BY 
CHAR ES -ARREN STODDARD.
BOSTON:
JAMES R. OSGOOD AND COMPANY,
Late Ticknor & Fields, and Fields, Osgood, & Co.
873.




Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1873,
BY CHARLES WARREN STODDARD,
in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington.
UNIVERSITY PRESS: WELCH, BIGELOW, & Co.,
CAMBRIDGE.




CONTENTS.
PAGE
IN THE CRADLE OF THE DEEP..   7
CHUMMING WITH A SAVAGE.
I. KINA-ANA......25
II. How I CONVERTED MY CANNIBAL..    43
III. BARBARIAN DAYS.....  57
TABOO. -A FATE-DAY IN TAHITI...    80
JOE OF LAHAINA...... 112
THE NIGHT-DANCERS OF WAIPIO..   128
PEARL-HUNTING IN THE POMOTOUS..  46
THE LAST OF THE GREAT NAVIGATOR.  169
A CANOE-CRUISE IN THE CORAL SEA.  184
UNDER A GRASS ROOF....   197
MY SOUTH-SEA SHOW...... 202
THE HOUSE OF THE SUN.....   221




iv                  CONTENTS.
THE CHAPEL OF THE PALMS.. 240
KAHLE........    259
LOVE-LIFE IN A LANAI......283
IN A TRANSPORT......                  300
A PRODIGAL IN TAHITI.....                    324




TO MY DEAR FRIEND ANTON ROMAN.
1^5








THE COCOA-TREE.
Cast on the water by a careless hand,
Day after day the winds persuaded me:
Onward I drifted till a coral tree
Stayed me among its branches, where the sand
Gathered about me, and I slowly grew,
Fed by the constant sun and the inconstant dew.
The sea-birds build their nests against my root,
And eye my slender body's horny case.
Widowed within this solitary place
Into the thankless sea I cast my fruit;
Joyless I thrive, for no man may partake
Of all the store I bear and harvest for his sake.
No more I heed the kisses of the morn;
The harsh winds rob me of the life they gave;
I watch my tattered shadow in the wave,
And hourly droop and nod my crest forlorn,
While all my fibres stiffen and grow numb
Beck'ning the tardy ships, the ships that never come!








SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
IN  THE CRADLE OF THE DEEP.
ORTY days in the great desert of the sea,
~fi  — forty nights camped under cloud-canopies, with the salt dust of the waves drifting over us.  Sometimes a Bedouin sail flashed for
an hour upon the distant horizon, and then faded,
and we were alone again; sometimes the west, at
sunset, looked like a city with towers, and we bore
down upon its glorified walls, seeking a haven; but
a cold gray morning dispelled the illusion, and our
hearts sank back into the illimitable sea, breathing
a long prayer for deliverance.
Once a green oasis blossomed before us, — a
garden in perfect bloom, girded about with creaming waves; within its coral cincture pendulous
boughs trailed in the glassy waters; from its hidden bowers spiced airs stole down upon us; above
all, the triumphant palm-trees clashed their melodious branches like a chorus with cymbals; yet
from the very gates of this paradise a changeful




8             SOUTII-SElA IDYLS.
current swept us onward, and the happy isle was
buried in night and distance.
In many volumes of adventure I had read of
sea-perils: I was at last to learn the full interpretation of their picturesque horrors.  Our little
craft, the Petrel, had buffeted the boisterous waves
for five long weeks.  Fortunately, the bulk of her
cargo was edible: we feared neither famine nor
thirst.  Moreover, in spite of the continuous gale
that swept us out of our reckoning, the Petrel
was in excellent condition, and, as far as we could
judge, we had no reason to lose confidence in her.
It was the gray weather that tried our patience
and found us wanting; it was the unparalleled
pitching of the ninety-ton schooner that disheartened and almost dismembered us.  And then it
was wasting time at sea.  Why were we not long
before at our journey's end.   Why were we not
threading the vales of some savage island, and
reaping our rich reward of ferns and shells and
gorgeous butterflies.
The sea rang its monotonous changes,- fair
weather and foul, days like death itself, followed
by days full of the revelations of new lifelbut
mostly days of deadly dulness, when the sea was as
unpoetical as an eternity of cold suds and blueing.
I cannot always understand the logical fitness
of things, or, rather, I am at a loss to know why
some things in life are so unfit and illogical. Of
course, in our darkest hour, when we were gath



IN THE CRADLE OF THE DEEP.             9
ered in the confines of the Petrel's diminutive cabin,
it was our duty 1 sing psalms of hope and cheer,
but we did n't. LIt was a time for mutual encouragement: very few of us were self-sustaining, and
what was to be gained by our combining in unanimous despair.
Our weather-beaten skipper, - a thing of clay
that seemed utterly incapable of any expression
whatever, save in the slight facial contortion consequent to the mechanical movement of his lower
jaw, - the skipper sat, with barometer in hand,
eying the fatal finger that pointed to our doom;
the rest of us were lashed to the legs of the centre-table, glad of any object to fix our eyes upon,
and nervously awaiting a turn in the state of
affairs, that was then by no means encouraging.
I happened to remember that there were some
sealed letters to be read from time to time on the
passage out, and it occurred to me that one of the
times had come - perhaps the last and only —
wherein I might break the remaining seals and
receive a sort of parting visit from the fortunate
friends on shore.
I opened one letter and read these prophetic
lines: " Dear child," - she was twice my age, and
privileged to make a pet of me, -" dear child, I
have a presentiment that we shall never meet
again in the flesh."
That dear girl's intuition came near to being
the death of me. I shuddered where I sat, over1*




10            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
come with remorse. QIt was enough that I had
turned my back on her and sought consolation in
the treacherous bosom of the ocean; that, having failed to find the spring of immortal life in
human affection, I had packed up and emigrated,
content to fly the ills I had in search of change;
but that parting shot, below the water-line as it
were, -that was more than I asked for, and something more than I could stomach) I returned to
watch with the rest of our liTtle company, who
clung about the table with a pitiful sense of momentary security, and an expression of pathetic
condolence on every countenance, as though each
was sitting out the last hours of the others.
Our particular bane that night was a crusty old
sea-dog whose memory of wrecks and marine disasters of every conceivable nature was as complete as an encyclopedia.  This " old man of the
sea" spun his tempestuous yarn with fascinating
composure, and the whole company was awed into
silence with the haggard realism of his narrative.
The cabin must have been air-tight, - it was as
close as possible, - yet we heard the shrieking of
the wind as it tore through the rigging, and the
long hiss of the waves rushing past us with lightning speed.  Sometimes an avalanche of foam
buried us for a moment, and the Petrel trembled
like a living thing stricken with sudden fear;we
seemed to be hanging on the crust of a great
bubble that was, sooner or later, certain to burst,




IN  TIlE CRADLE OF THE DEEP.              11
and let us drop into its vast, black chasm, where,
in Cimmerian darkness, we should be entombed
forever.}
The scenic effect, as I then considered, was unnecessarily vivid; as I now recall it, it seems to
me strictly in keeping and thoroughly dramatic.
At any rate, you might have told us a dreadful
story with almost fatal success.
I had still one letter left, one bearing this suggestive legend:' To be read in the saddest hour."
Now, if there is a sadder hour in all time than
the hour of hopeless and friendless death, I care
not to know of it.  I broke the seal of my letter,
feeling that something charitable  and  cheering
would give me strength.  A few dried leaves were
stored within it.  The faint fragrance of summer
bowers reassured  me: somewhere  in the blank
world of waters there was land, and there Nature
was kind and fruitful; font over the fearful deluge
this leaf was born to me in the return of the invisible dove my heart had sent forth in its extremity. )A song was written therein, perhaps a song
of triumph.  I could now silence the clamorous
tongue of our sea-monster, who was glutting us
with tales of horror, for a jubilee was at hand,
and here was the first note of its trumpets.
I read:
"Beyond the parting and the meeting
I shall be soon;
Beyond the farewell and the greeting,
Beyond the pulse's fever-beating,
I shall be soon."




12             SOUTHI-SEA  D DYLS.
I paused.  A  night black with croaking ravens,
brooding over a slimy hulk, through whose warped
timbers the sea oozed, - that was the sort of picture that rose before me. I looked further for a
crumb of comfort:" Beyond the gathering and the strewing,
I shall be soon;
Beyond the ebbing and the flowing,
Beyond the coming and the going,
I shall be soon."
A  tide of ice-water seemed rippling up and down
my spinal column; the marrow congealed within
my bones.  But I recovered.  When a man has
supped full of horror and there is no immediate
climax, he can collect himself and be comparatively
brave. A reaction restored my soul.
Once more the melancholy chronicler of the illfated Petrel resumed his lugubrious narrative. I
resolved to listen, while the skipper eyed the
barometer,~nd we all rocked back and forth in
search of the centre of gravity, looking like a
troupe of mechanical blockheads nodding in idiotic
unison.> All this time the little craft drifted helplessly, " hove to " in the teeth of the gale.
The sea-dog's yarn was something like this: He
once knew a lonesome man who floated about in a
waterlogged hulk for three months; who saw all
his comrades starve and die, one after another,
and at last kept watch alone, craving and beseeching death.  It was the  stanch  French  brig




IN THE CRADLE OF THE DEEP.            13
Mouette, bound south into the equatorial seas.
She had seen rough weather from the first: day
after day the winds increased, and finally a cyclone burst upon her with insupportable fury.
The brig was thrown upon her beam-ends, and began to fill rapidly.  With much difficulty her
masts were cut away, she righted, and lay in the
trough of the sea rolling like a log.  Gradually
the gale subsided, but the hull of the brig was
swept continually by the tremendous swell, and
the men were driven into the foretop cross-trees,
where they rigged a tent for shelter and gathered
what few stores were left them  from the wreck.
A dozen wretched souls lay in their stormy nest
for three whole days in silence and despair.  By
this time their scanty stores were exhausted, and
not a drop of water remained; then their tongues
were loosened, and they railed at the Almighty.
Some wept like children, some cursed their fate.
One man alone was speechless,  a Spaniard, with
a wicked light in his eye, and a repulsive manner
that had made trouble in the forecastle more than
once.
When hunger had driven them  nearly to madness they were fed in an almost miraculous manner.
Several enormous sharks had been  swimming
about the brig for some hours, and the hungry
sailors were planning various projects for the
capture of them. Tough as a shark is, they would
willingly have risked life for a few raw mouthfuls




14            SOUTII-SEA  D JYLS.
of the same.  Somehow, though the sea was still
and the wind light, the brig gave a sudden lurch
and dipped up one of the monsters, who was quite
secure in the shallow aquarium  between the gunwales.  He was soon despatched, and  divided
equally among the crew. Some ate a little, and reserved the rest for another day; some ate till they
were sick, and had little left for the next meal.,
The Spaniard with the evil eye greedily devoured
his portion, and then grew moody again, refusing
to speak with the others, who were striving to be
cheerful, though it was sad enough work.
When the food was all gone save a few mouthfiuls that one meagre eater had hoarded to the
last, the Spaniard resolved to secure a morsel at
the risk of his life.  It had been a point of honor
with the men to observe sacredly the right of
ownership, and any breach of confidence would
have been considered unpardonable.  At night,
when the watch was sleeping, the Spaniard cautiously removed the last mouthful of shark hidden
in the pocket of his mate, but was immediately
detected and accused of theft. He at once grew
desperate, struck at the poor wretch whom he had
robbed, missed his blow, and fell headlong from
the narrow platform  in the foretop, and was lost
in the sea.  It was the first scene in the mournful
tragedy about to be enacted on that limited stage.
There was less disturbance after the disappearance of the Spaniard.  The spirits of the doomed




IN THE CRADLE OF THE DEEP.          15
sailors seemed broken; in fact, the captain was the
only one whose courage was noteworthy, and it
was his indomitable will that ultimately saved
him.
One by one the minds of the miserable men
gave way; they became peevish or delirious, and
then died horribly.  Two, who had been mates
for many voyages in the seas north and south,
vanished mysteriously in the night; no one could
tell where they went or in what manner, though
they seemed to have gone together.
Somehow, these famishing sailors seemed to feel
assured that their captain would be saved; they
were as confident of their own doom, and to him
they intrusted a thousand messages of love. They
would lie around him, -for few  of them  had
strength to assume a sitting posture, - and reveal
to him the story of their lives.  It was most pitiful to hear the confessions of these dying men.
One said: "I wronged my friend; I was unkind to
this one or to that one; I deserve the heaviest
punishment God can inflict upon me"; and then
he paused, overcome with emotion. But another
took up the refrain: "I could have done much
good, but I would not, and now it is too late."
And a third cried out in his despair, " I have committed unpardonable sins, and there is no hope for
me.  Lord Jesus, have mercy!"  The youngest
of these perishing souls was a mere lad; he, too,
accused himself bitterly. FIe began his story at




16            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
the beginning, and continued it from time to time
as the spirit of revelation moved him; scarcely
an incident, however insignificant, escaped him in
his pitiless retrospect. 0, the keen agony of that.
boy's recital  more cruel than hunger or thirst,
and in comparison with which physical torture
would have seemed merciful and any death a
blessing.
While the luckless Mouette drifted aimlessly
about, driven slowly onward by varying winds
under a cheerless sky, sickness visited them. Some
were stricken with scurvy; some had lost the use
of their limbs and lay helpless, moaning and weeping hour after hour; vermin devoured them; and
when their garments were removed, and cleansed
in the salt water, there was scarcely sunshine
enough to dry them before night, and they were
put on  again, damp, stiffened with  salt, and
shrunken so as to cripple the wearers, who were all
blistered and covered with boils. The nights were
bitter cold: sometimes the icy moon looked down
upon them; sometimes the bosom  of an electric
cloud burst over them, and they were enveloped
for a moment in a sheet of flame.  Sharks lingered
about them, waiting to feed upon the unhappy
ones who fell into the sea overcome with physical
exhaustion, or who cast themselves from that dizzy
scaffold, unable longer to endure the horrors of
lingering death. Flocks of sea-fowl hovered over
them; the hull of the Mouette was crusted with




IN THE CRADLE OF THE DEEP.            17
barnacles; long skeins of sea-grass knotted themselves in her gaping seams; myriads of fish darted
in and out among the clinging weeds, sporting
gleefully; schools of porpoises leaped about them,
lashing the sea into foam; sometimes a whale blew
his long breath close under them. Everywhere
was the stir of jubilant life, — everywhere -but
under the tattered awning stretched in the foretop
of the Mouette.
Days and weeks dragged on.  When the captain
would waken from  his sleep, - which was not
always at night, however, for the nights were
miserably cold and sleepless, - when he wakened
he would call the roll. Perhaps some one made no
answer; then he would reach forth and touch the
speechless body and find it dead.  He had not
strength now to bury the corpses in the sea's
sepulchre; he had not strength even to partake
of the unholy feast of the inanimate flesh. He lay
there in the midst of pestilence; and at night,
under the merciful veil of darkness, the fowls of
the air gathered about him and bore away their
trophy of corruption.
By and by there were but two left of all that
suffering crew, - the captain and the boy,- and
these two clung together like ghosts, defying
mortality. They strove to be patient and hopeful: if they could not eat, they could drink, for
the nights were dewy, and sometimes a mist
covered them,- a mist so dense it seemed almost
B




18            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
to drip from the rags that poorly sheltered them.
A cord was attached to the shrouds, the end of it
carefully laid in the mouth of a bottle slungl in the
rigging. Down the thin cord slid occasional drops;
one by one they stole into the bottle, and by
morning there was a spoonful of water to moisten
those parched lips, - sweet, crystal drops, more
blessed than tears, for they are salt; more precious
than pearls.  A thousand prayers of gratitude
seemed hardly to quiet the souls of the lingering
ones for that great charity of Heaven.
There came a day when the hearts of God's
angels must have bled for the suffering ones. The
breeze was fresh and fair; the sea tossed gayly its
foam-crested  waves; sea-birds soared in wider
circles; and the clouds shook out their fleecy folds,
through which the sunlight streamed in grateful
warmth.  The two ghosts were talking, as ever, of
home, of earth, of land.  Land,- land anywhere,
so that it were solid and broad. 0, to pace again
a whole league without turning! 0, to pause in
the shadow of some living tree! To drink of some
stream whose waters flowed continually; flowed,
though you drank of them with the awful thirst
of one who has been denied water for weeks and
and weeks and weeks, for three whole months,an eternity, as it seemed to them.
Then they pictured life as it might be if God
permitted them to return to earth once more.
They would pace K -  Street at noon, and re



IN THE CRADLE OF THE DEEP.          19
visit that capital restaurant where many a time
they had feasted, though in those days they were
unknown to one another; they would call for
coffee, and this dish and that dish, and a whole
bill of fare, the thought of which made their
feverish palates grow moist again. They would
meet friends whom they had never loved as they
now loved them; they would reconcile old feuds
and forgive  everybody everything; they  held
imaginary conversations, and  found life very
beautiful and greatly to be desired; and somehow
they would get back to the little ccaf  and there
begin eating again, and with a relish that brought
the savory tastes and smells vividly before them,
and their lips would move and the impalpable
morsels roll sweetly over their tongues.
It had become a second nature to scour the
horizon with jealous eyes; never for a moment
during their long martyrdom had their covetous
sight fixed upon a stationary object. But it came
at last. Out of a cloud a sail burst like a flickering flame.  What an age it was a coming! how it
budded and blossomed like a glorious white flower,
that was transformed suddenly into a bark bearing down upon them! Almost within hail it
stayed its course, the canvas fluttered in the wind;
the dark hull slowly rose and fell upon the water;
figures moved to and fro, - men, living and breathing men! Then the ghosts staggered to their feet
and cried to God for mercy.  Then they waved




20             SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
their arms, and beat their breasts, and lifted up
their imploring voices, beseeching deliverance out
of that horrible bondage.  Tears coursed down
their hollow cheeks, their limbs quaked, their
breath failed them; they sank back in despair,
speechless and forsaken.
Why did they faint in the hour of deliverance
when that narrow chasm  was all that separated
them  from  renewed  life?  Because the  bark
spread out her great white wings and soared away,
hearing not the faint voices, seeing not the thin
shadows that haunted that drifting wreck.  The
forsaken ones looked out from  their eyrie, and
watched the lessening sail until sight failed them;
and then the lad, with one wild cry, leaped toward
the speeding bark, and was swallowed up in the
sea.
Alone in a wilderness of waters.  Alone, without
compass or rudder, borne on by relentless winds
into the lonesome, dreary, shoreless ocean of despair, within whose blank and forbidding sphere
no voyager ventures; across whose desolate waste
dawn sends no signal and night brings no reprieve;
but whose sun is cold, and whose moon is clouded,
and whose stars withdraw  into space, and where
the insufferable silence of vacancy shall not be
broken for all time.
0 pitiless Nature! thy irrevocable laws argue
sore sacrifice in the waste places of God's universe!....




IN  THE CRADLE OF THE DEEP.            21
The Petrel gave a tremendous lurch, that sent
two or three of us into the lee corners of the
cabin; a sea broke over us, bursting in the companion-hatch, and half filling our small and insecure
retreat.  The swinging lamp was thrown from  its
socket and extinguished; we were enveloped in
pitch darkness, up to our knees in salt water.
There was a moment of awful silence; we could
not tell whether the light of day would ever visit
us again; we thought perhaps it would n't.  But
the Petrel rose once more upon the watery hill-tops
and shook herself free of the cumbersome deluge;
and at that point, when she seemed to be riding
more easily than usual, some one broke the silence:
" Well, did the captain of the Mouette live to tell
the tale  "
Yes, he did.  God sent a messenger into the
lonesome deep, where the miserable man was found
insensible, with eyes wide open against the sunlight, and lips shrunken apart, - a hideous, breathing corpse.  When he was lifted in the arms of
the brave fellows who had gone to his rescue, he
cried, "Great God! am I saved V" as though he
couldn't believe it when it was true; then-he fainted, and was nursed through a long delirium, and was
at last restored to health and home and happiness.
Our cabin-boy managed to fish up the lamp,
and after a little we were illuminated; the agile
swab soon sponged out the cabin, and we resumed
our tedious watch for dawn and fairer weather.




22            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
Somehow, my mind brooded over the solitary
wreck that was drifting about the sea. I could
fancy the rotten timbers of the Mouette clinging
together, by a miracle, until the Ancient Mariner
was taken away from  her, and then, when she
was alone again, with nothing whatever in sight
but blank blue sea and blank blue sky, she lay for
an hour or so, bearded with shaggy sea-moss and
looking about a thousand years old. Suddenly it
occurred to her that her time had come, — that
she had outlived her usefulness, and might as well
go to pieces at once. So she yawned in all her
timbers, and the sea reached up over her, and laid
hold of her masts, and seemed to be slowly drawing her down into its bosom.  There was not an
audible sound, and scarcely a ripple upon the
water; but when the waves had climbed into the
foretop, there was a clamor of affrighted birds, and
a myriad bubbles shot up to the surface, where a
few waifs floated and whirled about for a moment.
It was all that marked the spot where the Mouette
went down to her eternal rest.
" Ha, ha!" cried our skipper, with something
almost like a change of expression on his mahogany
countenance, " the barometer is rising! " and sure
enough it was.  In two hours the Petrel acted like
a different craft entirely, and by and by came
daybreak, and after that the sea went down, down,
down, into a deep, dead calm, when all the elements
seemed to have gone to sleep after their furious




IN THE CRADLE OF THE DEEP.             23
warfare.  Like half-drowned flies we crawled out
of the close, ill-smelling cabin to dry ourselves in
the sun: there, on the steaming deck of the
schooner, we found new life, and in the hope that
dawned with it we grew lusty and jovial.
Such a flat, oily sea as it was then! So transparent that we saw great fish swimming about,
full fathom  five under us.  A monstrous shark
drifted lazily past, his dorsal fin now and then
cutting the surface like a knife and glistening like
polished steel, his brace of pilot-fish darting hither
and thither, striped like little one-legged harlequins.
Flat-headed gonies sat high on the water, piping their querulous note as they tugged at something edible, a dozen of them entering into the
domestic difficulty: one after another would desert
the cause, run a little way over the sea to get a
good start, leap heavily into the air, sail about for
a few minutes, and then drop back on the sea, feetforemost, and skate for a yard or two, making a
white mark and a pleasant sound as it slid over
the water.
The exquisite nautilus floated past us, with its
gauzy sail set, looking like a thin slice out of a
soap-bubble \the strange anemone laid its pale,
sensitive petals on the lips of the wave and panted
in ecstasy,\the Petrel rocked softly, swinging her
idle canvas ih the sun; we heard the click of the
anchor-chain in the forecastle, the blessedest sea



24             SOUTHI-SEA IDYLS.
sound I wot of; a sailor sang while he hung in the
ratlines and tarred down the salt-stained shrouds.
The afternoon waned; the man at the wheel struck
1wo bells, — it was the  delectable  dog-watch.
Down went the swarthy sun into his tent of
clouds; the waves were of amber; the fervid sky
was flushed; it looked as though something splendid were about to happen up there, and that it
could hardly keep the secret much longer.  Then
came the purplest twilight; and then  the sky
blossomed all over with the biggest, ripest, goldenest stars, - such stars as hang like fruits in
sun-fed orchards; such stars as lay a track of fire
in the sea; such stars as rise and set over mountains and beyond low  green capes, like young
moons, every one of them; and I conjured up my
spells of savage enchantment, my blessed islands,
my reefs baptized with silver spray; I saw the
broad fan-leaves of the banana droop in the motionless air, and through the tropical night the palms
aspired heavenward, while I lay dreaming my seadream in the cradle of the deep.




CHUMMING WITH A SAVAGE.
PART I.
KANA-AN A.
HERE was a little brown rain-cloud, that
blew over in about three minutes; and
Bolabola's thatched hut was dry as a
haystack in less than half that time. Those tropical sprays are not much, anyhow; so I lounged
down into the banana-patch, for I thought I saw
something white there, something white and fluttering, moving about.  I knew pretty well what
it was, and did n't go after it on an uncertainty.
The Doctor looked savage. Whenever he slung
those saddle-bags over his left shoulder, and
swung his right arm clean out from his body, like
the regulator of a steam-engine, you might know
that his steam  was pretty well up.  I turned to
look back, as he was strapping up his beast of
burden till the poor animal's body was positively
waspish; then he climbed into his saddle, and
sullenly plunged down the trail toward the precipice, and never said " Good by," or " God bless
you," or any of those harmless tags that come in
2




26            SOUTI-SEA IDYLS.
so well when you don't know how to cut off your
last words.
I solemnly declare, and this without malice, the
Doctor was perfectly savage.
Now, do you know what demoralized that Doctor  b how we came to a misunderstanding. or why
we parted company l  It was simply because here
was a glorious valley, inhabited by a mild, halfcivilized people, who seemed to love me at first
sight. I don't believe I disliked them, either.
Well! they asked me to stop with them, and I
felt just like it. I wanted to stop and be natural;
but the Doctor thought otherwise of my intentions; and that was the origin of the row.
The next thing I knew, the Doctor had got up
the great precipice, and I was quite alone with
two hundred dusky fellows, only two of whom
could speak a syllable of English, and I the sole
representative of the superior white within twenty
miles. Alone with cannibals, - perhaps they were
cannibals.  They had magnificent teeth, at ally
rate, and could bite through an inch and a half
sugar-cane, and not break a jaw.
For the first time that summer I began to moralize a little.  Was it best to have kicked against
the Doctor's jldgment    Perhaps not   But it is
best to be careful how you begin to moralize too
early; you deprive yourself of a great deal of fun
in that way. lf you want to do anything particularly, I shoulct advise you to do it, and then be
sufficiently sorry to make it all square.




CHUM1MING WITH'A SAVAGE.              27
I'm  not so sure that I was wrong, after all.
Fate, or the Doctor, or something else, brought
me first to this loveliest of valleys, so shut out
from  everything but itself that there were no
temptations which might not be satisfied.  Well!
here, as I was looking about at the singular loveliness of the place,-  you know this was my first
glimpse of its abrupt walls, hung with tapestries
of fern and clambering convolvulus; at one end
two exquisite waterfalls, rivalling one another in
whiteness and airiness, at the other the sea, the
real South Sea, breaking and foaming over a genuine reef, and even rippling the placid current of
the river that slipped quietly down to its embracing tide from the deep basins at these waterfalls,
right in the midst of all this, before I had been
ten minutes in the valley, I saw  a straw  hat,
bound with wreaths of fern and maile; under it
a snow-white garment, rather short all around,
low in the neck, and with no sleeves whatever.
There was no sex to that garment; it was the
spontaneous offspring of a scant material and a
large necessity.  I'd seen plenty of that sort of
thing, but never upon a model like this, so entirely tropical, - almost Oriental.. As this singular
phenomenon made directly for me, and, having
come within  reach, there  stopped  and stayed,
I asked its name, using one of my seven stock
phrases for the purpose; I found it was called
Kaina-ana.  Down it went into my note-book; for




28             SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
I knew  I was to have an experience with this
young scion of a race of chiefs.  Sure enough, I
have had it. He continued to regard me steadily,
without embarrassment.  He seated himself before me; I felt myself at the mercy of one whose
calm analysis was questioning every motive of my
soul.  This sage inquirer was, perhaps, sixteen
years of age. His eye was so earnest and so honest, I could return his look.  I saw a round, full,
rather girlish face; lips ripe and expressive, not
quite so sensual as those of most of his race; not
a bad nose, by any means; eyes perfectly glorious,
regular almonds, -with the mythical lashes
"that sweep," etc., etc.( The smile which presently transfigured his face was of the natur that
flatters you into submission against your will.
Having weighed me in his balance, -  an  you
may be sure his instincts did n't cheat him; they
don't do that sort of thing, - he placed his two
hands on my two knees, and declared, " I was his
best friend, as he was mine; I must come at once
to his house, and there live always with him."
What could I do but go. He pointed me to his
lodge across the river, saying, "There was his
home and mine."  By this time, my native without a master was quite exhausted.  I wonder what
would have happened if some one had n't come to
my rescue, just at that moment of trial, with a
fresh vocabulary.  As it was, we settled the matter at once.  This was our little plan,   an en



CHUMMING WITH A SAVAGE.              29
tirely private arrangement between Kana-ana and
myself: I was to leave with the Doctor in an
hour; but, at the expiration of a week we should
both return hither; then I would stop with him,
and the Doctor could go his way.
-There was an immense amount of secrecy, and
many vows, and I was almost crying, when the
Doctor hurried me up that terrible precipice, and
we lost sight of the beautiful valley.  Kana-ana
swore he would watch continually for my return,
and I vowed I'd hurry back; and so we parted.
Looking down from the heights, I thought I could
distinguish his white garment; at any rate, I knew
the little fellow was somewhere about, feeling as
miserably as I felt, - and nobody has any business
to feel worse.  How many times I thought of him
through the week! I was always wondering if he
still thought of me. I had found those natives to
be impulsive, demonstrative, and, I feared, inconstant.  Yet why should he forget me, having so
little to remember in his idle life, while I could
still think of him, and put aside a hundred pleasant memories for his sake? The whole island was
a delight to me.  I often wondered if I should
ever again behold such a series of valleys, hills,
and highlands in so small a compass.  That land
is a world in miniature, the dearest spot of which,
to me, was that secluded valley; for there was a
young soul watching for my return.
That was rather a slow week for me, but it




30             SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
ended finally; and just at sunset, on the day appointed, the Doctor and I found ourselves back on
the edge of the valley.  I looked all up and down
its green expanse, regarding every living creature,
in the hope of discovering Kana-ana in the attitude
of the watcher.  I let the Doctor ride ahead of
me on the trail to Bolabola's hut, and it was quite
in the twilight when I heard the approach of a
swift horseman.  I turned, and at that moment
there was a collision of two constitutions that
were just fitted for one another; and all thie
doubts and apprehensions of the week just over
were indignantly dismissed, for KaIna-an'a and I
vere one and inseparable, which was perfectly satisfactory to both parties!
The plot, which had been thickening all the
week, culminated then, much to the disgust of the
Doctor, who had kept his watchful eye upon me all
these days   to my advantage, as he supposed.
There was no disguising our project any longer, so
I out with it as mildly as possible. " There was a
dear fellow  here," I said, " who loved me, and
wanted me to live with him; all his people wanted
me to  stop, also; his mother and his grandmother had specially desired it.  They didn't care
for money; they had much love for me; and therefore implored me to stay a little. Then the valley
was most beautiful; I was tired; after our hard
riding, I needed rest; his mother and his grandmother assured me that I needed rest.  Now, why
not let me rest here awhile  "




CHUMMING  WITII A SAVAGE.           31
The Doctor looked very grave.  I knew that he
misunderstood me, -placed a wrong interpretation
upon my motives; the worse for him, I say.  He
tried to talk me over to the paths of virtue and
propriety; but I wouldn't be talked over.  Then
the final blast was blown; war was declared at
once. The Doctor never spoke again, but to abuse
me; and off he rode in high dudgeon, and the
sun kept going down on his wrath.  Thereupon I
renounced all the follies of this world, actually
hating civilization, and feeling entirely above the
formalities of society.' I resolved on the spot to
be a barbarian, and, perhaps, dwell for ever and
ever in this secluded spot.  And here I am back
to the beginning of this story, just after the shower
at Bolabola's hut, as the Doctor rode off alone and
in anger.
That resolution was considerable for me to
make.  I found, by the time the Doctor was. out
of sight and I was quite alone, with the natives
regarding me so curiously, that I was very tired
indeed.  So Kana-ana brought up his horse, got
me on to it in some way or other, and mounted
behind me to pilot the. animal and sustain me in
my first bareback act  Over the sand we went,
and through the river to his hut, where I was
taken in, fed, and petted in every possible way, and
finally put to bed, where Kana-ana' monopolized
me, growling in true savage fashion if any one
came near me.  I did n't sleep much, after all.  I




32             SOU TI-SEA IDYLS.
think I must have been excited. I thought how
strangely I was situated: alone in a wilderness,
among barbarians; my bosom  friend, who was
hugging me like a young bear, not able to speak
one syllable of English, andI very shaky on a few
bad phrases in his tongue. We two lay upon an
enormous old-fashioned bed with high posts,- very
high they seemed to me in the dim  rushlight.
The natives always burn a small light after dark;
some superstition or other prompts it. The bed,
well stocked with pillows, or cushions, of various
sizes, covered with bright-colored chintz, was hung
about with numerous shawls, so that I might be
dreadfully modest behind them.  It was quite
a grand affair, gotten up expressly for my benefit.  The rest of the house -all in one room, as
usual - was covered with mats, on which various
recumbent forms and several individual snores
betrayed the proximity of Kaina-ana's relatives.
How  queer the whole atmosphere of the place
was! The heavy beams of the house were of
some rare wood, which, being polished, looked like
colossal sticks of peanut candy.  Slender canes
were bound across this framework, and the soft,
dried grass of the meadows was braided over it, 
all completing our tenement, and making it as
fresh and sweet as new-mown hay.
The natives have a passion for perfumes.  Little bunches of sweet-smelling herbs hunlg in the
peak of the roof, and wreaths of fragrant berries




CHUMMl][ING WITH A SAVAGE.          33
were strung in various parts of the house.  I
found our bedposts festooned with them  in the
morning.  0, that bed!  It might have come
from England in the Elizabethan era and been
wrecked off the coast; hence the mystery of its
presence.  It was big  enough for a Mormon.
There was a little opening in the room opposite
our bed; you might call it a window, I suppose.
The sun, shining through it, made our tent of
shawls perfectly gorgeous in crimson light, barred
and starred with gold. I lifted our bed-curtain,
and watched the rocks through this window, - the
shining rocks, with the sea leaping above them in
the sun. There were cocoa-palms so slender they
seemed to cast no shadow, while their fringed
leaves glistened like frost-work as the sun glanced
over them. A bit of cliff, also, remote and misty,
running far into the sea, was just visible from my
pyramid of pillows.  I wondered what more I
could ask for to delight the eye.  Kana-ana was
still asleep, but he never let loose his hold on me,
as though he feared his pale-faced friend would
fade away from  him.  He lay close by.me.  His
sleek figure, supple and graceful in repose, was the
embodiment of free, untrammelled youth.  You
who are brought up under cover know nothing of
its luxuriousness.  How I longed to take him over
the sea with me, and show him something of life
as we find it. Thinking upon it, I dropped off
into one of those delicious morning naps. I awoke
2*                    c




34             SOUTHI-SEA IDYLS.
again presently; my companion-in-arms was the
occasion this time.  He had awakened, stolen
softly away, resumed his single garment, -- said
garment and all others he considered superfluous
after dark, - and had prepared for me, with his
own hands, a breakfast, which he now declared to
me, in violent and suggestive pantomime, was all
ready to be eaten. It was not'a bad bill of fare, -
fresh fish,. taro, poe, and goat's milk.  I ate as
well as I could, under the circumstances. I found
that Robinson Crusoe must have had some tedious
rehearsals before he acquired that perfect resignation to Providence which delights us in book form.
There was a veritable and most unexpected tablecloth for me alone.  I do not presume to question
the nature of its miraculous appearance.  Dishes
there were, - dishes, if you're not particular as
to shape or completeness; forks, with a prong or
two, — a bent and abbreviated prong or two;
knives that had survived their handles; and one
solitary spoon.  All these were tributes of the too
generous people, who, for the first time in their
lives, were at the inconvenience of entertaiining
a distinguished stranger.  Hence this reckless display of tableware.  I ate as well as I could, but
surely not enough to satisfy my crony  for, when
I had finished eating, he sat about two hours in
deep and depressing silence, at the expiration of
which time he suddenly darted off on his bareback steed and was gone till dark, when he re



CHUMMING WITH A SAVAGE.             35
turned with a fat mutton slung over his animal.
Now, mutton does n't grow  wild thereabout, neither were his relatives shepherds; consequently,
in eating, I asked no questions for conscience'
sake.
The series of entertainments offered me were
such as the little valley had not known for years:
canoe-rides up and- down the winding stream;
bathings in the sea and in the river, and in every
possible bit of water, at all possible hours; expeditions into the recesses of the mountains, to the
waterfalls that plunged into cool basins of fern
and cresses, and to the orange grove through acres
and acres of guava orchards; some climbings up
the precipices; goat hunting, once or twice, as far
as a solitary cavern, said to be haunted, - these
tramps always by daylight; then a new course of
bathings and sailings, interspersed with monotonous singing and occasional smokes under the
eaves of the hut at evening.
If it is a question how long a man may withstand the seductions of nature, and the consolations and conveniences of the state of nature, I
have solved it in one case; for I was as natural
as possible in about three days.
I wonder if I was growing to feel more at home,
or more hungry, that I found an appetite at last
equal to any table that was offered me! Chicken
was added to my already bountiful rations, nicely
cooked by being swathed in a broad, succulent




36             SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
leaf, and roasted or steeped in hot ashes. I ate it
with my fingers, using the leaf for a platter.
Almost every day something new was offered at
the door for my edification. Now, a net full of
large guavas or mangoes, or a sack of leaves
crammed with most delicious oranges from  the
mountains, that seemed to have absorbed the very
dew of heaven, they were so fresh and sweet.
Immense lemons perfumed the house, waiting to
make me a capital drink.  Those superb citrons,
with their rough, golden crusts, refreshed me.
Cocoanuts were heaped at the door; and yams,
grown miles away, were sent for, so that I might
be satisfied. All these additions to my table were
the result of long and vigorous arguments between the respective heads of the house. I detected trouble and anxiety  in their expressive
faces. I picked out a word, here and there, which
betrayed their secret sorrow. No assertions, no
remonstrances on my part, had the slightest effect
upon the poor souls, who believed I was starving.
Eat I must, at all hours and in all places; and
eat, moreover, before they would touch a mouthful. So Nature teaches her children a hospitality
which all the arts of the capital cannot affect.
I wonder what it was that finally made me restless and eager to see new faces! Perhaps my unhappy disposition, that urged me thither, and then
lured me back to the pride of life and the glory
of the world.  Certain I am that Kana-ana never




CHUMMING WITH A SAVAGE.             37
wearied me with his attentions, though they were
incessant. Day and night he was by me.  When
he was silent, I knew he was conceiving some surprise in the shape of a new fruit, or a new view to
beguile me. I was, indeed, beguiled; I was growing to like the little heathen altogether too well.
What should I do when I was at last compelled
to return out of my seclusion, and find no soul so
faithful and loving in all the earth beside l Day
by day this thought grew upon me, and with it I
realized the necessity of a speedy departure.
There were those in the world I could still remember with that exquisitely painful pleasure that
is the secret of true love.  Those still voices
seemed incessantly calling me, and something in
my heart answered them of its own accord. How
strangely idle the days had grown! We used to lie
by the hour - Kana-ana and I - watching a strip
of sand on which a wild poppy was nodding in the
wind.  This poppy seemed to me typical of their
life in the quiet valley. Living only to occupy so
much space in the universe, it buds, blossoms, goes
to seed, dies, and is forgotten.
These natives do not even distinguish the memory of their great dead, if they ever had any.
It was the legend of some mythical god that
Kana-ana told me, and of which I could not understand a twentieth part; a god whose triumphs
were achieved in an age beyond the comprehension
of the very people who are delivering its story,




38             SSOUTII-SEA IDYLS.
by word of mouth, from generation to generation.
Watching the sea was a great source of amusement
with us. I discovered in our long watches that there
is a very complicated and magnificent rhythm in
its solemn song.  This wave that breaks upon the
shore is the heaviest of a series that preceded it;
and these are greater and less, alternately, every
fifteen or twenty minutes.  Over this dual impulse the tides prevail, while through the year
there is a variation in their rise and fall.  What
an intricate and wonderful mechanism  regulates
and repairs all this!
There was an entertainment in watching a par,
ticular cliff, in a peculiar light, at a certain hour,
and finding soon enough that change visited even
that hidden quarter of the globe.  The exquisite
perfection of this moment, for instance, is not
again repeated on to-morrow, or the day after, but
in its stead appears some new tint or picture,
which, perhaps, does not satisfy like this. That
was the most distressing  disappointment that
came upon us there.  I used to spend half an
hour in idly observing the splendid curtains of
our bed swing in the light air from the sea; and I
have speculated for days upon the probable destiny awaiting one of those superb spiders, with a
tremendous stomach and a striped waistcoat, looking a century old, as he clung tenaciously to the
fringes of our canopy.
We had fitful spells of conversation upon some




CHUMMING WITH A SAVAGE.             39
trivial theme, after long intervals of intense silence.  We began to develop symptoms of imbecility. There was laughter at the least occurrence, though quite barren of humor; also, eating
and drinking to pass the time; bathing to make
one's self cool, after the heat and drowsiness of
the day.  So life flowed out in an unruffled current, and so the prodigal lived riotously and
wasted his substance.  There came a day when
we promised ourselves an actual occurrence in our
Crusoe life.  Someone had seen a floating object
far out at sea.  It might be a boat adrift; and,
in truth, it looked very like a boat. Two or three
canoes darted off through the surf to the rescue,
while we gathered on the rocks, watching and
ruminating.  It was long before the rescuers returned, and then they came empty-handed.  It
was only a log after all, drifted, probably, from
America.  We talked it all over, there by the
shore, and went home to renew the subject; it
lasted us a week or more, and we kept harping
upon it till that log - drifting slowly, 0 how
slowly! from  the far mainland to our island 
seemed almost to overpower me with a sense of
the unutterable loneliness of its voyage. I used
to lie and think about it, and get very solemn, indeed; then Kaina-ana would think of some fresh
appetizer or other, and try to make me merry
with good feeding.  Again and again he would
come with a delicious banana to the bed where I




40             SOUTH-SEA  D YLS.
was lying, and insist upon my gorging myself,
when I had but barely recovered from a late orgie
of fruit, flesh, or fowl.  He would mesmerize me
into a most refreshing sleep with a prolonged and
pleasing manipulation.  It was a reminiscence of
the baths of Stamboul not to be withstood.  From
this sleep I would presently be wakened by K6inaana's performance upon a. rude sort of harp, that
gave out a weird and eccentric music.  The mouth
being applied to the instrument, words were pronounced in a guttural voice, while the fingers
twanged the strings in measure.  It was a flow of
mlonotones, shaped into legends and lyrics.  I
liked it amazingly; all the better, perhaps, that it
was as good as Greek to me, for I understood it as
little as I understood the strange and persuasive
silence of that beloved place, which seemed slowly
but surely weaving a spell of enchantment about
me.  I resolved  to  desert peremptorily, and
managed to hire a canoe and a couple of natives,
to cross the channel with me. There were other
reasons for this prompt action.
Hour by hour I was beginning to realize one of
the inevitable results of Time. My boots were giving out; their best sides were the uppers, and their
soles had about left them.  As I walked, I could
no longer disguise this pitiful fact.  It was getting
hard on me, especially in the gravel.  Yet, regularly  each  morning, my  pieces  of boot were
carefully oiled, then rubbed, or petted, or coaxed




CHUMIMING WITH A SAVAGE.            41
into some sort of a polish, which was a labor of
love.  0 Kiia-ana!  how  could -you wring my
soul with those touching offices of friendship! —
those kindnesses unfailing, unsurpassed!
Having resolved to sail early in the morning,
before the drowsy citizens of the valley had fairly
shaken the dew out of their forelocks, all that day
-my last with Kana-ana — I breathed about me
silent benedictions and farewells.  I could not
begin to do enough for Kana-anl, who was, more
than ever, devoted to me.  He almost seemed to
suspect our sudden separation, for he clung to me
with a sort of subdued desperation. That was the
day he took from his head his hat -a very neat
one, plaited by his mother —insisting  that I
should wear it (mine was quite in tatters), while
he went bareheaded in the sun.  That hat hangs
in my room  now, the only tangible relic of my
prodigal days.  My plan was to steal off at dawn,
while he slept; to awaken my native crew, and
escape to sea before my absence was detected.  I
dared not trust a parting with him, before the
eyes of the valley.  Well, I managed to wake and
rouse my sailor boys.  To tell the truth, I did n't
sleep a wink that night.  We launched the canoe,
entered, put off, and had safely mounted the
second big roller just as it broke under us with
terrific power, when I heard a shrill cry above the
roar of the waters.  I knew the voice and its import.  There was Kana-ana rushing madly toward




42             SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
us; he had discovered all, and could n't even wait
for that white garment, but ran after us like one
gone daft, and plunged into the cold sea, calling
my name, over and over, as he fought the breakers.
I urged the natives forward. I knew if he overtook
us, I should never be able to escape again.  We
fairly flew over the water.  I saw him rise and fall
with the swell, looking like a seal; for it was his
second nature, this surf-swimming. I believe in my
heart I wished the paddles would break or the canoe
split on the reef, though all the time I was urging
the rascals forward; and they, like stupids, took
me at my word.  They could n't break a paddle,
or get on the reef, or have any sort of an accident.
Presently we rounded the headland, - the same
hazy point I used to watch from the grass house,
through the little window, of a sunshiny morning.
There we lost sight of the valley and the grass
house, and everything that was associated with
the past, -  but that was nothing.  We lost sight
of the little sea-god, Kina-ana, shaking the spray
from his forehead like a porpoise; and this was
all in all. I did n't care for anything else after
that, or anybody else, either. I went straight home
and got civilized again, or partly so, at least.  I've
never seen the Doctor since, and never want to.
He had no business to take me there, or leave me
there.  I could n't make up my mind to stay; yet
I'm always dying to go back again.
So I grew tired over my husks.  I arose and




CHUMMING WITH A SAVAGE.             43
went unto my father. I wanted to finish up the
Prodigal business. I ran and fell upon his neck
and kissed him, and said unto him, "Father, if
I have sinned against Heaven and in thy sight,
I'm afraid I don't care much.  Don't kill anything. I don't want any calf. Take back the ring,
I don't deserve it; for I'd give more this minute
to see that dear, little, velvet-skinned, coffeecolored Kana-ana, than anything else in the wide
world, -because he hates business, and so do I.
He's a regular brick, father, moulded of the purest
clay, and baked in God's sunshine. He's about
half sunshine himself; and, above all others, and
more than any one else ever can, he loved your
Prodigal."
PART II.
HOW I CONVERTED MY CANNIBAL.
WHEN people began asking me queer questions
about my my chum Kana-ana, some of them even
hinting that "he might possibly have been a girl
all the time," I resolved to send down for him,
and settle the matter at once. I knew he was not
a girl, and I thought I should like to show him
some American hospitality, and perhaps convert
him before I sent him back again.




