The abrupt contrast of the
yellow lower land with this cap of tanglewood, itself at times
covered, at times only dotted, with fleecy clouds, was singularly
vivid.

The inhabitants of the island were Arabs, mixed with some negro blood,
and wore the Oriental costume now so familiar to us all in this age of
illustration. The ship was besieged by them at once, and throughout
our stay, at all hours that they were permitted to come on board. They
were cleanly in person, as their religion prescribes, and applied no
offensive substance to their hair; on the contrary, some pleasant
perfume was perceptible about their clothing. The coloring generally
was dark, although some, among whom was the ruler, called the sultan,
have olive skins; but the features were clear and prominent, the
stature and form good, the bearing manly; nor did they seem other than
intelligent. The teeth, too, were fine, when not disfigured by the
chewing of the betel nut, which, when long continued, stains them a
displeasing dark red. Like all barbarians, they talked, talked,
talked, till one was nearly deafened. On one occasion, a group of them
favored us with a theological exposition, marked by somewhat
elementary conceptions. The ship was a perfect Babel at meal-times,
when the intermission of work allowed the freest visiting. Every man
who came brought at least a half-dozen fowl, with sweet potatoes,
fruit, and eggs, to match; and as, in addition to our own crew
bargaining, there were on the deck some fifty or sixty natives, all
vociferating, bartering, beseeching, or yelling to the fifty others in
canoes alongside, the tumult and noise may be conceived. The chickens,
too, both cocks and hens, present by the hundred in basket-work cages,
made no small contribution to the general uproar. Chickens, indeed,
numerous though not large, are among the chief food commodities of
that region; the usual price, as I recollect, being a dollar the
dozen. When we left Johanna, we must have had on board several hundred
as sea-stock. Not infrequently one would get out of its cage, and if
pursued would often end by flapping overboard, so by drowning
anticipating its appointed doom; but it was a pathetic sight to see
the poor creature, upborne by its feathers so long as dry, floating on
the waste of waters in the wake of the ship which seemed almost
heartlessly to forsake it.

The faith of the island being Mohammedan, we found it safe to give a
large liberty to the cre