Chapter IX: “the Whole Sea of Mist Turned to Clouds of Mingled Gold and Crimson.”

The crossing of streams, either by swinging bridges or through fords in which the water roared and rushed with the rapidity of a mill-stream, constituted a source of ever-recurring danger. The bridges at times were of even simpler construction than that already described, especially if the stream or chasm were narrow, for then two trees, or perhaps but one, would have to do duty as a support for the cross-pieces of wood; and as these latter were often so rotten that they snapped in two with the weight of a man, it may easily be perceived that the comfort and feeling of security while on them were but slight.

As a rule the natives have but little faith in these frail and fearful structures, and will go a long distance round to find a ford; unless indeed they are intoxicated, which they too often are when a chance occurs. But the bridges as a rule are left standing until they fall with the weight of some unlucky wight.

I have said that the horses were exceedingly sure-footed. So they needed to be; for the tracks in this mountain-land sometimes went winding alongside of frightful precipices, and the danger was quite as great in coming down as in going up.

But a horse occasionally got frightened, and lost for a time all his presence of mind.

One day Tom was riding on in front on just such a pathway as that I have mentioned. It was nowhere more than five feet wide; the mountain rising steep close on one side, the yawning gulf at the other, with bushes clinging to its edges. Stones occasionally came tumbling down from above with a hurtling noise; but when they rolled over the precipice they were heard no more, for they had fallen into space, and the sudden silence was awfully suggestive. Now and then came a sharp angle or curve in the pathway; and here the danger was at its height, for you could no longer see where the road led. You were riding right on to the cliff; and it was impossible to divest the mind of the idea that next moment the horse you bestrode would be pawing the air, as he and you were being hurled to destruction.

It was close to such an eeriesome and uncanny corner as this, and immediately after he had passed it, that Tom found himself face to face with a puma, coming along the narrow pathway with long, stealthy, lynx-like steps. The beast was as much startled as anyone. He emitted one low growl, then immediately turned to fly.

Nothing but instant action could have saved Tom’s life now, for the horse reared and swerved half over the cliff, as his rider threw himself off against the hill and clung to some rhododendron bushes. He had not quitted hold of the bridle, and slight though this support was it probably saved his horse. The beast’s hind-legs and thighs had almost disappeared. His nostrils were distended, and his eyes seemed to flash dark fire, as for a moment he hung ’twixt life and death. The shuddering, quivering groan the poor brute gave when he once more stood safe on the path was evidence of his appreciation of the terrible danger he had just escaped.

It will be easily seen, therefore, that travelling in Ecuador is fraught with many perils, and one may truly be said to take the road with his life in his hand. As far as our hero was concerned, however, this spice of danger certainly did not detract from the pleasures of the journey. He was nevertheless most careful before setting out of a morning to see that his horse and all the horses had been well fed and harnessed; for this concerned the safety of the poor brutes as well as his own. So simple an accident as the loosening of a belly-band has ere now in this wild land resulted in horse and rider being precipitated over a mountain-side, or swept from a ford into the rapids of some swollen river.

Dangers come when least looked for; nothing is certain when travelling except the unexpected, and it is always prudent to be prepared.

But I do not mean to hold my hero up as a paragon of prudence, or any other virtue for that matter; and I have to confess that his love of nature, and his search for the beautiful and the picturesque, often led him into difficulties he might otherwise have steered clear of.

“I say, Samaro,” he said one night to his major-domo, “I have a notion to climb one of these lofty mountains. Up into the region of perpetual snow. Do you understand?”

“I understand, señor; but--”

“Well, what?”

“Your uncle would not have dared to do so.”

“O, I shall dare more than my uncle ever dared. And whatever a man dares he can do.”

“Well, señor, I am ready. Will you start to-morrow?”

“Yes. The hill is at hand, or mountain rather; and it does not seem difficult to ascend. Looks quite near, indeed.”

“Excuse me, señor,” said Samaro, “if I take the liberty of laughing. The mountain certainly seems near, but so does the moon. The air is very clear, señor.”

“Well, all the better for us.”

Tom was early astir next morning; but early though it was he found Samaro busy enough. He was squatting under a bush, making for himself what looked to Tom something like a pair of leather breeches with feet attached.

“Ah! I see,” said Tom. “You expect it will be cold up yonder, so you are utilizing a puma’s skin.”

“I have been there before,” said Samaro, “with--”

“With whom?”

“A mad Englishman.”

“O! and now you will have to pilot a fool?”

“Si, señor.”

“Well, are you nearly ready, Mr. Guide?”

“I am ready,” replied Samaro; “and,” he added, pointing upward at the mighty Tinguragua, “the mountain is ready and waiting also.”

The journey and ascent, for it was both combined, were now commenced.

“There is no occasion to hurry,” said Tom; “we will take it easy.”

Well, mountain climbing does always seem easy at first; but, anyhow, Tom was now in grand form: his limbs were as hard and tough as hawsers, and it would have taken a good deal to make his heart palpitate. On they went, and soon leaving the river’s bank they penetrated into the depths of the primeval forest, and following a little track made by some wild animals in their nightly visits to the river, began to ascend.

The company consisted of Tom and his guide, with Tootu, Taoh, and Oko carrying ropes, axes, arms, provisions, and blankets. It was wonderful how well these three honest fellows agreed. As a rule wind, fire, and water do not pull well together when they meet, but in this case they did. Tootu was usually spokesman; but whatever he said, the other two, fire and water, were ready to chime in with, and swear to if need be.

Onwards and upwards they journeyed now for hours, the pathway sometimes so steep that they had to clamber on their hands and knees.

