The Earthquake at Mendoza, 20th March, 1861. 91 



probability I should die of starvation, when my life of agony 

 would be prolonged. 



" Thus passed two long, long hours. Hope indeed fought 

 with my drooping spirit. I am neither devout, nor am I 

 impious. I did not turn to God and beg for a life that ap- 

 peared to me to be quite out of the order of nature to grant, 

 but I did submit myself to his decrees ; and considering myself 

 as a mortal who was going in robust life to the gates of 

 eternity, I did all I could to calmly contemplate my frightful 

 situation, which I may call that of a living corpse. 



" After a time I heard a conversation between two men ; 

 one said, seeing that it was impossible to advance in that 

 direction with a carriage, he would leave it there and take the 

 horses away. In a moment it came to my recollection that on 

 the previous day I had been taken in a hired vehicle to a 

 country house in the vicinity of the city, and I believed the 

 voice I heard was that of the same coachman who drove 

 me, which same man had been rather talkative during that ride, 

 and that he had indirectly asked my name, and said he believed 

 that he had seen me in Copiapo. 



" I shouted out as well as I could several times, in the hope 

 they would hear me, which they did at last. When they 

 replied, I beseeched them to succour me, telling them that 

 although I was covered by a great weight of ruins, I was un- 

 hurt (which I then believed), and that I should not perish if 

 any assistance was afforded me. At once both of them com- 

 menced to remove the rubbish that covered me. 



" Lately I was so resigned, and when I had no hope of 

 being rescued ; now that it seemed I was about to be saved, I 

 felt my spirit sink within me. The companion of the good 

 Gonzales (for that was the name of the coachman) begin- 

 ning to feel the work severe, or on account of other motives, 

 said that he must leave off, but that he would return. Once 

 gone, I could not believe he would ever come back ; I feared 

 Gonzales would follow his example; and as I gave myself 

 only five or six hours more life if the weight above me was 

 not removed, I now considered I was indeed lost. But Gon- 

 zales, as if he had divined my thoughts, called aloud, telling 

 me not to despair ; that his death alone should prevent him 

 leaving his work of disinterring me undone. 



" You know that the houses of Mendoza are built of adobes, 

 or sun-dried bricks, and the mortar merely of mud, and not of 

 lime, consequently easier to separato than burnt bricks and 

 mortar ; so that when the walls fell down, they did so in such 

 a manner as rather to favour the removal of the ruins, even by 

 the hands alone. My benefactor worked away for more than 

 two hours, when he at last touched my head, and in a few 



