Note 2 — Chapter I · AMONG THE CARIBBEES

Thus it came about that, what with deserters and new-comers, the crew was a sort of kaleidoscopic aggregation, shifting from yellow to brown, from black to tan, from soft-voiced, slurring-tongued “patois men” to h-dropping ’Badians and brogue-speaking Montserratans. And a happy family they were at that—good-naturedly chaffing one another, having long-winded arguments over the respective merits of their various island homes, using preposterous, meaningless words of their own invention. And all and each making life miserable for the hapless natives of that “right little, tight little island” designated on the maps as Barbados, affectionately dubbed “Little England” by its sons and daughters, and also known as “Bimshire Land,”2 whose natives seem for some strange reason ever to be the butt and the jest of the other islanders, and who are the pariahs of their race, if we are to believe their fellow negroes of the Caribbees.