The Single Body Corresponded Well With
The Solitary Character Of Everything Around.
It was the only thing
in California from which I could ever extract anything like poetry.
Then, too, the
Man died far from home; without a friend near him;
by poison, it was suspected, and no one to inquire into it; and
without proper funeral rites; the mate, (as I was told,) glad to
have him out of the way, hurrying him up the hill and into the ground,
without a word or a prayer.
I looked anxiously for a boat, during the latter part of the
afternoon, but none came; until toward sundown, when I saw a
speck on the water, and as it drew near, I found it was the
gig, with the captain. The hides, then, were not to go off.
The captain came up the hill, with a man, bringing my monkey
jacket and a blanket. He looked pretty black, but inquired
whether I had enough to eat; told me to make a house out of
the hides, and keep myself warm, as I should have to sleep
there among them, and to keep good watch over them. I got
a moment to speak to the man who brought my jacket.
"How do things go aboard?" said I.
"Bad enough," said he; "hard work and not a kind word spoken."
"What," said I, "have you been at work all day?"
"Yes! no more Sunday for us. Everything has been moved in the
hold, from stem to stern, and from the waterways to the keelson."
I went up to the house to supper. We had frijoles, (the perpetual
food of the Californians, but which, when well cooked, are the best
bean in the world,) coffee made of burnt wheat, and hard bread.
After our meal, the three men sat down by the light of a tallow
candle, with a pack of greasy Spanish cards, to the favorite game
of "treinta uno," a sort of Spanish "everlasting." I left them and
went out to take up my bivouack among the hides. It was now dark;
the vessel was hidden from sight, and except the three men in the
house, there was not a living soul within a league. The coati
(a wild animal of a nature and appearance between that of the fox
and the wolf) set up their sharp, quick bark, and two owls, at the
end of two distant points running out into the bay, on different
sides of the hills where I lay, kept up their alternate, dismal notes.
I had heard the sound before at night, but did not know what it was,
until one of the men, who came down to look at my quarters, told
me it was the owl. Mellowed by the distance, and heard alone, at
night, I thought it was the most melancholy, boding sound I had
ever heard. Through nearly all the night they kept it up, answering
one another slowly, at regular intervals. This was relieved by the
noisy coati, some of which came quite near to my quarters, and
were not very pleasant neighbors.
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