"
I walked along the one street past the custom house, the post-office,
and the bank, about three hundred yards and saw nothing beyond but
tea-tree and swamps, through which ran a roughly-metalled road,
leading apparently to the distant mountains. There was nothing but
stagnation; it was the deadest seaport ever seen or heard of. There
were some old stores, empty and falling to pieces, which the owners
had not been enterprising enough to burn for the insurance money; the
ribs of a wrecked schooner were sticking out of the mud near the
channel; a stockyard, once used for shipping cattle, was rotting
slowly away, and a fisherman's net was hanging from the top rails to
dry. Three or four drays filled with pigs were drawn up near the
wharf; these animals were to form part of the steamer's return cargo,
one half of her deck space being allotted to pigs, and the other half
to passengers. In case of foul weather, the deck hamper, pigs and
passengers, was impartially washed overboard.
An old man in a dirty buggy was coming along the road, and all the
inhabitants and dogs turned out to look and bark at him, just as they
do in a small village in England, when the man with the donkey-cart
comes in sight. To allay my astonishment on observing so much
agitation and excitement, the Principal Inhabitant introduced
himself, and informed me that it was a busy day at the Port, a kind
of market day, on account of the arrival of the steamer.
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