It is always a great pleasure to the natives to help raise the ship's boats to the davits for the night. They know that white sailors make a sort of cry or "chanty" when hauling on a rope, so they, too, try to do the correct thing. The result is a noise very like a mob of schoolgirls let loose, a confusion of soprano screams. No one would suspect the sounds to come from the throats of men. Our own black sailors are the same; we hear them screaming and laughing in the forecastle exactly like girls. We are so used to island life that it has but just struck us as odd and picturesque that our almost naked sailors (they wear only a short _lava-lava_ round their loins) should be working in wreaths like queens of the May.
It is only to-day that any women have been able to get on board. Not knowing there were any on deck, I started toward the trade room. There was an instant loud cry of "_Fafine! Beretani fafine!_" and I was in the midst of them. The two who seemed of higher rank than the others took possession of me, and it was explained to me by our Johnny that they had come prepared to make a trade. Each had an elaborate _ridi_ for which she wanted two patterns of cotton print. The bargain seemed so unfair that I added a necklace apiece of yellow and white beads. They were enchanted with the necklaces, calling everybody to look at them. Then they began pulling off their rings to put on my hands; I did not like taking their rings, but I need have had no scruples, for one of them with prompt energy removed a gold ring from my finger to her own. These exchanges made, they fell to examining my clothes, which filled them with admiration. The next thing, they were trying to take my clothes off; finding this stoutly resisted, they turned up my sleeves to the shoulders. Their taste differed from mine, for, while I was thinking what a cold, ugly colour a white arm looked beside their warm, brown ones, they were crying out in admiration. One woman kissed my feet (the island kiss) and sniffed softly up and down my arms. She was plainly saying to the others, "She's just like a pickaninny; I would like to have her for a pet," holding out her arms as she spoke and going through the motions of tossing and caressing a baby. My hands and feet were measured by theirs and found to be much smaller (they were large women made on a more generous scale than I). "Pickaninny hands and feet," they said. The discovery of vaccination marks caused great excitement, especially as one of them could proudly show similar "_Beritani_" marks. Whether they were real vaccination scars or only accidental, I could not be sure. She, however, declared that they were true _Beritani_. Suddenly they all began calling out names; there were now five or six women sitting in a circle round me on the floor of the corridor at the head of the companion stairs. In a moment all their husbands' heads appeared at the doors and windows. My sleeves, in spite of my struggles, were dragged to my shoulders and, to my dismay, my petticoats were whipped up to my knees. At that I began to cry, when the men instantly disappeared, and except for an occasional sniffing the women behaved with more decorum. One woman was most anxious that I should stop on the island with her. I really think she had some hope that she might keep me as a sort of pet monkey. At last they were warned that the ship would be off soon, so they fled to their canoes.