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Thoroughly Spanish this, significant of that mixture of vanity and bravery, of swagger and fearlessness, which is characteristic of the best in Spain. It was a desperately brave thing to venture upon, this voyage from Jamaica to Espanola in a native canoe and across a sea visited by dreadful hurricanes; and the volunteer was entitled to his little piece of heroic drama.
Yet there was no reason why a calm should be anticipated, for I was in a region where the trade wind blows all the year round, except when, for a few hours, it gives place to one of the hurricanes that occasionally sweep over the Caribbean with devastating effect. Could it be possible that such a phenomenon was about to happen?
His Excellency Alexander O'Reilly, who came to the Antilles on a commission from Charles IV, in his report on Puerto Rico gives the following description of the condition of the inhabitants at that time: " ... To form an idea of how these natives have lived and still live, it is enough to say that there are only two schools in the whole island; that outside of the capital and San German few know how to read; that they count time by changes in the Government, hurricanes, visits from bishops, arrivals of 'situados, etc.
There is no appearance of recent fracture or disturbance of rocks to be seen in the central country, except the falls of Gonye; nor is there any evidence or tradition of hurricanes. I left Naliele on the 13th of August, and, when proceeding along the shore at midday, a hippopotamus struck the canoe with her forehead, lifting one half of it quite out of the water, so as nearly to overturn it.
Sally May and Jane whirled into the "Jolly Susan" like small hurricanes in time to sing the verse over again, and then the snatches of talk she could hear told Judith that her neighbours were thoroughly enjoying the fascinating business of dressing up, and had evidently forgotten all about her.
Honolulu was the goal of the Casco now, and all eagerly looked forward to the letters waiting for them there the first word from home since leaving San Francisco. Bad weather attended the Casco all the way. They were delayed by a succession of hurricanes and calms until the supply of food ran very low and they were reduced to a diet of "salt-horse" and ship-biscuit.
Through that porch flowed all the scandal of the South Seas tales of hurricanes and waterspouts, of shipwrecks, of accidents, of lucky deals in pearls or shells, of copra, of new fashions and old inhabitants, of liaisons of white and brown, of the flirtations of tourists, of the Government's issuing an ultimatum on the price of fish, of how the consuls quarreled at a club dinner, and of how one threw three ribs of roasted beef at the other, who retorted with a whole sucking pig just from the native oven, of Thomas' wife leaving him for Europe after a month's honeymoon; and all the flotsam and jetsam of report and rumor, of joke and detraction, which in an island with only one mail a month are the topics of interest.
The Paleface calls the place Point Grey, but the Indians yet speak of it as 'The Battle Ground of the West Wind. All his mighty forces he now brought to bear against the oncoming canoe; he swept great hurricanes about the stony ledges; he caused the sea to beat and swirl in tempestuous fury along its narrow fastnesses, but the canoe came nearer and nearer, invincible as those shores, and stronger than death itself.
"Right bang in the middle of the Walpole Reefs, and if it's true enough that you can get no holding-ground anywhere in less than forty fathom, then what of that? There are the hurricanes, too. But it's a first-rate thing. As good as a gold-mine better! Yet there's not a fool of them that will see it. I can't get a skipper or a shipowner to go near the place.
Mother Marie wrote again: 'M. Talon has not arrived; in his ship alone there were five hundred men. We are greatly concerned at the delay. They may have landed again in France, or have been lost in the storms which have proved to be so dreadful. The autumn of 1669 had been a stormy season. Fearful hurricanes swept over Quebec.
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