Through Five Republics on Horseback Part 17

CHAPTER XIII.

SKETCHES OF A HORSEBACK RIDE THROUGH THE REPUBLIC.

I CROSS THE SILVER RIVER.

I left Buenos Ayres for Uruguay in an Italian _polacca_. We weighed anchor one Sunday afternoon, and as the breeze was favorable, the white sails, held up by strong ropes of rawhide, soon wafted us away from the land. We sailed through a fleet of ships from all parts of the world, anch.o.r.ed in the stream, discharging and loading cargoes. There, just arrived, was an Italian emigrant ship with a thousand people on board, who had come to start life afresh. There was the large British steamer, with her clattering windla.s.s, hoisting on board live bullocks from barges moored alongside. The animals are raised up by means of a strong rope tied around their horns, and as the ship rocks on the swell they dangle in mid-air. When a favorable moment arrives they are quickly dropped on to the deck, completely stupefied by their aerial flight.

As darkness fell, the wind dropped, and we lay rocking on the bosom of the river, with only the twinkling lights of the Argentine coast to remind us of the solid world. The sh.o.r.eless river was, however, populous with craft of all rigs, for this is the highway to the great interior, and some of them were bound to Cuyaba, 2,600 miles in the heart of the continent. During the night a ship on fire in the offing lit up with great vividness the silent waste of waters, and as the flames leaped up the rigging, the sight was very grand. Owing to calms and light winds, our pa.s.sage was a slow one, and I was not sorry when at last I could say good-bye to the Italians and their oily food. Three nights and two days is a long time to spend in crossing a river.

MONTEVIDEO.

Montevideo, the capital of Uruguay, is "one of the handsomest cities in all America, north or south." Its population is over 350,000. It is one of the cleanest and best laid-out cities on the continent; it has broad, airy streets and a general look of prosperity. What impresses the newcomer most is the military display everywhere seen. Sentry boxes, in front of which dark-skinned soldiers strut, seem to be at almost every corner. Although Uruguay has a standing army of under 3,500 men, yet gold-braided officers are to be met with on every street. There are twenty-one generals on active service, and many more living on pension. More important personages than these men a.s.sume to be could not be met with in any part of the world.

The armies of most of these republics are divided into sections bearing such blasphemous t.i.tles as "Division of the Son of G.o.d," "Division of the Good Shepherd," "Division of the Holy Lancers of Death" and "Soldiers of the Blessed Heart of Mary." These are often placed under the sceptre of the Sacred Heart of Jesus as the national emblem.

Boys of seven and old men of seventy stand on the sidewalks selling lottery tickets; and the priest, with black beaver hat, the brim of which has a diameter of two feet, is always to be seen. One of these priests met a late devotee, but now a follower of Christ through missionary effort, and said: "Good morning, _Daughter of the Evil One_!" "Good morning, _Father_," she replied.

The cemetery is one of the finest on the continent, and is well worth a visit. Very few of Montevideo's dead are _buried_. The coffins of the rich are zinc-lined, and provided with a gla.s.s in the lid. All caskets are placed in niches in the high wall which surrounds the cemetery.

These mural niches are six or eight feet deep in the wall, and each one has a marble tablet for the name of the deposited one. By means of a large portable ladder and elevator combined, the coffins are raised from the ground. At anniversaries of the death the tomb is filled with flowers, and candles are lit inside, while a wreath is hung on the door. A favorite custom is to attend ma.s.s on Sunday morning, then visit the cemetery, and spend the afternoon at the bull-fights.

NATIVE HOUSES AND HABITS.

Uruguay is essentially a pastoral country, and the finest animals of South America are there raised. It is said that "Uruguay's pasture lands could feed all the cattle of the world, and sheep grow fat at 50 to the acre." In 1889, when I first went there, there were thirty-two millions of horned cattle grazing on a thousand hills. Liebig's famous establishments at Fray Bentos, two hundred miles north of Montevideo, employs six hundred men, and kills one thousand bullocks a day.

Uruguay has some good roads, and the land is wire-fenced in all directions. The rivers are crossed on large flat-bottomed boats called _balsas_. These are warped across by a chain, and carry as many as ten men and horses in one trip. The roads are in many places thickly strewn with bones of dead animals, dropped by the way, and these are picked clean by the vultures. No sooner does an animal lie down to die than, streaming out of the infinite s.p.a.ce, which a moment before has been a lifeless world of blue ether, there come lines of vultures, and soon white bones are all that are left.

On the fence-posts one sees many nests of the _casera_ (housebuilder) bird, made of mud. These have a dome-shaped roof, and are divided by a part.i.tion inside into chamber and ante-chamber. By the roadside are hovels of the natives not a twentieth part so well-built or rain-tight.

