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from
Singapore, bound for Jiddah on the
Red Sea, and was filled with the faithful followers of Mohammed, on a pilgrimage to
Mecca—Jiddah being the nearest seaport to that renowned shrine.
My boarding-officer was greeted with great cordiality by these devotees, who exchanged salaams with him, in the most reverential manner, and entered into conversation with him. They wanted to know, they said, about those black giants we had on board the
Alabama, and whether we fed them on live Yankees, as they had heard.
The boarding-officer, who was a bit of a wag, told them that we had made the experiment, but that the
Yankee skippers were so lean and tough, that the giants refused to eat them.
Whereupon there was a general grunt, and as near an approach to a smile as a Mohammedan ever makes.
They then said that they ‘had heard that we were in favor of a plurality of wives.’
They had heard of
Brigham Young and
Salt Lake.
The officer said, ‘Yes, we had a few; three or four dozen a piece.’
They now insisted upon his smoking with them, and plied him with other questions, to which they received equally satisfactory answers; and when he got up to depart, they crowded around him at the gangway, and salaamed him over the side, more reverentially than ever.
I have no doubt that when these passengers arrived at
Mecca, and discussed learnedly the
American war, half the pilgrims at that revered shrine became good Confederates.
Having doubled the island of Ceylon, and hauled up on the coast of Malabar, we captured on the 14th of January, the Emma Jane, of Bath, Maine, from Bombay, bound to Amherst.
Having removed from her such articles of provisions as we required, and transferred her crew to the Alabama, we burned her. She was in ballast, seeking a cargo, and there was, therefore, no claim of neutral property.
The master had his wife on board.
Being not a great distance from the land, we ran in for the purpose of discharging our prisoners; and descried the Ghaut mountains the next day. Coasting along a short distance to the eastward, we made the small Hindoo-Portuguese town of Anjenga, where we came to anchor at about four P. M. The town lies on the open coast, having a roadstead, but no harbor.
We ran in and anchored without a pilot.
We were soon surrounded by native boats—large canoes capable of
