THEY FOUND GOLD
The Story of SUCCESSFUL TREASURE HUNTS
By A HYATT VERRILL
Digitized by Doug Frizzle, November 2013
Link to the first part = http://stillwoods.blogspot.ca/2013/11/they-found-gold-pt.html
Chapter III.
THE TREASURE-TROVE OF CASCO
BAY . 22
The strange story of a Maine
Chapter IV.
THE GOLDEN BOOKS OF THE MAYAS. 31
An amazing tale and a treasure hunt in
CHAPTER III
The Treasure-Trove of Casco
Bay
THE mere thought of buried treasures creates
visions of tropic seas, palm-fringed keys and the
Spanish Main, which is quite natural, for the
Caribbean and the
tropics were the haunts of the buccaneers and pirates, and piratically-inclined
gentlemen and hidden hoards of precious metal and precious stones are ever
associated in the public mind. Yet
by no means all the sunken, hidden
and buried treasures are confined to the
favorite haunts of the freebooters
and the seas where-on Spanish plate
ships sailed and came to grief. And while the
rock-ribbed coast of Maine would be about the last place where one might expect to find hidden
treasures, yet, if we can believe history and tradition, many a cached hoard
lies buried in Maine soil, and more than one Maine the
treasures found in Maine have been com paratively
small, scarcely valuable enough to merit being called treasures; but at least
one has been wrested from its hiding
place which not only was a veritable treasuretrove, but in addition was
surrounded with all the mystery, the rom ance,
the tragedy and the secrecy which make tales of treasure and treasure
hunting so fascinating.
For generations, from
the days of the
earliest settlers, the re had been a
tradition that a treasure was hidden som ewhere
on Jewell's Island in Casco Bay . The oldest inhabitant
could not recall when the oldest
inhabitant of his memory could remember who was the
originator of the tale. Neithe r could any one recall when the first seekers for the
hidden gold dug and delved for the
reputed treasure. But for at least two hundred years people had searched for the treasure, without success. Who had buried the hoard, or what its origin, no one knew; but it was
generally agreed that it was pirates' loot and, as in the
minds of the islanders, one pirate
was as good, or as bad, as anothe r,
it was always referred to as "Captain Kidd's Treasure" regardless of the fact that poor, timid, much-maligned Captain
Kidd never went near the Maine coast
nor possessed treasure to bury.
Being, like many fisherfolk and islanders, som ewhat prone to superstition, the people embroidered the ir
tales of the treasure by adding
stories of ghostly guardians, spectral pirates and terrifying apparitions which
watched over the hoard of gold and
frightened away those who sought for it. And as a result, many a treasure
seeker sought to checkmate the
guardian spirits by employing occult or supernatural means of locating the legendary hoard.
Lambs were slaughtered and the ir fresh blood was scattered on the areas where it was planned to dig. Charms and
talismans of various kinds were used as aids in locating and securing the treasure, and one man even brought a famed
mesmerist and a girl subject to the
island, his idea being that when under a hypnotic spell the
young wom an could locate the gold. But neithe r
charms, talismans, fresh lamb's blood, divining rods nor a mesmerized maiden
resulted in finding a cent's worth of treasure on the
island.
And the n,
one day, a stranger arrived. To be sure, strangers were not so unusual upon an
island within sight of Portland as to cause any particular com ment; but this particular visitor made no bones of
announcing that he had com e to
Jewell's Island for the express
purpose of recovering the
traditional treasure and, so he declared, he possessed a chart which showed
exactly where the treasure was
buried. He had com e, he said, from St.
Johns , Newfoundland the
precious document from an aged negro
who had recently died. The deceased African, it seemed, had once been the devoted and faithful body-servant of a notorious
pirate, who, upon his death bed, had given the
chart showing the hiding place of
his treasure to the negro. Unable to
read or write, and, needless to say, without means, the
black man had never attempted to secure the
loot; but had safeguarded the chart
until, when he in turn was passing away, he presented the
map to the man who had befriended
him and who had now arrived at the island.
One would have expected that a man having a
chart which allegedly indicated precisely where the
treasure was concealed, would have lost no time in getting to work to dig it
up. But instead of hurrying to secure the
treasure, the owner of the precious chart hung about, and volunteered the information that he was awaiting the arrival of Captain Jonathan Chase, the skipper of a Jewell Island schooner, giving as
his reason that Captain Chase was the
only inhabitant of the island who
possessed an accurate mariners' com pass
and who could "shoot the sun,"
both the instrument and the ability being essential to the finding of the
treasure.
Naturally tongues began to wag. How did the man from
St. Johns the y once been
shipmates or old friends? And why, the
people asked one anothe r, hadn't the stranger provided himself with a com pass and acquired a knowledge of taking an
observation before he started on his treasure hunt?
But no one could find an answer to the se logical questions, and no one ever knew whethe r or not the
possessor of the chart had ever
before met Captain Jonathan; although from
the events which transpired it may
be quite reasonably assumed that the
two were not strangers.
Once an element of mystery had been injected
into the matter, rumor and gossip
added more. Captain Chase, it seemed, bore a far from
savory reputation. In hushed tones it was noised about that he himself had once
been a pirate. Every one knew that he made the
greater part of his money by smuggling, and the re
were lurid tales of strange goings-on in the
big rambling house where he dwelt. But as smuggling was not considered in the light of a crime by the
islanders, and as the captain when
at hom e led a law-abiding, moral
life and regularly attended "meeting," and as he was a hearty,
friendly sort, he was regarded in a most favorable light by his fellow
islanders.
In due course of time Captain Chase's rakish
little schooner came beating up Casco Bay and
dropped anchor off the island. And
scarcely had the skipper stepped ashore
and, after the usual greetings,
entered his hom e when the stranger from
St. Johns the heavy oak door and
was at once admitted.
What took place within the
residence of Captain Jonathan, what was said, no one of course will ever know, although
many an islander would have given his or her "eye teeth" as the y would have expressed it, to have been able to
overhear the conversation that took
place between Captain Chase and his visitor from
Newfoundland
There was one thing certain, however: the Captain must have been convinced that the stranger possessed a valuable and trustworthy clue
to the hiding place of the traditional treasure, for after a few hours the two men appeared, carrying a shovel and pick, the captain's com pass
and sextant, and without speaking to any one, the y
vanished in the woods. Of course no
one followed the m—the burly captain was not one to deal lightly with snoopers
if caught, and the man from St.
Johns the
type to be trifled with eithe r.
Hence no one knew where the y had
gone or how long the y were absent,
for, oddly enough, no one on the
island saw the m return. Yet, a few days
later, Captain Chase was pottering about his garden as usual and when, in quite
a casual manner, neighbors mentioned the
stranger from St. Johns, the captain eithe r
ignored the matter altogethe r or made non-com mittal
replies and opined that the fellow's
chart wasn't worth a tinker's darn and that, finding he was on a wild goose chase,
he'd probably cleared out. But on a small spot such as Jewell's Island a man's
movements are pretty well known, especially if he is a stranger, and as nothing
had been seen of the Newfoundlander
since he had set out with Captain Jonathan, and as he could not have left the island without taking a boat—which he assuredly
had not—anothe r mystery was scented
by the islanders. And when, shortly
after his reappearance, Captain Chase sailed away on anothe r
trading voyage, and the man with the chart had not shown up, tongues began to wag
with a vengeance. He had not been seen about the
island or the village, he had
certainly not been aboard the
captain's schooner when she had sailed, no small boat was missing, and no one
had rowed or sailed him ashore. Every one was soon asking every one else:
"What became of the man with the pirate's chart?"
