When we arrived at the top of the mountain, we made a halt at a blacksmith’s shop, for the purpose of getting Captain Lyon’s mule bled, the muleteer having declared that he had the pest; but the word pest appertains here to all sorts of animal ailments; for example, there was a fowl sick at this place, and on asking what was the matter with it, we were told that it had the pest; the fowl’s disease proved to be the pip.  Indeed, this convenient word pest, was indiscriminately applied to all diseases which the people did not understand.  It reminded me of La Fleur, in the Sentimental Journey, who, when he could not get his horse to pass the dead ass, cried “Pest!” as the dernier resort of his vocabulary of exclamations.  In the afternoon, we made a short halt at a venda within twelve miles of Botaes, to refresh ourselves, which was kept by an Englishman named John M’Dill, who had formerly lived at Gongo Soco with Captain Tregoning.  He had recently settled here on a small estate, which he was clearing for a coffee plantation.  About sunset, we crossed the Rio Paraheiba, over a long wooden bridge, about a mile beyond which we put up for the night, where we had but very indifferent accommodations.  We had ridden five leagues, or twenty miles, to-day.

Sunday, 3.—­We set off at five this morning, and arrived at the town of Valencia at nine, where we stopped for breakfast.  Nearly all the inhabitants of the town collected to comment upon us, and it so happened, that I was the principal object of curiosity in the whole group:  this unlooked for distinction, arose from two circumstances, first, my wearing a long beard; and secondly, my blindness.  These peculiarities produced numberless exclamations, as, “How could I travel?  Why did I travel?  Why did I wear a long beard?  Was I a Padre?—­or, a Missionary?” and so forth, until they became so pressing that we were glad to get housed, with closed doors, to keep these troublesome inquisitors at a respectful distance.

I can well understand, that a simple people, whose experience is limited to their own habits, and who have never had an opportunity of inter-mixing with other nations, must have been startled by the novelty of a beard; but their astonishment at the sight of a board, was not greater than mine, on discovering that they were destitute of an appendage, which, in the torid zone, is at once an article of luxury and utility.  The people of the East invariably wear beards, not merely as a national custom, but as a matter of necessity; and, for my part, I can testify, that I found it an indispensable protection to the neck, and the lower part of the face:  after a day’s journey, the luxury of immerging the face in cold water, leaving the beard half dry, was most refreshing, the evaporation producing a very reviving and agreeable effect.  In addition to my beard, I had the farther protection of a broad brimmed straw-hat, the crown of which was deeply wadded with cotton wool, and which completely screened me from the piercing rays of a tropical sun.