As for myself, rheumatism was about the only ailment I did not have at that time, and I suppose I did not really sympathize with him. But this energetic and indomitable man mended the pump, with Fisher's help, and led the water into the house, laid a floor, set up the tub in the little square room, and behold, our sulphur bath! After much persuasion, I tried the bath. The water flowed thick and inky black into the tub; of course the odor was beyond description, and the effect upon me was not such that I was ever willing to try it again. Jack beamed. "How do you like it, Martha?" said he. "Isn't it fine? Why people travel hundreds of miles to get a bath like that!" I had my own opinion, but I did not wish to dampen his enthusiasm. Still, in order to protect myself in the future, I had to tell him I thought I should ordinarily prefer the river. "Well," he said, "there are those who will be thankful to have a bath in that water; I am going to use it every day." I remonstrated: "How do you know what is in that inky water--and how do you dare to use it?" "Oh, Fisher says it's all right; people here used to drink it years ago, but they have not done so lately, because the pump was broken down." The Washington people seemed glad to pay us the visit. Jack's eyes danced with true generosity and glee. He marked his victim; and, selecting the Staff beauty and the Paymaster's wife, he expatiated on the wonderful properties of his sulphur bath. "Why, yes, the sooner the better," said Mrs. Martin. "I'd give everything I have in this world, and all my chances for the next, to get a tub bath!" "It will be so refreshing just before supper," said Mrs. Maynadier, who was more conservative. So the Indian, who had put on his dark blue waist-band (or sash), made from flannel, revelled out and twisted into strands of yarn, and which showed the supple muscles of his clean-cut thighs, and who had done up an extra high pompadour in white clay, and burnished his knife, which gleamed at his waist, ushered these Washington women into a small apartment adjoining the bath-room, and turned on the inky stream into the sarcophagus. The Staff beauty looked at the black pool, and shuddered. "Do you use it?" said she. "Occasionally," I equivocated. "Does it hurt the complexion?" she ventured. "Jack thinks it excellent for that," I replied. And then I left them, directing Charley to wait, and prepare the bath for the second victim. By and by the beauty came out. "Where is your mirror?" cried she (for our appointments were primitive, and mirrors did not grow on bushes at Ehrenberg); "I fancy I look queer," she added, and, in truth, she did; for our water of the Styx did not seem to affiliate with the chemical properties of the numerous cosmetics used by her, more or less, all her life, but especially on the voyage, and her face had taken on a queer color, with peculiar spots here and there.