ii4 RUBBER PLANTING ON THE 



in charge by Mr. Newmark, soon reached La Buena Ventura, and 

 entered the house that was to be my headquarters during my stay in the 

 Trinidad River district. 



I had not seen my friend Harvey, the founder of this tropical 

 enterprise, since we dined together at the Lotos Club in New York 

 four years before. He was then yearning to shake the snows of the 

 north from his feet and hasten back to the land where winter was 

 unknown. I doubt if he believed that I would ever redeem my promise 

 given then to visit him, and it was not for some time that I learned 

 the cause for this skepticism. It seems that many northerners come to 

 the City of .Mexico some venture to Orizaba and points easy of access 

 further south, but few get as far as Achotal. Only a short time pre- 

 viously a well known New York lawyer arrived there at one in the 

 morning, saw what he was "up against/' boarded the train, and started 

 back, though within ten miles of his destination. And that was why 

 my host exclaimed, "By Jove, you are really here!" 