44            SOUTH-SEA ID YLS.
I could teach him to dress, you know; to say a
very good thing to your face, and a very bad one
at your back; to sleep well in church, and rejoice
duly when the preacher got at last to the "Amen."
I might do all this for his soul's sake; but I
wanted more to see how the little fellow was getting on.  I missed him  so terribly, - his honest
way of showing likes and dislikes; his confidence in
his intuitions and fidelity to his friends; and those
quaint manners of his, so different from anything
in vogue this side of the waters.
That is what I remarked when I got home
again, and found myself growing as practical and
prosy as ever. I awoke no kindred chord in the
family bosom. -On the contrary, they all said, "It
was no use to think of it: no good could come
out of Nazareth."  The idea of a heathen and his
abominable idolatry being countenanced in the
sanctity of a Christian home was too dreadful for
anything.  But I believed some good might come
out of Nazareth, and I believed that, when it did
come, it was the genuine article, worth hunting
for, surely.  I thought it all over soberly, finally
resolving to do a little missionary work on my
own account.  So I wrote to the Colonel of tile
Royal Guards, who knows everybody and has immense influence everywhere, begging him to catch
Kdna-ana, when his folks were n't looking, and
send him  to my address, marked C. O. D., for I
was just dying. to see him.  That was how I




CIUMMl/NG WITH A SAVAGE.            45
trapped my little heathen and began to be a mission ary, all by myself.
I informed the Colonel it was a case of life and
death, and he seemed to realize it, for he managed
to get Kana-ana away from his distressed relatives
(their name is legion, and they live all over the
island), fit him  out in real clothing, — the poor
little wretch had to be dressed, you know; we all
do it in this country, -- then he packed him up
and shipped him, care of the captain of the bark
S. When he arrived, I took him right to my
room and began my missionary work.  I tried to
make all the people love him, but I'm afraid they
found it hard work.  IHe was n't half so interesting up here anyhow! I seemed to have been
regarding him through chromatic glasses, which
glasses being suddenly removed, I found a little,
dark-skinned savage, whose clothes fitted him horribly, and appeared to have no business there.
Boots about twice too long, the toes being heavily
charged with wadding; in fact, he looked perfectly miserable, and I've no doubt he felt so.  How
he had been studying English on the voyage up 
I-He wanted to be a great linguist, and had begun
in good earnest.  He said "good mornin'" as
boldly as possible about seven P. M., and invariably
spoke of the women of America as "him."  He
had an insane desire to spell, and started spellingmatches with everybody, at the most inappropriate hours and inconvenient places. He invariably




46             SOUTHI-SEA IDYLS.
spelled God d-o-g; when duly corrected, -  thus,
G-o-d, -  he would triumphantly shout, dog.  He
jumped  at these  irreverent conclusions  about
twenty times a day.
What an experience I had, educating my little
savage!  Walking him in the street by the hour;
answering questions on all possible topics; spelling up and down the blocks; spelling from  the
centre of the city to the suburbs and back again,
and around it; spelling one another at spelling, 
two latter-day peripatetics on dress parade, passing to and fro in high and serene strata of philosophy, alike unconscious of the rudely gazing and
insolent citizens, or the tedious calls of labor. A
spell was over us: we ran into all sorts of people,
and trod on many a corn, loafing about in this
way.  Some of the victims objected in harsh and
sinful language.  I found Kana-ana had so far
advanced  in the acquirement of our mellifluous
tongue as to be very successful in returning their
salutes. I had the greatest difficulty in convincing him of the enormity of his error.  The little
convert thought it was our mode of greeting
strangers, equivalent to their more graceful and
poetic password, Aloha, " Love to you."
My little cannibal was n't easily accustomed to
his new restraints, such as clothes, manners, and
forbidden  water-privileges.   He  several times
started on his daily pilgrimage without his hat;
once or twice, to save time, put his coat on next




CHUMMING WITH A SAVAGE.              47
his skin; and though I finally so far conquered
him as to be sure that his shirt would be worn on
the inside instead of the outside of his trousers
(this he considered a great waste of material), I
was in constant terror of his suddenly disrobing
in the street and plunging into the first water we
came to, -which barbarous act would'have insured
his immediate arrest, perhaps confinement; and
that would have been the next thing to death in
his case.
So we perambulated the streets and the suburbs, daily growing into each other's grace; and I
was thinking of the propriety of instituting a
series of more extended excursions, when I began
to realize that my guest was losing interest in our
wonderful city and the possible magnitude of her
future.
He grew silent and melancholy; he quit spelling entirely, or only indulged in rare and fitful (I
am pained to add, fruitless) attempts at spelling
God in the orthodox fashion.  It seemed almost
as though I had missed my calling; certainly, I
was hardly successful as a missionary.
The circus failed to revive him; the beauty of
our young women he regarded without interest.
He was less devout than at first, when he used to
insist upon entering every church we came to and
sitting a few moments, though frequently we were
the sole occupants of the building.  He would
steal away into remote corners of the house, and




48            SOUTH SEA ID YLS.
be gone for hours. Twice or three times I discovered him  in a dark closet, in puris naturalibus,
toying with a singular shell strung upon a feather
chain.  The feathers of the chain I recognized as
those of a strange bird held as sacred among his
people.  I began to suspect the occasion of his
malady: he believed himself bewitched or accursed
of some one, -a common superstition with the dark
races. This revelation filled me with alarm; for
he would think nothing of lying down to die under
the impression that it was his fate, and no medicine under the heaven could touch him further.
I began telling him of my discovery, begging
his secret from  him.  In vain I besought him.
"It was his trouble; he must go back!"  I told
him he should go back as soon as possible; that
we would look for ourselves, and see when a vessel
was to sail again. I took him among the wharves,
visiting, in turn, nearly all the shipping moored
there.  How he lingered about them, letting his
eyes wander over the still bay into the mellow hazes
that sometimes visit our brown and dusty hills!
His nature seemed to find an affinity in the
tranquil tides, the  far-sweeping  distances, the
alluring outlines of the coast, where it was blended
with the sea-line in the ever-mysterious horizon.
After these visitations, he seemed loath to return
again among houses and people; they oppressed
and suffocated him.
One day, as we were wending our way to the




CHUMMING WITH A SAVAGE.              49
city front, we passed a specimen of grotesque
carving, in front of a tobacconist's establishment.
Ka'na-anai stood eying the painted model for a moment, and then, to the amazement and amusement
of the tobacconist and one or two bystanders, fell
upon his knees before it, and was for a few moments lost in prayer.  It seemed to do him a deal
of good, as he was more cheerful after his invocation, - for that day, at least; and we could never
start upon any subsequent excursion without first
visiting this wooden Indian, which he evidently
mistook for a god.
He began presently to bring tributes, in the
shape of small cobble-stones, which he surreptitiously deposited at the feet of his new-found
deity, and passed on, rejoicing.  His small altar
grew from day to day, and his spirits were lighter as he beheld it unmolested, thanks to the indifference of the tobacconist and the street contractors.
His greatest trials were within the confines of
the bath-tub.  He who had been born to the Pacific, and reared among its foam and breakers, now
doomed to a seven-by-three  zinc box and ten
inches of water!  He would splash about like a
trout in a saucer, bemoaning his fate.  Pilgrimages to the beach were his greatest. delight; divings into the sea, so far from town that no one
could possibly be shocked, even with the assistance of an opera-glass.  He used to implore a
3                        D




50            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
daily repetition of these cautious and inoffensive
recreations, though, once in the chilly current, he
soon came out of it, shivering and miserable.
Where were his warm  sea-waves, and the shining
beach, with the cocoa-palms quivering in the intense fires of the tropical day  l How he missed
them  and mourned for them, crooning a little
chant in their praises, much to the disparagement
of our dry hills, cold water, and careful people!
In one of our singular walks, when he had been
unusually silent, and I had sought in vain to lift
away the gloom  that darkened his soul, I was
startled by a quick cry of joy from the lips of
the young exile,- a cry that was soon turned into
a sharp, prolonged, and pitiful wail of sorrow and
despair. We had unconsciously approached an
art-gallery, the deep windows of which were beautified with a few choice landscapes in oil.  Kainaana's restless and searching eye, doubtless attracted
by the brilliant coloring of one of the pictures,
seemed in a moment to comprehend and assume
the rich and fervent spirit with which the artist
had so successfully imbued his canvas.
It was the subject which had at first delighted
Kina-anaa, -the splendid charm of its manipulation which so affected him, holding him  there
wailing in the bitterness of a natural and incontrollable sorrow.  The painting was illuminated
with the mellowness of a tropical sunset. A transparent light seemed to transfigure the sea and




CHIUMMlJING WITH A SAVAGE.          51
sky. The artist had wrought a miracle in his inspiration.  It was a warm, hazy, silent sunset forever. The outline of a high, projecting cliff was
barely visible in the flood of misty glory that
spread over the face of it, - a cliff whose delicate
tints of green and crimson pictured in the mind a
pyramid of leaves and flowers. A valley opened
its shadowy depths through the sparkling atmosphere, and in the centre of this veiled chasm the
pale threads of two waterfalls seemed to appear
and disappear, so exquisitely was the distance imitated.  Gilded breakers reeled upon  a palmfringed shore; and the whole was hallowed by the
perpetual peace of an unbroken solitude.
I at once detected the occasion of Ka'na-an'a's
agitation. Here was the valley of his birth, - the
cliff; the waterfall, the sea, copied faithfully, at that
crowning hour when they are indeed supernaturally lovely. At that moment, the promise to him
of a return would have been mockery.  He was
there in spirit, pacing the beach, and greeting his
companions with that liberal exchange of love peculiar to them.  Again he sought our old haunt
by the river, watching the sun go down.  Again
he waited listlessly the coming of night.
It was a wonder that the police did not march
us both off to the station-house; for the little
refugee was howling at the top pf his lungs, while
I endeavored to quiet him by bursting a sort of
vocal tornado about his ears.  I then saw  my




52            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
error.  I said to myself, "I have transplanted a
flower from the hot sand of the Orient to the hard
clay of our more material world, —a flower too
fragile to be handled, if never so kindly. Day
after day it has been fed, watered, and nourished
by Nature.  Every element of life has ministered
to its development in the most natural way. Its
attributes are God's and Nature's own.  I bring
it hither, set it in our tough soil, and endeavor to
train its sensitive tendrils in one direction. There
is no room for spreading them here, where we are
overcrowded already.  It finds no succulence in
its cramped bed, no warmth in our practical and
selfish atmosphere. It withers from the root upward; its blossoms are falling; it will die!"  I
resolved it should not die. Unfortunately, there
was no bark  announced  to sail for his island
home within several weeks. I could only devote
my energies to keeping life in that famishing soul
until it had found rest in the luxurious clime of
its nativity.
At last the bark arrived.  We went at once
to see her; and I could hardly persuade the little
homesick soul to come back with me at night.
He who was the fire of hospitality and obliging to
the uttermost, at home, came very near to mutiny
just then.
It was this civilization that had wounded him,
till the thought of his easy and pleasurable life
among the barbarians stung him  to madness.




CHUMMING WITH A SAVAGE.             53
Should he ever see them again, his lovers? ever
climb with the goat-hunters among the clouds
yonder? or bathe, ride, sport, as he used to, till
the day was spent and the night come?
Those little booths near the wharves, where
shells, corals, and gold-fish are on sale, were Ka'naana's favorite haunts during the last few days he
spent here. I would leave him seated on a box or
barrel by one of those epitomes of Oceanica, and
return two hours later, to find him seated as I had
left him, and singing some weird mele, -some
legend of his home.  These musical diversions
were a part of his nature, and a very grave and
sweet part of it, too. A few words, chanted on a
low note, began the song, when the voice would
suddenly soar upward with a single syllable of exceeding sweetness, and there hang trembling in
bird-like melody till it died away with the breath
of he singer,
/Poor, longing soul! I would you had never left
the life best suited to you, -that liberty which
alone could give expression to your wonderful
capacities. Not many are so rich in instincts to
read Nature, to translate her revelations, to speak
of her as an orator endowed with her surpassing
eloquence.
It will always be a sad effort, thinking of that
last night together.  There are hours when the
experiences of a lifetime seem  compressed and
crowded together. One grows a head taller in his




54            SO UTH-SEA IDYLS.
soul at such times, and perhaps gets suddenly.
gray, as with a fright, also.
Kaina-ana talked and talked in his pretty, broken English, telling me of a thousand charming
secrets; expressing all the natural graces that at
first attracted me to him, and imploring me over
and over to return with him and dwell in the antipodes.  How near I came to resolving, then and
there, that I would go, and take the consequences,
-how very near I came to it!  He passed the
night in coaxing, promising, entreating; and was
never more interesting or lovable. It took just
about all the moral courage allotted me to keep
on this side of barbarism on that eventful occasion;
and in the morning Kaina-ana sailed, with a face
all over tears, and agony, and dust. J
I begged him to select somethifg for a remembrancer; and of all that ingenuity can invent and
art achieve he chose a metallic chain for his neck,
chose it, probably, because it glittered superbly,
and was good to string charms upon. He gave me
the greater part of his wardrobe, though it can
never be of any earthly use to me, save as a memorial of a passing joy in a life where joys seem to
have little else to do than be brief and palatable.
He said he "should never want them  again ";
and he said it as one might say something of the
same sort in putting by some instrument of degradation, -conscious of renewed manhood, but remembering his late humiliation, and bowing to
that remembrance.




CHlUMMING WITH A SAVAGE.             55
So Kana-ana, and the bark, and all that I ever
knew of genuine, spontaneous, and unfettered love
sailed into the west, and went down with the sun
in a glory of air, sea, and sky, trebly glorious that
evening.  I shall never meet the sea when it is
bluest without thinking of one who is its child
and  master.   I shall never see mangoes and
bananas without thinking of him  who is their
brother, born and brought up with them.  I shall
never smell cassia, or clove, or jessamine, but a
thouglht of Knaa-ana will be borne upon their
breath.  A flying skiff, land in the far distance
rising' slowly, drifting sea-grasses, a clear voice
burdened with melody, -all belong to him, and
are a part of him.
I resign my office.  I think that, perhaps, instead of my having converted the little cannibal,
he may have converted me.  I am  sure, at 1/ast,
that if we two should begin a missionary work
upon one another, I should be the first to experience the great change.  I sent my convert home,
feeling he was n't quite so good as when I first
got him; and I truly wish him as he was.
I can see you, my beloved,   sleeping, naked,
in the twilight of the west.  The winds kiss you
with pure and fragrant lips.  The sensuous waves
invite you to their embrace.  Earth again offers
you her varied store. Partake of her offering, and
be satisfied.  Return, 0 troubled soul! to your




56            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
first and natural joys: they were given you by
the Divine hand that can do no ill. In the smoke
of the sacrifice ascends the prayer of your race.
As the incense fadeth and is scattered upon the
winds of heaven, so shall your people separate,
nevermore to assemble among the nations.  So
perish your superstitions, your necromancies, your
ancient arts of war, and the unwritten epics of
your kino
Alas, lana-ana! As the foam of the sea you
love, as the fragrance of the flower you worship,
shall your precious body be wasted, and your untrammelled soul pass to the realms of your fathers.
Our day of communion is over.  Behold how
Night extends her wings to cover you from  my
sight! She may, indeed, hide your presence;
she may withhold from me the mystery of your
future: but she cannot take from me that which
I have; she cannot rob me of the rich influences
of your past.
Dear comrade, pardon and absolve your spiritual adviser, for seeking to remould so delicate
and original a soul as yours; and, though neither
prophet nor priest, I yet give you the kiss of
peace at parting, and the benediction of unceasing love.




CHUMMING  WITH A SAVAGE.             57
PART III.
BARBARIAN DAYS.
WE had  been watching  intently the faint,
shadowy outline along the horizon, and wondering whether it were really land, or but a cloudy
similitude of it; while we bore down upon it
all the afternoon in fine style, and the breeze
freshened as evening came on.  It was all clear
sailing, and we were in pretty good spirits,which is not always the case with landsmen at
sea.
Sitting there on the after-deck, I had asked
myself, more than once, If life were made up of
placid days like this, how long would life be
sweet. I gave it up every time; for one is not
inclined to consider so curiously as to press any
problem  to a solution in those  indolent latitudes.
Perhaps it was Captain Kidd who told me he had
sailed out of a twelve-knot breeze on a sudden, 
slipping off the edges of it, as it were, - and found
his sails all aback as he slid into a dead calm.
There, rocking in still weather, he saw another
bark, almost within hail, blown into the west and
out of sight, like a bird in a March gale.
I wonder what caused me to think of Kidd's
experiences just then. I can't imagine, unless it
3*




58             SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
was some prescient shadow floating in my neighborhood,- the precursor of the little event that followed. Such things do happen, and when we least
expect it; though, fortunately, they don't worry
us as a general thing.  I did n't worry at all, but
sat there by myself, while some of my fellow-passengers took a regular "constitutional" up and
down the deck, and over and over it, until the
nervous woman below in the cabin " blessed her
stars," and wished herself ashore.
I preferred sitting and pondering over the cloud
that seemed slowly to rise from the sea, assuming
definite and undeniable appearances of land.
I knew very well what land it must be: one of
a group of islands every inch of which I had traversed with the zeal of youthful enthusiasm; but
which of them, was a question I almost feared to
have answered.   Yet, what difference could it
make to me!  The land was providentially in our
course, but not on our way-bill. If we were within
gunshot of its loveliest portion, we must needs pass
on as frigidly as though it were Charybdis, or
something equally dreadful; and I began to think
it might be something of the sort, because of its
besetting temptations.
There was not the slightest doubt as to the certainty of its being land, when we went down to
supper; and at sunset we knew the dark spots
were valleys, and the bright ones hills.  I fancied
a hundred bronze-hued faces were turned toward




CHUMMING  WITTH A SAVAGE.            59
ius, as we seemed to twinkle away off in their sunset sea like a fallen star, or something of that sort.
I thought I could almost hear the sea beating
upon the crusts of the reef in the twilight; but
perhaps I did n't, for the land was miles away,
and night hid it presently, while the old solitude
of the ocean impressed us all as though we were
again in the midst of its unbroken, circular wastes.
Then they played whist in the cabin,    all but
ne.  I hung over the ship's side, resolved to
watch all night for the lights on shore, - the flickering watch-fires in the mountain camps; for I
knew  I should see them, as we were bound to
pass the island before morning.
The night was intensely dark; clouds muffled
the stars, and not a spark of light was visible in
any direction over the waters.  A shower could
easily have quenched the beacons I was seeking,
and my vigil soon became tedious; so presently
I followed the others and turned in, rather disconsolate and disgusted.
Toward midnight the wind fell rapidly, and
within half an hour we found ourselves in a dead
calm, when the moan of the breakers was quite
audible on our starboard quarter.  The Captain
was nervous and watchful; the currents in the
channel were strong, and he saw, by the variation
in the compass, that the vessel was being whirled
in a great circle around a point of the island.
Fortunately it began to get light before the




60            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
danger grew imminent.  At three o'clock we were
within soundings, and shortly after we plumped
the anchor into the rough coral at the bottom of
a pretty little harbor, where, the Captain informed
us, we must ride all day and get out with the
land-breeze, that would probably come down at
night.  I rushed up in the gray dawn, and bent
my gaze upon the shore.  I think I must.have
turned pale, or trembled a little, or done.something sensational and appropriate, though no one
observed it; whereat I was rather glad, on the
whole, for they could not have understood it if I
had done my best to explain, - which I had not
the least idea of doing, however, for it was none
of their affair.
I knew that place the moment I saw it, -the
very spot of all I most desired to see; and I
resolved, in my secret soul, to go ashore, there
and then; amicably if I might, forcibly if I
must.
The Captain was not over-genial that morning,
either; he hated detention, and was a trifle nervous about being tied up under the lee of the
land for twelve or twenty hours.  So he growled
if any one approached him all that day, and positively refused to allow the ship's boat to be touched,
unless we drifted upon the rocks, broadside, 
which, he seemed to think, was not entirely out
of the question.  I was sure there would be a
canoe   perhaps several  alongside by sunrise;




CHTUMMING WITH A SAVAGE.            61
so I said nothing, but waited in silence, determined to desert when the time came; and the
Captain might whistle me back if he could.
Presently the time came.  We were rocking
easily on the swell, directly to the eastward of a
deep valley.  The sky was ruddy; the air fresh
and invigorating, but soft as the gales of Paradise.,We were in the tropics.  You would have known
it with your eyes shut; the whole wonderful atmosphere confessed it.  But, with your eyes open,
those white birds, sailing like snow-flakes through
the immaculate blue heavens, with tail-feathers
like our pennant; the floating gardens of the sea,
through which we had been ruthlessly ploughing for
a couple of days back; the gorgeous sunrises and
sunsets, - all were proofs positive of our latitude
What a sunrise it was on that morning! Yet I
stood with iny back to it, looking west; for there
I saw, firstly, the foam on the reef- as crimson
as blood -falling over the wine-stained waves;
then it changed as the sun ascended, like clouds
of golden powder, indescribably magnificent, shaken
and scattered upon the silver snow-drifts of the
coral reef, dazzling to behold, and continually
changing.
Beyond it, in the still water, was reflected a
long, narrow strip of beach; above it, green pastures and umbrageous groves, with native huts,
like great bird's-nests, half hidden among them;
and the weird, slender cocoa-palms were there, —



62             SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
those exclamation-points in the poetry of tropic
landscape.  All this lay slumbering securely between high walls of verdure; while at the upper
end, where the valley was like a niche set in the
green and glorious mountains, two waterfalls floated downward like smoke-columns on a heavy morning.  Angels and ministers of grace! do you, in
your airy perambulations, visit haunts more lovely
than this? - as lovely as that undiscovered country from whose bourn the traveller would rather
not look back, premising that the traveler were
as singularly constituted as I am; which is, peradventure, not probable.
They knew it was morning almost as soon as
we did, though they lived a few furlongs farther
west, and had no notion of the immediate proximity of a strange craft, - by no means rakish in
her rig, however; only a simple merchantman,
bound for Auckland from  San Francisco, but the
victim of circumstances, and, in consequence, tied
to the bottom of the sea when half-way over.
They knew it was morning. I saw them swarming out of their grassy nests, brown, sleek-limbed,
and naked.   They regarded with amazement our
floating home.  The news spread, and the groves
were suddenly peopled with my dear barbarians,
wNho hate civilization almost as much as I do, and
are certainly quite as idolatrous and indolent as I
ever aspire to be.
I turned my palms outward toward them; I




CHlUMMING WITH A SAVAGE.            63
lifted up my voice, and cried, "Hail, my brothers!
We hasten with the morning; we follow after the
sun.  Greetings to you, dwellers in the West!"
Nobody heard me. I looked again. Down they
came upon the shore, wading into the sea.  Then
such a carnival as they celebrated in the shallow
water was a novelty for some of my cabin friends;
but I knew all about it.  I'd done the same thing
often enough myself, when I was young, and free,
and innocent, and savage.  I knew they were asking themselves a thousand questions as to our
sudden appearance in their seas, and would rather
like to know who we were, and where we were
going, but scorned to ask us.  They had once or
twice been visited by the same sort of whitishlooking people, and they had found those colorless
faces uncivil, and the bleached-out skins by no
means to be trusted with those whom they considered their inferiors. They did n't know that it is
one of the Thirty-nine Articles of Civilization to
bully one's way through the world. Then I prayed
that they might be moved to send out a canoe, so
that I could debark and go inland for the day.  I
prayed very earnestly, and out she came, ~ one of
their tiny, fragile canoes, looking like a deserted
chrysalis, with the invisible wings of the spiritual,
tutelary butterfly wafting it over the waves.  In
this chrysalis dug-out sat a tough little body, with
a curly head, which I recognized in a minute as
belonging to a once friend and comrade in mly




64             SO UTH-SEA IDYLS.
delightful exile, when I was a successful prodigal,
and wasted my substance in the most startling
and effectual manner, and enjoyed it a great deal
better than if I had kept it in the bank, as they
advised me to do.  On he came, beating the sea
with his broad paddle, alternately by either side
of the canoe, and regarding us with a commendable degree of suspicion.  I greeted him  in his
peculiar dialect.  The gift of tongues seemed suddenly to have descended upon me, for I found
little difficulty in saying everything I wanted to
say, in a remarkably brief space of time.
" Hail, little friend! " said I; " great love to you.
How is it on shore now."
He replied that it was decidedly nice on shore
now, and that his love for me was as much as mine
for him, and more too, and that consequently he
was prepared to conduct me thither, regardless of
expense.
I went with that lovely boy on shore.  The
Captain could not resist my persuasive appeals for
a short leave of absence, and so I went.  Perhaps
it would not have been advisable for him to have
suppressed me; and he made a courteous virtue
of necessity.
I had leave to stop till evening, unless I heard
a signal-gun, upon hearing which I was to return
immediately on board, or suffer the consequences.
Now, I am free to confess, that the consequences
did n't appall me as we swung off from the vessel,




CHUVJ MMING WITH A SAVAGE.          65
where I had been an uneasy prisoner for many
days; and I fell to chatting with Niga, my dusky
friend, in a sort of desperate joy.
Niga was a regular trump.  He had more
than once piled on horseback behind me, in the
sweet days when we used to rido double, -yea,
and even treble, if necessary.  There was usually
a great deal more boy than horse on the premises;
hence this questionable economy in our cavalry
regulations.  Niga told me many things as we
drew near the reef: he talked of nearly everybody
and everything; but of all that he told me, he said
nothing of the one I most longed to hear about.
Yet, somehow or other, I could not quite bring
myself to ask him, out and out, this question.
You lknow, sometimes it is hard to shape words
just as you want them shaped, and the question
is never asked in consequence.
The reef was growling tremendously. We were
drawing nearer to it every moment.  I thought
the chances were against us; but Niga was selfpossessed, and, as he had crossed it once that
morning,- and in the more dangerous direction
of the two, that is, against the grain of the
waves, - I concluded there was no special need of
my making a scene; and in the next moment we
were poised on a terrific cataract of glittering and
rushing breakers, snatched up and held trembling
in mid-air, with the canoe half filled with water,
and I perfectly blind with spray.
E




66             SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
It was a memorable moment in a very short
voyage; and the general verdict on board ship,
where they were watching us with some interest,
was, that it served me right.
When my eyes were once more free of the
water, I found myself in the midst of the natives,
who had been waiting just inside of the reef to
receive us; and, as they recognized me, they laid
a hand on the canoe, as many as could crowd
about it, fairly lifting it out of the water on our
way to the shore, all the while wailing at the top
of their voices their mournful and desolate wail.
It was impossible for me to decide whether
that chant of theirs was an expression of joy, or
sorrow: the nature of it is precisely the same, in
either case.
So we went on shore in our little triumphal
procession, and there I was embraced in a very
emphatic manner by savages of every conceivable
sex, age, and color.  Having mutely submitted to
their genuine expressions of love, I was conducted
-a willing and bewildered captive-along the
beach, around the little point that separates the
river from the sea, and thence by the river-bank
to the house I knew so well.  I believe I looked
at every dusky face in that assemblage, two or
three times over, but saw not the one I sought.
What could it mean   l Was he hunting in the
mountains, or fishing beyond tehe headland, or
sick, or in prison, that he came not to greet me 




CHAl lMING  WITH A SAVAGE.          67
Surely, something had befallen him, - something
serious and unusual, - or he would have been the
first to welcome me home to barbarism!
A strange dread clouded my mind: it increased
and multiplied as we passed on toward the house
that had been home to me.  Then, having led me
to the outer door, the people all sat there upon
the ground, and began wailing piteously.
I hastily crossed the narrow outer room, lifted
the plaited curtain, and entered the inner chamber, where I had spent my strange, wild holiday
long months before.  I looked earnestly about
mle, while my eyes gradually became familiar
with the dull light.  Nothing seemed changed.
I could point at once to almost every article in
the room.  It seemed but yesterday that I had
stolen away from them  in the gray dawn, and
repented my desertion too late.
I soon grew accustomed to the sombre light of
the room. I saw sitting about me, in the corners,
bowed figures, with their faces hidden in grief.
There was no longer any doubt as to the'nature
of their emotion.  It was grief that had stricken
the household, and the grief that death alone
occasions.  I counted every figure in the room;
I recognized each, the same that I had known
when I dwelt among them: he alone was absent.
I don't know what possessed me at that moment.  I felt an almost uncontrollable desire to
laugh, as though it were some masque gotten up




68            SOUTfI-SEA IDYLS.
for my amusement.  Then I wished they would
cease their masking, for I felt too miserable to
laugh.  Then I was utterly at a loss to know what
to do; so I walked to the old-fashioned bed - our
old-fashioned bed -  in the corner, looking just as
it used to.  I think the same old spider was there
still, clinging to the canopy; the very same old
fellow, in his harlequin tights, that we used to
watch, and talk about, and wonder what he was
thinking of, to stop so still, day after day, and
week after week, up there on the canopy. I threw
myself upon the edge of the bed, my feet resting
upon the floor; and there I tried to think of
everything but that one dreadful reality  that
would assert itself, in spite of my efforts to
deny it.
Where was my friend l  Where could he be,
that these, his friends, were so bowed with sorrow?
The question involved a revelation, already anticipated in my mind.  That revelation I dreaded as
I would dread my own death-sentence.  But it
came at last.  A woman who had been humbling
herself in the dust moved toward me from  the
shadow that half concealed her.  She did not rise
to her feet; she was half reclining on the mats of
the floor, her features veiled in the long, black
hair of her race. One hand was extended toward
me, then the other; the body followed; and so
she moved, slowly and painfully, toward the bedside.




CHUMJMIN G WITHA SAVAGAV E.         69
It was his mother.  I knew her intuitively.
Close to the bed she came, and crouched by me,
upon the floor.  There, with one hand clasped
close over mine, the other flooded with her copious
tears, and her forehead bowed almost to the floor,
she poured forth the measure of her woe.  The
moment her voice was heard, those out of the
house ceased wailing, and seemed to be listening
to the elegy of the bereaved.
Her voice was husky with grief; broken again
and again with sobs.  I seemed to understand
perfectly the nature of her story, though my
knowledge of the dialect was very deficient.
The mother's soul was quickened with  her
pathetic theme. The frenzy of the poet inspired
her lips.  It was an epic she was chanting, celebrating the career of her boy-hero.  She told of
his birth, and wonderful childhood; of his beautiful strength; of his sublime affection, and the
friend it had brought him from over the water.
She referred frequently to our former associations, and seemed to delight in dwelling upon
them.  Then came the story of his death, -the
saddest canto of the melancholy whole.
How  shall I ever forgive myself the selfish
pleasure I took in striving to remodel an immortal
soul.  What business had I to touch so sensitive
an organism; susceptible of infinite impressions,
but incapable, in its prodigality, of separating and
dismissing the evil, and retaining only the good, 




70            SOUTII-SEA IDYLS.
therefore fit only to increase and develop in the
suitable atmosphere with which the Creator had
surrounded it.
Why did I not foresee the climax!
I might have known that one reared in the nursery of Nature, as free to speak and act as the
very winds of heaven to blow  whither they list,
could ill support the manacles of our modern
proprieties.  Of what use to him  could  be a
knowledge of the artifices of society?  Simply a
temptation and a snare!
What was the story of his fate. That he came
safely home, rejoicing in his natural freedom; that
he could not express his delight at finding home
so pleasant; that his days were spent in telling
of the wonderful things he had seen: more sects
than the gods of the South Seas; more doubters
than believers; contradictions, and insults, and
suspicions, everywhere.   They  laughed  again,
when they thought of us, and pitied us all the
while.
But his exhilaration wore off, after a time.
Then came the reaction.  A restlessness; an undefined, unsatisfied longing.  Life became a burden.  The seed of dissension had fallen in fresh
and fallow soil  it was a souvenir of his sojourn
among us.  He, the child of Nature, must now
follow out the artificial and hollow life of the
world, or die unsatisfied; for he could not return
to his original sphere of trust and contentment.




CHUMIMING WITH A SAVAGE.             71
He had learned to doubt all things, as naturally
as any of us.
For days he moaned in spirit, and was troubled;
nothing consoled him; his soul was broken of its
rest; he grew desperate and melancholy.
I believe he was distracted with the problem of
society, and  I cannot wonder at it.  One day,
when his condition had become no longer endurable, he stole off to sea in his canoe, thinking,
perhaps, that he could reach this continent, or
some other; possibly hoping never again to meet
human faces, for he could not trust them.
It was his heroic exit from a life that no longer
interested him.  Great was the astonishment of
the Islanders, who looked upon him as one possessed of the Evil Spirit, and special sacrifices
were offered in his behalf; but the gods were inexorable; and, after several days upon the solitary
sea, a shadow, a mote, drifted toward the valley,
-  a canoe, with a famishing and delirious voyager,
that was presently tossed and broken in the surges;
then, a dark body glistened for a moment, wet
with spray, and sank forever, while the shining
coral reef was stained with the blood of the firstborn.
I heard it all in the desolate wail of the mother,
yet could not weep; my eyes burned like fire.
Little Niga came for me presently, and led me
into the great grove of ckacmae-trees, up the valley.
He insisted upon holding me by the hand: it was




72             SOUTH-SEA ID YLS.
all he could do to comfort me, and he did that
with his whole soul.
In silence we pressed on to one of the largest
of the trees. I recognized it at once. Niga and
I, one day, went thither, and I cut a name upon
the soft bark of the tree.
When we reached it we paused.  Niga pointed
with his finger; I looked.  It was there yet,-  a
simple name, carved in the rudest fashion. I read
the letters, which had since become an epitaph.
They were these:"KANA-ANA, At. 16 yrs."
Under them were three initials, -- my own, 
cut by the hand of Ka'na-ana, after his return
from America.
We sat down in  the gloomy grove.  "Tell
me," I said, "tell me, Niga, where has his spirit
gone l "
"He is here, now," said Niga; " he can see us.
Perhaps, some day, we shall see him."
"You have more faith than our philosophers,
for they have reasoned themselves out of everything.  Would  you like to be  a philosopher,
Niga " I asked.
Niga thought, if they were going to die, body
and soul, that he would n't like to be anything of
the sort, and that he had rather be a first-class
savage than a fourth-rate Christian, any day.
I interrupted him  at this alarming assertion.




