ve I hear the bells, don't you, Mrs. Steele?" She puts
the grey-gloved hand over her eyes as if she were tired.

"I could hear them, dear, if I were twenty."

"Vhat bells ees dthat?" The Peruvian turns away his fine head to
listen. "I hear nodthing."

"You are the only one that hears them, Blanche; tell us what they
say."

"Even Longfellow can't do that," I answer, "and his sense was so acute
and fine he heard them half across the world."

I look out to the misty coast line and repeat:

"What say the Bells of San Blas
To the ships that outward pass
To the harbour of Mazatlan?
To them it is nothing more
Than the sound of surf on the shore--
Nothing more to master or man.
But to me, a dreamer of dreams,
To whom what is and what seems
Are often one and the same,
The Bells of San Blas to me
Have a strange wild melody,
And are something more than a name."

"Ah, vas I not right, Madame Steele? I vill learn zo beautiful
Eenglish on dthis voyage."

CHAPTER II

[Illustration: Chapter Two]

MY INTERPRETER AT MAZATLAN

On the fifth day out from San Francisco we make the harbour of
Mazatlan, on the Mexican coast. The courtesy of the Captain secures us
a good view from "the bridge" as we approach our first port. A great
white rock juts up in the bay like a fragment of some Titan's
fortress; a lighthouse stares out to sea from a cliff at the harbour's
entrance; the tall cocoa palms wave their fern leaves in the blinding
sunshine, and red-roofed houses huddle below the dome of the Cathedral
rising white above the town.

The harbour soon swarms with the countless boats of the natives coming
with fruit and wares to sell or hoping to earn a few _reales_ by
rowing the curious to the wharf.

Senor Noma engages the largest of these boats and invites as many as
it will hold to go ashore with him. He helps in Mrs. Steele, Baron de
Bach brings me, and we are soon followed by Captain Ball and his wife,
and Miss Rogers, a pretty girl with her photographic camera and her
mamma, who is an Episcopal clergyman's wife, and so proud of the
circumstance that the gentlemen have dubbed her "The Church of
England."

The Mexican oarsmen make one think of comic opera brigands, except
that they look rather dirtier and their speech is music without song.
We land at a rude wharf in the low sea wall and pass through groups of
dark-skinned natives who eye us with sleepy interest. Th