I Was Seized With A Strong Propensity To Learn
Whether The Attractions Of Gooreedeeana Were Sufficiently Powerful
To Secure Her
From the brutal violence with which the women are treated,
and as I found my question either ill understood or
Reluctantly answered,
I proceeded to examine her head, the part on which the husband's vengeance
generally alights. With grief I found it covered by contusions
and mangled by scars. The poor creature, grown by this time more confident
from perceiving that I pitied her, pointed out a wound just above
her left knee which she told me was received from a spear, thrown at her
by a man who had lately dragged her by force from her home to gratify his lust.
I afterwards observed that this wound had caused a slight lameness
and that she limped in walking. I could only compassionate her wrongs
and sympathize in her misfortunes. To alleviate her present sense of them,
when she took her leave I gave her, however, all the bread and salt pork
which my little stock afforded.
After this I never saw her but once, when I happened to be near
the harbour's mouth in a boat, with captain Ball. We met her in a canoe
with several more of her sex. She was painted for a ball, with broad stripes
of white earth, from head to foot, so that she no longer looked like
the same Gooreedeeana. We offered her several presents, all of which
she readily accepted; but finding our eagerness and solicitude to inspect her,
she managed her canoe with such address as to elude our too near approach,
and acted the coquet to admiration.
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