CLIMATE, EVIL BEASTS, SCENERY 123 



in point of numbers and ferocity. All over 

 this broad land east, west, north, and south 

 there have we to sit down with him in 

 hateful and familiar association. To be ap- 

 preciated, however, he must be known, this 

 American fly. In summer, by dint of screened 

 doors and windows and shaded apartments, 

 we can in a measure control his visitations ; 

 though even then he lingers on the porches 

 ready to follow on the heels of every entering 

 guest, and once within to lay waste, devour, 

 and destroy temper and peace of mind in- 

 cluded as only a fly can. Strange to say, 

 the agile flea seldom darkens our doors, and 

 the hum of the mosquito is heard only in 

 occasional seasons, when the river waxes 

 riotous, and water lingers in the acequias or 

 overflows their banks. Snakes are common 

 enough ; but though they writhe and hiss, 

 and stand up on their hinder parts and give 

 us bad dreams, they are, the most of them, 

 harmless, though hot-tempered. Some of 

 these big brownery-greenery snakes are ex- 

 cellent mousers, and, as mice are our constant 

 torments here, I persuaded myself, after much 

 travail of spirit, to permit one such snake to 



