"Yet it speaks of the bygone magnificence of the once proud Lusitanian," answered the poet. "I must write some lines on the subject. The place is not without interest." "Those dhows, and low, dark, piratical-looking schooners, have considerably more interest to us, however," said Adair; "they are not employed in any honest calling, depend on that; and there lie two Spaniards and a Yankee. If they have no slaves on board, they will have before long, and we must do our best to catch them. We must depend on our own wits, though, for it's impossible to get any correct information from the Portuguese officers--they are most of them as arrant slave-dealers as the Arabs themselves. That man-of-war schooner, for instance, is much more likely to help the slavers to escape than to assist us in catching them, and is very likely often employed in bringing off a cargo of ebony from the shore." The schooner he pointed at was a handsome vessel, with a thoroughly piratical look about her. However, she formed a strong contrast to the Arab dhows by which she was surrounded. They were of all sizes, the largest measuring, perhaps, three hundred and fifty tons. "If I had to describe a dhow, I should say that her shape was like half a well-formed pear, cut longitudinally," observed Adair, looking towards the large craft over the quarter, which lay at some little distance, and was preparing apparently to put to sea. "See, her bow sinks deeply in the water, while the stern floats lightly upon it. Large as that craft is, she is only partially decked. She has cross-beams, however, to preserve her shape, and on them are laid flat strips of bamboo, which enable the crew to make their way from one end to the other. At the afterpart she has a large house, lightly built, the roof of which forms a poop, while the interior serves, I have no doubt, for the cabin of the skipper, and probably for his wives and children, as well as his passengers and the whole of his crew. She has a heavy, rough spar for a mast, tapering towards the head and raking forward. The sail which they are now just hoisting is, in shape, like a right-angled triangle, with a parallelogram below its base; the hypothenuse or head of the sail is secured to a yard, like an enormous fishing-rod; the halyards are secured to it about a third of the way from the butt-end, and it is hoisted close up to the head of the mast. A tackle brings down the lower end of the yard to the deck, and serves to balance the lofty tapering point, while the sheet is secured to the lower after-corner of the sail. Though many of the smaller dhows have only one mast, that big fellow has two, with a sail of the same shape as the first, but more diminutive. The larger sail is of preposterous proportions, and it seems wonderful that she can carry it without being capsized. It appears to be formed of a strong soft cotton canvas, of extreme whiteness. Those vessels don't tack, but when beating to windward wear