Hardly Had We Proceeded Two Hundred Yards, When We Were Steered Direct
To The Shore Below The Town, And Our
Boatmen coolly laid down their
paddles and told us that they had performed their share, and that as
Eppigoya was
Divided into four parts under separate headmen, each
portion would supply rowers!
Ridiculous as this appeared, there was no contesting their decision; and
thus we were handed over from one to the other, and delayed for about
three hours in changing boatmen four times within a distance of less
than a mile! The perfect absurdity of such a regulation, combined with
the delay when time was most precious, was trying to the temper. At
every change, the headman accompanied the boatmen to our canoe, and
presented us with three fowls at parting; thus our canoes formed a
floating poultry show as we had already purchased large supplies. Our
live stock bothered us dreadfully; being without baskets, the fowls were
determined upon suicide, and many jumped deliberately overboard, while
others that were tied by the legs were drowned in the bottom of the
leaky canoe.
After the tenth day from our departure from Vacovia the scenery
increased in beauty. The lake had contracted to about thirty miles in
width, and was decreasing rapidly northward; the trees upon the
mountains upon the western shore could be distinguished. Continuing our
voyage north, the western shore projected suddenly, and diminished the
width of the lake to about twenty miles. It was no longer the great
inland sea that at Vacovia had so impressed me, with the clean pebbly
beach that had hitherto formed the shore, but vast banks of reeds
growing upon floating vegetation prevented the canoes from landing.
These banks were most peculiar, as they appeared to have been formed of
decayed vegetation, from which the papyrus rushes took root; the
thickness of the floating mass was about three feet, and so tough and
firm that a man could walk upon it, merely sinking above his ankles in
the soft ooze.
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