190 VISITS TO MADAGASCAR. chap. vii. 



in their anxiety about the time disturbed me more than once. 

 About four we arose, and after spending a short time together 

 in that communion of feeling which had formed the basis of 

 our intercourse, and receiving from my friends tlie latest ex- 

 pression of their affectionate feeling, and the kind wishes 

 which they had written down for me on the margin of a piece 

 of newspaper after I had lain down to rest, we set out by the 

 starlight of early morning towards the beach. The friendly 

 chief who had sent me my bed for the night I found waiting 

 under his verandah. He told me a canoe was ready for me on 

 the shore, and he then bade me farewell. Before we were 

 well out of his compound a man came to say that the ship 

 was getting under way. We hastened on ; the moon was 

 shining brightly, and only a faint line of light indicated the 

 approach of the dawn. When at the water's edge, I took a 

 hurried leave of my friends, and stepping into the little light 

 canoe, was soon on my way to the ship. Hats and hands 

 were waved as long as they could be seen, but I was soon 

 unable to distinguish anything beyond the white lambas 

 covering the figures still standing on the beach. 



On reaching the " Castro," I found the anchor nearly up. 

 The wind was fair, so that before six we were out of the har- 

 bour, the white surf rolling on the reefs behind us, and a 

 light breeze from the land wafting us over the ocean. From 

 the poop of our vessel I stood and gazed with strongly ex- 

 cited feelings on the peopled^ shore, where the friends I had 

 left still lingered, and between whom in their comparatively 

 isolated solitude, and the deeply interested friends in my ov^na 

 remote native land, I had been as the wire of the telegraph, 

 the medium of communicating thouo^hts and wishes of hal- 

 lowed sympathy and kindness. And this, without reference 

 to other advantages that may result from my visit, I felt to 

 be a more than ample compensation for any trifling inconve- 

 nience the voyage had occasioned. I had often before, espe- 



