Yesterday afternoon the tepid warmth of the air and glassy stillness of the river seemed to me highly suggestive of fishing, and I determined, not having yet discovered what I could catch with what in these unknown waters, to try a little innocent paste bait—­a mystery his initiation into which caused Jack much wonderment.  The only hooks I had with me, however, had been bought in Darien—­made, I should think, at the North expressly for this market; and so villanously bad were they that, after trying them and my patience a reasonable time, I gave up the attempt and took a lesson in paddling instead.  Amongst other items Jack told me of his own fishing experience was, that he had more than once caught those most excellent creatures Altamaha shad by the fish themselves leaping out of the water and landing, as Jack expressed it, to escape from the porpoises, which come in large schools up the river to a considerable distance, occasioning, evidently, much emotion in the bosoms of the legitimate inhabitants of these muddy waters.  Coasting the island on our return home we found a trap, which the last time we examined it was tenanted by a creature called a mink, now occupied by an otter.  The poor beast did not seem pleased with his predicament; but the trap had been set by one of the drivers, and, of course, Jack would not have meddled with it except upon my express order, which, in spite of some pangs of pity for the otter, I did not like to give him, as in the extremely few resources of either profit or pleasure possessed by the slaves I could not tell at all what might be the value of an otter to his captor.

Yesterday evening the burial of the poor man Shadrach took place.  I had been applied to for a sufficient quantity of cotton cloth to make a winding-sheet for him, and just as the twilight was thickening into darkness I went with Mr. ——­ to the cottage of one of the slaves whom I may have mentioned to you before—­a cooper of the name of London, the head of the religious party of the inhabitants of the island, a methodist preacher of no small intelligence and influence among the people—­who was to perform the burial service.  The coffin was laid on trestles in front of the cooper’s cottage, and a large assemblage of the people had gathered round, many of the men carrying pine-wood torches, the fitful glare of which glanced over the strange assembly, where every pair of large white-rimmed eyes turned upon ——­ and myself; we two poor creatures on this more solemn occasion, as well as on every other when these people encounter us, being the objects of admiration and wonderment, on which their gaze is immovably riveted.  Presently the whole congregation uplifted their voices in a hymn, the first high wailing notes of which—­sung all in unison, in the midst of these unwonted surroundings—­sent a thrill through all my nerves.  When the chant ceased, cooper London began a prayer, and all the people knelt down in the sand, as I did also.