THE PEARL OF THE ANTILLES.
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country, the other, the western, bythe solid walls and wharves of the city. The steamer comes to anchor, and is at once surrounded by boats, the owners of which are anxious to carry you to shore. But they do not importune you as in other countries ; they merely suggest mildly that their boats are there, and they would be happy to transport you to land. This they do for fifty cents, if you are knowing and wary ; for seventy-five cents, if you leave the price to them. First, however, you must get permission of the customs official, who comes off to the boat in a little steamer. He is a villanous-looking fellow, — as, indeed, are all the officiais of Spanish extraction, with few exceptions, — but he grants permission, as you are merely a passenger in transit. Left at the quay by the boatman, the stranger finds himself in bewilderment, puzzled as to which way to turn. There is no importunate hackman at his elbow kindly to direct him, as in Boston and New York ; there is not the omnipresent small Irish boy of STATUE OF COLUMBUS (HAVANA). the North, anxious to direct the stranger into by and forbidden places. He looks about at a loss how to accept the situation ; he does not understand how it is that no one is lying in wait for him. If he can talk a little Spanish, he invokes the aid of an official, and is informed that those carriages which he sees standing at the corners are for public hire, and not subsidized by government or private individuals, as he supposed.