VERNANIA: The Celebrated Works of Jules Verne in One Edition. Жюль Верн
caused such a fiery discussion between the Major and Paganel.
“Ah! the Gauchos,” replied McNabbs. “Well, Paganel, the north wind is not blowing to-day. What do you think of those fellows yonder?”
“I think they look like regular bandits.”
“And how far is it from looking to being, my good geographer?”
“Only just a step, my dear Major.”
Paganel’s admission was received with a general laugh, which did not in the least disconcert him. He went on talking about the Indians however, and made this curious observation:
“I have read somewhere,” he said, “that about the Arabs there is a peculiar expression of ferocity in the mouth, while the eyes have a kindly look. Now, in these American savages it is quite the reverse, for the eye has a particularly villainous aspect.”
No physiognomist by profession could have better characterized the Indian race.
But desolate as the country appeared, Thalcave was on his guard against surprises, and gave orders to his party to form themselves in a close platoon. It was a useless precaution, however; for that same evening, they camped for the night in an immense TOLDERIA, which they not only found perfectly empty, but which the Patagonian declared, after he had examined it all round, must have been uninhabited for a long time.
Next day, the first ESTANCIAS of the Sierra Tandil came in sight. The ESTANCIAS are large cattle stations for breeding cattle; but Thalcave resolved not to stop at any of them, but to go straight on to Fort Independence. They passed several farms fortified by battlements and surrounded by a deep moat, the principal building being encircled by a terrace, from which the inhabitants could fire down on the marauders in the plain. Glenarvan might, perhaps, have got some information at these houses, but it was the surest plan to go straight on to the village of Tandil. Accordingly they went on without stopping, fording the RIO of Los Huasos and also the Chapaleofu, a few miles further on. Soon they were treading the grassy slopes of the first ridges of the Sierra Tandil, and an hour afterward the village appeared in the depths of a narrow gorge, and above it towered the lofty battlements of Fort Independence.
CHAPTER XXI A FALSE TRAIL
THE Sierra Tandil rises a thousand feet above the level of the sea. It is a primordial chain—that is to say, anterior to all organic and metamorphic creation. It is formed of a semicircular ridge of gneiss hills, covered with fine short grass. The district of Tandil, to which it has given its name, includes all the south of the Province of Buenos Ayres, and terminates in a river which conveys north all the RIOS that take their rise on its slopes.
After making a short ascent up the sierra, they reached the postern gate, so carelessly guarded by an Argentine sentinel, that they passed through without difficulty, a circumstance which betokened extreme negligence or extreme security.
A few minutes afterward the Commandant appeared in person. He was a vigorous man about fifty years of age, of military aspect, with grayish hair, and an imperious eye, as far as one could see through the clouds of tobacco smoke which escaped from his short pipe. His walk reminded Paganel instantly of the old subalterns in his own country.
Thalcave was spokesman, and addressing the officer, presented Lord Glenarvan and his companions. While he was speaking, the Commandant kept staring fixedly at Paganel in rather an embarrassing manner. The geographer could not understand what he meant by it, and was just about to interrogate him, when the Commandant came forward, and seizing both his hands in the most free-and-easy fashion, said in a joyous voice, in the mother tongue of the geographer:
“A Frenchman!”
“Yes, a Frenchman,” replied Paganel.
“Ah! delightful! Welcome, welcome. I am a Frenchman too,” he added, shaking Paganel’s hand with such vigor as to be almost alarming.
“Is he a friend of yours, Paganel?” asked the Major.
“Yes,” said Paganel, somewhat proudly. “One has friends in every division of the globe.”
After he had succeeded in disengaging his hand, though not without difficulty, from the living vise in which it was held, a lively conversation ensued. Glenarvan would fain have put in a word about the business on hand, but the Commandant related his entire history, and was not in a mood to stop till he had done. It was evident that the worthy man must have left his native country many years back, for his mother tongue had grown unfamiliar, and if he had not forgotten the words he certainly did not remember how to put them together. He spoke more like a negro belonging to a French colony.
The fact was that the Governor of Fort Independence was a French sergeant, an old comrade of Parachapee. He had never left the fort since it had been built in 1828; and, strange to say, he commanded it with the consent of the Argentine Government. He was a man about fifty years of age, a Basque by birth, and his name was Manuel Ipharaguerre, so that he was almost a Spaniard. A year after his arrival in the country he was naturalized, took service in the Argentine army, and married an Indian girl, who was then nursing twin babies six months old— two boys, be it understood, for the good wife of the Commandant would have never thought of presenting her husband with girls. Manuel could not conceive of any state but a military one, and he hoped in due time, with the help of God, to offer the republic a whole company of young soldiers.
“You saw them. Charming! good soldiers are Jose, Juan, and Miquele! Pepe, seven year old; Pepe can handle a gun.”
Pepe, hearing himself complimented, brought his two little feet together, and presented arms with perfect grace.
“He’ll get on!” added the sergeant. “He’ll be colonel-major or brigadier-general some day.”
Sergeant Manuel seemed so enchanted that it would have been useless to express a contrary opinion, either to the profession of arms or the probable future of his children. He was happy, and as Goethe says, “Nothing that makes us happy is an illusion.”
All this talk took up a quarter of an hour, to the great astonishment of Thalcave. The Indian could not understand how so many words could come out of one throat. No one interrupted the Sergeant, but all things come to an end, and at last he was silent, but not till he had made his guests enter his dwelling, and be presented to Madame Ipharaguerre. Then, and not till then, did he ask his guests what had procured him the honor of their visit. Now or never was the moment to explain, and Paganel, seizing the chance at once, began an account of their journey across the Pampas, and ended by inquiring the reason of the Indians having deserted the country.
“Ah! there was no one!” replied the Sergeant, shrugging his shoulders—“really no one, and us, too, our arms crossed! Nothing to do!”
“But why?”
“War.”
“War?”
“Yes, civil war between the Paraguayans and Buenos Ayriens,” replied the Sergeant.
“Well?”
“Well, Indians all in the north, in the rear of General Flores. Indian pillagers find pillage there.”
“But where are the Caciques?”
“Caciques are with them.”
“What! Catriel?”
“There is no Catriel.”
“And Calfoucoura?”
“There is no Calfoucoura.”
“And is there no Yanchetruz?”
“No; no Yanchetruz.”
The reply was interpreted by Thalcave, who shook his head and gave an approving look. The Patagonian was either unaware of, or had forgotten that civil war was decimating the two parts