It was on the day after the Grand Ball, Tuesday, April 10, that a party of us started on a walking trip to the city of Puerto Principe, forty-five miles away. My companions, who, like myself, were all colonists, were Jeff D. Franklin of Florida, David Murphy of New Jersey, A. H. Carpenter of Massachusetts, and a Mr. Crosby of Tennessee. Mr. Crosby was a man of middle age; the rest of us were younger, Carpenter being a mere youth of perhaps eighteen. All were good walkers. The start was made at about 8:30 in the morning. The day was pleasant and balmy, but not excessively warm. The trail was now in good condition, and the walking would have been altogether agreeable had it not been for the packs upon our shoulders. We carried hammocks, blankets, and such food as bread, crackers, sardines, bacon, and coffee. One of the party had a frying-pan slung across his back. Our loads were not actually heavy, but they seemed so after we had walked a few miles. Our course lay to the southwest, through the deserted plantation of Mercedes, where we stopped an hour to eat oranges and chat with the colonists at work there. Resuming our march, we soon passed an inhabited Cuban shack near an abandoned sugar mill, stopping a few minutes to investigate a small banana patch near the road. We had been here before and knew the owner. A mile further on we reached another occupied shack, and called to get a drink of agua (water). We were hospitably received in the open front of the casa (house) and given heavy, straight-backed, leather-bottomed chairs of an antique pattern. The agua furnished was rain water which had been stored in a cistern, and had at least the virtue of being wet. There were at home an old man, a very fleshy elderly woman, and two rather good-looking girls, the appearance and dress of one of whom indicated that she was a visitor. This was about the only shack we saw where there were no young children in evidence. We tarried but a few minutes. After making inquiries about the road, as we did at almost every house, we continued on our way.