2G5 
Chap. XVI.—B.P.] THE KING OF MOSQUITO. 
dragged clear of one slioal, when grit, grit, there she 
was hard and fast on another, so that at last we were 
obliged to take down the sail and haul her along by 
main force ; the men tucking up their trousers and 
dragging her over the ground through the deepest 
water they could find. It was lucky for them that the 
soles of their feet were pretty tough, for the bottom 
of the Lagoon is covered with oysters, which would 
cut through an ordinary cuticle in no time. 
As to the cutter, she soon came to a standstill, and, 
after a time, returned to Cassava Cay, where both 
officers and men had a great oyster feast, and then 
went on board with a sufficient quantity of those suc¬ 
culent delicacies to serve as a supper for all hands. 
The oysters are very small, not much larger, indeed, 
than a good-sized mussel, and somewhat similar in 
shape, but having all the flavour and slipperiness of a 
real u native.” The supply is unlimited, and I am 
surprised that some enterprising Yankee has not long 
since set up a Central American oyster saloon, after 
the pattern of those in Hew York, where you have a 
choice of no less than twenty-two different methods of 
cooking this justly popular bivalve. 
At length, after two hours’ hard work, which the sun 
above and the oysters below caused us to remember 
long afterwards, the boat reached a small jetty, which 
had been run out from the rising ground on which 
stands the King’s house, surrounded by a number of 
cocoa-nut and breadfruit-trees, which not only give 
it a most acceptable shade, but also a very picturesque 
appearance. This jetty was built of stones and lumps 
