240 
DOTTINGS ON THE ROADSIDE. [Chap. XIV.-B. P. 
This homily, read to my guests, probably went in 
at one ear and out of the other, judging from the un¬ 
disguised pleasure of every one when, a few days 
afterwards, I announced that I intended to take a short 
cruise up the coast in pursuit of knowledge; to visit 
the Mosquito king, to find out for myself whether 
facilities were afforded higher up for a landing by those 
troublesome scamps, the filibusters; and generally to 
get some practical notion of what sort of a place the 
Mosquito Coast was, and what was really going on in 
this famous but singularly little known and less under¬ 
stood part of the world. 
