had a camera. I
know a picture of them, with "Where did they come from?" written
underneath, would bring me a small fortune as a copyrighted prize
puzzle. No one but a mule could solve it; and after all that would be
the best answer. I cannot do any better myself, even after having made
the dizzy journey from top to bottom.

We trotted through _La Armenia_ in our very best style--I, because I did
not want to be unfavorably compared with an habitual mule-back
performer,--Vincent, because, as he afterwards confided to me, one of
the prettiest girls in all _Honduras_ lived there.

The rest of the afternoon passed uneventfully enough. To reach _San
Pedro_ was the object of our exertion, and fondly I hoped the
key-keeping saint would unlock some safe and savory abiding-place for
our night's habitation.

About half after five I saw before us a church and a few small houses,
and though I heard no crowing of cocks, a barking of dogs intimated that
we had reached a village, none other than the namesake of Rome's
favorite apostle.

At the farther end of the settlement we found our accommodations.

Outwardly considered these houses are much alike, and though the inside
furniture is almost as similar in kind and disposition, the interiors do
vary greatly after all.

As I lay in a hammock which had been put up for me in front of the
house, and watched the moon rise from behind a mountain just across the
road, it seemed to me that life was very beautiful and well worth
living, in spite of all its hardships. The higher the moon rose, the
more fully her glorious rays streamed over all the surrounding objects
and bathed them in a more charitable light than anything feminine is
supposed to do, the more nearly romantic I grew and felt almost like
finding a certain charm even in _San Juan_. The announcement that my bed
was awaiting me was all that saved me from utter lunacy. Casting a last
lingering glance upon the fair beauty of the scene before me, I gathered
together my half-scattered prosaic faculties and went indoors to--can I
ever give you an idea of it?

Across a vilely dirty room was stretched a cord upon which were hung to
dry, huge and manifold strips of salt meat. To my uneducated olfactories
it seemed past the turning point and far on the road to utter ruin--the
smell was so suffocating and sickening.

One bed Eduardo had succeeded in making very comfortable for me, while
on the other, in its birthday suit, lay an in