CIIUMMING WITH A SA VA GE.          73
"The philosophers would call your faith a superstition, Niga; they do not realize that there is
no true faith unmixed with  superstition, since
faith implies a belief in something unseen, and is,
therefore, itself a superstition.  Blessed is the
man who believes blindly, -call it what you
please,- for peace shall dwell in his soul.  But,
Niga," I continued, "where is God  "
"Here, and here, and here," said Niga, pointing
me to a grotesque carving in the sacred grove, to
a monument upon the distant precipice, and to a
heap of rocks in the sea; and the smile of recognition with which the little votary greeted his
idols was a solemn proof of his sincerity.
"Niga," I said, "we call you and your kind
heathens. It is a harmless anathema, which cannot, in the least, affect you personally. Ask us if
we love God! Of course we do.  Do we love
him above all things, animate or inanimate  Undoubtedly! Undoubtedly is easily'said, and let
us give ourselves credit for some honesty.  We
believe that we do love God, above all; that we
have no other gods before him; yet, who of us
will give up wealth, home, friends, and follow
him. Not one! The God we love is a very
vague, invisible, forbearing  essence.   He  can
afford to be lenient with us while we are debating
whether our neighbor is serving him in the right
fashion, or not. We'd rather not have other gods
before him: one is as many as we find it conven4




74            SO UTHI-SEA IDYLS.
jent to serve.  The lover kisses passionately a
miniature.  It is not, however, an image of his
Creator, nor any memorial of his Redeemer's
passion, but only a portrait of his mistress. Do
you blame us, Niga    It is the strongest instinct
of our nature to worship something.  Man is a
born idolater, and not one of us is exempted by
reason of any scruples under the sun. You see it
daily and hourly: each one has his idols."
Little Niga, who sympathized deeply with me,
seemed to have gotten some knowledge of our
peculiarly mixed theories concerning God and the
fiture state, from conversations overheard after the
return of Kana-ana.  He tried to console me with
the assurance that Kana-ana died a devoted and
unshaken adherent to the faith of his fathers.
I could n't but feel that his blood was off my
hands when I learned this; and I believe I gave
Niga a regular hug in that moment of joy.
Then we walked here and there, through the
valley, and visited the old haunts, made memorable by many incidents in that romantic and
chivalrous life of the South.  Every one we met
had some word to add concerning the Pride of the
Valley, dead in his glorious youth.
Over and over, they assured me of his fidelity
to me, his white brother, adding that Kana-ai'a
had, more than once, expressed the deepest regret
at not having brought me back with him.
He.even meditated sending for me, in the same




CIH UMJMING WITH A SA VAGE.         75
manner that T had sent for him; and, if he had
done so, it was his purpose to see that I was at
once made familiar with their Articles of Faith;
for he anticipated a willing convert in me, and it
was the desire of his heart that I should know
that perfect trust, peculiar to his people, and
which is begotten of the brief gospel, so often
quoted out of place: namely, that "seeing is
believing."
It was a kind thought of his, and I wish he had
carried it into execution, for then he might have
lived.  It was his susceptible nature that had
come in contact with the great world, and received
its death-wound.  Had I been there to help him,
I would have planned something to divert his
mind until he had recovered himself, and was
willing to submit to the monotony of life over
yonder.  Had he not done as much for me. Had
he not striven, day after day, to charm  me with
his barbarism, and come very near to success. I
should say he had.  Dear little martyr! was he
not the only boy I ever truly loved, - dead now
in his blossoming prime!
0 Kana-an! Little Niga and I sat talking of
you, down by the sea, and we wept for you at
last; for the tears came by and by, when I began
to fully realize the greatness of my loss.  All
your youth, and beauty, and freshness, in destruction, and your body swallowed up in the graves of
the sea!




76            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
The meridian sun blazed overhead, but it made
little difference to us. Afternoon passed, and
evening was coming on almost unheeded; for our
thoughts were buried with him, under the waves,
and life was nothing to us, then.
I no longer cared to observe the lights and
shadows on the cliffs, nor the poppy nodding in
the wind, nor the seaward prospect: that was
spoiled by our vessel, - the seclusion was broken
in upon.  I cared for nothing any longer, for I
missed everywhere his step, patient and faithful
as a dog's, and his marvellous face, that could look
steadily at the sun without winking, and deluge
itself with laughter all the while, for there was
nothing hidden or corrupting in it.
Presently I returned into the sacred grove,
touching the three letters he had carved there,
and calling on his spirit to regard me as respecting his dumb idols, which were nothing but the
representatives of his jealous gods, - dear to him
as the Garden of Gethsemane, the Mount of
Olives, and the shihing summits of Calvary to us.
Then down I ran to the bathing-pools, and fron
place to place I wandered in a hurried and nervous tour, for it was growing dark.  I saw the
ship's lights flickering over the water, while the
first cool whispers of the night-wind came down
from the hills, filling me with warnings; in the
midst of which there was a flash of flame and a
sudden, thunderous report, -enough to awaken




CIHUMMIJfNG WITH A SA VA GE.          77
the dead of the valley, - and I turned to go. I
believe, if dear Ka'na-ana had been there, as I
prayed he might be, I would have laughed at that
signal, and hastened inland.to avoid discovery;
for I was sick of the world.; I might have had
reason to regret it afterward, because friendship is
not elastic, and the best of friends cannot long
submit to being bored by the best of fellows. Perhaps it was just as it should be: I had no time
to consider the matter there;) I hurried to his
mother, and she clung to me; others came about
me, and laid hold of me: so that I feared I should
be held captive until it was too late to board the
vessel. Her sails were even then shaking in the
wind; and I heard the faint click of the capstan
tugging at the anchor-chains.
With a quick impulse I broke away from them,
and ran to the beach, where Niga and I entered
his canoe, and slid off from the sloping sands.
Down we drifted toward the open sea, while the
natives renewed their wailing, and I was half
crazed with sorrow.  It is impossible to resist the
persuasive eloquence of their chants. Think, then,
with what a troubled spirit I heard them, as we
floated on between the calm  stars in the heavens
and the whirling stars in the sea.
We went out to the ship's side, and little Niga
was as noisy as any of them when' I pressed upon
him a practical memorial of my visit; and away
he drifted into the night, with his boyish bab



78             SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
ble pitched high and shrill; and the Present
speedily became the Past, and grew  old in a
moment.
Then I looked for the last time upon that faint
and cloudy picture, and seemed almost to see the
spirit of the departed beckoning to me with waving arms and imploring looks; and I longed for
him with the old longing, that will never release
me from  my willing bondage.  I blessed him  in
his new life, and I rejoiced with exceeding great
joy that he was freed at last from the tyranny of
life, - released from the unsolvable riddles of the
ages. The night-wind was laden with music, and
sweet with the odors of ginger and cassia; the
spume of the reef was pale as the milk of the
cocoanuts, and the blazing embers on shore glowed
like old sacrificial fires.
Then I heard a voice crying out of the shadow,
an ancient aid eloquent voice, - saying:   Behold my fated race! Our days are numbered.
Long have we feasted in the rich presence of a
revealed deity. We sat in ashes under the mute
gods of Baal; we fled before the wrath of Moloch, the destroyer; we were as mighty as the
four winds of heaven: but the profane hand of
the Iconoclast has desecrated our temples, and
humbled our majesty in the dust.  0  impious
breakers of idols! Why will ye put your new
wines into these old bottles, that were shaped for
spring waters only, and not for wine at all! Lo!




CH UMMING WITH A. SAVAGE.           79
ye have broken them, and the wine is wasted. Be
satisfied, and depart!"
So that spirit of air sang the death-song of his
tribe, and the sad music of his voice rang over the
waters like a lullaby.
Then I heard no more, and I said, "My asylum
is the great world; my refuge is in oblivion";
and I turned my face seaward, never again to
dream fondly of my island home; never again to
know it as I have known it; never again to look
upon its serene and melancholy beauty: for the
soul of the beloved is transmitted to the vales of
rest, and his ashes are sown in the watery furrows
of the deep sea!




TABOO.  A  FETE-DAY  IN  TAHITI.
~ 7:~ T was on one of those vagabond pilgrimay ages to nowhere in particular, such as
every stranger is bound to make in a
strange land, that I first stumbled upon my royal
Jester, better known in Tahiti as Taboo.
Great Jove! what a night it was! A wild ravine
full of banyan and pandanus trees, and of parasite
climbers, and the thousand nameless leafing and
blossoming creatures that intermarry to such an
alarming extent in the free-loving tropics, had
tempted me to pasture there for a little while.  I
was wandering  on  among  roots and  trailing
branches, and under ropes upon ropes of flowers
that seemed to swing suddenly across my path on
purpose to keep me from  finding too easily the
secret heart of the mountain.  I felt it was right
that I should be made to realize how sacred a spot
that sanctuary of Nature was, but I fretted somewhat at the persistency of those speechless sentinels who guarded its outer door so faithfully.
There was a waterfall within, that I had prayed
to see, -one of those mysterious waterfalls that
descend noiselessly from the bosom of a cloud,




TABOO.-A FETE-DAY IN  TAHITI.   81
stealing over cushions of moss, like a ray of light
in a dream, or something else equally intangible.
You never find this sort of waterfall in the
common way.  No one can exactly point it out to
you; but you must search for it yourself, and
listen for its voice, -and usually listen in vain,
- till, suddenly, you come upon it in a moment,
almost as if by accident; and its whole quivering
length glitters and glistens with jewels, where it
hangs, like a necklace, on the bosom of a great cliff.
It is the only visible chain that binds earth to
heaven; and no wonder you gaze at it with questioning eyes!
Well, while I was looking about me, expecting
every moment to feel the damp breath of the
waterfall upon my forehead, night came down.
Where was I 1 In the midst of a pathless forest;
between cliffs whose sleek, mossy walls were so
steep as to forbid even the goat's sharp hoof.
Down the hollow  of the ravine, among round,
slippery rocks, and between trellises of giant roots,
tumbled a mountain torrent.  No human form
visible, probably none to be looked for on that side
of the inaccessible dome of the mountain; yet
fearlessly I toiled on, knowing that food and shelter were on every side, and that no hand, whose
clasp was as fervent as the clasp of the vine itself,
would be raised against me; and, thank Heaven!
outsiders were scarce.
In the midst of the narrowing chasm, with the
4*                         F




82            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
night thickening, and the wood growing more and
more objectionable, I heard a sound as of stumbling feet before me.  My first thought was of
color!  I would scarcely trust a White Man in
that predicament.  What well-disposed White
would be prowling, like a wild animal, alone in a
forest at nightS  It occurred to me that I was
white, or had passed as such; but I know and
have always known that, inwardly, I am purpleblooded, and supple-limbed, and invisibly tattooed
after the manner of my lost tribe! I was startled
at the sound, and slackened my pace to listen:
the footsteps paused with mine. I plunged forward, accusing the Echoes of playing me false.
Again the mysterious one rushed awkwardly on
before me, with footfalls that were not like mine,
nor like any that I could trace: they were neither
brute nor human, but fell clumsily among the
roots and stones, out of time with me; therefore,
no echo, and beyond my reckoning entirely.
At this hour the moon, of a favorable size,
looked over the cliff, flooding the chasm with her
soft light.  I rejoiced at it, and hoped for a revelation of the Unknown, whose tottering steps had
mocked mine for half an hour.
We were in the midst of a dense grove of breadfruit-trees.  Scarcely a ray of light penetrated
their thick-woven branches; but, against the faint
light of the open distance, I marked the weird
outline of one who might once have been human,




TABOO.-A FETE-DAY IN TAHITI.   83
but was no longer a tolerable image of his Maker.
The figure was like the opposite halves of two
men bodily joined together in an amateur attempt
at human grafting.  The trunk was curved the
wrong way; a great shoulder bullied a little
shoulder, and kept it decidedly under; a long leg
walked right around a short leg that was perpetually sitting itself down on invisible seats, or swinging itself for the mere pleasure of it.  One arm
clutched a ten-foot bamboo about three inches in
diameter, and wielded it as though it were a bishop's crook, and something to be proud of; the
other arm -it must have belonged to a child
when it stopped growing   was hooked up over
one ear, looking as though it had been badly wired
by some medical student, and was worn as a lasting reproach to him. A shaggy head was set on
the down-slope of the big shoulder, and seemed to
be continually looking over the little shoulder and
under the little arm for some one always expected,
but who was very long in coming.
Upon this startling discovery I turned to flee,
but the figure immediately followed. It was evidently too late to escape an interview, and, taking
heart, I walked toward it, when, to my amazement, it hastily staggered away from me, looking
always over its shoulder, quickening its pace with
mine, slackening its speed with me, and keeping,
or seeking to keep, within a certain distance of
me all the while.  My curiosity was excited, and,




84            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
as I saw it bore me no ill-will, I made a quick
plunge forward, hoping to capture it.  With an
energetic effort it strove to escape me; but, with
the head turned  the wrong way, it stumbled
blindly into a bit of jungle, where it lay whining
piteously. I assisted it to its feet, with what
caution and tenderness I could, and, finding it
still wary, walked on slowly, leading the way to
the edge of the grove, where the moonlight was
almost as radiant as the dawn.  It followed me
like a dog, and was evidently grateful for my
company.  I walked slowly that it might not
stumble, and, as we emerged from the shadow of
the breadfruits, I manceuvered so as to bring its
face toward the moonlight, and I saw -- a hideous
visage, with all its features sliding to one corner;
and nothing but the two soft, sleepy-looking eyes
saved me from  yielding to the disgust that its
whole presence awakened.  As it was, I involuntarily started back with a shudder, and a slight
exclamation that attracted its attention. "Taboo!
Taboo  " moaned the poor creature, half in introduction, half in apology and explanation.
He was well named the "forbidden one": set
apart from all his fellows; incapable of utterance;
maimed  in body; an  outcast among his own
people; homeless, yet at home everywhere; friendless, though welcomed by all for his entertaining
and ludicrous simplicity; feeding, like the birds,
from Nature's lap, and, like the birds, left to the
winds and waters for companionship.




TABOO.-A FjTE-DAY IN TAHITI.   85
Somehow I felt that Taboo could lead me at
once to the waterfall: and I tried to seek out the
small door to his brain, and impress him with my
anxiety to reach the place.  0, what darkness
was there, and what doubts and fears seemed to
cloud the hidden portals of his soul   He made
an uncouth noise for me.  Perhaps he meant it as
music: it was frightful to hear it up there in the
mountain solitudes.  He got me fruits and a little
water in the palm of his hand, which he expected
me to drink with a relish.  He lay down at my
feet in a broken heap of limbs, crooning complacently.  He was playful and thoughtful alternately; at least, he lost himself in long silences
from time to time, while his eyes glowed with a
deep inward light, that almost made me hope to
startle his reason from its dreadful sleep; but a
single word broke the spell, and set him to laughing as though he would go all to pieces; and his
joy was more pitiful than his sorrow.
In one of his silent moods he suddenly staggered to his feet, and shambled into a narrow trail
to one side of the gorge.  I wondered at his unexpected impulse, and feared that he had grown
tired of me already, preferring the society of his
feathered comrades, a few of whom  sounded their
challenge-note, that soared like silver arrows in
the profound stillness of the ravine. It seemed
not, however: in a few moments he returned, and
signalled me with his expressive grunt, and I fol



86            SO  UTH-SEA IDYLS.
lowed him.  Through thickets of fern, arching
high over our heads, down spongy dells, and over
rims of rock jutting from the base of the mountain, Taboo and I clambered in the warm moonlight.  Anon we came upon a barricade of banmboos, growing like pickets set one against another.
I know not how broad the thicket might have
been, - possibly as broad as the ravine itself, 
but into the thick of it Taboo edged himself; and
close upon his heels I followed.  In a few moments we had crushed our way through the midst
of the bamboos, that clashed together after us so
that a bird might not have tracked us, and lo! a
crystal pool in the heart of a wonderful garden;
and to it, silently, from heaven itself descended
that mysterious waterfall, whose actual existence
I had seriously begun to question. It lay close
against the breast of the mountain, strangely pale
in the full glow of the moon, while, like a vein of
fire, it seemed to throb from  end to end; or like
a shining thread with great pearls slipping slowly
down its full length, taking the faint hues of the
rainbow as they fell, playing at prisms, until my
eyes, weary of watching, closed of their own accord.  I sank down by Taboo, who was sleeping
soundly in the hollow  of a great tree; and the
one cover for both of us was the impenetrable
shadow that is never lifted from that silent sanctuary of the Most High.
The sky was as saffron when we woke from our




TABOO.-A FETE-DAY IN TAHITI.   87
out-of-door sleep, and the whole atmosphere was
less poetical and impressive than on the night
previous.  Stranger than all else, there was no
visible trace of the mysterious waterfall.  I even
began to question my own senses, and thought it
possible that I had been dreaming. Yet there sat
Taboo in his frightful imperfection, as happy and
indifferent as possible. Of course, he could tell
me nothing of the magical waters. He had doubtless already forgotten the episode of the hour previous.  He lived for the solitary moment, and his
mind seemed unable to grasp the secrets of ten
seconds on either side of his narrow present. In
fact, he was playing with a splendid lizard when I
returned from  my brief and fruitless reconnoissance; and as I came up he wondered at me, as he
never ceased to wonder, with fresh bewilderment,
whenever I came back to him, after never so brief
an absence.
I soon learned to play upon Taboo's one stop;
to point a finger at him, and bore imaginary augerholes right into him  anywhere; for he always
winced and whined, like a very baby, and yielded
at once to my pantomimic suggestion.  But what
a wreck was here! A delicate instrument, full of
rifts and breakages, with that single key readily
answerable to the slightest touch of my will. I
have often wished that it had been a note more
deep, profound, or sympathetic. It was simply
merry and shrill, and incapable of any modulation




88            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
whatever.  Point a finger at him, make a few
coils in the air that grow to a focus as they draw
nearer to him, and he would run over with uncontrollable jollity that was at times a little painful in its boisterousness.
I knew  well enough that I had sucked the
honey from that particular cell in the mountain,
and that I might as well resume my pilgrimage.
There was to be a Fete Napoleon in Papeete.  We
had n't heard, up to that hour, of the wreck of
the great Empire, and, being in a loyal French
colony, it behooved us to have the very best time
possible. Said I to myself, "Taboo will find sufficient food for merriment in our mode of feting an
Emperor; therefore Taboo shall go with me to town
and enjoy himself."  I suggested an immediate adjournment to Papeete with the tip of my forefinger, whereat Taboo doubled up, as usual, and,
in his own fashion, implored me to stop being so
funny.  We at once started; returning through
the bamboo-brakes, fording the stream  in some
awkward way, and slowly working our passage
back to town.
The Tahitians have but one annual holiday.
As this, however, is seventy-two hours in length,
while everything relating to it is broad in proportion, it is about as much as they can conscientiously ask for.
Taboo and I entered the town on the eve of the
first day, together with  multitudes from  the




TABOO.-A FLTE-DAY IN TAHITI.   89
neighboring districts, flocking thither in their best
clothes. The lovely bay of Papeete was covered
with fleets of canoes, hailing from all the seaside
villages on the island, and many of them  fiom
Moorea, and islands even more distant. No sea is
too broad to be compassed by an ambitious Kanack, who scents a festival from afar.
Along the crescent shores of the bay, the canoes
were heaped, tier upon tier. It was as though a
whole South Sea navy had been stranded, for the
town was crowded with canoe-boys and all manner
of natives, in gala dress. The incessant rolling of
drums, the piping of bamboo-flutes, and the choruses of wandering singers began early in the dawn
of the 14th August, and were expected to continue, uninterruptedly, to the evening of the 16th.
Taboo regarded it all with singular indifference.
Everybody seemed to know him, and to take particular delight in greeting him. His sleepy disregard of them was considered extremely laughable, and they went their way roaring with merriment, that contrasted strongly with the grave,
listless face of the simple one, who was apparently
oblivious of everything.
The morning after we appeared in Papeete was
Sunday, according to the calendar.  The little
cathedral, with banana-leaves rustling in the
open windows, was thronged with worshippers of
all colors, doubly devout in the excessive heat.
Various choirs relieved one another during Mass,




90            SOUTI-SEA IDYLS.
and some diminutive fellows, under ten years of
age, chanted Latin hymns in a pleasingly plaintive
voice, led by a friar in long clothes and a choker.
Taboo crouched by the open door during service,
raking the gravel-walk with his crooked fingers,
and hitching about with indefatigable industry.
After the last gospel, we all went into the middle
of the street- for there were no sidewalks - and
got our boots very dusty. Little knots of friends
seemed to sit down in the way wherever they
pleased, and to talk as long as they liked; while
everybody else accommodatingly turned out for
them, or paused, and listened to the conversation,
without embarrassment on either side.  Liquor
was imbibed on the sly; some eyes were beginning to swim  perceptibly, and some tongues to
wag faster and looser than ever.  The Admiral's
flagship was one pyramid of gorgeous bunting,
and his band delighted a great audience, gathered
upon the shore, with a matinee gratis.  At sunset
the imperial batteries belched their sulphurous
thunder, that came as near to breaking the sabbath as possible. In the evening more music, up
at the Governor's garden,- waltzes, polkas, and
quadrilles, so brilliantly executed that the listeners
were half mad with delight; and you could n't for
the life of you tell what day it had been, nor
what night it was, but Sunday was positively set
down against it in the calendar.  At ten P. M. a
signal-gun says " Good-night " to the citizens of




TABOO.-A FETE-DAY JN TAHIIT.    91
Papeete, and it behooves all those who are darkskinned to retire instantly, on pain of arrest and a
straw-heap in the calaboose.
In the midst of our Sunday festival, while yet
the streets were hilarious, slap-bang went this impudent piece of ordnance, and at once the crowd
began to disperse in the greatest confusion.  Taboo, who had been an inanimate spectator during
the day's diversions, seemed to comprehend the
necessity of hasty flight to some quarter or other;
and, with a confusion of ideas peculiar to him, he
began careering in great circles through the swaying multitudes, and continued to revolve around
an uncertain centre, until I seized him and sought
to pilot him to some convenient place of shelter.
I thought of the great market, that, like those
ancient cities of refuge, was always open to the
benighted wanderer; and thither we hastened.
A lofty roof, covering a good part of a block, kept
the rain from a vast enclosure, stored with stalls,
tables, and benches. It was simply shelter of the
barest kind, but sufficient for all needs in that
charitable climate. There was a buzzing of turbulent throngs as we edged our way toward the
centre of the market-place; you would think that
all the bees of Tahiti were swarming in unison,
from the noise thereof.  The commotion was long
in quieting.  It had to subside like the sea at
flood-tide. Every little while a brace of gendarmes
strutted past the premises, feeling mighty fine in




92             SOUTII-SEA IDYLS.
their broad white pants, like a ship with studdingsails out, and with those comical bobtails sprouting out of the small of their backs. I know that
Taboo and I, having laid ourselves on somebody's
counter, listened and nudged each other for two
or three hours, and that it began to feel like
morning before there was sleep enough to go entirely around the establishment.
The man who is the first to wake in Papeete
lights his lamp and goes to market.  As soon as
he makes his untimely appearance, the comrnunity begins to stir; a great clatter of drowsy
voices and dozens of yawns are the symptoms of
returning day; and in ten minutes the market
is declared open, though it is still deep and tranquil starlight overhead, with not a trace of dawn
as yet visible.
When the market opens before 3 A. M.    and
the hour happens to be the blackest of the fourand-twenty —it is highly inconvenient for any
foreigner and his royal jester who may be surreptitiously passing the night upon one of the fruit
counters, but there is no help for them: sleepy
heads give way to fresh-gathered bread-fruits and
nets of fragrant oranges; bananas are swung up
within tempting reach of everybody; all sorts of
natives come in from  the four quarters of the
Papeetean globe, with back-loads of miscellaneous
viands, a mat under one arm, and a flaming torch
in hand.  Rows upon rows of girls sell fruits and




TABOO -A II TEi-DA Y IN TAHITIL   93
flowers to the highest bidder; withering old women
haggle over the prices of their perfumed and juicy
wares; solitary men offer their solitary strings of
fish for a real each, and refuse to be beaten down
by any wretch of a fellow who dares to insinuate
that the fish are a trifle too scaly; boys sit demurely over their meagre array of temptations in
the shape of six tomatoes, three eggs, a dozen or
so of guavas, and one cucumber.  These youngsters usually sit with a passionless countenance
that forbids any hope of a bargain at reduced
prices, and they pass an hour or two with scarce
a suggestion of custom; but it is suddenly discovered that they have something desirable, and a
dozen purchasers begin quarrelling for it, during
which time some one else quietly makes his purchase from one corner of the boy's mat; and, having closed out his stock in less than ten minutes,
he quietly pockets his reales, and departs without
having uttered a syllable.
Taboo and I went from  one mat to another,
eying the good things for breakfast. I offered him
the best that the market afforded; and I could
easily do so, for in no land is the article cheaper
or better.  Taboo, having made the circuit of the
entire establishment, upon mature deliberation
concluded to take nothing.  At every point he
was greeted uproariously by the noisy and goodnatured people, who were willing to give him anything he might choose to take.  They, probably,




94             SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
felt that it was worth more than the price of the
article to see the sublime scorn on the poor fellow's face as he declined their limes, feis, mangoes,
or whatever delicious morsel it might have been.
As for me, I could n't resist those seductions.  I
made my little purchases and withdrew to the seaside, where I could break my fast by sunrise, and
enjoy comparative quiet.  Taboo grinned in the
market-place till he was weary of the applause
showered upon him  by the ungodly, who mrade
light of his irreparable misfortune and took pleasure in his misery.  He hunted me up, or, rather,
stumbled upon me again, and stayed by me, amusing himself with pelting the fish that sported,
like sunbeams and prisms, in the sea close at our
feet.
It was fte-day in Tahiti.  I sat, at sunrise, by
the tideless margin of a South Sea lagoon, bristling
with coral and glittering with gem-like fish; in
either hand I held a mango and banana. I raised
the mango to my lips.  What a marvel it was I
A  plump vegetable egg, full of delusion, and
stuffed with a horny seed nearly as large as itself.
It had a fragrance as of oils and sirups; it purged
sweet-scented and resinous gums.  Its hide was,
perhaps, too tough for convenience, but its inner
lusciousness tempted me to persevere in the consumption of it.  With much difficulty I broke the
skin. Honey of Hymettus! It seemed as though
the very marrow of the tropics were about to in



TABOO.-A F1'TE-DAY IN TAITI.   95
toxicate my palate. Alas, for the hopes of youthful inexperience! What was so fair to see proved
but a meagre mouthful of saturated wool; that
colossal and horny seed asserted itself everywhere.
The more I strove to handle it with caution, the
more slippery and unmanageable it became.  It
shot into my beard, it leaped lightly into my
shirt-bosom, and skated over the palms of both
hands.  Small rivulets of liquor trickled down my
sleeves, making disagreeable puddles at both elbows.
My fingers were webbed together in a glutinous
mass.  My whole front was in a shocking state of
smear.  My teeth grew weary of combing out the
beguiling threads of the fruit.  The thing seemed,
to my imagination, a small, flat head, covered with
short, blond hair, profusely saturated with some
sweet sort of ointment, that I had despaired of
feasting on; and I was not sorry when the slippery stone sprang out of my grasp, and peppered
itself with sea-sand.
I knew that there still remained to me a morsel that was of itself fit food for the gods.  I
poised aloft, with satisfaction, the rare-ripe banana, beautiful to the eye as a nugget of purest
gold. The pliant petals were pouting at the top
of the fruit.  I readily turned them back, forming
an unique and convenient gilded salver for the
column of flaky manna that was, as yet, swathed
in lace like folds.  These gauzy ribbons fell from
it almost of their own accord, and hung in fleecy
fe&toons about it.




96            SOUTH-SEA ID YLS.
Here was a repast of singularly appropriate
mould, being about the size of a respectable mouth,
and containing just enough mouthfuls to temporarily satisfy the appetite. Not a morsel of it but
was full of mellowness, and sweet flavor, and fragrance.  Not an atom  of it was wasted; for, no
sooner had I thrown aside the cool, clean, fleshlike case, than it was made way with by a fowl,
that had, no doubt, been patiently awaiting that
abundant feast.
Mangoes and bananas! Their very names smack
of shady gardens, that know no harsher premonition of death than the indolent and natural decay
of all things. The nostril is excited with the
thought of them; the palate grows moist and
yearns for them; and the soul feasts itself, for a
moment, with a memory of mangoes and bananas
past, whose perfection was but another proof of
immortality, since it is impossible ever to forget
them  individually.  Mangoes and bananas! the
prime favorites at Nature's most bountiful board;
the realization of a dream of the orchards of the
Ilesperides; alike excellent, yet so vastly dissimilar in their excellences, it seems almost incredible
that the same beneficent Providence can have created the two fruits!
It was the memorable 15th of August, 1870;
but I have reason to believe the bananas were no
better on that particular occasion than almost
always in their own latitude. The 15th of August,




TABOO. —A FE T-DAY LN  TAHITI.    97
where was the Emperor then? I forget; I know
that we rejoiced in the blissful confidence that we
were to have a grand time at all hazards.  There
were guns at sunrise from ship and shore; a grand
national procession of French and Tahitians to
High Mass at 10.30; guns - twenty-one of them
-together with the ringing of bells, and a salute
of flags, at the elevation of the Host, so that you
would have known the supreme moment had you
been miles away.  Then came a sumptuous public
breakfast for the Frenchmen; and for the natives,
games of several sorts.
Taboo and I, having properly observed the more
solemn ceremonials of the day, gave ourselves up
to the full enjoyment of these latter diversions.
There was a greased pole, with shining cups; and
flowing prints, both useful and ornamental, hung
at the top of it. Several naked and superbly built
fellows shinned up it with infinite difficulty, and
were so fatigued when they got there, they were
only too willing to clutch the first article within
reach, which was, of course, the least desirable, and
scarcely worth the  trouble of getting.  0, such
magnificent grouping at the foot of the pole, as the
athletes shouldered one another in a sort of cooperative experiment at getting up sooner; such
struggles to rise a little above the heads of the
impatient climbers beneath as made the aspiring
Kanack quite pale,- that is, greenish yellow; such
losing of grips, and fainting of hearts, and slidings
5                        G




98            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
back to earth in the midst of taunts and jeers, but
all in the best of humors and the hottest of suns!
such novelties as these were a very great delight
to Taboo and myself. He, however, did n't deign
to laugh heartily: he merely smiled in a superior
manner that seemed to imply that he knew of
something that was twice as much fun and not
half the trouble, but he did n't choose to disclose
it.  He nearly always seemed to know as much as
any ten of us; and it was like an assumption of
innocence, that queer, vacant expression of his
face. I'm not sure that he was not possessed of
some rare instinct beyond our comprehension,
which was to him  an abundant compensation for
the fragmentary body he was obliged to trundle
about.
Early in the afternoon, there were fresh arrivals
in the bay: two mammoth double war-canoes, of
fifty paddles each, came in from a remote sea-district; they were the very sort of water-monsters
that went out to greet my illustrious predecessor,
Captain Cook, nearly a century ago. Taboo and
I were only too glad to sit meekly among the ten
thousand spectators that blackened the great sweep
of the shore, while these savages matched their
prowess.  With one vigorous plunge of the paddles the canoes sprang from the beach into the
watery arena.  How strange they looked! Long,
low sides, scarce eight inches above water, and
stained like fish-scales; big, yawning jaws in their




TABOO.-A FEI TEI-DAY IN TAII TI.   99
snakelike heads, and the tail of a dragon in their
wakes; every man of the hundred stripped to the
skin and bareheaded; their brawny bodies glistening in the sun as though they had been oiled,
while, with mechanical accuracy, the crews beat
the water with their paddles, and chanted their
guttural chants, with the sea flashing and foaming
under them.  The race was a tie; perhaps it was
fortunate that it proved so.  I fear if one crew
had beaten the other crew the breadth of a paddle,
that other would have lain to and eaten that one
right under our very eyes.  They had their songs
of triumph, both sounding the chorus, during
which they drummed with their paddles on the
sides of their canoes, till the frail things shivered
and groaned in genuine misery.  Then they renewed the race, because they could n't possibly be
still for a moment; and they looked like a brace
of mastodon-centipedes trying to get out of the
water, with death hissing in their throats.
The evening of the great day was drawing to
a close.  Taboo and I again went out into the
narrow, green lanes of Papeete, seeking what we
might devour with all our eyes and ears.  They
were very charming, those long arbors of densely
leaved trees, with little tropical vignettes set in
the farther end of them.  It was almost like getting a squint through the wrong end of a telescope, pointed toward some fairy-land or other.
As it grew dark, a thousand ready hands began




100           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
illuminating the avenues that lead to the Governor's house.  Up and down its deep veranda swung
ropes of lanterns; and as the guards at the garden-gate presented arms at the approach of the
Admiral, or some distinguished  and decorated
foreigner, the strains of Strauss, deliciously played,
filled the illuminated grove with an air of romance
that was very Oriental in its mellowness, and
quickened every foot that was so happy as to touch
the soil of Tahiti in so fortunate an hour. On
every part of the public lawns the revels were conducted after the native fashlon.  Bands of singers
and dancers sang and danced in the streets, and
were frequently rewarded with liberal potations.
Taboo looked on as amiably as usual, and for some
time as passively also; but there was something
intoxicating in the air, and it began to have a
visible effect upon him. It was not long before he
strove to emulate the singers. St. Cecilia! what
a song was his! I could scarcely endure to hear
that royal Jester striving to tune his inharmonious
voice to the glib, though monotonous Tahitian
madrigals.  I walked away by myself, or rather
went into another part of the village, and sought
a change of scene; for there was no seclusion to
be hoped for on a flte-night.
From the Governor's halls came the entrancing
harmony of flutes and harps; from every lane and
alley the piping of nose-fifes and the droning of
nasal chorals; from the sea rolled in the deep,




TABOO.-A FETE-DAY IN TAHIITI.  101
hoarse booming of the reef, the rhythmical plash of
oars, or the clear, prolonged cry of some one in the
watery distance hailing some one close at hand.
Even so savage and picturesque a spectacle as this
grew wearisome after a time, and I turned my
steps toward a place of shelter, and suggested to
myself sleep.
In one lane was a throng of natives, wilder in
their demonstrations of joy than all the others.
My curiosity was excited, and I hastened to join
them.  Having with some difficulty wedged my
way into the front row of spectators, I beheld the
subject of their riotous applause.  In the centre
of a small ring was an ungainly figure, writhing
in grotesque contortions; tom-toms were being
beaten with diabolical energy and wildness; flutes
and shrill voices were chiming in rapid and bewildering chromatics; the audience-the halfcrazed and utterly  inhuman audience — gloated
over the shocking spectacle with devilish delight.
In one moment I comprehended all: TTaboo, overcome by the general and unusual excitement, had
succumbed to its depraving influences; and, unable longer to control himself, he was broadly
burlesquing, in his helplessness, one of the national
dances.  Music had at last reached his impenetrable soul, awakened his long-slumbering sympathies, and found him her willing slave. A pity
that some diviner strain had not first led him captive, that he might have been spared this disgrace!




102           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
I saw his unhappy body ambling to the shame
of all.  I saw those pitiful, unshapen shoulders
undulating in vain attempts at passional expression; the helpless arm waving at every movement
of the body, while the withered hand spun like a
whirligig above his ears; his eyes, having lost
their accustomed mild light, stared distractedly
about, seeking rescue and protection, as I thought.
In a few moments I attracted his notice, though
he seemed but partly to recognize me.  There
was his usual uncertain recognition grown more
doubtful, -nay, even hopeless, -as his face betrayed.  Again I caught his eye: I felt that but
one course was left me, and at once I aimed my
finger at him. He winced in his delirious dance.
I coiled it round and round, weaving airy circle
within circle; quicker and quicker I wove my
spell, and at last shot the whole hand at him, as
though I would run him through.  He doubled,
like one struck with a fatal blow, and went to the
ground all of a senseless heap. There was a disturbance in the audience.  Some of them thought
I had bewitched Taboo; and it behooved me to go
at once, rather than seek to make explanation of
the singular result of my presence there.  I went,
and spent a dull night, accusing myself of being
the possible spiritual murderer of Taboo. I had
no business to bring him to the metropolis at that
unfortunate season; I had no right to leave him
with his traducers: and that was the whole statement of the case.




TABOO.-A FETE-DAY IN TAHITI.  103
The last day of the fete was, of course, less joyous to me.  A score of nameless nags were to be
ridden by light weights in breech-cloths; and I
sought consolation in the prospect of seeing some
bewitching horsemanship.  The track, in use but
once every twelvemonth, and yielding annually a
young orchard of guava-trees, presented to the astonished gaze of the foreign sporting-gentleman
who happened to be on the ground-  if, indeed,
there was such a one present - a half-mile course,
with numerous stones and hollows relieving its
surface, while the rope that enclosed it kept giving
way every few moments, letting in a mixed multitude among the half-broken horses.
The Queen was present at the races, - Pomare,
whose life has been one long, sorrowful romance;
the Admiral was also there; and many a petty
officer, with abundant gilt and tinsel. At a signal
from the trumpeter the horses were entered unannounced, and everybody betted wildly.  One little
African jockey, mounted upon the cleverest piece
of flesh and blood in the field, called for the larger
stakes; and he would certainly have won, but for
an unavoidable accident: the little African was
pressing in on the home-stretch, and everything
looked lovely for the winning mare, when, unluckily, she put her nigh leg in a crab-hole, and
snapped her shin-bone square off.  The undaunted
little African tried his best to finish the heat on his
own responsibility, and went off into the air in fine




104           SOUTH-SEA  D YLS.
style, but missed his calculation, and burrowed
about three lengths from the goal.  His neck was
driven in nearly up to the ears, and the mare had
to be shot; but the races went mercilessly on
until a tremendous thunder-storm flooded the track
and washed the population back to town.  Dance
after dance consumed the afternoon hours; and
song upon song, eternally reiterated, finally failed
to create any special enthusiasm.
I saw no further traces of Taboo. Again and
again I followed knots of the curious into the
larger native houses, where the lascivious dances
were given with the utmost abandon; thither - I
suspected - Taboo would most likely be impelled,
for the music was wilder and the applause more
boisterous and unrestrained.
The evening of the last day of the fete was darkening; most people were growing a little weary of
the long-drawn festivities; many had succumbed
to their fatigue, and slept by the wayside, or, it
may be, they had known too well the nature of
the Tahitian juices, such as no man may drink
and not fall!
The palace of Pomare- a great, hollow, incomplete shell, whose windows have never been glazed,
and whose doors have never b-en hung - was the
scene of the concluding ceremonials of the season.
The long verandas were thickly hung with numberless paper-lanterns, swinging continually in the
soft night-winds that stole down from the star-lit




TABOO.-A F'TE-DAY IN  TAHITI.   105
slopes of Fautahua; the broad lawns in front of
the palace were blocked out in squares, like the
map of a liliputian city.  Each one of these plats
was set apart for a band of singers, and there were
as many bands as districts in Tahiti and Moorea,
together with delegations from  islands more remote.  Soon the choruses began to  assemble.
Choirs of fifty voices each, male and female, led by
tight-headed drums and screaming fifes, drew toward the palace-gardens, and were formally admitted by the proper authorities, who were very much
swollen with the pomp of office and, perhaps, a
little sprinkle of the exhilarating accompaniments
of the season.  One after another the white-robed
processions approached,   each fresh arrival looking more like the chorus in "Norma" than the
last, though it then seemed impossible that any
Druid could presume to appear more gracefully
ghostlike.  Each singer wore a plume of cocoaleaves, whose feathers were more lovely than the
downy wands of the ostrich. They were made of
knots of long, slender ribbons, softer than satin,
veined like clouded silver, as transparent as the
clearest isinglass, and as delicate as the airiest
gauze.
Out of the core of the palm-tree, in the midst of
its rich, dark mass of foliage, springs a tuft of
leaves as tender as the first sprouts of a lily-bulb.
These budding leaves are carefully removed, split
edgewise, and the enamelled sheets laid open to the
5*




106            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
sun; then, with the thumb-nail, passed skilfully
over the inner surface, a filmy membrane is separated, and spread in the air to dry.  A single tree
yields but a small cluster of these pale, cloud-like
leaves, scarcely a handful in all, yet the tree withers when they pluck the heart of it.  It is the very
soul of the Southern palm, with every leaf spiritualized, and looking vapory as tangible moonlight.
The leader of the concert having challenged the
choruses from the veranda of the palace, at once
twenty choirs struck into their particular anthem
with the utmost zeal.  A discord about six acres
in extent was the result. It seemed as though
each choir was seeking whom  it might drown out
with superior vocal compass and volume.  With
much difficulty the several bands of singers were
persuaded to await their turn for a solo effort that
might be listened to with no small degree of pleasure.  From time to time, during the entire evening, some obstreperous chorus would break loose,
spite of every precaution; and it had always to
sing itself out before order could be restored.
Taboo would have thoroughly enjoyed those two
thousand singers, each singing his or her favorite
roundelay, independent of all laws of time and
melody.  He might have been there, as it was,
offering his inharmonious chant with the mob of
contestants.
By the time the series of prize-songs had been
sung, the sky grew cloudy, and the torches began




TABOO.-A FETE-DAY IN  TAHITI.  107
to flicker in the increasing wind; a few great drops
of rain spat down in the midst of the singers, and
the reef moaned loudly, like the baying of signalguns.  It was ominous of coming storms.  At the
climax of a choral revolution, in which every
man's voice seemed raised against his neighbor's, a
roar as of approaching armies was heard, mingled
with the accompanying crash of artillery. A sudden puff of wind extinguished the major part of
the torches, and wrecked many of the lanterns in
the palace porch. It was simply a tropical shower
in all its magnificence; but it was enough! The
fete concluded then and there, in the promptest
manner.  The narrow  streets of Papeete were
clogged with retreating hosts, who continually
shouted a sort of general adieu to everybody, as
they gathered their skirts about them, and, with
shoes in hand, turned their bare feet homeward.
Since the end had at last come, and I had no
further claims upon the people, nor the people
upon me, - if, indeed, either of us were ever anything in particular to one another, — I drifted
with the majority, and soon found myself in the
suburban wilderness that girdles the small capital
of the queendom.  I wandered on till the noise
of the revellers grew more and more indistinct.
They were scattering themselves over the length
and breadth of the island, carrying their songs
with them.  Now and then a fresh gust of wind
bore down to me an echo of a refrain that had




108           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
grown familiar during the days of the fete, and
will not soon be forgotten; but the past was
rapidly fading, and the necessities of the future
began to present themselves with unusual boldness. Instinctively I turned into the winding
trail that once before had led me toward that
mysterious mountain sacristy, over whose font fell
the spiritual and dreamlike rivulet whose baptismal virtues Taboo and I had sought together.  I
felt certain that I could find it without guidance;
for the broken clouds let slip such floods of moonlight as made day of darkness, and rendered the
smallest landmark easily distinguishable.
I paused for rest in the breadfruit grove where
first I met with my weird companion. Presently
I resumed my pilgrimage, wending my way toward
the slender path that led through fern, forest, and
bamboo-jungle, to the crystal lake and waterfall.
In vain I sought it; the slightest traces of the
trail seemed obliterated.  I wandered  up and
down the winding way, till I was in despair of
finding the slightest clew to the mystery.  I sat
down and thought how a slight accident of forgetfulness was lending a sense of enchantment to the
whole valley, when I heard a stumbling step, too
marked to be soon forgotten.  I crept into a
shadow, and awaited the approach of the solitary
wanderer.  How  he tottered as he drew  near!
He seemed to have lost part of his small skill
since I last saw him.  He was laughing quietly




TABOO.-A FITE-DAY IN TAHITI.  109
to himself while he journeyed: perhaps some
memory of the fete still pleased him. He passed
me, unconscious of my presence. I ran cautiously,
and followed him at a safe distance.  We threaded
the old path, by stream  and cliff and brake, and,
after a little, reached the secluded and silent
borders of the lake.  Once or twice he had heard
me as I brushed past the bamboos or a twig
snapped  under  foot, but  those  forest-sounds
scarcely disconcerted him; he was too well used
to them.  He paused at the margin of the lake,
stooped awkwardly and drank of it, went a little
to one side where an outlet fed the torrent we had
forded some distance down the valley, and there
he bathed.  Having started  once or twice, as
though with some remembered and definite purpose, he paused a moment or two, looked about
him helplessly, and returned to the foot of the
great tree where we slept the first night of our
acquaintance.
There was a faint suggestion of the fall across
the sombre  breast of the cliff opposite, but
whether it were real or a delusion, I could scarcely
determine.  Taboo was soon asleep among the
roots of the banyan; and I, weary of seeking
some revelation of the island mysteries, lay down
near him, and gradually sank into unconsciousness.  Once in the night I awoke: the clouds had
blown over, and the moon was more resplendent
than I ever remember to have seen it.  Out on




110            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
the mossy rim  of the lake stood Taboo, gazing
wistfully upon the mountains.  Instinctively my
eves followed his, and there I beheld the waterfall
in all its glory, leaping, like a ray of light, from
the bosom of the sky.  I could scarcely determine
whether or no it really fell into the lake, for the
foliage about its shores was too profuse. It flashed
like handfuls of diamond-dust thrown  into the
light, and descended as noiselessly and airily as
vapor.
The clouds soon gathered again. I slept, overcome with weariness; and when I awoke at dawn,
Taboo was missing, as well as all traces of the
fall. This, however, scarcely surprised me, for I
had grown to look upon it as some lunar effect
that came and went with the increasing or decreasing splendor of the moon; or it might have been
the short-lived offspring of the showers that sweep
over the island at uncertain  intervals.  It was
probably the only dramatic result to be looked for
in the career of Taboo.  You never can depend
upon one of those veering minds, whose north-star
has burned out in oblivion.  I believe it was his
destiny to disappear with that rainbow, and, perhaps, return with it when the fall should noiselessly steal down the mountain once more.
He may have had an object in secreting himself for a season; perhaps he was renewing his
youthful innocence in some more solitary spot.
He may have gone apart to laugh by the hour at




TABOO. —A FLTEI-DAY  IN TAHITI.  111
the folly of the foreigners who fete a disgraced
emperor; or was he making his queer noises to
hear the queerer echoes that came back to him,
and all the while caring no more for life or death
than a parrot or a magpie, or even a poor, halfshapen soul, — one of those sacred idiots that
have found worshippers before now, and never yet
failed to awaken a chord of sympathy in the heart
that is fashioned after the Divine pattern of the
Son of God.




