KINGSTON. 
211 
Chap. XIII.—B.P.] 
Leave-taking and the hundred and one preparations 
for departure fully occupied the short time allowed 
before sailing. The principal part of the work pour 
prendre conge and shopping is done at Kingston, for 
Port Eoyal is simply the dockyard of Jamaica; but 
boats and canoes are often passing backwards and 
forwards between the two places, which are scarcely 
five miles apart, so that communication between them 
is not a very difficult matter. It requires some skill, 
however, to pilot your boat through the narrow and 
shallow channels winding between the mangroves 
which fringe the famous Palisades for some distance; 
but once clear, the slashing trade-wind soon “rips” 
you over to the commercial capital, where you land 
with a very uncomfortable damp feeling, caused by 
the saline particles with which the trade-wind is 
loaded. 
Kingston is bordered on the sea, or rather lagoon 
side, by rickety tumbledown piers and landing-places, 
just like Mr. Quilp’s wharf. The town is divided into 
narrow streets, dusty enough in the dry season, and 
sufficiently muddy for sea-boots in the wet: there is 
no regular pavement, and if a pedestrian were eccen¬ 
tric enough to keep the so-called side walk, he would 
frequently find himself in a hole, now picking his way 
over broken stones, and then mounting over hillocks 
of brickwork, almost in ruins, which jut out from the 
sides of the houses like small pyramids with flattened 
tops, and steps on each side. So shin-breaking are 
these heaps that even the Egyptian cry of ‘ Backsheesh ’ 
would be welcomed, if accompanied by the ready band 
p 2 
