A somewhat adventurous career fell to the lot of the late Julius Froebel, a nephew of the great Friedrich Froebel of “Kindergarten” fame. Having devoted his early manhood to journalism and politics of a very rabid and revolutionary character, he became the recognised leader of the Dresden democratic party in 1848. After being arrested in Austria and reprieved from a death-sentence, he fled to New York, and was for some time the editor of a German paper published there.

Two years later he joined a party of traders who were sailing for Central America, and with these he stayed for some months at Granada, on Lake Nicaragua. Finding town life becoming tame to him, he one day started off by himself to examine the more inland district, which was then inhabited largely by Indian tribes. The project had been in his mind for a long time, and what finally decided him was the accidental meeting with a fellow countryman, who told him privately that gold had just been found in large quantities at a village a little farther west; so without a guide, without more than one day’s provisions, and 205 with only a very scanty knowledge of Spanish to help him on his way, he set off on his risky trip.

He travelled all that day, and met no one after he had left the outskirts of the town; and that night, with his saddle for a pillow, he slept very comfortably under a tree. On the next day, he continued his way till an easy ride of about twelve miles, across a pathless plain, brought him suddenly on the heels of a travelling party of fifty Indians,—men, women, and children—all of them chatting freely and jubilantly, and riding as though bent upon some definite errand. They saluted him cheerily and he asked, in his broken Spanish, how far he was from the next village.

“It is over there; not far; not very far.” He looked where they were pointing and saw that smoke was rising thinly from beyond a clump of trees. “Keep with us, SeÑor, and we will show you the way,” added the man, who seemed to be the chief or leader.

But this village proved to be a great deal farther than it looked; riding among the trees and thick undergrowth was slow and weary work, and, even in this damp, shaded spot, the heat was now becoming almost unendurable. The Indians themselves were losing their energy and talkativeness; and many of them were beginning to lag behind or fall asleep in their saddles, when the chief cried out that they would halt at the little stream which was already in sight.

Froebel, more than willing, dismounted with the rest, and, tethering his horse to a tree, sought a comfortable resting-place for himself. Hunger and fatigue not infrequently go hand in hand, and the sight of the 206 Indian women collecting sticks to feed the fires which they had speedily made reminded the traveller not only that it was some hours since he had breakfasted, but that, beyond a flask of brandy and water, all his provisions were exhausted. He watched wistfully the Indians’ preparations. What were they going to eat?

Two women near him were untying their bundles, and now produced therefrom a number of small drinking-gourds, nets of eggs, bunches of plantains, with oranges or other fruit, which Froebel eyed hungrily. Then, to his great relief, he saw that he was to be regarded as one of the family; for two young Indians, sons of the chief, at once helped him generously to the fruit, and explained that the great cooking-pots that hung over one or other of the fires would soon be filled with eggs, of which he would be expected to eat his share.

When the eggs were “done,” the water used for boiling them, instead of being thrown away, was economically employed for cocoa-making; irregular, greasy-looking blocks of sweetened chocolate being thrown into the pot, which a woman stirred with a stick till it was a thick, boiling paste; and into this each person dipped his or her gourd.

The meal being ended, the men lay and smoked long cheroots, and recommenced their light-hearted gabble of the morning. Froebel intimated that he was willing to pay for his meal, but the Indians stoutly refused his offer of money, and with such an air of gentle reproach that he began to feel as small as though he had asked for a bill after dining at a friend’s table. Something of the dignity of manner of their Spanish conquerors 207 seemed to have descended to these Indians; though they were far from holding themselves aloof from their guest, or from making any secret of their own affairs, not one of them ventured to ask the German a single question as to his coming or his going. They told him that they were Niquirans—a wandering, gypsy-like tribe of the Nahuatlan stock; and that, as they had heard of the discovery of a gold-mine at the village which they were approaching, where everyone might go and help himself, they thought—being in the neighbourhood—they might as well bring away a few sackfuls of the metal.

The journalist pricked up his ears. El Dorado, Tom Tiddler’s Ground, was not a fable after all, then?

“Are there any white men there?” he asked.

The chief of the Niquirans smiled. He was a great deal too polite to say that, had there been, the gold would not be there long, but that was what his smile seemed to imply.

“We have heard of none as yet, SeÑor; but we did not know of the gold till this morning. The village, as you perceive, is quite away from any main road, and ordinarily there is nothing to bring white men in this direction.”

When all had rested sufficiently, the journey was resumed, and a short ride brought them into the village, which was as deserted as “sweet Auburn” itself. Not so much as a dog was in evidence; but the murmur of voices in the little valley beyond was a sufficient guide to the quarter where the inhabitants had collected. Very soon the gold-seekers came upon these, three or four hundred of them, encamped between a 208 stream and a small bluff; and, round this, horses, mules, ox-waggons, and tents were drawn up in the form of a crescent.

