Latin America 255 



Costa Rica is one of the most charming of all lands. In 

 addition to breath-taking scenery in all directions, it has a 

 dehghtful, cultivated, intellectual society in its capital. I 

 may add also that many of the ladies are singularly lovely. 



With horses and guides kindly lent us by my friend 

 Charles Lankester, who plants coffee at Las Concavas, 

 Ned Hammond and I once made a trip to the summit of 

 the volcano of Irazti and spent a couple of nights camped 

 just below the cinder cone. It was possible to walk to the 

 top of the mountain, with the cinders crackling with frost 

 underfoot, and as daylight came to stand and watch the 

 sunrise. The clouds were far below us. At last we could 

 see the blue sea of the Atlantic far away and over 10,000 

 feet below. Far and wide in every direction the moun- 

 tain tops stuck up like islands in the deep white sea of fog. 

 In a few hours the fog all burned away to reveal the in- 

 credible beauty of the valleys of this crumpled-up land. 

 Nothing in the mountain forest is more breath-taking than 

 the orchids, which are simply beyond description. Imagine 

 a mass of corsage Cattleyas ensconced on a branch directly 

 below you as you peer down some little mountain canyon, 

 perhaps a hundred blossoms, a flaming mass of scarlet, 

 which would fill a bushel basket. 



I remember every hour of my considerable number of 

 visits to Costa Rica with lasting pleasure. The mainland 

 of Central America has conspired to treat me very kindly, 

 something which the waters off its coast have usually quite 

 reversed. I never in my life have suffered more acutely 

 than in going from port to port on those two little sub- 

 marine chasers, the Wild Duck and the Victor, of doleful 

 memory. I appreciate the kindness of the United Fruit 



