with eyes of most oily sweetness, and tongue, no doubt, to match,
pockets our gold, and imparts in return a governmental permission to
inhabit the Island of Cuba for the space of one calendar month. We go
trailing through the market, where we buy peeled oranges, and through
the streets, where we eat them, seen and recognized afar as Yankees by
our hats, bonnets, and other features. We stop at the Cafe Dominica, and
refresh with coffee and buttered rolls, for we have still a drive of
three miles to accomplish before breakfast. All the hotels in Havana are
full, and more than full. Woolcut, of the Cerro, three miles from the
gates, is the only landlord who will take us in; so he seizes us fairly
by the neck, bundles us into an omnibus, swears that his hotel is but
two miles distant, smiles archly when we find the two miles long, brings
us where he wants to have us, the Spaniards in the omnibus puffing and
staring at the ladies all the way. Finally, we arrive at his hotel, glad
to be somewhere, but hot, tired, hungry, and not in raptures with our
first experience of tropical life.

It must be confessed that our long-tried energies fall somewhat flat on
the quiet of Woolcut's. We look round, and behold one long room with
marble floor, with two large doors, not windows, opening in front upon
the piazza and the street, and other openings into a large court behind,
surrounded by small, dark bedrooms. The large room is furnished with two
dilapidated cane sofas, a few chairs, a small table, and three or four
indifferent prints, which we have ample time to study. For company, we
see a stray New York or Philadelphia family, a superannuated Mexican who
smiles and bows to everybody, and some dozen of those undistinguishable
individuals whom we class together as Yankees, and who, taking the map
from Maine to Georgia, might as well come from one place as another, the
Southerner being as like the Northerner as a dried pea is to a green
pea. The ladies begin to hang their heads, and question a little:--"What
are we to do here? and where is the perfectly delightful Havana you told
us of?" Answer:--"There is nothing whatever to do here, at this hour
of the day, but to undress and go to sleep;--the heat will not let you
stir, the glare will not let you write or read. Go to bed; dinner is at
four; and after that, we will make an effort to find the Havana of the
poetical and Gan Eden people, praying Heaven it may not have its only
existence