138 I N A G U A 



remained. There were only a few years left; he could see no 

 reason to follow. The sea and the forest behind provided all 

 the necessities of life, thatch for the roof, fish and conchs to 

 eat, the clearing grew a little grain, enough for his few needs. 



In my turn I explained how I came to Inagua, how our ship 

 was wrecked and why I was heading out into the bush. When 

 I described the Basilisk to him he became quite interested. Mov- 

 ing over to an old cupboard he extracted from some papers a 

 faded and creased photograph. I turned it over and looked at 

 the picture on its face. It was a photo of the Spray! Captain 

 Slocum had stopped at Inagua on one of his famous voyages 

 and had given a lecture at the tumbled down church. As a 

 memento of his visit he had left this photograph of his ship. 



In the morning I refilled the canteen from the rain barrel 

 beneath the eaves, ate a few pieces of conch meat and once 

 again went into the bush. Until I reached the houses near the 

 Lagoon Christophe there would be no more water unless I 

 could find the waterholes which the old man described to me. 

 This was unlikely since he had not visited them for over twenty 

 years. 



By evening I had walked about twenty miles zigzagging 

 back and forth between the coast and the barren plains near 

 the inland lake. As I went I shot a series of the lizards and in- 

 jected them with the syringe and formol, packing them in the 

 jar with little strips of paper beneath their gauze wrapping 

 describing the localities where they were captured. When I 

 reached the beach again late in the afternoon as the shadows 

 were lengthening, I was very weary; my shirt and ducks were 

 smeared with dirt, and I was sticky with perspiration. Thorns 

 had scratched and torn at my arms and legs. I had tried to be 

 as sparing of water as possible but the canteen was half empty. 

 Another day like this and it would be gone. The heat had been 

 intolerable. I sat down on the sand and opened a tin of beef. 



