The result was that the _Kanzlar_ was
hung up for twenty-four hours. We tried to comfort ourselves by
thinking that we were undoubtedly occupying the same mud-bank which
had been used by the strategic Judson to further the course of
empire.
The _Kanzlar_ could not cross the bar to go to Chinde, so the
_Adjutant_, which belongs to the same line and which was created for
these shallow waters, came to the _Kanzlar_, bringing Chinde with
her. She brought every white man in the port, and those who could
not come on board our ship remained contentedly on the _Adjutant_,
clinging to her rail as she alternately sank below, or was tossed
high above us. For three hours they smiled with satisfaction as
though they felt that to have escaped from Chinde, for even that
brief time, was sufficient recompense for a thorough ducking and the
pains of sea-sickness. On the bridge of the _Adjutant_, in white
duck and pith helmets, were the only respectable members of Chinde
society. We knew that they were the only respectable members of
Chinde society, because they told us so themselves. On her lower
deck she brought two French explorers, fully dressed for the part as
Tartarin of Tarascon might have dressed it in white havelocks and
gaiters buckled up to the thighs, and clasping express rifles in new
leather cases. From her engine-room came stokers from Egypt, and
from her forward deck Malays in fresh white linen, Mohammedans in
fez and turban, Portuguese officials, chiefly in decorations, Indian
coolies and Zanzibari boys, very black and very beautiful, who wound
and unwound long blue strips of cotton about their shoulders, or
ears, or thighs as the heat, or the nature of the work of unloading
required.
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