Page:Travel letters from New Zealand, Australia and Africa (1913).djvu/228

 alligator pear is more vegetable than fruit. Today we also had mangoes, which resemble the American paw-*paw, but they are much better fruit. You peel them, and eat them as you do green corn, the seed representing the cob This being Sunday, we saw two Salvation Army meetings on the street. All the "soldiers" were negroes, and there was the usual drum in the centre of the circle, and the usual pleas for money Now that I am out of Australia, and off the "Anchises," which carried Australian water, I am free to drink all the water I want. I saw so many false teeth in Australia, and heard so frequently that the bad teeth of the Australians were due to the water, that I never took a drink that my teeth didn't ache We learned this evening that all the money Mr. Riley spent in gambling and drinking was loaned him by a Mr. Wilson, who came ashore this afternoon, and is trying hard to get his money. At a late hour, Mr. Riley had not been able to satisfy his creditor. You meet strange characters on ships. Think of a man going to sea without money, and being financed by a stranger We knew a woman on the ship who was so unhappy because of a big waist that she imagined her husband was mean to her, and she told a good many of the women that were it not for her children, she would seek forgetfulness by enclosing her head in a pillow-slip, and inhaling chloroform Durban had a small harbor which did very well in the days of small ships, but when big ships became fashionable the town was compelled to spend millions in improvements. The result is that ships drawing thirty feet can tie up at its docks. Good coal is found not far