the name of your country; you are
playing with us." Then he tried to give a convincing illustration. "My
country is Wanumbai--anybody can say Wanumbai. I'm an orang-Wanumbai;
but, N-glung! who ever heard of such a name? Do tell us the real name of
your country, and then when you are gone we shall know how to talk about
you." To this luminous argument and remonstrance I could oppose nothing
but assertion, and the whole party remained firmly convinced that I
was for some reason or other deceiving them. They then attacked me on
another point--what all the animals and birds and insects and shells
were preserved so carefully for. They had often asked me this before,
and I had tried to explain to them that they would be stuffed, and made
to look as if alive, and people in my country would go to look at them.
But this was not satisfying; in my country there must be many better
things to look at, and they could not believe I would take so much
trouble with their birds and beasts just for people to look at. They did
not want to look at them; and we, who made calico and glass and knives,
and all sorts of wonderful things, could not want things from Aru to
look at. They had evidently been thinking about it, and had at length
got what seemed a very satisfactory theory; for the same old man said to
me, in a low, mysterious voice, "What becomes of them when you go on to
the sea?" "Why, they are all packed up in boxes," said I "What did you
think became of them?" "They all come to life again, don't they?" said
he; and though I tried to joke it off, and said if they did we should
have plenty to eat at sea, he stuck to his opinion, and kept repeating,
with an air of deep conviction, "Yes, they all come to life again,
that's what they do--they all come to life again."

After a little while, and a good deal of talking among themselves, he
began again--"I know all about it--oh yes! Before you came we had rain
every day--very wet indeed; now, ever since you have been here, it is
fine hot weather. Oh, yes! I know all about it; you can't deceive me."
And so I was set down as a conjurer, and was unable to repel the charge.
But the conjurer was completely puzzled by the next question: "What,"
said the old man, "is the great ship, where the Bugis and Chinamen go to
sell their things? It is always in the great sea--its name is Jong; tell
us all about it." In vain I inquired what they knew about it; they knew
nothing but that it was called "Jong,"