One look at the mattresses was enough. I slept, or rather lay awake sweltering, on all the coverlets piled on the least filthy of the upper berths. The cabin smelt horrible, and the only light there, as in the saloon, was a candle in a bracket, the glass of which was so grimed with dirt that it gave hardly any light at all. No water was laid on to the filthy basin, and it did not do to let one’s mind dwell for one instant on cockroaches—like a child who tries not to think of some horrible ghost story in the dark.
About six this morning the muchacho (they have no word for steward apparently) woke me by rattling at the handle of my door, when I climbed down and held parley with him through the crack. He said something in English about “washing,” and I thinking he had brought me water to put in the unspeakable basin, said: “No, not yet,” and tried to shut the door.
However, he was not to be ignored, for he shoved the door open, apologising as he did so, came in and shut and fastened down the scuttle, and then backed out again with many more bows and excuses. Then I understood that it was not I who was to be washed, but the decks! Somehow, it had not occurred to me that the decks of the Butuan ever could be cleaned like those of other ships!
All day long we have been slipping past these Dream Islands, sometimes so close that one can see the waves breaking on the rocks and the blue sea running up into fairy bays, and I should so much like to go ashore in some of them, and see the negritos and savages, and the beautiful jungles where monkeys swing about on great flowering vines. That is always the Tropic Island of one’s dreams, is it not? But now I begin to think that possibly life is not all a transformation scene in the lovely jungles, where there are doubtless deadly snakes; poisonous, scentless plants; swamps, and malaria, to say nothing of the fatigues and difficulties of getting there. On the whole, for beauty of scenery, health and comfort, I think I would rather live in a glen on a Scottish moor.
My luggage is rather on my mind, as I found I had to bring such a quantity, for muslin and cotton frocks take up so much room that I was compelled to abandon my first plan of one moderate trunk, and am now engineering what looks like a family “flitting.” Talking of frocks, you once asked me to tell you if those I had brought out were all right. They are quite right, thanks, at least the muslins are and the very thin cottons, but anything thicker, even print, is too warm, and the very thinnest of stuff skirts or coats are stifling and impossible. I always envy the lucky women in Hong Kong whom I left going about in white serge and grey flannel, and even being compelled to put wraps on in the evening!
Another thing I find about clothes is that every one wears white, and though one gets rather tired of it, still it is the best thing for the fashion of washing clothes by pounding them on boulders, and then drying them in this terrific sun will evaporate the strongest colours in an incredibly short time. Clothes don’t last long here anyhow, colour or no colour, as there is something in the water that rots material, so that it goes into holes and tears if you look at it, and something in the air which rots silk even more disastrously and quickly, and turns all white silk and satin quite deep yellow.
I have been writing this at intervals all day, and now it is six o’clock, and the meal is due. I can see the polite skipper standing waiting for me to enter and take my seat, and the mangy dog trying to squeeze himself in under the bench where my place is. So I will leave off and finish this in Manila, where we are to arrive in the early morning.
Manila, March 2.
I thought a mail would be going out the day I got here, but I find it does not go till to-morrow morning, of which I am rather glad, as it gives me time to let you know I have arrived safely. Yet when you get this—oh what a long way off—the trip to Manila will be a half-forgotten thing of the past!