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During this constant Straggle it happened, that Phillis one Day at publick Prayers smote the Heart of a gay West-Indian, who appear'd in all the Colours which can affect an Eye that could not distinguish between being fine and tawdry.

But already, without a word, brown Feliu has stripped for the struggle; another second, and he is shooting through the surf, head and hands tunnelling the foam hills.... One two three lines passed! four! that is where they first begin to crumble white from the summit, five! that he can ride fearlessly! ... Then swiftly, easily, he advances, with a long, powerful breast-stroke, keeping his bearded head well up to watch for drift, seeming to slide with a swing from swell to swell, ascending, sinking, alternately presenting breast or shoulder to the wave; always diminishing more and more to the eyes of Mateo and Miguel, till he becomes a moving speck, occasionally hard to follow through the confusion of heaping waters ... You are not afraid of the sharks, Feliu! no: they are afraid of you; right and left they slunk away from your coming that morning you swam for life in West-Indian waters, with your knife in your teeth, while the balls of the Cuban coast-guard were purring all around you.

For a moment I gazed at the sight blankly. Then I realized that sweeping on us was one of those sudden, deadly West-Indian hurricanes. Our harbor was sheltered from the north and east winds. But this wind was southern born, rare, oncoming in a fury against which we had no protection. Hastily closing his armamentarium, Kennedy also hurried out on the street.

This is also a West-Indian fruit: It consists only of a mass of large kernels, from which a small proportion of pulp may be sucked, which is very sweet, but has little flavour. Custard apple. The Annona Reticulata of Linnæus. The quality of this fruit is well expressed by its English name, which it acquired in the West Indies; for it is as like a custard, and a good one too, as can be imagined.

I shall only instance Albertus Magnus, who in his Dissertation upon the Loadstone observing that Fire will destroy its magnetick Vertues, tells us that he took particular Notice of one as it lay glowing amidst an Heap of burning Coals, and that he perceived a certain blue Vapour to arise from it, which he believed might be the substantial Form, that is, in our West-Indian Phrase, the Soul of the Loadstone.