Japanese lanterns lighted the road which led from the main highway to the club, and the old rambling structure was aglow with a thousand colored cup-lights that made it look like fairyland. Within and without were dozens of palms and all sorts of tropical shrubs, and the entrance-way was one huge bower-like fernery. Around the lower entrance-room colored flags grouped themselves artistically, and below a huge mass of bunting at the farther end rose the grand staircase that led above. Upstairs, the ladies' dressing-room was most gorgeous, and the walls were hung with costly, golden-wove tapestries from Japan. The main parlor formed one of the dancing-rooms and opened into two huge adjoining bed-chambers which were thrown together in one suite. All around the walls and ceilings were garlands and long festoons and wreaths, and everywhere were bowers of plants, borrowed mirrors, and lights. Out on the veranda, overhanging the river, were clusters of small tables, glowing under fairy lamps, and the railings were a mass of verdure. The orchestra consisted of twenty-five natives, dressed in white shirts whose tails were not tucked in, hidden behind a forest of plants, and as the clock struck ten they began to coax from their instruments a dreamy waltz. The guests began to pour in--Spanish dons with their corpulent wives, and strapping Englishmen with their leaner better halves. The Spaniards, sniffing the air, all looked longingly toward the supper-rooms, while the ladies who came with them ambled toward the powder and paint boxes in the boudoir. I suppose about two hundred people in all were on hand, and the sight was indeed gay. After every one had become duly hot from dancing or duly hungry from waiting, supper was served, and there was almost a panic as the Spanish element with one accord made for the large room at the extreme other end of the building, where dozens of small tables glistened below candelabra with red shades, and improvised benches groaned under the weight of a great variety of refreshments. Soon the slender caballeros got to look fatter in the face, and the double chins of their ladies grew doubler every moment. Knives, forks, and spoons were all going at once, and talk was suspended. But the room presented a pretty sight, with its fourscore couples sitting around beneath the swaying punkahs, and the soft warm light made beauties out of many ordinary-looking persons. After everybody was satisfied, dancing was resumed in the big front rooms on the river, and the gayety went on; but the heavy supper made many of the foreign guests grow dull, and the cool hours of early morning saw everyone depart, carrying with them or in them food enough for many days. Thus ended the great ball given to balance the debt of hospitality owed by the bachelors to their married friends, and now will come the committee's collectors for money to pay the piper. January 31st.