Travels in the United States, etc.,: during 1849 and 1850./ By the Lady Emmeline Stuart Wortley.

TRAVELS IN AMERICA.
Just before we started, two Granadian gentlemen came running
down the bank with some light baggage, to hold a parley with
the head-boatman, who presently afterward came to me, and beseechingly and deprecatingly begged me to allow him to set these
caballeros down at a village he named, not far down the river:
without my permission, of course, he said he told them it was impossible; but they had been disappointed, I think, of a boat they
had tried to get, and were anxious to avail themselves of this
favorable opportunity.
Would not this much retard us, by loading the canoe so much
more, I wished to know. He assured me we should not be a mrnoment longer on account of it, and it would particularly oblige them
and the caballeros if I would give my consent. I granted their
request, of course as a great indulgence, and off we started, under
a broiling sun at first (but that was soon changed for deluges of
rain); indeed, while I stood on the shore, superintending the construction of the awning, I thought my bonnet would almost have
been burnt on my head by the intense rays of the sun.
The New Granadians soon arrived at their destination, paid
the boatmen, and thanked me very gratefully and gracefully for
the permission I had accorded; and lifting their light sombreros,
and murmuring a profusion of acknowledgments, away they ran
up the bank, and away we sped along the winding river.
Our boatmen hurried on in the highest good-humor, and apparently determined I should have no occasion to regret this simple
act of complaisance. The rain was terrific.
I said our ride was a sort of subterranean grope-through such
holes we burrowed along; and really our little voyage seemed a
kind of submarine navigation, pleasingly diversified, however, by
several awful storms of thunder and lightning; but, alas! by no
coral bowers, no pearly grots-we saw, felt, heard, and were aware
of nothing but rain' rain! rain! Umbrellas were a mockery and
a snare. They seemed to act like positive conductors of the rainlightnings! The very awning, which at first sheltered us, became
a practical joke; water-proof cloaks, tarpaulin, &cO., were mere
straws for the drowni.ng to catch at.
We felt unresuscitable by all the Humane Societies on earth.
They may recover people half or three-cluarters drowned; but the
utterly melted away-how could they ever restore them to substance and life? Water-proof! why, it seemed to rain into the
very brain! Nothing but watery images suggested themselvesNiagaras and whirlpools, twirled mops and twisting maelstroms,
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