Streets of Castries are laid out in right angles, and many of the population were laid out in the streets at all angles. Every old soak fills up. I saw a black man and woman stagger along the walk, fall in the gutter, make love and wallow there like pigs. In the outskirts darky women were dragging their drunk lovers, brothers or husbands through the mud by heels or head or spreading them out like clothes to dry on doorsteps or windowsills. The squalor was stentorious and stercoraceous. Castries was a medley of noise, music and mud. The only bible commandment followed was the eleventh. “Thou shalt get stewed.” The patron saint of the city must be Saint Amant, the French seventeenth century bacchanalian bard who received inspiration for his drinking songs by imbibing enormous quantities of spirits which resulted in ebullitions like “La Debauche.” Alcaeus said, “Wine and truth”—and it was a very naked truth we saw in the Casino on the hill. Yes, it was quite “orgiferous.” What is an orgy? Listen to Gautier: “Oh, the orgy giving to the winds its heaving breasts, red with kisses; the orgy shaking out its perfumed hair upon its bare shoulders, dancing, singing, shouting, holding one hand out to this man and the other to that one; the orgy, hot courtezan, that yields readily to every fancy, that drinks punch and laughs, that stains the cloth and its gown, that dips its garland of flowers in a bath of Malmsey wine; the ribald orgy, showing its foot and its leg, letting its heavy head fall to right or left; the quarrelsome, blaspheming orgy, quick to snatch its stilleto from its garter; the quivering orgy, that has only to stretch out its wand and turn an idiot into a poet and a poet into an idiot; the orgy that duplicates our being, and sends fire running through our veins, sets diamonds in our eyes and rubies on our lips; the orgy, the only poetry that is possible in these prosaic days.” The Casino orchestra was squeaking, the couples reeking; airs were lively like those of the girls. One temptress asked me to give her a good time—and my watch; another charmer wanted my gold charm; but discretion was the better part of virtue and valor. To escape with money and morals, we slid down hill after throwing them a few shillings to buy religious tracts to make tracks in a different direction. In town a crowd stood watching two women fighting and shaking their fists and naked breasts at each other till the sweet milk of kindness turned to sour hate.