Worse than these were the
mosquitoes, also an imported nuisance, which stabbed and stung
without any preliminary droning; and the heat was worse still, for
thirteen human beings were lying on the floor and the door was shut.
Had I known that two of these were lepers, I should have felt far
from comfortable. As it was, I got up soon after midnight, and
cautiously stepping among the sleeping forms, went out of doors.
Everything favoured reflection, but I think the topics to which my
mind most frequently reverted were my own absolute security--a lone
white woman among "savages," and the civilizing influence which
Christianity has exercised, so that even in this isolated valley,
gouged out of a mountainous coast, there was nothing disagreeable or
improper to be seen. The night was very still, but the sea was
moaning; the river rippled very gently as it brushed past the reeds;
there was a hardly perceptible vibration in the atmosphere, which
suggested falling water and quivering leaves; and the air was full
of a heavy, drowsy fragrance, the breath of orange flowers, perhaps,
and of the night-blowing Cereus, which had opened its ivory urn to
the moon. I should have liked to stay out all night in the vague,
delicious moonlight, but the dew was heavy, and moreover I had not
any boots on, so I reluctantly returned to the grass house, which
was stifling with heat and smells of cocoa-nut oil, tobacco, and the
rancid smoke from beef fat.
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