Page:The Homes of the New World- Vol. III.djvu/110

Rh Some ladies with Spanish physiognomies entered the carriage at one of the railway-stations. They seemed to be country-people, but were well dressed, and wore no covering on the head. Two of them were very handsome, were stout, and bore themselves proudly and with great hauteur and ungraciousness to a couple of gentlemen, evidently their admirers, who attended them, and who, at the last moment, presented bouquets with an air which did not look despairing, but rather full of roguishness, as they withdrew, without obtaining a glance from the proud beauties. This woke me up a little. And I was wide awake when we, in the afternoon, left behind us that region of ensnarement, and the landscape suddenly expanding itself, the city of Matanzas was before us, its glorious bay now blue—clearly, brightly blue—and in the background the lofty mountain ridge, Pan di Matanzas, so called from its form, and the opening to Yumori valley. The freshest, the most delicious breezes met us here; and at the railway-station I was met by two gentlemen, with mild, agreeable countenances, who bade me welcome. It was my countryman, Mr. F., from Götheberg, now resident at Matanzas; and Mr. J. B., who conveyed me in his volante to his handsome house, Here I was received most kindly by his handsome young wife, a Creole, but with such a fair, fresh, northern appearance, that she needed merely a helmet on her brow to have served as a model for a Valkyria.

With this agreeable young couple I am spending my time quietly and pleasantly, and invigorating myself, both soul and body, partly in their fresh, pleasant home—(my young hostess is the daughter of an Anglo-American, and everything in the house bears the impress of that cleanliness, order, and excellent management which distinguish the housewives of that race)—and partly by my solitary rambles in the neighbourhood of the city, although it is so unusual for a lady out of doors—especially with a