Fleas are so numerous in these huts that sometimes, after spending a night in one, it would have been impossible to place a five-cent piece on any part of my body that had not been bitten by them. Scorpions come out of the wood they burn on the earthen floor, and monster c.o.c.kroaches nibble your toes at night. The thick, hot gra.s.s roofs of the ranches harbor centipedes, which drop on your face as you sleep, and bite alarmingly. These many-legged creatures grow to the length of eight or nine inches, and run to and fro with great speed. Well might the little girl, on seeing a centipede for the first time, ask: "What is that queer-looking thing, with about a million legs?" Johnny wisely replied: "That's a millennium. It's something like a centennial, only its has more legs."

After vain attempts to sleep, you rise, and may see the good wife cleaning her only plate for you by rubbing it on her greasy hair and wiping it with the bottom of her chemise. Ugh! Proceeding on the journey, it is a common sight to see three or four little birds sitting on the backs of the horned cattle getting their breakfast, which I hope they relish better than I often did.

A WAKE, AND HOW TO GET TO HEAVEN.

During my journey I was asked: Would I like to go to the wake held that night at the next house, three miles away? After supper, horses were saddled up and away we galloped. Quite a number had already gathered there. We found the dead man lying on a couple of sheepskins, in the centre of a mud-walled and mud-floored room. "No useless coffin enclosed his breast," nor was he wound in either sheet or shroud. There he lay, fully attired, even to his shoes. Four tallow candles lighted up the gloom, and these were placed at his head and feet. His clammy hands were reverently folded over his breast, whilst entwined in his fingers was a bronze cross and rosary, that St. Peter, seeing his devotion, might, without questioning, admit him to a better world. The scene was weird beyond description. Outside, the wind moaned a sad dirge; great bats and black moths, the size of birds, flitted about in the midnight darkness. These, ever and anon, made their way inside and extinguished the candles, which flickered and dripped as they fitfully shone on the shrunken features of the corpse. He had been a reprobate and an a.s.sa.s.sin, but, luckily for him, a pious woman, not wishing to see him die "in his sins," had sprinkled _Holy Water_ on him. The said "Elixir of Life" had been brought eighty miles, and was kept in her house to use only in extreme cases. The poor woman had paid the price of a cow for the bottle of water, but the priest had declared that it was an effectual soul-saver, and they never doubted its efficacy.

Around the corpse was a throng of women, and they all chattered as women are apt to do. The men, standing around the door, talked of their horse-races, fights or anything else. For some hours I heard no allusion to the dead, but as the night wore on the prophetess of the people came forth.

If my advent among them had caused a stir, the entrance of this old woman caused a bustle; even the dead man seemed to salute her, or was it only my imagination--for I was in a strangely sensitive mood--that pictured it? As she slowly approached, leaning heavily on a rough, thick staff, all the females present bent their knees. Now prayers were going to be offered up for the dead, and the visible woman was to act as interceder with the invisible one in heaven. After being a.s.sisted to her knees, the old woman, in a cracked, yet loud, voice, began. "_Santa Maria, ruega por nosotros, ahora, y en la hora de nuestra muerte!_"

(Holy Mary pray for us now, and in the hour of our death!) This was responded to with many gesticulations and making of crosses by the numerous females around her. The prayers were many and long, and must have lasted perhaps an hour; then all arose, and mate and cigars were served. Men and women, even boys and girls, smoked the whole night through, until around the Departed was nothing but bluish clouds.

The natives are so fond of wakes that when deaths do not occur with great frequency, the bones of "grandma" are dug up, and she is prayed and smoked over once more. The digging up of the dead is often a simple matter, for the corpse is frequently just carried into the bush, and there covered with p.r.i.c.kly branches.

THE SNAKE'S HISTORY.

I met with a snake, of a whitish color, that appeared to have two heads. Never being able to closely examine this strange reptile, I cannot positively affirm that it possesses the two heads, but the natives repeatedly affirmed to me that it does, and certainly both ends are, or seem to be, exactly alike. In the Book of Genesis the serpent is described as "a beast," but for its temptation of Eve it was condemned to crawl on its belly and become a reptile. A strange belief obtains among the people that all serpents must not only be killed, but _put into a fire_. If there is none lit, they will kindle one on purpose, for it must be burned. As the outer skin comes off, it is declared, the four legs, now under it, can be distinctly seen.

A GIRL'S NEW BIRTH AND TRANSLATION.

At Rincon I held a series of meetings in a mud hut. Men and women, with numerous children, used to gather on horseback an hour before the time for opening. A little girl always brought her three-legged stool and squatted in front of me. The rest appropriated tree-trunks and bullocks' skulls. The girl referred to listened to the Gospel story as though her life depended upon it, as indeed it did! When at Rincon only a short time, the child desired me to teach her how to pray, and she clasped her hands reverently. "Would Jesus save _me_?" she asked. "Did He die for me--_me_? Will He save me now?" The girl _believed_, and entered at once into the family of G.o.d.

