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VIII
WITH THE COTTAGERS IN THE
MOUNTAINS
AY after day, from early in the morning until
late at night, we have been stationed on the
highest pinnacles surrounding the lovely mountain city
of Loja, gazing all about us, in every direction, with
eagles circling over distant mountain regions. We
have reveled in the sun-sparkling air and in the moun-
tain stillness which is further sweetened by the soft
lullaby of the cattle-bells, and deepened by the distant
seething of the water-falls in the “Two Infernos.”
The mountain battlements have a hard ringing sound
of their own when the sun breaks through the cold of
night; and in the peaceful valley beneath us an occa-
sional railway-train dashes like a devil insane into the
gloomy recesses of the tunnel. A sudden nervous
tremor shoots through the stillness, grazes us momen-
tarily like a distant wail of complaint—for we are
sitting here so idly—and disappears again in the sunny
haze. We try to work up a little of our national pride,
because this railroad was invented by our own Nordics,
and we look down with condescension on these people
who have invented nothing, not even a bit of religious
puritanism. But once we are brought face to face with
one of these mountain shepherds, the entire edifice of
our racial conceit collapses. We cannot help loving
this people, and in fact envying them; our concern is
that they appear to have no envy of us. We are a
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