" When we sat at table the captain's boy could only just
squeeze himself between us and the rail. It was like dining in a
private box. And certainly no theatre ever offered such scenery, nor
did any menagerie ever present so many strange animals.
We were four white men: Captain Jensen, his engineer, and the other
passenger, Captain Anfossi, a young Italian. Before he reached his
post he had to travel one month on the _Deliverance_ and for another
month walk through the jungle. He was the most cheerful and amusing
companion, and had he been returning after three years of exile to
his home he could not have been more brimful of spirits. Captain
Jensen was a Dane (almost every river captain is a Swede or a Dane)
and talked a little English, a little French, and a little Bangala.
The mechanician was a Finn and talked the native Bangala, and
Anfossi spoke French. After chop, when we were all assembled on the
upper deck, there would be the most extraordinary talks in four
languages, or we would appoint one man to act as a clearing-house,
and he would translate for the others.
On the lower deck we carried twenty "wood boys," whose duty was to
cut wood for the furnace, and about thirty black passengers. They
were chiefly soldiers, who had finished their period of service for
the State, with their wives and children. They were crowded on the
top of the hatches into a space fifteen by fifteen feet between our
cabin door and the furnace.
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