One day a man on horseback, tears streaming down his cheeks, galloped up to my hut. It was her father. His girl was dead. She had gone into the forest, and, feeling hungry, had eaten some berries; they were poisonous, and she had come home to die. Would I bury her? Shortly afterwards I rode over to the hovel where she had lived. Awaiting me were the broken-hearted parents. A grocery box had been secured, and this rude coffin was covered with pink cotton. Four horses were yoked in a two-wheeled cart, the parents sat on the casket, and I followed on horseback to the nearest cemetery, sixteen miles away. There, in a little enclosure, we lowered the girl into her last earthly resting-place, in the sure and certain hope of a glorious resurrection.

She had lived in a house where a cow's hide served for a door, but she had now entered the "pearly gates." The floor of her late home was mother earth; what a change to be walking the "streets of gold!" Some day, "after life's fitful fever," I shall meet her again, not a poor, ragged half-breed girl, but glorified, and clothed in His righteousness.

HOW I DID NOT LOSE MY EYES.

One day I was crossing a river, kneeling on my horse's back, when he gave a lurch and threw me into the water. Gaining the bank, and being quite alone, I stripped off my wet clothes and waited for the sun to dry them. The day was hot and sultry, and, feeling tired, I covered myself up with the long gra.s.s and went to sleep. How long I lay I cannot tell, but suddenly waking up, I found to my alarm that several large vultures, having thought me dead, were contemplating me as their next meal! Had my sleep continued a few moments longer, the rapacious birds would have picked my eyes out, as they invariably do before tearing up their victim. All over the country these birds abound, and I have counted thirty and forty tearing up a living, quivering animal.

Sometimes, for mercy's sake, I have alighted and put the suffering beast out of further pain. Before I got away they have been fighting over it again in their haste to suck the heart's blood.

A BACHELOR RABBIT.

The pest of Australia is the rabbit, but, strange to say, I never found one in South America. In their place is the equally destructive _viscacha_ or prairie dog--a much larger animal, probably three or four times the size, having very low, broad head, little ears, and thick, bristling whiskers. His coat is gray and white, with a mixture of black. To all appearance this is a ferocious beast, with his two front tusk-like teeth, about four inches long, but he is perfectly harmless.

The viscacha makes his home, like the rabbit, by burrowing in the ground, where he remains during daylight. The faculty of acquisition in these animals must be large, for in their nightly trips they gather and bring to the mouth of their burrow anything and everything they can possibly move. Bones, manure, stones and feathers are here collected, and if the traveller accidentally dropped his watch, knife or handkerchief, it would be found and carried to adorn the viscacha's doorway, if those animals were anywhere near.

The lady reader will be shocked to learn that the head of the viscacha family, probably copying a bad example from the ostrich, his neighbor, is also very unamiable with his "better half," and inhabits bachelor's quarters, which he keeps all to himself, away from his family. The food of this strange dog-rabbit is roots, and his powerful teeth are well fitted to root them up. At the mouth of their burrows may often be seen little owls, which have ejected the original owners and themselves taken possession. They have a strikingly saucy look, and possess the advantage of being able to turn their heads right around while the body remains immovable. Being of an inquisitive nature, they stare at every pa.s.ser-by, and if the traveller quietly walks around them he will smile at the grotesque power they have of turning their head. When a young horse is especially slow in learning the use of the reins, I have known the cowboy smear the bridle with the brains of this clever bird, that the owl's facility in turning might thus be imparted to it.

Another peculiar animal is the _comadreka_, which resembles the kangaroo in that it is provided with a bag or pouch in which to carry its young ones. I have surprised these little animals (for they are only of rabbit size) with their young playing around them, and have seen the mother gather them into her pouch and scamper away.

DRINKING WATER, SAINTS AND THE VIRGIN.

In Uruguay it is the custom for all, on approaching a house, to call out, "Holy Mary the Pure!" and until the inmate answers: "Conceived without sin!" not a step farther must be made by the visitor. At a hut where I called there was a baby hanging from the wattle roof in a cow's hide, and flies covered the little one's eyes. On going to the well for a drink I saw that there was a cat and a rat in the water, but the people were drinking it! When smallpox breaks out because of such unsanitary conditions, I have known them to carry around the image of St. Sebastian, that its divine presence might chase away the sickness.

The dress of the Virgin is often borrowed from the church, and worn by the women, that they may profit by its healing virtues. A crucifix hung in the house keeps away evil spirits.

