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Updated: May 26, 2025
Next came a gouty old man in a horse-litter, like a prisoner in the hands of a convoy of officers of justice. A body of horsemen followed, and in the rear toiled onward a long file of baggage-mules. As the train advanced into the more settled regions of the country it became evident that the personage thus convoyed was not a prisoner, but a person of the highest consequence.
We did not, however, approve of this arrangement, so the horses were saddled, and, leaving word that the baggage-mules were to follow on as soon as possible, we mounted, and set off for the 'Volcano House. We had not gone far before we were again overtaken by a shower, which once more drenched us to the skin. The scene was certainly one of extreme beauty.
She was then sitting up, apparently as well as ever, and seemed to look upon the recent event as a very light matter. Directly we had finished our meal about three o'clock the guide came and tried to persuade us that, as the baggage-mules had not yet arrived, it would be too late for us to go on to-day, and that we had better spend the night where we were, and start early in the morning.
He could not allow them to continue on their way to California, of course, which they most certainly would never have reached, but he inflicted no greater punishment than ordering them to mount the baggage-mules and return with us. We did not entirely rely on Barney's report that the Indians had left the neighbourhood, though it perhaps made us less cautious than we would otherwise have been.
It was a wild, rugged glen, high up on one side of which the narrow pathway wound in some places rounding a cliff or projecting boulder, which rendered the passage of the baggage-mules extremely difficult.
"Only that we are now approaching one of the dangerous passes of the mountains, where baggage-mules sometimes touch the cliffs with their packs, and so get tilted over the precipices. But our mules are quiet, and with ordinary care we have nothing to fear." The gorge in the mountains, which the travellers soon afterwards entered, fully justified the guide's expression "dangerous."
It was inhabited by Druses, but no men were to be seen, except a few poor husbandmen, ploughing on the mountain-sides. The women, wearing those enormous horns on their heads which distinguish them from the Mohammedan females, were washing at a pool below. We crossed the valley, and slowly ascended the height on the opposite side, taking care to keep with the baggage-mules.
They had reached the higher altitudes of the mountains when we again introduce them to the reader, and were urging their mules forward, in order to reach a somewhat noted pass, before the breaking out of a storm which the arriero knew, from certain indications in the sky, was rapidly approaching. The party consisted of four Will, Larry, Bunco, and the arriero with three baggage-mules.
While the muleteers walked all the way from Tetuan, driving the baggage-mules and urging on our own, S`lam by arrangement rode on the top of a light load; and there he sat, huddled up on the mule, wet and discontented, dawdling behind, last of all, in the cavalcade, and anything but living up to his character of soldier-servant and escort.
It was, of course, important to recover the horses and baggage-mules, and Maysotta proposed that she should conduct us to the edge of the forest, where we could remain while she, with Keokuk, searched for the animals, expressing, at the same time, her confidence of success. Having placed Clarice on my horse, I led the animal by the rein till we reached the spot proposed.
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