It was a delectable mystery, but mystery soon
changed to suspicion, and, the
captain being out of the way, the people decided it was high time to do a little
investigating on the ir own account.
But even if the y found no traces of the missing man the y
did find som ething else.
On the
Southe astern shore of the island was a deep, freshly-dug hole, and in the soft earth and sand at the
bottom of the
cavity was the rectangular
impression left by a chest or box! It was quite obvious to all that som e one had dug the
hole and had removed a chest from
its hiding place, and no one doubted that the
chest had contained treasure and that Captain Chase and the
man from Newfoundland had been the lucky ones to lift "Captain Kidd's
Treasure" from the spot where it had rested so many years. That, in
the minds of the
islanders, explained everything. It was quite natural, the y
reasoned, that the stranger should
have departed secretly carrying his share of the
loot, and unquestionably, the y
decided, he had left in one of Captain Jonathan's dories, the captain owning a number. And no doubt, the y thought, Captain Chase had quietly placed his
portion of the treasure aboard his
schooner and had sailed away to deposit it in som e
large town on the mainland.
So, satisfied that the y
had solved the mystery, and that the long-sought treasure had been found at last, the islanders again resumed the ir
placid lives and forgot all about the
man with the pirate's chart. And
when, in due course of time, Captain Chase returned, and abandoning the sea, settled down and lived in ease and com fort in his big house, the
people accepted his change of life as a furthe r
proof that he had found the
treasure, and forbore questioning him as to the
source of his sudden affluence.
Years went by. Captain Chase passed away,
respected as a well-to-do, substantial citizen and the
island's wealthiest inhabitant should be. But he had left no will as far as
known, he had neithe r kith nor kin,
and when, after due formalities, the
properly constituted officials took possession of the
deceased captain's hom e the y discovered a number of strange things.
Everywhere within the place were
secret com partments, sliding panels,
underground passages and similar devices such as no honest man would need. But the re was nothing of an incriminating nature othe r than a goodly store of casks and bottles of
liquor, cigars and othe r goods which
had paid no custom s duties; and the inconsiderable amount of money that had been
left by the dead captain was in ordinary
currency.
Captain Chase had been dead and buried for
several years, his house and contents had been disposed of at public auction,
and the islanders had lost all
interest in the tale of the famous treasure and its lucky finders when a
hunter made a most exciting and gruesom e
discovery. In a dense patch of woods not far from
the "treasure pit," he
came upon a human skeleton lying in a deep and narrow crevice between two
ledges of rock.
Years of sun and rain, of snow and ice had left
no traces of perishable garments othe r
than a few bits of cracked, rotten leathe r
that had once been boots, and a few fragments of a so'wester. But among the bleached bones were buttons and a silver finger
ring that identified the remains
beyond all question. The skeleton was all that remained of the man from
St. Johns
That he had met death by violence was obvious,
for in the back of the skull, near the
nape of the neck, and evidently
inflicted as the man had been
bending over, was a clean square hole such as would have been made by a blow of
a pick. Of course, in the light of
this discovery, no one doubted that Captain Jonathan had murdered the stranger when, by the
aid of his chart, the y had secured the treasure chest. All the
known circumstances, as recalled by those who were living at the time, pointed to the
crime having been com mitted. But the re was nothing to be done about it. Captain Chase
was as dead as the skeleton of the unfortunate man from
Newfoundland the murdered man
had relatives, or if so, where the y
could be located in order to notify the m
of the discovery of his mortal
remains. So the bones were duly
interred in the graveyard, not far from all that was earthly of Captain Jonathan, and the re the
matter ended as far as the islanders
were concerned. But for many years in fact up to the
present time the re are hair-raising
tales of strange noises and mysterious lights seen and heard about the Chase house at dead of night, and all the treasures of all the
pirates would not induce any islander to visit the
vicinity of the "treasure
pit" or the spot where the skeleton was found, after nightfall.
CHAPTER IV
The Golden Books of the
Mayas
IT was a fascinating story that the little aviator told, a story that sounded more
like the pages of a fiction magazine
than fact, yet told in such a convincing and simple manner that it had the ring of truth.
It began with the
ill-starred Escobar revolution in northe rn
Mexico the rebels ordered six
aeroplanes from a firm in the States. Under the
contract, the planes were to be
flown across the border by American
pilots and delivered to the Escobar
forces, and the little aviator who was
narrating his amazing adventures had undertaken to deliver one of the planes. But when the
miniature flying squadron had landed safely within the
rebel lines it was discovered that the
Mexicans were two pilots short, and when General Escobar offered seventy-five
dollars in gold a day for the
services of American pilots, our aviator friend and his buddy jumped at the chance.
For a time all went well; the
planes were employed solely in scouting and observing, and the prom ised
salaries were paid prom ptly. But
gradually payments fell off, and when several weeks had passed with no money
forthcom ing, and with all demands
met by profuse apologies and excuses, the
two Americans decided it was time to quit. That, however, was easier said than
done. Being unfamiliar with the
Spanish language the y had
unwittingly signed papers binding the mselves
to serve the rebel forces for the duration of the
revolution, and to attempt to desert and fly across the
border was hopeless, for never were the y
permitted to take off unless accom panied
by a Mexican officer. But at length the
two men devised a scheme which the y
felt might work. The next morning when the y
were ordered to make a flight the
motors missed and sputtered and after tinkering with the m
for som e time without improving
matters, the two men informed the com mandant
that the machines required a com plete overhauling. And when this wholly
unnecessary work had been ostensibly com pleted,
the y declared that a "tuning-up
flight" was essential and that to test out the
planes with an extra man aboard would be dangerous. Shrugging his shoulders at the seemingly inevitable, the
officer gave his consent, and elated at the
success of the ir ruse and thoughts
of soon seeing the last of Mexico the two men took off with fuel and oil tanks filled
to the ir capacity.
Once in the
air the y separated. Where his friend
went or what became of him, our aviator could not say; but as he himself had
heard that the re was need of an
American pilot in El
Salvador
Thousands of feet beneath him the terrain of Mexico the
east the coastline and the sea appeared.
Unfamiliar with the
country, and fearful of being com pelled
to make a landing and being instantly seized as a rebel, the
fugitive followed the shore, hoping
to reach the borders of Guatemala or British
Honduras before his fuel was exhausted.
All went well until he had passed Carmen Island
off the coast of Campeche the lagoon, he set a course for the boundary.
And the n,
when safety seemed certain, when the
worst of his long flight was over, his engine began to miss.
It was no temporary or minor trouble, but a
broken oil line, and he realized that a landing was inevitable. Below him
stretched the primeval jungle. To
crash among the giant vine-entangled
trees meant certain death or worse. Far off on eithe r
side he could see the silvery gleam
of rivers, but already he had lost much of his altitude, and was too low to
glide to eithe r stream.
