Читать книгу Roraima and British Guiana, With a Glance at Bermuda, the West Indies, and the Spanish Main онлайн

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There were only two passengers besides myself for the Hamilton Hotel, and these were a very charming old lady and her son—a young physician from Boston—who had been advised to spend the winter abroad. A short walk brought us to the hotel, a good-sized, comfortable building, commanding a fine view of the harbour and port of the town. On our way up, we passed a splendid specimen of the india-rubber tree, whose luxuriant growth almost hid the broad veranda’d cottage behind it. Speaking of this tree, Mark Twain says that, when he saw it, it was “out of season, possibly as there were no shoes on it, nor suspenders, nor anything a person would properly expect to find there.” This tree was the first sign of tropical vegetation that we had seen, which fact had rather surprised us, as on the cover of a “bill of fare,” which had been shown to us in New York, was a picture of the Hamilton Hotel, with an avenue of palms and bananas leading up to it. The fine palms—mountain cabbage—we afterwards discovered about half-a-mile off, and not even within sight of the hotel. But one cannot expect to find everything one sees, even on a bill of fare. We were informed by the clerk that we were the first visitors of the season. “But somebody else is here,” said I, pointing to a solitary name in the visitor’s register. “Oh,” said he, “that’s me;” and forthwith assigned us our rooms.