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Words: 9945 in 4 pages
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h groans and shrieks as if all civilized creation were yielding up the ghost in the last throes of mortal agony for the special delectation of innumerable cannibals, whose cries and yells of evident delight could also be plainly heard.
Terror-stricken, I glanced at my companion, but he seemed perfectly undisturbed.
"What is it?" I managed to hoarsely whisper.
"Wagons," he briefly ejaculated.
And wagons I found it to be of a kind and class utterly unknown to me. The wheels were slices of trees, cut diametrically, in the centre of which holes had been bored for the insertion of the axles.
I think in order to fully accomplish the feat of making this a two-wheeled cart, and a music box combined, they must have used kerosene oil for axle grease. So much for the sound of concentrated human woe which I must eternally regret Milton could not have heard before he described the sufferings of the lost souls in purgatory. The cries of fiendish joy were only the loving words of cheer addressed by the charioteers to the patient oxen drawing the creaking, rumbling, rolling wagons on over the rough, uneven roads.
Gladly we passed them by and as quickly as possible got beyond earshot.
At noon the servants had not yet overtaken us, and as we were fairly famished, we stopped at an Indian hut along the way, to partake of any hospitality the place might afford.
It did not look particularly inviting, I must confess. An old man, whose whole attire consisted of a pair of trousers and a hat, sat outside the door, the centre of a more or less scantily clad group of women and children, while around all, caloes, pigs, chickens, ducks, and cats ran riot.
It was, perhaps, this novel and spontaneous kindness added to my more than perfect willingness to endure a restful separation from my mule, which induced me to get down and enter that house with all my inborn and inbred love of cleanliness and daintiness crying out within me.
Only one door led into the one room containing beds, table, chair, boxes, and oh, bliss! a hammock, which, dirty as it was, I was only too thankful to occupy. No window lighted the darkness of the place, or afforded an occasional breath of fresh air. The floor was packed earth and was so dirty that it was a perfect paradise for swarms of fleas and other insects.
It was not a great while before we discovered that a sudden shower, so common in tropical countries, was upon us, and in all probability we had before us the pleasant prospect of a drenching.
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