XII STEPHEN'S ISLAND 169 
At eleven next day we anchored off Stephen's 
Island, a small fertile one about a mile both in width 
and length. We walked across it, followed by a trail 
of natives in every variety of dress and undress, through 
patches of jungle, groves of plantations and cocoa-nuts, 
and gardens of taros, to a small village of ragged huts, 
where we bought mats ; and then followed the shore back, 
where we sat under the shade of two magnificent wongi 
trees, whose thick branches, laden with date-like plums 
in every stage of ripeness, formed an impenetrable shade. 
In the village close by we bargained for fowls, * man 
hen four shillings, woman hen two,' which showed that 
they knew the value of money. There were more 
horrible sights here than you ever see in the crowded 
bazaars of an Eastern city. One boy had a head 
which we measured, it was thirty-one inches round ; we 
saw a woman too, whose nose and eyes had so com- 
pletely gone, that the skin had grown smooth and 
tight over them ; her mouth was always open, the lips 
gone, and the teeth sticking straight out from the 
gums. They say that many of these deformities are 
caused by eating certain kinds of native fruits, and 
human flesh in a decomposed state. Two women 
here were rasping cocoa-nut with shells to use in cooking 
their yams, and in pots close by we saw the fibre from 
the leaves steeping in water, before it was made into 
ropes and lines for their fishing-nets. 
From Stephen's Island we went on to York Island, 
very low lying, and about three or four miles round. 
We walked all round it, ploughing our way along 
stretches of heavy sand, then over sharp rocks where 
the sea came in with a loud roar from the wide, open 
ocean, and, rushing upon the rocks, leapt high above 
them. A long trail of natives followed in our rear with 
only the scantiest of clothing. 
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