The dance began about nine o'clock and most of the participants, both men and women, were neatly attired in white garments. The men were very jealous of their girls, though for what reason it was hard to understand. Many writers rhapsodise over the beauty and loveliness of the Mexican women, but I couldn't see it. There are rare exceptions, however. The dance-hall consisted of a smooth dirt floor with no covering overhead, and the orchestra--a violin and some sort of a wind-instrument--was mounted on a large box in the center. A row of benches extended around the outside of the "dancing-ground." The men all carried their machetes (large cutlasses, the blades of which range from eighteen to thirty-six inches in length) in sheaths at their side, and two or three of the more gaily dressed wore colored sashes around their waists. All wore their sombreros. The dance had not progressed for more than an hour when one of the villagers discovered that his lady was engaging too much of the attention of one of our boatmen, and this resulted in a quarrel. Both men drew their machetes and went at one another in gladiator fashion. It looked as if both would be carved to pieces, but after slashing at each other for awhile they were separated and placed under arrest. It was discovered that one of them had received an ugly, though not dangerous, wound in his side, while the other (our man) had the tendons of his left wrist severed. The men were taken away and the dance proceeded as orderly as before. We now had only two boatmen left. In discussing the matter at home a year later a member of our party remarked that "it was a great pity that the whole bunch wasn't put out of commission; then we would have returned to Tampico, and from there home." One of the natives very courteously invited us to get up and take part in the dance, but after the episode just mentioned we decided not to take a chance. Our boatmen spent all the next day in fruitless endeavor to secure another helper, and we did not start until the day after at about nine o'clock--a needless delay of forty-two hours; but they were apparently no more concerned than if it had been ten minutes. We were learning to measure time with an elastic tape. Ober complains of the poor traveling facilities in Mexico, and says that "in five days' diligent travel" he accomplished but 220 miles. We had been out longer than that and had not covered twenty miles.