Goodaloo, was spare, short, and active, seemingly designed by nature for the ticklish occupation he professed; for the frail stick skeleton roof, when divested of the old straw, looked as if it would have given way beneath the foot of a cat. After a professional survey, and a most important consultation with Tinta, his deputy, a Christian like himself, and half-a-dozen rich Islam inhabitants, it was determined to be most advisable, that only a portion of the roof should be renewed at once, so that I might have the shelter, either of the old or of the newly finished roof, to sleep under, during the three days required to put all to rights. The Governor and his Deputy, however, were the only useful members of this Council, for the former directed his servants to supply me with the necessary grass, whilst the latter assisted Goodaloo in thatching. The Islam gentlemen, with the cool dignity which, somehow or other, they do assume most naturally, sat down upon the skins brought for that purpose, and proceeded to call for coffee, and to give directions to their Christian superiors, in a manner that would have delighted Satan himself, to have observed, if he takes any pleasure at all, in seeing honest, simple humility, treated with the most evident contempt. All this time, I was glad to keep out of the way, lying upon the alga inside; but when actual business commenced, I began to think I must retreat into the open air. Black, sooty flakes, now began to fall thickly from the glistening well-smoked roof frame, which consisted of long bamboo canes, that diverging from an elevated centre spread around in a wide circumference, to rest upon a round wattled wall of sticks and mud. To this annoyance, was soon added falling bits of rotten thatch, that descended upon my bare head and shoulders, until I could stand it no longer, but rushed out of the dirty mess and seated myself upon a quantity of clean straw near to my Mahomedan visitors, who appeared to have made my garden a public café, for they kept coming and going all day, staying a little to watch if the proceedings were going on to their satisfaction, and aiding, to the extent of an “Inshallah” (please God), “it would be finished by to-morrow.” Before evening, one-third of the roof was well covered in, for as I had promised to give a couple of sheep at the conclusion of the business, to the servants of Tinta, they worked away at his cimbyllal grass, as if it had been all my own; and had I not inwardly resolved to return his kindness in some way or other, my conscience would have often induced me to call out, “Hold! enough!”