JOE OF LAHAINA.
I.
WAS stormed in at Lahaina.  Now, Lahaina is a little slice of civilization,
beached on the shore of barbarism.  One
can easily stand that little of it, for brown and
brawny heathendom becomes more wonderful and
captivating by contrast. So I was glad of dear,
drowsy, little Lahaina; and was glad, also, that
she had but one broad street, which possibly led
to destruction, and yet looked lovely in the distance.  It did n't matter to me that the one broad
street had but one side to it; for the sea lapped
over the sloping sands on its lower edge, and the
sun used to set right in the face of every solitary
citizen of Lahaina, just as he went to supper.
I was waiting to catch a passage in a passing
schooner, and that's why I, came there; but the
schooner flashed by us in a great gale from the
south, and so I was stormed in indefinitely.
It was Holy Week, and I concluded to go to
housekeeping, because it would be so nice to have




JOE OF LAHAINA.              113
my frugal meals in private, to go to mass and vespers daily, and then to come back and feel quite
at home. My villa was surburban, - built of dried
grasses on the model of a haystack, dug out in
the middle, with doors and windows let into the
four sides thereof. It was planted in the midst
of a vineyard, with avenues stretching in all directions, under a network of stems and tendrils.
"Her breath is sweeter than the sweet winds
That breathe over the grape-blossoms of Lahaina."
So the song said; and I began to think upon the
surpassing sweetness of that breath, as I inhaled
the sweet winds of Lahaina, while the wilderness
of its vineyards blossomed like the rose. I used
to sit in my veranda and turn to Joe (Joe was my
private and confidential servant), and I would say
to Joe, while we scented the odor of grape, and
saw the great banana-leaves waving their cambric
sails, and heard the sea moaning in the melancholy
distance, - I would say to him, "Joe, housekeeping is good fun, is n't it l " Whereupon Joe would
utter a sort of unanimous Yes, with his whole body
and soul; so that question was carried triumphantly, and we would relapse into a comfortable
silence, while the voices of the wily singers down
on the city front would whisper to us, and cause
us to wonder what they could possibly be doing at
that moment in the broad way that led to destruction.  Then we would take a drink of cocoa-milk,
H




114           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
and finish our bananas, and go to bed, because we
had nothing else to do.
This is the way that we began our co-operative
housekeeping: One night, when there was a riotous sort of a festival off in a retired valley, I saw,
in the excited throng of natives who were going
mad over their national dance, a young face that
seemed to embody a whole tropical romance. On
another night, when a lot of us were bathing in
the moonlight, I saw a figure so fresh and joyous
that I began to realize how the old Greeks could
worship mere physical beauty and  forget its
higher forms. Then I discovered that face on
this body, -a rare enough combination, - and
the whole constituted Joe, a young scapegrace
who was schooling at Lahaina, under the eyenot a very sharp one - of his uncle.  When I
got stormed in, and resolved on housekeeping for
a season, I took Joe, bribing his uncle to keep the
peace, which he promised to do, provided I gave
bonds for Joe's irreproachable conduct while with
me.  I willingly gave bonds - verbal ones - for
this was just what I wanted of Joe: namely, to
instil into his youthful mind  those counsels
which, if rigorously followed, must result in his
becoming a true and unterrified American.  This
compact settled, Joe took up his bed, - a roll of
mats, -and down we marched to my villa, and
began housekeeping in good earnest.
We soon got settled, and began to enjoy life,




JOE OF LAHAINA.               115
though we were not without occasional domestic infelicities. For instance, Joe would wake up in the
middle of the night, declaring to me that it was
morning, and thereupon insist upon sweeping out at
once, and in the most vigorous manner. Having
filled the air with dust, he would rush off to the
baker's for our hot rolls and a pat of breakfast butter, leaving me, meantime, to recover as I might.
Having settled myself for a comfortable hour's
reading, bolstered up in a luxurious fashion, Joe
would enter with breakfast, and orders to the effect that it be eaten at once and without delay.
It was useless for me to remonstrate with him:
he was tyrannical.
He got me into all sorts of trouble.  It was
Holy Week, and I had resolved upon going to
mass and vespers daily. I went. The soft nightwinds floated in through the latticed windows of
the chapel, and made the candles flicker upon
the altar.  The little throng of natives bowed in
the impressive silence, and were deeply moved.
It was rest for the soul to be there; yet, in the
midst of it, while the Father, with his pale, sad
face, gave his instructions, to which we listened
as attentively as possible, - for there was something in his manner and his voice that made us
better creatures, - while we listened, in the midst
of it I heard a shrill little whistle, a sort of chirp,
that I knew perfectly well.  It was Joe, sitting
on a cocoa-stump in the garden adjoining, and




116           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
beseeching me to come out, right off. When
service was over, I remonstrated with him for his
irreverence.  "Joe," I said, "if you have no
respect for religion yourself, respect those who
are more fortunate than you."  But Joe was
dressed in his best, and quite wild at the entrancing loveliness of the night. " Let's walk a little,"
said Joe, covered with fragrant wreaths, and redolent of cocoanut-oil. What could I do. If I had
tried to do anything to the contrary, he might
have taken me and thrown me away somewhere
into a well, or a jungle, and then I could no longer
hope to touch the chord of remorse, - which chord
I sought vainly, and which I have since concluded
was not in Joe's physical corporation at all. So
we walked a little.  In vain I strove to break Joe
of the shocking habit of whistling me out of vespers.  He would persist in doing it.  Moreover,
during the day he would collect crusts of bread
and banana-skins, station himself in ambush behind the curtain of the window next the lane, and,
as some solitary creature strode solemnly past, Joe
would discharge a volley of ammunition over him,
and then laugh immoderately at his indignation
and surprise. Joe was my pet elephant, and I was
obliged to play with him very cautiously.
One morning he disappeared. I was without the
consolations of a breakfast, even. I made my
toilet, went to my portmanteau for my purse, - for
I had decided upon a visit to the baker, - when




JOE OF LAHAINA.              117
lo! part of my slender means had mysteriously
disappeared. Joe was gone, and the money also.
All day I thought about it. In the morning, after
a very long and miserable night, I woke up, and
when I opened my eyes, there, in the doorway,
stood Joe, in a brand-new suit of clothes, including boots and hat.  He was gorgeous beyond description, and seemed overjoyed to see me, and
as merry as though nothing unusual had happened.
I was quite startled at this apparition. "Joseph!"
I said in my severest tone, and then turned over
and looked away from him.  Joe evaded the subject in the most delicate manner, and was never
so interesting as at that moment. He sang his
specialties, and played clumsily upon his bamboo
flute, - to soothe me, I suppose, - and wanted me
to eat a whole flat pie which he had brought home
as a peace-offering, buttoned tightly under his
jacket.  I saw I must strike at once, if I struck
at all; so I said, "Joe, what on earth did you
do with that money  "  Joe said he had replenished his wardrobe, and bought the flat pie especially for me.  "Joseph," I said, with great
dignity, " do you know that you have been stealing, and that it is highly sinful to steal, and may
result in something unpleasant in the world to
come. "  Joe said, " Yes," pleasantly, though I
hardly think he meant it; and then he added,
mildly, "that he couldn't lie,"    which was a
glaring falsehood,   "but wanted me to be sure




118           SO UTH-SEA IDYLS.
that he took the money, and so had come back to
tell me."
" Joseph," I said, i you remind me of our noble
Washington; and, to my amazement, Joe was
mortified.  He did n't, of course, know who Washington was, but he suspected that I was ridiculing
him.  He came to the bed and haughtily insisted
upon my taking the little change he had received
from his costumers, but I implored him to keep
it, as I had no use at all for it, and, as I assured
him, I much preferred hearing it jingle in his
pocket.
The next day I sailed out of Lahaina, and Joe
came to the beach with his new trousers tucked
into his new boots, while he waved his new hat violently in a final adieu, much to the envy and admiration of a score of hatless urchins, who looked upon
Joe as the glass of fashion, and but little lower than
the angels.  When I entered the boat to set sail,
a tear stood in Joe's bright eye, and I think he
was really sorry to part with me; and I don't
wonder at it, because our housekeeping experiences were new to him, - and, I may add, not unprofitable.
II.
Some months of mellow and beautiful weather
found me wandering here and there among the
islands, when the gales came on again, and I was




JOE OF LAIIAINA.              119
driven about homeless, and sometimes friendless,
until, by and by, I heard of an opportunity to
visit Molokai, - an island seldom  visited by the
tourist, -  where, perhaps, I could get a close view
of a singularly sad and interesting  colony of
lepers.
The whole island is green, but lonely. As you ride
over its excellent turnpike, you see the ruins of a
nation that is passing, like a shadow, out of sight.
Deserted  garden-patches, crumbling walls, and
roofs tumbled into the one- state-chamber of the
house, while knots of long grass wave at halfnast
in the chinks and crannies.  A  land of great
traditions, of magic, and'witchcraft, and spirits.
A fertile and fragrant solitude.  How I enjoyed
it; and yet how it was all telling upon me, in its
own way! One cannot help feeling sad  there,
for he seems to be living and moving in a long
revery, out of which he dreads to awaken to a
less pathetic life.  I rode a day or two among the
solemn and reproachful ruins with inexpressible
complacence, and, having finally climbed a series
of verdant and downy hills, and ridden for twenty
minutes in a brisk shower, came suddenly upon
the brink of a great precipice, three thousand feet
in the air.  My horse instinctively braced himself, and I nervously jerked the bridle square up to
my breastbone, as I found we were poised between heaven and earth, upon a trembling pinnacle of rock. A broad peninsula was stretched




120            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
below me, covered with grassy hills; here and
there clusters of brown huts were visible, and to
the right, the white dots of houses to which I was
hastening, for that was the leper village.  To
that spot were the wandering and afflicted tribes
brought home to die.  Once descending the narrow stairs in the cliff under me, never again could
they hope to strike their tents and resume their
pilgrimage; for the curse was on them, and neces-.
sity had narrowed down their sphere of action to
this compass, - a solitary slope between sea and
land, with the invisible sentinels of Fear and Fate
forever watching its borders.
I seemed to be looking into a fiery furnace,
wherein walked the living bodies of those whom
Death had already set his seal upon.  What a
mockery it seemed to be climbing down that crag,
through wreaths of vine, and under leafy cataracts breaking into a foam of blossoms a thousand
feet below me; swinging aside the hanging parasites that obstructed the narrow way, - entering
the valley of death, and the very mouth of hell,
by these floral avenues!
A brisk ride of a couple of miles across the
breadth of the peninsula brought me to the gate
of the keeper of the settlement, and there I dismounted, and hastened into the house, to be rid
of the curious crowd that had gathered to receive
me.  The little cottage was very comfortable, my
host and hostess friends of precious memory; and




JOE OF LAIIAINA.              121
with them I felt at once at home, and began the
new life that every one begins when the earth
seems to have been suddenly transformed  into
some better or worse world, and he alone survives
the transformation.
Have you never had such an experience. Then
go into the midst of a community of lepers; have
ever before your eyes their Gorgon-like faces; see
the horrors, hardly to be recognized as human,
that grope about you; listen in vain for the voices
that have been hushed forever by decay; breathe
the tainted atmosphere; and bear ever in mind
that, while they hover about you, - forbidden to
touch you, yet longing to clasp once more a hand
that is perfect and pure, -the insidious seeds of
the malady may be generating in your vitals, and
your heart, even then, be drunk with death!
I might as well confess that I slept indifferently
the first night; that I was not entirely free from
nervousness the next day, as I passed through the
various wards assigned to patients in every stage
of decomposition. But I recovered myself in time
to observe the admirable system  adopted by the
Hawaiian government for the protection of its unfortunate people.  I used to sit by the window
and see the processions of the less afflicted come
for little measures of milk, morning and evening.
Then there was a continuous raid upon the ointment-pot, with the contents of which they delighted to anoint themselves.  Trifling disturbances
6




122           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
sometimes brought the plaintiff and defendant to
the front gate, for final judgment at the hands of
their beloved keeper. And it was a constant entertainment to watch the progress of events in
that singular little world of doomed spirits.  They
were not unhappy.  I used to hear them  singing
every evening: their souls were singing while their
bodies were falling rapidly to dust.  They continued to play their games, as well as they could
play them with the loss of a finger-joint or a toe,
from week to week: it is thus gradually and thus
slowly that they died, feeling their voices growing
fainter and their strength less, as the idle days
passed over them and swept them to the tomb.
Sitting at the window on the second evening,
as the patients came up for milk, I observed one
of them watching me intently, and apparently try-'ing to make me understand something or other,
but what that something was I could not guess.
He rushed to the keeper and talked excitedly with
him for a moment, and then withdrew to one side
of the gate and waited till the others were served
with their milk, still watching me all the while.
Then the keeper entered and told me how I had a
friend out there who wished to speak with me, 
some one who had seen me somewhere, he supposed, but whom I would hardly remember.  It
was their way never to forget a face they had once
become familiar with.  Out I went.  There was
a face I could not have recognized as anything




JOE OF LAHAINA.              123
friendly or human.  Knots of flesh stood out upon
it; scar upon scar disfigured it. The expression
was like that of a mummy, stony and withered.
The outlines of a youthful figure were preserved,
but the hands and feet were pitiful to look at.
What was this ogre that knew me and loved me
still.
He soon told me who he had once been, but
was no longer.  Our little, unfortunate " Joe," my
Lahaina charge. In his case the disease had spread
with fearful rapidity: the keeper thought he could
hardly survive the year. Many linger year after
year, and cannot die; but Joe was more fortunate.
His life had been brief and passionate, and death
was now hastening him to his dissolution.
Joe was forbidden to come near me, so he
crouched down by the fence, and pressing his hands
between the pickets sifted the dust at my feet,
while he wailed in a low voice, and called me,
over and over, "dear friend," "good friend," and
" master." I wish I had never seen him so humbled.  To think of my disreputable little protege,
who was wont to lord it over me as though he had
been a born chief, - to think of Joe as being there
in his extremity, grovelling in the dust at my feet;
forbidden to climb the great wall of flowers that
towered between him  and his beautiful world,
while the rough sea lashed the coast about him,
and his only companions were such hideous foes
as would frighten one out of a dream 




124           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
How I wanted to get close to him! but I dared
not; so we sat there with the slats of the fence
between us, while we talked very long in the twilight; and I was glad when it grew so dark that
I could no longer see his face,- his terrible face,
that came to kill the memory of his former beauty.
And Joe wondered whether I still remembered
how we used to walk in the night, and go home,
at last, to our little house when Lahaina was as
still as death, and you could almost hear the great
stars throbbing in the clear sky! How well I remembered it, and the day when we went a long way
down the beach, and, looking back, saw a wide
curve of the land cutting the sea like a sickle, and
turning up a white and shining swath! Then, in
another place, a grove of cocoa-palms and a melancholy, monastic-looking building, with splendid
palm-branches in its broad windows; for it was
just after Palm Sunday, and the building belonged
to a Sisterhood.  And I remembered how the
clouds fell and the rain drove us into a sudden
shelter, and we ate tamarind-jam, spread thick on
thin slices of bread, and were supremely happy.
In this connection, I could not forget how Joe became very unruly about that time, and I got mortified, and found great difficulty in getting him
home at all; and yet the memory of it would have
Ibeen perfect but for this fate.  0 Joe! my poor,
dear, terrible cobra! to think that I should ever
be afraid to look into your face in my life!




JOE OF LAHAINA.              125
Joe wanted to call to my mind one other reminiscence, - a night when we two walked to the old
wharf, and went out to the end of it, and sat there
looking inland, watching the inky waves slide up
and down the beach, while the full moon rose over
the superb mountains where the clouds were
heaped like wool, and the very air seemed full of
utterances that you could almost hear and understand but for something that made them  all a
mystery. I tried then, if ever I tried in my life,
to make Joe a little less bad than he was naturally,
and he seemed nearly inclined to be better, and
would, I think, have been so, but for the thousand
temptations that gravitated to him when we got
on solid earth again.  He forgot my precepts then,
and I'm afraid I forgot them myself. Joe remembered that night vividly. I was touched to hear
him confess it; and I pray earnestly that that one
moment may plead for him in the last day, if,
indeed, he needs any special plea other than that
Nature has published for her own.
" Sing for me, Joe," said I; and Joe, still crouching on the other side of the lattice, sang some of
his old songs.  One of them, a popular melody,
was echoed through the little settlement, where
faint voices caught up the chorus, and the night
was wildly and weirdly musical. We walked by
the sea the next day, and the day following that,
Joe taking pains to stay on the leeward side of
me, -- he was so careful to keep the knowledge of




126           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
his fate uppermost in his mind: how could I dismiss it from my own, when it was branded in his
countenance? The desolated beauty of his face
plead for measureless pity, and I gave it, out of
my prodigality, yet felt that I could not begin to
give sufficient.
Link by link he was casting off his hold on life;
he was no longer a complete being; his soul was
prostrated in the miry clay, and waited, in agony,
its long deliverance.
In leaving the leper village, I had concluded
to say nothing to Joe, other than the usual " aloha"
at night, when I could ride off, in the darkness,
Iand, sleeping at the foot of the cliff, ascend it in
the first light of morning, and. get well on. my
journey before the heat of the day.  We took a
last walk by the rocks on the shore; heard the
sea breathing its long breath under the hollow
cones of lava, with a noise like a giant leper in
his asthmatic agony. Joe heard it, and laughed
a little, and then grew silent; and finally said he
wanted to leave the place,- he hated it; he loved
Lahaina dearly: how was everybody in Lahaina.
- a question he had asked me hourly since my
arrival.
When night came I asked Joe to sing, as usual;
so he gathered his mates about him, and they sang
the songs I liked best. The voices rang, sweeter
than ever, up from the group of singers congregated
a few rods off, in the darkness; and while they sang,




JOE OF LAHATNA,                 127
my horse was saddled, and I quietly bade adieu to
my dear friends, the keepers, and mounting, walked
the horse slowly up the grass-grown road. I shall
never see little Joe again, with his pitiful face,
growing gradually as dreadful as a cobra's, and
almost as fascinating in its hideousness,  I waited,
a little way off, in the darkness, -  waited  and
listened, till the last song was ended, and I knew
he would be looking for me, to say Good night.
But he didn't find me; and he will never again
find me in this life, for I left him  sitting in the
dark door of his sepulchre, -  sitting and singing
in the mouth of his grave,-  clothed all in death.




THE NIGHT-DANCERS OF WAIPIO.
HE afternoon sun was tinting the snowy
crest of Mauna Kea, and folds of shadow
were draping the sea-washed eastern cliffs
of Hawaii, as Felix and I endeavored to persuade
our fagged steeds that they must go and live, or
stay and die in the middle of a lava-trail by no
means inviting.  As we rode, we thought of the
scandal that had so recently regaled our too willing ears: here it is, in a mild solution, to be taken
with three parts of disbelief.
Two venerable and warm-hearted missionaries,
whose good works seemed to have found dissimilar
expression, equally effective, I trust, proved their
specialties to be church-building.
Rev. Mr. A seemed to think the more the merrier, and his pretty little meeting-houses looked
as though they had been baked in the lot, like a
sheet of biscuits; while Rev. Mr. B condensed his
efforts into the consummation of one resplendent
edifice.  Mr. A was always wondering why Mr. B
should waste his money in a single church, while
Mr. B was nonplussed at seeing Mr. A break out




TIE NIGHT-DANCERS OF TWAIPIO.  129
in a rash of diminutive chapels. Well, Felix and
I were riding northward up the coast, over dozens
and dozens of lovely ridges; through scores of
deep gullies cushioned with ferns as high as our
pommels, and fording numberless streams, white
with froth and hurry, eagerly seeking the most
exquisite valley in the Pacific, as some call it.
We rode till we were tired out twenty times
over; again and again we looked forward to the
bit of Mardi-life we were about to experience in
the vale of the Waipio, while now and then we
passed one of Mr. A's pretty little churches.  Once
we were impatient enough to make inquiry of a
native who was watching our progress with. considerable emotion: there is always some one to
watch you when you are wishing yourself at the
North Pole.  Our single spectator affected an air
of gravity, and seemed quite interested as he said,
" Go six or seven churches farther on that trail, and
you'11 come to Waipio."  On we went with renewed
spirits, for the churches were frequent, almost
within sight of each other. But we faltered presently and lost our reckoning, they were so much
alike.  Again we asked our way of a solitary
watcher on a hill-top, who had had his eye upon
us ever since we rose above the rim of the third
ridge back: he revealed to us the glad fact that
we were only two churches from Paradise! How
we tore over the rest of that straight and narrow
way with the little life left to us, and came in
6*                     i




130           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
finally all of a foam, fairly jumping the last mite
of a chapel that hung upon the brink of the beautiful valley like a swallow's nest! And down we
dropped into fifty fathoms of the sweetest twilight
imainable, - so sweet it seemed to have been born
of a wilderness of the night-blooming cereus and
fed forever on jasmine buds.
There were shelter and refreshment for two hungry souls, and we slid out of our saddles as though
we had been boned expressly for a cannibal feast.
By this time the rosy flush on Mauna Kea had
faded, and its superb brow was pale with an unearthly pallor.  " Come in," said the host; and he
led us under the thatched gable, that was fragrant
as new-mown hay.  There we sat, "in," as he
called it, though there was never a side to the
concern thicker than a shadow.
A stream flowed noiselessly at our feet. Canoes
drifted by us, with dusky and nude forms bowed
over the paddles.  Each occupant greeted us,
being guests in the valley, just lifting their slumberous eyelids, - masked batteries, that made Felix forget his danger; they seldom  paused, but
called back to us from the gathering darkness with
inexpressibly tender, contralto voices.
Thereupon we were summoned to dinner in
another apartment, screened with vines. The faint
flicker of the tapers suggested that what breath
of air might be stirring came from the mountain,
and it brought with it a message from the orangery




THE NIGHT-DANCERS OF VWAIPIO.  131
up the valley. "How will you take your oranges' "
queried Felix; "in pulp, liquid, or perfume I" -
and such a dense odor swept past us at the moment,
I thought I had taken them in the triple forms.
"You are just in time," said our host.  "Why,
what's up 3 " asked I. " The moon will be up presently, and after moonrise you shall see the hulahula."
Felix desired to be enlightened as to the nature
of the what-you-call-it, and was assured that it
was worth seeing, and would require no explanatory chorus when its hour came.
It was at least a mile to the scene of action; a
tortuous stream wound thither, navigable in spots,
but from time to time the canoe would have to
take to the banks for a short cut into deeper
water.
" I can never get there." growled Felix; "I'm
full of needles and pins"; to which the host responded by excusing himself for a few moments,
leaving Felix and me alone.  It was deathly still
in the valley, though a thousand crickets sang,
and the fish smacked their round mouths at the
top of the water. Evening comes slowly in those
beloved tropics, but it comes so satisfactorily that
there is nothing left out.
A  moonlight night is a continuous festival.
The natives sing and dance till daybreak, making
it all up by sleeping till the next twilight.  Nothing is lost by this ingenious and admirable ar



132            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
rangement.  Why should they sleep, when a night
there has the very essence of five nights anywhere
else, extracted and enriched with spices till it is so
inspiring that the soul cries out in triumph, and
the eyes could n't sleep if they would.
At this period, enter to us the host, with several
young native girls, who seat themselves at our
feet, clasping each a boot-leg encasing the extremities of Felix and myself.
Felix kicked violently, and left the room with
some embarrassment, and I appealed to the hospitable gentleman of the house, who was smiling
somewhat audibly at our perplexity.
He assured me that if I would throw  myself
upon the mats in the corner, two of these maids
would speedily relieve me of any bodily pain I
might at that moment be suffering with.
I did so: the two proceeded as set down in
the verbal prospectus; and whatever bodily pain
I may have possessed at the beginning of the process speedily dwindled into insignificance by comparison with the tortures of my novel cure. Every
limb had to be unjointed and set over again.
Places were made for new joints, and I think the
new joints were temporarily set in, for my arms
and legs went into angles I had never before seen
them in, nor have I since been able to assume
those startling attitudes. The stomach was then
kneaded like dough. The ribs were crushed down
against the spine, and then forced- out by well-di



THE NIGHT-DANCERS OF WAIPIO.  133
rected blows in the back. The spinal column was
undoubtedly abstracted, and some mechanical substitute now does its best to help me through the
world.  The arms were tied in bow-knots behind,
and the skull cracked like the shell of a hard-boiled
egg, worked into shape again, and left to heal.
By this time I was unconscious, and for an hour
my sleep promised to be eternal.  I must have
lain flat on the matting, without a curve in me,
when Nature, taking pity, gradually let me rise
and assume my own proportions, as though a little
leaven had been mixed in my making over.
The awakening was like coming from a bath of
the elements. I breathed to the tips of my toes.
Perfumes penetrated me till I was saturated with
them. I felt a thousand years younger; and as
I looked back upon the old life I seemed to have
risen from, I thought of it much as a butterfly
must think of his grub-hood, and was in the act of
expanding my wings, when I saw Felix, just recovering, a few feet from me, apparently as ecstatic as myself. I never dared to ask him how he
was reduced to submission, for I little imagined he
could so far forget himself. There are some sudden and inexplicable revolutions in the affairs of
humanity that should not be looked into too closely, because a chaotic chasm yawns between the old
man and the new, which no one has ever yet explored.  Felix sprang to his feet like Prometheus
unbound, and embraced me with fervor, as one




134           SOUTH-SEA iD YLS.
might after a hair-breadth escape, exclaiming,
"Did you ever see anything like it, Old Boy 2"
to which the Old Boy, thus familiarly addressed
(0. B. is a pet monogram of mine, designed and
frequently executed by Felix), responded, " There
was n't much to see, but my feelings were past expression."  " What's its name? " asked Felix.  "I
think they call it lomi-lomi," said I.  "Pass lomilomi!" shouted Felix; and then we both roared
again, which summoned the host, who congratulated us and invited us to his canoe.
Felix again endeavored to fathom the mysteries
of the hdula-hula.  Was it something to eat?-did
they keep it tied in the daytime.- what was its
color? etc., till the amused gentleman who was
conducting us to an exhibition of the great Unknown nearly capsized our absurdly narrow canoe
in the very deepest part of the creek.  Bands of
fishermen and women passed us, wading breasthigh in the water, beating it into a foam before
them, and singing at the top of their voices as
they drove the fish down stream into a broad net
a few rods below.  Grass-houses, half buried in
foliage, lined the mossy banks; while the dusky
groups of women and children, clustering about
the smouldering flames that betokened the preparation of the evening meal, added not a little to
the poetry of twilight in the tropics.
Felix thought he would like to turn Kanaka on
the spot; so we beached the canoe, and approached




THE NIGHT-DANCERS OF WAIPIO.   135
the fire, built on a hollow  stone under a tamarind-tree, and were at once offered the cleanest
mat to sit on, and a calabash of poi for our refreshment.  How to eat paste without a spoon was
the next question.  The whole family volunteered
to show us; drew  up around the calabash in a
hungry circle, and dipped in with a vengeance.
Six right hands spread their first and second fingers like sign-boards pointing to a focus in the
very centre of that poi-paste; six fists dove simultaneously, and were buried in the luscious mass.
There was a spasmodic working in the elbows, an
effort to come to the top, and in a moment the
hands were lifted aloft in triumph, and seemed to
be tracing half a dozen capital O's in the transparent air, during which manceuvre the mass of poi
adhering to the fingers assumed fair proportions,
resembling, to a remarkable degree, large, white
swellings; whereupon they were immediately conveyed to the several mouths, instinctively getting
into the right one, and, having discharged freight,
reappeared as good as ever, if not better than before.
"Disgusting!" gasped Felix, as he returned to
the water-side.  I thought him  unreasonable in
his harsh judgment, assuring him  that our own
flour was fingered as often before it came, at last,
to our lips in the form of bread.  "Moreover," I
added, "this poi is glutinous: the moment a finger enters it, a thin coating adheres to the skin,




136            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
and that finger may wander about the calabash all
day without touching another particle of the substance. Therefore, six or sixteen fellows fingering
in one dish for dinner are in reality safer than we,
who eat steaks that have been mesmerized under
the hands of the butcher and the cook."
Felix scorned to reply, but breathed a faint
prayer for a safe return to Chicago, as we slid into
the middle of the stream, and resumed our course.
The boughs of densely leaved trees reached out
to one another across the water.  We proceeded
with more caution as the channel grew narrow;
and pressing through a submerged thicket of reeds,
we routed a flock of water-fowls that wheeled overhead on heavy wings, filling the valley with their
clamor.
Two or three dogs barked sleepily off somewhere
in the darkness, and the voice of some one calling
floated to us as clear as a bird's note, though we
knew it must be far away.  We strode through a
cane-field, its smoky plumes just tipped with
moonlight, and saw the pinnacle of Mauna Kea,
as spacious and splendid as the fairy pavilion that
Nourgihan brought to Pari-Banou, illuminated as
for a festival.  To the left, a stream  fell from the
cliff, a ribbon of gauze fluttering noiselessly in the
wind.
" O, look! " said Felix, who had yielded again to
the influences of Nature. Looking, I saw the moon
resting upon the water for a moment, while the




THE NIGHT-DAN CERS OF WAIPIO    137
dew seemed actually to drip from her burnished
disk. Again Felix exclaimed, or was on the point
of exclaiming, when he checked himself in awe.
I ran to him, and was silent with him, while we
two stood worshipping one stately palm that rested its glorious head upon the glowing bosom of
the moon, like the Virgin in the radiant aureola.
"Well," said our host, "supposing  we get
along!"  We got along, by land and water, into
a village in an orange-grove. There was a subdued murmur of many voices.  I think the whole
community would have burst out into a song of
some sort at the slightest provocation.  On we
paced, in Indian file, through narrow lanes, under
the shining leaves. Pale blossoms rained down
upon us, and the air was oppressively sweet.
Groups of natives sat in the lanes, smoking and
laughing. Lovers made love in the face of heaven,
utterly unconscious of any human presence. Felix
grew  nervous, and proposed withdrawing; but
whither, O Felix, in all these islands, wouldst thou
hope to find love unrequited, or lovers shamefaced
withal. Much Chicago hath made thee mad!
Through a wicket we passed, where a sentinel
kept ward.  Within the bamboo paling, a swarm
of natives gathered about us, first questioning the
nature of our visit, which having proved entirely
satisfactory, we were welcomed in real earnest,
and offered a mat in an inner room of a large
house, rather superior to the average, and a dis



138           SOUTH- SEA IDYLS.
agreeable liquor, - brewed of oranges, very intoxicating when not diluted, and therefore popular.
We were evidently the lions of the hour, for we
sat in the centre of the first row of spectators who
were gathered to witness the hula-hula.  We reclined as gracefully as possible upon our mats,
supported by plump pillows, stuffed with dried
ferns.  Slender rushes -  strung with kukui-nuts,
about the size of chestnuts, and very oily -- were
planted before us like foot-lights, which, being
lighted at the top, burned slowly downward, till
the whole were consumed, giving a good flame for
several hours.
The great mat upon the floor before us was the
stage.  On one side of it a half-dozen muscular
fellows were squatted, with large calabashes headed with tightly drawn goat-skins. These were the
drummers and  singers, who could beat nimbly
with their fingers, and sing the epics of their
country, to the unceasing joy of all listeners. " It's
an opera  " shouted Felix, in a frenzy of delight at
his discovery.  A dozen performers entered, sitting
in two lines, face to face, — six women and six
men.  Each bore a long joint of bamboo, slit at
one end like a broom.  Then began a singularly
intricate exercise, called pi-ulv.  Taking a bamboo
in one hand, they struck it in the palm  of the
other, on the shoulder, on the floor in front, to
left and right; thrust it out before them, and
were parried by the partners opposite; crossed it




THE NIGHT-DANCERS OF WAIPIO.   139
over and back, and turned in a thousand ways to
a thousand metres, varied with chants and pauses.
"Then it's a pantomime," added Felix, getting
interested in the unusual skill displayed.  For
half an hour or more the thrashing of the bamboos
was prolonged, while we were hopelessly confused
in our endeavors to follow the barbarous harmony,
which was never broken nor disturbed by the expert and tireless performers.
During the first rest, liquor was served in gourds.
Part of the company withdrew to smoke, and'the
conversation became general and noisy.  Felix
was enthusiastic, and drank the health of some of
the younger members of the troupe who had offered
him the gourd.
A rival company then repeated the pi-zul, with
some additions; the gourds were again filled and
emptied.  " Now for the hula-hula," said the host,
who had imbibed with Felix, though he reserved
his enthusiasm for something less childish than
pi-ulu.  It is the national dance, taught to all
children by their parents, but so difficult to excel
in that the few who perfect themselves can afford
to travel on this one specialty.
There was a murmur of impatience, speedily
checked, and followed by a burst of applause, as a
band of beautiful girls, covered with wreaths of
flowers and vines, entered and seated themselves
before us. While the musicians beat an introductory overture upon the tom-toms, the dancers pro



140           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
ceeded to bind shawls and scarfs about their waists,
turban-fashion.  They sat in a line, facing us, a
foot or two apart.  The loose sleeves of their
dresses were caught up at the shoulder, exposing
arms of almost perfect symmetry, while their bare
throats were scarcely hidden by the necklaces of
jasmines that coiled about them.
Then the leader of the band, who sat, grayheaded and wrinkled, at one end of the room,
throwing back his head, uttered a long, wild, and
shrill guttural, - a sort of invocation to the goddess of the hula-hula.  There had, no doubt, been
some sort of sacrifice offered in the early part of
the evening, -- such as a pig or a fowl, - for the
dance has a religious significance, and is attended
by its appropriate ceremonies.  When this clarion
cry had endt'A, the dance began, all joining in with
wonderfully accurate rhythm, the body swaying
slowly backward and forward, to left and right;
the arms tossing, or rather waving, in the air
above the head, now beckoning some spirit of
light, so tender and seductive were the emotions
of the dancers, so graceful and free the movements
of the wrists; now, in violence and fear, they
seemed to repulse a host of devils that hovered
invisibly about them.
The spectators watched and listened breathlessly, fascinated by the terrible wildness of the song
and the monotonous thrumming of the accompaniment. Presently the excitement increased. Swift



THE NIGHT-DANCERS OF WAIPIO.   141
er and more wildly the bare arms beat the air,
embracing, as it were, the airy forms that haunted
the dancers, who rose to their knees, and, with astonishing agility, caused the clumsy turbans about
their loins to quiver with an undulatory motion,
increasing or decreasing with the sentiment of the
song and the enthusiasm of the spectators.
Felix wanted to know  "how long they could
keep that up and live. "
Till daybreak, as we found! There was a little
resting-spell -a very little resting-spell, now and
then   for the gourd's sake, or three whiffs at a
pipe that would poison a White Man in ten minutes; and before we half expected it, or had a
thought of urging the unflagging dancers to renew
their marvellous gyrations, they were at it in
terrible earnest.
From the floor to their knees, from their knees
to their feet, now facing us, now turning from us,
they spun and ambled, till the ear was deafened
with cheers and boisterous, half-drunken, wholly
passionate laughter.
The room whirled with the reeling dancers, who
seemed encircled with living serpents in the act
of swallowing big lumps of something from their
throats clear to the tips of their tails, and the
convulsions continued till the hysterical dancers
staggered and fell to the floor, overcome by unutterable fatigue.
The sympathetic Felix fell with them, his head




142            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
sinking under one of the rush candles, that must
have burned into his brain had he been suffered
to immolate himself at that inappropriate and
unholy time and place.  This was the seductive
dance still practised in secret, though the law forbids it; and to the Hawaiian it is more beautiful,
because more sensuous, than anything else in the
world.
I proposed departing at this stage of the festival, but Felix said it was not practicable.  He felt
unwell, and suggested the efficacy of another attack of lomi-lomi.
A slight variation in the order of the dances
followed. A young lover, seated in the centre of
the room, beat a tattoo upon his calabash and sang
a song of love.  In a moment he was answered.
Out of the darkness rose the sweet, shrill voice
of the loved one.   Nearer and nearer it approached; the voice rang clear and high, melodiously swelling upon the air.  It must have been
heard far off in the valley, it was so plaintive and
penetrating.  Secreted at first behind shawls hung
in the corner of the room, some dramatic effect
was produced by her entrance at the right moment.
She enacted her part with graceful energy.  To
the regular and melancholy thrumming of the
calabash, she sang her song of love. Yielding to
her emotion, she did not hesitate to betray all,
neither was he of the calabash slow to respond;
and, scorning the charms of goat-skin and gourd,




THE NIGHT-DANCERS OF WAIPIO.   143
he sprang toward her in the madness of his soul,
when she; having reached the climax of desperation, was hurried from the scene of her conquest
amid whirlwinds of applause.
"It's a dance, that's what it is!" muttered
Felix, as the audience began slowly to disperse.
Leading him back to the canoe, we had the whole
night's orgie reported to us in a very mixed and
reiterative manner, as well as several attempts at
illustrating the peculiarities of the performance,
which came near resulting in a watery grave
for three, or an upset canoe, at any rate.  Our
host, to excuse any impropriety, for which he felt
more or less responsible, said "it was so natural
for them to be jolly under all circumstances that
when they have concluded to die they make their
P. P. C.'s with infinite grace, and then die on
time."
Of course they are jolly; and to prove it, I told
Felix how the lepers, who had been banished to
one little corner of the kingdom, and forbidden to
leave there in the flesh, were as merry as the
merriest, and once upon a time those decaying
remnants of humanity actually gave a grand ball
in their hospital.  There was a general clearing
out of disabled patients, and a brushing up of old
finery, while the ball itself was the topic of conversation.  Two or three young fellows, who had a
few fingers left (they unjoint and drop off as the
disease progresses), began to pick up a tune or




144           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
two on bamboo flutes.  Old, young, and middleaged took a sly turn in some dark corner, getting
their stiffened joints limber again.
Night came at last.  The lamps flamed in the
death-chamber of the lazar-house.  Many a rejoicing soul had fled from that foul spot, to flash
its white wings in the eternal sunshine.
At an early hour the strange company assembled.
The wheezing of voices no longer musical, the
shuffling of half-paralyzed limbs over the bare floor,
the melancholy droning of those bamboo flutes,
and the wild sea moaning in the wild night were
the sweetest sounds that greeted them.  And
while the flutes piped dolorously to this unlovely.
spectacle, there was a rushing to and fro of unlovely figures; a bleeding, half-blind leper, seizing another of the accursed beings, - snatching her, as it
were, from the grave, in all her loathsome clay, -
dragged her into the bewildering maelstrom of the
waltz.
Naturally excitable, heated with exertion, drunk
with the very odors of death that pervaded the
hall of revels, that mad crowd reeled through the
hours of the fete.  Satiated, at last, in the very
bitterness of their unnatural gayety, they called
for the hzda-hlulct as a fitting close.
In that reeking atmosphere, heavy with the
smoke of half-extinguished lamps, they fed on the
voluptuous abando2n of the dancers till passion
itself fainted with exhaustion.




