They were much disturbed by our presence, and if our sails were loosened to dry, they wondered why we did not sail away. We made a reconnoissance of their harbor to ascertain or confirm the accuracy of the surveys of Beechy, and the flag, or station staffs, we erected on shore for this purpose, around which numbers would gather, sorely perplexed them.
The principal town of Napa, containing about twenty thousand inhabitants, is located behind the rising beach, and can not be seen well from the shipping. Its _kiang_, or river, forms a harbor for junks from China, Japan, and their coasting trade, and small boats only. The houses of the town which are low, are enclosed in walls of cyclopean masonry, built mostly without any cement, of coral rock. Over these the limbs of the banyan project, and they are mostly fringed on top by a growth of cactus. The entrances to their dwellings are from narrow alleys running from the streets, and concealed by an abrupt elbow turn, so unless you notice close, you will scarcely observe the doorway. The streets are narrow, and laid out like those of Peking, and unpaved, and the reception that we met with on walking them, was anything but sociable; not that the mass of the people, who, after getting a little over the trepidation which our unexpected arrival produced, were not inclined to be friendly, but because of the surveillance of their suspicious and jealous officials. On our approach the shops were closed, and the way in front entirely deserted, while as soon as you had passed, there was a great throng gazing at you from the rear. Those weaving in the open air with their rude looms seizing their children did flee. Old women, awfully ugly, with tattoed hands, hair piled on their heads like a greasy mop, invested with a single salt-sack-looking garment of exceeding brevity, if you came upon them would betake themselves to flight, leaving the sharks’ meat, or vegetables, which they might have for sale, in the market-place, or else bury their faces in their dirty bluish tattoed hands, and so remain until you had passed. We were forced to conclude that our presence was as moving as that of Mr. Nicodemus in the Spectre Bridegroom; or else that an American naval officer, if he caused those old sycoraxes to shun him, must be ugly enough to scare a horse from his oats.