| | 1 | Author: | Herbert
Henry William
1807-1858 | Requires cookie* | | | Title: | Guarica, the charib bride  | | | | Published: | 2006 | | | | Subjects: | University of Virginia Library, Modern English collection | UVA-LIB-Text | | | | Description: | The heavy dew of the tropics was yet
lying bright and unexhaled on every herb
and flower; myriads of which, in most
profuse variety of odor and bloom, strewed,
like one gorgeous carpet, the beautiful savannahs,
and wild forest glades of the fair
province of Cahay. The sun had not fairly
risen, although the warm and rosy light
which harbingered his coming, was tinging,
with its fairy dyes, the small and fleecy
clouds that floated, like the isles of some
enchanted sea, over the azure skies. The
faint sea-breeze, which murmured still
among the fresh green leaves, though it
was fast subsiding, was laden with perfumes
of such strange richness, that while
they gratified they almost cloyed the
senses; birds of the most superb and gorgeous
plumage were glancing, meteor-like,
among the boughs; but the innumerable
insect tribes, which almost rival
them in beauty, had not as yet been called
forth to their life of a day, by the young
sunbeams. The loveliness of those sequestered
haunts, which had but recently
been opened to the untiring and insatiate
avarice of the Europeans, exceeded the
most wild conceptions, the most voluptuous
dreams, of the romancer or the poet. The
solemn verdure of the mighty woods thick
set with trees, more graceful than the
shades of those ægean Isles, where the
Ionian muse was born to witch the world
for ages—the light and feathery mimosas,
the fan-like heads of the tall palms, towering
a hundred feet above their humbler, yet
still lofty brethren—the giant oaks, their
whole trunks overgrown with thousands of
bright parasites, and their vast branches
canopied with vines and creepers—masses
of tangled and impervious foliage—the natural
lawns, watered by rills of crystal—
the rocks, that reared themselves among
the forests, mantled not as the crags of the
cold northern climes, with dark and melancholy
ivy, but with festoons of fruits and
flowers that might have graced the gardens
of the fabulous Hesperides. It was
upon such a scene, as is but imperfectly
and feebly shadowed forth, in the most
glowing language, that the sweet dawn
was breaking, when, from a distance,
through the lovely woodlands, the mellow
notes of a horn, clearly and scientifically
winded, came floating on the gentle air;
again it pealed forth its wild cadences,
nearer and louder than before—and then
the deep and ringing bay of a full mouthed
hound succeeded. Scarcely had the first
echo of the woods replied to the unwonted
sounds, before a beautiful, slight hind, forcing
her way through a dense thicket of
briers, dashed with the speed of mortal terror
into the centre of a small savannah,
through which stole almost silently a broad
bright rivulet of very limpid water. Pausing
for a second's space upon the brink, the
delicate creature stood, with its swan-like
neck curved backward, its thin ear erect,
its full black eye dilated, and its expanded
nostrils snuffing the tainted breeze. It was
but for a second that she stood; for the next
moment a louder and more boisterous crash
arose from the direction whence she had
first appeared—the blended tongues of
several hounds running together on a hot
and recent trail. Tossing her head aloft,
she gathered her slight limbs under her,
sprung at one vigorous and elastic bound
over the rivulet, and was lost instantly to
view among the thickets of the further
side. A few minutes elapsed during which
the fierce baying of the hounds came quicker
and more sharply on the ear; and then,
from the same brake out of which the bind
had started, rushed, with his eyes glowing
lika coals of fire, his head high in the air,
and his long feathery tail lashing his tawny
sides, a formidable blood hound, of that savage
breed which was, in after times, so
brutally employed against the hapless Indians
by their Christian conquerors. Another,
and another, and a fourth succeeded,
making the vaulted woods to bellow with
the deep cadences of their continuous cry.
Hard on the blood hounds, crashing through
the tangled branches with reckless and impetuous
ardor, a solitary huntsman followed
splendidly mounted on a fiery Andalusian
charger, of a deep chestnut color, with four
white legs, and a white blaze down his
face, whose long thin mane, and the large
cord-like veins that might be seen meandering
over his muscular, sleek limbs, attested,
as surely as the longest pedigree,
the purity of his blood. The rider was a
young man of some four or five-and-twenty
years, well, and rather powerfully made
than otherwise, though not above the middle
stature; his long dark hair, black eye,
and swarthy skin told of a slight admixture
of the Moorish blood; while the expression
of his features, though now excited somewhat
by the exhilaration of the chase,
grave, dignified and noble, bespoke him
without a doubt a polished cavalier of
Spain. His dress, adapted to the occupation
which he so gallantly pursued, was a
green doublet belted close about his waist
by a girdle of Cordovan leather, from which
swung, clinking at every stride of his
horse, against the stirrup, a long and basket-hilted
bilboa blade, in a steel scabbard,
which was the only weapon that he wore,
except a short two-edged stiletto, thrust
into the belt at the left side. A broad
sombrero hat, with a drooping feather,
breeches and gloves of chamois leather,
laced down the seams with silver, and russet
buskins drawn up to the knee, completed
his attire. He sat his horse gracefully
and firmly; and the ease with which
he supported him, and wheeled him to and
fro among the fallen trees and rocks, notwithstanding
the fiery speed at which he
rode, bespoke him no less skillful than intrepid
as a horseman. The chase continued
for above an hour, during which
every species of scenery that the level portions
of the isle contained was traversed by
the hunter; the open forest, the dense
swampy brake, the wide luxuriant savannah—and
each at such hot speed, that
though he turned aside neither for bush,
nor bank, though he plunged headlong
down the steepest crags, and dashed his
charger, without hesitation, over every fallen
tree that barred his progress, and every
brook or gulley that opposed him, still it
was with no little difficulty that he contrived
to keep the hounds in hearing. And
now the hapless hind, worn out by the sustained
exertions which had at first outstripped
the utmost pace of her pursuers,
but which availed her nothing to escape
from foes against whose most sagacious instinct
and unerring scent she had but fleetness
to oppose—was sinking fast, and must,
as the rider judged by the redoubled speed
and shriller baying of his hounds, soon turn
to bay, or be run down without resistance.
Her graceful head was bowed low toward
the earth; big tears streamed down her
hairy cheeks; her arid tongue lolled from
her frothing jaws; her coat, of late so
sleek and glossy, was all embossed with
sweat and foam, and wounded at more
points than one by the sharp thorns and
prickly underwood through which she had
toiled so fruitlessly. Still she strove on,
staggering and panting in a manner pitiful
to witness, when the deep bay of the blood
hounds was changed suddenly into a series
of sharp and savage yells, as they caught
view of their destined prey. | | | Similar Items: | Find |
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