the attack wore off. Many of the passengers of the "Burgermeister" are invalids going home to recuperate after an experience with the climate of Africa.
Tuesday, April 8.—It is fortunate I am not seasick,
and laid up, for my cabin window looks out on
the deck where the steerage passengers are. Early
this morning I heard a babel of voices, and supposed
all the negro boys were on deck, and talking at the
same time. Looking out of my window, I discovered
that fifteen or twenty Hindus were doing all the talking,
while the two hundred negro boys were sitting
around in perfect silence. The steerage passengers can
look into my room, if so disposed, and often do. Before
I finished dressing, the two hundred negro boys
were fed. Each was given three ship biscuits, and
weak tea was provided for those who could get to it.
When the boys gathered around the teakettle, they reminded
me of pigs around a swill-trough. The stronger
boys drank the tea from cups made out of the hollow
of their hands, and the weaker ones, or runts, got none.
Several of the boys were living skeletons, and had evidently
been very ill. I threw an apple to one of the
runts, but he had never seen that kind of fruit before,
and I was compelled to inform him by means of signs
that it was good to eat. . . . Six of the boys sat
together, and divided everything given them. I was
told that they were brothers, although there wasn't a
year's difference in their ages. Their father probably
has a dozen wives, as polygamy is practiced by nearly
