I am not favourably impressed with the honesty of the islanders that do the washing, or rather that do not do it. Following the example of the officers of the ‘Havannah,’ I delivered my bag of clothes, the accumulation since leaving England, to the washer, who promised, as only a black washerman will promise, to have it on board before we sailed: he kept his word, for he came when the ship was under weigh, had his money, and with bows, and prayers for my welfare in this world, vanished over the side. We were well out to sea when I looked at my bag; imagine my wrath at finding everything just as I had given it. It was lucky for the rascal he was out of reach, and perhaps quite as well for me; a dollar (4_s._) a dozen to carry one’s clothes ashore, most likely to wear, and bring back again dirtier than it went, would enrage the meekest saint! The voyage in the ‘Havannah’ from Panama to Vancouver Island was a long and wearisome one. We left Tobago on June 4, and entered the Straits of Juan de Fuca on July 12. Reference to the track-chart shows how we idled and idled along on the sea, sauntering, rather than sailing; with a blazing sun right over the masthead, the heat was intolerable, and attended with a depressing languor, that forbade all energy, and fairly melted one in body and mind. The only land sighted was a very distant view of the Gallopagos Islands, a mere black looking spot on an interminable surface of blue. This group of volcanic islands, so strangely isolated, might have been a monster fish, a phantom ship, or even the great sea-serpent, for anything that could be definitely made out, even aided by a ship’s telescope. We caught great numbers of dolphins (_Coryphæna hippuris_), which are far more lovely to the eye than agreeable to the palate, in my estimation. This fish, usually from four to five feet in length, is built for rapid passage through the water: the tail, forked like horns, together with the long dorsal fin, reaching from head to tail, enables it to turn with an ease and celerity during even its swiftest transit through the sea. All who have written (in prose or poetry) about the dolphin have attempted a description of its marvellous colouring: to convey, by word-painting, the slightest idea of the changing, flashing, glowing radiance that plays around and upon this fish, when fresh from the ocean, is as impossible as to describe the colours of the Aurora, or the phosphorescence of the tropical seas; it must be witnessed to be realised in all its magnificence. Flying-fish are its favourite food, and these the dolphins course as greyhounds course hares; what is called ‘flying’ being merely an extended leap, aided by the immensely-elongated pectoral fins, made in sheer desperation to escape the voracious sea-hounds so hotly pursuing them.