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Hamed's manoeuvring with the dhow bears much the appearance of one anxious to obtain the credit of generosity without incurring the attendant inconvenience of its reality. Otherwise I cannot divine what good his procrastinations and the means he took for keeping me near him so long could have been to him; for he made no overtures to me whatever.
They wished to engage an Arab dhow for navigating the lake, sufficiently large to carry provisions and to resist hostile attacks, but could only obtain a canoe. It was long and narrow, hollowed-out of the trunk of a single tree. She carried Bombay, Gaetano, two Belooch soldiers, and a captain, with twenty stark-naked savage sailors.
"They're all out of the dhow, sir," exclaimed the seamen who remained on board the vessel. "Have another look and make quite sure," answered the commander. Well it was that they did so, for in a dark corner of the hold, buried all but the head in the sand which the dhow carried for ballast, lay a poor old woman. She was dug out and borne on board.
Fiji shows a pirogue, the native canoe, rudely shaped from a tree trunk and hollowed out by fire. Labuan has a piratical looking native dhow. The stamps of Rhodesia and the Congo Free State depict the advance of civilization on the dark continent.
Bombay soon returned as much puzzled as myself, unable to extract any but the old answer that I was welcome to the dhow, and that he would try and procure men for me.
They stated that the dhow had been crammed full of slaves, many of whom had been drowned in their attempt to reach the shore, while it was probable that a still larger number would perish before they were again put on board another slave-ship by their cruel masters.
As the boatswain had supposed, a dhow had been made out by the party which had landed on the larger island, and as soon as steam could be got up, the ship had gone in chase of her.
"I don't think any Arab dhow, whether belonging to the Somalis or otherwise, can escape the Mermaid, should one heave in sight!"
He had gone up for the fourth time, when he caught sight of a white sail coming up from the southward with the wind off the land; she was a dhow, of that there was no doubt, and might be a full slaver. She would possibly pass close to the island, abreast of which, as she was sailing rapidly, she would very quickly arrive. There was no time to be lost.
"Try and hit her," he cried out; "it may be better to sink her where our boats can pick up some of the poor wretches, than allow them to be dashed to pieces on those cruel rocks fire shot." Gun after gun sent their shot at the dhow; but the range was a long one, and tossed as she was from sea to sea, while the ship herself was far from steady, they flew ahead of their mark.
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