126 DESCRIPTION OF YOUNG ISLANDERS. 
head ; and as every person endeavoured to 
set his mind at rest, he very soon made him- 
self at home. 
" The young men, ten in number, were 
tall, robust, and healthy, with good-natured 
countenances which would anywhere have 
procured them a friendly reception; and 
with a simplicity of manner and a fear of 
doing wrong, which at once prevented the 
possibility of giving offence. Unacquainted 
with the world, they asked a number of 
questions, which would have applied better 
to persons with whom they had been inti- 
mate, and who had left them but a short 
time before, than to perfect strangers; and 
inquired after ships and people we had never 
heard of. Their dress, made up of the pre- 
sents which had been given them by the 
masters and seamen of merchant ships, was 
a perfect caricature. Some had on long 
black coats, without any other article of 
dress, except trowsers; some, shirts without 
coats ; and others, waistcoats without either ; 
none had shoes or stockings, and only two 
possessed hats, neither of which seemed likely 
to hang long together." 