No sooner did the new-comers show their faces than the villagers, who seemed to have been taking their siesta, rose up and armed themselves with stones or sticks, and some few even with bows and spears.

The Niquirans drew up hesitatingly, and Froebel, dismounting, approached the threatening crowd with every sign of friendliness. He asked to see the chief, and, on being taken before him, demanded to know the cause of such a hostile reception.

“We have found a gold-mine here,” said the chief, “and our people at first mistook your party for unfriendly Indians who might have come to drive us away from it.” He went on to say, with delightful frankness, that the villagers intended removing as much of the gold as possible, and that, as soon as their own claims were satisfied, anyone would be welcome to what remained.

“But will there be any remaining?” asked Froebel, with an incredulous smile. “There are many of my people who would gladly give you money and cattle in exchange for your gold. You had better show me your mine.”

The chief eyed him with some amount of suspicion, discussed the matter with one or two cronies for a few minutes, and at last invited the stranger to “come and see.” Following his conductors through the line of vehicles, animals, and babies that marked off the precious spot, Froebel came to the bluff-face, at which one or two of the more zealous Indians were now beginning 209 work again. He had been prepared to see nothing but quartz, or possibly a few grains of the metal mingled with sand; therefore he was fain to stand still and rub his eyes when he beheld a broad golden stratum in the cliff on which the sunrays flashed as on a looking-glass. It was a sight that would have made the least covetous of mortals gasp.

The chief pointed proudly to a row of bushel-baskets, piled to the brim with the glittering substance, and intimated that, since the white stranger’s intentions were peaceable, he was at liberty to fill his pockets.

There are some white men who, when they have an unpalatable truth to disclose, do not trouble to choose a tasteful or tactful or kind method of performing the task; and it is to be feared that Herr Froebel was one of these. He knew little about metallurgy, but one glance at the shining lump that he took from the nearest basket told him that the “gold” was pyrites, worth perhaps twopence a cart-load. To the amazement of the Indians he flung it contemptuously away.

“That’s no gold; it’s rubbish; worth nothing,” he blurted out.

Not gold? But not an Indian believed him; not one of them could see anything but jealousy or intentional insult in this frank piece of information; and the chief and his followers turned threateningly upon him. One and another took up the cry, and Froebel, who had left his only pistol in his holster, fancied that he saw death staring him in the face; for the excitement that he had created in the little community could not be quelled by a man who only knew about a thousand 210 words of the language. He dodged between two mules and into the open; but the crowd of loiterers there had already invented another version of his crime; he was running off with their gold! There was nothing for it but pure and undisguised flight, and he set off as fast as his legs could carry him to the spot where the Niquirans were awaiting him. Sticks, stones, and mud whizzed about his head, and he could hear swift feet pursuing him.

Luckily, it was a time of day when no Indian, however fleet of foot, will run very far or fast; his pursuers turned out to be only some mischievous boys who were not going to throw away an opportunity of pelting a fugitive; and, at sight of the grim-looking Niquiran horsemen, who began to move a step or two forward, even these returned to their camp. Mounting his horse again, Froebel looked back and saw that the villagers were making ready to repel any advance of the strangers; they were again collecting their weapons and shouting defiance at the Niquirans. Doubtless these would have had a very easy victory; for they were better armed and infinitely finer men, in the habit of fighting at a moment’s notice; while the simple villagers had had no quarrel with their neighbours for a quarter of a century.

“There is nothing to fight about; it was all my fault,” said Froebel; and he hastily explained the whole matter.

His companions laughed, and turned their horses’ heads; they were happy-go-lucky, hand-to-mouth folk, to whom the disappointment was far less bitter than to the German; and they rode away cheerily 211 enough, leaving the gold-diggers to bask in their happy ignorance.

As he had nothing better to do, Froebel threw in his lot with the wanderers, and, in this manner, spent many happy months in seeing the country. But, to a man of his restless disposition, even this roving life became wearisome; he returned to Granada and there fell in again with two of the Yankee traders with whom he had arrived. For the next year or so he travelled with them, visiting almost every town in Central America; and at last decided to return with them to the States by way of Mexico.

Mexico, as will be seen in a later chapter, was in a state of great unrest at this time (1853); and, in the wilder parts, it was unsafe for white men to travel without escort; but, as troops of soldiers were often scouring the country, the three strangers relied on being able to travel with one or other of these. They had a pleasant ride through Guatemala, visited the wonderful ruins at Uxmal in Yucatan: ruins nearly a thousand years old, that tell practically all that can be told of the civilisation of the ancient Mexicans; and at length entered upon the longer and more perilous portion of their trip.

