84 OUR SEARCH FOR A WILDERNESS. 



Captain roared out for all hands to go to sleep. But he would 

 not practice what he preached for he always talked himself 

 to sleep, sometimes in English, or in Spanish or again in 

 Creole, while now and then he would mingle all three. 



By day one would not have suspected Filo, the mate, of 

 being a person of romance; but under the spell of the tropi- 

 cal moonlight he would often tell stories to the crew; stories in 

 which the heroine was always "i/!<y preciosa, muy joven, 

 muyUnda," — very charming, very young and very beautiful. 

 She would set difficult tasks for her many lovers, and her 

 favored suitor would be the one who most bravely bore him- 

 self under the tests. I remember one tale to which the crew 

 listened with awe; in which one of the lovers was to lie all 

 night in the cathedral, stiff and still like a corpse; another 

 was to go to the same cathedral on the same night dressed 

 in winding sheets like a ghost; another was to represent the 

 angel of death, while a fourth impersonated the devil; and a 

 fifth was sent as an ordinary man. Of course none of them 

 were to know of the others having been sent by the fair 

 heroine of the story; and of course the fortunate lover was 

 the one who showed no terror and passed the night quietly 

 in the church, returning in the morning to claim his bride. 



The story had its dramatic situations and Filo made the 

 most of them. Even Maestro was moved to utter a low 

 "Dios mio!" at the description of the entrance of the ghost, 

 the angel of death and finally the devil; at which the poor 

 corpse, who had been shaking with fear through it all, started 

 up and fled in terror. 



Filo's story lost nothing in his telling and the superstitious 



crew went very soberly to rest that night. W and I lay, 



as we so often did, staring wonderingly out into the night, 

 — the marvellous tropical night. 



It was all like a dream; the shining water of the caTw, the 

 deep, mysterious forest growing down to the water's edge, the 



