Stop, Reader, stop—let NATURE claim a Tear—A
Prince of Mine, Lee Boo, lies bury’d here.
As a memorial of the Antelope packet and the fortunate sojourn of her company in the Pelew Islands, a stately volume was prepared at the direction of the East India Company. This passage is worthy to be quoted in remembrance of King Abba Thulle:
The night before the schooner sailed, the king asked Captain Wilson how long it might be before his son’s return to Pelew. Being told that it would be about thirty moons, or perhaps longer, Abba Thulle drew from his basket a piece of line and after making thirty knots in it, a little distance from each other, left a long space and then adding six other knots carefully put it by.
Thirty months to be counted one by one, and six more in the event of longer delay before the return of Lee Boo! A hundred and forty years have gone since the king of the Pelew Islands and Captain Henry Wilson of the Antelope were brothers in spirit, and the curse of civilization has long since blighted the manners and the morals of those simple people of the Pacific; but this story of a shipwreck survives with a certain noble distinction, and it helps to redeem the failures of weaker men to play the gallant part amid the cruel adversities of the sea.
THE END
Transcriber’s Notes
Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling were made consistent when a predominant preference was found in the original book; otherwise they were not changed.
Simple typographical errors were corrected; unbalanced quotation marks were remedied when the change was obvious, and otherwise left unbalanced.
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