THE NIGHT-DANCERS OF WAIPIO.   145
"That was a dance of death, was it not, Felix? "
Felix lay on his mat, sleeping heavily, and evidently unmindful of a single word I had uttered.
Our time was up at daybreak, and, with an endless deal of persuasion, Felix followed me out of
the valley to the little chapel on the cliff. Our
horses took a breath there, and so did we, bird'seying the scene of the last night's orgie.
Who says it is n't a delicious spot, - that deep,
narrow, and secluded vale, walled by almost perpendicular cliffs, hung with green tapestries of
ferns and vines; that slender stream, like a thread
of silver, embroidering a carpet of Nature's richest
pattern; that torrent, leaping from the cliff into a
garden of citrons; the sea sobbing at its mouth,
while wary mariners, coasting in summer afternoons, catch glimpses of the tranquil and forbidden
paradise, yet are heedless of all its beauty, and
reck not the rustling of the cane-fields, nor the
voices of the charmers, because - because these
things are so common in that latitude that one
grows naturally indifferent?
As for Felix, who talks in his sleep of the hulahula, and insists that only by the lomi-lomi he
shall be saved, he points a moral, though at present he is scarcely in a condition to adorn any
tale whatever; and said moral I shall be glad to
furnish, on application, to any sympathetic soul
who has witnessed by proxy the unlawful revels
of those night-dancers of Waipio.
7                        J




PEARL-HUNTING IN THE POMOTOUS.
HE Great Western ducked in the heavy. swell, shipping her regular deck-load of
salt-water every six minutes.  Now the
Great Western was nothing more nor less than a
seventeen-ton schooner, two hours out from Tahiti.
She was built like an old shoe, and shovelled in a
head sea as though it was her business.
It was something like sea life, wading along her
submerged deck from morning till night, with a
piece of raw junk in one hand and a briny biscuit
in the other; we never could keep a fire in that
galley, and as for hard tack, the sooner it got
soaked through the sooner it was off our minds,
for we knew to this complexion it must shortly
come.
Two hours out from  Tahiti we settled our
course, wafting a theatrical kiss or two toward the
gloriously green pyramid we were turning our
backs on, as it slowly vanished in the blue desert
of the sea.
A  thousand  palm-crowned and  foam-girdled
reefs spangle the ocean to the north and east of




PEARL-HUNTING IN THE POMOTOUS. 147
Tahiti. This train of lovely satellites is known
as the Dangerous Archipelago, or, more commonly
in that latitude, the Pomotou Islands. It's the
very hot-bed of cocoa-nut oil, pearls, half-famished
Kanakas, shells, and shipwrecks. The currents
are rapid and variable; the winds short, sharp,
and equally unreliable. If you would have adventure, the real article and plenty of it, make your
will, bid farewell to home and friends, and embark
for the Pomotous.  I started on this principle,
and repented knee-deep in the deck-breakers, as
we butted our way through the billows, bound for
one of the Pomotous on a pearl hunt.
Three days I sat in sackcloth and salt water.
Three nights I swashed in my greasy bunk, like a
solitary sardine in a box with the side knocked
out. In my heart of hearts I prayed for deliverance: you see there is no backing out of a schooner,
unless you crave death in fifty fathoms of phosphorescent liquid and a grave in a shark's maw.
Therefore I prayed for more wind from the right
quarter, for a sea like a boundless mill-pond; in
short, for speedy deliverance on the easiest terms
possible.  Notwithstanding, we continued to bang
away at the great waves that crooked their backs
under us and hissed frightfully as they enveloped
the Great Western with spray until the fourth night
out, when the moon gladdened us and promised
much while we held our breath in anxiety.
We were looking for land.  We'd been looking




148           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
for three hours, scarcely speaking all that time.
It's a serious matter raising a Pomotou by moonlight.
"Land!" squeaked a weak voice about six feet
above us. A lank fellow, with his legs corkscrewed
around the shrouds, and his long neck stretched
to windward, where it veered like a weather-cock
in a nor'wester, chuckled as he sung out "Land! "
and felt himself a little lower than Christopher Columbus thereafter. " Where away2" bellowed our
chunky little captain, as important as if he were
commanding a grown-up ship.  "Two points on
the weather-bow! " piped the lookout, with the
voice of one soaring in space, but unhappily choked
in the last word by a sudden lurch of the schooner
that brought him speedily to the deck, where he
lost his identity and became a proper noun, second
person, singular, for the rest of the cruise.
Now, "two points" is an indefinite term  that
embraces any obstacle ahead of anything; but the
" weather-bow " has been the salvation of many a
craft in her distress; so we gave three cheers for
the "weather-bow," and proceeded to sweep the
horizon with unwinking gaze.  We could scarcely
tell how near the land might lie; fancied we could
already hear the roar of surf-beaten reefs, and
every wave that reared before us seemed the
rounded outline of an island.  Of course we shortened sail, not knowing at what moment we might
find ourselves close upon some low  sea-garden




PEARL-HUNTING IN THE POMOTOUS. 149
nestling under the rim of breakers that fenced it
in, and being morally averse to running it down
without warning.
It was scarcely midnight; the moon was radiant;
we were silently watching, wrapped in the deep
mystery that hung over the weather-bow.
The wind suddenly abated; it was as though it
sifted through trees and came to us subdued with
a whisper of fluttering leaves and a breath of spice.
We knew what it meant, and our hearts leaped
within us as over the bow loomed the wave-like
outline of shadow that sank not again like the
other waves, neither floated off cloud-like, but
seemed to be bearing steadily down upon us, - a
great whale hungry for a modern Jonah.
What a night it was! We heard the howl of
waters now; saw the palm boughs glisten in the
moonlight, and the glitter and the flash of foam
that fringed the edges of the half-drowned islet.
It looked for all the world like a grove of cocoatrees that had waded out of sight of land, and
did n't know which way to turn next. This was
the Ultima Thule of the Great Western's voyage,
and she seemed to know it, for she behaved splendidly at last, laying off and on till morning in fine
style, evidently as proud as a ship-of-line.
I went below and dozed, with the low roar of
the reef quite audible; a fellow gets used to such
dream-music, and sleeps well to its accompaniment.




150           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
At daybreak we began beating up against wind
and tide, hoping to work into smooth water by
sunrise, which we did easily enough, shaking hands
all around over a cup of thick coffee and molasses
as three fathoms of chain whizzed overboard after
a tough little anchor that buried itself in a dim
wilderness of corals and sea-grass.
Then and there I looked about me with delighted eyes. The Great Western rode at anchor in a
shallow lake, whose crystal depths seemed never
to have been agitated by any harsher breath than
at that moment kissed without ruffling its surface.
Around us swept an amphitheatre of hills, covered
with a dense growth of tropical foliage and cushioned to the hem of the beach with thick sod of
exquisite tint and freshness.  The narrow rim of
beach that sloped suddenly to the tideless margin
of the lake was littered with numberless slender
canoes drawn out of the water like so many fish,
as though they would navigate themselves in their
natural element, and they were, therefore, not to
be trusted alone too near it.  Around the shore,
across the hills, and along the higher ridges waved
innumerable cocoa-palms, planted like a legion of
lances about the encampment of some barbaric
prince.
As for the very blue sky and the very white
scud that shot across it, they looked windy enough;
moreover we could all hear the incoherent booming of the sea upon the reef that encircled our




PEARL-HUNTING IN  THIE POMOTOUS. 151
nest.  But we forgot the wind and the waves in
the inexpressible repose of that armful of tropical
seclusion. It was a drop of water in a tuft of
moss, on a very big scale; that's just what it
was.
In a few  moments, as with one impulse, the
canoes took to water with a savage or two in each,
all gravitating to the schooner, which was for the
time being the head-centre of their local commerce; and for an hour or more we did a big business in the exchange of fish-hooks and fresh fruit.
The proportion of canoes at Motu Hilo (Crescent
Island) to the natives. of said. fragment of Eden
was as one to several; but the canoeless could not
resist the superior attraction of a foreign invader,
therefore the rest of the inhabitants went headfirst into the lake, and struck out for the middle,
where we peacefully swung at anchor.
The place was sharky, but a heavy dirk full
twenty inches tall was held between the teeth of
the swimmers; and if the smoke-colored dorsal of
any devil of a shark had dared to cut the placid
surface of the water that morning, he would speedily have had more blades in him than a farrier's
knife.  A few vigorous strokes of the arms and
legs in the neighborhood, a fatal lunge or two, a
vermilion cloud in a sea churned to a cream, and
a dance over the gaping corpse of some monster
who has sucked human blood more than once,
probably, does the business in that country.




152            SOUT1- SEA IDYLS.
It was a sensation for unaccustomed eyes, that
inland sea covered, littered, I might say, with
woolly heads, as though a cargo of cocoa-nuts had
been thrown overboard in a stress of weather.
They gathered about as thick as flies at a honeypot, all talking, laughing, and spouting mouthfiuls
of water into the air like those impossible creatures
that do that sort of thing by the half-dozen in all
high-toned and classical fountains.
Out of this amphibious mob one gigantic youth,
big enough to eat half our ship's crew, threw up
an arm  like Jove's, clinched the deck-rail with
lithe fingers, and took a rest, swinging there with
the utmost satisfaction.
I asked him aboard, but he scorned to forsake
his natural element: water is as natural as air to
those natives.  Probably he would have suffered
financially had he attempted boarding us, for his
thick back hair was netted with a kind of spacious
nest and filled with eggs on sale. It was quite
astonishing to see the ease with which he navigated
under his heavy deck-load.
This colossal youth having observed that I was
an amateur humanitarian, virtue received its instant reward (which it doesn't in all climates),
for he at once offered me three of his  eggs in
a very winning and patronizing manner.
I took the eggs because I like eggs, and then I
was, anxious to get his head above water if possible; therefore I unhesitatingly took the eggs, offer



PEARL-HUNTING IN  THE POMOTOUS. 153
ing him  in return a fish-hook, a tenpenny nail,
and a dilapidated key-ring.
These tempting curios he spurned, at the same
moment reaching me another handful of eggs.
His generosity both pleased and alarmed me.  I
saw with joy that his chin was quite out of water
in consequence of his charity, even when he
dropped back into the sea, floating for a few moments so as to let the blood circulate in his arm
again; but whether this was his magnanimous gift,
or merely a trap to involve me in hopeless debt,
I was quite at a loss to know, and I paused with
my hands full of eggs, saying to myself, There is
an end to fish-hooks in the South Pacific, and
dilapidated key-rings are not my staple product!
In the midst of my alarm he began making vows
of eternal friendship. This was by no means disagreeable to me.  He was big enough to whip any
two of his fellows, and one likes to be on the best
side of the stronger party in a strange land.
I reciprocated 
I leaned over the stern-rail of the Great Western in the attitude of Juliet in the balcony scene,
assuring that egg-boy that my heart was his if he
was willing to take it at second-hand.
He liked my sentiments, and proposed touching
noses at once (a barbarous greeting still observed
in the most civilized countries with even greater
license, since with Christians it is allowable to
touch mouths).
7*




154           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
We touched noses, though I was in danger of
sliding headlong into the sea. After this ceremonial he consented to board the Great Western,
which having accomplished with my help, he deposited his eggs at my feet, offered me his nose
once more, and communicated to me his name,
asking in the same breath for mine.
He was known as Hua Manu, or Bird's Egg.
Every native in the South Sea gets named by accident.  I knew a fellow whose name was " Cockeye"; he was a standing advertisement of his
physical deformity.  A fellow that knew me rejoiced in the singular cognomen of " Thrown from
a horse." Fortunately he does n't spell it with so
many letters in his tongue.  His christening happened in this wise: A bosom friend of his mother
was thrown from a horse and killed the day of his
birth. Therefore the bereaved mother reared that
child, an animated memorial, who in after years
clove to me, and was as jolly as though his earthly
mission was n't simply to keep green the memory
of his mother's bosom friend sailing through the
air with a dislocated neck.
I turned to my new-found friend. "Hua Manu,"
said I, "for my sake you have made a bird's-nest
of your back hair. You have freely given me your
young affection and your eggs.  Receive the sincere thanks of yours truly, together with these
fish-hooks, these tenpenny nails, this key-ring."
Hua Manu smiled and accepted, burying the fish



PEARL-HUNTING IN THE POMOTOUS. 155
hooks in his matted forelock, and inserting a tenpenny nail and a key-ring in either ear, thereby
making himself the envy of the entire population
of Motu Hilo, and feeling himself as grand as the
best chief in the archipelago.
So we sat together on the deck of the Great
Western, quite dry for a wonder, exchanging
sheep's-eyes and confidences, mutually happy in
each other's society.  Meanwhile the captain was
arranging his plans for an immediate purchase of
such pearls as he might find in possession of the
natives, and for a fresh search for pearl oysters at
the earliest possible hour. There were no pearls
on hand.  What are pearls to a man who has as
many wives, children, and cocoa-nuts as he can
dispose of? Pearls are small and colorless. Give
them a handful of gorgeous glass beads, a stick of
sealing-wax, or some spotted beans, and keep your
pale sea-tears, milky and frozen and apt to grow
sickly yellow and die if they are not cared for.
Motu Hilo is independent.  No man has squatted there to levy tax or toll.  We were each one
of us privileged to hunt for pearls and keep our
stores separate.  I said to Hua Mann, " Let's invest in a canoe, explore the lagoon for fresh oysterbeds, and fill innumerable cocoa-nut shells with
these little white seeds.  It will be both pleasant
and profitable, particularly for me."  We were
scarcely five minutes bargaining for our outfit, and
we embarked at once, having agreed to return in




156            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
a couple of days for news concerning the success
of the Great Western and her probable date of
sailing.
Seizing a paddle, Hua Manu propelled our canoe
with incredible rapidity out of the noisy fleet in
the centre of the lake, toward a green point that
bounded it, one of the horns of the crescent. He
knew a spot where the oyster yawned in profusion,
a secret cave for shelter, a forest garden of fruits,
a never-failing spring, etc. Thither we would fly
and domesticate ourselves. a The long, curved
point of land soon hid the inner waters from view.
We rose and sank on the swell between the great
reef and the outer rim-of the island, while the sun
glowed fiercely overhead and the reef howled in
our ears.  Still on we skimmed, the water hissing
along the smooth sides of the canoe, that trembled
at every fierce stroke of Hua Manu's industrious
paddle.  No chart, no compass, no rudder, no exchange of references, no letter of introduction, yet
I trusted that wild Hercules who was hurrying me
away, I knew not whither, with an earnestness
that forced  the sweat from  his naked body in
living streams.
At last we turned our prow and shot through a
low arch in a cliff, so low we both ducked our heads
instinctively, letting the vines and parasites trail
over our shoulders and down our backs.
It was a dark passage into an inner cave lit
from  below, -a cave filled with an eternal and




PEARL-HUNTING IN  THE POMOTOUS. 157
sunless twilight that was very soothing to our
eyes as we came in from the glare of sea and sky.
"Look!" said Hua Manu.  Overhead rose a
compressed dome of earth, a thick matting of roots,
coil within coil.  At the side innumerable ledges,
shelves and seams lined with nests, and never a
nest without its egg, often two or more together.
Below us, in two fathoms of crystal, sunlit and
luminous bowers of coral, and many an oyster
asleep with its mouth open, and many a prismatic
fish poising itself with palpitating gills, and gauzy
fins fanning the water incessantly.
" Hua Manu!" I exclaimed in rapture, "permit
me to congratulate you.  In you I behold a regular South Sea Monte Christo, and no less magnificent title can do you justice."  Thereat Hua Manu
laughed immoderately, which laugh having run
out we both sat in our canoe and silently sucked
eggs for some moments.
A canoe-length from where we floated, a clear
rill stole noiselessly from above, mingling its sweet
waters with the sea; on the roof of our cavern
fruits flourished, and we were wholly satisfied.
After such a lunch as ours it behooved us to cease
idling and dive for pearls.  So THua Manu knotted
his long hair tightly about his forehead, cautiously
transferred himself from the canoe to the water,
floated a moment, inhaling a wonderfully long
breath, and plunged under.  How he struggled to
get down to the gaping oysters, literally climbing




158            SOUTII-SEA IDYLS.
down head-first! I saw his dark form  wrestling
with the elements that strove to force him back to
the surface, crowding him out into the air again.
He seized one of the shells, but it shut immediately, and he tugged and jerked and wrenched at
it like a young demon till it gave way, when he
struck out and up for air.  All this seemed an age
to me.  I took full twenty breaths while he was
down.  Reaching the canoe, he dropped the great,
ugly-looking thing into it, and hung over the outrigger gasping for breath like a man half hanged.
He was pale about the mouth, his eyes were suffused with blood, blood oozed from  his ears and
nostrils; his limbs, gashed with the sharp corals,
bled also.  The veins of his forehead looked ready
to burst, and as he tightened the cords of hair
across them it seemed his only salvation.
I urged him to desist, seeing his condition and
fearing a repetition of his first experience; but he
would go once more; perhaps there was no pearl
in that shell; he wanted to get me a pearl.  He
sank again and renewed his efforts at the bottom
of the sea.  I scarcely dared to count the minutes
now, nor the bubbles that came up to me like little balloons with a death-message in each.  Suppose he were to send his last breath in one of
those  transparent globes, and I look down and
see his body snared in the antlers of coral, stained
with his blood.  Well, he came up all right, and
I postponed the rest of my emotion for a later experience.




PEARL-HUNTING IN THE POMOTOUS. 159
Some divers remain three minutes under water,
but two or three descents are as many as they can
make in a day.  The ravages of such a life are
something frightful.
No more pearl-hunting after the second dive
that day; nor the next, because we went out into
the air for a stroll on shore to gather fruit and
stretch our legs.  There was a high wind and a
heavy sea that looked threatening enough, and
we were glad to return after an hour's tramp.
The next day was darker, and the next after that,
when a gale came down upon us that seemed likely
to swamp Motu Hilo.  A swell rolled over the
windward reef and made our quarters in the grotto
by no means safe or agreeable. It was advisable
for us to think of embarking upon that tempestuous sea, or get brained against the roof of our
retreat.
Hua Mann looked troubled, and my heart sank.
I wished the pearl oysters at the bottom of the
sea, the Great Western back at Tahiti, and I loafing under the green groves of Papeete, never more
to be deluded abroad.
I observed no visible changes in the weather
after I had been wishing for an hour and a half.
The swell rather increased; our frail canoe was
tossed from side to side in imminent danger of
upsetting.
Now and then a heavy roller entirely filled the
mouth of our cavern, quite blinding us with spray;




160           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
having spent its fury it subsided with a concussion
that nearly deafened us, and dragged us with fearful velocity toward the narrow mouth of the cave,
where we saved ourselves from being swept into
the sea by grasping the roots overhead and within
reach.
" Could I swim 3 " asked Hua Manu.  Alas, no!
That we must seek new shelter at any risk was
but too evident.  "Let us go on the next wave,"
said Hua, as he seized a large shell and began
clearing the canoe of the water that had accumulated.  Then he bound his long hair in a knot to
keep it from his eyes, and gave me some hasty directions as to my deportment in the emergency.
The great wave came.  We were again momentarily corked up in an air-tight compartment.  I
wonder the roof was not burst open with the intense pressure that nearly forced the eyes out of my
head and made me faint and giddy.  Recovering
from the shock, with a cry of warning from Hua,
and a prayer scarcely articulated, we shot like a
bomb from a mortar into the very teeth of a frightful gale.
Nothing more was said, nothing seen.  The
air was black with flying spray, the roar of the
elements more awful than anything I had ever
heard before. Sheets of water swept over us with
such velocity that they hummed like circular saws
in motion.
We were crouched as low as possible in the




PEARL-HUNTING IN  THE POMOTOUS. 161
canoe, yet now and then one of these, the very
blade of the wave, struck us on the head or shoulders, cutting us like knives.  I could scarcely distinguish Hua's outline, the spray was so dense,
and as for him, what could he do? Nothing, indeed, but send up a sort of death-wail, a few notes
of which tinkled in my ear from time to time, assuring me how utterly without hope we were.
One of those big rollers must have lifted us
clean over the reef, for we crossed it and were
blown into the open sea, where the canoe spun for
a second in the trough of the waves, and was cut
into slivers by an avalanche of water that carried
us all down into the depths.
I suppose I filled at once, but came up in spite
of it (almost every one has that privilege), when I
was clutched by Hua Manu and made fast to his
utilitarian back-hair.  I had the usual round of
experiences allotted to all half-drowned people:
a panoramic view of my poor life crammed with
sin and sorrow and regret; a complete biography
written and read through inside of ten seconds.
I was half strangled, call it two thirds, for that
comes nearer the truth; heard the water singing
in my ears, which was not sweeter than symphonies, nor beguiling, nor in the least agreeable. I
deny it!  In the face of every corpse that ever
was drowned I emphatically deny it 
Hua had nearly stripped me with one or two
K




162           SOUTI-SEA IDYLS.
tugs at my thin clothing, because he did n't think
that worth towing off to some other island, and he
was willing to float me for a day or two, and run
the risk of saving me.
When I began to realize anything, I congratulated myself that the gale was over. The sky was
clear, the white caps scarce, but the swell still
sufficient to make me dizzy as we climbed one big,
green hill, and slid off the top of it into a deep
and bubbling abyss.
I found Hua leisurely feeling his way through
the water, perfectly self-possessed and apparently
unconscious that he had a deck passenger nearly
as big as himself.  My hands were twisted into
his hair in such a way that I could rest my chin
upon my arms, and thus easily keep my mouth
above water most of the time.
My emotions were peculiar.  I was n't accustomed to travelling in that fashion. I knew it had
been done before. Even there I thought with infinite satisfaction of the Hawaiian woman who
swam for forty hours in such a sea, with an aged
and helpless husband upon her back.  Reaching
land at last she tenderly drew her burden to shore
and found him - dead! The fact is historical,
and but one of several equally marvellous.
We floated on and on, cheering each other hour
after hour; the wind continuing, the sea falling,
and anon night coming like an ill omen, - night,
that buried us alive in darkness and despair.




PEARL-HUNTING IN THE POMOTOUS. 163
I think I must have dozed, or fainted, or died
several times during the night, for it began to
grow light long before I dared to look for it, and
then came sunrise, - a sort of intermittent sunrise
that gilded Hua's shoulder whenever we got to the
top of a high wave, and went out again as soon as
we settled into the hollows.
Hua Manu's eyes were much better than mine;
he seemed to see with all his five senses, and the
five told him that there was sand not far off!  I
would n't believe him; I think I.was excusable for
questioning his infallibility then and there.  The
minute he cried out " Land! " I gave up and went
to sleep or to death, for I thought he was daft,
and it was discouraging business, and I wished I
could die for good.  Hua Manu, what a good egg
you were, though it's the bad that usually keep
atop of the water, they tell me!
IHua Manu was right  he walked out of the sea
an hour later and stood on a mound of coarse sand
in the middle of the ocean, with my miserable,
water-logged body lying in a heap at his feet.
The place was as smooth and shiny and desolate
as anybody's bald head.  That's a nice spot to be
merry in, is n't it. Yet he tried to make me open
my eyes and be glad.
He said he knew the Great Western would be
coming down that way shortly; she'd pick us off
the shoal, and water and feed us.




164           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
Perhaps she might!  Meantime we hungered
and thirsted as many a poor castaway had before
us.  That was a good hour for Christian fortitude:
beached in the middle of the ocean; shelterless
under a sun that blistered Hua's tough skin; eyes
blinded with the glare of sun and sea; the sand
glowing like brass and burning into flesh already
irritated with salt water; a tongue of leather
cleaving to the roof of the mouth, and no food
within reach, nor so much. as a drop of fresh water
for Christ's sake!
Down went my face into the burning sand that
made the very air hop above it...... Another
night, cool and grateful; a bird or two flapped
wearily overhead, looking like spirits in the moonlight. Hun scanned earnestly our narrow horizon,
noting every inflection in the voices of the wind
and waves, - voices audible to him, but worse than
dumb to me, — mocking monotones reiterated
through an agonizing eternity.
A wise monitor was Hua Manu, shaming me to
silence in our cursed banishment.  Toward the
morning after our arrival at the shoal, an owl
fluttered out of the sky and fell at our feet quite
exhausted.  It m'ight have been blown from Motu
Hilo, and seemed ominous of something, I scarcely
knew what.  When it had recovered from  its fatigue, it sat regarding us curiously. I wanted to
wring its short, thick neck, and eat it, feathers and
all.  Hua objected  there was a superstition that




PEARL-HUNTING IN THE POMOTOUS. 165
gave that bland bird its life. It might continue
to ogle us with one eye as long as it liked. How
the lopsided thing smirked!` how that stupid owlface, like a rosette with three buttons in it, haunted me! It was enough to craze any one; and,
having duly cursed him and his race, I went stark
mad and hoped I was dying forever...
There are plenty of stars in this narrative.
Stars, and plenty of them, cannot account for the
oblivious intervals, suspended animation, or whatever it was, that came to my relief from time to
time.  I cannot account for them  myself.  Perhaps Hua Manu might; he seemed always awake,
always on the lookout, and ever so patient and
painful.  A dream came to me after that owl had
stared me into stone, - a dream of an island in a
sea of glass; soft ripples lapping on the silver
shores; sweet airs sighing in a starlit grove; some
one gathering me in his arms, hugging me close
with infinite tenderness; I was consumed with
thirst, speechless with hunger; like an infant I
lay in the embrace of my deliverer, who moistened
my parched lips and burning throat with delicious
and copious draughts.  It was an elixir of life; I
drank health and strength in every drop; sweeter than mother's milk flowed the warm tide unchecked, till I was satisfied and sank into a deep
and dreamless sleep.....
The Great Western was plunging in her old
style, and I swashed in my bunk as of yore. The




166           SOUTH-SEA JD YLS.
captain sat by me with a bottle in his hand and
anxiety in his countenance.
" Where are we?" I asked.
" Two hours out from Tahiti, inward bound."
"How! What! When!" etc.; and my mind
ran up and down the record of the last fortnight,
finding many blots and some blanks.
"As soon as I got into my right mind I could
hear all about it "; and the captain shook his bottle,
and held on to the side of my bunk to save himself from total wreck in the lee-corners of the
cabin.
" Why, wasn't I right-minded?  I could tell a
hawk from a hernshaw; and, speaking of hawks,
where was that cursed owl  "
The captain concluded I was bettering, and put
the physic into the locker, so as to give his whole
attention to keeping right side up.  Well, this is
how it happened, as I afterward  learned: The
Great Western suffered somewhat from the gale
at Motu Hilo, though  she was comparatively
sheltered in that inner sea.  Having repaired, and
given me up as a deserter, she sailed for Tahiti.
The first day out, in a light breeze, they all saw
a man apparently wading up to his middle in the
sea.  The fellow hailed the Great Western, but as
she could hardly stand up against the rapid current in so light a wind, the captain let her drift
past the man in the sea, who suddenly disappeared.
A consultation of officers followed.  Evidently




PEARL-HUNTING IN THE POMOTOUS. 167
some one was cast away and ought to be looked
after; resolved to beat up to the rock, big turtle,
or whatever it might be that kept that fellow
afloat, provided the wind freshened sufficiently;
wind immediately freshened; Great Western put
about and made for the spot where Hual Manu had
been seen hailing the schooner.  But when that
schooner passed he threw himself upon the sand
beside me and gave up hoping at last, and was
seen no more.
What did he then.  I must have asked for
drink. He gave it me from an artery in his wrist,
severed by the finest teeth you ever saw.  That's
what saved me.  On  came the little schooner,
beating up against the wind and tide, while I had
my lips sealed to that fountain of life.
The skipper kept banging away with an old
blunderbuss that had been left over in his bargains
with the savages, and one of these explosions
caught the ears of Hua.  He tore my lips from
his wrist, staggered to his feet, and found help
close at hand.  Too late they gathered us up out
of the deep and  strove to renew  our strength.
They transported us to the little cabin of the
schooner, Hua Manu, myself, and that mincing
owl, and swung off into the old course. Probably
the Great Western never did better sailing since
she came from the stocks than that hour or two
of beating that brought her up to the shoal.  She
seemed to be emulating it in the home run, for we




168           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
went bellowing through the sea in a stiff breeze
and the usual flood-tide on deck.
I lived to tell the tale. I should think it mighty
mean of me not to live after such a sacrifice.  Hua
Manu sank rapidly.  I must have nearly drained
his veins, but I don't believe he regretted it. The
captain said when he was dying, his faithful eyes
were fixed on me.  Unconsciously I moved a little;
he smiled, and the soul went out of him in that
smile, perfectly satisfied. At that moment the
owl fled from the cabin, passed through the hatchway, and disappeared.
Hua Manu lay on the deck, stretched under a
sail, while I heard this.  I wondered if a whole
cargo of pearls could make me indifferent to his
loss.  I wondered if there were many truer and
braver than he in Christian lands. They call him
a heathen.  It was heathenish to offer up his life
vicariously. He might have taken mine so easily,
and perhaps have breasted the waves back to his
own people, and been feted and sung of as the hero
he truly was.
Well, if he is a heathen, out of my heart I would
make a parable, its rubric bright with his sacrificial
blood, its theme this glowing text:   Greater love
hath no man than this, that a man lay down his
life for a friend."




THE LAST OF THE GREAT NAVIGATOR.
HINK  of a sea and sky of such even and
MRj    utter blueness, that any visible horizon
is out of the question.  In the midst of
this pellucid sphere the smallest of propellers
trailing two plumes of sea-foam, like the tailfeathers of a bird of paradise, and over it all a
league of floating crape,- for so seem the heavy
folds of smoke that hang above us.
Thus we pass out of our long hours of idleness
in that grove of eight thousand cocoa-palms by the
sea-shore, -the artist and I seeking to renew our
dolce far niente in some new forest of palms by
any shore whatever.  Enough that it is sea-washed,
and hath a voice and an eternal song.
Now  turn to the stone-quarry darkened with
the groups of the few faithful friends and many
islanders. They are so ready to kill time in the
simplest manner; why not in staring our awkward
little steamer out of sight.
One glimpse of the white handkerchiefs, fluttering like a low flight of doves, and then with all the
8




170           SOUTII-SEA IDYLS.
sublime resignation of the confessed lounger, we
await the approach of twilight and the later hours
that shall presently pass silver-footed over this
tropic sea.
Four, P. M., and the roar of the reef lost to us
voyagers.  The sun an hour high.  The steams of
dinner appealing to us through the yawning hatches,
-  everything yawning in this latitude, animate and
inanimate, - and the world as hot as Tophet.  We
lie upon our mattresses, brought out of the foul
cabin into the sweet air, and pass the night half
intoxicated with romance  and cigarettes.  The
natives cover the deck of our little craft in lazy
and laughing flocks.  Some of them  regard us
tenderly; they are apt to love at sight, though
Heaven knows there is little in our untrimmed exteriors to attract any one under the stars.
We hear, now and then, the sharp click of flint
and steel, and after it see the flame, and close to
the flame a dark face, grotesque it may be, like
an antique water-spout with dust in its jaws. Bv t
some are beautiful, with glorious eyes that shine
wonderfully in the excitement of lighting the pipe
anew.
Voices arise at intervals from among the groups
of younger voyagers. We hear the songs of our own
land worded in oddly and rather prettily broken
English. " Annie Laurie," " When the Cruel War is
over," and other equally ambitious and proportionately popular ballads ring in good time and tune




THE LAST OF TIHE GREAT NAVIGATOR. 171
from  the lips of the young bloods, but the girls
seldom join to any advantage. How strange it all
seems, and how we listen!
With the first and deepestpurple of the dawn, the
dim outlines of Molokai arise before us. It is an
island of cliffs and canfons, much haunted of the
King, but usually out of the tourist's guide-book.
It is hinted one may turn back this modern page
of island civilization, and with it the half-christianized and wholly bewildered natures of the uncomprehending natives, and here find all of the old
superstitions in their original significance, the
temples, and the shark-god, and the hula-hula girls,
beside whose weird and maddening undulations
your can-can dancers are mere jumping-jacks.
Listen for faint music of the wandering minstrels! No, we are too far out from shore: then
it is the wrong end of the day for such festivals.
A brief siesta under the opening eyelids of the
morn, and at sunrise we dip our colors abreast
charming little Lahaina, drowsy and indolent, with
its two or three long, long avenues overhung with
a green roof of leaves, and its odd summer-houses
and hammocks pitched close upon the white edge
of the shore.
We wander up and down these shady paths an
hour or two, eat of the fruits, luscious and plentiful, and drink of its liquors, vile and fortunately
scarce, and get us hats plaited of the coarsest
straw and of unbounded rim, making ourselves still




172           SOUTH-SEA  D YLS.
more hideous, if indeed we have not already reached
the acme of the unpicturesque.
Now for hours and hours we hug the shore,
slowly progressing under the insufficient shadow
of the palms, getting now and then glimpses of
valleys folded inland, said to be lovely and mystical. Then there are mites of villages always halfgrown and half-starved looking, and always close
to the sea. These islanders are amphibious. The
little bronze babies float like corks before they can
walk half the length of a bamboo-mat.
Another night at sea, in the rough channel this
time, and less enjoyable for the rather stiff breeze
on our quarter, and some very sour-looking clouds
overhead. All well by six, however, when we hear
the Angelus rung from the low tower of a long
coralchurch in another sea-wedded hamlet.  Think
of the great barn-like churches, once too small for
the throngs that gathered about them, now full of
echoes, and whose doors, if they still hang to their
hinges, will soon swing only to the curious winds 
In and out by this strange land, marking all its
curvatures with the fidelity of those shadow lines
in the atlas, and so lingering on till the evening
of the second day, when, just at sunset, we turn
suddenly into the bay that saw the last of Captain
Cook, and here swing at anchor in eight fathoms
of liquid crystal over a floor of shining white coral,
and clouds of waving sea-moss.  From  the deck
behold the amphitheatre wherein was enacted the




THE LAST OF THE GREAT NAVIGATOR  173
tragedy of " The Great Navigator, or the Vulnerable god."  The story is brief and has its moral.
The approach of Captain Cook was mystical.
For generations the islanders had been looking with
calm eyes of faith for the promised return of a
certain god.  Where should they look but to the
sea, whence came all mysteries and whither retreated the being they called divine?
So the white wings of the Resolution swept down
upon the life-long quietude of Hawaii like a messenger from heaven, and the signal gun sent the
first echoes to the startled mountains of the little
kingdom.
They received this Jupiter, who carried  his
thunders with him and kindled fires in his mouth.
He was the first smoker they had seen, though
they are now his most devout apostles. Showing
him all due reverence, he failed to regard their customs and traditions, which was surely ungodlike,
and it rather weakened the faith of their sages.
A plot was devised to test the divinity of the
presuming captain.
While engaged in conversation, one of the chiefs
was to rush at Cook with a weapon; should he cry
out or attempt to run, he was no god, for the gods
are fearless; and if he was no god, he deserved
death for his deception.  But if a god, no harm
could come of it, for the gods are immortal.
So they argued, and completed their plans. It
came to pass in the consummation of them that




174           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
Cook did run, and thereupon received a stab in the
back.  Being close by the shore he fell face downward in the water and died a half-bloody, halfwatery, and wholly inglorious death.  His cornpanions escaped to the ship and peppered the
villages by the harbor, till the inhabitants, half
frantic, were driven into the hills.
Then they put to sea, leaving the body of their
commander in the hands of the enemy, and with
flag at half-mast were blown sullenly back to England, there to inaugurate the season of poems,
dirges, and pageants in honor of the Great Navigator.
His bones were stripped of flesh, afterwards
bound with kapa, the native cloth, and laid in one
of the hundred natural cells that perforate the
cliff in front of us, and under whose shadow we
now float. Which of the hundred is the one so
honored is quite uncertain.  What does it matter,
so long as the whole mountain is a catacomb of
kings' No commoners are buried there.  It was
a kind and worthy impulse that could still venerate.so far the mummy of an idol of such palpable clay
as his.
Many of these singular caverns are almost inaccessible.  One must climb down by ropes from
the cliff above. Rude bars of wood are laid across
the mouths of some of them.  It is the old tabu
never yet broken.  But a few  years back it was
braving death to attempt to remove them.




THE LAST OF THE GREAT NAVIGATOR. 175
Cook's flesh was most likely burned.  It was
then a custom.  But his heart was left untouched
of the flames of this sacrifice. What a salamander
the heart is that can withstand the fires of a judgment!
The story of this heart is the one shocking page
in this history: some children discovered it afterward, and, thinking it the offal of an animal, devoured it.  Whoever affirms that the " SandwichIslanders eat each other," has at least this ground
for his affirmation.  Natives of the South Sea
Islands have been driven as far north as this in
their frail canoes. They were cannibals, and no
doubt were hungry, and may have eaten in their
fashion, but it is said to have been an acquired
taste, and was not at all popular in this region.
Dramatic justice required some tragic sort of revenge, and this was surely equal to the emergency.
Our advance guard, in the shape of a monthearlier tourist, gave us the notes for doing this
historical nook in the Pacific.  A  turned-down
page, it is perhaps a little too dog-eared to be read
over again, but we all like to compare notes.  So
we noted the items of the advance guard, and they
read in this fashion: 
OBJECTS  OF  INTEREST   RELATING   TO
CAPTAIN COOK.
Item  I. The tree where Cook was struck.
"  II. The rock where Cook fell.




