (N.W.), on a new road to any I had been formerly. We groped our way through rain and biting wind. At 7 a.m. we took a last view of the cross of Morro Velho from a height forty-six miles off, having passed through Cachoeira do Campo, a long, straggling village which climbed a hill and possessed a church and one or two respectable houses. It should be remarked that in Minas Geraes there are a great number of large black crosses, with all the instruments of the Passion, erected either before