With tensed nerves and set face he stared at the endless sea of green forest, searching for som e spot where the re
would be one chance in ten thousand of com ing
down without being killed or crippled. Each second that he dropped his peril
increased; the engine was coughing and
spitting, and at any instant it might "go dead." Then, when, as he
expressed it, he had "kissed the
world goodby," he saw a clearing in the
heart of the jungle. It was not an
open field by any means, but a large rectangular area where the re were no big trees, a space that might have
been an old clearing grown up to low brush and rank weeds. There was no time to
consider the chances; all he could
do was to "pancake" the
plane and hope for the best. But
luck was with him; the plane tore
through the brush for a few yards,
swung sharply to one side, ripped off a wing, and the n
slowly turned turtle.
Shaken but uninjured, the
aviator crawled from under the wrecked plane. But as he glanced about he
realized that he might almost as well have crashed in the
jungle and finished everything. He was miles—he had no idea how many miles—from the
nearest settlements, he had no food othe r
than his emergency rations which would serve for a day; he had no weapons, not
even an axe or a machete, and on every side stretched unbroken, uninhabited
forest. But standing beside the
wreck of his plane was merely wasting time, and securing his electric torch, his
emergency ration and the com pass, he examined his surroundings, seeking the most open spot at which to enter the jungle. A few yards from
where he stood was a low hillock or mound, and thinking the
slight elevation might provide a better survey, he pushed through the brush towards it. It was covered with a tangle
of weeds and vines, and he shuddered involuntarily as he thought what an ideal
spot it afforded for snakes. But in the
face of his greater and more concrete peril his inordinate dread of reptiles
did not prevent him from forcing his
way recklessly up the slope.
Suddenly the
ground seemed to open beneath his feet. He shot downward and, amid a shower of
earth, stones and leaves, came to an abrupt and jarring stop. Dazed and shaken,
he gazed about. He was in an underground chamber or vault, and behind him a
flight of stone steps led up to the
aperture through which he had fallen. Above his head arched a stone roof, and
on the farthe r
side of the room ,
dimly outlined in the semi-darkness,
he could see an immense sculptured idol and a square stone table.
Rising, he stepped toward the
great stone god, and as he passed close to the
table-like affair of stone he noticed that it was hollowed into a deep trough
from which hung curious-looking
objects resembling gigantic fish-hooks with discs in place of eyes.
Wondering what the y
were, he examined the m closely, and
discovered that, threaded on to the
ends resting in the trough, were
numbers of square leaves or plates of metal. Scraping away the bat guano that covered the m,
he was amazed to find the plates
covered with incised glyphs and figures. And as he raised the uppermost and exposed the
surface of the plate below, he could
scarcely believe his eyes. The surface gleamed dull yellow—it was solid gold!
Still unable to credit the
evidence of his eyes, he attempted to lift one of the
affairs from the
trough. But he could barely move it, for the
hook-like rod with its attached plates weighed over two hundred pounds! And the re were fourteen of the
things—fourteen immense hooks, each bearing eleven sheets of beaten, engraved gold!
Abruptly he burst into peals of wild laughter.
He was standing beside a fortune, half a million dollars' worth of gold at
least, yet of as little value to him as the
great stone idol in the shadows. At
that mom ent he gladly would have traded
all that precious metal for a square meal, or a gun. Cursing his luck, he
dropped the metal back into the trough, and climbing the
stairs he plunged into the forest.
Realizing that if he went north he must
eventually reach a stream which would lead him to the
coast, he headed in that direction. But could he survive long enough to make the nearest river? Torn by thorns, beset by swarms
of the terrible rodederos or biting
gnats of Yucatan om pelled to make long detours around dense tangles
and swampy spots. Conserving his meager rations until he was faint with hunger,
and never stopping to rest, he stumbled forward.
For seventeen hours all through the night he pushed onward, keeping as nearly as
possible to a com pass course, until,
almost at the end of his strength,
he burst from the
forest into a small clearing surrounding a chicle camp. The rest was easy. Well
fed and rested, and accom panied by a
guide, he mounted a mule and rode to the
nearest village, whence by packet-boat and steamship, he returned to the States.
Such was the
story the little aviator told,
strange, fantastic, to be sure, but, paradoxically, reasonable by its very
incredibility. Naturally he had tried to interest som e
one to finance an expedition to return with him to the
scene of his discovery and secure the
treasure. Among othe rs he approached
a fellow aviator—a wealthy young man whom
he had met at an aviation school, and who was willing to finance an expedition.
But neithe r he nor his friends knew
anything about the tropics or the jungles, none of the m
spoke Spanish, and none of the m
possessed any archaeological knowledge. For this reason the y
got in touch with me and asked if I would take charge of the
party in return for a share in whatever the y
found.
Although, when I first heard the aviator's story, I was skeptical, yet as I
weighed and measured his statements my doubts began to dissolve. The fellow was
absolutely ignorant of archaeology or the
ancient Mayan civilization, yet he had correctly described the appearance of the
almost legendary Maya "books." And he could not have imagined
anything of the sort nor could he
have read of the m, for no book,
pamphlet or magazine article describing similar objects had ever been published
as far as I could ascertain. Only in rare, almost unknown writings of the old Spanish priests and conquerors was the re any reference to the
traditional, or supposedly fabulous, golden books containing the secret history of the
Maya race and civilization. Neverthe less,
it seemed far too remarkable a coincidence that an aviator, crashing haphazard
in the Yucatan the exact spot where the most valuable of Mayan treasures had been
concealed. Still, truth at times is far stranger than fiction. I knew by
experience that amazing coincidences do occur far more often than is generally
believed, and I decided to secure the
opinion of a friend, who is perhaps the
best known authority on Mayan objects, before com ing
to a final decision.
His reply astonished me, for I had rathe r expected a practical hardheaded scientist would
scoff at the whole story. Instead,
he wrote to me as follows: "I am convinced of the
sincerity of the aviator, and I
believe that he has found som ething the re, probably of great interest. ... Of course, we
could not take part in the
expedition officially, as it would spoil our cordial relations with the Mexican Government. As far as the objects described are concerned the y are unique. ... Whethe r
gold or not, the y would be of
extraordinary archaeological value, and I am extremely interested in the proposition. I hope you will be able to help
unravel this intriguing problem."
That decided me; I agreed to accom pany the
treasure hunters and take charge of the
expedition. But the re were many
difficulties to be overcom e and many
details to be attended to before we could start. First of all we had to secure
a proper boat for the trip. This had
to be large enough to accom modate
our party and our outfit, staunch enough to weathe r
the gales and heavy seas of the Gulf of Mexico ,
yet it must be of shallow draught to navigate the
lagoons and rivers, and equipped with both sails and motor. Most important of
all, we needed a captain and crew whom
we could trust and who were of the
adventurous type.
At last we found a vessel that seemed to possess
all the essential requirements. She
was sloop-rigged, forty feet in length, drew four feet of water, had a beam of thirteen
feet and was equipped with a fifty horse-power gasoline motor. She had had a
varied career; sponger, rum-runner, fisherman and smuggler in turn; and her grizzled,
leathe r-faced Norwegian owner, who
also acted as captain, asked no inconvenient questions.
Then came the
matter of outfit supplies, medical stores, camping outfits, arms and
ammunition. But at last all was ready and our search for the
Maya treasure began.
We were rathe r
crowded, for eight of us went aboard at Havana the aviator, who had gone
ahead by steamer, for he was a poor sailor, was to be picked up at Progreso.
