38 VISITS TO MADAGASCAR. chap. ii. 



dropping from a dirty lamp suspended from the top rendered 

 it quite filthy, and it was never washed except by the rain 

 beating in at the door. 



Our quarters had never been very comfortable ; but after 

 we had been in harbour for some time, our captain went to an 

 island near the reef and brought away a number of demijohns 

 of rum, which had been buried in the sand there some time 

 before by a smuggling vessel from Mauritius ; and after this, 

 sometimes our officers drank very freely and got to fight- 

 ing on the deck. Eaw rum was sometimes given to the men 

 in a large basin, after which, the yelling, quarrelling, and 

 tumult that followed, made us really apprehensive for our 

 safety in harbour, to say nothing of the prospect of ovir voyage 

 back to Mauritius. 



I used to think that a voyage in a steamer like the 

 "Indiana" would, from the many comforts it afforded, tend 

 to spoil a missionary going to an uncivilised country ; but a 

 voyage in such a vessel as the " Grregorio " would most 

 effectually counteract any such tendency. We certainly saw 

 human nature under a phase somewhat new to ourselves, and 

 probably different from most of its ordinary manifestations. 

 Its development here was sometimes varied by our steward or 

 cabin servant, who was quite an original — a native of Mau- 

 ritius, twenty-five or thirty years of age, healthy, strong, and 

 good-looking. He had been servant to some English officers, 

 of whose integrity and character he appeared to have formed 

 a high estimate. He professed to be a Protestant, and was, in 

 his way, at times very devout, — reading, and sometinles praying 

 audibly, or silently, in one corner of our little dirty cabin, 

 before stretching himself on the floor and folding his little 

 dog Beauty in his arms as a means of composing himself to 

 sleep. His knowledge of languages, besides his native Creole, 

 consisted in a little English, which he was frequently using, 

 a little Bengalee, and a little Malagasy. He was very fond 



