My daydreams were dispelled by the return of the boat, which brought my husband and the captain from the island.

“No bread,” said the latter, shaking his head; “you must be content to starve a little longer.  Provision-ship not in till four o’clock.”  My husband smiled at the look of blank disappointment with which I received these unwelcome tidings, “Never mind, I have news which will comfort you.  The officer who commands the station sent a note to me by an orderly, inviting us to spend the afternoon with him.  He promises to show us everything worthy of notice on the island.  Captain —–­ claims acquaintance with me; but I have not the least recollection of him.  Would you like to go?”

“Oh, by all means.  I long to see the lovely island.  It looks a perfect paradise at this distance.”

The rough sailor-captain screwed his mouth on one side, and gave me one of his comical looks, but he said nothing until he assisted in placing me and the baby in the boat.

“Don’t be too sanguine, Mrs. Moodie; many things look well at a distance which are bad enough when near.”

I scarcely regarded the old sailor’s warning, so eager was I to go on shore—­to put my foot upon the soil of the new world for the first time—­I was in no humour to listen to any depreciation of what seemed so beautiful.

It was four o’clock when we landed on the rocks, which the rays of an intensely scorching sun had rendered so hot that I could scarcely place my foot upon them.  How the people without shoes bore it, I cannot imagine.  Never shall I forget the extraordinary spectacle that met our sight the moment we passed the low range of bushes which formed a screen in front of the river.  A crowd of many hundred Irish emigrants had been landed during the present and former day; and all this motley crew—­men, women, and children, who were not confined by sickness to the sheds (which greatly resembled cattle-pens) were employed in washing clothes, or spreading them out on the rocks and bushes to dry.

The men and boys were in the water, while the women, with their scanty garments tucked above their knees, were trampling their bedding in tubs, or in holes in the rocks, which the retiring tide had left half full of water.  Those who did not possess washing-tubs, pails, or iron pots, or could not obtain access to a hole in the rocks, were running to and fro, screaming and scolding in no measured terms.  The confusion of Babel was among them.  All talkers and no hearers—­each shouting and yelling in his or her uncouth dialect, and all accompanying their vociferations with violent and extraordinary gestures, quite incomprehensible to the uninitiated.  We were literally stunned by the strife of tongues.  I shrank, with feelings almost akin to fear, from the hard-featured, sun-burnt harpies, as they elbowed rudely past me.