e
not more than three or four, but often as many as eighteen or
twenty. Let me tell you of the various persons who composed this
outside audience, as I watched them one morning. A native policeman,
a business man waiting for his car, three beggars, boys with large
trays of bread, fruit and sweetmeats on their heads, a washerwoman
with a huge basket of clothes poised securely on her head, the
driver of an ox-cart, who stopped his team while we sang "America,"
three women going to market, a party of daintily dressed,
sweet-faced senoritas with their chaperone, a dirty, wild-looking
old hag who almost frightened me, a young mother carrying a naked
baby in her arms, and boys--well, it was no use to count them. What
do you think? Are we not being well advertised?"

[Illustration: ON THE MILITARY ROAD FROM SAN JUAN TO LARES.]

Great care was taken in locating these schools. Rev. A. F. Beard,
Senior Secretary of the A. M. A., and Rev. William H. Ward, D.D., a
member of the Executive Committee, visited the island to examine the
conditions and discover the best points for such work. Prof. Scott,
after reaching the island, also made thorough investigation
concerning the most important location. He wrote after reaching
Porto Rico: "The railroad from Arecibo is impassable. I hired a pony
and a boy to guide me and started for the town. The only way of
traveling now, except on military roads, is by pony. I had never
ridden two miles on horseback in my life, but it had to be done and
I am still intact, and have ridden twenty to twenty-five miles
to-day without even getting stiff. We reached Arecibo, having to
ford or ferry streams five times. There were no bridges left.

"Friday I rode to Lares, eighteen miles over the roughest trail
imaginable. Much of it is as steep as a stairway, with stones of all
sizes replacing the steps. But I managed to stick to my pony. We
reached Lares at eight o'clock, the eighteen miles taking nine
hours, with three hours at noon waiting for the rain to cease."

Lares, a town of 3,000 population, is situated in the western part
of the island. It was finally decided that this should be the place
for the second school planted by the American Missionary
Association. Prof. Scott writes also: "Lares is a very pleasant
place, built around the top of a hill, the best residences at the
top, with best possible drainage and supplied with excellent spring
water. I had a letter to the Alcalde (Mayor) and to the l