We Met Such A Drove Bound For Hilo, With One Or Two Men In Front And Others At The Sides And Behind, Uttering Loud Shouts.

The bullocks are nearly mad with being hunted and driven, and at times rush like a living tornado, tearing up the earth with their horns.

As soon as the galloping riders are seen and the crooked-horned beasts, you retire behind a screen. There must be some tradition of some one having been knocked down and hurt, for reckless as the natives are said to be, they are careful about this, and we were warned several times by travellers whom we met, that there were "bullocks ahead." The law provides that the vaccheros shall station one of their number at the head of a gulch to give notice when cattle are to pass through.

We jogged on again till we met a native who told us that we were quite close to our destination; but there were no signs of it, for we were still on the lofty uplands, and the only prominent objects were huge headlands confronting the sea. I got off to walk, as my mule seemed footsore, but had not gone many yards when we came suddenly to the verge of a pali, about 1,000 feet deep, with a narrow fertile valley below, with a yet higher pali on the other side, both abutting perpendicularly on the sea. I should think the valley is not more than three miles long, and it is walled in by high inaccessible mountains.

Enter page number Go  Previous Next
Page 140 of 466
Words from 38504 to 38761 of 127766