that such a stony surface could support
such a teeming vegetation.

In the afternoon of the third day we were approaching the port. When
within about a league of it, we came out upon a low, swampy plain, with
a grove of cocoanut trees at a long distance before us, the only
objects rising above the level surface, indicating, and, at the same
time, hiding, the port of Yalahao. The road lay over a causeway, then
wet and slippery, with numerous holes, and sometimes completely
overflowed. On each side was a sort of creek, and in the plain were
large pools of water. With a satisfaction perhaps greater than we had
experienced in our whole journey, we reached the port, and, after a
long absence, came down once more upon the shore of the sea.

The village was a long, straggling street of huts, elevated a few feet
above the washing of the waves. In passing along it, for the first time
in the country we came to a bridge crossing a brook, with a fine stream
of running water in sight on the left. Our horses seemed as much
astonished as ourselves, and we had great difficulty in getting them
over the bridge. On the shore was another spring bubbling within reach
of the waves.

We rode on to the house of Don Juan Bautista, to whom we had a letter
from the cura of Chemax, but he had gone to his rancho. His house and
one other were the only two in the place built of stone, and the
materials had been obtained from the ruins of Zuza, standing on his
rancho, two leagues distant on the coast.

We returned through the village to a house belonging to our friend the
cura, better than any except the two stone houses, and in situation
finer than these. It stood on the very edge of the bank, so near the
sea that the waves had undermined part of the long piazza in front; but
the interior was in good condition, and a woman tenant in possession.
We were about negotiating with her for the occupation of a part; but
wherever we went we seemed to be the terror of the sex, and before we
had fairly made a beginning, she abandoned the house and left us in
quiet possession. In an hour we were completely domesticated, and
toward evening we sat in the doorway and looked out upon the sea. The
waves were rolling almost to our door, and Doctor Cabot found a new
field opened to him in flocks of large sea-fowl strutting along the
shore and screaming over our heads.

[Engraving 56: Port of Yalahao]

The plate opposite represents this place as taken from the s