Volume 1

Savage life and scenes in Australia and New Zealand: being an artist's impressions. Of countries and people at the Antipodes ... / by George French Angas ... ; with numerous illustrations.

  • Angas, George French, 1822-1886.
Date:
1847
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Savage life and scenes in Australia and New Zealand: being an artist's impressions. Of countries and people at the Antipodes ... / by George French Angas ... ; with numerous illustrations. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    41/368 (page 23)
    NEGRO COTTAGE AND COOKING HUT. 2&2 racter of our host, Marsalin, a pretty Moorish boy, Johnny, a lazy rascal, whom one could not help lik- ing withal, Vincent, Pena, and little Antonio. Our guides here left us, and whilst our hostess prepared _ the supper, I had time to survey our novel habitation. It was a substantial stone cottage, with two apart- ments; the inner one being the sleeping-room of the family: this inner room too formed the repository for all manner of household utensils, articles of cook- ing, fruits, onions, &e. Here my sketeh-book and other articles were carefully deposited by Jokim’s mother. As there are no fire-places or chimneys in the houses, the cooking goes forward in a small round hut outside the back-door—a very snug and picturesque little place. We discovered the one in which a negress was preparing our coffee. There was no aperture but the entrance; the floor was sunk partly below ground, and in the centre, over a char- coal fire, raised on a triangular iron-stand, supported by three round stones, stood an earthen pipkin, holding our coffee; the cakes were baking in the embers, and a semicircle of drowsy turkeys, appa- rently enjoying the warmth of the place, stood with their tails to the fire—not unlike some old commer- cial gentlemen one has sometimes seen in the coffee- room ofa country hotel on a frosty morning. Struck with the primitive appearance of this hut, and the habitual composure of the row of sleeping turkeys, I at once made a sketch of the scene by the dim light of the central fire.