114 THE CRUISE OF TEE "CACHALOT:' 



and admire at our ease the wonderful variety of beautiful 

 plants which grew here so lavishly, unseen by mortal 

 eye from one year's end to another. I have somewhere 

 read that the Creator has delight in the beautiful work 

 of His will, wherever it may be; and that while our 

 egotism wonders at the waste of beauty, as we call it, 

 there is no waste at all, since the Infinite Intelligence 

 can dwell with complacency upon the glories of His 

 handiwork, perfectly fulfilling their appointed ends. 



All too soon the pleasant occupation came to an 

 end. The long row of casks, filled to the brim and 

 tightly bunged, were towed ofif by us to the ship, and 

 ranged alongside. A tackle and pair of " can-hooks " 

 was overhauled to the water and hooked to a cask. 

 " Hoist away ! " And as the cask rose, the beckets that 

 had held it to the mother-rope were cut, setting it quite 

 free to come on board, but leaving all the others still 

 secure. In this way we took in several thousand 

 gallons of water in a few hours, with a small expendi- 

 ture of labour, free of cost ; whereas, had we gone into 

 Mayotte or Johanna, the water would have been bad, 

 the price high, the labour great, with the chances of 

 a bad visitation of fever in the bargain. 



The woodmen had a much more arduous task. The 

 only wood they could find, without cutting down big 

 trees, which would have involved far too much labour 

 in cutting up, was a kind of iron-wood, which, besides 

 being very heavy, was so hard as to take pieces clean 

 out of their axe-edges, when a blow was struck directly 

 across the grain. As none of them were experts, 

 the condition of their tools soon made their work 

 very hard. But that they had taken several axes in 

 reserve, it is doubtful whether they would have been 



