A Queer Race: The Story of a Strange People — page 99: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

96 A QUEER RACE. \ CHAPTER XVI. QUEEN MAB. We landed in a little cove, from which a steep zigzag path, winding among great cedars and towering palm- trees, led to the town—so steep, that being out of condi- tion with our long life at sea, T’om and I found some dif- ficulty in keeping up with our companions, who could hardly have walked faster if we had been competing for a prize. We two were continually lagging behind, and more than once Fane gave us a look which expressed both pity and contempt, as if he thought us very poor creat- ures indeed. This riled me exceedingly, and i did my utmost to overtake him; but he was in splendid fettle; the more I strove the faster he went, and when after a fifteen minutes’ spurt we reached the town, I was com- pletely biown and bathed with perspiration, while he was not even flushed, and breathed as quietly as an infant. I began to dislike Mr. Amyas Fane. ; As for poor old Tom, we had left him half a mile be- hind, dead-beat, sitting on a stone, and mopping his face with an ancient bandana pocket-handkerchief. The town—village, rather, though it was tlie capital of the island and the seat of royalty—consisted of two or three hundred wooden houses. Some of them were ride in the extreme, being little more than log huts; others were larger and more pretentious, built of boards, with verandas and external galleries, and brightly painted. All were thatched, and being more or less mantled with greenery and begirt with gardens, the general effect was gay and picturesque. In the center of the village was a large square, on one side of which stood the church, distinguished by a wooden tower, and on the other a still larger building, known ag Government House, used for meetings, public offices,- and the like. All the people we met were more or less piebald. Some bore a general resemblance to my companions, others were of the same type as the boatmen whom I have already described. At last we reached the house where the flag was flying. | It was the largest I had yet seen. Thatched, like all * Gom G JOO cS Eom