A THUNDER STORM. 



113 



There was no one in the hut but a little girl, and the 

 moment the rain abated I followed. I had another 

 stream to cross, which was also much swollen, and the 

 road was flooded. The road lay through a thick for- 

 est ; very soon the clouds became blacker than ever ; 

 on the left was a range of naked mountains, the old 

 stone quarries of Copan, along which the thunder roll- 

 ed fearfully, and the lightning wrote angry inscriptions 

 on its sides. An English tourist in the United States 

 admits the superiority of our thunder and lightning. I 

 am pertinacious on all points of national honour, but 

 concede this in favour of the tropics. The rain fell 

 as if floodgates were opened from above ; and while 

 my mule was slipping and sliding through the mud I 

 lost my road. I returned some distance, and was again 

 retracing my steps, when I met a woman, barefooted, 

 and holding her dress above her knees, who proved to 

 be my rheumatic patient, the wife of Don Jose Maria. 

 "While inquiring the road, I told her that she was set- 

 ting at naught the skill of the physician, and added, 

 what I believed to be very true, that she need not ex- 

 pect to get well under our treatment. I rode on some 

 distance, and again lost my way. It was necessary to 

 enter the woods on the right, I had come out by a 

 footpath which I had not noticed particularly. There 

 were cattle-paths in every direction, and within the line 

 of a mile I kept going in and out, without hitting the 

 right one. Several times I saw the print of Augus- 

 tin's feet, but soon lost them in puddles of water, and 

 they only confused me more ; at length I came to a 

 complete stand-still. It was nearly dark ; I did not 

 know which way to turn ; and as Mr. Henry Pelham 

 did when in danger of drowning in one of the gutters 

 of Paris, I stood still and hallooed. To my great joy, 

 Vol. L— P 



