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The beach was a scene of confusion: water in jars, bags of rice, vegetables, salt-fish, fowls in coops, were everywhere strewed about among the armed natives, who were obeying the orders of the chiefs, who themselves walked up and down, dressed in their gayest apparel, and glittering in their arms and ornaments.
No store rooms are needed, where there is no winter, and everything grows fresh and fresh, save the salt-fish, which can be easily kept and I understand usually is kept underneath the bed. As for separate bedrooms for boys and girls, and all those decencies and moralities for which those who build model cottages strive, and with good cause of such things none dream.
Tea, coffee, sugar, rice, spices, bags and bagging here have their home. And there are haughty bonded warehouses filled with fine liquors. From his white cabin at the top of a venerable structure comes the dean of the salt-fish business. "Export trade fair," he says; "good demand from South America." One of the pleasantest things in the world is "going a journey" but few know it now.
The carts used in the winter work are drawn by these dogs, who are almost invariably urged and goaded on beyond their strength, fed only with putrid salt-fish, and an inadequate quantity even of that.
A basket of rice with a little salt-fish and spices is easily hidden in a favourable place. You only want a jar to cook it, and there is enough for two for a week; or it is brought day by day by some trusted friend to a place previously agreed upon.
Whenever he has pledged his word in serious business, it is sacred; he gives himself passionately to games of hazard; he is a good husband, a good father; jealous of his wife's honour, but careless of his daughter's; who, despite any little faux-pas, meets with no difficulty in getting a husband. The Tagal is of very sober habits: all he requires is water, a little rice, and salt-fish.
Philanthropy does not consist in giving a little more salt-fish, and some fewer lashes: the real amelioration of the captive caste ought to extend over the whole moral and physical position of man.
"Moreover, these come for wool, salt-fish, and our earth coal, and they bring us fine cloth, linen, and stout armour. I am glad to see yonder Flemish ensign. If luck goes well with us, I shall get a fresh pair of gauntlets for my lord, straight from Gaunt, the place of gloves." "GANT for glove," said Grisell. "How? You speak French.
Passing Cape Wilberforce, called Udjung Turu, or Bearaway Point, they continue their course down the Gulf to the Wellesley Islands, named by them Pulo Tiga, or The Three Islands; this is the usual southern limit of their voyage. The Macassar proas that visit Port Essington, amounting in one season to fourteen, usually brought for barter tea, sugar, cloths, salt-fish, rice, etc.
The salt-fish ration was probably rather better than the meat, but the cheese was nearly always very bad, and of an abominable odour. The butter was no better than the cheese. It was probably like so much train-oil. The bread or biscuit which was stowed in bags in the bread-room in the hold, soon lost its hardness at sea, becoming soft and wormy, so that the sailors had to eat it in the dark.
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