IX.
NEARING SHORE.
Preparations against a Rancho.—A golden Set.—Bonaventura.—A Rancho: what is it?—Companions.—Aztec or Chinese?—Desolation.—Tropic Thorns and Flowers.—An Oasis.—Hacienda of Solado, and its unexpected Hospitalities.—Freaks of the Spanish Bayonet.—Green velvet Mountains.—The true Protector.
One day's sail from land is not thought much of by the sea-tossed traveler. The stage-tossed may feel equally comforted. Though the stage is to be my companion more days than the one, still this oceanic stretch in its voyaging will come to a prosperous issue, God willing and working, to-morrow at the heat of the day, which is not noon, but three in the afternoon, in this burning sky.
I was warned last night, at my dismal quarters at Ceral, that this night would be far more miserable. So I fortified myself with big gingerbread swine—their ginger-snaps hereabouts take no other shape—with a French roll, a Bologna sausage that has done duty heretofore as a pistol, its tinfoil covering making it look like a shining silvered barrel, and all the more terrible, as it peeped from my breast-pocket, to the non-appearing robbers. So fearful was I that this would protect me, that it was hidden away in my valise, and is now to be agreeably eaten. That is more than turning swords into pruning-hooks, even pistols into meat. For dulces I had oranges, bananas, and pea-nuts. But the pea-nuts are not baked, and the bananas are hard and horrid, so that I have to fall back on the oranges, and sour they are.
The rancho food thus being provided for, the rest of its accompaniments are easily accepted. On a big log, resting on a white
