DOING THE HONOURS. 



335 



posite corridor, where the sight of our loose traps might 

 not tempt them to their undoing, and selecting a place 

 for that purpose, the cartarets were set up immediately, 

 and, with all the comforts of home, the padres lay down 

 for an hour's rest. I had no ill-will toward these worthy 

 men ; on the contrary, the most friendly feeling ; but, 

 to do the honours of the palace, I invited them to dine 

 with us. Catherwood and Pawling objected, and they 

 would have done better if left to themselves ; but they 

 appreciated the spirit of the invitation, and returned me 

 muchas gratias. After their siesta I escorted them over 

 the palace, and left them in their apartment. Singu- 

 larly enough, that night there was no rain; so that, with 

 a hat before a candle, we crossed the courtyard and 

 paid them a visit ; we found the three reverend gentle- 

 men sitting on a mat on the ground, winding up the day 

 with a comfortable game at cards, and the Indians 

 asleep around them. 



The next morning, with the assistance of Pawling 

 and the Indians to lift and haul them, I escorted them 

 to the other buildings, heard some curious speculations, 

 and at two o'clock, with many expressions of good-will, 

 and pressing invitations to their different convents, they 

 returned to the village. 



Late in the afternoon the storm set in with terrific 

 thunder, which at night rolled with fearful crashes 

 against the Avails, while the vivid lightning flashed 

 along the corridors. The padres had laughed at us 

 for their superior discrimination in selecting a sleeping- 

 place, and this night their apartment was flooded. 

 From this time my notebook contains memoranda only 

 of the arrival of the Indians, with the time that the 

 storm set in, its violence and duration, the deluges of 

 rain, and the places to which we were obliged to move 



