Page:Voyage in search of La Perouse, volume 2 (Stockdale).djvu/356

 

CHAP. XV.

Abode at Waygiou—Scorbutic Patients are speedily relieved—Interviews with the Natives—Anchor at Bourou—Passage through the Straits of Bouton—Ravages produced by the Dysentery—Author at Sourabaya—Abode at Samarang—My Detention at Fort Anké near Batavia—Abode at Isle de France—Return to France.

 

During our stay at Waygiou we were frequently visited by the natives, who brought us turtles, several of which weighed from 200 to 240 pounds. They had mostly been taken on the islands of Aiou. The soup which we made of them afforded great relief to our scorbutic patients. When the natives perceived that we were in need of them, they made us pay for them at ten times their value. These animals continued to crawl about several hours after their heads had been cut off. The natives sold us likewise, turtle eggs roasted and dried; broiled turtle flesh, pullets, hogs, of which they told us there was great abundance in their woods; oranges, cocoa-nuts, papayas, gourds of different kinds, rice, purslain (portulaca quadrifida), sugar canes, pimento, unripe ears of Turkey corn roasted, and the freshsprouts