The War Trail | Page 2

them.
Land of Anahuac! thou recallest other scenes, far different from these-- scenes of tender love or stormy passion. The strife is o'er--the war-drum has ceased to beat, and the bugle to bray; the steed stands chafing in his stall, and the conqueror dallies in the halls of the conquered. Love is now the victor, and the stern soldier, himself subdued, is transformed into a suing lover. In gilded hall or garden bower, behold him on bended knee, whispering his soft tale in the ear of some dark-eyed dongella, Andalusian or Aztec!
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Lovely land! In truth have I sweet memories of thee; for who could traverse thy fields without beholding some fair flower, ever after to be borne upon his bosom! And yet, not all my souvenirs are glad. Pleasant and painful, sweet and sad, they thrill my heart with alternate throes. But the sad emotions have been tempered by time, and the glad ones, at each returning tide, seem tinged with brighter glow. In thy bowers, as elsewhere, roses must be plucked from thorns; but in memory's mellowed light I see not the thorns--I behold only the bright and beautiful roses.
CHAPTER TWO.
A MEXICAN FRONTIER VILLAGE.
A Mexican pueblita on the banks of the Rio Bravo del Norte--a mere rancheria, or hamlet. The quaint old church of Morisco-Italian style, with its cupola of motley japan, the residence of the cura, and the house of the alcalde, are the only stone structures in the place. These constitute three sides of the piazza, a somewhat spacious square. The remaining side is taken up with shops or dwellings of the common people. They are built of large unburnt bricks (adobes), some of them washed with lime, others gaudily coloured like the proscenium of a theatre, but most of them uniform in their muddy and forbidding brown. All have heavy jail-like doors, and windows without glass or sash. The reja of iron bars, set vertically, opposes the burglar, not the weather.
From the four corners of the piazza, narrow, unpaved, dusty lanes lead off to the country, for some distance bordered on both sides by the adobe houses. Still farther out, on the skirts of the village, and sparsely placed, are dwellings of frailer build, but more picturesque appearance; they are ridge-roofed structures, of the split trunks of that gigantic lily, the arborescent yucca. Its branches form the rafters, its tough fibrous leaves the thatch. In these ranchitos dwell the poor peons, the descendants of the conquered race.
The stone dwellings, and those of mud likewise, are flat-roofed, tiled or cemented--sometimes tastefully japanned--with a parapet breast-high running round the edge. This flat roof is the azotea, characteristic of Mexican architecture.
When the sun is low and the evening cool, the azotea is a pleasant lounging-place, especially when the proprietor of the house has a taste for flowers; then it is converted into an aerial garden, and displays the rich flora for which the picture-land of Mexico is justly celebrated. It is just the place to enjoy a cigar, a glass of pinole, or, if you prefer it, Catalan. The smoke is wafted away, and the open air gives a relish to the beverage. Besides, your eye is feasted; you enjoy the privacy of a drawing-room, while you command what is passing in the street. The slight parapet gives security, while hindering a too free view from below; you see, without being seen. The world moves on, busied with earthly affairs, and does not think of looking up.
I stand upon such an azotea: it is that over the house of the alcalde; and his being the tallest roof in the village, I command a view of all the others. I can see beyond them all, and note the prominent features of the surrounding country. My eye wanders with delight over the deep rich verdure of its tropic vegetation; I can even distinguish its more characteristic forms--the cactus, the yucca, and the agave. I observe that the village is girdled by a belt of open ground--cultivated fields--where the maize waves its silken tassels in the breeze, contrasting with the darker leaves of the capsicums and bean-plants (frijoles). This open ground is of limited extent. The chapparal, with its thorny thicket of acacias, mimosae, ingas, and robinias--a perfect maze of leguminous trees--hems it in; and so near is the verge of this jungle, that I can distinguish its undergrowth of stemless sabal palms and bromelias--the sun-scorched and scarlet leaves of the pita plant shining in the distance like lists of fire.
This propinquity of the forest to the little pueblita bespeaks the indolence of the inhabitants; perhaps not. It must be remembered that these people are not agriculturists, but vaqueros (herdsmen); and that the glades and openings of that thick chapparal are speckled with herds of fierce Spanish cattle, and droves of small sharp-eared