The guide-books and geographies say that La Guayra is the hottest and most unhealthy place in the world; that it is hotter than Cairo, or Madras, or Abushar, or Aden, or Yuma; but the United States consul says that this is an absurd and inexcusable falsehood, and represents the city as being a most attractive summer resort. Humboldt says yellow-fever is born there, and that it is the chief distributing point for the plague; the consul says that there is only occasionally a case of fever of a mild type, which is often mistaken for genuine yellow-jack, and people ordinarily recover from it. Humboldt says, too, that in his time this was a famous place for tidal waves; that a lookout was always stationed at the fort, which sits in a crevice in the mountains above the town, to watch for them, and when one was seen coming a gun was fired to warn the vessels, which pulled in their anchors and put out to sea to escape being dashed against the mountains. He also says that it was the worst place for barnacles (_teredo navalis_) in the world, and that vessels were totally ruined by lying at anchor there; but Mr. Bird says these stories are all humbug, and while it might have been so in Humboldt’s time, the conditions are totally different now. [Illustration: WAITING FOR THE NEW YORK STEAMER.] Above the city, among the rocks, are the ruins of old Spanish forts which have been the scenes of the most terrific conflicts, and the ravines have run with blood from the carnage until the sea has been as red as a sunset. In the days of the buccaneers La Guayra was a favorite place for fighting, and there being no harbor, the pirate kings were always cruising after the galleons which came there to load with treasures for the King of Spain. Upon the top of a high bluff overlooking the town is an immense castle, which was at one time the residence of the Captain-general of the Spanish colonies, and is haunted by all sorts of legends and romantic traditions. It is now in ruins, and the underground tunnel which formerly connected it with the Military Barracks, four miles away, has caved in at many places. To readers of that remarkable novel, “Westward, Ho!” by Charles Kingsley, this castle has a romantic interest, as it was here where the Rose of Devon was carried by her Spanish lover, and where she was sought and found by Aymas and Frank Leigh. But things are different nowadays. The great American house of Boulton, Bliss & Dallett have their headquarters there, control the trade, send vessels to New York every ten days without molestation laden with coffee, and the only blood that flows is shed by the fleas.