That night we were to have enjoyed the fancy dress ball for which so much preparation had been made, when an untoward accident put an end to all our merriment. A young middy, a promising lad and a great favourite on board, fell from the mizen-top— “To die! to sleep: To sleep! perchance to dream.” Such is fate! William III, whose diseased and emaciated form had survived the thickest of a dozen frays, dies through his horse stumbling on a mole-hill in his own park; a great African explorer is killed by the accidental explosion of his own gun; so, too, our poor little middy, after having many a time helped furl a sail in mid-ocean, with the billows raging in their fury, and the lightning playing about the yards, must needs fall here, with the vessel riding at anchor in a very duck-pond! He was probably a victim to sunstroke. Never shall I forget the thud that brought me up from below, caused by his head being shattered against the deck. One of the ship’s boats conveyed his remains to a small European cemetery not far from the shore, where others of his countrymen had preceded him—a lonely spot, around which the jackal yelled and the tiger prowled. As the tug could not be with us till the following day, I seized the opportunity of going ashore in one of the native craft with which European ships are invariably beset on entering an Eastern river. I proceeded on foot through a small village, very clean and regularly built, composed of well-thatched, one-storied houses. Something—I suppose it was the manner in which the men were lolling about and smoking, while the women did all the work—reminded me of small villages that I had seen in Ireland. But what first attracted my attention was the ubiquitous sparrow, just as impudent and pugnacious-looking as ever. I now came to a tract of dried-up rice-fields, as hard as brick-bats, where the trees were few and far between, and were for the most part alive with parroquets of gorgeous plumage, chattering and jabbering, as if, forsooth, they had to settle the affairs of the whole country. I therefore varied the monotony of the walk by shooting an occasional bird, which, however, proved quite useless for culinary purposes. As it grew late in the day, I turned back towards the shore; and it appeared to me a favourable opportunity for returning the kindness of the junior officers, at whose hospitable mess I had discussed many a leathery piece of salt pork and weevil-eaten biscuit, washed down with rum and water. By means of a great deal of gesticulating—for I knew not a word of the language—I became the proud possessor of a goodly store of live fowls, eggs, and plantains, for what I afterwards discovered to be about three times the correct price. I was received with thanks on board, and, from my doubtless grotesque appearance, armed with a gun and umbrella, and surrounded by my provisions, was forthwith dubbed “Robinson Crusoe.”