Our party consisted of the captain, the mate who also acted as engineer, the cook who was likewise the
radio operator; Dick, Pete, George, Bob and myself; about as varied an
assortment as could have been found. The skipper, a hawk-nosed old fellow who
would have made an ideal pirate, but in whose veins the
Viking blood had turned to water and very thin water as we later discovered.
The engineer-mate, an ex-naval man. Sparks, the
ne'er-do-well scion of a wealthy family of note. Dick, young, exuberant,
enthusiastic and an amateur yachtsman. Pete, who thought himself almighty
hunter and a dead shot, who constantly read wild west thrillers and was
provided with a veritable arsenal of rifles, shot guns and revolvers. Bob, big,
blonde and British, a husky young giant who had gone through the World War. George, a well-known author and
novelist, a treasuretrove fan, and possessing a tendency towards com munism and a dry humor, and finally, myself. With
everything in readiness, tanks filled with water, refrigerator packed with ice,
extra drums of gasolene on deck, we moved bag and baggage aboard and waited
impatiently for the weathe r to permit us to start, for the Gulf of Mexico in winter is a treacherous sea
and on the morning we had planned to
leave a howling "northe r"
was thundering across the Gulf.
Mountainous seas came rolling in to burst in up-flung foam and spray above the Malecon, and no ships othe r
than the ocean liners dared venture
forth. But the next day dawned dear
and sunny, and although the seas
were still running mountain-high beyond the
Morro we cast off moorings and headed for the
harbor mouth. For a few mom ents, as
we reached the open sea, I thought
certain that our expedition would end the n
and the re, for it seemed impossible
that the Vigilance could live through such a sea. Between the waves even the
highest buildings of Havana the trough of the
seas the y never expected to see us
rise again. But the little craft
managed to survive and even made good time.
By mid-afternoon the re
was only a moderate sea running, and as we were all dog-tired and it would have
been dangerous to attempt navigating the
channels of the barrier-reef, we put
into Bahia Honda for the night.
A mile or so from
the entrance of the great landlocked harbor, a boat came pulling
alongside, its occupants two Cubans, one in khaki shirt and trousers,
barefooted and bare-legged; the othe r clad in dirty white, and both wearing heavy
revolvers and cartridge belts. He of the
khaki introduced himself as a sergeant in the
Cuban Army and his com rade as a
soldado, and explained that the y had
been fishing, and offered to pilot us to the
port in return for the ir passage. At
the port, which consisted of a weathe r-beaten, ramshackle building that served for a barracks,
an even more tumble-down shed that did duty as a warehouse, and a rickety
wharf, a group of Negroes and a few slouching soldiers had gathe red on the
dock. But the re was no official to
receive us, and we were informed that in order to com ply
with the law we must go to the "City" ten miles inland, the port being only a landing place. And, looking as
if he had been waiting for us ever since we had left Havana the remains of what once had been a Ford car.
"Good Lord!" I ejaculated when I saw the ancient conveyance. "That's nothing but a
wreck."
The chauffeur grinned the
wider. "Si, senor," he agreed. "But it's the
best wreck in Bahia Honda!"
There was no alternative, so the six of us crowded into the
battered tin Lizzie, a ragamuffin cranked the
motor, and with a rattle and bang it woke into life. Off we went and never have
I had such a wild ride! As if ruts, stones, holes, fallen branches and othe r natural objects were not enough, our maniac
driver seemed to take supreme delight in seeing how close he could com e to running down stray cattle, by how narrow a
margin he could miss barbed wire fences and trees and how fast he could take a
corner on two wheels. But eventually, by nothing less than a miracle, we
reached the town. It was a miserable
apology of a place with horrible streets filled with mud-puddles, with a bare
dusty plaza, a church that stood drunkenly awry, sundry unpainted shacks and
hovels and with mangy, starving curs, naked black and brown children and
repulsive black vultures everywhere. In response to our knocks at his door, the Captain of the
Port appeared clad in filthy pajamas. He was a surly looking rascal,
black-browed and muddy-skinned, and calmly informed us that if we wished to
make entry we must return to the
port and the re await his pleasure to
receive us.
We had thought the
up trip a nightmare, but it was nothing com pared
with the return journey, for anothe r "wreck" having materialized from nowhere, our driver decided to make it a race,
and how we escaped death still remains a mystery to us all. Like madmen the two black fiends drove the ir
protesting, rattling, tortured cars; leaping the
bowlders and the obstructions,
plunging through swamp-holes, crashing through brush, skidding around corners,
and yelling like wild Indians. But by the
grace of God we reached the port in
safety. Eventually, also, the Captain
of the Port put in his appearance, quite
gorgeously arrayed in spotless white uniform, gold lace and brass buttons, and
a peaked blue cap, and accom panied by
a bodyguard of half a dozen soldiers in full service equipment including rifles
and bayonets. Having glanced over our papers he proceeded to "hold us
up" by declaring we had violated several of the
Cuban maritime laws, that we were liable to a heavy fine for not having taken on
a qualified pilot, etc. In vain I argued that as the re
was no pilot available we could not have taken him aboard, and that our
authority from Havana permitted us
to alter and leave any Cuban port without paying dues. Very arrogantly the rascal informed us that the
absence of a pilot had no bearing on the
case. The law decreed that pilotage was com pulsory,
but it made no provision for having a pilot. It reminded me of the story of the
collegiates who, when driving a car without a windshield, were held up by a
traffic policeman, and when the y
protested that the law did not com pel a windshield on a car the
cop agreed that might be the case,
but reminded the m that the law made it com pulsory
for a car to be provided with a windshield-cleaner, and the reupon
handed the m a ticket. There was no
use trying to convince the Cuban official,
but he did admit that as we were strangers and Gringos, and hence ignorant of the law, we probably had not violated the m deliberately, and hence he would overlook the fine if we paid him fifteen dollars which was the pilotage fee. Then, as an afterthought, he added
that the re would be a furthe r charge of five dollars to pay for his services
for com ing aboard. It was
out-and-out robbery we knew, but he had the
local section of the Cuban Army to
support him so the re was nothing to
be done but to submit.
At dawn we bade Bahia Honda farewell and heading
westward found smooth water inside the
reefs, and late in the afternoon
dropped anchor in the lee of Jutia
Cay. A short distance from us was a
dingy, patched Cuban fishing smack, and hardly were our sails furled when a
boat put off from her and came alongside.
Its occupants were the two blackest,
raggedest, dirtiest Cubans I have ever seen, but the y
grinned amiably, announced the mselves
the captain and mate of the Angel Blanca (White Angel). Ye gods! was ever a
vessel more inappropriately named! And presented us with half a dozen fine
lobsters. Naturally this called for a return, and with our visitors puffing
American cigarettes, and with friendly relations thus established, the schooner's skipper informed us that the neighboring bay was fairly swarming with the jutias. "Ah, senor, you have but to load
and fire Bam! Bam! Bam!" he cried, gesturing vividly. For the benefit of those who do not know, let me explain
that the jutia is a large rodent,
weighing twelve to twenty-five pounds, resembling a giant guinea pig in
appearance, with the fur of a
raccoon and the tail of a rat, and
more or less arboreal in habits. As its flesh is most delectable, the dusky skipper's information resulted in
immediate preparations for a jutia hunt.
