d an irregular valley, the slopes
of which were covered with thousands of coffee-trees, with their
magnificent dark green leaves and sweet-scented, white flowers. Three
hundred and fifty thousand trees made up the plantation, which was one
of two owned and managed by Senor Rau. The house was large, and rather
pretentious, two stories in height, with buildings for cleaning, packing
and storing coffee on the same terrace, and with a veritable village of
houses for the indian workmen down below. I received a warm reception
from the Senor and his household, who have established here a veritable
bit of Germany in tropical America. Not only was I myself cared for, but
I was urged to make no haste in going further, as no steamer would go
from La Cruzada before the 4th, and it would be easy to reach that
place in twenty-four hours. So, for several days the hospitable
plantation-house was my home. Great lines of mules were constantly going
from here, through to El Salto and La Cruzada, with loads of coffee,
and coming back with provisions, and the many supplies necessary for an
establishment of this importance. When the next _mulada_ should appear,
animals would be sent to Tumbala for my companions and the luggage.
Curiously, none came for two whole days--a very unusual occurrence--and
the boys remained prisoners in that dreary town for all that time. For
my own part, I was thankful to reach a place where a comfortable bed and
certain meals were to be counted on. My fever left me, but the following
morning I found myself suffering from swollen jaws; every tooth was
loose and sore, and it was difficult to chew even the flesh of bananas;
this difficulty I had lately suffered, whenever in the moist mountain
district of Pennsylvania, and I feared that there would be no relief
until I was permanently out of the district of forest-grown mountains.
Nor was I mistaken, for ten days passed, and we had reached the dry
central table-land of Mexico, before my suffering ended. One day, while
we were on the _finca_, considerable excitement was caused by one of the
Indians working in the field being bitten by a poisonous serpent. The
man was brought at once to the house, and remedies were applied which
prevented serious results, although his leg swelled badly. The serpent
was killed, and measured about five feet in length, having much the
general appearance of a rattlesnake, but with no rattles. Don Enrique
says that the most dangerous snake in