But these observations are not a part of my story. With the cargo of loyalist coffee we headed for New Orleans. We made bad weather of it all of the way. The faddish ship wouldn’t sail or heave to and was as cranky as an old man in his dotage. Some days we actually went backward, and it was a long time before we raised South Pass light and were picked up by a tug. The moment the hawser tightened the old ship threw herself back on her haunches and refused to budge. The captain of the towboat, after struggling strenuously to get us under way, dropped back and screamed at me, “What in hell is the matter with that damned old hooker?” “You don’t know how to tow and she knows it,” I retorted. “One would think you had all the anchors in the United States down,” he shouted. I assured him that we didn’t have even one down and he tried it again and finally got us to going. We were off quarantine soon after sundown and discovered that an embargo of forty days against Central American ports had been raised only an hour before. The balkiness of the “Richards” had prevented us from having to ride at anchor for days or weeks and be subjected to casual inspection and gossip which might have caused trouble. While the delay had been of service to us in that respect it provoked some anxiety on another point. I had an idea that the Costa Rican Government might try to have the ship seized, and our trip had been such a long one that no time was to be lost in selling our cargo and getting away. I took samples of the coffee to New Orleans on a tug and placed them in the hands of old Peter Stevens, of the Produce Exchange, who sold the whole cargo in an hour. While the coffee was coming out stores were going in, and we were out of the river again and on our way to Hayti in record time. Though I had good cause to remember Santo Domingo I never had been in the “Black Republic,” and as I had heard there was a probability of some lively times there I determined to visit it before I returned to New York. But the crankiness of the “Richards” interfered with my plans. When we were about one hundred miles west of Key West the old ship committed suicide by burning herself to death. The fire started in the hold amidships, but we could not even imagine what might have caused it. It was so unexpected that it had a good start before we discovered it. We fought it, of course, but we might as well have tried to quench a volcano in eruption. The strange craft had made up her mind to go under, and there was nothing for us to do but take to the whaleboat, which was large enough for all of us, as I had only a small crew. After we had shoved off we returned at considerable risk to rescue a big black cat which was on the ship when I bought her. We had christened him “John Croix,” and every man on board undertook to teach him all he knew about navigation, with the result that the animal had become so highly educated that he could do everything about the ship but use the sextant.