shirt and pair of trowsers. Oh, those weary clothes! If a man could travel as a dog, how delightful it would be to keep moving from year's end to year's end.

We steamed up the coast for two days quietly, placidly, and steadily! I cannot say that the trip was a pleasant one, remembering how intense was the heat. On one occasion we stopped for practice-shooting, and it behoved me of course to mount the paddle-box and see what was going on. This was at eleven in the morning, and though it did not last for above an hour, I was brought almost to fainting by the power of the sun.

Punta-arenas-Sandy Point-is a small town and harbor situated in Costa Rica, near the top of the Bay of Nicoya. The sail up the bay is very pretty, through almost endless woods stretching away from the shores to the hills. There is however nothing majestic or grand about the scenery here. There are no Andes in sight, no stupendous mountains such as one might expect to see after coming so far to see them. It is all pretty quiet and ordinary; and on the whole perhaps superior to the views from the sea at Herne Bay.

The captain of the 'Vixen' had decided on going up to San José with me, as at the last moment did also the master, San José being the capital of Costa Rica. Our first object therefore was to hire a guide and mules, which with the assistance of the acting English consul we soon found. For even at Punta-arenas the English flag flies, and a distressed British subject can claim protection.

It is a small village lying along a creek of the sea, inside the sandy point from whence it is named. Considerable business is done here in the exportation of coffee, which is the staple produce of Costa Rica. It is sent chiefly to England; but it seemed to me that the moneymaking inhabitants of Punta-arenas were mostly Ameri

cans; men who either had been to California or who had got so far on their road thither and then changed their minds. It is a hot, dusty, unattractive spot, with a Yankee inn, at which men may "liquor," and a tram railroad running for twelve miles into the country. It abounds in oysters and beer, on which we dined before we started on our journey.

I was thus for the first time in Central America. This continent, if it may be so called, comprises the five republics of Guatemala, Honduras, San Salvador, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica. When this country first broke away from Spanish rule in 1821, it was for a while content to exist as one state, under the name of the Republic of Guatemala; as it had been known for nearly three hundred years as a Spanish province under the same denomination-that of Guatemala. After a hard tussle with Mexico, which endeavored to devour it, and which forty years ago was more prone to annex than to be annexed, this republic sat itself fairly going, with the city of Guatemala for its capital. But the energies and ambition of the different races comprised among the two million inhabitants of Central America would not allow them to be governed except each in his own province. Some ten years since, therefore, the five States broke asunder. Each claimed to be sovereign and independent. Each chose its own president and had its own capital; and consequently, as might be expected, no part of the district in question has been able to enjoy those natural advantages with which Providence has certainly endowed it. To these States must be added, in counting up the countries of Central America, British Honduras, consisting of Belize and the adjacent district, and the Mosquito coast which so lately was under British protection; and which is But here I must be silent,

-.

256

COSTA RICA.

or I may possibly trench upon diplomatic subjects still

unsettled.

My visit was solely to Costa Rica, which has in some respects done better than its neighbors. But this has been owing to the circumstances of its soil and climate rather than to those of its government, which seems to me to be as bad as any can be which deserves that name. In Costa Rica there certainly is a government, and a very despotic one it is.

I am not much given to the sins of dandyism, but I must own I was not a little proud of my costume as I left Punta-arenas. We had been told that according to the weather our ride would be either dusty or muddy in no ordinary degree, and that any clothes which we might wear during the journey would be utterly useless as soon as the journey was over. Consequently we purchased for ourselves, in an American store, short canvas smockfrocks, which would not come below the saddle, and coarse holland trousers. What class of men may usually wear these garments in Costa Rica I cannot say; but in England I have seen navvies look exactly as my naval friends looked; and I flatter myself that my appearance was quite equal to theirs. I had procured at Panamá a light straw hat, with an amazing brim, and had covered the whole with white calico. I have before said that my beard had become "poblada," so that on the whole I was rather gratified than otherwise when I was assured by the storekeeper that we should certainly be taken for three filibusters. Now the name of filibuster means something serious in those localities, as I shall in a few pages have to explain.

We started on our journey by railroad, for there is a tramway that runs for twelve miles through the forest We were dragged along on this by an excellent mule, till

our course was suddenly impeded by a tree which had fallen across the road. But in course of time this was removed, and in something less than three hours we found ourselves at a saw-mill in the middle of the forest.

The first thing that met my view on stepping out of the truck was a solitary Englishman seated on a half-sawn log of wood. Those who remember Hood's Whims and Oddities may bear in mind a heart-rending picture of the last man. Only that the times do not agree, I should have said that this poor fellow must have sat for the picture. He was undeniably an English laborer. No man of any other nation would have had that face, or worn those clothes, or kicked his feet about in that same awkward, melancholy humor.

He was, he said, in charge of the saw-mill, having been induced to come out into that country for three years. According to him, it was a wretched, miserable place. "No man," he said, "ever found himself in worse diggings." He earned a dollar and a half a day, and with that he could hardly buy shoes and have his clothes washed. "Why did he not go home?" I asked. "Oh, he had come for three years, and he'd stay his three years out-if so be he didn't die." The saw-mill was not paying, he said; and never would pay. So that on the whole his account of Costa Rica was not encouraging.

We had been recommended to stay the first. night at a place called Esparza, where there is a decent inn. But before we left Punta-arenas we learnt that Don Juan Rafael Mora, the President of the Republic, was coming down the same road with a large retinue of followers to inaugurate the commencement of the works of the canal. He would be on his way to meet his brother-president of the next republic, Nicaragua, at San Juan del Sur; and at a spot some little distance from thence this great work was

to be begun at once. He and his party were to sleep at Esparza. Therefore we decided on going on further before we halted; and in truth at that place we did meet Don Juan and his retinue.

As both Costa Rica and Nicaragua are chiefly of importance to the eastern and western worlds, as being the district in which the isthmus between the two Americas may be most advantageously pierced by a canal—if it be ever so pierced-this subject naturally intrudes itself into all matters concerning these countries. Till the opening of the Panamá railway the transit of passengers through Nicaragua was immense. At present the railway has it all its own way. But the subject, connected as it has been with that of filibustering, mingles itself so completely with all interests in Costa Rica, that nothing of its present doings or politics can be well understood till something is understood on this canal subject. Sooner or later I must write a chapter on it; and it would almost be well if the reader would be pleased to take it out of its turn and get through it at once. The chapter, however, cannot well be brought in till these, recording my travels in Costa Rica, are completed.

Don Juan Mora and his retinue had arrived some hours before us, and had nearly filled the little hotel. This was kept by a Frenchman, and as far as provisions and beer were concerned seemed to be well kept. Our requirements did not go beyond these. On entering the public sitting-room a melodiously rich Irish brogue at once greeted my ears, and I saw seated at the table, joyous in a semi-military uniform, The O'Gorman Mahon, great as in bygone unemancipated days, when with head erect and stentorian voice he would make himself audible to half the County Clare. The head was still as erect, and the brogue as unexceptionable.