176           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
Item  III. The altar on the hill-top.
"IV. The riven palms.
"   V. The sole survivor,  the boy that ran.
"  VI. A specimen sepulchre in the cliff.
Until dark the native children have been playing about us in the sea, diving for very smooth
"rials," and looking much as frogs must look
to wandering lilliputians. The artist cares less
for these wild and graceful creatures than one
would suppose, for he confesses them  equal in
physical beauty to the Italian models.  All sentiment seemed to have been dragged out of him by
much travel.  At night we sit together on the
threshold of our grass house, and not twenty feet
from the rock - under water only at high tide 
where Cook died.  We sit talking far into the
night, with the impressive silence broken only by
the plash of the sea at our very door.
By and by the moon looks down upon us from
the sepulchre of the kings. We are half clad, having
adopted the native costume as the twilight deepened and our modesty permitted.  The heat is
still excessive.  All this low land was made to
God's order some few centuries ago.  We wonder
if He ever changes his mind; this came down redhot from the hills yonder, and cooled at highwater mark.  It holds the heat like an oven-brick,
and we find it almost impossible to walk upon it at
noontime, even our sole-leather barely preserving




THE LAST OF THE GREAT NAVIGATOR. 177
our feet from its blistering surface. The natives
manage to hop over it now and then; they are about
half leather, anyhow, and the other half appetite.
We come first upon No. II. in the list of historic haunts.
Let us pass down to the rock, and cool ourselves
in the damp moss that drapes it. It is almost as
large as a dinner-table, and as level. You can
wade all around it, count a hundred little crabs
running up and down over the top of it.  So much
for one object of interest, and the artist draws his
pencil through it.  At ten, p. M., we are still
chatting, and have added a hissing pot of coffee
over some live coals to our housekeeping.  Now
down a little pathway at our right comes a native
woman, with a plump and tough sort of pillow
under each arm. These she implores us to receive
and be comfortable. - We refuse to be comforted
in this fashion, we despise luxuries, and in true
cosmopolitan independence hang our heads over
our new saddle-trees, and sleep heavily in an atmosphere rank with the odor of fresh leather; but
not till we have seen our humane visitor part of
the way home.  Back by the steep and winding
path we three pass in silence. She pauses a moment in the moonlight at what seems a hitchingpost cased in copper. It is as high as our hip, and
has some rude lettering apparently scratched with
a nail upon it.  We decipher with some difficulty
this legend:
8'                     L




178            SOUTI-SEA IDYLS.
Near this spot
fell
CAPTAIN JAMES COOK, R. N.,
the
Renowned Circumnavigator,
who
discovered these islands,
A. D. 1778.
His Majesty's Ship
Imogene,
Oct. 17, 1837.
So No. 1. of our list is checked off; and no lives
lost.
"Aloha!" cries a soft voice in the distance. Our
native woman has left us in our pursuit of knowledge under difficulties, and now there is no visible trace of her and her pillows, - only that voice
out of the darkness crying, " Love to you  "  She
lives in memory, -this warm-hearted TVaihine;
so do her pillows.
Returning to our lodgings, we discover a square
heap of broken lava rocks.  It seems to be the
foundation for some building; and such it is, for
here the palace of Kamehameha I. stood, - a palace
of grass like this one we are sleeping in.  Nothing
but the foundation remains now. Half a dozen
rude stairs invite the ghosts of the departed courtiers to this desolate ruin.




THE LAST OF THE GREAT NAVIGATOR. 179
They are all Samaritans in this kingdom.  By
sunrise a boy with fresh coffee and a pail of muffins
rides swiftly to our door.  He came from over the
hill. Our arrival had been reported, and we are
summoned to a late breakfast in the manner of the
Christians.  We are glad of it.  Our fruit diet of
yesterday, the horrors of a night in the saddle -  a
safe and pretty certain mode of dislocating the
neck — make us yearn for a good old-fashioned
meal.  Horses are at our service.  We mount
after taking our muffins and coffee in the centre of
a large and enthusiastic gathering of villagers.
They came to see us eat, and to fumble the artist's
sketches, and wonder at his amazing skill.
Up the high hill with the jolliest sun shining full
in our eyes, brushing the heavy and dew-filled
foliage on both sides of the trail, and under the
thick webs spun in the upper branches, looking
like silver laces this glorious morning, -on, till
we reach the hill-top.
Here the guide pauses and points his horse's
nose toward a rude corral.  The horses seem to
regard it from habit, - we scarcely with curiosity.
A  wall half in ruins in the centre, rising from
a heap of stones tumbled together, a black, weather-stained cross, higher than our heads as we sit
in the saddle. It is the altar of sacrifice. It is
here that the heart of the great navigator survived
the flames.
No. III. scored off. At this rate we shall finish




180           SOUTII-SEA IDYLS.
by noon easily.  The sequel of an adventurous
life is soon told.
After breakfast, to horse again, and back to the
little village by the sea. We ride into a cluster
of palms, our guide leading the way, and find two
together, each with a smooth and perfectly round
hole through its body, about three feet from the
roots, made by the shot of Cook's avengers.  A
lady could barely thrust her hand through them;
they indicate rather light calibre for defence nowadays, but enough to terrify these little villages,
when Cook's men sent the balls hissing over the
water to bite through the grit and sap of these
slender shafts. They still live to tell the tale in
their way.  So much for No. IV.
We pause again in the queer little straggling
alleys of the village, planned, I should think, after
some spider's web.  They are about as regular in
their irregularity. It is No. V. this time. A bit
of withered humanity doubled up in the sun, as
though some one had set him.up on that wall to
bake.  He is drawn all together; his chin sunk in
between his knees, his knees hooped together with
his dreadfully slim arms, a round head, sleek and
shining as an oiled gourd; sans teeth; eyes like
the last drops in desert wells; the skeleton sharply protruding; no motion; apparently no life beyond the quick and incessant blinking of the
eyelids, - the curtains fluttering in the half-shut
windows of the soul. Is it a man and a brother.




THE LAST OF THE GREAT NAVIGATOR. 181
Yes, verily! When the uncaptured crew of the
Resolution poured their iron shot into the tents of
the adversary, this flickering life was young and
vigorous, and he ran like a good fellow. Better
to have died in his fiery youth than to have slowly
withered away in this fashion.  For here is the
philosophy of mammon left to itself: when you
get to be an old native, it is your business to die;
if you don't know your business, you are left to
find it out: what are you good for but to bury.
Let us slip over the smooth bay, for we must
look into one of these caverns.  Cross in this
canoe, so narrow that we cannot get into it at all,
but balance ourself on its rim  and hold our
breath for fear of upsetting. These odd-looking
out-riggers are honest enough in  theory, but
treacherous in practice; and a shark has his eye
on us back yonder. Sharks are mesmeric in their
motions through the water, and corpse-colored.
A new guide helps us to the most easily reached
cave, and with the lad and his smoking torch we
climb into the dusky mouth.
There is dust everywhere and cobwebs as thick
as cloth, hanging in tatters. An almost interminable series of small cells, just high enough to
straighten one's back in, leads us farther and farther into the mountain of bones. This cave has
been pillaged too often to be very ghostly now.
We find a little parcel of bones here. It might
have been a hand and an arm once, cunning and




182            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
dexterous. It is nothing now but a litter. Here
is an infant's skull, but broken, thin and delicate
as a sea-shell, and full of dust. Here is a tougher
one, whole and solid; the teeth well set and very
white; no sign of decay in any one of these molars.
Perhaps it is because so little of their food is even
warm when they eat it.  This rattles as we lift it.
The brain and the crumbs of earth are inseparably
wedded.  Come with us, skull.  You look scholarly, and shall lie upon our desk, -  a solemn epistle
to the living. But the cave is filled with the vile
smoke of our torch, and we are choked with the
heat and dust.  Let us out as soon as possible.  The Great Navigator's skeleton cannot be
hidden in this tomb.  Down we scramble into the
sand and shadow by the water, and talk of departing out of this place of relics.
We are to cross the lava southward where it is
frescoed with a wilderness of palm-trees: for when
the mountain came down to the sea, flowing redhot, but cooling almost instantly, it mowed down
the forests of palms, and the trunks were not consumed, but lay half buried in the cooling lava, and
now you can mark every delicate fibre of the bark
in the lava, as firm as granite.
Still farther south lies the green slope that was
so soon to be shaken to its foundations. I wonder
if we could discover any of the peculiar loveliness
that bewitched us the evening we crossed it in
silence.  There was something in the air that




THIE LAST OF THE GREAT NAVIGATOR. 183
said, "Peace, peace"; and we passed over the
fatal spot without speaking.  But the sea spoke
under the cliffs below us, and the mountain has
since replied.
This place  is  named  prettily, ITKealekctlcua.
You see that mountain l There are paths leading
to it.  Thither the gods journeyed in the days of
old.  So the land is called "the path of the gods."
It is a cool, green spot up yonder; the rain
descends upon  it in  continual baptism.  The
natives love these mountains and the sea. They
are the cardinal points of their compass. Every
direction given you is either toward the mountain
or toward the sea.
There is much truth in the Arabian tale, and it
is time to acknowledge it.  Mountains are ma,netic.  The secret of their magnetism  may lie
in the immobility of their countenances. Praise
them  to their face, and they are not flattered;
forget them  for a moment: but turn again, and
see their steadfast gaze!   You feel their earnestness.  It is imposing, and you cannot think lightly of it.  Who forgets the mountains he has once
seen. It is quite probable the mountain cares
little for your individuality: but it has given part
of itself to the modelling of your character; it
has touched you with the wand of its enchantment; you are under the spell.  Somewhere in
the recesses of this mountain are locked the bones
of the Great Navigator, but these mountains have
kept the secret.




11.c1\
A CANOE-CRUISE IN THE CORAL SEA.
F you can buy a canoe for two calico
shirts, what will your annual expenses in
Tahiti amount to. This was a mental
problem I concluded to solve, and, having invested
my two shirts, I began the solution in this wise:
My slender little treasure lay with half its length
on shore, and, being quite big enough for two, I
looked about me, seeking some one to sit in the
bows, for company and ballast.
Up and down the shady beach of Papeete I
wandered, with this advertisement written all over
my anxious face:"WANTED -A crew about ten years of age; of a mild
disposition, and with no special fondness for human, flesh;
not particular as to sex! Apply immediately, at the new
canoe, under the breadfruit-tree, Papeete, South Pacific."
Some young things were pitching French coppers
so earnestly  they did n't read my face; some
were not seafaring, at that moment; while most
of them  evidently ate more than was good for
them, which might result disastrously in a canoecruise, and I set my heart against them.  The




A CANOE-CRUISE IN THE CORAL SEA. 185
afternoon was waning, and my ill-luck seemed to
urge upon me the necessity of my constituting a
temporary press-gang for the kidnapping of the required article.
"Who is anxious to go to sea with me?" I
bawled, returning through the crowds of young
gamblers, all intently disinterested in everything
but "pitch and toss."  Not far away a group of
wandering minstrels - such as make musical the
shores of Tahiti - sat in the middle of the street,
chanting. One youth played with considerable
skill upon a joint of bamboo, of the flute species,
but breathed into from the nostrils, instead of the
lips.  Three or four minor notes were piped at uncertain intervals, playing an impromptu variation
upon the air of the singers.  Drawing near, the
music was suspended, and I proposed shipping one
of the melodious vagabonds, whereupon the entire
chorus expressed a willingness to accompany me,
in any capacity whatever, remarking,. at the same
time, that "they were a body bound, so to speak,
by chords of harmony, and any proposal to disband
them would, by it, be regarded as highly absurd."
Then I led the solemn procession of volunteers
to my canoe, and we regarded it in silence; it was
something larger than a pea-pod, to be sure, but
about the shape of one. After a moment of deliberation, during which a great throng of curious
spectators had assembled, the orchestra declared
itself in readiness to ship before the paddle for




186           SOUTII-SEA IDYLS.
the trifling consideration of $ 17.  I knew  the
vague notion that money is money, call it dollar
or dime, generally entertained by the innocent
children of Nature; and, dazzling the unaccustomed eyes of the flutist with a new two-franc
piece, he immediately embarked.  The bereaved
singers sat on the shore and lifted up their voices
in resounding discord, as the canoe slid off into the
still waters, and  my crew, with commendable
fortitude, laid down the nose-flute, took up the
paddle, and we began our canoe-cruise.
The frail thing glided over the waves as though
invisible currents were sweeping her into the hereafter; the shore seemed to recede, drawing the
low, thatched houses into deeper shadow; other
canoes skimmed over the sea, like great waterbugs, while the sun set beyond the sharp outlines
of beautiful Morea, glorifying it and us.
There was a small islet not far away, — an
islet as fair and fragrant as a bouquet, - looking, just then, like a mote in a sheet of flame.
Thither I directed the reformed flutist, and then
let myself relapse into the all-embracing quietness
that succeeds nearly every vexation that flesh is
heir to.
There was something soothing in the nature of
my crew.  He sat with his back to me, - a brown
back, that glistened in the sun, and arched itself,
from time to time, cat-like, as though it was very
good to be brown and bare and shiny. From the waist




A CANOE-CRUISE IN THE CORAL SEA. 187
to the feet fell the resplendent folds of a pareu, worn
by all Tahitians, of every possible age and sex,
and consisted, in this case, of a thin breadth of
cloth, stamped with a deep blue firmament, in
which supernaturally yellow suns were perpetually
setting in several spots. A round head topped
his chubby shoulders, and was shaven from the
neck to the crown, with a matted forelock of the
blackness of darkness falling to the eyes and keeping the sun out of them.  One ear was enlivened
with a crescent of beaten gold, which decoration,
having been won at "pitch and toss," will probably never again, in the course of human events,
meet with its proper mate.  On the whole, he
looked just a little bit like a fan-tail pigeon with
its wings plucked.
At this point my crew suddenly rose in the
bows of the canoe, making several outlandish
flourishes with his broad paddle. I was about to
demand the occasion of his sudden insanity, when
we began to grate over some crumbling substance
that materially impeded our progress and suggested all sorts of disagreeable sensations, - such as
knife-grinding in the next yard, saw-filing round
the corner, etc. It was as though we were careering madly over a multitude of fine-tooth combs.
With that caution which is inseparable from canoecruising in every part of the known world, I leaned
over the side of my personal property and penetrated the bewildering depths of the coral sea.




188'SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
Were we, I asked myself, suspended about two
feet above a garden of variegated cauliflowers 1  Or
were the elements wafting us over a minute winterforest, whose fragile boughs were loaded with
prismatic crystals 
The scene was constantly changing: now  it
seemed a disordered bed of roses, — pink, and
white, and orange; presently we were floating in
the air, looking down upon a  thousand-domed
mosque, pale in the glamour of the Oriental moon;
and then a wilderness of bowers presented itself, 
bowers whose fixed leaves still seemed to quiver in
the slight ripple of the sea, - blossoming for a
moment in showers of buds, purple, and green, and
gold, but fading almost as soon as born. I could
scarcely believe my eyes, when these tiny, though
marvellously brilliant fish shot suddenly out from
some lace-like structure, each having the lurid and
flame-like beauty of sulphurous fire, and all turning instantly, in sudden consternation at finding
us so near, and secreting themselves in the coral
pavilion that amply sheltered them. Among the
delicate anatomy of these frozen ferns our light
canoe was crashing on its way.  I saw the fragile
structures overwhelmed with a single blow from
the young savage, who stood erect, propelling us
onward amid the general ruins.  With my thumb
and finger I annihilated the laborious monuments
of centuries, and saw havoc and desolation in our
wake.




A CANOE-CRUISE IN THE CORAL SEA. 189
There, in one of God's reef-walled and cliff-sheltered aquaria, we drifted, while the sky and sea were
glowing with the final, triumphant gush of sunset
radiance. Fefe at last broke the silence, with an
interrogation: " Well, how you feel  "  " Fefe," I
replied, " I feel as though I were some good and
faithful bee, sinking into a sphere of amber, for a
sleep of a thousand years."  Fefe gave a deepmouthed and expressive  grunt, as he laid his
brown profile against the sunset sky, thereby displaying his solitary ear-ring to the best advantage,
and with evident personal satisfaction.  "And how
do you feel, Fefe l " I asked.  He was mum for a
moment; arched his back like any wholesome
animal when the sun has struck clean through it;
ejaculated an ejaculation with his tongue and teeth
that cannot possibly be spelled in English, and
thereupon his nostril quivered spasmodically, and
was only comforted by the immediate application
of his nose-flute, through which dulcet organ he
confessed his deep and otherwise unutterable joy.
I blessed him for it, though there were but three
notes, all told, and those minors and a trifle flat.
Fefe's impassioned soul having subsided, we both
looked over to beautiful Morea, nine miles away.
How her peaks shone like steel, and her valleys
looked full of sleep! while here and there one
golden ray lingered for a moment to put the final
touch to a fruit it was ripening or a flower it was
painting, — for they each have their perfect work




190            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
allotted to them, and they don't leave it half completed.
It was just the hour that harmonizes everything in nature, and when there is no possible discord in all the universe.  The fishes were baptizing themselves by immersion in space, and kept
leaping into the air, like momentary inches of
chain - lightning.  Our islet  swam  before  us,
spiritualized, -  suspended, as it were, above the
sea, - ready at any moment to fade away.  The
waves had ceased beating upon the reef; the clear,
low notes of a bell vibrating from the shore called
us to prayer. Fefe knew it, and was ready, - so was
I; and with bare heads and souls utterly at peace
we gave our hearts to God --- for the time being!
Then came the hum of voices and the rustle of
renewed life.  On we pressed towards our islet,
under the increasing shadows of the dusk.  A
sloping beach received us; the young cocoa-palms
embraced one  another with  fringed  branches.
Through green and endless corridors we saw the
broad disk of the full moon hanging above the hill.
Fefe at once chose a palm, and having ascended
to its summit cast down its fruit.  Descending,
he planted a stake in the earth, and striking a nut
against its sharpened top soon laid open the
fibrous husk, with which a fire was kindled.
Taking two peeled nuts in his hands, he struck
one against the other and laid open the skull of it,
-  a clear sort of scalping that aroused me to




A CANOE-CRUISE IN  THE CORAL SEA. 191
enthusiasm.  There is one end of a cocoa-nut's
skull as delicate as a baby's, and a well-directed tap
does the business; possibly the same result would
follow  with those of infants of the right age, 
twins, for instance. Fefe agrees with me in this
theory, now first given to the public.
Then followed much talk, on many topics, over
our tropical supper, -— said supper consisting of
sea-weed salad, patent self-stuffing banana-sausages,
and cocoa-nut hash.  We argued somewhat, also,
but in South Pacific fashion,-  which would surely
spoil, if imported; I only remember, and will record, that Fefe regarded the nose-flute as a triumph of art, and considered himself no novice in
musical science, as applicable to nose-flutes in a
land where there is scarcely a nose without its
particular flute, and many a flute is silent forever,
because its special nose is laid among the dust.
Having eaten, I proposed sleeping on the spot,
and continuing the cruise at dawn.  "Why should
we return to the world and its cares, when the sea
invites us to its isles? Nature will feed us. In
that blest land, clothing has not yet been discovered.  Let us away! " I cried.  At this juncture, voices came over the sea to us, -  voices
chanting like sirens upon the shore.  Instinctively  Fefe's nose-flute resumed its tremolo, and I
knew the day was lost.  "Come! " said the little
rascal, as though he were captain and I the crew,
and he dragged me toward the skiff. With terrific




192           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
emphasis, I commanded him to desist.  "Don't
imagine," I said, " that this is a modern Bounty,
and that it is your duty to rise up in mutiny for
the sake of dramatic justice. Nature never repeats
herself, therefore come back to camp! "
But he wouldn't come.  I knew I should lose
my canoe unless I followed, or should have to
paddle back alone, - no easy task for one unaccustomed to it.  So I moodily embarked with him;
and having pushed off into deep water, he sounded
a note of triumph that was greeted with shouts on
shore, and I felt that my fate was sealed.
It had been my life-dream to bid adieu to the
human family, with one or two exceptions; to
sever every tie that bound me to anything under
the sun; to live close to Nature, trusting her, and
getting trusted by her.
I explained all this to the young " Kanack,"
who was in a complete state of insurrection, but
failed to subdue him.  Overhead the  air was
flooded with hazy moonlight; the sea looked like
one immeasurable drop of quicksilver, and upon
the summit of this luminous sphere our shallop
was mysteriously poised. A faint wind was breathing over the ocean; Fefe erected his paddle in the
bows, placed against it a broad mat that constituted part of my outfit for that new life of which I
was defrauded, and on we sped like a belated seabird seeking its mossy nest.
Beneath us slept the infinite creations of an



A CANOE-CRUISE IN  THE CORAL SEA. 193
other world, gleaming from  the dark bosom of the
sea with an unearthly pallor, and seeming to reveal something of the forbidden mysteries that lie
beyond the grave.  "La Petite Pologne," whispered Fefe, as he arched his back for the last time,
and stepped on shore at the foot of this singular
rendezvous, - a narrow lane threading the groves
of Papeete, bordered by wine-shops, bakeries, and
a convent-wall, lit at night by smoky lanterns
hanging motionless in the dead air of the town,
and thronged from 7 P. M. till 10 P. M. by people
from all quarters of the globe.
Fefe having resumed his profession as soon as
his bare foot was on his native heath again, the
minstrels moved in a hollow square through the
centre of La Petite Pologne. They were rendering some Tahitian madrigal, - a three-part song,
the solo, or first part, of which being got safely
through with, -  a single stanza, -  it was repeated
as a duo, and so re-repeated through simple addition with a gradually-increasing chorus; the
nose-flute meantime getting delirious, and sounding its finale in an ecstasy prolonged to the point
of strangulation, when the whole unceremoniously
terminated, and everybody took a rest and a fresh
start. During these performances, the audience
was dense and demonstrative.  Fefe was in his
element, sitting with his best side to the public,
and flaunting' his ear-ring mightily.  A  dance
followed: a dance always follows in that land of
9                         M




194           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
light hearts, and as one after another was ushered
into the arena and gave his or her body to the
interpretation of such songs as would startle Christian ears,- albeit there be some Christian hearts
less tender, and Christian lips less true, -to my
surprise, Fefe abandoned his piping and danced
before me, and then came a flash of intuition, -
rather late, it is true, but still useful as an explanatory supplement to my previous vexations.
" Fefe!" I gasped  (Fefe  is the  Tahitian for
kElephantiasis), and my Fefe raised his or her
skirts, and danced with a shocking leg.  I really
can't tell you what Fefe was.  You never can
tell by the name.  He might have been a boy, or
she might have been a girl, all the time. I don't
know that it makes any particular difference to
me what it was, but I cannot encourage elephantiasis in anything, and therefore I concluded
my naval engagement with Fefe, and solemnly
walked toward my chamber, scarcely a block off.
The music followed me to my door with a song
of some kind or other, but the real nature of
which I was too sensitive to definitely ascertain.
Gazelle-eyed damsels, with star-flowers dangling
from  their ears, obstructed the way.  The gendarmes regarded me with an eye single to France
and French principles. Mariners arrayed in the
blue of their own sea and the white of their own
breakers bore down upon us with more than belonged to them.  Men of all colors went to and




A CANOE-CRUISE IN THE CORAL SEA. 195
fro, like mad creatures; women followed; children
careered hither and thither.  Wild shouts rent
the air; there was an intoxicating element that
enveloped all things. The street was by no means
straight, though it could scarcely have been narrower; the waves staggered up the beach, and
reeled back again; the moon leered at us, looking blear-eyed as she leaned against a cloud; and
half-nude bodies lay here and there in dark corners, steeped to the toes in rum.  Out of this human maelstrom, whose fatal tide was beginning
to sweep me oa with it, I made a plunge for my
door-knob and caught it.  Twenty besetting sins
sought to follow me, covered with wreaths and
fragrant with sandalwood oil; twenty besetting
sins rather pleasant to have around one, because
by no means as disagreeable as they should be.
Fefe was there also, and I turned to address him
a parting word, -a word calculated to do its
work in a soil particularly mellow.
" Fefe," I said, "how can I help regarding it as
a dispensation of Providence that your one leg is
considerably bigger than your other' How can I
expect you, with your assorted legs, to walk in
that straight and narrow way wherein I have frequently found it inconvenient  to walk myself, to
say nothing of the symmetry of my own extremities. Therefore, adieu, child of the South, with
your one ear-ring and your piano-forte leg; adieu
forever."




196           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
With that I closed my door upon the scene, and
strove to bury myself in oblivion behind the white
window-shade.  In vain: the shadow with the
mustache and goatee still pursued the shadow with
the flowing locks that fled too slowly.  Voices
faint, though audible, indulged in allusions more
or less profane, and with a success which would
be considered highly improper in any latitude.
Thus sinking into an unquiet sleep, with a dream
of canoe-cruising in a coral sea, whose pellucid
waves sang sadly upon the remote shores of an
ideal sphere, across the window loomed the gigantic shadow of some brown beauty, whose vast
proportions suggested nothing more lovely than a
new Sphinx, with a cabbage in either ear.




UNDER A GRASS ROOF.
A LEAF TORN AT RANDOM FROM A TROPICAL NOTEBOOK.
T Kahakuloa, under a terrific hill and
close upon a frothing tongue of the sea,
I draw rein. The act is simply a formality of mine; probably the animal would have
paused here of his own free will, for he has
been rehearsing his stops a whole hour back, during which time he limped somewhat and reaped
determinedly the few tufts of dry grass that Nature
had provided him by the trail-side.  The clouds
are falling; the cliffs are festooned with damp
gauze; the air is moist and cool; a grass hut of
uncommon purity stands invitingly by. A moonfaced youth, whose spotless garments appealed to
me as he overtook our caravan a mile back, says,
"Will you eat and sleep  "  I am but human, and
a hungry and sleepy human at that; so I tip off
from my mule's back with gratitude and alacrity.
In a moment the fine linen of mine host is hung
upon its peg, and a good study of the Nude re



198           SOUTH-SEA ID YS.
turns to me for further orders.  I am  literally
famishing, and the mule is already up to his ears
in water-cress; but then I have ridden and he has
carried me.  How just, O Mother Nature, are thy
judgments!
With the superb poses of a trained athlete, the
Nude swings a fowl by the neck, and shortly it is
plucked and potted, together with certain vegetables of the proper affinities.  Then he swathes a
fish in succulent leaves, and buries it in hot ashes;
and then he smokes his peace-pipe. Pipe no sooner
lighted than mouths mysteriously gather: five,
ten, a dozen of them  magically assemble at the
smell of smoke and take their turn at the curled
shell, with a hollow stalk for a mouth-piece.  Dinner at last.  0, fish, fruit, and fowl on a mat on
a floor in a grass hut at evening! How excellent
are these - amen! Night -  supper over - some
one twanging upon a stringed instrument of rude
native origin. Gossip lags, - darkness and silence,
and a cigarette.  The Nude rises haughtily and
lights a lamp that looks very like a diminutive
coffee-pot with a great flame in the nose of it.  He
hangs it against a beam already blackened with
smoke to the peak of the roof.  Again the peacepipe sweeps the home-circle, and is passed out to
the mouths of the neighborhood.
Guests drop down upon us and fill the one aperture of the hut with rows of curious, welcoming
faces; assorted dogs press through the door in turn,




UNDER A GRASS R OO              199
receive a slap from each member of the family, and
retreat with invisible tails; sudden impulses set
all tongues wagging in unison; impulses, equally
sudden and unaccountable, enjoin protracted intervals of silence. The sea breathes heavily; there
is a noise of rain-drops sliding down the thatch.
Guests disperse with a kind " aloha." We are alone
with the night. The spirit of repose descends upon
us; one by one the dusky members of mine host's
household roll themselves into mummies and lie
in a solemn row along the side of the room, sleeping.  I, also, will sleep.  A great bark-cloth (kapt)
that rattles as though it had received seven starchings, is all mine for covering, -a royal kapa this,
of exceeding stiffness. I lie with my eyes to the
roof, and count the beams that look like an arbor.
What is it, as large as my thumb, cased in brown
armor    A roach  -— a melancholy procession of
roaches passing from one side of the hut, over the
roof, with their backs downward, and descending on
the other side by the beams, - a hundred of them,
perhaps, or a thousand: the cry is, "Still they
come!"  There is a noise of tiny feet upon the
roof, and it isn't rain; there is a sound as of falling
objects that escape before I can catch them.  My
hand rests upon a cool, moist creature that writhes
under it, - an animated spinal column with four
legs at one end of it. Away, thou slimy newt!
Something runs over the matting, making a still,
small clatter as it goes, - something looking like a




200            SOUTII-SEA IDYLS.
toy train of dirt-cars.  Ha! the venomous and
wily centipede! Put out the coffee-pot, for these
sights are horrible!
Now I will sleep with my face under the kapa, -
silence, serene silence, and darkness profound; the
sea beating in agony at the foot of the big hill, -
a time for lofty and sublime revery.  More rain
outside the hut; gusts of wind, wailing as they
rush past us. Thanks for this shelter. My pillow
saturated with cocoa-nut oil — ah, what savage
dreams may have disturbed these sleepers! No
matter.  Will get a wink of sleep before daybreak.
Sleep, at last, -  how refreshing art thou!
Hello! the coffee-pot in a blaze again; the Nude
smoking  his  peace-pipe; children  eating  and
making merry.  Daybreak 1  No; midnight, perchance, -darkness without, darkness once more
(by request) within.  " Come again, bright dream."
Horror! the house shaken as by an earthquake,gnashing of teeth distinctly audible; the mule undoubtedly eating up the side of the grass hut!
Anon, quiet restored.  A suggestion of moonlight
through the open door; the twanging of the stringed
affair; a responsive twang in the distance. Some
one steals cautiously forth into the starlight.  All
is not well in Kahakuloa.  Rain over; mule vegetating elsewhere; roaches subdued; sea comparatively  quiet.   Welcome, kind  Nature's  sweet
restorer!... Humming of voices; rolling of
dogs about the house; ditto of children ditto;




UNDER A GRASS ROOF.             201
broad daylight, and  breakfast waiting.  Mule
saddled, and, with a mouthful of roses, looking
fresh and happy.  Mule-boy eager for the fray.
Time up. Adieu, adieu — 0 beautiful Kahakuloa!
I must away,
Above the terrible hill hang clouds and shadows;
fringes of rain obscure the trail as it climbs persistently to heaven; but up that trail, into and
through those clouds and shadows, I pursue my
solitary pilgrimage.




MY SOUTH-SEA SHOW.
IGH in her lady's-chamber sat Gail, lookI j   ing with calm eyes through the budding
maples across the hills of spring.  Her
letter was but half finished, and the village post
was even then ready; so she woke out of her
revery, and ended the writing as follows:
SPRING, -.
"I know not where you may be at this moment,living with what South-Sea Island god, drinking the
milk of cocoa-nut, and eating bread-fruit,- but wherever you are, forget not your promise to come home
again, bringing your sheaves with you."
Anon she sealed it and mailed it, and it was
hurried away, over land and sea, till, after many
days, it found me drinking my cocoa-milk and refreshing myself with bread-frlits.
Anon I replied to her, not on the green enamel
of a broad leaf, with a thorn stylet, but upon the
blank margins of Gail's letter, with mylast halfinch of pencil. I said to her:



MY SOUTII-SEA SHOW.               203
SUMMER,.
"By and by I will come to you, when the evenings
are very long, and the valley is still. I will cross the
lawn in silence, and stand knocking at the south entry.
Deborah will open the door to me with fear and trembling, for I shall be sunburnt and brawny, with a baby
cannibal under each arm. Then at a word a tattooed
youngster shall reach her a Tahitian pearl, and I will
cry,' Give it to Mistress Gail'; whereat Deborah will
willingly withdraw, leaving me motionless in the dead
leaves by the south entry. You will take the token,
dear Gail, and know it as the symbol of my return.
You will come and greet us, and lead us to the best
chamber, and we will feast with you as long as you like,
-I and my cannibals."
T was never quite sure of what Gail said to my
letter, but I knew her for a true soul; so I gathered
my cannibals under my metaphorical wings, and
journeyed unto the village, and came into it at sunset, while it was autumn.  We passed over the lawn
in silence, and stood knocking at the south entry,
in real earnest.  Deborah came at last, and the
little striped fellow bore aloft his pearl of Tahitian
beauty, while I gave my message, and Deborah
was terrified and thought she was dreaming.  But
she took the pearl and went, and we stood in the
keen air of autumn, and my South Sea babies were
very cold and moaned pitifully under my arms,
and the little pearl-bearer shivered in all his stripes,
and capered in the dead leaves like an imp of
darkness.




204           SO UTH-SEA IDYLS.
Then Gail came to us and let us in, and we
camped by the great fire in the sitting-room,
whither Deborah brought bowls of new milk for
the little ones, and was wonderfully amazed at their
quaintness and beauty, but quite failed to affiliate
with my striped pearl-bearer.
So I said, "Sit you down, Deborah, and hear
the true story of my Zebra."  Gail had already
captured the bronze babies, and was helping them
with their bowls of milk as they nestled at her
feet, and I took my striped beauty between my
knees and stroked his soft wool, and told how he
saved me from a watery death, and again from the
fiery stake, and was doubly dear to me forevermore: 
" We were at the island of Pottobokee, getting
water and fruit; had stacked the last sack of
mangoes and limes in the boat, and were off for
the ship, glad to escape with our scalps, when a
wave took us amidships on the reef, and we
swamped in  the dreadful spume.  Some were
drowned; some clung to the boat, though it was
stove badly, while relief came from the vessel as
quickly as possible, and the fragments were gathered
out of the waves and taken aboard.
"They thought themselves lucky to escape with
the remnants, for they knew the natives for cannibals, and the shore was black and noisy within ten
minutes after the accident.  It looked stormy in
that neighborhood: hence the caution and haste




MY SOUTH-SEA SHOW.              205
of the i'elief-crew, who left me for drowned, I suppose, as they never came after me, but spread everything, and went out of sight before dark that
evening.
"I was no swimmer at all, but I kicked well,
and was about diving the fatal dive, - last of three
warnings that seem providentially allotted the luckless soul in its extremity: I was just upon the
third sinking, when a tough little arm gripped
me under the breast, and I hung over it limp and
senseless, knowing nothing further of my deliverance, until I found myself a captive in Kabala-kum,
- a heathenish sort of paradise, a little way back
from the sea-coast.' The natives had given up all hope of feasting
upon me, for there was n't a respectable steak in
my whole carcass, nor was my appetite promising;
so they resolved to make a bonfire of me, to get
me out of the way.  But that tough little arm
that saved me from an early -grave in the water
was' husband to a tough little heart, that resolved
I should n't be burnt.  I was his private and
personal property; he had fished me out of the
sea; he would cook me in his own style when he
got ready, and no one else was to have a word in
the matter.
"There he showed his royal blood, Deborah, for
he was the King's son: this marvellous tattooing
proclaims his rank. Only the noble and brave are
permitted to brand these rainbows into their brown
skins.




206           S OUTH-SEA IDYLS.
"I was almost frightened when I first returned
to consciousness, and saw this little fellow pawing
me in his tender and affectionate way. He was
lithe as a panther, and striped all over with brilliant and changeless stripes; so I called him my
boy Zebra, and I suppose he called me his white
mouse, or something of that sort.
"Well, he saved me at all events; and having
heard something of you and Gail from  me, he
wanted to see you very much, and we made our
escape together, though he had to sacrifice all his
bone-jewelry, and lots of skulls and scalps: and
here he is, and you must like him, Deborah, because he is a little heathen, and doesn't go to
sabbath school, as a general thing, and worships
idols very badly."
Deborah did me the compliment to absorb a tear
in the broad hem of her apron, at the conclusion
of my episode, whereat my beautiful Zebra regarded her in utter amazemlent, then turned his
queer face-ringed, streaked, and striped -  up
to mine, and laughed his barbaric laugh. He was
wonderful to see, with his breast like a pigeon; his
round, supple, almost voluptuous limbs, peculiar
to his amphibious tribe; his head crowned with a
turban of thick wool, so fine and flossy, it looked
as though it had been carded: it stood two inches
deep at a tangent from his oval pate.
From his woolly crown to the soles of his feet,
my Zebra was frescoed in the most brilliant and




MY SOUTH-SEA SHOW.              207
artistic fashion. Every color under the sun seemed
pricked into his skin (there he discounted the zebras, who are limited in their combinations of light
and shade): this, -together with the multiplicity
of figures therein wrought, was a never-failing joy
to me.  0 my Zebra! how did you ever grow so
splendid off yonder in the South Seas?
We chatted that evening by Gail's fire, till my
Zebra's woolly head went clean to the floor, and he
looked like some prostrate idol about to be immolated on that Christian hearth; and the baby
cannibals were as funny as two little brown rabbits,
with their ears clipped, nestling at Gail's patient
feet.
It was fully nine o'clock by this time, so Deborah
got the Bible, smoothed out her apron, and opened
it thereon, while she read a chapter. We sat by
the fire and listened. I heard the earnest voice
of the reader, while the autumn winds rose in
gusts, and puffed out the curtains now and then.
1 thought of the chilly nights and frosty mornings
we were to endure, - we exiles of the South.  I
thought of the snows that were to follow, and of
the little idolaters sleeping through the gospel,
with deaf ears, while their hearts panted high in
some dream of savage joy.
There was a big bed made up on the floor of my
room, - the best chamber at Gail's, - and there I
laid out my little pets, tucking them in with infinite concern; for they looked so like three




208           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
diminutive mummies, as they lay there, that I
didn't know whether they would think it worth
while to wake up again into life; and what would
I be worth then, without my wild boys?- I, who
was born, by some mischance, out of my tropical
element, and whose birthright is Polynesia! Gail
laughed when she saw me fretting so, and she
patted the curly heads of the babies, and stroked
the Zebra's shaggy pate, and said " Good night " to
us, as her step measured the hall, and a door
closed in the distance; whereupon, instead of
freezing in the icy linen of the spare bed at the other
end of the room, I crept softly into the nest of
cannibals, and we slept like kittens until morning.
At a seasonable hour the next day, I got my
jewels- my little inhuman jewels - into their
thick, winter clothes again, and we trotted down
to breakfast, as hungry as bears. Deborah was
good enough to embrace both the little ones, but
she gave the Zebra a wide berth, and was not
entirely satisfied at leaving him loose in the house.
He was rather odd-looking, I confess.  He used
to curl up under the table and go to sleep, at all
hours of the day, -- I think it was the cold weather
that encouraged him in it,    stretching himself,
now and then, like a spaniel, and showing his
sharp saw-teeth in a queer way, when he laughed
in his dreams.  Presently Gail came in, and we
sat at table, and came near to eating her out of
house and home.  Deborah said grace, -rather a




MY SOUTH-SEA SHOW.                   209
long one, considering we were so hungry,    a grace
in which my babies were not forgotten, and the
Zebra was made the subject of a special prayer.
To my horror, Zebra was helping himself surreptitiously to the nearest dish, the while. It was a
merry meal.  I rose in the midst of it, and laid
before Gail an enormous placard, printed in as
many colors as even the Zebra could boast, and
Gail read it out to Deborah:
JENKINS' HALL.
IMMENSE ATTRACTION!
FOR ONE NIGHT ONLY!
HOKY AND POKY,
A BRACE OF SOUTH-SEA BABIES, FROM THE ANCIENT RIVERS
OF KABALA-KUM,
-ANDTHE  WONDERFUL BOY
ZEBRA,
A CANNIBAL PRINCE, FROM THE PALMY PLAINS OF POTTOBOKEE,
IN THEIR GRAND MORAL DIVERSION.
3- The first and only opportunity is now afforded the great public
to observe with safety how the heathen, in his blindness,
bows down to wood and stone.
These are the only original and genuine representatives of the
Kabalakumists and Pottobokees that ever left
their coral strand.
ADMISSION, -. CHILDREN, HALF PRICE.
Deborah was awed into  silence, and Gail was
apparently thinking over the possible result of this
strange  advertisement, for she said nothing, but
took deliberate sips of coffee, and broke the dry
toast between her fingers, while she looked at all
four of us savages in a peculiar and ominous manN




210           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
ner.  Nothing was said, however, to disparage any
further announcement of the entertainment; and,
having appeased our hunger, we adjourned to the
reading of another chapter, during which the South
Sea babies would play cat's-cradles under Gail's
writing-table, and the Zebra put his foot into the
middle of her wvork-basket, and was very miserable
indeed.
My hands were full of business.  As an impressario I had to rush about all day, mustering the
Great Public for the evening. Out I went, full of
it, while the bronze midgets were left in charge of
Gail and Deborah, and the Zebra was locked in an
upper room, with plenty to eat, and no facilities
for getting into mischief. I saw the leading men
in town: the preacher, who was deeply interested,
proposing to take up a collection on the next sabbath, for our benefit, - which proposition I received
with a graceful acquiescence peculiarly my own;
the professor, at the Seminary, who was less affable,
but whose pupils were radiant at the prospect of
getting into the cannibals at reduced rates; and
the editor, who desired to print full biographies of
myself and cannibals, with portraits and fac-simile
of autographs. He strongly urged the plausibility
of this new method of winning the heart of the
Great Public, and was willing to take my note for
thirty days, in consideration of his personal friendship for me, and his sympathy, as a public man
and a member of the press, with the show business.




