THE CAPE. 353 



houses, each with the wooden image cf a codfish 

 or mackerel swinging from its steep roof, the 

 absence of grass or aught of green near the shores, 

 and above all and mixed with all, the everlasting 

 glare of the sand, all united to give the shores of 

 the Cape a most desolate appearance. 



Where a country is poor the people are gener- 

 ally thriving and in their way happy. So it is 

 here. I don't know that a fisherman's life exactly 

 fills my ideal of a happy existence. But the peo- 

 ple are universally frugal, industrious and intelli- 

 gent their wants are few, their tastes the reverse 

 of luxurious, and the labor of their hands suffices 

 to make them a competence so that after all, 

 making due allowance for the many hardships of 

 their peculiar life, they are very happy. 



The widow lady with whom I had made my 

 home on my arrival on shore, was kind enough to 

 provide me with many little articles, necessary 

 only on such a trip as I was about to make. She 

 set apart for my use, during my stay on shore, a 

 neat little room, in which for the first time since 

 starting to sea I made myself perfectly at home 

 Here I enjoyed once more, to some degree, a free- 

 dom from exciting care, which seldom falls to the 

 sailor's lot. The quiet of the country how much 

 and often I had longed for it ! did my soul good, 

 and I found myself in a condition of mind to sit 

 down and reason with myself on the folly of the 

 life which I had so long been leading. Here was 

 ttrengthened my previously formed determination 

 23 



