A CURIOUS PEOPLE.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3217, 21 October 1881, Page 3

A CURIOUS PEOPLE.

A curious people of an amphibious nature dwell on Cape Hotteras, N.C. They live mainly on fish, clams, oysters, crabs, terrapins, and wild fowl. When they leave home they go in a boats, and whether they go to Court or go com'ting or to trade, or to mill, or to a funeral, they go by sail. Their corn mills are run by sails, and some of them pump their water with windmills. They do not go upstairs, but 'go aloft'; and when they go to bed they ' are under the weather,'and when in robust health they are ' bung up and bilge free.' They speak of a trim-built sweetheart as ' clipper-built.' If she is a little stout they say she is ' broad in the beam,' or she is ' wide across the transom.' Many of them have ship cabin doors in the houses that slide on grooves, and to their buildings they give a coating of tar instead of painting them. The ' old woman' blows a conch shell when dinner is ready, and they measure time by the ' bells.' Their babies are not rocked in cradles, but swung in hammocks. They chew black pig-tail tobacco, and drink a wild tea called ' Yeopon.' They manure their land with sea-grass, and bury their yam potatoes in the sand-hills. When they want the doctor they hang a ' red flag against the hill side as a signal of distress. If he does not come, because the ' 'wind ain't fair,' they take a dram of whisky and copperas, soak their feet in < sea-water, 'turn in,' and trust to luck. If they die they will be buried on the top of a i sand ridge ; and when you see several sail- ( boats on the water in procession, with a flag at half-mast, you are looking at a funeral. They ornament their houses with whales' ribs and jaws, sharks' teeth, swordflsh snouts, devil-fish arms, sawfish swords (six feet long), miniature ships, camphor-wood chests, t Honduras gourds, spy-glasses, South Ameri- ' can lariats, war clubs from the Mozambique • Islands, Turkish pipes, West India shells, < sandal-wood boxes, Chinese chess men, j Japanese faces, Madagascar idols, Australian 1 boomerangs, and other strange outlandish , things. Their hogs are raised on clams, mussels, offal of fish, and garbage, and their cattle wade out on the shoals for miles, where the water covers their backs, to feed on seagrass, and if they nre carried up country, and fed on corn and fodder, they will not live. Every man is captain of some kind of a boat, and ' she' is always better than any other boat in some way.