RECOLLECTIONS OF FULL YEARS
"followed the leader," gave some original renderings of German Grand Opera, played Puss-in-the-corner, and finished the evening with our feet on a fender before a great, open fire, recounting, with much appreciated embellishments, our interesting experiences.
We knew we should not find any place as delightful as Don José's again,—not even in Manila, because Manila would be hot, so it was with great reluctance that we obeyed orders to be ready to leave the next morning at six. This meant getting out of our comfortable, civilised beds at five o'clock, while the stars would still be out, and when the ashes of our evening's fire would be cold and grey on the hearth. It was a cheerless thought, but we had to "get to Loo" said General Bell.
It was raining—of course—and there was not much scenery visible except when the clouds would float upward, now and then, like veils lifted off grand panoramas, but by this time we had ceased to consider the weather. When we got to Loo we found the "town" consisted of just two empty log huts, one with a plaited reed floor, the other with no floor at all, and neither of them with any sort of partition. We stretched a rope across the middle of the better one, hung Igorrote blankets on it by way of a screen, and prepared to make ourselves comfortable on the, fortunately flexible, floor; ladies on one side, gentlemen on the other. But along late in the afternoon a pack train of mules and Igorrotes and orderlies arrived from the south bringing us the astonishing news that the Commissioners were only a few miles behind and expected to camp that night at Loo!
The rain had settled down into a dreary, soaking patter; it was cold; we were all wet; there was no place for a fire; and, altogether, we were fairly uncomfortable.
The Commissioners, Mr. Worcester and Mr. Moses, with their private secretaries and a doctor—five in all—came along about an hour behind their pack train. They
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