De Questa would have had serious trouble but for the thoughtfulness of the steward, who remembered that I was traveling with him and came to me for advice. "When did he ask for poison?" I inquired. "At breakfast-time," said the steward. "Oh, then, he merely wants fish," and I explained as well as I could to an English steward the meaning of the French word.
The English of the ignorant classes look upon French very much as a clergyman does upon profanity, or as a missionary regards the muttered charms and incantations of a "voodoo" priestess. De Questa finally got his fish, but he had long before lost his appetite. This adventure discouraged him so much that he refused thenceforth to try to convey in English, Castilian, or French, any of his desires concerning food, but resorted to the primitive sign language. When he wanted eggs, he would flap his arms together and cackle like a hen that has just laid an egg. The steward who, perhaps, had never seen two square inches of countryside in his life, thought he was imitating a rooster and laughed until he almost had a fit. De Questa nearly starved. He had, at last, to eat whatever he could find, without trying to seek what he wanted. I explained to him that roosters did not lay eggs!
Our destination was Philadelphia. It was there that the Spaniards who were living upon Queen Maria Cristina's property had their headquarters. I found two of them, Christopher and John Fallon, living in fine houses, with something of a court about them. They had control of about forty thousand acres of coal lands belonging to the Queen. This large tract was situated at a place to which the Fallons had given their name, Fallonville. I at once consulted several of the best lawyers of Philadelphia, among them William B. Reed, later Minister to China, and was advised to go immediately to the lands and see what had been done with them. I made an appointment with John Fallon, and we went out to the mines. I can not now recall exactly where they were, but I remember that we passed through a wilderness, after leaving the train that took us from Philadelphia, and that we had a very long drive in carriages. A railway track had been built through the forest to the mines, and it seemed to me about fifteen miles long. I appeared to John Fallon as a foreigner who was interested in mines and in coal lands in particular, but not, of course, as representing the Queen.