"Once a terrible thing happened to me; we were sailing by
an island when we heard cannon shots. It was the garrison firing off a
salvo."
"But what are you laughing at?" asked Ariston.
"Nervousness.... Well, as I was saying, I went up to the captain of
the ship and asked his permission to let me land on the island. 'Very
well,' he said to me, 'take the Golondrina, if you wish,'--Golondrina
was the name of the canoe; 'but you must be back within a couple of
hours.'
"I set off in my boat and hala! hala! ... I reached the island, which
was thickly planted with plane-trees and cocoanut-trees, and I
disembarked on the beach into which the Golondrina had thrust its
prow."
Here Don Alonso's features were convulsed with the impossibility of
restraining his laughter; he shot a glance at the barber, accompanied
by a confidential wink.
"I land," he continued, "then I start running, and soon, paf! ... in
the face; a huge mosquito, and then, paf! ... another mosquito, until
I was surrounded by a swarm of the animals, each one as large as a
bat. With a scarred face I begin to run for the beach so as to escape
in my canoe, when I catch sight of a lobster right next to the
Golondrina; but what a lobster I He must have been as big as a bear;
he was black, and shiny, and went chug, chug, chug, like an
automobile.
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