from H.M.S. Scout, rushing helter skelter, colliding with everybody,
bestriding their horses as they would a topsail-yard, hanging on to
manes and lassoing horns, and enjoying themselves thoroughly. In
the shady tortuous streets we met hundreds more of native riders,
clashing at full gallop without fear of the police. Many of the
women were in flowing riding-dresses of pure white, over which their
unbound hair, and wreaths of carmine-tinted flowers fell most
picturesquely.

All this time I had not seen our domicile, and when our drive ended
under the quivering shadow of large tamarind and algaroba trees, in
front of a long, stone, two-storied house with two deep verandahs
festooned with clematis and passion flowers, and a shady lawn in
front, I felt as if in this fairy land anything might be expected.

This is the perfection of an hotel. Hospitality seems to take
possession of and appropriate one as soon as one enters its never-
closed door, which is on the lower verandah. There is a basement,
in which there are a good many bedrooms, the bar, and billiard-room.
This is entered from the garden, under two semicircular flights of
stairs which lead to the front entrance, a wide corridor conducting
to the back entrance. This is crossed by another running the whole
length, which opens into a very large many-windowed dining-room
which occupies the whole width of the hotel. On the same level
there is a large parlour, with French windows opening on the
verandah. Upstairs there are two similar corridors on which all the
bedrooms open, and each room has one or more French windows opening
on the verandah, with doors as well, made like German shutters, to
close instead of the windows, ensuring at once privacy and coolness.
The rooms are tastefully furnished with varnished pine with a strong