Isles of the Pacific; Or, Sketches from the South Seas (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1882 Excerpt: ...leopard. The black is the largest, and is sometimes as long as thirty inches, and as thick as a man's leg. Some of these creatures like to lie on the sandy bottoms of the shallow lagoons between the coral reefs, others live on the reefs where the surf is constantly breaking, so that whatever the weather may be, the fishers need never be idle. In calm weather they gather the red kind off the top of the reef just inside the foam of the breakers; in stormy times they dive for the black species inside the lagoon. The beche-de-mer fishers are generally a wild, rough set of men, but hospitable and generous, and manage to get on very well with the natives of the various islands whom they take with them to do the hardest part of the work. They generally build small craft with the help of the natives, and cruise about from island to island, carrying with them a few axes, /some long knives, and two or three great cast-iron boilers for the fish. They often take no provisions but cocoa-nuts, trusting to finding turtle, fish and sea-birds' eggs to live on. A great deal of information about the islands of the Pacific Ocean has been obtained from these men, as they live on them till their cargoes are completed, whereas the whalers only discover their existence. Mr. Cooper, in his delightful book on "Coral Lands," quotes a verbatim copy of a treaty between English beche-de-mer fishers and the natives they employ; the natives always liking to have the agreement in writing, though quite unable to read or write themselves. This is how the treaty is worded--" We, men and women of Nukunivano, whose marks are put at the bottom of this paper, agree to go with the Captain Longbeard (their own nickname for the gentleman in question) to the island of Ganuet Gay, and t...