to touch the bread, come what come might; and so we told the natives.

Being extravagantly fond of ship-biscuit--the harder the better--they
were quite overjoyed; and offered to give us, every day, a small
quantity of baked bread-fruit and Indian turnip in exchange for the
bread. This we agreed to; and every morning afterward, when the
bucket came, its contents were at once handed over to Bob and his
friends, who never ceased munching until nightfall.

Our exceedingly frugal meal of bread-fruit over, Captain Bob waddled
up to us with a couple of long poles hooked at one end, and several
large baskets of woven cocoa-nut branches.

Not far off was an extensive grove of orange-trees in full bearing;
and myself and another were selected to go with him, and gather a
supply for the party. When we went in among the trees, the
sumptuousness of the orchard was unlike anything I had ever seen;
while the fragrance shaken from the gently waving boughs regaled our
senses most delightfully.

In many places the trees formed a dense shade, spreading overhead a
dark, rustling vault, groined with boughs, and studded here and there
with the ripened spheres, like gilded balls. In several places, the
overladen branches were borne to the earth, hiding the trunk in a
tent of foliage. Once fairly in the grove, we could see nothing else;
it was oranges all round.

To preserve the fruit from bruising, Bob, hooking the twigs with his
pole, let them fall into his basket. But this would not do for us.
Seizing hold of a bough, we brought such a shower to the ground that