and many of the remainder were blinded, deafened or disfigured.

Back we crept to the deserted _hacienda_, and there in this hideous nest
of smallpox we took up our quarters, choosing out of the many in the
great pile sleeping rooms that had evidently not been used for months
or years. Food we did not lack, for sheep and goats were straying about
untended, while in the garden we found fruit and vegetables in plenty,
and in the pantries flour and other stores.

At first Emma was dazed and crushed by fatigue and emotion, but she
recovered her spirits after a night's sleep and on learning from
Antonio, who was told it by some _peon_, that it was not her aunt that
the smallpox had killed, but her uncle by marriage, whom she had never
seen. Having no fear of the disease, indeed, she became quite resigned
and calm, for the strangeness and novelty of the position absorbed
and interested her. Also, to my alarm, it excited her philanthropic
instincts, her great idea being to turn the _hacienda_ into a
convalescent smallpox hospital, of which she was to be the nurse and
I the doctor. Indeed she refused to abandon this mad scheme until
I pointed out that in the event of any of our patients dying, most
probably we should both be murdered for wizards with the evil eye. As a
matter of fact, without medicine or assistance we could have done little
or nothing.

Oh, what a pestilence was that of which for three weeks or so we were
the daily witnesses, for from the flat roof of the _hacienda_ we could
see straight on to the _plaza_ of the little town. And when at night we
could not see, still we could hear the wails of the dying and bereaved,
the eternal clang of the church bells, rung to scare away the demon of
disease, and the midnight masses chanted by the priests, that grew faint