A HUNT FOR HOATZINS 95 



to have company. A stout — no, exceedingly fat 

 — bespectacled gentleman, with pigment of 

 ebony, and arrayed in full evening dress and 

 high hat, was guarding a small dilapidated suit- 

 case, and glaring at him across the aisle was a 

 man of chocolate hue, with the straight black 

 hair of the East Indian and the high cheek- 

 bones and slanting eyes of the Mongolian. His 

 dress was a black suit of heavy Scotch plaid, 

 waistcoat and all, with diamonds and loud tie, 

 and a monocle which he did not attempt to 

 use. Far off in the distant corner lounged a 

 bronzed planter in comfortable muddy clothes. 

 But we three upheld the prestige of the west 

 end of the carriage. 



Soon, impelled by the great heat, I removed 

 my coat and was looked at askance; but I was 

 the only comfortable one of the three. With 

 the planter I should have liked to converse, but 

 with those who sat near I held no communica- 

 tion. I could think of them only as insincere 

 imitators of customs wholly unadapted to their 

 present lives and country. I could have re- 

 spected them so much more if they had clad 

 themselves in cool white duck. I hold that a 

 man is not worth knowing who will endure ex- 



