Lippincotts Magazine, February 1873 | Page 8

as they rose from the water like Tritons, and, throwing their treasures down in a heap, bounded forward to give their visitors the conventional signals of friendship. A rapid bargain was concluded, in which the sylvan booty of the wild men (not forgetting the prudent exaction of their weapons) was entirely made over to the custody of the explorers in exchange for a few Birmingham knives worth fourpence each.
However curious and amicable might be their new relations with the savages, the party were desirous to put an end to them as soon as possible. Pepe Garcia announced that the pale chiefs, wishing to resume their march, were about to separate from them. This decision appeared to be unpleasant or distressful in their estimation, and they tried to reverse it by all sorts of arguments. No answer being volunteered, they shouted to their women to await them, and betook themselves to walking with the party. One of the three ambassadors, a graceful rogue of twenty-five, marked all over with rocoa and lote, so as to earn for himself the nickname of "the Panther," gamboled and caracoled in front of the procession as if to give it an entertainment. His two comrades had garroted with their arms the neck of the chief interpreter: another held Juan of Aragon by the skirt of his blouse, and regulated his steps by those of the youth. This accord of barbarism and civilization had in it something decidedly graceful, and rather pathetic: if ever the language natural to man was found, the medium in circulation before our sickly machinery of speech came to be invented, it was in this concert of persuasive action and tender cooing notes. The main body of the Siriniris marched pellmell along with the porters, whom this vicinage made exceedingly uncomfortable, and who were perspiring in great drops.
At the commencement of a wood the whites embraced the occasion to take formal leave of their new acquaintances. As they endeavored to turn their backs upon them they were at once surrounded by the whole band, crying and gesticulating, and opposing their departure with a sort of determined playfulness.
At the same time a word often repeated, the word _Huatinmio_, began to enter largely into their conversation, and piqued the curiosity of the historiographer. Marcoy begged the interpreter to procure him the explanation of this perpetual shibboleth. Half by signs, half in the polyglot jargon which he had been employing with the Siriniris, Garcia managed to understand that the word in question was the name of their village, situated at a small distance and in a direction which they indicated. In this retreat, they said, no inhabitants remained but women, children and old men, the rest of the braves being absent on a chase. They proposed a visit to their capital, where the strangers, they said, honored and cherished by the tribe, might pass many enviable days.
The proposed excursion, which would cause a loss of considerable time and a deflection from the intended route, was declined in courteous terms by Marcoy through the interpretation of Pepe Garcia. Among civilized folk this urbane refusal would have sufficed, but the savages, taking such a reply as a challenge to verbal warfare, returned to the charge with increased tenacity. It were hard to say what natural logic they put in practice or what sylvan persuasions they wrought by, but their peculiar mode of stroking the white men's backs with their hands, and the softer and still softer inflections which they introduced into their voices, would have melted hearts of marble. In brief, the civilized portion adopted the more weakly part and allowed themselves to be led by the savage portion.
The colonel and Pepe Garcia were still more easily persuaded than Mr. Marcoy, and only awaited his adhesion. When it was finally announced the Siriniris renewed their gambols and uttered shouts of delight. They then took the head of the excursion. A singularity in their guides, which quickly attracted the notice of the explorers, was the perfect indifference with which they took either the clearings or the thickets in their path. Where the strangers were afraid of tearing their garments, these unprotected savages had no care whatever for their skins. It is true that their ingenuity in gliding through the labyrinth resembled magic. However the forest might bristle with undergrowth, they never thought of breaking down obstacles or of cutting them, as the equally practiced Bolivians did, with a knife. They contented themselves with putting aside with one hand the tufts of foliage as if they had been curtains or draperies, and that with an easy decision of gesture and an elegance of attitude which are hardly found outside of certain natural tribes.
The city of Huatinmio proved to be a group of seven large sheds perched among plaintains and