was a younger man by ten years than our friend, and, boylike, gloried in the opportunity; so we again began to scull along the creek, sheltered by the same umbrageous screen of mangroves, now so luxuriant that it shut out both sun and light as if it had been a continuous artificial arbour. I cannot describe the beauty and coolness of this shade—water clear and pellucid as crystal under foot; a long distinct view through forests of naked mangrove stems on each side, while aloft there was a perfect web of verdure resting on the trelliswork formed by the interlacing of their bows, which spread out in a delicious covering over the whole creek. We dislodged innumerable birds of every variety, from the tall floating ghostlike crane to the chattering paroquet; and more than one owl flitted away from us, and flew up through the branches, until the sun struck him, when, with a flaff and a rustling brush through the topmost leaves, he came down overhead like a shot; until, restored by the green twilight, he would recover himself, and once more sail away along the narrow creek, and disappear round the corner of it ahead of us. In one instance, a boy in the bow struck one down with a boat-hook, so that the bird fell against Lieutenant Sprawl's head as he sat in the stern-sheets of the boat ahead.
"Hillo, Brail, my man," quoth he, "where away—what are you after?"
This narrow canal was absolutely alive with fish—they surrounded us on all sides; and although we could discern some dark suspicious-looking figures at the bottom, which we conjectured to be alligators; still there was no perceptible motion amongst them, and we continued to pull quietly until the head-most boat took the ground for a moment, and the others closed upon her.
"What is that?" sung out old Bloody Politeful.
"Lord only knows," answered the midshipman beside him, as a loud snorting noise, approaching to a roar, a sound that hovered between the blowing of a whale and the bellowing of a bull half choked in a marsh, echoed along the green arch.
"Now, what customer can that be?" quoth your humble servant.
"A hippopotamus," said one of the launch's crew; and before we could hear any thing more, an animal, with a coarse black leather skin, and a most formidable head, about the size of a small Highland cow (it must have been but a young one), floundered down the creek past us, stirring up the mud as thick as tar all round about—but we had other work in hand, so he escaped without a shot. We pulled on, and presently the mangroves settled down right across the narrow creek, twisting their snake-like branches together into an impervious net. Ahead, our course was thus most effectually stopped by this ligneous portcullis, but close to the obstacle a small muddy path branched off to the right, and we determined to follow it.
It appeared a good deal poached, as if from the passing of a number of people recently along it; and we had not proceeded above twenty yards when we came upon a spare studding-sail boom, to which some heavy weight had been attached, for two slings were fastened round it, showing, by the straight and wire-like appearance of the rope, how severe the strain had been; the spar itself was broken in the midst, as if the weight attached to it had been more than it could bear.
"Aha," thought I, "we are getting near the earth of the fox any how—the scent is high."
We carried on. The path became more and more cut up, but no other evidences of our being on the proper trail occurred; and as we could not fall in with a tree tall enough to afford us a glimpse of the lay of the land about us, had we ascended it, we had no alternative but to stand on.
"No chance of doing any good here," grumbled an old quartermaster, close to where I was struggling nearly knee-deep in mud. "We shall catch nothing but fever here."
"Hillo!" said a little middy, as we braced up sharp round a right-angled corner of the pestiferous path—"hillo, the road stops here;" and so it certainly appeared to do about pistol-shot, or nearer, ahead of us, where a mound of fresh cut prickly bushes was heaped up about six feet high right across the path. Whether this was a casual interruption thrown up by the natives, or an impediment cast in our way by our concealed amigos, I could not tell. A loud barking of dogs was now heard ahead of us—presently a halt was called, and the word was passed along to see that the priming of the muskets was dry and sound; and all of us instinctively drew his cutlass a finger's breadth or so from its sheath, to see that it would come readily to one's hand, should need be. The first lieutenant, who, disdaining the common ship cutlass, had buckled on a most enormous Andrea Ferrara with a huge rusty basket-hilt, advanced boldly towards the enclosure, when a smooth-faced, very handsome dark young man suddenly raised his head above the green defence—"Que quieren ustedes, amigos mios?"
"What's that to you?" rejoined Sprawl; "give us a clear road, my darling, or maybe we shall cooper you, after a very comical fashion."
We had scarcely uttered the words when a discharge of grape burst from the green mound, crashing amongst the branches, and sending them down in a shower on our heads; while all the neighbouring trees, like Jacob's wands, became, in the twinkling of an eye, patched with white spots, from the rasping of the shot.
"Forward!" shouted Davie Doublepipe—"follow me, men!" when—rattle—a platoon of musketry was fired at us. The grape had missed, from a wrong elevation of the gun; not so the small arms—one of our party was shot dead and three wounded; but the spring was nevertheless made. We scrambled across the brushwood that had been heaped on the road, and to the top of the stockade, about six feet high, that it masked, and presently found ourselves in the presence of thirty determined fellows, who were working like fiends in the endeavour to slew round seven eighteen-pound carronades, that had been mounted on a stage of loose planks, and pointed towards the river. Apparently they had been unable to accomplish this with more than one, the gun that had just been fired, which in the recoil had slid off the platform, and was now useless, from sinking in the semisolid black soil, two of the others having already, in the attempt to train them round on us, capsized and sunk right out of sight in it. So aid from the cannon they now had none; but never did men show a more daring front—as they stood their ground, exchanging blow for blow most manfully.
The fort, or battery, was a stockaded enclosure, about fifty yards square. Towards the river face, before we attempted to turn it, the guns had been mounted on a stage of loose planks, a most unstable foundation, from resting on running mud. The brushwood between them and the river grew thick and close, and opposite the muzzle of each cannon the leaves were scorched and blackened. The wooden platform extended about twelve feet in breadth landward, but beyond it the whole inside of the fort was soft black mud, through which, on the side farthest from the river, protruded the stumps of the haggled brushwood, where it had been cleared by the hatchet; while branches were thickly strewed on the surface nearer the guns, to afford a footing across it. These branches, however, had been removed for a space of ten feet, at the spot we boarded at, where the slimy ground appeared poached into a soft paste, so that no footing might be afforded to an attacking force.
The desperadoes already mentioned, were all armed with boarding pikes, or cutlasses, while several had large brass bell-mouthed trabucos, or blunderbusses, which threw five or six musket-balls at a discharge. Most of them were naked to their trowsers, and they all wore a blue, yellow, or red sash, drawn tight round the waist, through which several had pistols stuck; while their heads were covered, in general, by a blue or red cloth cap, like a long stocking, to the end of which was fastened a thick silk or woollen tassel, either hanging down the back, or falling over the side of the head. Some wore shirts of a striped woollen stuff, common amongst the Biscayan boatmen. One elderly man, a large athletic Hercules of a fellow, bareheaded, and very bald; with his trowsers rolled up to his knees, displaying his dark brawny legs and naked feet, dressed in one of the aforesaid striped shirts, and wearing a broad-brimmed, narrow conical-crowned hat, with a flaming red riband tied round it close to the spreading brim, stood in advance of the others, with a trabuco in his hand, the piece held in a way that it might be instantly levelled at us.
These ferocious-looking
