When he received this intelligence, Mehevi, by the aid of his fingers, went through a long numerical calculation, as if estimating the number of Frenchmen the squadron might contain.
It was just after employing his faculties in this way that he happened to notice the swelling in my limb.

He immediately examined it with the utmost attention, and after doing so, despatched a boy who happened to be standing by with some message.
After the lapse of a few moments the stripling re-entered the house with an aged islander, who might have been taken for old Hippocrates himself.
His head was as bald as the polished surface of a cocoanut shell, which article it precisely resembled in smoothness and colour, while a long silvery beard swept almost to his girdle of bark.

Encircling his temples was a bandeau of the twisted leaves of the Omoo tree, pressed closely over the brows to shield his feeble vision from the glare of the sun.
His tottering steps were supported by a long slim staff, resembling the wand with which a theatrical magician appears on the stage, and in one hand he carried a freshly plaited fan of the green leaflets of the cocoanut tree.

A flowing robe of tappa, knotted over the shoulder, hung loosely round his stooping form, and heightened the venerableness of his aspect.
Mehevi, saluting this old gentleman, motioned him to a seat between us, and then uncovering my limb, desired him to examine it.

The leech gazed intently from me to Toby, and then proceeded to business.