Onwards and upwards, then onwards and _downwards_. This was the worst of it. It was as trying to the nerves as the temper. It did seem a pity that, after they had reached a certain elevation, they should be confronted with a ravine into the very bottom of which the pathway led them before taking them onwards and upwards again. It was like having to do the ascent twice over. But there was no help for it.

Tom was amply rewarded, however, by the beauty of the tropical forest. I should search in vain through the tablets of my memory for words in which to express the charm and singularity of those woodlands. On the lower grounds, indeed, the vegetation was all a wild and lovely tangle, representing on an enormous scale the struggle for existence that has been going on here for ages. It was one great and continued fight for the sunlight, in which to some extent and for a time the largest and strongest trees gained the victory. But the smaller and weaker plants, the splendidly-flowered creepers, the mosses, the orchids, and lesser ferns were not to be denied. There was nowhere they would not go, no height to which they would not aspire and climb. They draped the tree-stems and branches with blossoms, it is true; but by and by that very wealth of trailing, hanging, waving beauty proved the downfall of the most lordly giants of the forest; and when winds swept through the woods they came down with a crash, and in a few weeks had disappeared off the face of the earth. For here a fallen trunk is seldom seen, in such teeming myriads do busy-footed insects work on the ground and beneath it.

Out at last came the wanderers upon a higher region still, and now they had to traverse for miles a kind of hilly plateau that looked altogether like the work of some wonderful landscape gardener. It was a plateau covered with innumerable little tree-clad, fern-clad, moss-clad, flower-covered hills, with rocks in the shape of gray needles, silvery boulders, square towers, domes, and minarets, peeping up through the foliage everywhere. Round and among these wound many a little footpath--the footpaths of wild beasts--but none, probably, more dangerous than the timid agouti, the cavy, or peccary. Occasionally they crossed small meandering streams that appeared here and there, popping out from banks of foliage or gushing and trickling from the hill-sides, and disappearing again soon in the same mysterious manner.

Add to this “garden wide and wild” birds that flutter from bough to bough, many silent but of rainbow radiance, others gray and brown and hardly seen, but trilling forth such melody as can be heard from no other feathered songsters on earth; add to it radiant butterflies and moths in clouds; bees also, some of enormous size and dangerous wrathful appearance; and snakes basking on the moss of rocks, gliding swiftly through the little glades, or hanging asleep on the bushes.

Close to a tiny stream of clear water Tom sat down; the weary carriers threw down their burdens, and a welcome meal was made of biscuits and fruit, and a long rest taken before resuming the ascent.

The great mountain was there before them still, looking as big and far steeper than when they started.

The foliage changed now, and some parts of the mountain over which they climbed were all ablaze with tree-rhododendrons, while the perfume of wild heliotrope filled the air. Heaths, too, were abundant, many of which put Tom in mind of those he had wandered among on the mountains of the Cape of Good Hope.

Climbing began in earnest soon after this; and no one spoke, but clambered on and up in silent earnestness. Just about sunset they found themselves once more on a vast plateau, on which grew only the scantiest herbage. After crossing this they found a small cave in the mountain-side, and here for the night the bivouac was made.

While dinner was being prepared Tom climbed higher up still and sat himself down on a rock; but the vastness and grandeur of the scene, and its indescribable silence and solemnity, must be left to the reader’s imagination.

He must have been fully ten thousand feet above the sea-level; and yet the snowy craters of Carhuairazo, just visible over the bluff bare brow of the mountain, still towered high above him.

Far below was an ocean of lesser hills, of woods and plains and smiling valleys, with streams that looked like trickling rills or silver threads among the green, and here and there a glassy lake.

The sun went down in a blaze of glory, and he now hastened below to enjoy repose and a well-earned dinner.

About nine o’clock, though the stars had been very bright before this, a storm-cloud passed over the mountain-side, with a roaring wind, heavy rain, and thunder and lightning. After this Tom went out to have one more look at the scene before turning in. Nothing was now visible beneath but a dim chaos of clouds, nothing on the horizon either, except, far away to the north, the giant cone of Cotopaxi. Its snow-girt crater was lit up every now and then by the gleams of the great fires within--gleams that darted in straight lines up through the rolling clouds of smoke that hung pall-like over it.

This is the loftiest and mightiest volcano in the world. Talk not of its height in feet or yards--speak of it in miles; and fancy, if you can, a burning mountain nearly five miles in height, the thunders of whose workings can be heard, and have been heard, six hundred miles away! It made Tom shiver to think of it. But O, the illimitable distance of the stars that shone above, and to think of God who made them all! What a mystery of mysteries! And the stars are voice-less, and these dread volcanoes speak only to us in thunders that we cannot understand, till we are fain to seek for refuge in the only refuge we have: our belief in the goodness of the Father, and the religion revealed to us in the Book of Books.

Tom sighed, he knew not why, and crept inside to the shelter of the cave, and wrapping himself in his blanket soon sank to sleep. But many times ere morning he was startled by the roar of falling debris of earth, rocks, and stone, loosened by the recent rain storm.

Samaro roused his young master early to see the sunrise. But when he went outside he stood for a few moments in silent wonder. Where had the world all gone to? It had disappeared, most assuredly--most of it at all events. Here was the mountain above and round him, but all the gorgeous scenery he had gazed on last night was swallowed up in an ocean of white mist or clouds. The word “ocean” is precisely the one to use. Beneath and as far as the eye could gaze all was a vast white sea, only it was bounded on the horizon by the jagged ridges and crater-cones of the mountains, and these looked like rocks and cliffs overhanging this ocean.

It was a marvellous sight; but when presently the red sun showed over the edge the scene was changed, and the whole sea of mist turned to clouds of mingled gold and crimson.