Landing upon the
cay in com pany with the two Cubans who had volunteered to act as guides
and to carry back the bag of jutias
we found ourselves faced by an impenetrable barrier of dense thorny brush and
vines. But our guide assured us that farthe r
on the re was an opening where we might
penetrate to the interior where the gaunt limbs and trunks of dead trees marked the alleged haunt of the
creatures we sought The "opening" proved merely a slightly less
impenetrable wall of jungle. But we managed to get through or rathe r Bob and I did, for the
othe rs gave up after the first few yards and with clothe s torn and legs scratched and bleeding we emerged
from the
entanglement into more open country where a jungle of small trees bordered a
dark, dismal swamp filled with dead trees and with swarms of hungry mosquitoes.
Slapping at the vicious insects,
splashing through black mud, dodging thorn trees, we pressed on; but with no
sign of the jutias that were
supposed to infest the place. And the n, suddenly, an enormous jutia dashed from a thicket ahead. I threw up my gun to shoot, but
before I could press the trigger the Cuban near me uttered a yell like a Com anche, and waving his machete rushed after the beast directly in my line of fire. The next
instant both man and beast vanished in the
brush, whence, presently, the Cuban
returned ruefully picking thorns from
his bare feet and cursing volubly. And that was the
only jutia we saw. Tired and disgusted we tramped back to the boat and vowed never again to believe anything a
Cuban told us.
Before sunrise we were again on our way. The day
passed uneventfully and just as the
sun sank below the western horizon
we passed Cape San Antonio light and headed across the
channel for distant Yucatan.
A strip of dazzling snow white beach above a sea
of liquid beryl, and beyond the
beach a wall of malachite-green verdure and waving palms such was our first
vision of Yucatan as we dropped anchor off Holbox Cay (pronounced All bosh).
Had it not been for the boats moored
close inshore, and the throng of
people gathe red upon the beach, the
island might have been uninhabited, for the re
was no sign of village or house. Directly the
keel of our dinghy touched bottom , a
dozen men rushed knee-deep into the
water and literally lifted our boat high and dry onto the
sand. Then, laughing and chattering, the
people crowded about us, as curious as though we had been beings from Mars. And no wonder, for never before had Gringos
visited the cay and never before had
any of the inhabitants seen an
outboard motor. In fact we were the
first strangers of any kind who had visited Holbox in more than twenty years!
All were Mayas or partly Maya, spotlessly clean
and neat, the men wearing drill
trousers, the typical Yucatan shirt
much ruffled and tucked and worn outside the
trousers and high-crowned palm leaf som breros;
the wom en
in the low-cut ruffled and richly
embroidered Mayan dresses.
Greetings and introductions over, and with the Alcalde of Holbox leading the
way, the procession escorting us marched
along a straight sandy path between walls of jungle and nodding palms. Two
hundred yards inland and suddenly, unexpectedly, we were in the "town." Perhaps it should not be
called that; rathe r it might be deemed
a mere village, for its total population would not number three hundred. But as
it is the only settlement on the island, as it is the
metropolis and the port as well as the capital, with its essential officials, why not dignify
it by referring to it in the fond
terms applied by its delightful citizens?
Though its streets were merely thoroughfares of
sand, all were named, and although the
buildings were all of thatch, all were numbered, all were spotless, and many were
painted. There was a tiny plaza, and, quite true to form, on one side was the alcaldia
and the church. Although the church was a tiny affair, and while neithe r priest nor cleric dwells at Holbox, yet loving
care was lavished upon it, and very impressive was the
deep reverence the people showed for
it. And even if the alcaldia was of
thatch, yet it was the largest of the buildings and served not only as the seat of government, but also as a schoolhouse
and a ballroom as occasion demanded.
But the re were two things that I
missed. I saw no jail, no calaboose, and I saw no one who appeared to be a
policeman. In answer to my queries I was told, quite as a matter of course,
that neithe r policemen nor a jail
were required. Neithe r did Holbox
possess a lawyer, a doctor, a judge nor even an undertaker.
"Do the
people never die are the y never
ill?" I asked the roly-poly,
brown-faced alcalde. For a brief
instant he removed the long, crooked
cigar from his mouth in order to
reply.
"It is a most healthy place my
island," he informed me. "Perhaps it is that we of Holbox eat so much
of the fish, quien sabe?" he shrugged his shoulders. "And never have
we required a medico. And only the
very young and the very old die,
senor."
I glanced about, children barely able to toddle,
kiddies of both sexes and all ages, were everywhere in evidence, and in the blazing sunlight, spreading copra to dry, were two
men whose snow-white hair and beards spoke most eloquently of age.
"And what, Señor Alcalde, do you consider
very young and very old?" I asked him.
He grinned. "Until the y
can creep about and after the y can
no longer creep," he replied. Then, indicating one of the ancients busy with the
copra, "There, senor, is my great-grandfathe r.
He is one hundred and two, yet he still carries his load of wood as well as any
one. And the re with him is Pablo
Gonzales whose ninety-eighth birthday was but last week, and who celebrated by
taking to himself a new wife. Ah, a lovely bride, senor; muy guapa, and only
ninety-six!"
Perhaps the
most outstanding feature of Holbox and its people is cleanliness, and this is the more astonishing as the
inhabitants are engaged in one of the
dirtiest of trades, for the sole
industry of the people is
shark-fishing! I doubt if any othe r
com munity of equal size anywhere is
supported entirely by sharks; but sharks not only provide a livelihood for the three hundred odd inhabitants of Holbox, but
enable the m to live very well
indeed.
To be sure, nobody is rich, but neithe r is anybody poor. All are independent, all are
content and the re are no social
distinctions, no jealousy. One might think that shark-fishing would be a
hazardous occupation; but I was assured by the
alcalde and othe rs that never in the history of Holbox had a man been killed or badly
injured by a shark. "Not that the
sharks are not dangerous," the
alcalde explained, "but because we of Holbox are most careful."
Of course our visit called for a fiesta which
lasted until dawn when, accom panied
by practically all the inhabitants,
we wended our way to the beach, bade
farewell to our charming, happy hosts, and boarding the
Vigilance, set sail for Progreso
where we arrived late that night. Next morning we prepared to receive the port officials, but hour after hour passed with
no sign of anybody bothe ring about
us. But at last a boat arrived and its two swarthy occupants informed us that
we were to go alongside the dock to be
received. As we hove up anchor and prepared to get under way I picked up a line
with the idea of throwing it to the fellows and giving the m
a tow.
"No! no, señor!" the y cried in unison. "We cannot touch a rope
until you have been passed by the sanidad (doctor). If we did we would be
arrested, fined and cast into prison."
A mom ent
later as I was hauling in the
trolling-line, one of the fellows
called to me, a broad grin on his face: "The law says nothing about a
fishing-line, senor." So, at the
end of our trolling-line the boat
was towed to shore, thus com plying
with the letter, if not with the spirit, of the
regulations.
We soon discovered that the
boatmen were not the only experts at
circumventing the maritime laws of Mexico.
As we neared the dock a man waved
his arms wildly, yelling for us to keep off. Here was a pretty how-do-you-do!
One mom ent we were told to com e to the
dock; the next we were told not to.
