He was a tall, elderly man with a fine white beard cut to a point, and a face that was singularly grave and dignified in cast. But his dress, which in another place might have seemed eminently appropriate, was the occasion of my surprise, for it consisted of a suit of black broad-cloth with a wide-skirted frock coat, a chimney-pot hat of patriarchal mould, and polished black boots, and he carried a neatly-rolled black silk umbrella. Altogether his appearance was even more suggestive of the agency of some sportive jinn than my own, for he might have been picked up just as he stood in Oxford Street and dropped an instant later in the middle of Quittáh. “This is Mr. Pereira,” said Vanderpuye, as the stranger removed his hat with a flourish and bowed solemnly to me. “You’re from the _Lady Jane_, I perceive,” said he glancing at the house-badge on my white cap and speaking in almost perfect English. I replied that I was, and explained that the Captain proposed to join us as soon as he had finished his business with the Commissioner. “Then,” said Mr. Pereira, “we will walk to my house and wait for him.” So we resumed our walk through the hot, sandy street amidst crowds of naked, black urchins and groups of small shaggy short-haired sheep, which bleated stridently and quarrelled for scraps of offal--dry plantain skins, shreds of sugar-cane, and even fragments of putrid fish--which they disinterred from the grimy, heated sand. In the course of about five minutes we arrived at Pereira’s house, which abutted upon a narrow street or lane, along one side of which a row of broad-leaved wild fig trees cast a deep and grateful shade. The house was a two-storeyed building of whitewashed brick, the lower or ground floor forming the trading store, over which were the living rooms surrounded by a wooden verandah. At the entrance to the stairway Vanderpuye took his leave, and Pereira and I ascended to the “hall” or principal living-room, where my host handed me, with a bow, into a luxurious easy-chair; and having blown a shrill blast upon a whistle which he drew from his pocket, begged me to excuse him for a few minutes while he despatched some business that demanded his attention in the store. Left to myself, I gazed about at my new surroundings with uncommon satisfaction, for, accustomed as I had been to the narrow proportions of the brig’s tiny cuddy, the lofty, spacious apartment in which I now sat appeared quite magnificent, and as my eye took in the various details--the floor covered with handsome matting, the wide, hospitable chairs, the shining table with its bowl of flowers, the little painted sideboard groaning under huge dishes of bananas, sour-sops and mangoes, the perspiring water-cooler that hung in the open window, and, above all, the charming vista of blue-green foliage, glossy-leafed plantains and feathery cocoa-nut palms--I felt that the prospect of a few months ashore was not so alarming after all.