But fortune was more favourable to them than to the generality of Mexican travellers in those days; for they covered the long journey, of over a thousand miles, from the frontier to Chihuahua in North Mexico, without a single misadventure. While in this city, Froebel discovered, first that he was leading too uneventful a life for his constitution, and secondly, that his purse was now empty, for while his companions 212 had been ants, he had been a cricket. It happened that the Mexican Commander-in-Chief, General Trias, was going north to put down a rising, and Froebel obtained from him the post of temporary transport-agent; he was to follow the troops with ten waggons and a hundred mules, and assist generally in the commissariat.

Every day, from the time of starting, horrible reports of atrocities committed by the Apache Indians reached him. In one place, fourteen women and children had been slaughtered; in another, a flock of sheep had been stolen and the shepherds killed; while in a third, the prairie had been deliberately set on fire at a time when the wind could not fail to carry the flames to a cluster of huts, many of whose occupants were burned to death. Yet the soldiers could not so much as get a sight of the culprits, who, on their fleet horses, made nothing of covering fifty miles in a few hours.

But one night, when Froebel and his muleteers were encamped some few hundred yards behind the main body, a volley of musketry sounded close at hand; and an attendant, who was in the act of handing the transport agent his supper, fell dead. The muleteers snatched up brands from the fire for torches, and, gun in hand, ran in search of the enemy.

“Shoot; shoot,” cried Froebel, himself setting the example by firing at a group of shadowy figures that were already on the move. But it was too late; the Indians could be heard scampering away across the prairie. The agent dared not take his men in pursuit, leaving the mules unguarded; but he rode 213 across to the cavalry tents where General Trias and twenty men, who had heard the firing, were already in the saddle.

“Fall in with us, then, as you know the direction in which they went,” said Trias hurriedly; and away they all galloped.

Far away across the plain they could hear the regular beat of the fleeing horses’ hoofs. Without stopping, Trias gave the command to fire; the twenty carbines went off like one, and, from the sudden wild screaming ahead of them, Froebel knew that some of the bullets had hit their random mark. This was confirmed in a minute or so when, in the clouded and uncertain light of the moon, he caught sight of three Indians and a horse lying on the ground as the troop swept past.

“There they are; load again,” shouted Trias; and all could see the feather head-dresses of the Apaches waving in the breeze, still within gunshot. But the next volley took no apparent effect, the shapes were growing dimmer again, and the sounds less distinct.

“On; on; we must have them,” shouted the General; and, as the horses were tolerably fresh, the task was still not hopeless.

“Hark! They have reached the road,” cried one of the soldiers, who was perfectly familiar with the neighbourhood. This was the high road to the Texan frontier, in places a mere sand-strip bordered on either side by forests, in others a smooth, well-beaten track bisecting a vast prairie. The news was the reverse of good, for now the Apaches might at any moment separate, and disappear among the trees. The forest part of the road wound very considerably, so that the 214 pursuers would no longer be able to profit by the light of the already setting moon.

Half an hour went by; an hour; and still the Mexicans rode on, now certain that they heard the Indians’ horses, now equally certain that all of them had dispersed over the prairie or in the woods. But all of a sudden a faint scream sounded along the road, together with the undeniable tramp of horses. The scream came nearer, and the soldiers spurred their breathless chargers round the bend of the road.

“There are lights,” shouted Froebel.

“Yes; carriage-lamps; they have stopped the mail-coach,” roared Trias. “Keep it up, my men; we must have them now.”

“Why, they are running to meet us,” said Froebel; “they must have been reinforced.”

The lights were certainly coming nearer, and, with them, a body of horsemen; and now the soldiers could hear the quick popping of pistol-shots. Then all at once a loud shout arose from where the lights were, the sound of wheels came nearer and nearer, but the accompanying horsemen were obviously riding now in the other direction.

“Are you the soldiers?” shouted a chorus of voices from the coach as it came up.

“Yes.”

“You can catch them yet; they tried to stop us and rob us; and would have done, but for hearing you.”

The troop did not draw bridle, but wheeled away on to the prairie in pursuit of half a dozen moving figures on whom they were easily gaining. A minute later a 215 voice in front cried: “All right; we’ll give in. Don’t fire.”

“Why, those are not Indians,” said Trias in astonishment.

Nor were they; they were six Mexican brigands who had been pursuing the mail; the Apaches were probably safe long ago, in one of their forest camps. The highwaymen were soon seized and bound, and as it was ultimately discovered that they were some of the revolutionaries for whom Trias was on the look-out, the night-ride was not altogether a wild-goose chase.