Bennington semi-weekly banner. (Bennington, Vt.) 1894-1902, 1895-08-23
SOFT BLACK EYES.

What a trivial thing will color the whole
of mans life! How small an incident,
compared to tho large future he has map
ped out for himself may make or mar it!
l learned all this and more one sultry May
day in Mexico five years ago.
had been sent to Mexico as chief of q
surveying corps to establish the boundaries
of the Santa Anita grant, which lay along
the Rio Claro just outside the city of Chi
huahua. 1t was responsible position for
n young man, and held my head high.
1t was the day of La Fiesta dc San Qua
dalupc. The saint himself had been dead
l understood, several hundred years, but
in Mexico that doesn't make any differ
encc. The longer folks are dead there tho
moro they seem to be thought of and the
bigger birthday party they have. Almost
every other week contains the feast day"
of some dead saint or saintGss, and trade
and commerce are suspended to do the Oc-
casiOn justice. The natives of Mexico are
tho most percnnially pious people on earth.
Why, | have known thCm-mon in my own
emplOy-tO be so GnthuSCd over the pos
thumous birthday of some long dead saint
that they would get up in the gray dawn
to go about celebrating it. This morning,
the morning of Guadalupe's feast day, the
whole force of poems under me had struck.
No chainmcn, no flagmcn, no aXmcn were
left me. Only Sims and Bailey, my two
American assistants, staid behind. When
began abusing them for the customs of
Mexico, they said while they did not care
even remotely for the saint to whom it
was dedicated, still they were glad it was
a holiday and they thought they would go
up stream and fish awhile. They were
only indifferent laymen, without any re-
ligious feeling.
When I was left alone in camp, spent
a short time on my field notes, when it
came over me that was wasting the day.
just outside the chaparral the river was
laughing and murmuring in the open. 1t
seemed to ask me to walk beside it. Tho
adobe huts along its banks were tenant
less; their inmates had gone to the feast.
But, strange sight, there ut the bend Of
the river where the waters were the mer-
REST was a solitary worker, and whatever
it was she was doing, she was doing it
with vim. A dark eyed dark haired,
dark shawled daughter of Spain she
seemed to be, and yet she was working
fit of curiosity seized me to know what she
was doing and why she was doing it. l
approached her with the question on my
lips at what did she work, and por-kay Il
spell it as l said it). Softly she raised
pair Of melting orbs and sweetly and elo-
quently she answered me. From her reply
in the most musical language in the world,
gathered that she would be at the feast,
but that she must cleanse the sOiled linen
that lay around her on the sand, for tho
owner of it, gentleman who was staying
at the United States hotel, wanted it by
noon, and tomorrow would not do (she
said this plaintivcly). If itwcre not done
by noon, she finished most pathetiCally,
she would get no diners, and that she
needed in tho speculative degree. Dinerol
All, the next most potent thing in Mexico
to saints days is money!
AS her red lips told me this, her great
black eyes wandered from the soiled
clothes ut her feet to the spires of the Ca
thedral in the distance and the waving
foliage of the plaza where the feasting and
merrymaking were going on. There was
a look of sadness and longing in them as
she gazed. Being a tender hearted man,
asked her If there was aught could do for
her. In q wonderful mixture of Anglo
Spanish, which l invented while in Mex
leo, and which no one could ever master
but myself, 1 assured her was at her serv-
ice if she so desired and asked how could
assist her.
The black eyes flashed gratitude ere the
scarlet mouth said, in silvery sweet tones,
would you sit on a rock beside me and rub
the shirts Of the gentleman ON a largo rock
with very small rock?"
Looking back now in the light of ma
turer wisdom, can sec that should have
declined that job on the grounds that it
was too unesthetic. Butt didn't. On
the contrary, l accepted it effusively.
There was touch Of romance about it
that appealed to me-the day itself began
to appeal to me for the first time. L began
to feel something of tho enthusiasm for
feast days that had taken my men out be-
fore daybrGpk. would not be so hard on
them again, 1 thought. Truly it was
very pretty custom, and began to sympa-
thize with it and to understand it better
If San Guadalupe had not been so long in
TERED, in the gladness of my heart would