Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard
door of the landing, the colonel leaped out with a fling of both feet in an avalanche of woollen coverings. His spurs having become entangled in a perfect welter of ponchos, he nearly pitched on his head, and did not recover his balance till the middle of the room. Concealed behind the half-closed jalousies he listened to what went on below.
The envoy had already mounted, and turning to the morose officers occupying the great doorway , took off his hat formally.
"Caballeros," he said, in a very loud tone, "allow me to recommend you to take great care of your colonel. It has done me much honor and gratification to have seen you all, a fine body of men exercising the soldierly virtue of patience in this exposed situation, where there is much sun and no water to speak of, while a town full of wine and feminine charms is ready to embrace you for the brave men you are. Caballeros, I have the honor to salute you. There will be much dancing to-night in Sulaco. Good-bye!"
But he reined in his horse and inclined his head sideway on seeing the old major step out, very tall and meagre in a straight, narrow coat coming down to his ankles, as it were the casing of the regimental colors rolled round their staff.
The intelligent old warrior, after enunciating in a dogmatic tone the general proposition that the "world was full of traitors," went on pronouncing deliberately a panegyric upon Sotillo. He ascribed to him with leisurely emphasis every virtue under heaven, summing it all up in an absurd colloquialism current among the lower class of Occidentals (especially about
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