Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: June 15, 2025
Then, while the boy sat at the tiller, Sparicio lighted his tiny charcoal furnace below, and prepared a simple meal, delicious yellow macaroni, flavored with goats' cheese; some fried fish, that smelled appetizingly; and rich black coffee, of Oriental fragrance and thickness. Julien ate a little, and lay down to sleep again.
Persistently and furiously, at half-past two o'clock of an August morning, Sparicio rang Dr. La Brierre's night-bell. He had fifty dollars in his pocket, and a letter to deliver. He was to earn another fifty dollars deposited in Feliu's hands, by bringing the Doctor to Viosca's Point. He had risked his life for that money, and was terribly in earnest.
Julien ate less sparingly at this second meal; and smoked a long time on deck with Sparicio, who suddenly became very good-humored, and chatted volubly in bad Spanish, and in much worse English. Then while the boy took a few hours' sleep, the Doctor helped delightedly in maneuvering the little vessel.
Julien descended in his under-clothing, and opened the letter by the light of the hall lamp. It enclosed a check for a larger fee than he had ever before received, and contained an urgent request that he would at once accompany Sparicio to Viosca's Point, as the sender was in hourly danger of death. The letter, penned in a long, quavering hand, was signed, "Henry Edwards."
Mosquitoes bit savagely; and the heat became thicker; and there was yet no wind. Sparicio and his hired boy Carmelo had been walking backward and forward for hours overhead, urging the vessel yard by yard, with long poles, through the slime of canals and bayous. With every heavy push, the weary boy would sigh out, "Santo Antonio! Santo Antonio!"
Julien knew it; he only nodded his head in reply, and looked the other way, into the glory of God. Then, wishing to divert the fisherman's attention to another theme, he asked what was Carmelo singing. Sparicio at once shouted to the lad: "Ha! ... ho! Carmelo! Santu diavulu! ... Sing-a loud-a! Doct-a lik-a! Sing-a! sing!" .... "He sing-a nicee," added the boatman, with his peculiar dark smile.
... "Scuza, Doct-a! look-a out!" Julien bent down, as the big boom, loosened, swung over his head. The San Marco was rounding into shore, heading for her home. Sparicio lifted a huge conch-shell from the deck, put it to his lips, filled his deep lungs, and flung out into the night thrice a profound, mellifluent, booming horn-tone. A minute passed.
Then the vast sweetness of that violet night entered into his blood, filled him with that awful joy, so near akin to sadness, which the sense of the Infinite brings, when one feels the poetry of the Most Ancient and Most Excellent of Poets, and then is smitten at once with the contrast-thought of the sickliness and selfishness of Man, of the blindness and brutality of cities, whereinto the divine blue light never purely comes, and the sanctification of the Silences never descends ... furious cities, walled away from heaven ... Oh! if one could only sail on thus always, always through such a night through such a star-sprinkled violet light, and hear Sparicio and Carmelo sing, even though it were the same melody always, always the same song!
Word Of The Day
Others Looking