I was at
the one called in the chart 'Saddle Hill,' the smallest of them, I
think: and seldom have I had such sensations of peace as I lay a whole
burning day in a rising vale, deeply-shaded in palm and tropical
ranknesses, watching thence the _Speranza_ at anchor: for there was a
little offing here at the shore whence the valley arose, and I could see
one of its long peaks lined with cocoanut-trees, and all cloud burned
out of the sky except the flimsiest lawn-figments, and the sea as
absolutely calm as a lake roughened with breezes, yet making a
considerable noise in its breaking on the shore, as I have noticed in
these sorts of places: I do not know why. These poor Andaman people seem
to have been quite savage, for I met a number of them in roaming the
island, nearly skeletons, yet with limbs and vertebrae still, in
general, cohering, and in some cases dry-skinned and mummified relics of
flesh, and never anywhere a sign of clothes: a very singular thing,
considering their nearness to high old civilisations all about them.
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