I smothered my anger, went up to the little cabin, and began to stow away as much of my belongings as I could cram into the two shallow drawers under the bunk, kicking out "Percy", who wanted to help. He did not seem to mind, and was back again in a minute. If he was dirty, he had a cheerful little face and a pair of big dog-like eyes. He pleaded with them so hard to be allowed to stay and help that I had not the heart to kick him out again. That "chunk" of goat soon disappeared, once Mr. Scarlett and I settled down to breakfast. Whilst we were busy with it a European-built boat pulled past us from the steamer, with our little yellow-haired friend under the awnings. I almost felt inclined to wave to her, but, not wanting another snub, did not do so. "I expect she’s going to live at the telegraph station. She won’t find many comforts in this place," Mr. Scarlett said grimly, pointing to the various square, white-faced buildings at the end of Jask peninsula. Down on the low ground, where the peninsula joined the coast line, there was a neglected-looking red-brick building among some palm trees (Mr. Scarlett said it was a fort), and another, larger and more imposing, some little way inshore. With the exception of these there was precious little to see except sand-hills, a few scattered palm trees, and perhaps a hundred native huts dotted among them. We could see the track which led inland to the town of old Jask, though the town itself was not visible. On the horizon the misty outlines of barren mountains rose high into the burning sky. Even at this hour the sun was very fierce. Presently that European boat came pulling off to the _Bunder Abbas_ with a note for me from the Englishman in charge of the telegraph station—the acting political agent—asking me to breakfast with him and not to bother with formalities. "Off you skip, sir," Mr. Scarlett advised me. "They calls their lunch ’breakfast’. I’d like to have a few kind words with the men whilst you are away." So on shore I went, landing on a broad, sandy beach, where crowds of Arabs or Persians, and niggers of sorts—every sort, I should fancy—were unloading those wretched lighters and some large dhows lying half out of water. Donkeys, as patient as donkeys are all the world over, and camels, as supercilious and discontented as they, too, always are, were being laden with bales of merchandise. One of the boat’s crew—a Zanzibar nigger he was—led me through them, away from the shore and the native huts, through a small grove of palm trees, where that old fort stood, and across an open cultivated space, sloping gently upwards towards the telegraph station. At the top of this was a double line of wire entanglements extending from side to side.