And now, while a corps of native divers were at work every day in the lagoon, gathering shells, Antonio and our young heroes often going down in the diving-bells, and heaping up piles of these; while scores of natives were busy also diving for, and extracting or digging out great sponges from coral caves and cavities, Leona began to ask herself the question, What can I do for these poor people?
She went among them almost daily when the weather was fine, and it is nearly always fine here. The natives looked upon this beautiful but sad-faced young lady, dressed all in white, as a kind of good spirit, and most of them were just a little afraid of her.
But she never went on shore without bringing little presents that she obtained from Antonio—tobacco, of which the men, curiously enough, were inordinately fond, smoking it in pretty little pipes carved from the dried hard wood they found on the island. Sometimes, however, these pipes were fashioned from coral.
The king, too, smoked an immense hubble-bubble, a present from Antonio in former years.
But Leona brought the women beads as well, and many little nicknacks fashioned by her own hands from coloured paper and cloth, such as watch-pockets, &c. These the cannibal ladies did not hang on the walls of their huts, but to their ears, half-filling them with little pink cowries to keep them steady.
As their ears were very large, and as they walked erect and stately, the ornaments never fell off.
But these were all wives of great chiefs, or those in high authority. Once Leona inadvertently gave a common cannibal’s wife a pair of these pretty pockets. Of these the woman was instantly deprived. She only sighed, and sat down in the sands to bewail her lot.
When Miss Leona came on shore, she brought Teenie with her, dressed becomingly in pink and white, and always Johnnie Smart, the fat boy, as a kind of bodyguard.
He really wasn’t much use after all, except to carry things. He would gaze around him for a few minutes wonderingly; but being incapable of taking it all in, he contented himself with turning his fat face skywards, and chuckling pleasantly to himself, the eyes of course being out of sight.
Leona’s first visit was always to the king’s tent, or rather palace.