第69章 Chapter XXXIX(1)

The next morning, as there was no particular work on hand, Ready and Mr. Seagrave took the lines to add to the stock of the fish-pond. As the weather was fine and cool, William accompanied them, that he might have the benefit of the fresh air. As they passed the garden, they observed that the seeds sown had already sprung up an inch or two above the ground, and that, apparently none of them had missed. While Ready and Mr. Seagrave were fishing, and William sitting near them, William said to his father--

"Many of the islands near us are inhabited; are they not, papa?"

"Yes, but not those very near us, I believe. At all events, I never heard any voyagers mention having seen inhabitants on the isles near which we suppose the one we are on to be."

"What sort of people are the islanders in these seas?"

"They are various. The New Zealanders are the most advanced in civilization. The natives of Van Diemen's Land and Australia are some portions of them of a very degraded class - indeed, little better than the beasts of the field."

"I have seen them," said Ready; "and I think I can mention a people, not very numerous indeed, who are still more like the beasts of the field. I saw them once; and, at first, thought they were animals, and not human beings."

"Indeed, Ready; where may that be?"

"In the Great Andaman Isles, at the mouth of the Bay of Bengal. I once anchored in distress in Port Cornwallis, and the morning after we anchored, we saw some black things going upon all fours under the trees that came down to the water's edge. We got the telescope, and perceived then that they were men and women, for they stood upright."

"Did you ever come into contact with them?"

"No, sir, I did not; but I met, at Calcutta, a soldier who had; for at one time the East India Company intended making a settlement on the island, and sent some troops there. He said that they caught two of them; that they were not more than four feet high, excessively stupid and shy; they had no houses or huts to live in, and all that they did was to pile up some bushes to keep the wind off."

"Had they any arms?"

"Yes, sir, they had bows and arrows; but so miserably made, and so small, that they could not kill anything but very small birds."

"Where did the people come from who inhabited these islands, papa?"

"That is difficult to say, William; but it is supposed that they have become inhabited in much the same way as this our island has been - that is, by people in canoes or boats driven out to sea, and saving their lives by effecting a landing, as we have done."

"I believe that's the truth," replied Ready; "I heard say that the Andaman Isles were supposed to have been first inhabited by a slaver full of negroes, who were wrecked on the coast in a typhoon."

"What is a typhoon, Ready?"

"It is much the same as a hurricane, William; it comes on in India at the change of the monsoons."

"But what are monsoons?"

"Winds that blow regular from one quarter so many months during the year, and then change round and blow from another just as long."

"And what are the trade-winds, which I heard poor Captain Osborn talking about after we left Madeira?"

"The trade-winds blow on the equator, and several degrees north and south of it, from the east to the west, following the course of the sun."

"Is it the sun which produces these winds?"

"Yes, the extreme heat of the sun between the tropics rarefies the air as the earth turns round, and the trade-winds are produced by the rushing in of the less heated air."

"Yes, William; and the trade-winds produce what they call the Gulf Stream," observed Ready.

"How is that? I have heard it spoken of, papa."

"The winds, constantly following the sun across the Atlantic Ocean, and blowing from east to west, have great effect upon the sea, which is forced up into the Gulf of Mexico (where it is stopped by the shores of America), so that it is many feet higher in the Gulf than in the eastern part of the Atlantic. This accumulation of water must of course find a vent somewhere, and it does in what is called the Gulf Stream, by which the waters are poured out, running very strong to the northward, along the shores of America, and then eastward, passing not far from Newfoundland, until its strength is spent somewhere to the northward of the Azores."

"The Gulf Stream, William," said Ready, "is always several degrees warmer than the sea in general, which is, they say, owing to its waters remaining in the Gulf of Mexico so long, where the heat of the sun is so great."

"What do you mean by the land and sea breezes in the West Indies, and other hot climates, papa?"

"It is the wind first blowing off from the shore, and then blowing from the sea towards the shore, during certain hours of the day, which it does regularly every twenty-four hours. This is also the effect of the heat of the sun. The sea breeze commences in the morning, and in the afternoon it dies away, when the land breeze commences, which lasts till midnight."

"There are latitudes close to the trade-winds," said Ready, "where the wind is not certain, where ships have been becalmed for weeks; the crews have exhausted the water on board, and they have suffered dreadfully. We call them the Horse latitudes - why, I do not know. But it is time for us to leave off, and for Master William to go into the house."

They returned home, and after supper Ready went on with his narrative.