But the seeming impasse was solved
by one of the assembled officials shouting
to us to com e alongside a tug moored
to the dock. Mexican rules may
prohibit a vessel touching the dock
until passed by the health-officer
and Custom s, but the y say nothing about mooring to anothe r ship lying at a dock!
We had planned to stop at Progreso only long
enough to secure fresh water and provisions and to pick up our aviator, but
Fate decreed othe rwise, for a northe r sweeping down across the
treacherous Gulf lashed the harbor into
a maelstrom and held us prisoners
ashore for three days while the port
remained closed to all shipping. Time, however, did not hang heavily on our
hands, for the re was Merida only a
few miles inland, with the amazing
ruins of Chichen Itza and othe r
ancient Maya cities and temples within easy reach.
When at last the
northe r had blown itself out we once
more resumed our journey toward the
site of the aviator's strange
discovery. Stopping in at Campeche we were received as hospitably and
effusively as at Progreso and we were asked by the
postmaster if we would carry two bags of mail to Puerto Aguada. Anxious to accom modate him, but fearing that it might result in som e entanglement in the
intricacies of Mexican red tape, I explained that we had cleared for Carmen and
that as Aguada was not a port of entry, we could not legally put in the re. But he assured me that it was quite all
right. "You will be carrying the
national mails, senor," he said. "Si, I will provide you with an
official flag. And you need not land. If you but blow the
whistle a boat will com e to you from the
shore and receive the correo."
So, temporarily, we became a mail packet, and by
so doing raised as much of a com motion
in Mexican officialdom as though we
had smuggled a cargo of munitions of war into Aguada.
Leaving Campeche and headed for the Laguna de Terminos we felt that we were
"getting warm" as the y say
in "hunt the thimble," for
up one of the rivers that empty into
the big shoal lagoon was the wrecked plane and the
golden books of the Mayas. But
scarcely had we entered the lagoon,
having duly delivered the mail to the boat at Aguada, when Fate began to interfere
with our plans. Though we were directly in the
channel—as plotted on the charts—we
went hard and fast aground on a mud flat. Pushing, poling and kedging proving
fruitless so we gave up and settled ourselves to await the
rising tide, meanwhile sending Dick and Bob in the
small boat to Aguada to secure a pilot. With the
Maya practice aboard we had no furthe r
trouble, until we approached the
fringe of mangroves with the mouth
of the Candelaria River marked by a
primitive lighthouse on a flooded point of land. But here our local pilot came
to grief. Like all the rivers of the district the
visible mouth of the Candelaria is
barely one hundred feet wide and barred by sand banks and oyster reefs between
which, som ewhere, was a reputed
channel. But to find the channel was
like hunting for the proverbial
needle in a haystack and only after going aground a dozen times did we succeed
in entering the river's mouth and
drew up to a flimsy bamboo wharf near the
lighthouse where a couple of thatched huts were perched on posts above the mud and water among the
mangroves. Upon the landing stage
two men awaited us, one gray-haired and gray-bearded, clad in heavy woolen
mackinaw and canvas trousers; the othe r, almost as venerable, dressed in a patchwork of
odds and ends. That any human beings could exist in such a spot seemed
incredible. There was no dry land, no fresh water, no firewood nothing but
stinking mud, sprawling mangroves, hordes of pelicans, ibis and herons, and
oysters, growing by millions on the
mangrove roots and bed of the
stream. But he of the mackinaw, who
declared himself to be eighty-four, informed us that he had lived in this spot
for sixty years and never had been ill for a single day. By this time our
skipper had acquired the pilot habit
and as our practice from Aguada
admitted total ignorance of the
river channels, we hired the ancient
with the mackinaw, who claimed to be
familiar with every bend, shoal, current and twist of the
stream. The fact that he was the tender
of the lighthouse and that he would
be deserting his post did not trouble him in the
least "The light, senor," he informed me, "has been here but
thirty years. Before the n, for God
knows how many years, the re was no
light. Yet all that time boats came and went. For Dios, senor, can it not the n be spared for a few days? And—," he added
as a final argument, "few boats com e
this way, and those that do know the
channel without the light and, of a
truth, much of the time I bothe r not to light it anyway."
Our aviator treasure-finder had assured us that the Candelaria was the
stream he had noted just before he had crashed and that he could easily
identify the proper place to search
because of a conspicuous sharp "S" bend of the
stream due south of the spot where
he had crashed. But as we chugged up the
great river between interminable mangroves and impenetrable jungles, we were
unwittingly traveling not nearer but farthe r
from the
treasure that we sought. And very soon it became obvious to all that we were on
the wrong river.
The aviator insisted that he had not sighted a
house, village or even a clearing othe r
than the deserted spot where he had
com e to earth. Yet along the Candelaria the re
were clearings galore, houses and settlements, and even two good-sized
villages! However, having com e thus far,
we decided to keep on. Possibly, we thought, the
aviator had been farthe r inland than
he had believed, and that the upper
reaches of the river might be
uninhabited. Anyway, we'd have a look, do a bit of exploring and satisfy
ourselves one way or the othe r before deciding on our next move. But when we
were a few miles above the largest
settlement—which most appropriately bore the
name of Suspiro or "The Last Gasp," our pilot informed us that we
could go no farthe r in the Vigilance.
Just ahead were rapids a whole series, hundreds of the m.
So, running in under the banks, we
moored our little ship to a tree, and lowering our dinghy with its outboard motor,
I prepared to discover for myself what lay beyond. George, it appeared, had a
mortal terror of snakes and firmly believed the
Yucatan jungle fairly swarmed with venom ous
serpents. Pete, too, held back, for he shared George's fear of deadly reptiles.
And as the
aviator had already decided that for som e
inexplicable reason he had made a mistake, and hence took no furthe r interest in the
river, only Dick, Bob and myself embarked in the
small boat and headed up stream.
The first rapid didn't amount to much, and with
little trouble our motor forced the
boat through the swift broken water.
But the second rapid was an entirely
different proposition. Foaming and roaring, the
stream came plunging over the rocks
with terrific force. But I had had years of experience with tropical rapids,
and selecting a chute-like stretch of black water, I shouted to Dick to give the motor full speed and head for it. With a rush we
were at it. For a mom ent the boat hesitated; the n
slowly, inch by inch, it moved up the
liquid slope and emerged in the
smooth water beyond. At the third
rapid, however, we very nearly came to grief. Despite the
full power of the motor, the boat remained stationary in the terrific grip of the
current, and even when Bob and I pulled with all our strength at the oars, we could make no headway. Realizing that the struggle was hopeless, I yelled to Dick to slow the motor down and permit the
boat to drop back. But I had forgotten to warn him that the
eddies and whirlpools below the
rapids were more dangerous than the
falls the mselves. Instead of letting
the dinghy drift with the current, until well clear of all danger, Dick
opened the throttle and swung the boat about. Instantly we were in the grip of the
whirlpool. The dinghy careened perilously, water poured over the gunwale, and she spun like a top. For a mom ent I thought nothing could save us; but
fortunately Dick heard my frenzied: "Stop her!" in time.
He shut off the
motor and the boat righted and swung
with the current.
But it was a mighty dose shave!
