"Chico," with hat stuck on the back of his head, hastened up to our group with the intimation that we had better get on board if it was not our intention to be left behind. "Have you got plenty of food," was the inquiry, "for we are as hungry as hunters?" "Yes, plenty," was the answer. "And drink?" "And the drink." "You have not forgotten the cigars?" "No, the cigars are all right."
Our car was attached to the express. It was a long, narrow car, with a table down the centre. We were met with the refreshing odour of ham and eggs being prepared in the adjoining kitchen.
The long train panted toward the hills, leaving leafy Mendoza behind and winding away through aisles of great grey boulders by the side of the muddy Mendoza River. There was a dreary forlornness about the country as the train, with the river as its guide, seemed to be making for a huge black cutting in the mountains. We did not mind, for the Spanish cook and his assistant were busy serving us with ham and eggs, and coffee, and freshly baked rolls.
Maybe it was the breakfast, or the exhilarating air of the hills, or the genial company, or the pleasure of the post-breakfast cigar; but we were the merriest party imaginable. The engineer who had turned vine grower became reminiscent of the days when he helped to build this line, and of how, when work was over in the evening, he frequently mounted his horse, rode twenty miles to attend a Spanish dance, mounted his horse again at four in the morning, and was back at work in the hills by sunrise. Of course, he was quite sure that those were romantic and adventurous days compared with the present.
We were not travelling fast. The line was gradually rising, and the engine was giving off sounds as though it were suffering from asthma. We got into country--wild, moorlike, and broken with many streams--which reminded some of us of parts of Scotland. We struck into what had looked like a black defile, through which the river came racing, and on either side of us rose gaunt rocks, black and brown, which suggested that a terrific fire had once raged.
No snow was in sight--nothing but fierce, repellent crags. Suddenly we came upon an upland valley with a wide stretch of grass, a straggling village, and a big hotel--just the sort of hotel you are constantly bumping into in the Swiss mountains. The passing of the train for Chili is probably the one excitement. The Italian folk gathered about the little station and gazed with curious eyes at the passengers.