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And no sooner had the two white men installed themselves therein, with a large fire blazing before the hut to afford them light, and drive off the mosquitoes, than several women appeared with baskets on their heads, some of which contained cassava, while the contents of others consisted of the young heads of Indian corn, boiled, and wrapped in plantain leaves, the hind quarter of a kid, roasted, roasted plantains, a quantity of fruit, and a calabash containing a liquid which had a faint, mellow, acid flavour, something like weak cider, exceedingly refreshing as a beverage, but decidedly heady, as they discovered a little later on.
Very graceful is the appearance of the plantain, or banana, which varies from twelve to fifteen feet in height, and has fine large leaves like those of the palm, but a brittle reedy stem, not more than eight inches in diameter. It attains its full growth in the first year, bears fruit in the second, and then dies; thus its life is as brief as it is useful.
This cover was necessary, else the macaws, which are shy birds, might have uttered one of their wild, choral screams, and flown off. They did not, however, and Guapo had a fair chance at them. All his movements could be observed by the party at the house, as he was on that side of the plantain. He was seen to adjust an arrow into the tube, and then raise the gravatána to his lips.
The boat was hauled up close to the chief's house, and then five young plantain trees, as emblems of peace, were carried on board one by one, the first three being each accompanied by a young pig with his ears ornamented with coconut fibre; the fourth was accompanied by a dog; and the fifth by the bag which Cook had given Oree in 1769, containing the pewter plate with the inscription relating to the Endeavour's visit, and the beads, and imitation coins.
He scarcely ever touched plantain wine or beer, and had never been known to be intoxicated. The people were generally excessively fond of this wine, the peasants especially drinking large quantities of it. Rumanika was not only king, but priest and prophet; indeed, his elevation to the throne was due, as his friends asserted, to supernatural agency.
The waterfall, the sound of which had reached them a few minutes earlier, was some sixty feet in height and about twelve feet wide, the river tumbling vertically down the perpendicular face of the cliff into a wide basin, the lofty sides of which were draped with the graceful fronds of giant ferns, the broad leaves of the wild plantain, crimson-leaved acacias, enormous bunches of maidenhair, and several varieties of plant and bush, the names of which were unknown to the trio of gazers, and which were brilliant with blossoms of the most lovely hues.
Here, still sheltered by the hedge, he stopped and Audrey stopped, and Aguilar absently plucked up a young plantain from the turf and dropped it into his pocket. "There's been a man a-hanging round this place since yesterday mornin'," said Aguilar intimately. "I call him a suspicious character at least, I did, till last night.
The bush, too, would fly back into place and there would be the intruder, really hanged by himself. It was the common form of snare, devised for small game by the boys of early Kentucky, and still used by them. Henry and Paul made four of these ingenious little contrivances, and baited them with bruised pieces of the small plantain leaves that the rabbits love.
Corn of two or three kinds waved on the eastern slopes, half a dozen head of cattle and perhaps a couple of dozen sheep grazed on the opposite side of the valley; cocoa-nuts reared their tall slender stems and waved their feathery branches by hundreds, and behind them again as the ground sloped gently upward it became more and more densely covered with palm, banana, and plantain groves thickly interspersed with various trees, some of considerable size and dense foliage, among which brilliant orchids and gaudy parasites of the gayest hues entwined themselves to the very summits.
Not only had he retired with his thwarted allies, but, disgusted at the failure of his expedition, he had quarrelled with Fowooka, and had plundered him of all his cattle, together with a number of slaves: this termination of the affair had so delighted Kamrasi that he had ordered general rejoicings: he killed a number of oxen, and distributed them among his people, and intoxicated half the country with presents of maroua, or the plantain cider.
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