With No Particular
Zeal For Religion, No Business Or Pursuit, How Completely
Must This Man's Life Be Wasted!
The next day, on
our return, we met seven very wild-looking Indians, of whom
some were caciques that had just received from the Chilian
government their yearly small stipend for having long remained
faithful.
They were fine-looking men, and they rode
one after the other, with most gloomy faces. An old cacique,
who headed them, had been, I suppose, more excessively
drunk than the rest, for he seemed extremely grave and
very crabbed. Shortly before this, two Indians joined us,
who were travelling from a distant mission to Valdivia
concerning some lawsuit. One was a good-humoured old man,
but from his wrinkled beardless face looked more like an
old woman than a man. I frequently presented both of them
with cigars; and though ready to receive them, and I dare
say grateful, they would hardly condescend to thank me. A
Chilotan Indian would have taken off his hat, and given his
"Dios le page!" The travelling was very tedious, both
from the badness of the roads, and from the number of great
fallen trees, which it was necessary either to leap over or to
avoid by making long circuits. We slept on the road, and
next morning reached Valdivia, whence I proceeded on
board.
A few days afterwards I crossed the bay with a party of
officers, and landed near the fort called Niebla. The buildings
were in a most ruinous state, and the gun-carriages
quite rotten.
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