It was a dark and rainy morning, when “Land on the lee-bow,” was sung out by the man at the helm, and in less time than is occupied in writing it, the occupants of the close little cabin made their way on deck, to look for the first time upon the coast of Central America. The dim outlines of the land were just discernible through the murky atmosphere, and many and profound were the conjectures hazarded as to what precise point was then in view. The result finally arrived at was, that we were off “Monkey Point,” about thirty miles to the northward of our destined port. This conclusion was soon confirmed by observing, close under the shadow of the shore, an immense rock, rising with all the regularity of the Pyramids to the height of three hundred feet; a landmark too characteristic to be mistaken. We were sweeping along with a stiff breeze, and were comforted with the assurance that we should be in port to breakfast, “_if_,” as the cautious captain observed, “the wind held.” But the perverse wind did not hold, and in half an hour thereafter we were rocking about with a wash-tubby motion, the most disagreeable that can be imagined, and of which we had had three days’ experience under the Capes of San Domingo. The haze cleared a little, and with our glasses we could make out a long, low line of shore, covered with the densest verdure, with here and there the feathery palm, which forms so picturesque a feature in all tropical scenery, lifting itself proudly above the rest of the forest, and the whole relieved against a background of high hills, over which the gray mist still hung like a veil. Some of the party could even make out the huts on the shore; but the old man at the helm smiled incredulously, and said there were no huts there, and that the unbroken and untenanted forest extended far back to the great ridge of the Cordilleras. So it was when the adventurous Spaniards coasted here three centuries ago, and so it had remained ever since. These observations were interrupted by a heavy shower, acceptable for the wind it brought, which filled the idle sails, and moved us towards our haven. And though the rain fell in torrents, it did not deter us from getting soaked, in vain endeavors to harpoon the porpoises that came tumbling in numbers around our bows.