Next morning, com pletely
beaten by the series of rapids, and
thoroughly convinced that we were on the
wrong river, we returned downstream and again moored to the
lightkeeper's wharf. After discussing every possible angle of the situation, and cross-questioning the aviator and consulting maps and charts of the district none of which were anywhere near
correct we decided that our only course was to try the
next river. So with our venerable mackinaw-clad pilot at the
helm we left the Candelaria and
headed across the lagoon for the Chumpum River. But before we sighted the mouth of that stream, anothe r
northe r came howling down, whipping the shoal water into ugly seas. To be caught in the height of the
storm on a lee shore without harbor or shelter would have meant certain
disaster, and our only hope was to head across the
bay and anchor in the lee of Carmen
island. It was lucky for us that we did not delay, for we barely made it.
Green seas broke com pletely
over the decks, the little ship seemed actually to stand on end at
times; and each time she dropped from
the crest of a wave she came down with
a sickening crash that threatened to knock the
bottom out of her. Even with her
powerful motor at full speed she made barely three knots in the face of the
terrific gale, and six terrible hours were consumed in crossing that eighteen-mile
strip of bay to where, at last, we were able to drop anchor in com paratively smooth water. By the
next day the worst of the northe r
was over, and as we were in need of fresh water and provisions, we decided to
put into port before returning to ascend the
river.
A crowd was awaiting us as we approached the dock at Carmen, and to our surprise we
discovered that we had innocently and unwittingly created more com motion and excitement than anything since the last revolution. In fact we had been the cause of a serious controversy between officials
that had for a time threatened to disrupt the
peace of the district, we had caused
official despatches to keep the
wires hot between Carmen and Mexico City, and we had very narrowly escaped being
chased by an armed force, arrested and thrown into prison! And all because of
those sacks of mail from Campeche
which we had delivered to the boat
at Aguada!
Our stop at Aguada had been reported; the port captain at Carmen had been advised from Campeche that we had cleared for Carmen, and
instantly he had gone up in the air,
so to speak. He had sent a scathing and denunciatory message to the com mandante
at Aguada in which he accused that official of having violated the law by allowing us to enter the port, and hinted that he was aiding and abetting
revolutionists or filibusters, or at the
least an American secret mission, to enter Mexican territory illegally.
Following this, the irate and
excitable port captain had sent a wireless message to Mexico City asking for the arrest and imprisonment of the poor Aguada com mandante.
The latter had countered by wiring to the
capital that as we carried mail from
Campeche to Aguada, and had had the
mail flag, the authorities must have
expected us to touch at Aguada, and he quite logically argued that had he not
permitted us to enter he would have been interfering with the Government mails. In the
meantime, frenzied word had been sent that an "American gunboat"—Ye
gods! the Vigilance being mistaken for such—had been seen ascending the Candelaria River after kidnaping the keeper of the
lighthouse! The excitable natives and the
imaginative port captain could think of but one explanation. The Americanos had
designs on Yucatan! And the fact
that the local press had been filled
with hot-headed denunciations of the
"Yanquis" in connection with the
Lower California episode, lent color to the
idea. Thereupon the port captain had
been on the point of radioing for a
gunboat and a com pany of soldiers to
capture us when an American resident of the
town had received word from our
"agent" in Campeche informing him that as we had taken out
"cabotaje" or coasting papers we had a perfect right to stop at
Aguada or anywhere else. Thereupon every one concerned was satisfied. The
tempest in a teapot was over. The port captain and the
com mandante
exchanged mutual regrets over the misunderstanding.
Mexico City was duly notified that a mistake had been made, amicable relations
were once more established all around, and when we arrived we were welcom ed effusively, and literally with open arms.
"But," suggested the
fiercely-mustached and pom pous port
captain, as he patted me on the back
and embraced me, "it would be wise if the
Americanos did not fly the ir flag on the
'yate' except when entering a port."
Even if all suspicions of our gun-running
mission had been allayed, still the
rom antically-minded Yucatecans could
not be satisfied with such tame and everyday reasons as we offered in
explanation of our presence, not of course mentioning our search for the Maya treasure. To the ir
minds the re must be som ething far more advenurous to have induced Gringos
to voyage so far in such a small boat. And as the y
knew nothing of the Maya treasure-trove
that the aviator had discovered, the ir active, imaginative minds sought for som e sinister and ulterior reason for our being the re. As a result, when we were at last ready to
sail, our local "agent" informed us that the
port captain would not issue clearance papers unless we were accom panied by an officer. Moreover, we were not only
required to supply bed and board to the
unwelcom e official, but were to pay
him for his time also. It was crowded enough aboard the
Vigilance as it was, we had no
intention of supporting an officer in com parative
luxury and paying him in addition, and with an officer on board it would be
impossible to get away with the
treasure. Finally, we decided, it was just a new scheme for squeezing a few
more dollars from us, and angry and disgusted
I hurried off to beard the port
captain in his den. As I entered his office he sprang to his feet, welcom ed me cordially and patted me on the back like the
dearest of friends. And when, still seething, I demanded why he had given such
an order, and added that if that was his idea of courtesy we'd clear for
Progreso forthwith, he instantly disclaimed all intentions of causing us the slightest inconvenience and actually appeared to
be as "desolated" as he claimed to be because I should have misjudged
him.
"But, senor mio!" he exclaimed.
"I am your friend, your com padre, your servant. I kiss your hand, excelencia, I obey your slightest wish.
I am here to show you and your com panions
every courtesy, to make everything easy, to render you every service. Of a
truth, amigo mio, anything within my
poor power will I do to make you remember Carmen with nothing but delight. The
order—" he chuckled, embraced me and beamed "the
order, senor, was but my little joke. You are at liberty to go where and when
you so desire without hindrance, amigo. But—" he winked—"I must show
my authority at times. Your agent—" he shrugged—"must be made to know
his place. He would have you Americanos think that only he can arrange matters.
So to him I give the order so that you
will com e to me and I may the reupon prove my desire to be of service, while
your agent may thus know that he is not such a great man as he may think
himself. Ah, si, excelencia, it is in such manner that we must make small those
who feel the mselves to be great. Si,
of a truth, senor, we must now and the n
prick the bubbles so that the y may burst—Pff ! Is it not so, excelencia? And now, mi amigo, do me the honor to accept my most humble apologies that
you have been so inconvenienced. And may you go with God, senor!"
Grinning, I left his presence. There was som ething very ludicrous in his scheme for calling
down the agent by issuing an order
aimed at us and which did not affect the
agent in the least. In fact it
reminded me forcibly of old Blackbeard the
pirate who, having pistoled two of his officers, remarked that if he
"didn't shoot an officer now and the n
his crew would forget who he was."
The water over the
bar at the river's mouth proved too shallow
for the Vigilance, so she was anchored outside and we ferried ourselves and
belongings ashore in the dinghy and
made ourselves at hom e in the ranch house of a huge estate whose owner had
given us letters to his Mexican manager. Here, once again, George's terror of snakes
caused him to decide to remain at the
ranch rathe r than tempt Fate in the jungles, and, as usual, Pete followed suit. So,
with a grinning, brown-skinned Mayan to serve as guide, camp-boy and
man-of-all-work, Dick, Bob, the
aviator and myself started up river in hopes of finding the
hidden treasure.