MY SOUTIH-SEA  SIIOW.           211
Everything worked so nicely that it really
seemed quite providential that I had come, as I
had, like anything in the night, - noiseless and
unheralded.  Everything was in good order, and,
after our late dinner, I went out again, to finish
for the evening, -portioning off my charges, as
before, and returning, at the last moment, to bring
them up to the hall for their debut.  But judge of
my horror at finding my Zebra stretched upon the
floor of his room, quite insensible; and all this
time, Jenkins's Hall was thronged with the Great
Public, who had come to see us bow down to
wood and stone.
I was greatly alarmed. What could this sudden
attack mean? He was not subject to disorders of
that nature, -at least, I had never seen him in a
similar condition.  The little fellows began to cry,
in their peculiar fashion, which is simply raising
the voice to the highest and shrillest pitch, and
then shaking to an unlimited degree.  Gail was by
no means charmed at these new developments, and
Deborah fled from the room.  In a moment the
cause of our trouble was disclosed. Gail's cologne
bottles were exhumed from under the bed -  but
quite empty.  Their contents had been imbibed
by the Zebra in an extemporaneous bacchanalian
festival, tendered to himself by himself, in honor
of the occasion.
It was useless to borrow further trouble, so I
prepared my apology: "The sudden indisposition




212           SO UTH-SEA IDYLS.
peculiar to young cannibals during the early stages
of a public and Christian career had quite prostrated the representative from many a palmy plain;
and the South Sea babies would endeavor to fill the
vacancy caused by his absence with several new
and interesting features not set down in the bills."
I was most cordially received by the. audiences
and the little midgets danced their weird and
fantastic dances, in the least possible clothing
imaginable, and sang their love-lyrics, and chanted
their passionate war-chants, and gave the funeral
wail in a manner that reflected the highest credit
upon their respective South-Sea papas and mammas.  I considered it an entire success, and pocketed the proceeds with considerable satisfaction.
But to return to my poor little Zebra. His
cologne-spree had been quite too much for him.
He was mentally and physically demoralized, and
could be of no use to me, professionally, for a
week, at least. I at once saw this, and as I had two
or three engagements during that time, I begged
Gail to allow him  to remain with her during
his convalescence, while I went on with the babes
and fulfilled my engagements.  She consented.
Deborah also promised to be very good to him.
I think she took a deeper interest in him when
she found how very human he was, -a fact she
did not fully realize until he took to drinking.
On we went, through three little villages, in
three little valleys, with crowded houses every




MY SOUTI-SEA SHOW.               213
evening.  Delighted and enthusiastic audiences
wanted the midgets passed around, just as we
passed the bone fish-hooks and shark's-teeth combs,
for inspection.
About this time I received a short and decisive
epistle from Gail, - an immediate summons home.
The Zebra, in an unwatched moment, had got
into the kerosene, and was considered no longer a
welcome guest at Gail's.  Deborah was praying
with him daily, which did n't seem to have the desired effect, for he was growing worse and worse
every hour.
There were at least seven towns  anxiously
awaiting my South-Sea Lecture, with the "heathen in his blindness " attachment.  Yet it was out
of the question to think of pressing on in my tour,
thereby sacrificing my poor Zebra, and possibly
Gail as well.  I feared it was already too late to
save him, for I knew the nature of his ailment, and
foresaw the almost inevitable result. When we returned, Gail met us with tears in her eyes and furrows of care foreshadowed in her face.  I felt how
great a responsibility I had shifted upon her shoulders, and accused myself roundly for such selfishness.  The babes rushed into her arms with the
first impulse of love, and refised to allow her out
of their sight again for some hours.
Deborah was, even then, wrestling with the angels up in Zebra's room, and I waited until she
came down, with her eyes red and swollen,- a bot



214           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
tie of physic in one hand and a Bible in the other;
then I went in to my poor, thin, shadowy little
Zebra, who was wild-eyed and nervous, and scarcely knew me at first, but went off into hysterics the
moment he found me out, to make up for it. He
had had no opportunity of speaking to any one,
save in his broken English, for several days, and
he rushed into a torrent of ejaculations so violent
and confising that I was thoroughly alarmed at
his condition. Presently he grew quieter, from
sheer exhaustion, and then I learned how he had
taken Deborah's well-intended efforts toward his
spiritual conversion.  He believed her prcying him
to death!  Deborah knew nothing of the sensitive
organism  of these islanders.  When moved, by a
spirit of revenge, they threaten one another with
prayers.  Incantations are performed and sacrifices offered, under which fearful spells the unhappy victim of revenge cannot think of surviving.
So he lies down and dies, without pain, or any effort on his part; and all your physic is like so
much water, administer it in what proportions
you choose.
I went into the garden, where I saw Gail under
the maples,-the very maples that were budding
in pink and white when she wrote me the letter
bidding me come out of the South, bringing my
sheaves with me.  The animated sheaves were
even then swinging on the clothes-lines, and taking
life easily.  "Gail," I said, "0 Gail, the Zebra is




MY SOUTH-SEA SHOW.              215
a dead boy! "  Gail was shocked, and silent.  I
told her how useless, how hopeless it was to think
of saving him. All the doctors and all the medicines in the world were a fallacy where the soul
was overshadowed with a malediction.     Gail," I
said, " that Zebra says he wants to be an angel,
and he could n't possibly have decided upon anything more unreasonable than this.  What shall I
do without my Zebra. "  And I walked off by myself, and felt desperately, while Gail was wrapped
in thought, and the babes continued to do inexpressible things on the clothes-lines, to the intense
admiration of three small boys on the other side of
the garden-fence.
The doctor had already been called, and the
physic that Deborah carried about with her was a
legitimate draught prescribed by him.  Little did
he know of the death-angel that walks hand-inhand with a superstition as antique as Mount
Ararat.  So day by day the little Zebra grew
more and more slender, till his frail, striped skeleton stretched itself in a hollow of the bed, and
great gleaming eyes watched me as they would devour me with deathless and passionate love.
Sometimes his soul seemed to steal out of his
withering body and make mysterious pilgrimages
into its native clime.  I heard him murmuring
and muttering in a language unfamiliar to me. I
remembered that the chiefs had a dialect of their
own,- a vocabulary so sacred and secret that no




216           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
commoner ever dared to study out its meaning.
This I took to be his classical and royal tongue,
for he was of the best blood of the kingdom, and a
King's heir.
Deborah, at the delicate suggestion of Gail, discontinued her visitations to his chamber, as it
seemed to excite him so sadly; but her earnest
soul never rested from prayer in his behalf till his
last breath was spent, and his splendid stripes
grew livid for a moment, and seemed to change
like the dolphin's before their waning glories were
faded out in the lifeless flesh.
One twilight I took the midgets into the darkened room.  They scarcely knew the thin, drawn
face, with the slender, wiry fingers locked over
it, but they recognized the death-stroke with prophetic instinct, and, crouching at the foot of the
bed, rocked their dusky bodies to and fro, to and
fro, wailing the death-wail for Zebra.
Then I longed for wings to fly away with my
savage brood, - away, over seas and mountains,
till the palms waved again their phantom crests in
the mellow starlight, and the sea moaned upon the
reef, and the rivulet leaped from crag to crag
through silence and shadow: where death seemed
but a grateful sleep; for the soul that dawned in
that quiet life had never known the wear and tear
of this one, but was patient, and peaceful, and
ready at any hour of summons.
Dear Gail strove to comfort me in my tribula



MY SOUTH-SEA SHOW.             217
tion; but the Great Public went its way, and knew
nothing of the young soul that was passing in
speedy death.  Yet the Great Public was my
guide, philosopher, and friend. I could do nothing without its sanction and  co-operation.  I
basked in its smiles. I trembled at the thought
of its displeasure; and now death was robbing me
of my hard-earned riches, and annihilating my
best attraction. No wonder I fretted myself, and
berated my ill-fortune. Poor Gail had her hands
full to keep me within bounds.  I rushed to the
Zebra's room, and vowed to him that if he wouldn't
die just yet, I would take him  home at once
to his kingdom, and we'd always live there, and
die there, by and by, when we were full of years.
Alas, it was too late! "I want to be an angel,"
reiterated my Zebra, his thin face brightening
with an unearthly light; "to be an angel," whispered that faint and failing voice, while his humid
eyes glowed like twin moons sinking in the far,
mystical horizon of the new life he was about to
enter upon.  I struggled with him no longer.  I
bowed down by his pillow, and pressed the shadowy
form of my once beautiful Zebra.  "Well, be an
angel, little prince," said I; "be anything you
please, now, for I have done my best to save you,
and failed utterly."
So he passed hence to his destiny; and his nation
wept not, neither wore they ashes upon their foreheads, nor burned seams in their flesh; for they
10




218            SOUTHI-SEA IDYLS.
knew not of his fate.  But there was a small grave
digged in the orchard, and at dusk I carried the
coffin in my arms thither: how light it was! he
could have borne me upon his brawny shoulders
once,- strong as a lion's.  Gail cried, and Deborah cried; and I was quite beside myself.  The
mites of cannibals ate earth and ashes, and came
nearly naked to the obsequies, refusing to wear
their jackets, though the air was frosty and the
night promised snow.  We knelt there, to cover
Zebra for the last time, crying and shivering, and
feeling very, very miserable.
I took a little rest from business after that;
seeing, meantime, a stone cut in this manner:Here lies,
In this far land,
A PRINCE OF THE SAVAGE SOUTH,
And the Last of his Tribe.
But life called me into the arena again.  A
showman has little time to waste in mourning
over his losses, however serious they may be.
One frosty evening I got my brace of cannibals
into the lumbering ambulance that constituted
my caravan, with our boxes of war-clubs and
carved whale's-teeth lashed on behind us; plenty
of buffalo-robes around us, and a layer of hot
bricks underfoot, and so we started for our next
scene of action. The inexorable calls of the profession forbade our lingering longer under Gail's
hospitable roof; and it was not without pangs of




MY SOUTH-SEA SHOW.              219
inexpressible sorrow that we turned from her door,
and knew not if we were ever again to enjoy the
pure influences of her household.
My heart warmed toward poor, disconsolate
Deborah in that moment, and I forgave her all,
which was the most Christian act I ever yet performed.  As we rode down the lane, I caught a
glimpse of the low mound in the orchard, and I
buried my little barbarians under my great-coat,
so as to spare them a fresh sorrow, while I thought
how, spring after spring, that small grave would
be covered with drifts of pale apple-blossoms, and
in the long winters it would be hidden under the
paler drifts of snow, - when it should be strewn
with sea-shells, and laid away under a cactushedge, in a dense and fragrant shade; and I gathered my little ones closer to me, and said in my
soul: "0, if the August Public could only know
them as I know them, it would doubt us less, and
love us more! The Zebra is gone, indeed, but my
babes are here, fresh souls in perfect bodies, like
rareripe fruits, untouched as yet, with the nap and
the dew upon them."  The  stars sparkled and
flashed in the cloudless sky, as we hurried over
the crisp ground, - a little, bereaved, benighted
company of South-Sea strollers, who ask your
charity, and give their best in return for it.
I have told you of my South-Sea show. You
may yet have an opportunity of judging how you




220           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
like it, provided my baby heathens don't insist
upon turning into angels before their time, after
the manner of the lamented Zebra. In the mean
time, the dread of this not improbable curbing of.
my high career is but one of the sorrows of a
South-Sea showman.




THE  HOUSE  OF THE  SUN.
Y Hawaiian oracle, Kahele, having posed
_   himself in compact and chubby grace,
awaited his golden opportunity, which
was not long a coming. I sat on the steps of
L -'s veranda, and yawned frightfully, because
life was growing tedious, and I did not know exactly what to do next.  L -'s house was set in
the nicest kind of climate, at the foot of a great
mountain, just at that altitude where the hot air
stopped dancing, though it was never cool enough
to shut a door, or to think of wearing a hat for
any other purpose than to keep the sun out of
one's eyes.  L's veranda ran out into vacancy as blank as cloudless sky and shadowless sea
could make it; in fact, all that the eye found to
rest upon was the low hill jutting off from one corner of the house beyond a jasmine in blossom; and
under the hill a flat-sailed schooner rocking in a
calm. I think there was nothing else down the
slope of the mountain but tangled yellow grass,
that grew brown and scant as it crept into the




222            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
torrid zone, a thousand feet below us, and there it
had not the courage to come out of the earth at
all; so the picture ended in a blazing beach, with
warm  waves sliding up and down it, backed by
blue-watery and blue-airy space for thousands
and thousands of miles.
Why should not a fellow yawn over the situation? especially as L-   was busy and could not
talk much, and L's books were as old as the
hills and a good deal drier.
Having yawned, I turned toward Kahele, and
gnashed my teeth.  The little rascal looked knowing; his hour had come.  He fired off in broken
English, and the effect was something like this:"Suppose we sleep in House of the Sun, —we
make plenty good sceneries' "
"And where is that " quoth I.
Kahele's little lump of a nose was jerked up toward the great mountain at the back of L —'s
house. " Haleakala!" r cried he, triumphantly,
for he saw he had resurrected my interest in life,
And he felt that he had a thing or two worth showing, a glimpse. of which might content me with
this world, dull as I found it just then.  " Haleakala - the House of the Sun - up before us," said
Kahele.
"And to get into the Sun's House?"
"Make a good climb up, and go in from the top! "
* Haleakala, an extinct crater in the Sandwich Islands,
supposed to be the largest in the world.




THE HOUSE OF THE SUN.             223
Ha! to creep up the roof and drop in at the
skylight: this were indeed a royal adventure.
"How long would it take. "
Kahele waxed eloquent.  That night we should
sleep a little up on the slope of the mountain, lodging with the haolis (foreigners) among the first
clouds; in the morning we should surprise the sun
in the turrets of his temple; then down -down
-down into the crater, that had been strewn
with ashes for a thousand years.  After that, out
on the other side, toward the sea, where the tradewinds blew, and the country was fresh and fruitful.  The youngster sweated with enthusiasm
while he strove to make me comprehend the full
extent of the delights pertaining to this journey;
and, as he finished, he made a rapid flank movement toward the animals, staked  a few  rods
away.
It was not necessary that I should consent to
undertake this expedition.  He was eager to go,
and he would see that I enjoyed myself when I
went; but go I must, now that he had made up
my mind for me.  I confess, I was as wax in that
climate. Yet, why not take this promising and
uncommon tour. The charm of travel is to break
new paths.  I ceased to yawn any further over
life.  Kahele went to the beasts, and began saddling them.  L's hospitality culninated in
a bottle of cold, black coffee, and a hamper of delicious sandwiches, such as Mrs. L-  excels in.




224            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
I had nothing to do but to go.  It did look like
a conspiracy; but, as I never had the moral courage to fight against anything of that sort, I got
into the saddle and went.
Turning for a moment toward the brute's tail,
overcome with conflicting emotions, I said:"Adieu, dear L, thou picture of boisterous industry! Adieu, Mrs. L, whose light
is hid under the bushel of thy lord; but, as it
warms him, it is all right, I suppose, and thy reward shall come to thee some day, I trust! Byby, multitudes of little L     s, tumbling recklessly in the back-yard, crowned with youth and
robust health and plenty of flaxen curls! Away,
Kahele! for it is toward evening, and the clouds
are skating along the roof of the House of the
Sun.  Sit not upon the order of your going, but
strike spurs at once, - and away! 
It was thus that I relieved myself. The prospect of fresh adventure intoxicated me.  I do not
believe I could have been bought off after that anlivening farewell.  The air of the highlands was
charged with electricity.  I bristled all over with
new life.  I wanted to stand up in my saddle and
fly.
It seemed the boy had engaged a special guide
for the crater, - one accustomed to feeling his way
through the bleak hollow, where any unpractised
feet must have surely gone astray.  Kahele offered
him a tempting bonls to head our little caravan




THE HOUSE OF THE SUN.             225
at once, though it goes sorely against the Hawaiian
grain to make up a mind inside of three days.
Kahele managed the financial department, whenever he had the opportunity, with a liberality
worthy of a purse ten times as weighty as mine;
but as he afterward assured me, that guide was a
fine man, and a friend of his whom it was a pleasure and a privilege to serve.
Of course, it was all right, since I couldn't help
myself; and we three pulled up the long slopes of
Haleakala, while the clouds multiplied, as the sun
sank, and the evening grew awfully still. Somewhere up among the low-hanging mist there was a
house full of haolis, and there we proposed to
spend the night. We were looking for this shelter with all our six eyes, while we rode slowly onward, having scarcely uttered a syllable for the
last half-hour. You know there are some impressive sorts of solitude, that seal up a fellow's lips;
he can only look about him in quiet wonderment,
tempered with a fearless and refreshing trust in
that Providence who has enjoined silence. Well,
this was one of those times; and right in the
midst of it Kahele sighted a smoke-wreath in the
distance.  To me it looked very like a cloud, and
I ventured to declare it such; but the youngster
frowned me down, and appealed to the special
guide for further testimony. The guide declined
to commit himself in the matter of smoke or mist,
as he ever did on all succeeding occasions, being a
o10                       o




226           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
wise guide, who knew his own fallibility.  It was
smoke — a thin, blue ribbon of it, uncoiling itself
from  among the branches of the overhanging
trees, floating up and up and tying itself into
double-bow knots, and then trying to untie itself,
but perishing in the attempt.
In the edge of the grove we saw the little white
cottage of the haolis; and, not far away, a campfire, with bright, red flames dancing around a kettle, swung under three stakes with their three
heads together.  Tall figures were moving about
the camp, looking almost like ghosts, in the uncertain glow of the fire; and toward these lights and
shadows we jogged with satisfaction, scenting sup.per from afar.
" Halloo!" said we, with voices that did not
sound very loud, up in that thin atmosphere.
" Halloo I  said they, with the deepest unconcern, as though they had been through the whole
range of human experience, and there was positively nothing left for them to get excited over.
Some of their animals whinnied in a fashion that
drew a response from ours.  A dog barked savagely, until he was spoken to, and then was obliged
to  content himself with an occasional whine.
Some animal -a sheep, perhaps- rose up in the
trail before us, and plunged into the bush, sending our beasts back on their haunches with fright.
A field-cricket lifted up his voice and sang; and
then a hundred joined him; and then ten thou



THE HOUSE OF THE SUN.            227
sand times ten thousand swelled the chorus, till
the mountains were alive with singing crickets.
"Halloo, stranger! Come in and stop a bit,
won't you?"  That was our welcome from  the
chief of the camp, who came a step or two forward, as soon as we had ridden within range of
the camp-fire.
And we went in unto them, and ate of their
bread, and drank of their coffee, and slept in their
blankets, - or tried to sleep, -  and had a mighty
good time generally.
The mountaineers proved to be a company of
California miners, who had somehow drifted over
the sea, and, once on that side, they naturally
enough went into the mountains to cut wood, break
trails, and make themselves useful in a rough, outof-door fashion.  They had for companions and assistants a few natives, who, no doubt, did the best
they could, though the Californians expressed considerable contempt for the "lazy devils, who were
fit for nothing but to fiddle on a jew's-harp."
We ate of a thin, hot cake, baked in a frying-pan
over that camp-fire; gnawed a boiled bone fished
out of the kettle swung under the three sticks;
drank big bowls of coffee, sweetened with coarse
brown sugar and guiltless of milk; and sat on the
floor all the while, with our legs crossed, like so
many Turks and tailors.  We went to our blankets
as soon as the camp-fire had smothered itself in
ashes, though meanwhile Jack, chief of the camp,




228           SO UTH-SEA IDYLS.
gathered himself to windward of the flames, with
his hips on his heels and his chin on his knees,
smoking a stubby pipe and talking of flush times
in California. He was one of those men who
could and would part with his last quarter, relying upon Nature for his bed and board.  He said
to me, "If you can rough it, hang on a while, -
what's to drive you off?"  I could rough it: the
fire was out, the night chilly; so we turned in under blue blankets with a fuzz on them like moss,
and, having puffed out the candle, -that lived
long enough to avenge its death in a houseful of
villanous smoke, -we turned over two or three
times apiece, and, one after another, fell asleep.
At the farther side of the house lay the natives,
as thick as sheep in a pen, one of them a glossy
black fellow, as sleek as a eunuch, born in the
West Indies, but whose sands of life had been
scattered on various shores. This sooty fellow
twanged a quaint instrument of native workmanship, and twanged with uncommon skill.  His art
was the life of that savage community at the other
end of the house.  Again and again, during the
night, I awoke and heard the tinkle of his primitive harp, mingled with the ejaculations of delight
wrung from the hearts of his dusky and sleepless
listeners.
Once only was that midnight festival interrupted.  We all awoke suddenly and simultaneously,
though we scarcely knew why; then the dog began




THE HO1 USE OF TIlE SUN.          229
to mouth horribly.  My blanket-fellows - beds
we had none -knew there was mischief brewing,
and rushed out with their guns cocked.  Presently the dog came in from the brush, complaining
bitterly, and one of the miners shot at a rag fluttering among the bushes.  In the morning we
found a horse gone, and a couple of bullet-holes
in a shirt spread out to dry. As soon as the excitement was over, we returned to the blankets
and the floor.  The eunuch tuned his harp anew
and, after a long while, dawn looked in at the uncurtained window, with a pale, gray face, freckled
with stars.
Kahele saw it as soon as I did, and was up betimes. I fancy he slept little or none that night,
for he was fond of music, and especially fond of
such music as had made the last few hours more
or less hideous.  Everybody rose with the break
of day, and there was something to eat long before
sunrise, after which our caravan, with new vigor,
headed for the summit.
Wonderful clouds swept by us; sometimes we
were lost for a moment in their icy depths.  I
could scarcely see the tall ears of my mule when
we rode into those opaque billows of vapor that
swept noiselessly along the awful heights we were
scaling.  It was a momentary but severe bereavement, the loss of those ears and the head that
went with them, because I cared not to ride saddles that seemed to be floating in the air.  What




230           SOUTH-SEA ID LS.
was Prince Firouz Schah to me, or what was I to
the Princess of Bengal, that I should do this
thing!
There are pleasanter sensations than that of
going to heaven on horseback; and we wondered
if we should ever reach the-point where we could
begin to descend again to our natural level, and
talk with people infinitely below us just then.
Ten thousand perpendicular feet in the air; our
breath short; our animals weak in the knees; the
ocean rising about us like a wall of sapphire, on
the top of which the sky rested like a cover, - we
felt as though we were shut in an exhausted receiver, the victims of some scientific experiment
for the delectation of the angels. We were at the
very top of the earth. There was nothing on our
side of it nearer to Saturn than the crown of our
heads.  It was deuced solemn, and a trifle embarrassing. It was as though we were personally responsible for the planet during the second we happened to be uppermost in the universe.  I felt unequal to the occasion in that thin, relaxing atmosphere.  The special guide, I knew, would shirk
this august investiture, as he shirked everything
else, save only the watchful care of my collapsing
porte-monnaie.  Kahele, perhaps, would represent
us to the best of his ability, -which was not
much beyond an amazing capacity for food and
sleep, coupled with cheek for at least two of his
size. There is danger in delay, saith the copy



TIHE HOUSE OF THE SUN.            231
book; and while we crept slowly onward toward
the rim of the crater, the sun rose, and we forgot
all else save his glory.  We had reached the
mouth of the chasm.  Below us yawned a gulf
whose farther walls seemed the outlines of some
distant island, within whose depths a sea of cloud
was satisfied to ebb and flow, whose billows broke
noiselessly at the base of the sombre walls among
whose battlements we clung like insects.  I wonder that we were not dragged into that awful sea,
for strange and sudden gusts of wind swept past
us, coming from various quarters, and rushing like
heralds to the four corners of the heavens. We
were far above the currents that girdle the lower
earth, and seemed in a measure cut off from the
life that was past.  We lived and breathed in
cloud-land.  All our pictures were of vapor; our
surroundings changed continually.  Forests laced
with frost; silvery, silent seas; shores of agate
and of pearl; blue, shadowy caverns; mountains
of light, dissolving and rising again transfigured
in glorious resurrection, the sun tingeing them
with infinite color.  A flood of radiance swept over
the mysterious picture, -  a deluge of blood-red
glory that came and went like a blush; and then the
mists faded and fled away, and gradually we saw
the deep bed of the crater, blackened, scarred,
distorted, - a desert of ashes and cinders shut in
by sooty walls; no tinge of green, no suggestion
of life, no sound to relieve the imposing silence of




232           SO UTH-SEA IDYLS.
that literal death'of Nature.  We were about to
enter the guest-chamber of the House of the Sun.
If we had been spirited away to the enchanted
cavern of some genie, we could not have been
more bewildered.  The cloud-world had come to
an untimely end, and we were left alone among
its blackened and charred ruins.  That magician,
the sun, hearing the approach of spies, had transformed his fairy palace into a bare and uninviting
wilderness. But we were destined to explore it,
notwithstanding; and our next move was to dismount and drive our unwilling animals over into
the abyss.  The angle of our descent was too near
the perpendicular to sound like truth, in print.  I
will not venture to give it; but I remember that
our particular guide and his beast were under
foot, while Kahele and his beast were overhead,
and I and my beast, sandwiched between, managed to survive the double horror of being buried
in the debris that rained upon us from the tail-end
of the caravan, and  slaying - the  unfortunate
leaders ahead with the multitude of rocks we sent
thundering down the cliff.  A moving avalanche
of stones and dust gradually brought us to the
bed of the crater, where we offered thanks in the
midst of an ascending cloud of cinders, every soul
of us panting with exhaustion, and oozing like a
saturated sponge. The heat was terrific; shelter
there was none; L —'s coffee was all that saved
us from  despair.  Before us stretched miles and




THE HO USE OF THE S UN.           233
miles of lava, looking like scorched pie-crust; two
thousand feet above us hung heavy masses of
baked masonry, unrelieved by any tinge of verdure.  To the windward there was a gap in the
walls, through which forked tongues of mist ran
in, but curled up and over the ragged cliffs, as
though the prospect were too uninviting to lure
them  farther.  It behooved us to get on apace,
for life in the deserted House of the Sun was, indeed, a burden, and morever there was some danger of our being locked in. The wind might veer
a little, in which case an ocean of mist would deluge the crater, shutting out light and heat, and
bewildering the pilgrim  so that escape were impossible.  The loadstone bewitched the compass
in that fixed sea, and there were no beacons and
no sounding signals to steer by.  Across the
smooth, hard lava occasional traces of a trail were
visible, like scratches upon glass. Close to the
edges of this  perilous  path  yawned  chasms.
Sometimes the narrow  way led over a ridge between two sandy hollows, out of which it was almost
impossible to return, if one false step should
plunge you into its yielding vortex.  There was
a long pull toward afternoon, and a sweltering
camp about three P. M., where we finished L —'s
lunch, and were not half satisfied.  Even the consoling weed barely sustained our fainting spirits,
for we knew that the more tedious portion of the
journey was yet to come.




234           SOUTTI-SEA IDYLS.
The windward vestibule wound down toward
the sea, a wild gorge through which the molten
lava had poured its destructive flood. There it lay,
a broad, uneven pass of dead, black coals, — clinkers, as ragged and sharp as broken glass,- threaded by one beaten track a few inches in breadth.
To lose this trail were to tear the hoofs from your
suffering beasts in an hour or two, and to lacerate
your own feet in half the time.  Having refreshed
ourselves on next to nothing, we pressed forward.
Already the shadows were creeping into the House
of the Sun, and as yet we had scarcely gained the
mouth of the pass. As we rode out from the shelter
of a bluff, a cold draught struck us like a wave of
the sea. Down the bleak, winding chasm we saw
clouds approaching, pale messengers that travel
with the trade-wind and find lodgment in the
House of the Sun.  They were hastening home
betimes, and had surprised us in the passage. It
was an unwelcome meeting.  Our particular guide
ventured to assume an expression of concern, and
cautiously remarked that we were pilikia,-that
is, in trouble!  For once he was equal to an
emergency; he knew of a dry well close at hand;
we could drop into it and pass the night, since it
was impossible to feel our way out of the crater
through clouds almost as dense as cotton.  Had
we matches?  No.  Had we dry sticks? Yes, in
the well, perhaps. Kah6le could make fire without phosphorus, and we could keep warm till morn



THE HOUSE OF THE SUN.             235
ing, and then escape from the crater as early as possible.  After much groping about, in and out of
clouds, we found the dusty well and dropped into
it.  Ferns -a few  of them -grew  about its
sides; a dwarfed tree, rejoicing in four angular
branches, as full of mossy elbows as possible, stood
in the centre of our retreat, and at the roots of
this miserable recluse the Kanakas contrived to
grind out a flame by boring into a bit of decayed
wood with a dry stick twirled rapidly between
their palms. Dead leaves, dried moss, and a few
twigs made a short-lived and feeble fire for us.
Darkness had come upon the place.  We watched
the flaming daggers stab the air fitfully, and finally
sheathe themselves for good. We filled our shallow
cave with smoke that drove us into the mouth of
it, from time to time, to keep from  strangulation.
We saw our wretched beasts shaking with cold;
we saw the swift, belated clouds hurrying onward
in ghostly procession; we could do nothing but
shudder and return to our dismal bed. No cheerful cricket blew his shrill pipe, like a policeman's
whistle; the sea sang not for us with its deep, resounding voice; the Hawaiian harp was hushed.
A stone, loosened by some restless lizard, rattled
down the cliff; a goat, complaining of the cold,
bleated once or twice.  The wind soughed; the
dry branches of our withering tree sawed across
each other: these were our comforters during
that almost endless night.




236            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
Once the heavens were opened to us.  Through
the rent in the clouds we saw a great shoulder of
the cliff above us, bathed in moonlight.  A thousand grotesque shadows played over the face of it.
Pictures came and went, -a palimpsest of mysteries.  Gargoyles leered at us from  under the
threatening brows of the bluff; and a white spectre, shining like a star, stood on the uppermost
peak, voiceless and motionless,- some living creature lost in admiration of the moon.  Then the
sky fell on us, and we were routed to our solitary
cave.
There is a solitude of the sea that swallows up
hope; the despairing spirit hangs over a threatening abyss of death; yet above it and below  it
there are forms of life rejoicing in their natural
element.  But there is a solitude of the earth
that is more awful; in it Death taunts you with
his presence, yet delays to strike.  At sea, one
step, and the spirit is set at liberty, - the body is
entombed forever. But alas! within the deserts of
the earth no sepulchre awaits the ashes of him
who has suffered, and nought but the winds or the
foul-feeding vultures shall cleanse that bleaching
skeleton where it lies.
We tried to sleep on our stony pillows.  Kahele
woke and found the guide and me dozing; later,
the guide roused himself to the discovery that
Kahele and I were wrapped in virtuous unconsciousness.  Anon I sat up among the rocks, lis



THE HOUSE OF THE SUN.             237
tened to the two natives breathing heavily, and
heard the wind sighing over the yawning mouth of
our cavern.  I heard the beasts stamping among
the clinkers, and covered my head again with the
damp blanket, and besieged sleep.  Then we all
three started from our unrefreshing dreams, and
lo! the clouds were rising and fleeing away, and
a faint, rosy light over the summit-peaks looked
like sunrise; so we rose and saddled the caravan,
and searched about us for the lost trail.  Hour
after hour we drew nearer to the mouth of the
crater.  Our progress was snail-like; each one of
us struck out for himself, having lost confidence
in the cunning of the other.  From  small elevations we took our reckoning, and he who got the
farthest toward the sea lifted up his voice in triumph, and was speedily joined by the rest of the
party.
At last we came upon the bluffs that overhang
the green shores of the island. We were safely
out of the Sun's Tabernacle, but not yet free to
pass into the lowly vales of the earth. Again and
again we rode to the edges of the cliffs, whose
precipitous walls forbade our descent.  Sometimes
we clung to the bare ribs of the mountain, where
a single misstep might have sent us headlong into
the hereafter.  Frequently we rejoiced in a discovery that promised well; but anon a sheltered
chasm unveiled its hideous depths, or an indigojungle laid hold of us and cut us off in that direction.




238           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
Below  us lay the verdant slopes of Kaupo.
From their dried-grass houses flocked the natives,
looking like ants and their hills.  They watched
us for hours with amused  interest.  Now and
then they called to us with faint and far-off voices,
— suggestions that were lost to us, since they
sounded like so many bird-notes floating in the
rind. All day we saw the little village lying under us temptingly peaceful and lazy.   Clouds
still hung below us: some of them  swept by,
pouring copious drops, that drove our audience
within doors for a few moments; but the rain was
soon over, the sun shone brighter than ever, the
people returned to watch us, and the day waned.
We surprised flock upon flock of goats in their
rocky retreats; but they dispersed in all directions like quicksilver, and we passed on. About
dusk we got into the grassy land, and thanked
God for deliverance.
Here Kahele's heart rejoiced.  Here, close by
the little chapel of Kaupo, he discovered one
whom  he proclaimed his grandfather; though,
judging from the years of the man, he could
scarcely have been anything beyond an uncle. I
was put to rest in a little stone cell, where the
priests sleep when they are on their mission to
Kaupo.  A narrow bed, with a crucifix at the foot
of it, a small window in the thick wall, with a jug
of water in the corner thereof, and a chair with a
game-leg, constituted  the furnishment of the




THE HOUSE OF THE SUN.           239
quaint lodging.  Kahdle rushed about to see old
friends,  who wept over him, -- and was very
long absent, whereat I waxed wroth, and berated
him roundly; but the. poor fellow was so charmingly repentant that I forgave him all, and more
too, for I promised him I would stay three days,
at least, with his uncle-grandfather, and give him
his universal liberty for the time being.
From the open doorway I saw the long sweep
of the mountains, looking cool and purple in the
twilight.  The ghostly procession of the mists
stole in at the windward gap; the after-glow of
the evening suffused the front of the chapel with
a warm light, and the statue of the Virgin above.the chapel-door, -a little faded with the suns of
that endless summer, a little mildewed with the
frequent rains, - the statue looked down upon us
with a smile of welcome.  Some youngsters, as
naked as day-old nest-birds, tossed a ball into the
air; and when it at last lodged in the niche of
the Virgin, they clapped their hands, half in
merriment and  half in  awe, and the  games
of the evening ended.  Then the full moon
rose; a cock crew in the peak of the chapel,
thinking it daybreak, and the little fellows slept,
with their spines curved like young kittens. By
and by the moon hung, round and mellow, beyond
the chapel-cross, and threw a long shadow in the
grass; and then I went to my cell and folded my
hands to rest,with a sense of blessed and unutterable peace.




THE CHAPEL OF THE PALMS.
(  1H, the long suffering of him who threads
(p 1 a narrow trail over the brown crust of a'~' -'l hill where the short grass lies flat in
tropical sunshine! On one side sleeps the blue,
monotonous sea; on the other, crags clothe themselves in cool mist and look dreamy and solemn.
The boy Kahele, who has no ambition beyond
the bit of his foot-sore mustang, lags behind,
taking all the dust with commendable resignation.
As for me, I am  wet through with  the last
shower; I steam  in the fierce noonday heat.  I
spur Hoke the mule into the shadow of a great
cloud that drifts lazily overhead, and am  grateful
for this unsatisfying shade as long as it lasts. I
watch the sea, swinging my whip by its threadbare lash like a pendulum, — the sea, where a
very black rock is being drowned over and over by
the tremendous swell that covers it for a moment;
but somehow the rock comes to the surface again,
and seems to gasp horribly in a deluge of break



THE CHAPEL OF THE PALMS.            241
ers.  That rock has been drowning for centuries,
yet its struggle for life is as real as ever.
I watch the mountains, cleft with gTeen, ferncushioned chasms, where an occasional stream
silently distills. Far up on a sun-swept ledge a
white, scattering drift, looking like a rose-garden
after a high wind, I know to be a flock of goats
feeding. But the wind-dried and sunburnt grass
under foot, the intangible dust that pervades the
air, the rain-cloud in the distance, trailing its banners of crape in the sea as it bears down upon us,
-these are what fret tne a little, and make life a
burden for the time being; so I spur my faithless
Hoke up a new ascent as forbidding as any that
we have yet come upon, and slowly and with
many pauses creep to the summit.
Kahele, "the goer," belies his name, for he
loiters everywhere and always; yet I am not sorry.  I have the first glimpse of Wailua all to myself.  I am  not obliged to betray my emotion,
which is a bore of the worst sort.
Wailua lies at my feet, - a valley full of bees,
butterflies, and blossoms, the sea fawning at the
mouth of it, the clouds melting over it; waterfalls gushing from numerous green corners; silverwhite phaetons floating in mid-air, at a loss to
choose between earth and heaven, though evidently a little inclined earthward, for they no sooner
drift out of the bewildering bowers of Wailua than
they return again with noticeable haste.
11                         P




242            SOUTHI-SEA IDYLS.
Down I plunge into the depths of the valley,
with the first drops of a heavy shower pelting me
in the back; and under a great tree, that seems
yearning to shelter somebody, I pause till the rain
is over.
Anon the slow-footed Kahble arrives, leaking all
over, and bringing a peace-offering of ohias, the
native apple, as juicy and sweet as the forbidden
fruits of Paradise.  As for these apples, they have
solitary seed, like a nutmeg, a pulp as white as
wax, a juice flavored with roses, and their skin as
red as a peony and as glossy as varnish. These we
munch and munch while the forest reels under
the impetuous avalanches of big rain-drops, and
our animals tear great tufts of sweet grass from
the upper roadside.
Is it far to the chapel, I wonder.  Kahele
thinks not, - perhaps a pari or two distant.  But
a pari, a cliff, has many antecedents, and I feel
that some dozen or so of climbs, each more or less
fatiguing, still separate me from  the rest I am
seeking, and hope not to find until I reach the
abode of Pere Fidelis, at the foot of the cross,
as one might say.
The rain ceases.  Hoke once more nerves himself for fresh assaults upon the everlasting hills.
Kahele drops behind as usual, and the afternoon
wanes.
How fresh seems the memory of this journey!
yet its place is with the archives of the past. I




THE CHAPEL OF THE PALMS.        243
seem to breathe the incense of orange-flowers and
to hear the whisper of distant waterfalls as I
write.
It must have been toward sunset, —  we were
threading the eastern coast, and a great mountain
filled the west, — but I felt that it was the hour
when day ends and night begins.  The heavy
clouds looked as though they were still brimful of
sunlight, yet no ray escaped to gladden our side
of the world.
Finally, on the brow of what seemed to be the
last hill in this life, I saw a cross,    a cross among
the palms.  Hoke saw it, and quickened his pace:
he was not so great an ass but he knew that there
was provender in the green pastures of Pere Fidelis, and his heart freshened within him.
A few paces from the grove of palms I heard a
bell swing jubilantly.  Out over the solemn sea,
up and down that foam-crested shore, rang the
sweet Angelus.  One may pray with some fervor
when one's journey is at an end.   When the
prayer was over I walked to the gate of the chapelyard, leadino the willing Hoke, and at that moment a slender figure, clad all in black, his long
robes flowing gracefully about him, his boyish face
heightening the effect of his grave and serene demeanor, his thin, sensitive hands held forth in
hearty welcome, — a welcome that was almost like
a benediction, so spiritual was the love which it
expressed, - came out, and I found myself in the




244            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
arms of Pere Fidelis, feeling like one who has at
least been permitted to kneel upon the threshold
of his Mecca.
Why do our hearts sing jubilate when we meet
a friend for the first time. What is it within us
that with its life-long yearning comes suddenly
upon the all-sufficient one, and in a moment is
crowned and satisfied. I could not tell whether
I was at last waking from a sleep or just sinking
into a dream. I could have sat there at his feet
contented; I could have put off my worldly cares,
resigned ambition, forgotten the past, and, in the
blessed tranquillity of that hour, have dwelt joyfully under the palms with him, seeking only to
follow in his patient footsteps until the end should
come.
Perhaps it was the realization of an ideal that
plunged me into a luxurious revery, out of which
I was summoned by mon pere, who hinted that I
must be hungry.  Prophetic father! hungry I
was indeed.
Mon pere led me to his little house with three
rooms, and installed me host, himself being my
ever-watchful attendant.  Then he spoke: "The
lads were at the sea, fishing: would I excuse him
for a moment' "
Alone in the little house, with a glass of claret
and a hard biscuit for refreshment, I looked about
me.  The central room, in which I sat, was bare
to nakedness: a few devotional books, a small




THE CIHAPEL OF TIlE PALMS.          245
clock high up on the wall, with a short wagging
pendulum, two or three paintings, betraying more
sentiment than merit, a table, a wooden form
against the window, and a crucifix, complete its
inventory.  A  high window was at my back; a
door in front opening upon a veranda shaded
with a passion-vine; beyond it a green, undulating
country running down into the sea; on either
hand a little cell containing nothing but a narrow
bed, a saint's picture, and a rosary. Kahele, having distributed the animals in good pasturage, lay
on the veranda at full length, supremely happy
as he jingled his spurs over the edge of the steps
and hummed a native air in subdued falsetto, like
a mosquito.
Again I sank into a revery.  Enter mon pere
with apologies and a plate of smoking cakes made
of eggs and batter, his own handiwork; enter the
lads from the sea with excellent fish, knotted in
long wisps of grass; enter Kahele, lazily sniffing
the savory odors of our repast with evident relish;
and then supper in good earnest.
How happy we were, having such talks in several sorts of tongues, such polyglot efforts toward
sociability, - French, English, and native in equal
parts, but each broken and spliced to suit our
dire necessity! The candle flamed and flickered
in the land-breeze that swept through the house,
- unctuous waxen stalactites decorated it almost
past recognition; the crickets sang lustily at the




246           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
doorway; the little natives grew sleepy and curled
up on their mats in the corner; Kahele slept in
his spurs like a born muleteer.  And now a sudden conviction seized us that it was bedtime in
very truth; so momi pare led me to one of the cells,
saying, "Will you sleep in the room  of Pere
Amabilis."  Yea, verily, with all humility; and
there I slept after the benediction, during which
the young priest's face looked almost like an
angel's in its youthful holiness, and I was afraid I
might wake in the morning and find him gone,
transported to some other and more lovely world.
But I did n't.  Pere Fidelis was upbefore daybreak. It was his hand that clashed the joyful
Angelus at sunrise that woke me from my happy
dream; it was his hand that prepared the frugal
but appetizing meal; he made the coffee, such
rich, black, aromatic coffee as Frenchmen alone
have the faculty of producing.  He had an eye to
the welfare of the animals also, and seemed to be
commander-in-chief of affairs secular as well as
ecclesiastical; yet he was so young!
There was a day of brief incursions mountainward, with the happiest results.  There were welcomes showered upon me for his sake; he was
ever ministering to my temporal wants, and puzzling me with dissertations in assorted languages.
By happy fortune a Sunday followed when the
Chapel of the Palms was thronged with dusky
worshippers; not a white face present but the fa



TIIE CHAPEL OF THE PALMS.           247
ther's and mine own, yet a common trust, in the
blessedness of the life to come struck the key-note
of universal harmony, and we sang the   agnificatt
with one voice.  There was something that fretted
me in all this admirable experience: Pere Fidelis
could touch neither bread nor water until after
the last mass. Hour by hour he grew paler and
fainter, spite of the heroic fortitude that sustained
his famishing body.
"lyfon pere," said I, "you must eat, or go to
heaven betimes."  He would not.  "You must
end with  an earlier mass," I persisted.  It was
impossible: many parishioners came from  miles
away; some of these started at daybreak, as it
was, and they would be unable to arrive in season
for an earlier mass.  Excellent martyr! thought
I, to offer thy body a living sacrifice for the edification of these savage Christians! At last he
ate, but not until appetite itself had perished.
Then troops of children gathered about him clamoring to kiss the hand of the priestly youth; old
men and women passed him with heads uncovered,
amazed at the devotion of one they could not
hope to emulate.
Whenever I referred to his life, he at once led
me to admire his fellow-apostle, who was continually in his thoughts.  Pere Amabilis was miles
away, repairing a chapel that had suffered somewhat in a late gale; Pere Arnabilis would be so
glad to see me; I must not fail to visit him; and




248            SOUTHI-SEA IDYLS.
for fear of some mischance, Pere Fidelis would
himself conduct me to him.
The way was hard,- deep chasms to penetrate,
swift streams to be forded, narrow and slippery
trails to be threaded through forest, swamp, and
wilderness. These obstacles separated the devoted friends, but not for long seasons.  Pere Fidelis would go to him whom he had not laid eyes on
for a fortnight at least.
The boy Kahele was glad of companionship;
one of the small fishers, anl acolyte of the chapel,
would accompany us, and together they could lg
behind,?eating ohias and dabbling in every stream.
A  long day's journey followed.  We wended
our way through jungles of lauhala, with  slim
roots in the air and long branches trailing about
them like vines; they were like great cages of
roots and branches in a woven snarl.  We saw a
rocky point jutting  far into the sea.   " Pere
Amabilis dwells just beyond that cape," said my
companion, fondly; and it seemed not very far distant; but our pace was slow and wearisome, and
the hours were sure to distance us.  We fathomed dark ravines whose farther walls were but a
stone's throw from  us, but in whose profound
depths a swift torrent rushed madly to the sea,
threatening to carry us to our destruction,-  green,
precipitous troughs, where the tide of mountainrain was lashed into fury, and with its death-song
drowned our voices and filled our animals with
terror.




