A Servant of Satan: Romantic Career of Prado the Assassin — page 108: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

100 | A SERVANT OF SATAN. morality, and humanity disappeared, and by the time 4 he arrived in New Caledonia he had become the most des- _ perate and dangerous of all the blood-stained criminals on ~ board. ) eS. ae. eee CHAPTER XI. ANOTHER VICTIM. At last, ninety-three days after her departure from St. — Martin de Re, the Loire cast anchor in the Bay of Noumea. ~ The town, perched on the slope of a hill, is quite pic- turesque with its flat-roofed white housesthat are shaded by — _ gigantic cocoanut trees, and half hidden by huge bushes of — a kind of scarlet rhododendron of a singular luxuriance and ~ beauty. Owing to the frequence of cyclones and tornadoes ~ no building is more than one-story high, even the church ~ tower having been razed to the ground by a storm which ~ took place a short time before Frederick reached the colony.’ ~ The young man, however, had no opportunity of ex- amining the town more closely. For shortly before midday the convicts were placed on barges rowed by naked savages, and conveyed to the barren and desolate Island of Nou, ~ distant about an hour from the city. On landing the con- victs were taken to a shed where they were ordered to strip. Their bodies were then plentifully besprinkled with the — most nauseating kind of insect powder, after which they ~ were furnished with their new kit, consisting of coarse can- — vas trousers, jackets and shirts, straw hats, wooden shoes, — hammocks and dingy-colored blankets. They were then ~ locked up by batches of sixty in long, low buildings, the © small windows of which were heavily barred. “al There they were left without either food or water until — the following morning. The night was horrible. The most impenetrable darkness prevailed, no lantern or any kind of ~ light having been provided to dispel the gloom. The-~ comicbooks.com