Instead of this triumph, my only achievement in the battle of Cerro Gordo was to call my colonel a coward, for which I was afterwards confined to close quarters, and only recovered the right to range abroad on the eve of a subsequent battle, when it was thought that my sword might be of more service than my condemnation by court-martial.
Of such a nature were my thoughts as I lay under canvas on the field of Cerro Gordo on the night succeeding the battle.
Agua! por amor Dios, agua aguita !
These words reaching my ear, and now a second time pronounced, broke in upon the train of my reflections.
They were not the only sounds disturbing the tranquillity of that calm tropic night. From other parts of the field, though in a different direction and more distant, I could hear many voices speaking in a similar strain, in tones of agonised appeal, low mutterings, mingled with moanings, where some mutilated foeman was struggling in the throes of death, and vainly calling for help that came not.
On that night, from the field of Cerro Gordo, many a soul soared upward to eternity many a brave man went to sleep with unclosed eyes, a sleep from which he was never more to awaken.
In what remained of twilight after my arrival on the ground, I had visited all the wounded within the immediate vicinity of my post all that I could find for the field of battle was in reality a wood, or rather a thicket; and no doubt there were many who escaped my observation.
I had done what little was in the power of myself and a score of companions soldiers of my corps to alleviate the distress of the sufferers: for, although they were our enemies, we had not the slightest feeling of hostility towards them. There had been such in the morning, but it was gone ere the going down of the sun, leaving only compassion in its place.
Yielding simply to the instincts of humanity, I had done my best in binding up wounds, many of them that I knew to be mortal; and only when worn out by fatigue, absolutely done up, had I sought a tent, under the shelter of which it was necessary I should pass the night.
It was after a long spell of sleep, extending into the mid-hours of the night, that I was awakened from my slumbers, and gave way to the reflections above detailed. It was then that I heard that earnest call for water; it was then I heard the more distant voices, and mingled with them the howling bark of the coyote, and the far more terrible baying of the large Mexican wolf. In concert with such choristers, no wonder the human voices were uttered in tones especially earnest and lugubrious.
Agua! par amor Dios, agua, aguita !
For the third time I listened to this
piteous appeal. It surprised me a little. I thought I had placed a vessel of water within the reach of every one of the wounded wretches who lay near my tent. Had this individual been overlooked?
Perhaps he had drunk what had been left him, and thirsted for more! In any case, the earnest accents in which the solicitation was repeated, told me that he was thirsting with a thirst that tortured him.
I waited for another, the fourth repetition of the melancholy cry. Once more I heard it.
This time I had listened with more attention. I could perceive in the pronunciation a certain provincialism, which proclaimed the speaker a peasant, but one of a special class. The por amor Dios , instead of being drawled out in the whine of the regular alms-asker, was short and slurred. It fell upon the ear as if the a in amor was omitted, and also the initial letter in aguita . The phrase ran: Agua! por mor Dios, gua, aguita !
I recognised in those abbreviations the patois of a peculiar people, the denizens of the coast of Vera Cruz, and the tierra caliente the Jarochos .
The sufferer did not appear to be at any great distance from my tent perhaps a hundred paces, or two hundred at most. I could no longer lend a deaf ear to his outcries.
I started up from my catre a camp-bedstead, which my tent contained groped, and found my canteen, not forgetting the brandy-flask, and, sallying forth into the night, commenced making my way towards the spot where I might expect to find the utterer of the earnest appeal.
Story 1, Chapter III The Menace of a Monster
chapparalOne of these paths I followed.
Its windings soon led me astray. Though the moon was shining in a cloudless sky, I was soon in such a maze that I could neither tell the direction of the tent I had left behind, nor that of the sufferer I had sallied out in search of.
In sight there was no object to guide me. I paused in my steps, and listened for a sound.
For some seconds there was a profound silence, unbroken even by the groans of the wounded, some of whose voices were, perhaps, now silent in death. The wolves, too, had suspended their hideous howlings, as though their quest for prey had ended, and they were busily banqueting on the dead.
The stillness produced a painful effect, even more than the melancholy sounds that had preceded it I almost longed for their renewal.