The memory is a bad dream from which I must awake.
The other side, you say? Yes, there is another. A cloudless blue sky
overhead. The gorgeous air-flowers, delicate and fragrant. Trees
covered with a drapery of orchidaceae. The loveliest of flowers and
shrubs. Birds of rainbow beauty, painted by the hand of God, as only
He can. Flamingoes, parrots, humming-birds, butterflies of every size
and hue. Arborescent ferns; cacti, thirty feet high, like huge
candelabra. Creeping plants growing a hundred feet, and then passing
from the top of one ever-vernal tree to another, forming a canopy for
one from the sun's rays. Chattering monkeys. Deer, with more
beautiful eyes than ever woman had since Eve fell. The balmy air
wafting incense from the burning bush; and last, but oh, not least,
the joy in seeing the degraded aborigine learning to love the "Light
of the World"! Yes, there are delights; but "life is real, life is
earnest," and a meal of algarroba beans (the husks of the prodigal
son of Luke XV.) is not any more tempting if eaten under the shade of
a waving palm of surpassing beauty.
The mission station previously referred to lies one hundred miles in
from the river bank, three hundred miles north of Asuncion, among the
Lengua Indians. As far as I am aware, no Paraguayan has ever visited
there. The missionaries wish their influence to be the only one in
training the Indian mind. The village bears the strange name of
Waikthlatemialwa (The Place Where the Toads Arrived). At the
invitation of the missionaries, I was privileged to go there and see
their work. A trail leads in from the river bank, but it is so bad
that bullock carts taking in provisions occupy ten and twelve days on
the journey. Tamaswa (The Locust Eater), my guide, led me all during
the first day out through a palm forest, and at night we slept on the
hard ground. The Indian was a convert of the mission, and although
painted, feathered and almost naked, seemed really an exemplary
Christian. The missionaries labored for eleven years without gaining
a single convert, but Tamaswa is not the only "follower of Jesus"
now. During the day we shot a deer, and that evening, being very
hungry, I ate perhaps two pounds of meat. Tamaswa finished the rest!
True, it was only a small deer, but as I wish to retain my character
for veracity, I dare not say how much it weighed. This meal
concluded, we knelt on the ground. I read out of the old Book: "I go
to prepare a place for you," and Locust Eater offered a simple prayer
for protection, help and safety to the God who understands all
languages.
My blanket was wet through and through with the green slime through
which we had waded and splashed for hours, but we curled ourselves up
under a beer barrel tree and tried to sleep.
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