There is an almost daily shower here, and it is lovely now, with a
balmy freshness in the air. No one could imagine that we are in the
torrid zone, and only 3 degrees from the equator. The mercury has not
been above 83 degrees since I came, and the sea and land breezes are
exquisitely delicious. I wish you could see a late afternoon here in
its full beauty, with palms against a golden sky, pink clouds, a pink
river, and a balm-breathing air, just strong enough to lift the heavy
scented flowers which make the evenings delicious. There has been a
respite from mosquitoes, and I am having a "real good time."

But I had a great fright yesterday (part of the "good time" though). I
was going into the garden when six armed policemen leapt past me as if
they had been shot, followed by Mr. Daly, the land-surveyor, who has
the V.C. for some brave deed, shouting "a cobra! a cobra!" and I saw a
hooded head above the plants, and then the form I most fear and loathe
twisting itself toward the house with frightful rapidity, every one
flying. I was up a ladder in no time, and the next moment one of the
policemen, plucking up courage, broke the reptile's back with the butt
of his rifle, and soon it was borne away, dead, by its tail. It was
over four feet long. They get about three a day at the fort.

There is a reward of 20 cents per foot for every venomous snake brought
in, 50 cents per foot for an alligator, and 25 dollars for every tiger.
Lately the police have got two specimens of an ophiophagus, a
snake-eating snake over eighteen feet long, whose bite they say is
certain death. They have a horrible collection of snakes alive, half
dead, dead, and preserved. There was a fright of a different kind late
at night, and the two made me so nervous that when the moonlight
glinted two or three times on the bayonet of the sentry, which I could