Rainbows End

Rainbow's End

The Project Gutenberg EBook of Rainbow's End, by Rex Beach #4 in our series by Rex Beach
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Title: Rainbow's End
Author: Rex Beach
Release Date: February, 2004 [EBook #5086] [Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] [This file was first posted on April 22, 2002]
Edition: 10
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
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RAINBOW'S END
By REX BEACH
Author of "THE AUCTION BLOCK" "THE SPOILERS" "THE IRON TRAIL" Etc.
Illustrated

CONTENTS
I. THE VALLEY OF DELIGHT
II. SPANISH GOLD
III. "THE O'REILLY"
IV. RETRIBUTION
V. A CRY FROM THE WILDERNESS
VI. THE QUEST BEGINS
VII. THE MAN WHO WOULD KNOW LIFE
VIII. THE SPANISH DOUBLOON
IX. MARAUDERS
X. O'REILLY TALKS HOG LATIN
XI. THE HAND OF THE CAPTAIN-GENERAL
XII. WHEN THE WORLD RAN BACKWARD
XIII. CAPITULATION
XIV. A WOMAN WITH A MISSION
XV. FILIBUSTERS
XVI. THE CITY AMONG THE LEAVES
XVII. THE CITY OF BEGGARS
XVIII. SPEAKING OF FOOD
XIX. THAT SICK MAN FROM SAN ANTONIO
XX. EL DEMONIO'S CHILD
XXI. TREASURE
XXII. THE TROCHA
XXIII. INTO THE CITY OF DEATH
XXIV. ROSA
XXV. THE HAUNTED GARDEN
XXVI. HOW COBO STOOD ON HIS HEAD
XXVII. MORIN, THE FISHERMAN
XXVIII. THREE TRAVELERS COME HOME
XXIX. WHAT HAPPENED AT SUNDOWN
XXX. THE OWL AND THE PUSSY-CAT

I
THE VALLEY OF DELIGHT
In all probability your first view of the valley of the Yumuri will be from the Hermitage of Montserrate, for it is there that the cocheros drive you. Up the winding road they take you, with the bay at your back and the gorge at your right, to the crest of a narrow ridge where the chapel stands. Once there, you overlook the fairest sight in all Christendom--"the loveliest valley in the world," as Humboldt called it--for the Yumuri nestles right at your feet, a vale of pure delight, a glimpse of Paradise that bewilders the eye and fills the soul with ecstasy.
It is larger than it seems at first sight; through it meanders the river, coiling and uncoiling, hidden here and there by jungle growths, and seeking final outlet through a cleft in the wall not unlike a crack in the side of a painted bowl. The place seems to have been fashioned as a dwelling for dryads and hamadryads, for nixies and pixies, and all the fabled spirits of forest and stream. Fairy hands tinted its steep slopes and carpeted its level floor with the richest of green brocades. Nowhere is there a clash of color; nowhere does a naked hillside or monstrous jut of rock obtrude to mar its placid beauty; nowhere can you see a crude, disfiguring mark of man's handiwork--there are only fields, and bowers, with an occasional thatched roof faded gray by the sun.
Royal palms, most perfect of trees, are scattered everywhere. They stand alone or in stately groves, their lush fronds drooping like gigantic ostrich plumes, their slim trunks as smooth and regular and white as if turned in a giant lathe and then rubbed with pipe- clay. In all Cuba, island of bewitching vistas, there is no other Yumuri, and in all the wide world, perhaps, there is no valley of moods and aspects so varying. You should see it at evening, all warm and slumberous, all gold and green and purple; or at early dawn, when the mists are fading like pale memories of dreams and the tints are delicate; or again, during a tempest, when it is a caldron of whirling vapors and when the palm-trees bend like coryphees, tossing their arms to the galloping hurricane. But whatever the time of day or the season of the year at which you visit it, the Yumuri will render you wordless with delight, and you will vow that it is the happiest valley men's eyes have ever looked upon.
Standing there beside the shrine of Our Lady of Montserrate, you will see beyond the cleft through which the river emerges another hill, La Cumbre, from which the view is almost as wonderful, and your driver may tell you about the splendid homes that used to grace its slopes in the golden days when Cuba had an aristocracy. They were