﻿80 REMARKS ON THE ISLAND 



showing between them part of the remoter landscape, 

 while they left the rest to be supplied by the be- 

 holder's imagination. The town of Matsamudo lay 

 on our left, remarkable at a distance for the tower 

 of the principal mosque, which was built by Hah- 

 maky a queen of the island, from whom the pre- 

 sent king is descended : a little on our right was a 

 small town, called Bantam. Neither the territory of 

 JSice> with its olives, date-trees, and cypresses, nor 

 the isles of Hieres> with their delightful orange- 

 groves, appeared so charming to me as the view 

 from the road of H'mzuan ; which, nevertheless, is 

 far surpassed, as the Captain of the Crocodile assured 

 us, by many of the islands in the Southern Ocean, 

 If life were not too short for the complete discharge 

 of all our respective duties, public and private, and 

 for the acquisition even of necessary knowledge in 

 any degree of perfection, with how much pleasure 

 and improvement might a great part of it be spent 

 in admiring the beauties of this wonderful orb, and 

 contemplating the nature of man in all its varieties ! 



We hastened to tread on firm land, to which we 

 had been so long disused, and went on shore, after 

 breakfast, to see the town, and return the Governor's 

 visit. As we walked, attended by a crowd of natives, 

 I surprized them by reading aloud an Arabic inscrip- 

 tion over the gate of a mosque, and still more, when 

 I entered it, bv explaining four sentences, which were 

 written very distinctly on the wall, signifying, " that 

 ** the world was given us for our own edification, 

 " not for the purpose of raising sumptuous build- 

 " ings j life, for the discharge of moral and reli- 

 *' gious duties, not for plcasureable indulgences ; 

 " wealth, to be liberally bestowed, not avariciously 

 * 4 hoarded ; and learning, to produce good actions, 

 " not empty disputes." We could not but respect 

 the temple even of a false prophet, in which we 



