The river is broad and deep.
Both banks are lined with sago palms.
When a young man marries a young woman, the custom here is to pay nothing
for her; but for a widow something very great. The people live chiefly
on sago. Sago is cooked with shell-fish, boiled with bananas, roasted on
stones, baked in the ashes, tied up in leaves, and many other ways. We
have received large presents of sago, both boats bearing as much as is
safe to carry. We leave in the morning. At present a man is going
through the streets in great wrath, having been to his plantation and
missed a bunch of bananas. As he moves along he shouts out his loss, and
challenges the thief.
We had a gathering of old men until late into the night, and they closed
with a wail, chanted, with drums keeping time. Hours before daylight
Semese was up, waiting for me to turn out.
We had a fine run back to Yule, where, at sunset, we were met by a
terrific gale of wind and a thunderstorm. We had to put in close to the
land, and for four hours sit it out in a deluge of rain.
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