Page:Wanderings of a Pilgrim Vol 1.djvu/63

 exchange for an empty tin case that held portable soup; the price of a little pig was sixpence, or an old razor: they were eager at first for knives, but very capricious in their bargains: the privates of the Lancers had glutted the market. On my holding up a clasp-knife, the savage shook his head. I cut off the brass rings from the window-curtains,—great was the clamour and eagerness to possess them. On giving a handful to one of the men, he counted them carefully, and then fitted them on his fingers. The people selected those they approved, returned the remainder, and gave me fruit in profusion. Even curtain-rings soon lost their charm—my eye fell on a basket of shells, the owner refused by signs all my offers—he wanted some novelty: at length an irresistible temptation was found—an officer of the Lancers cut off three of the gay buttons from his jacket, and offered them to the savage, who handed up the shells.

"Figurez-vous," said the Lancer, "the Carnicobarbarian love of that fellow, matted with straw and leaves from the waist to the knee, decked with three Lancer buttons suspended round her neck by a cocoa-nut fibre, and enraptured with the novelty and beauty of the tout ensemble!!"

The dress, or rather the undress of the men was very simple; a handkerchief tied round the waist and passed between the limbs so as to leave the end hanging like a tail: some wore a stripe of plantain-leaf bound fillet-like round their heads; the necks of the chiefs were encircled either with silver wire in many rings, or a necklace of cowries.

One of the canoes which came from a distant part of the island was the most beautiful and picturesque boat I ever saw; it contained twenty-one men, was paddled with amazing swiftness, and gaily decorated. Of the canoes, some were so narrow that they had bamboo outriggers to prevent their upsetting. The natives appeared an honest, inoffensive race, and were much pleased with the strangers. After dinner it was proposed to go on shore in the cool of the evening: the unmarried ladies remained on board. I could not resist a run on a savage island, and longed to see the women, and know how they were treated.