As an excursion or a hunting trip the voyage was all any one could have wished. There
were no houses, no settlements. Everywhere was jungle containing countless forms
of bird-life. Alligators and crocodiles basked on logs beside the banks. There were deer, peccary, jaguars, pumas,
ocelot, tapir and wild turkeys in the
forests. And, basking in the
sunshine upon the tops of the low trees that lined the
river banks, were hundreds of gigantic iguanas, dragon-like monsters eight to
nine feet in length and striped like tigers with brilliant orange and black.
Possibly iguanas should not be dignified by the name of game; but if any one thinks that the se giant lizards cannot provide sport and
excitement let him try shooting iguanas with a rifle while standing in a
fifteen-foot boat. And to see and hear an eight-foot dragon com e crashing down at the
report of one's rifle gives one no small thrill. Moreover, the creatures are good to eat, and with three of the big fellows in our boat I anticipated a toothsom e stew when we camped for the
night. At last, a short time before sundown, we swung around a bend and
Encantada was before us, a deserted camp-like dwelling once used as barracks by
the vaqueros and chicle gathe rers of the
ranch. In its entrancing setting of luxuriant tropical vegetation, flaming
flowers, golden fruit-laden orange trees, waving palms and background of virgin
forest its name, meaning "The Enchanted," seemed most appropriate.
But no sooner had we stepped ashore than we realized how misleading was the name and why the
place had been abandoned. Instantly we were enveloped in a perfect cloud of the terrible rodederos
or day-flying biting gnats of Yucatan. In vain we thrashed about, slapped,
brushed, smoked and cursed. They filled our ears, crawled up our noses,
blundered into our eyes and drew blood from
every inch of our exposed skin. Madly we raced up the
steep bank, hoping the pests might
be confined to the lowland. But the y were as thick if not thicker the re, and to make matters worse, the y were reinforced by swarms of equally vicious
mosquitoes. It was humanly impossible to withstand the
united attack, and we dashed for the
tumble-down building that had once served as a kitchen, hoping that by kindling
a smoky fire we might find relief. But scarcely had we entered when we were in
full retreat, for the kitchen was
fairly alive with vermin. We were between the
devil and the deep sea, so to speak,
but sulphur candles and spraying with formalin decreased the
flea army in the kitchen to som e extent, and to our vast relief we found that the rodederos
abandoned the ir offensive in the semi-darkness of the
building, while the pungent smoke from green leaves had the
desired effect upon the mosquitoes.
With sundown, both rodederos and mosquitoes vanished, but we looked forward with
anything but pleasure to exploring the
jungle the next day. In the morning, however, a brisk wind was blowing, and
although the jungle teemed with
mosquitoes, and we were com pelled to
cover our heads and faces with improvised nets, to stuff cotton in ears and
nostrils and smear our hands and arms with a mixture of vaseline and creosote,
we managed to do fairly well. Throughout that day we explored the river, cruising for miles upstream, searching for
the aviator's peculiar S-shaped bend
by which we hoped to locate the
treasure. Time after time we would com e
to a bend which he declared must be the
right one. Landing, we would take com pass
bearings and hew our way into the
jungle with machetes. And such jungles! Never in my forty years' experience in the West Indies, Central and South America, have I
seen anything to equal the m. It was
impossible to move five feet in any direction without cutting a path. Palms
with trunks covered with great black spines, wiry bushes armed with crooked thorns,
twisted, tangled briars, razor-edged saw-grass, prickly agaves, acacias and cacti,
with fallen limbs and leaves, knee-deep vegetable debris and slimy trunks of wild
plantains all formed an almost solid wall, while underfoot the ground was a sea of sticky black ooze in which
we sank to our ankles. It was obvious that the
aviator, with no machete, could never have forced his way at night through such
a barrier, and according to him the
vegetation about the ancient
clearing was not dense. In fact it couldn't have been, for he had walked through
the forest for seventeen hours with
no means of cutting a trail. But the re
was the chance that the character of the
jungle might change a short distance from
the river, and the only way of determining what lay inland was to
hew a way in. It was terrible work, and bitterly disheartening, to toil for
hours cutting through the tangle,
tearing flesh and garments, in agonies from
biting insects, only to find no large trees or open forest.
But so positive was the
aviator that we were on the right
stream, so certain he seemed of his distance from
the coast and river and his com pass bearings when he had first found his engine
missing, and so sincere in his statements, that despite discouragement after
discouragement, despite the fact
that he "identified" fully a dozen bends as the
right one, we kept at it. But at last, after days of futile, fearful labor,
after weary hours of hacking and hewing through the
jungle, the aviator was forced to admit
that he had made a mistake som ewhere,
that he was totally at a loss. The river, he argued, when viewed from a boat upon its surface did not look the same as when seen from
the air, and also, he pointed out,
although he had spotted only one S-bend the re
were scores which, in all probability, had been hidden from
his view by the forest. All our
hopes were dashed. The one man who knew or claimed to know the secret of the
Mayas' treasure had failed us. And at last, bitterly disappointed and utterly
discouraged, we abandoned the search
and returned downstream.
We arrived at the
ranch to find George tremendously elated. He actually had seen a snake! During
all the time we had been upriver and
in the jungles we had not seen a
trace of a serpent, yet hare at the
ranch, a snake and a venom ous snake
at that had been killed in the
kitchen patio. And I still maintain that the
little viper wriggled from the jungle and into the
patio and sacrificed its life for the
express purpose of satisfying George that the re
really were snakes in Yucatan.
Perhaps it was lucky for us that we did not find the
Mayan treasure, for when we reached Carmen we were boarded by my friend the port captain and half a dozen soldiers who with
profuse apologies and begging ten thousand pardons thoroughly searched the Vigilance
from stem to stern. Evidently the y had the ir
suspicions, and had the Mayan
treasure been found on board who can say what might have been the result as far as we were concerned? But it was
not until we were about to sail, and the
port captain had invited Bob and myself to drink a farewell toast in a native
liquor which, he affirmed, was com pounded
of sulphuric acid and gunpowder, and which tasted as if it might have been,
that I learned why our vessel had been searched.
During the
last ill-starred revolution, an airplane, bearing a fleeing rebel leader and
laden with gold coin and incriminating documents, had crashed som ewhere within the
jungle, and that, so the officials
surmised, was what we had been seeking.
Here was an entirely new angle, a new
development. By som e strange and
almost incredible coincidence had two rebel airplanes crashed in the same jungle-covered area? Was our aviator the pilot of the
ill-fated plane freighted with revolutionary documents, revolutionist funds and
a revolutionary leader? If so, had the
little aviator really stumbled upon the
underground hiding place of the
golden books of the Mayas, or had he
invented the tale in hopes of luring
an expedition in search of a mythical treasure in order that he might locate the plane and secure the
papers for which the Mexican
Government would pay a small fortune? Quien
sabe? as the Spaniards say. It
is a mystery we have never solved. Unquestionably, som ewhere
in the jungle, rests the wreckage of an .airplane containing the skeleton of a rebel leader, thousands of dollars
in minted gold and paper which, if in the
possession of the Mexican
Government, would result in many a man facing a firing squad. And possibly, not
far distant, the golden books of the Mayas still lie hidden in the ir
subterranean chamber, a treasure whose value is beyond all estimate.
Link to next chapter of They Found Gold - Ch 5-6
Link to next chapter of They Found Gold - Ch 5-6
No comments:
Post a Comment