The moment he laid hands
on a fugitive, the latter collapsed; whereupon the policeman dropped him
and took after another. The joke of it was that the one so abandoned did
not try again to make off, but stayed as though he had been tagged at
some game. Finally the whole lot, still vociferating, moved off down the
white road.
For over an hour we hung from our window sill, thoroughly interested and
amused by the varied life that deployed before our eyes. The morning
seemed deliciously cool after the hot night, although the thermometer
stood high. The sky was very blue, with big piled white clouds down near
the horizon. Dazzling sun shone on the white road, the white buildings
visible up and down the street, the white walls enclosing their gardens,
and the greenery and colours of the trees within them. For from what we
could see from our window we immediately voted tropical vegetation quite
up to advertisement: whole trees of gaudy red or yellow or bright orange
blossoms, flowering vines, flowering shrubs, peered over the walls or
through the fences; and behind them rose great mangoes or the slenderer
shafts of bananas and cocoanut palms.
Up and down wandered groups of various sorts of natives. A month later
we would have been able to identify their different tribes and to know
more about them; but now we wondered at them, as strange and
picturesque peoples. They impressed us in general as being a fine lot of
men, for they were of good physique, carried themselves well, and looked
about them with a certain dignity and independence, a fine free pride of
carriage and of step.
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