Just then we saw Mr Ebony coming towards us loaded with a basket of fruit, which he placed on the sand, and then after a dance round us he plumped down by the fire and picked out the skewers where the fish was most done, handing one to each, and our breakfast began.
Mr Ebony thoroughly enjoyed his coffee with plenty of sugar, for he had no distrust now, but ate and drank as we did, laughing and talking all the while, and stopping every now and then to point to butterfly or bird that went by, eating a prodigious breakfast, but mostly of fish and fruit.
Breakfast over, as soon as he saw us ready for a start he stuck his spear down again in front of the door, excited and eager to be off, and ready to draw our attention to the fact that one of us had no gun.
We pointed, however, to the butterfly-nets and that satisfied him, and when we were ready to start I suggested to my uncle that we should put the uncooked remains of the fish and the fruit inside the hut so as to have them when we came back.
“To be sure, Nat,” he said, “I had forgotten them.”
But at the first attempt to remove them Mr Ebony stopped me, and uttered a loud, ringing cry, whose effect was to bring about a couple of dozen little naked black boys out of the jungle, where they must have been watching us, safely hidden all the time.
To these comical-looking little objects the chief said a few words, when there was a rush, and the remains from our breakfast were carried off like magic, Mr Ebony pointing to the sea and to the trees as much as to say, “There is plenty more when we want it.”
We were not long in getting to work, for no sooner were we in the denser part of the island where the foliage grew thick and moist, than we were astounded at the number of little lizards that swarmed about, darting here and there and puzzling me at first as to what colour they were. One moment they seemed to be bright green, the next like a wriggling line of the most beautiful blue.
I found out their colour, though, as soon as I had one in the butterfly-net, for while their bodies were of a brilliant green, their tails were a blue as pure as the sky.
A couple of them were consigned to the spirit bottle for preservation, and then we tramped on, growing more and more delighted with the country the farther we went.