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Updated: June 10, 2025
If this should be so it was time to see about making my dispositions for the conflict; I accordingly re-entered the house and, girding on my cutlass, thrust a brace of fully loaded revolvers into my belt, seized my own pet rifle and, filling my jacket pockets with cartridges, sallied forth and, joining Bowata and his party, led them down to the beach.
By the time that we had completed our survey it was too late to think of returning to Eden that day, so we again bore up for the wreck, spending that night aboard her and returning to our own island on the day following. On our way back I touched at Cliff Island and had a chat with Bowata, relating to him the result of our trip of inspection.
But for the moment my attention was fully occupied by Bowata and his people, who crowded round us, all talking at once, some of them excitedly relating particular incidents of the adventure, while others were striving to express their gratitude to me for putting into their hands the means to defend themselves successfully against the most formidable raid that had ever been attempted by the apes.
These two tasks, including the time occupied in sailing from place to place and returning, occupied the entire day, so that it was already dusk when, having landed Bowata and his son, and our cargo of branches and reeds, we arrived back at our own island of Eden.
These peculiarities of the shore rendered it morally certain that the beach itself would be the actual battle-ground in the coming conflict; and it was with the view to its decision there that I made my final arrangements, and posted Bowata and his men.
Meanwhile Bowata and his followers poured in still another flight of arrows, and then, flinging down their bows, they gripped their formidable war clubs and, uttering weird yells, charged across the sand and fell upon the Chinamen as they emerged from the water.
Also, realising that henceforth Billy and I would be fully occupied in building the new boat, the thought occurred to me that it was high time to secure such domestic help as would enable us to give our whole time and thought to our work without troubling about such matters as cooking, house-cleaning, and so on. Such help could only be obtained through Bowata.
Of those seven Bowata happened to be one, his wound consisting of a sword thrust through the upper part of the left arm. I therefore took him and his six companions in misfortune up to the house to dress their wounds, leaving the remainder of the party on the beach to collect the weapons and their spent arrows, and to clear up generally.
I designedly directed the particular attention of Bowata and his followers to my new companions, explaining who and what they were; but of course the shellbacks understood nothing of what I was saying, and they made little or no attempt to conceal their relief when I at length bade farewell to the blacks and we made sail again upon our return to Eden.
Those men, Bowata assured me, were the pick of the entire tribe, and I quite believed him, for, although small and slight compared with the average Englishman, they were lithe, wiry, active, and resolute-looking men, with an eager gleam in their eyes which seemed to suggest that the prospect of a fight was the reverse of distasteful to them.
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