When All Was Quiet
Again, One Of The Men, Who Could Speak A Little Malay, Came To Me
And Begged Me Not To Sleep Too Hard.
"Why?" said I. "Perhaps the
pirates may really come," said he very seriously, which made me
laugh and assure him I should sleep as hard as I could.
Two days were spent here, but the place was unproductive of
insects or birds of interest, so we made another attempt to get
on. As soon as we got a little away from the land we had a fair
wind, and in six hours' sailing reached the entrance of the
Watelai channel, which divides the most northerly from the middle
portion of Aru. At its mouth this was about half a mile wide, but
soon narrowed, and a mile or two on it assumed entirely the
aspect of a river about the width of the Thames at London,
winding among low but undulating and often hilly country. The
scene was exactly such as might be expected in the interior of a
continent. The channel continued of a uniform average width, with
reaches and sinuous bends, one bank being often precipitous, or
even forming vertical cliffs, while the other was flat and
apparently alluvial; and it was only the pure salt-water, and the
absence of any stream but the slight flux and reflux of the tide,
that would enable a person to tell that he was navigating a
strait and not a river. The wind was fair, and carried us along,
with occasional assistance from our oars, till about three in the
afternoon, when we landed where a little brook formed two or
three basins in the coral rock, and then fell in a miniature
cascade into the salt water river. Here we bathed and cooked our
dinner, and enjoyed ourselves lazily till sunset, when we pursued
our way for two hours snore, and then moored our little vessel to
an overhanging tree for the night.
At five the next morning we started again, and in an hour
overtook four large praus containing the "Commissie," who had
come from Dobbo to make their official tour round the islands,
and had passed us in the eight. I paid a visit to the Dutchmen,
one of whom spoke a little English, but we found that we could
get on much better with Malay. They told me that they had been
delayed going after the pirates to one of the northern islands,
and had seen three of their vessels but could not catch them,
because on being pursued they rowed out in the wind's eye, which
they are enabled to do by having about fifty oars to each boat.
Having had some tea with thorn, I bade them adieu, and turned up
a narrow channel which our pilot said would take us to the
village of Watelai, on the west side- of Are. After going some
miles we found the channel nearly blocked up with coral, so that
our boat grated along the bottom, crunching what may truly be
called the living rock.
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