ll-built houses are here), to
ensure a draught of air beneath them. We were, of course, asked to
come in and sit down, but preferred looking about, under our
umbrellas; for the heat was intense. The soil is half pitch, half
brown earth, among which the pitch sweals in and out, as tallow
sweals from a candle. It is always in slow motion under the heat of
the tropic sun: and no wonder if some of the cottages have sunk
right and left in such a treacherous foundation. A stone or brick
house could not stand here: but wood and palm-thatch are both light
and tough enough to be safe, let the ground give way as it will.

The soil, however, is very rich. The pitch certainly does not
injure vegetation, though plants will not grow actually in it. The
first plants which caught our eyes were pine-apples; for which La
Brea is famous. The heat of the soil, as well as of the air, brings
them to special perfection. They grow about anywhere, unprotected
by hedge or fence; for the Negroes here seem honest enough, at least
towards each other. And at the corner of the house was a bush worth
looking at, for we had heard of it for many a year. It bore
prickly, heart-shaped pods an inch long, filled with seeds coated
with a red waxy pulp.

This was a famous plant--Bixa Orellana, Roucou; and that pulp was
the well-known Arnotta dye of commerce. In England and Holland it
is used merely, I believe, to colour cheeses; but in the Spanish
Main, to colour human beings. The Indian of the Orinoco prefers
paint to clothes; and when he has 'roucoued' himself from head to
foot, considers himself in full dress, whether for war or dancing.
Doubtless he knows his own business best from long experience.
Indeed, as we stood broiling on the shore, we began somewhat to
regret that European manners and customs prevented our adopting the
Guaraon and Arawak fashion.

The mule-cart arrived; the lady of the party was put into it on a
chair, and slowly bumped and rattled past the corner of Dundonald
Street--so named after the old sea-hero, who was, in his lifetime,
full of projects for utilising this same pitch--and up a pitch road,
with a pitch gutter on each side.

The pitch in the road has been, most of it, laid down by hand, and
is slowly working down the slight incline, leaving pools and ruts
full of water, often invisible, because covered with a film of brown
pitch-dust, and so letting in the unwary walker ov