J827.J Adventures of Nattfretgus. 147 



scene, terrific as it was, proved to the steersman but the scene of his ' vocation ;' 

 and he did not forget the reward in prospect, but asked for a box, or present. This 

 was perhaps his policy ; he thought, that at such a moment, I could not refuse him. 

 Another tremendous sea followed, lifting us up still higher, and impelling us for- 

 ward with great velocity, until the fore part of the boat took the ground ; she then 

 swiftly wheeled round on her beam-ends. Then it is that the danger is most im- 

 minent, for the next sea almost instantly striking the side of the boat, perhaps 

 upsets it, when it not unfrequently happens that one or two lives are lost. In our 

 case, the boat, when struck, turned very nearly over ; but being, though a young 

 man, an old sailor, I held on by the weather gun-whale, until successive seas threw 

 her high and dry' on the beach. Palanquins without number were ready to 

 receive me, and stepping into one, I was in a few minutes at the Navy Hotel.' " 



The residence at Madras introduces us to a lively -account (which is 

 resumed in another part of the volume) of the jugglers, snake-dancers, &c. 

 of India. We leave our readers to find this out in the book for them- 

 selves; premising that it will repay their trouble. From Madras the 

 author sails, with new freight, to Pondicherry, and from thence to 

 Columbo in Ceylon, and thence to the Isle of France making money 

 rapidly and marrying a young lady and describing his ground, both 

 by sea and land, occasionally with great spirit, all the way. In this 

 prosperous state, he writes home to England, recommending that his 

 brother should come out to India ; a measure which, he says, he after- 

 wards had deep cause to regret, though he meant it well at the time. He 

 was now, however, in a train to perceive that every thing in the world 

 went well, and rather to doubt whether his own previous annoyances 

 had not arisen out of some mistake. 



" My table (he says) being amply supplied with mutton and poultry, hams, 

 wines, and liqueurs, how often would I inwardly rejoice when I compared my own 

 successes and happy state with the condition of others! Nay I almost imagined 

 that the loud complaints of poverty and misfortune were the outcry of the idle and 

 dissolute alone ; and came to the conclusion, that no art could be more easily 

 acquired than that of becoming rich." 



The whole of the wood scenery of India is described as of exquisite 

 beauty. The Cingalese believes that it was in Ceylon that the Garden 

 of Eden originally stood ; and go so far as to shew in one place " the 

 print of Adam's foot !" The writer occasionally speaks too of the "curry" 

 cookery, like a man who could distinguish between eating and the mere 

 animal process of swallowing food. Some notices occur of the danger 

 to be looked for from serpents, however, and tigers ; and it is stated to 

 be remarkable, that in India a tiger will never carry off a European 

 when he can get a native ;" a circumstance of etiquette, which the 

 " natives" probably would feel at least as much " honoured in the breach 

 as in the observance." 



" Fortune, however like a looking-glass is constant to no man ;" and 

 the term of the prosperity of Naufragus was at this time approaching. 

 The beauty of the India seas affords no warrant to the voyager that it 

 may not be his fate to be swallowed up in them ; and a single hurricane 

 was fated to destroy all the fruits of the industry of Naufragus. Prom 

 Port Louis, in the Isle of France, where he had married, having taken in 

 fresh freight, and with his wife on board, our author sails to the coast of 

 Sumatra, where he invests his whole fortune in a cargo of sugar to carry 

 to Bengal, by which a large profit a hundred or a hundred and fifty per 

 cent. is to be made. One or two singular accidents occur immediately 

 on his quitting Tappanooly the harbour where he had loaded which 



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