and darkness, falling suddenly when once the glaring-
sun dropped behind the hills, and soon a blaze of
light poured from the hotels, saloons, and gambling
and dance houses in front, while a thousand moving
torches glimmered m the surrounding darkness, and
mingled with the promiscuous mass of brute and
human life. Rising in the background was the dark
silent wood, and in front the sluggish stream, on
whose bank this so strange assemblage had gathered.
There was a fandango that night; there always seems to be one at places of this kind. The Gorgonan upper ten danced at the alcalde's; the baser sort on the sward beneath a vertical moon, Byron is right in his sarcasm on the chaste moon. It was a half barbaric and wholly voluptuous dance, and the reward of the danseuse, the most enduring and suggestive, was to ha>"e the hats of the company piled on her head — a doubtful honor considering the heads from which they come. These hats had the advantage over beehives, that their inhabitants did not sting.
Rising early next morning, and partaking of a hasty breakfast of beans, salt meat, coarse black bread, and coffee without milk, I went out and encountered a scene similar to that at Gatun, where we had embarked on the river below two days before, except that in the present bargaining mules took the place of boats, and there was an absence of that wild hilarity which displayed itself immediately on landing from the steamer. All throuoh the nip'ht boats had been arrivino- and there were now a hundred of them and more strung side by side at the landing. On the low shelving sandy bank were scattered miners' tents and native huts, uncovered piles of baggage, mingled with which were the prostrate forms of unhoused pilgrims, landlords, muleteers, and transport contract- ors, while up the steep embankment, rising from the river-bottom, were bands of fly-blown horses of the or- der of Rosinante, neighing to the mournful melody of mules, and filling the heavens with their discords.
