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The second was to come towards the end of the following year, in the loss of another yacht, the Unity; and the third blow, with more important results, was struck when it was at last decided by Government that our trading station was not to be a stopping-place for steamers.
Putting into the river where Pinzon had been trading, some of the natives complained that he had violently carried off four men and two girls to be sold as slaves in Spain. Discovering that such was the case, Columbus ordered that they should be restored immediately to their homes, and, giving them numerous presents and clothing, he sent them on shore.
The next three days were spent working slowly down the coast and keeping a good look-out for their consort, occasionally stopping to do a little trading with the islanders, some of whom came as much as fifteen miles out to them. The chief article of commerce was salt, which was of very good quality.
For a minute Abner gazed in utter amazement at the sight of this vessel, for no ships, large or small, came to this little lonely bay. There was a harbor two or three miles farther up the coast to which all trading craft repaired. What could the strange ship want here?
He it was who hoodwinked the captain of a French ship of double the size and strength of his own, and fairly cheated him into the surrender of his craft without the firing of a single pistol or the striking of a single blow; he it was who sailed boldly into the port of Gambia, on the coast of Guinea, and under the guns of the castle, proclaiming himself as a merchant trading for slaves.
But it isn't the books that ruin them; the misfortune is that they make improper use of books! That is why study doesn't come up to ploughing and sowing and trading; as these pursuits exercise no serious pernicious influences. As far, however, as you and I go, we should devote our minds simply to matters connected with needlework and spinning; for we will then be fulfilling our legitimate duties.
Thus equipped the Stone Indian bears himself with an air of perfect independence. The only articles of European commerce they require in exchange for the meat they furnish to the trading post are tobacco, knives, ammunition, and spirits, and occasionally some beads, but more frequently buttons which they string in their hair as ornaments.
It is now eleven years since they have visited Aru, and by thus making their attacks at long and uncertain intervals the alarm dies away, and they find a population for the most part unarmed and unsuspicious of danger. None of the small trading vessels now carry arms, though they did so for a year or two after the last attack, which was just the time when there was the least occasion for it.
We close this chapter with a brief notice of the greatest merchants of the ancient world, the Phœnicians. They were at a very early period a trading and mercantile nation, and the variegated robes and golden ornaments fabricated at Sidon were prized by the Homeric heroes. They habitually traversed the Ægean Sea, and formed settlements on its islands.
Muskets and swords were scattered about everywhere, and, although she was plainly a merchant-vessel, she had a lot of the small cannon used in those days. "I looked about a great deal, and it struck me that she had been a merchantman trading with the West Indies, but glad enough to fight a Spanish treasure-ship if she happened to come across one.
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