United States or Indonesia ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
There are no better canoe-men on the coast. They ship only on board the Bristol ships, and they have more than once flogged a cruel skipper caught ashore. Fresco-land is beautified by perpendicular red cliffs, and the fine broad beach is feathered with cocoas which suggest kopra the dried meat of the split kernel. At 3.15 P.M. came Grand Lahou Bosman's Cabo La Hoe 180 miles from Cape Palmas.
The blue duranta and the white oleander, the cool gray-green hibiscus with lemon-colored blossoms, the yellow allamanda, the trumpet lily, acacias, lilac ipomaea, tree ferns, and huge bird's-nest ferns mingled with white convolvulus, and over all lifted groves of cocoas and the symmetrical breadfruit.
They reared cattle and poultry, cultivated corn and yams, plantains and cocoas, guavas, and papaws and mameys, and avocados, and all luxurious West-Indian fruits; the very weeds of their orchards had tropical luxuriance in their fragrance and in their names; and from the doors of their little thatched huts they looked across these gardens of delight to the magnificent lowland forests, and over those again to the faint line of far-off beach, the fainter ocean-horizon, and the illimitable sky.
On the 12th the savages came again in their canoes, laden with cocoas, bananas, ubes-roots, hogs, and fresh water, contending violently who should get first on board.
They wear a species of white cloth, made of grass, and are quite ignorant of fire, which put them in great terror. Instead of bread they eat cocoas, which they pull unripe, burying them for some days in the sand, and then laying them in the sun, which causes them to open.
It plainly appeared that he was fearful of the Dutch having some design of seizing his country, as he would fain have engaged them to go to war with the other island, and even offered to give them ten hogs and a good quantity of cocoas, if they would be gone from his island in two days. Yet he made them a visit aboard, praying when he entered the ship, and praying also at every cabin he entered.
They were tall and as straight as sunflower-stalks, walking with a swimming gait. They were graceful even when old. Those dark women and men seemed to fit in perfectly with the marvelous background of the cocoas, the bananas and the brilliant foliage. The whites appeared sickly, uncouth, beside the natives, and the white women, especially, faded and artificial.
"When we had gathered our number, we returned to the city, where the merchant who had sent me to the forest gave me the value of the cocoas I brought: 'Go on, said he, 'and do the like every day, until you have got money enough to carry you home. I thanked him for his advice, and gradually collected as many cocoa-nuts as produced me a considerable sum.
They found no difficulty whatever in doing without water, their thirst being amply quenched by the milk of the cocoas, and the juice of the guavas and other fruits. They paddled for two days longer, working steadily all day and far into the night, and passed one or two islands.
When we had gathered our number, we returned to the city, where the merchant, who had sent me to the forest, gave me the value of the cocoas I brought: "Go on," said he, "and do the like every day, until you have got money enough to carry you home." I thanked him for his advice, and gradually collected as many cocoa-nuts as produced me a considerable sum.
Word Of The Day