The worthy captain’s mention of “coming on deck” is doubtless from force of habit, for neither he nor I have been anywhere but on deck for more than a week, except perhaps to look for something which we have left below. Most of my time is spent in the rigging, where what little wind there is may generally be met with; and our table-cloth is spread on the “after-hatch,” while our arrangements for going to bed consist merely of throwing a blanket on the deck, and stretching ourselves upon it, undisturbed save by an occasional scamper of two or three frolicsome rats over our faces.
When I awake the next morning, I find the captain’s promise amply made good. The sun is just rising, and under its golden splendor the broad blue sea stretches westward as far as eye can reach, every ripple tipped with living fire. On the other side extends a sea of another kind—the gray, unending level of the great Arabian desert, melting dimly into the warm dreamy sky. In front, the low white wall of a Turkish fort stands out like an ivory carving against the hot brassy yellow of the sand-hills that line the shore; while all around it are the little cabins of mud-plastered wickerwork that compose the Arab village, looking very much like hampers left behind by some monster picnic. Here and there, through the light green of the shallower water along the shore, a flash of dazzling white, keen and narrow as the edge of a sword, marks the presence of the dangerous coral-reefs among which we have been picking our way for the last three days, with the chance of running aground at any moment.
“You were right, captain,” say I, as the burly skipper rises and stretches his brawny arms, like a bear awaking from its winter nap. “This is a sight worth seeing, indeed.”
“Ah, this ain’t what I meant,” chuckles the captain; “the best o’ the show’s to come yet. Look over yonder—there, just ’twixt the reef and the shore. D’ye see anything in the water?”
“Well, I think I see something swimming—sharks, I suppose.”
“Sharks, eh? Well, land-sharks you might call ’em, p’raps. Take my glass and try again.”
The first look through the glass works a startling change. In a moment the swarm of round black spots which I have ignorantly taken for the backs of sharks, are turned into faces—the faces of Arab children, and (as I perceive with no little amazement) of very young children too, some of the smallest being apparently not more than five or six years old! Our vessel is certainly not less than a mile from the shore, and the water, shallow as it is, is deep enough at any point to drown the very tallest of these adventurous little “water-babies;” yet they are evidently making for the ship, and that, too, at a speed that will soon bring them alongside of her.
“Are they really coming all this way out without resting?” ask I.
“Bless you, that’s nothing to an Arab!” laughs the captain; “these little darkies are as much at home in the water as on land. I’ve heard folks talk a good deal of the way the South Sea Islanders can swim; but I’ve seen as good swimming here as ever I saw there.”