TWO KINDS OF PLOVER 179 



crowd at Knysna, we found a goodly number of people 

 assembled when we reached the vessel. The pilot 

 came on board in due time, when it might reasonably 

 have been expected that we should make a start, but it 

 appeared from signals which were put up at the Heads, 

 that the bar was not in a condition for us to pass. This 

 entailed a delay of nearly two hours, during which we 

 had time to observe the culinary arts as practised by a 

 Chinaman who went by the name of " Ah Sin," and who 

 was an important personage on board, to wit, the cook. 

 "Ah Sin" prepared the dinner in a small kitchen on 

 deck, going about his business in a very workman-like 

 manner, and being in nowise disconcerted or flurried 

 by the inquisitiveness of either the passengers or their 

 friends who had come to see them off. When we went 

 down to dinner we were rather surprised to see him 

 standing at the head of the small table in the saloon, 

 dispensing curry to the assembled guests, his pigtail 

 being neatly curled round the top of his head. He 

 seemed very much at his ease. 



After a long delay, flags were at length put up 

 at the Heads signalling that we might now start. 

 Although the estuary is of such width, varying from 

 one to two miles in places, yet there is only a narrow 

 channel along which a vessel of any size may go, but 

 the pilot's duty being to know this channel, we natur- 

 ally steamed along without mishap of any sort ; first 

 across the open water of the estuary, and then following 

 the deep channel which winds along beneath a high 

 bank overgrown with bush and scrub. This bank leads 

 us up to the narrow gateway of the Heads, and here, 

 just before the vessel begins to plunge and duck pre- 



