THROUGH WILD EUROPE 23 



placed between us, and being each provided with 

 a wooden spoon we were soon busily engaged, 

 and found it very cool and satisfying after our 

 exertions. 



Our trip to Malaga may be briefly described as a 

 failure. The sierras which surround the town are, I 

 believe, good, and the district had been recommended 

 as quite worth visiting, but we were unfortunate in 

 not being able to find any reliable guide who could 

 direct us in which quarter to try. We were dis- 

 appointed also in the town itself. The drought, 

 under which Spain suffered so terribly that year, 

 was beginning to make itself felt, and the clouds of 

 dust, which lay to the thickness of four inches in the 

 streets, were intolerable. The smells everywhere 

 were terrible ; and, to crown all this, our hotel, one 

 of the biggest in the place, was alive with bugs ! 

 Insect pests are the curse of Spanish travel. We 

 had changed our room soon after our arrival because 

 it stank so abominably of drains that it was impossible 

 to remain in it. We had a double-bedded room as 



usual, and I slept all right, but poor M spent 



half the night in agony, until, in desperation, he un- 

 packed his luggage and unearthed a box of Keating's 

 insect powder and plentifully besprinkled his bedding 

 with it. After that he had a little unquiet sleep, and 

 in the morning we examined the field of battle. 

 The ' Keating's ' had done its work faithfully. We 



