Ere long, overexcited by the sound of the Molucho war song, which they struck up in chorus, they went round so hurriedly and quickly, that at the end of ten minutes it would have been impossible for any human being to distinguish a single ring of the chain, which seemed to be moved by a spring. Imagine an immense wheel turning on its axle with the speed of a railway carriage wheel, and you will have an idea of the exercise which the bravest and most brilliant warriors of the twelve Molucho tribes indulged in with gaiety of heart.
They did not stop till the pyre had become a pile of ashes. Carefully collecting these ashes the piaies went with great pomp to throw them into a torrent which leaped no great distance from the camp. A portion of the Indians, that is to say, those among them still able to use their limbs, accompanied them with a new dance and fresh songs. As for Leon, utterly exhausted, he had fallen almost in a fainting state near a hut.
"Come, brother," Diego said to him, as he helped him to rise, and pointed to the dawn which was beginning to whiten the horizon, "let us depart; it is late, and we must be back in camp before daylight."
"Let us go--let us go," said Leon, "for my head is turning. The smell of blood chokes me, and the atmosphere here is poisoned."
Diego looked at him without replying; then, after exchanging a few words with the great chief Huachacuyac and the Sayotkatta, he took the arm of the smuggler captain, and went with him toward the camp where the Soto-Mayor family were resting.
The sun was rising radiantly when Señor Don Juan de Soto-Mayor, with pale face and features worn by the unhappy news which Don Pedro de Sallazar brought him on the previous evening, raised the canvass of the tent in which he had spent the night, and stepped forth. General Don Pedro accompanied him.
The morning was superb, and the arrieros were engaged in loading the mules and saddling of horses; Leon, seated apart on a fallen tree, seemed plunged in deep and bitter thoughts. The old gentleman approached, and he did not seem to notice his presence.
"Good morning, Señor Captain," he said to him, lightly touching his shoulder.
The young man started at the sound of this voice; then rising, he slightly raised his hat off his head, and bowed to the old general, while replying, mechanically--