“That’s it, sir. Give ’em time and a stir-up every now and then, and they go all into a nasty thin watery stuff which you can pour away, wash what’s left with clean water, and there at last are all the pearls at the bottom without losing one, while the shells have lain in the sun and grown sweet.”
Enough pearling being done for the day, Bostock attacked one of the heaviest laden cocoanut-trees, making a “sterrup,” as he called it, by passing a short piece of rope round himself and the tree, tying it fast, and then half-sitting in it and pressing against the trunk with his legs, hitching the rope up foot by foot till he reached the leafy crown, where he screwed off a dozen fine nuts and threw them down upon the sand before descending.
“Why, Bob,” cried Carey, “I didn’t think you were so clever as that.”
“More did I, sir.”
“But you must have had lots of practice.”
“Nay, sir, I never did it afore; but I’ve seen the blacks do it often, and it seemed so easy I thought I’d try.”
Later on, when well refreshed, they went cautiously to the mouth of the little river, stalking the crocodiles by gliding from rock to rock, but without result; not a single pair of watchful eyes was to be seen on the surface. There were, however, plenty of a mullet-like fish.
But the party preferred to make use of their lines from the raft moored at the edge of the deep water, where they were not long in securing half-a-dozen fine fish partaking of the appearance of the John Dory as far as the great heads were concerned, but in bodily shape plumper and thicker of build.
Then the raft was unmoored and the sail hoisted, to fill out in the soft land breeze, which wafted them back to their stranded home.