They returned to a dinner of fish, for which Vera
Cruz is celebrated. "If what the man says be true," said
Ingham, "we must be very near heaven."
It was now in November. Oh, the glory of that ride,
as they left Vera Cruz and through a wilderness of color
jogged slowly on to their new paradise!
"Through Eden four glad couples took their way."
Higher and higher. This wonder and that. Not a blade
of grass such as they ever saw before, not a chirping
cricket such as they ever heard before; a hundred
bright-winged birds, and not one that they had ever
seen before. Higher and higher. Trees, skies, clouds,
flowers, beasts, birds, insects, all new and all
lovely.
The final purchase was of one small plantation, with
a house large enough for a little army, yet without a
stair. Oranges, lemons, pomegranates, mangoes, bananas,
pine-apples, coffee, sugar--what did not ripen in those
perennial gardens? Half a mile above there were two
smaller houses belonging to the same estate; half a mile
above, another was purchased easily. This was too cold
to stay in in November, but in June and July and August
the temperature would be sixty-six, without change.
They sent back the mules. A telegram from Vera Cruz
brought from Boston, in fifteen days, the best books
in the world, the best piano in the world, a few boxes of
colors for the artists, a few reams of paper, and a few
dozen of pencils for the men.
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