e as the finger. These he coaxed along with many tears,
and at the next size be saved his own wind and used his petata, or
straw hat. A gentle blaze rose in the whole centre of the pile; still
he coaxed it along, and by degrees brought on sticks as large as his
arm, which, by a gentle waving of his hat, in a few minutes were all
ignited. Our uncertainty was at an end. The whole pile was in a blaze,
and all four of us went busily to work gathering fuel. There was no
necessity for dry wood; we cut down bushes, and carried them in green;
all burned together; the flames extended, and the heat became so great
that we could not approach to throw on more. In our satisfaction with
the result we did not stop to read the moral of the lesson taught us by
the Indian boy. The flames were fast rectifying the damp, unwholesome
atmosphere, and inducing more warm and genial sensations. Very soon,
however, this bettering of our house's condition drove us out of doors.
The smoke rolled through the long apartment, and, curling along the
roof, passed into the front sala, where, dividing, it rushed through
the doors in three dense bodies, and rolled up the front of the palace.
We sat down outside, and watched it as it rolled away.

While this was going on, the mayoral crawled along the same path by
which we had ascended, and told us that the luggage had arrived. How it
could be got to us seemed a problem. The slight clearing on the upper
terrace gave us a view of the lower one, which was an unbroken mass of
bushes and weeds ten or twelve feet high. Perhaps half an hour had
elapsed, when we saw a single Indian ascend the platform of the second
terrace, with his machete slowly working his way toward us. Very soon
the top of a long box was seen rising above the same terrace,
apparently tottering and falling back, but rising again and coming on
steadily, with an Indian under it, visible from time to time through
the bushes. Toward the foot of the terrace on which we were it
disappeared, and after a few minutes rose to the top. Holding on with
both hands to the strap across his forehead, with every nerve strung,
and the veins of his forehead swelled almost to bursting, his face and
his whole body dripping with sweat, he laid his load at our feet. A
long line followed; staggering, panting, and trembling, they took the
loads from their backs, and deposited them at the door. They had
carried these loads three leagues, or nine miles, and we paid them