"Although I have written Orizaba at the top of 
this sheet, I am really at Cordova, 20 miles lower down the 
road toward Vera Cruz. Our car is standing on the si detract 
here in front of the station where we were dropped off at 
three this afternoon. It is eight in the evening and is dark 
with a dripping rain outside. Dutton and Gilbert are at the 
t^ble playing cribbage and Mr. Breckinridge is playing "solitaire . n 
Since writing you last in Monterey we have been con- 
stantly on the go through dust and rain and chill and heat over 
half of Mexico. Yesterday afternoon we reached the City of 
Mexico, attended to some business and then set out for this 
point. We would have gone on to Vera Cruz but Dutton seemed 
to fear the yellow fever. The trip to Tampico was given up 
for the same reason. There is as yet no yellow fever in the 
country and there is no danger. Our object in coming here is to 
see the great peak of Orizaba (see picture in the Cosmos Club) 
I ) 
the face of the great plateau where the highland breaks off 
next the Gulf and to get a glimpse of Popocatepetl on the way. 
Our itinerary is now made out for five or six trips with the 
City of Mexico as the starting point. Some of these are 
archeologic and some are geologic. I found my friend W. W. 
Blake in Mexico City and he will go with us on two or three 
of the trips., 
I have sketched a little as we ran, but of course 
the results amount to out little. X may get time to sketch 
something at Orizaba tomorrow where we will probably tie over 
a 
for a day. It is/very picturesque place with plenty of bridges 
