t the heat was
continuous night and day; exhaustion without relief. The only time that
one could get a breath was about five o'clock in the morning; in the
middle of the day the sun's rays are white-hot needles,--this is the
only way that I can express it; and even if one carries an umbrella,
the heat pierces directly through. From the first of November to
the middle of December, there is usually about six or seven hours
a day of comparative comfort; but the season is too short to brace
the enervated body. One day the thermometer fell to seventy-eight;
we Americans shivered and craved a fire, so much did we feel the
change of temperature.

I finally learned from the natives that it is not best after bathing,
to rub the body with a towel; and indeed, following them more closely,
that it is wise to feed with cocoanut oil the famished pores of the
skin which has been weakened by excessive exudation. The rainy season
begins in April, usually, and gives some relief from the excessive
heat; and such rains, never in my life had I known before what it
was to have rain come down by the barrelful! The two-story house in
which we were quartered was quite solidly built, and the boards of
the second story were over-lapped to keep out the rain; and yet,
I have often had to get up on the bed or table while the water
poured in at innumerable unsuspected cracks and swept the floor
like a torrent. It was hard to tell which frightened one the most,
the terrible rain-storms or the awful earthquakes. In the house
there was a magnificent glass chandelier. The first time we had a
severe earthquake that chandelier swayed back and forth in such a
wild way that it seemed as if it must fall and crush every prism,
tiny light, and bell. I felt sure whenever a quake began that I
should not live through it. The flying fragments across the room,
the creaking hard-wood doors, the nauseating feeling that everything
under foot was falling away,--it was a frightful experience then,
it is a sickening memory now. One never gets used to these shocks no
matter how many occur; the more, the worse. They are more frequent
in the night than in the day. It was not quite so bad if the wild
start from uneasy slumber was followed by a cheery voice calling,
"Hello there, are you alive, has anything hurt you, has anything
struck?" Even the rats are terrified, and the natives, almost to a
soul, leave their houses, congregate in the middle of the street,
and begin to p