FAR AND NEAR 



what eats them ? Why all this terrible panoply 

 of spines ? The spine and the thorn everywhere, I 

 suppose, is simply a sign of savage, unregenerate 

 nature. We saw in Jamaica some species of palm, 

 so bristling with long, awl-like thorns that one could 

 not look at them without a positive feeling of dis- 

 comfort. Think of the amount of original sin there 

 must be in such a tree! And no fruit to guard, 

 either, — just a spontaneous overflow of the hatred 

 and spitefulness of the old fire-eating, all-devouring, 

 seismic earth! 



Great Salt Pond is shallow, of a uniform depth 

 of about three and a half feet, so that the fisher- 

 men wade in, hauling their nets. The evaporation 

 is so great that the water seems to be always flowing 

 in from the sea. 



On our way out we found a boat at the inlet w ith 

 our friends the Davises, — a father and three sons, 

 • — from Port Henderson. Their hospitality and soli- 

 citude for our well-being had brought them the four 

 miles with a pail of fresh water. In the inlet, which 

 was running like a mill race, we all went in bathing, 

 partly for a bath, but chiefly of necessity to haul and 

 push our boats out against the current. How de- 

 licious that bath w^as, except that the savage current 

 hurled both my son and me against the banks w ith 

 such force that our skins w^ere gashed in several 

 places. 



Here we saw that large, beautiful tropical fish, the 



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