To starboard lies at anchor the Mexican navy—a small-sized tug. Our voyage to Cuba is begun.
XIX
Voyaging Across the Gulf of Mexico and Straits of Yucatan from Vera Cruz to Progresso and Havana
Steamship Monterey, at Sea,
December 21st-24th.
It was late in the day when we set sail from Vera Cruz. The shoreland faded; the grove of cocoanut palms in the Alameda with their feathery tops waving in the evening breeze, were the last green things I saw. As the sun sank suddenly behind the great volcano, the western horizon was filled with golden and scarlet and purple coloring, and Orizaba’s summit was flooded with roseate splendor. The stars burst out, the moon crept up from the dark waters. We were on the Mexican Gulf, and the tropical heavens glowed and burned with a brilliance unknown to the latitudes of the middle north. The waters, churning in our wake, flashed and glowed with the phosphorescence characteristic of tropic seas. The wind freshened and, by the middle of the night, the knowing ones hinted that more than the usual commotion of the sea might be expected before the dawn. In fact, a cablegram had been received, sent from Galveston, warning us that a “Norther” was on its way.
A STREET OF VERA CRUZ
I sat up till late, enjoying the rising gale and drinking in the delicious air.