re
over the ankles in mud. "Show a light, boy." He turns round, and,
placing his lantern close to the ground, you see at a glance the horrid
truth revealed--you are in a perfect mud swamp; so, tuck up your
trowsers, and wade away to the omnibuses, about a quarter of a mile off.
Gracious me! there are two ladies, with their dresses hitched up like
kilts, sliding and floundering through the slushy road. How miserable
they must be, poor things! Not the least; they are both tittering and
giggling merrily; they are accustomed to it, and habit is second nature.
A man from the Old World of advanced civilization--in these matters of
minor comforts, at least--will soon learn to conduct himself upon the
principle, that where ignorance is bliss, wisdom becomes folly.
Laughing, like love, is catching; so these two jolly ladies put me in a
good humour, and I laughed my way to the 'bus half up to my knees in
mud. After all, it made it lighter work than growling, and go I must; so
thank you, ladies, for the cheering example.

Hot tea soon washes away from a thirsty and wearied soul the remembrance
of muddy boots, and a good Havana soothes the wounded spirit. After
enjoying both, I retired to rest, as I hoped, for we had to make an
early start in the morning. Scarce was I in bed, ere the house rang
again with laughing and romping just outside my door; black and white,
old and young, male and female, all seemed chorusing together--feet
clattered, passages echoed--it was a very Babel of noise and confusion.
What strange beings we are! Not two hours before, I had said and felt
that laughing was catching; now, although the merry chirp of youth
mingled with it, I wished the whole party at the residence of an old
gentleman whose name I care not to mention. May we not truly say of
ourselves what the housemaid says of the missing article--"Really, sir,
I don't know nothing at all about it?" A few hours before, I was
joining in the laugh as I waded nearly knee-deep in mud, and now I was
lying in a comfortable bed grinding my teeth at the same joyous sounds.

It took three messages to the proprietor, before order was restored and
I was asleep. In the morning, I found that the cause of all the rumpus
was a marriage that had taken place in the hotel; and the master and
mistress being happy, the servants caught the joyous infection, and got
the children to share it with them. I must not be understood to cast any
reflections upon the happy pair, wh