The _Mary_ was, therefore, run in as close as possible, and Jack leaped on the sands a few minutes after the Pilot.
Willis marched boldly on towards the natives, and when he arrived beside the old man, the crowd opened up and formed an avenue through which a chief advanced, followed by a number of men, seemingly priests, who carried a grotesque-looking figure that Jack presumed to be an idol.

The figure was made up of wicker-work--was of colossal height--the features, which represented nothing on earth beneath nor heaven above, were inconceivably hideous--the eyes were discs of mother-of-pearl, with a nut in the centre--the teeth were apparently those of a shark, and the body was covered with a mantle of red feathers.
At the command of the chief, some of the natives advanced and placed a quantity of bananas, bread-fruits, and other vegetables at the Pilot's feet; the priests then came forward and knelt down before him, and seemed to worship after the fashion of the ancients when they paid their devotions to the Eleusinian goddess, or the statue of Apollo.
Meanwhile, Jack, on his side, was likewise surrounded by the natives, who was treated with much less ceremony than Willis.

Instead of falling down on their knees, each of them, one after the other, rubbed their noses against his, and then danced round him with every demonstration of savage joy.
Jack had now an opportunity of observing the personages about him more in detail.

They were mostly tall and well-formed; their features bore some resemblance to those of a negro, their nose being flat and their lips thick; on the other hand, they had the high cheek-bones of the North American Indian and the forehead of the Malay.

Nearly all of them were entirely naked, but wore a necklace and bracelets of shells.
They were armed with a sort of spear and an axe of hard wood edged with stone.