“Well, mine’s somethin’ in the same way,” returned the seaman, “but we haven’t a rap to buy with.”
Whether Laihova overheard the whisper or not we cannot tell, but he stopped at that moment, purchased a large quantity of the tempting fruit, and handed it, without a word, to his friends, who received it with becoming gratitude.
“You’s a trump, Hovey,” said the negro, as he put a whole peach into his capacious mouth.
“Ditto,” said Hockins, performing the same feat with a banana.
“Do I hear music?” said Mark Breezy.
“An’ don’t I smell rum?” remarked Hockins.
“An’ doesn’t I hear cackling?” inquired Ebony.
By way of answer to all three, Laihova turned round the corner of a stall, when the party reached a spot which was devoted to the sale of native rum, or “toaka”—a coarse fiery spirit made from sugar-cane, and sold at a very low price. Here a native musician was discovered twanging a native guitar, either as an accompaniment to the cackling of hundreds of fowls and the gobbling of innumerable turkeys, or as a desperate effort to beat these creatures at their own game of noise.
On inquiry Mark found that fowls were sold at from fourpence to eightpence a-piece; geese and turkeys from a shilling to eighteenpence. Also that beef and vegetables were proportionally cheap.
“It seems to me,” remarked Hockins, as they moved slowly along, enjoying the fruit and the scene, “that this here island is a sort of paradise.”