The people were very _religious_, and no rain having fallen for five months, had concluded to carry around a large image of the Virgin they had, and show her the dry crops. I rode on, but did not get wet!

NO NEED OF THE DOCTOR OR VET.

"A poor girl got very severely burnt, and the remedy applied was a poultice of mashed ears of _viscacha_. The burn did not heal, and so a poultice of pig's dung was put on. When we went to visit the girl, the people said it was because they had come to our meetings that the girl did not get better. A liberal cleansing, followed by the use of boracic acid, has healed the wound. Another case came under our notice of a woman who suffered from a gathering in the ear, and the remedy applied was a negro's curl fried in fat."

To cure animals of disease there are many ways. Mrs. Nieve boasted that, by just saying a few cabalistic words over a sick cow, she could heal it. A charm put on the top of the enclosure where the animals are herded will keep away sickness. To cure a bucking horse all that is necessary is to pull out its eyebrows and spit in its face. Let a lame horse step on a sheepskin, cut out the piece, and carry it in your pocket; if this can't be done, make a cross with tufts of gra.s.s, and the leg will heal. For ordinary sickness tie a dog's head around the horse's neck. If a horse has pains in the stomach, let him smell your shirt.

A RACE FOR INFORMATION.

Uruguay is said to have averaged a revolution every two years for nearly a century, so in times of revolutionary disturbance the younger children are often set to watch the roads and give timely warning, that the father or elder brother may effect an escape. The said persons may then mount their fleetest horse and be out of sight ere the recruiting sergeant arrives. Being one day perplexed, and in doubt whether I was on my right road, I made towards a boy I had descried some distance away, to ask him. No sooner did the youth catch sight of me than he set off at a long gallop away from me; why, I could not tell, as they are generally so interested at the sight of a stranger. Determined not to be outdone, and feeling sure that without directions I could not safely continue the journey, I put spurs to my horse and tried to overtake him. As I quickened my pace he looked back, and, seeing me gain upon him, urged his horse to its utmost speed. Down hill and up hill, through gra.s.s and mud and water, the race continued. A sheepskin fell from his saddle, but he heeded it not as he went plunging forward.

Human beings in those lat.i.tudes were very few, and if I did not catch him I might be totally lost for days; so I went clattering on over his sheepskin, and then over his wooden saddle, the fall of which only made his horse give a fresh plunge forward as he lay on its neck. Thus we raced for at least three miles, until, tired out and breathless, I gave up in despair.

Concluding that my fleet-footed but unamiable young friend had undoubtedly some place in view, I continued in the same direction, but at a more respectable pace. Shortly afterwards I arrived at a very small hut, built of woven gra.s.s and reeds, which I presumed was his home. Making for the open door, I clapped my hands, but received no answer. The hut was certainly inhabited--of that I saw abundant signs--but where were the people? I dare not get down from my horse; that is an insult no native would forgive; so I slowly walked around the house, clapping my hands and shouting at the top of my voice. Just as I was making the circuit for the third time, I descried another and a larger house, hidden in the trees some distance away, and thither I forthwith bent my steps. There I learned that I had been taken for a recruiting sergeant, and the inhabitants had hidden themselves when the boy galloped up with the message of my approach.

I FIND DIAMONDS.

"For one shall grasp and one resign.

One drink life's rue, and one its wine; And G.o.d shall make the balance good."

Encamped on the banks of the Black River, idly turning up the soil with the stock of my riding-whip, I was startled to find what I believed to be real diamonds! Beautifully white, transparent stones they were, and, rising to examine them closely in the sunlight, I was more than ever convinced of the richness of my find. Was it possible that I had unwittingly discovered a diamond field? Could it be true that, after years of hardship, I had found a fortune? I was a rich man--oh, the enchanting thought! No need now to toil through scorching suns. I could live at ease. As I sat with the stones glistening in the light before my eyes, my brain grew fevered. Leaving my hat and coat on the ground, I ran towards my horse, and, vaulting on his bare back, wildly galloped to and fro, that the breezes might cool my fevered head. Rich? Oh, how I had worked and striven! Life had hitherto been a hard fight. When I had gathered together a few dollars, I had been prostrated with malarial or some other fever, and they had flown. After two or three months of enforced idleness I had had to start the battle of life afresh with diminished funds. Now the past was dead; I could rest from strife. Rest! How sweet it sounded as I repeated aloud the precious word, and the distant echoes brought back the word, Rest!

I was awakened from my day dreams by being thrown from my horse! Hope for the future had so taken possession of me that the present was forgotten. I had not seen the caves of the prairie dog, but my horse had given a sudden start aside to avoid them, and I found myself licking the dust. Bather a humiliating position for a man to be in who had just found unlimited wealth; Somewhat subdued, I made my way back to my solitary encampment.