lice-officer and two philanthropists;--our object was to investigate
that lowest phase of social existence.----

Bang, whang, go the wrestlers below, with loud shouts and laughter. I
give them one eye and ear,--Can Grande has me by the other.

_Can Grande_.--I went into one of their miserable dance-saloons. I saw
there the vilest of men and the vilest of women, meeting with the worst
intentions; but even for this they had the fiddle, music and dancing.
Without this little crowning of something higher, their degradation
would have been intolerable to themselves and to each other.----

Here the man who gave the back in leap-frog suddenly went down in the
middle of the leap, bringing with him the other, who, rolling on the
deck, caught the traitor by the hair, and pommelled him to his heart's
content. I ventured to laugh, and exclaim, "Did you see that?"

_Can Grande_.--Yes; that is very common.--At that dance of death, every
wretched woman had such poor adornment as her circumstances allowed,--a
collar, a tawdry ribbon, a glaring false jewel, her very rags disposed
with the greater decency of the finer sex,--a little effort at beauty, a
sense of it. The good God puts it there;--He does not allow the poorest,
the lowest of his human children the thoughtless indifference of
brutes.----

And there was the beautiful tropical sky above, starry, soft, and
velvet-deep,--the placid waters all around, and at my side the man who
is to speak no more in public, but whose words in private have still the
old thrill, the old power to shake the heart and bring the good thoughts
uppermost. I put my hand in his, and we descended the companionway
together and left the foolish sailors to their play.

But now, on the after-deck, the captain, much entreated, and in no wise
unwilling, takes down his violin, and with pleasant touch gives us the
dear old airs, "Home, Sweet Home," "Annie Laurie," and so on, and we
accompany him with voices toned down by the quiet of the scene around.
He plays, too, with a musing look, the merry tune to which his little
daughter dances, in the English dancing-school, hundreds of leagues
away. Good-night, at last, and make the most of it. Coolness and quiet
on the water to-night, and heat and mosquitoes, howling of dogs and
chattering of negroes tomorrow night, in Havana.

The next morning allowed us to accomplish our transit to the desired
land of Havana. We pass the custom-house, where an official in a cage,