We were anchored nearly in the centre of a shallow swampy lagoon, about a mile across, as near as I could judge; two very large schooners, heavily armed, were moored ahead of us, one on each bow, and another rather smaller lay close under our stern; they all had sails bent, and every thing apparently in high order, and were full of men. The shore, to the distance of a bow-shot from the water all around us, was low, marshy, and covered with an impervious jungle of thick strong reeds and wild canes, with here and there a thicket of mangroves; a little farther off, the land swelled into lofty hills, covered to the very summit with heavy timber, but every thing had a moist, green, steamy appearance, as if it had been the region of perpetual rain. “Lots of yellow fever here,” thought I, as the heavy rank smell of decayed vegetable matter came off on the faint sickly breeze, and the sluggish fog banks crept along the dull clay-coloured motionless surface of the tepid water. The sea view was quite shut out--I looked all round and could discern no vestige of the entrance. Right ahead there was about a furlong of land cleared at the only spot which one could call a beach,--that is, a hard shore of sand and pebbles. Had you tried to get ashore at any other point, your fate would have been that of the Master of Ravenswood; as fatal, that is, without the gentility; for you would have been suffocated in black mud, in place of clean sea-sand. There was a long shed in the centre of this cleared spot, covered in with boards, and thatched with palm leaves; it was open below, a sort of capstan-house, where a vast quantity of sails, anchors, cordage, and most kinds of sea stores were stowed, carefully covered over with tarpawling. Overhead there was a flooring laid along the couples of the roof, the whole length of the shed, forming a loft of nearly sixty feet long, divided by bulkheads into a variety of apartments, lit by small rude windows in the thatch, where the crews of the vessels, I concluded, were occasionally lodged during the time they might be under repair. The boat was manned, and Obed took me ashore with him.