BECHE-DE-MER. 269 



in anything like abundance, they will settle down there for a 

 few months, or it may be a year or two, and cure and store it 

 up until some passing vessel chances to call and purchase it. 

 If no ship calls, they will fill their little craft with as much as 

 she can carry, and set sail for some larger island where there 

 is a trading station, and bargain for a vessel to come down 

 and fetch the remainder. I have heard many a curious story 

 about these strange nineteenth-century voluntary Crusoes. 

 The scene of one of the best of these was in the Kingsmill 

 Group, where a friend of mine had a conversation with a man 

 of this kind, relative to the best way of cooking a crayfish. 



'We,' said he, 'are used to cooking them in an oven of hot 

 stones, but white men mostly like them boiled in a pot.' 



It was evident that his mind \vas in somewhat of a fog as to 

 whether he had himself any claim to be reckoned among the 

 sons of Japhet. Another dates from the island of Manuai, 

 where a bcche-de-mer fisherman asked him to read a certain 

 paper for him. 



' Were you never taught to read f inquired my friend. 



' Oh yes,' he replied. ' I had a good schooling once, but it's 

 so long ago that I don't know English from Dutch when it's 

 wrote down.' 



This man's son (who spoke good English) remarked that he 

 should like very much to be able to read. My friend, with a 

 prophetic vision of a school board for Coral Lands, and a 

 shilling in the pound rate, rejoined : 



' Don't you try to know too much ; knowledge is only a lot 

 of bother.' 



'Oh,' said the lad, 'but I should like to read the Bible; 

 there's good stories in it, 'specially that part about the pirates.' 



' Indeed, you must be mistaken ; there's no such thing in 

 the Bible.' 



