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To Brace's satisfaction, his brother seemed all the better for the little exertion he had gone through, and when the boats were once more sought and the fire extinguished to save them from drawing upon themselves the attentions of any Indians who might be near, Sir Humphrey was one of the first to fall asleep under the tent-like sail, the boats swinging gently in the darkness at the end of the rope secured to a huge overhanging bough.
The tent-like tumulus, say they, was but the mere rude mound of earth heaped over the dead in an uncultured age; and the mound would be made higher and larger according to the dignity of the deceased; and the podium or row of stones around its foot was simply the retaining wall necessary to give it stability and shape.
The Comtes of Auvergne and Lauraguais were also made a part of the dowry, and Pope Clement added one hundred thousand ducats in jewels, precious stones, and other wedding gifts; to which Alessandro likewise contributed his share. He had already arrived at Livorno in one of his galleys, which was lined with crimson satin fringed with gold, and covered with a tent-like awning in cloth of gold.
Many of the big trees, of different kinds, were buttressed at the base with great thin walls of wood. Others, including both palms and ordinary trees, showed an even stranger peculiarity. The trunk, near the base, but sometimes six or eight feet from the ground, was split into a dozen or twenty branches or small trunks which sloped outward in tent-like shape, each becoming a root.
Instead of a fine city of stone and mortar, he found scattered Indian villages with mere tent-like houses formed by fastening grass or straw or buffalo skins to poles. The people were the poorest and most barbarous which he had met. Coronado was, however, fortunate in securing a supply of corn and buffalo meat in Quivira for his long return journey.
But they had to think of other things soon after, for there had been a fierce encounter at daybreak that morning, some miles from the city, for what reason the party did not know; but its results were the bringing of about a dozen wounded men on horse, donkey, and camel, to be carried into the tent-like booth in the grounds, where of late the Hakim had attended to his patients, and he and his assistants were as hard at work as they could be for hours.
He invariably slept on the floor, converting his room, indeed, into the general semblance of a tent, by divesting it of all the appliances dear to a Christian gentleman, and one who loves to repose as such. Yet there was comparative freshness in that tent-like apartment, as I entered it that night, shutting the door of mine after me, to prevent ailantus and upas-antiar from following in my wake.
For a time, as he listened to the movements below-stairs, the sound of voices still rose, drowsy as the hour waxed late; the light that flickered through the cracks in the puncheon flooring gradually dulled, and presently a harsh grating noise acquainted him with the fact that Sudley was shovelling the ashes over the embers; then the tent-like attic was illumined only by the moonlight admitted through the little square window at the gable end so silent, so still, it seemed that it too slept like the silent house.
From this we emerge into Rainy Chamber, an elliptical room not less than two hundred feet long by one hundred feet wide, with a tent-like ceiling rising high in the center and sloping down to meet the floor, which also slopes irregularly toward a deep central depression, giving the room a greater height than any other visited.
He set off then walking up and down the tent-like room they were in, wiping the great drops of dew from his forehead openly as he passed his two friends; but the moment his back was to them the handkerchief glided to his eyes, where other salt drops kept on gathering, to be swept carefully away each time before he turned.