THE CHAPEL OF THE PALMS.           249
Now and then we paused to breathe, man and
beast panting with fatigue; sometimes the rain
drove us into the thick wood for shelter; sometimes a brief deluge, the offspring of a rent cloud
at the head of the ravine, stayed our progress for
half an hour, until its volume was somewhat
spent and the stream was again fordable. Here
we talked of the daily miracles in nature. Again
and again the young fathers are called forth into the
wilderness to attend on the sick and dying. Little
chapels are hidden away among the mountains
and through the valleys; all these must be visited in turn. Their life is an actual pilgrimage
from chapel to chapel, which nothing but physical
inability may interrupt.
At one spot I saw a tree under which Pere Fidelis once passed a tempestuous night. On either
side yawned a ravine swept by an impassable
flood.  There were no houses within reach.  On
the soaked earth, with a pitiless gale sweeping
over the land, from sunset to sunrise he lay without the consolation of one companion.  Food was
frequently scarce: a few limpets, about as palatable as parboiled shoe-leather, a paste of roast
yams and water, a lime perhaps, and nothing besides but lumpy salt from the sea-shore.
While we were riding, a herald met us bearing a
letter for mon pere.  It was a greeting from  Pere
Amabilis, who announced the chapel as rapidly
nearing its complete restoration. Pere Fidelis
11*




250            SOU TII-SEA IDYLS.
fairly wept for joy at this intelligence, and burst
into a panegyric upon the unrivalled ingenuity of
his spiritual associate.  We were sure to surprise
him at work, and this trifling episode seemed to
be an event of some importance in the isolated
life they led.
At sunset we passed into the open vale of Wailuanui, and saw the chapel looking fresh and tidy
on the slope of the hill toward the sea.  Two
waterfalls that fell against the sunset flashed like
falling flame, and a soft haze tinged the slumberous solitudes of wood and pasture with the dreamlike loveliness of a picture. There seemed to be
but one sound audible,- the quick, sharp blows
of a hammer.  Pere Fidelis listened with eyes
sparkling, and then rode rapidly onward.
Behold! from  the chapel wall, high up on a
scaffolding of boughs, his robes gathered about
him, his head uncovered and hammer in hand,
Pere Amabilis leaned forth  to welcome us.  The
hammer fell to the earth. Pere Amabilis loosened
his skirts and clasped his hands in unaffected rapture.  We were three satisfied souls, asking for
nothing beyond the hem of that lonely valley in
the Pacific.
Of course there was the smallest possible house
that could be lived in, for our sole accommodation,
because but one priest needed to visit the district
at a time, and a very young priest at that.  A
tiny bed in one corner of the room was thought




THE CHAPEL OF THE PALMS.           251
sufficient, together with two plates, two cups, and
a single spoon.  Luxuries were unknown and unregretted.
"Well, father, what have you at this hotel "
said Pere Fidelis as we came to the door of the
cubby-house.
"Water," replied our host with a grave tone
that had an undercurrent of truth in it.
But we were better provided for. Within an
hour's time a reception took place: native parishioners came forth to welcome Pere Fidelis and the
stranger, each bringing some voluntary tribute, -
a fish, a fowl lean enough to quiet the conscience
of Pere Fidelis, an egg or two, or a bunch of taro.
Long talks followed; the news of the last
month was discussed with much enthusiasm, and
some few who had no opportunity of joining in the
debate gave expression to their sentiments through
such speaking eyes as savages usually are possessed of.
The welcome supper-hour approached.  Willing hands dressed a fowl; swift feet plied between
the spring and the kettle swung over the open
camp-fire; children danced for very joy before the
door of the chapel, under the statue of the Virgin, whose head was adorned with a garland of
living flowers.  The shadows deepened; stars
seemed to cluster over the valley and glow with
unusual fervor; the crickets sang mightily, —
they are always singing. mightily over  yonder;




252            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
supper came to the bare table with its meagre array of dishes; and, since I was forced to have a
whole plate and a bowl, as well as the solitary
spoon, for my sole use, the two young priests ate
together from the same dish and drank from the
same cup, and were as grateful and happy as the
birds of the air under similar circumstances.
A  merry meal, that!  For us no weak tea,
that satirical consoler, nor tea whose strength is
bitterness, an abomination to the faithful, but
mon pere's own coffee, the very aroma of which
was invigorating; and then our friendly pipes out
under the starlight, where we sat chatting amicably, with our three heads turbaned in an aromatic
Virginian cloud.
I learned something of the life of these two
friends during that social evening.  Born in the
same city in the north of France, reared in the
same schools, graduated from the same university,
each fond of life and acquainted with its follies,
each in turn stricken with an illness that threatened death, together they came out of the dark
valley with their future consecrated to the work
that now absorbs them, the friendship of their
childhood increasing with their years and sustaining them  in a remote land, where their vow of
poverty seems almost like a sarcasm, since circumstance deprives them of all luxuries.
" Do you never long for home. do you never regret your vow." I asked.




THE CHAPEL OF THE PALM3S.           253
"Never  " they answered; and I believe them.
"These old people are as parents to us; these
younger ones are as brothers and sisters; these
children we love as dearly as though they were
our own.  What more can we ask?"
What more, indeed. With the rain beating
down upon your unsheltered heads, and the torrents threatening to ingulf you; faint with journeyings; anhungered often; weak with fastings;
pallid with prayer, - what more can you ask in the
same line. say I.
Pere Fidelis coughed a little, and was somewhat feverish.  I could see that his life was not
elastic: his strength was even then failing him.
"Pere Amabilis is an artisan: he built this
house, and it is small enough; but some day
he will build a house for me but six feet long and
so broad," said Pere Fidelis, shrugging his shoulders; whereat Pere Amabilis, who looked like a
German student with his long hair and spectacles,
turned aside to wipe the moisture from the lenses,
and said nothing, but laid his hand significantly
upon the shoulder of his friend, as if imploring
silence. Alas for him when those lips are silent
forever!
I wondered if they had no recreation.
"   yes.  The poor pictures at the Chapel of
the Palms are ours, but we have not studied art.
And then we are sometimes summoned to the farther side of the island, where we meet new faces.
It is a great change."




254            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
For a year before the arrival of Pere Amabilis,
who was not sooner able to follow his friend, Pere
Fideliswas accustomed to go once a month to a
confessional many miles away. That his absence
might be as brief as possible, he was obliged to
travel night and day.  Sometimes he would reach
the house of his confessor at midnight, when all
were sleeping: thereupon would follow this singular colloquy in true native fashion. A rap at the
door at midnight, the confessor waking from  his
sleep.
Confessor.  "Who's there  "
Pele Fidelis.  "It is I!"
Conf. " Who is I  "
Pere F.  " Fidelis!"
Conf.  "Fidelis who l"
Pere F. "Fidelis kahuna pule!" (Fidelis the
priest.)
Conf. "Aweh!" (An expression of the greatest
surprise.)  "Entre, Fidelis kahuna pule."
Then he would rise, and' the communion that
followed must have been most cheering to both,
for mon pere even now is merry when he recalls it.
These pilgrimages are at an end, for the two
priests confess to one another: conceive of the
fellowship that hides away no  secret, however
mortifying!
The whole population  must have been long
asleep before we thought of retiring that night,
and then arose an argument concerning the fittest




THE CHAPEL OF THE PALMS             255
occupant of the solitary bed.  It fell to me, for
both were against me, and each was my superior.
When I protested, they held up their fingers and
said, "Remember, we are your fathers and must
be obeyed."  Thus I was driven to the bed, while
mine hosts lay on the bare floor with saddles for
pillows.
It was this self-sacrificing hospitality that hastened my departure.  I felt earth could offer me
no nobler fellowship, - that all acts to come, however gracious, would bear a tinge of selfishness in
comparison with the reception I had met where
least expected.
I am thankful that I had not the heart to sleep
well, for I think I could never have forgiven myself had I done so.  When I woke in the early
part of the night, I saw the young priests bowed
over their breviaries, for I had delayed the accustomed offices of devotion, and they were fulfilling
them in peace at last, having me so well bestowed
that it was utterly impossible to do aught else for
my entertainment.
Once more the morning came.  I woke to find
Pere Amabilis at work, hammer in hand, sending
his nails home with accurate strokes that spoke
well for his trained muscle.  Pere Fidelis was concocting coffee and directing the volunteer cooks,
who were seeking to surpass themselves upon this
last meal we were to take together. In an hour
mon pere was to start for the Chapel of the Palms,




256            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
while I wended my way onward through a new
country, bearing with me the consoling memory
of my precious friends.  I can forgive a slight and
forget the person who slights me, but little kindnesses probe me to the quick.  I wonder why the
twin fathers were so very careful of me that morning ^   They could not do enough to satisfy themselves, and that made me miserable; they stabbed
me with tender words, and tried to be cheerful
with  such  evident effort that I could n't eat
half my breakfast, though, as it was, I ate more
than they did -God forgive me! - and altogether it was a solemn and a memorable meal.
A group of natives gathered about us seated
upon the floor; it was impossible for Pere Fidelis
to move without being stroked  by the affectionate creatures who deplored his departure. Pere
Amabilis insisted upon adjusting our saddles, during which ceremony he slyly hid a morsel of cold
fowl in our saddle-bags.
That parting was as cruel as death.  We shall
probably never see one another again; if we do,
we shall be older and more practical and more
worldly, and the exquisite confidence we have in
one another will have grown blunt with time. I
felt it then as I know it now, -our brief idyl
can never be lived over in this life.
Well, we departed: the corners of our blessed
triangle were spread frightfully.  Pere Fidelis was
paler than ever; he caught his breath as though




THE CIAPEL OF THE PALMIS.          257
there was n't much of it, and the little there was
would n't last long; Pere Amabilis wiped his
spectacles and looked utterly forsaken; the natives stood about in awkward, silent groups, coming forward, one by one, to shake hands, and then
illing back like so many automatons. Somehow,
genuine grief is never graceful: it forgets to pose
itself; its muscles are perfectly slack and unreliable.
The sea looked gray and forbidding as it shook
its shaggy  breakers under the cliff: life was
dismal enough.  The animals were unusually wayward, and once or twice I paused in despair under
the prickly sunshine, half inclined to go back and
begin over again, hoping to renew the past; but
just then Hoke felt like staggering onward, and
I began to realize that there are some brief, perfest experiences in life that pass from us like a
dream, and this was one of them.
In the proem  to this idyl I seem to see two
shadowy figures passing up and down over a lonesome land.  Fever and famine do not stay them:
the elements alone have power to check their pilgrimage.  Their advent is hailed with joyful bells:
tears fall when  they depart.  Their paths are
peace. Fearlessly they battle with contagion, and
are at hand to close the pestilential lips of unclean death.  They have lifted my soul above
things earthly, and held it secure for a moment.
From  beyond the waters my heart returns to
Q




258            S O U TH-SEA ID YLS.
them.  Again at twilight, over the still sea, floats
the sweet Angelus; again I approach the chapel
falling to slow decay: there are fresh mounds in
the churchyard, and the voice of wailing is heard
for a passing soul.  By and by, if there is work to
do, it shall be done, and the hands shall be folded,
for the young apostles will have followed in the
silent footsteps of their flock. Here endeth the
lesson of the Chapel of the Palms.




KAHELE.
ROM  a bluff, whose bald forehead jutted
a thousand feet into the air, and under
whose chin the sea shrugged its great
shoulders, Kahele, my boy, - that delightful contradiction, who was always plausible, yet never
right, -  Kahele and I looked timidly over into the
sunset valley of Meha.  The " Valley of Solitude "
it was called; albeit, at that moment, and with
half an eye, we counted the thirty grass-lodges of
the village, and heard the liquid tongues of a trio
of waterfalls, that dived head-first into the groves
at the farther end of the valley, where the mountain seemed to have opened its heart wide enough
to let a rivulet escape into the sea. But the spot
was a palpable and living dream, and no fond rivulet would go too hastily through it; so there was
a glittering sort of monogram writ in water, and
about it the village lodges were clustered in a very
pleasing disorder.
The trail dropped down the cliff below us in
long, swinging zigzags, and wound lazily through




260            SO UTH-SEA IDYLS.
the village; crossed the stream at the ford; dipped
off toward the sea, as though the beach, shining
like coarse gold, were a trifle too lovely to be
passed without recognition, and then it climbed
laboriously up the opposite cliff, and struck off
into space.  In ten seconds a bird might have
spanned the deep ravine, and caught as much of
its loveliness as we; but we were n't birds, and,
moreover, we had six legs apiece to look after, so
we tipped off from the dizzy ridge that overhung
the valley of Meha to the north, and gradually descended into the heat and silence of the place, that
seemed to make a picture of itself when we first
looked down upon it from our eyry.
We found the floor of the valley very solemn
and very lovely, when we at last got down into
it.  Three youngsters, as brown as berries, and
without any leaves upon them, broke loose from
a banana-orchard and leaped into a low hou-tree
as we approached. They were a little shy of my
color, pale-faces being rare in that vicinity.  Two
women who were washing at the ford -  and washing the very garments they should have had upon
their backs - discovered us, and plunged into the
stream  with a refreshing splash, and a laugh
apiece that was worth hearing, it was so genuine
and hearty. Another youngster hurried off from a
stone-wall like a startled lizard, and struck on his
head, but did n't cry much, for he was too frightened.  A  large woman lay at full length on a




KAHELE.                  261
broad mat, spread under a pacndacus, and slept
like a turtle.  I began to think there were nothing but women and children in the solitary valley,
but Kahele had kept an eye on the reef, and, with
an air of superior intelligence, he assured me that
there were many men living about there,and they,
with most of the women and children, were then
out in the surf, fishing.
"To the beach, by all means!" cried I; and
to the beach we hastened, where, indeed, we found
heaps of cast-off raiment, and a hundred footprints in the sand.  What would Mr. Robinson
Crusoe have said to that, I wonder! Across the
level water, heads, hands, and shoulders, and
sometimes half-bodies, were floating' about, like
the amphidbiac.  We were at once greeted with a
shout of welcome, which came faintly to us above
the roar of the surf, as it broke heavily on the reef,
a half-mile out from shore.  It was drawing toward
the hour when the fishers came to land, and we
had not long to wait, before, one after another,
they came out of the sea like so many mermen
and mermaids.  They were refreshingly innocent
of etiquette,- at least, of our translation of it;
and, with a freedom that was amusing as well as
a little embarrassing, I was deliberately fingered,
fondled, and fussed with by nearly every dusky
soul in turn.  "At last," thought I, "fate has led
me beyond the pale of civilization; for this begins
to look like the genuine article."




262           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
With uncommon slowness, the mermaids donned
more or less of their apparel, a few  preferring
to carry their robes over their arms; for the air
was delicious, and ropes of sea-weed are accounted full dress in that delectable latitude.  Down
on the sand the mermen heaped their scaly spoils,
- fish of all shapes and sizes, fish of every color;
some of them throwing somersaults in the sand,
like young athletes; some of them  making wry
faces, in their last agony; some of them lying still
and clammy, with big, round eyes like smokedpearl vest-buttons set in the middle of their
cheeks; all of them  smelling fishlike, and none
of them  looking very tempting.  Small boys laid
hold on small fry, bit their heads off, and held the
silver-coated morsels between their teeth, like animated sticks of candy.  There was a Fridayish and
Lent-like atmosphere hovering over the spot, and
T turned away to watch some youths who were
riding surf-boards not far distant,- agile, narrowhipped youths, with tremendous biceps and proud,
impudent heads set on broad shoulders, like young
gods. These were the flower and chivalry of the
Meha blood, and they swam like young porpoises,
every one of them.
There was a break in the reef before us; the
sea knew it, and seemed to take special delight in
rushing upon the shore as though it were about to
devour sand, savages, and everything.  Kahele
and I watched the surf-swimmers for some time,




KAHELE.                  263
charmed with the spectacle.  Such buoyancy of
material matter I had never dreamed of. Kahele,
though much in the flesh, could not long resist
the temptation to exhibit his prowess, and having
been offered a surf-board that would have made a
good lid to his coffin, and was itself as light as
cork and as smooth as glass, suddenly threw off
his last claim to respectability, seized his sea-sled,
and dived with it under the first roller which was
then about to break above his head, not three feet
from him.  Beyond it, a second roller reared its
awful front, but he swam under that with ease;
at the sound of his "open sesame," its emerald
gates parted and closed after him. He seemed
some triton, playing with the elements, and dreadfully "at home" in that very wet place.  The
third and mightiest of the waves was gathering its
strength for a charge upon the shore. Having
reached its outer ripple, again Kahele dived and
reappeared on the other side of the watery hill,
balanced for a moment in the glassy hollow, turned
suddenly, and, mounting the towering monster,
he lay at full length on his fragile raft, using his
arms as a bird its pinions,- in fact, soaring for a
moment with the wave under him.  As it rose, he
climbed to the top of it, and there, in the midst
of foam seething like champagne, on the crest
of a rushing sea-avalanche about to crumble and
dissolve beneath him, his surf-board hidden in
spume, on the very top bubble of all, Kaheil




264            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
danced like a shadow.  He leaped to his feet and
swam  in the air, another Mercury, tiptoeing  a
heaven-kissing hill, buoyant as vapor, and with a
suggestion of invisible wings about him,- Kahele
transformed for a moment, and for a moment
only; the next second my daring sea-skater leaped
ashore, with a howling breaker swashing at his
heels.  It was something glorious and almost incredible; but I saw it with my own eyes, and I
wanted to double his salary on the spot.
Sunset in the valley of Meha.  The air flll of
floating particles, that twinkled like diamond-dust;
the great green chasm  at the head of the valley
illuminated  by one broad  bar of light shot obliquely through it, tipped at the end with a shower of white rockets that fringed a waterfall, and a
fragment of rainbow like a torn  banner.  That
deep, shadowy ravine seemed, for a moment, some
mystery about to be divulged; but the light faded
too soon, and I never learned. the truth of it.
The sea quieter than usual; very little sound save
the rhythmical vibration of the air, that suggested
flowing waters and quivering leaves; the lights
shifted along  the  upper cliffs;.a silver-white
tropic-bird sailed from cloud to cloud, swiftly and
noiselessly, like a shooting-star.  A delicious moment, but a brief one; soon the sun was down,
and the deepening shadows and gathering coolness set all the valley astir.
Camp-fires were'kindled throughout the village;




KAHELE.                  265
column after column of thin blue smoke ascended
in waving spirals, separating at the top in leafshaped clouds.  It was like the spiritual resurrection of some ancient palm-grove; and when
the moon rose, a little later, flooding the Vale of
Solitude with her vague light, the illusion was
perfected; and a group of savages, scenting the
savory progress of their supper, sat, hungry and
talkative, under every ghostly palm. Clear voices
ascended in monotonous and weird recitative; they
chanted a monody on the death of some loved
one, prompted, perhaps, by the funereal solemnity
of the hour; or sang an ode to the moon-rise, the
still-flowing river, or the valley of Mdha, so solitary in one sense, though by no means alone in its
loneliness.
Kahele patronized me extensively.  I was introduced to camp after camp, and in rapid succession -repeated the experiences of a traveller who
has much to answer for in the way of color, and
the peculiar cut of his garments. I felt as though
I was some natural curiosity, in charge of the robustious Kahele, who waxed more and more officious every hour of his engagement; and his
tongue ran riot as he descanted upon my characteristics, to the joy of the curious audiences we
attracted.
Some hours must have passed before we thought
of sleep.  How could we think of it, when every
soul was wide awake, and time alone seemed to
12




266           SOUTII-SEA IDYLS.
pass us by unconsciously. But Kahele finally led
me to a chief's house, where, under coverlets of
kapa, spiced with herbs, and in the midst of numerous members of the household, I was advised
to compose my soul in peace, and patiently await
daylight. I did so, for the drowsy sense that best
illustrates the tail-end of a day's journey possessed me, and I was finally overcome by the low,
monotonous drone of a language that I found
about as intelligible as the cooing of the multitudinous pigeon.  The boy sat near me, still descanting upon our late experiences, our possible
future, and the thousand trivial occurrences that
make the recollections of travel forever charming.
The familiar pipe, smoked at about the rate of
three whiffs apiece, circulated freely, and kept the
air mildly flavored with tobacco; and night, with
all that pertains to it, bowed over me, as, in an
unguarded moment, I surrendered to its narcotizing touch.
There was another valley in my sleep, like unto
the one I had closed my eyes upon, and I saw
it thronged with ancients. No white face had yet
filled those savage and sensuous hearts with a sense
of disgust, which, I believe, all dark races feel when
they first behold a bleached skin.  Again the
breathless heralds announced the approach of a
king, and the multitudes gathered to receive him.
I heard the beating of the tom-toms, and saw the
dancers ambling and posing before his august maj



KAIHLE.                  267
esty, who reclined in the midst of a retinue of obsequious retainers.  The spearsmen hurled their
spears, and the strong men swung their clubs; the
stone-throwers threw  skilfully, and the sweetest
singers sang long mnles in praise of their royal
guest.  A cry of fear rent the air as a stricken
one fled toward the city of refuge; the priests
passed by me in solemn procession, their robes
spotted with sacrificial blood. War-canoes drew
in from the sea, and death fell upon the valley.  I
heard the wail for the slaughtered, and saw the
grim idols borne forth in the arms of the triumphant; then I awoke in the midst of that dreampageant of savage and barbaric splendor.
It was still night; the sea was again moaning;
the cool air of the mountain rustled in the long
thatch at the doorway; a ripe bread-fruit fell to
the earth with a low thud.  I rose from  my mat
and looked about me.  The room was nearly deserted; some one lay swathed like a mummy
in a dark corner of the lodge, but of what sex I
knew  not, - probably one who had outlived all
sensations; and perhaps all desires; a rush, strung
full of oily kuulci nuts, flamed in the centre of the
room, and a thread of black smoke climbed almost
to the peak of the roof; but, falling in with a current of fresh air, it was spirited away in a moment.
I looked out of the low door: the hour was
such a one as tinges the stoutest heart with su



268           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
perstition; the landscape was complete in two
colors,- a moist, transparent gray, and a thin,
feathery silver, that seemed almost palpable to the
touch.  Out on the slopes near the stream  reclined groups of natives, chatting, singing, smoking, or silently regarding the moon. I passed them
unnoticed; dim paths led me through guava jungles, under orange-groves, and beside clusters of
jasmine, overpowering in their fragrance. Against
the low eaves of the several lodges sat singers,
players upon the rude instruments of the land,
and glib talkers, who waxed eloquent, and gesticulated with exceeding grace.  Footsteps rustled before and behind me; I stole into the thicket, and
saw lovers wandering together, locked in each
other's embrace, and saw friends go hand-in-hand
conversing in low tones, or perhaps mute, with an
impressive air of the most complete tranquillity.
The night-blooming cereus laid its ivory urn open
to the moonlight, and a myriad of crickets chirped
in one continuous jubilee. Voices of merriment
were wafted down to me; and, stealing onward
toward the great meadow by the stream, where
the  sleepless  inhabitants  of the valley  held
high carnival, I saw the most dignified chiefs of
Mleha sporting like children, while the children capered like imps, and the whole community seemed
bewitched with the glorious atmosphere of that
particular night.
Who was the gayest of the gay, and the most




KAHELE.                  269
lawless of the unlawful    My boy, Kahele, in
whom I had placed my trust, and whom, until this
hour at least, I had regarded as a most promising specimen of the reorganized barbarians.
Perhaps it was all right; perhaps I had been
counting his steps with too much confidence; they
might have been simply a creditable performance,
the result of careful training on the part of his tutors.  I am inclined to think they were! At any
rate, Kahele went clean back to barbarism  that
night, and seemed to take to it amazingly.  I said
nothing; I thought it wiser to seem to hold the
reins, though I held them  loosely, than to try to
check the career of my half-tamed domestic, and
to find him beyond my control; therefore I sat on
one side taking notes, and found it rather jolly on
the whole.
The river looked like an inky flood with a broken silver crust; canoes floated upon its sluggish
tide like long feathers; swimmers plied up and
down it, now and then " blowing," whale-fashion,
but slipping through the water as noiselessly as
trout.  I could scarcely tell which was the more
attractive,- Nature, so fragrant and so voluptuous, or man, who had become a part of Nature for
the hour, and was very unlike man as I had been
taught to accept him.
Not till dawn did the dance or the song cease;
not till everybody was gray and fagged, and
tongues had stopped wagging from  sheer exhaus



270           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
tion.  I returned to my mats long ere that, to revolve in my mind plans for the following day.
It was evident that Kahele must at once quit
the place, or go back to barbarism and stick there.
I did n't care to take the responsibility of his return to first principles, and so ordered the animals
saddled by sunrise. At that delicious moment,
the youngster lay like one of the Seven Sleepers,
whom nothing could awaken.  Everybody in the
village seemed to be making up his lost sleep, and
I was forced to await the return of life before pressing my claims any further.
The scorching noon drew on; a few of the
sleepers awoke, bathed, ate of their cold repast,
and slept again.  Kahele followed suit; in the
midst of his refreshment, I suggested the advisability of instant departure; he hesitated.  I enlarged upon the topic, and drew an enticing picture of the home-stretch, with all the endearing
associations clustering about its farther end; he
agreed to everything with a sweet and passive
grace that seemed to compensate me for the vexations of the morning.
I went to the river to bathe while the beasts
were being saddled, and returned anon to find
Kahele sound asleep, and as persistent in his
slumbers as ever.  The afternoon waned; I began
to see the fitness of the name that had at first
seemed to me inappropriate to the valley: everybody slept or lazed during the hot hours of the




KAHIZLE.                 271
day, and a census-taker might easily have imagined the place a solitude. At sunset, there was
more fishing and more surf-swimming.  It seemed
to me the fish smelt stronger, and the swimmers
swam less skilfully than on the evening previous;
possibly it was quite as pretty a spectacle as the
one that first charmed me, but blessings are bores
when they come out of season.
Night drew on apace; the moon rose, and the
inhabitants pretended to rest, but were shortly
magnetized out of their houses, where they danced
till daybreak.  The sweets of that sort of thing
began to cloy, and I resolved upon immediate
action.  Kahele was taken by the ears at the very
next sunrise, and ordered to get up the mules at
once.  He was gone nearly all day, and came in
at last with a pitiful air of disappointment that
quite unmanned me; his voice, too, was sympathetic, and there was something like a tear in his
eye when he assured me that the creatures had
gone astray, but might be found shortly, - perhaps even then they were approaching; and the
young scamp rose to reconnoitre, glad, no doubt,
of an excuse for escaping from my natural but
ludicrous discomfiture.   It is likely that my
boy Kahele would have danced till doomsday,
had I not shown spleen.  It is as likely, also,
that the chief and all his people would have
helped him  out in it, had I not offered such
reward as I thought sufficient to tempt their




272            S  UTHI-SEA IDYLS.
greed; but, thank Heaven, there is an end to
everything!
On the morning of the fourth day, two travellers
might have been seen struggling up the face of
the great cliff that walls in the valley of Meha to
the south.  The one a pale-face, paler than usual,
urging on the other, a dark-face, darker than was
its wont. Never did animals so puzzle their wits
to know whether they were indeed desired to hasten forward, or to turn back at the very'next
crook in the trail.  We were at big odds, Kahele
and I; for another idol of mine had suddenly
turned to clay, and, though I am used to that sort
of thing, I am never able to bear it with  decent
composure.  On we journeyed, working at crosspurposes, and getting nearer to the sky all the
while, and finally losing sight of the bewitching
valley that had demoralized and so nearly divorced
us; getting wet in the damp grasses on the highlands, and sometimes losing ourselves for a moment in the clouds that lie late on the mountains;
seeing lovely, narrow, and profound vales, wherein the rain fell with a roar like hail; where the
streams swelled suddenly like veins, and where
often there was no living creature discernible, not
even a bird; where silence brooded, and the world
seemed empty.
A very long clay's journey brought us out of
the green and fertile land that lies with its face to
the trade-wind; there the clouds gather and shed




KAHEtLE.                 273
their rains; but all of the earth lying in the lee
of the great central peak of the island is as dust
and ashes, - unwatered, unfruitful, and uninteresting, save as a picture of deep and dreadful desolation.  No wonder that Kahele longed to tarry
in the small Eden of Meha, knowing that we were
about to journey into the deserts that lie beyond
it. No wonder that the shining shores of the valley beguiled him, when he knew that henceforth
the sea would break upon long reaches of black
lava, as unpicturesque as a coal-heap, the path
along which was pain, and the waysides anguish
of spirit; where fruit was scarce, and water brackish, and every edible dried and deceitful.
Having slept the sleep of the just, — for I felt
that I had done what I could to reclaim my backsliding Kahele, - I awoke on a sabbath morning that
presented a singular spectacle. Its chief features
were a glittering, metallic-tinted sea, and a smoking plain backed by naked sand-hills.  The low
brush, scattered thinly over the earth, tried hard
to look green, but seldom got nearer to it than a
dusty gray. Evidently there was no sap in those
charred twigs, for they snapped like coral when
you tested their pliancy.  A few huts, dust-colored and ragged, were scattered along the trail;
they had apparently lost all hope, and paused by
the wayside, to end their days in despair.
The hale-pule, or prayer-house, chief of the forlorn huts, by virtue of extraordinary hollowness
122                       R




274            SOUTHf-SEA IDYLS.
and a ventilation that was only exceeded by all
out-of-doors, -this prayer-house, or clhrch, was
thrown open to the public, and, to my amazement,
Xahele suggested the propriety of our attending
worship, even before the first conch had been
blown from the rude door by the deacon himself.
We went along the chalky path that led to the
front of the house, and sat in the shelter of the
eaves for an hour or more. Seven times that conch
was blown, and on each occasion the neighborhood
responded, though stingily; a few worshippers
would issue  out of the wilderness and  draw
slowly toward  us.  One or two men came on
horseback, and were happy in their mood, exhibiting the qualities of their animals on the
flats before us.  Some came on foot, with their
shoes in hand; the shoes were carefully put on at
the church door, but put off again a few moments
after entering the rustic pews.  Dogs came, about
one for every human; these lay all over the floor,
or mounted the seats, or were held in the arms of
the congregation, as the case might be.  Children
came and played a savage version of leap-frog in
the lee of the church, but they were bleak-looking
youngsters, not at all like the little human vegetables that flourished in the genial atmosphere of
the valley of Meha.
The conch was blown again; the most melancholy sound that ever issued from windy cavity
floated up and down that disconsolate land, and




KAHELE.                 275
seemed to be saying, in pathetic gusts, "Come to
meeting! Come to meeting "  Probably every
one that could come had come; at any rate
no one else followed, and, after a decent pause,
the services of the morning were begun.  The
brief interval of ominous silence that preceded
the opening was enlivened by the caprices of a
fractious horse, and at least two stampedes of
the canine persuasion, at which time the dogs
seemed possessed of devils, and were running
down in a body toward the sea, but thought
better of it, and stole noiselessly back again,
one after the other, just in season for the opening prayer, to which they entered with a lowcomedy cast of countenance, and a depressed
tail.
That prayer bubbled out of the savage throat
like a clear fountain of vowels. The dignity of
the man was impressive, and his face the picture
of devotion; his deportment, likewise, was all that
could be desired in any one, under the circumstances. Either he was a rare specimen of the
very desirable convert from  barbarism, or he was
a consummate actor; I dare not guess which of the
two beguiled me with his grave and euphonious
prayer.
I regret to state that, during the energetic
expounding of the Scriptures, a few of the congregation forgot themselves and slept audibly; a few
arose and went under the eaves to smoke; chil



276            SOUTH-SEA ID YLS.
dren went down on all-fours, and crawled under
the pews in chase of pups as restless and incorrigible as themselves. At a later period, some one
announced an approaching schooner, and the body
of the house was unceremoniously cleared, for a
schooner was as rare a visitor to that part of the
island as an angel to any quarter of the globe.
Further ceremony was out of the question, at least
until the excitement had subsided; the parson,
with philosophical composure, precipitated his doxology, and we all walked out into the dreary afternoon to watch the schooner blowing in toward
shore.
The wind was rising; white  clouds scudded
over us; transparent shadows slid under us; the
whole earth seemed unstable, and life scarcely
worth the living.  Along the dead shore leaped
the sea, in a careless, dare-devil fashion; hollow
rocks spouted  great mouthfuls of  spray  contemptuously into the air; columns of red dust
climbed into the sky, reeling to and fro as they
passed over the bleak desert toward the sea on the
opposite side of the island. These dust-chimneys
were continually moving over the land so long as
the wind prevailed, which was for the rest of that
afternoon, to my certain knowledge.  In fact, the
gale increased every hour; sheets of spray leaped
over the rocky barriers of the shore, and matted
the dry grass, that hissed like straw whenever a
fresh gust struck it.




KAIHELE.                 277
One tattered cocoa-palm, steadfast in its mission, though the living emblem of a forlorn hope,
wrestled with the tempest that threw all its crisp
and rattling leaves over its head like a pompon,
and fretted it till its slender neck twisted as
though it were being throttled.  The thatched
house seemed about to go to pieces, and every timber creaked in agony; yet we gathered in its lee,
and awaited the slow approach of the schooner.
Near shore she put about, and seemed upon the
point of scudding off to sea again.  For a moment our hearts were in our throats; we were in
danger of missing the sensation of the season:
new faces, new topics of conversation, and, perhaps,
something good to eat, sent thither by Providence,
who seldom  forgets his children in  the waste
places, though I wonder that he lets them lose
themselves so often.
The schooner rocked on the big rollers for half
an hour; a small boat put off from  her, with
some dark objects seated in it; out on the great
rollers the little shallop rocked, sometimes hidden
from  view  by an intervening wave, sometimes
thrown partly out of the water as it balanced for
a moment on the crest of a breaker, but gradually
drawing in toward a bit of beach, where there was
a possible chance of landing, in some shape or
other. A few rods from shore, three dusky creatures deliberately plunged overboard and swam
toward us. We rushed in a body to welcome them,




278           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
— two women, old residents of the place, who
came out of the sea wailing for joy at their safe
return to a home no more inviting than the one
whose prominent features I have sought to reproduce.  Down they sat, not three feet from the
water, that bubbled and hissed along the coarse
sand, and lifted up their voices in pitiful and impressive monotones, as they recounted in a savagely poetic chant their various adventures since
they last looked upon the beloved picture of desolation that lay about them.
The third passenger-a youngster   came to
land when he had got tired of swimming for the
ful of it, and, once more upon his native heath,
he seemed at a loss to know what to do next, but
suffered himself to be vigorously embraced by
nearly everybody in sight, after which he joined
his companions with placid satisfaction, and capered
about as naturally as though nothing unusual had
happened.
Off into the windy sea sped the small schooner,
bending to the breeze as though it were a perpetual miracle that brought her right-side-up every
once in a while.  Back to the deserted prayerhouse our straggling community wended its way;
everything that had been said before was said
again, with some embellishments. It was beginning to grow tiresome.  I longed to plunge into
the desert that stretched around, seeking some
possible oasis where the fainting spirit might re



IKAHELE.                 279
assure itself that earth was beautiful and life a
boon.
Kahele agreed with me that this sort of thing
was growing tiresome.  tie knew of a good place
not many miles away; we could go there and
sleep. It presented a church and a good priest,
and other inducements of an exceedingly proper
and unexceptionable  character.  The prospect,
though uninviting, was sufficient to revive me for
the moment, and during that moment we mounted, and were blown away on horseback.  The
wind howled in our ears; sand-clouds peppered us
heavily; small pebbles and grit cut our faces;
heavier gusts than usual changed earth, sea, and
sky into temporary chaos. The day waned, so did
our spirits, so did the life of our poor beasts. In
the distance, the church of Kahele's prophecy
stood out like a small r'ock in a land than which no
land I wot of can be wearier. The sun fell toward
the sea; the wind subsided, though it was still
lusty and disagreeable.
We entered the church, having turned our disheartened beasts into paddock, and found a meagre and late afternoon session, seated upon mats
that covered the earthen floor. A priest strove to
kindle a flame of religious enthusiasm  in our unnatural hearts, but I fear he sought in vain.  The
truth was, we were tired to death; we needed
wholesome soup, savory meats, and steaming vegetables, to humanize us.  I didn't want to be a




280            SO UTH-SEA [DYLS.
Christian on an empty stomach.  The wind began to sigh, after its passion was somewhat spent;
sand sifted over the matting with a low hiss; and
the dull red curtains, that stretched across the lower
half of the windows, flapped dolefully.  Overhead,
the wasps had hung their mud-baskets, and the
gray atmosphere of everything was depressing in
the extreme. Service was soon over; the people
departed across the windy moors, with much fluttering of gay garments.  A horse stood at pasture,
with his head down, his back to the wind, and his
tail glued to his side, -  a picture of sublime resignation.  A high mound, with a sandstone sepulchre built in the face of it, cut off half of the
very red sunset, while a cactus-hedge, starred with
pale pink blossoms, ran up a low hill, and made
silhouette pictures against the sky.
I turned to watch a large butterfly, blown over
in the late gale, -stranded, as it were, at the
church-porch, and too far gone to set sail again;
a white sea-bird wheeled over me in big circles,
and  screamed  faintly; something  fell in the
church with a loud echo,- a prayer-book, probably; and then the priest came out, fastened the
door of the deserted sanctuary, and the day's duties were done.. We had nothing to do but follow
him to his small frame dwelling, where the one
little window to the west seemed to be set with
four panes of burnished gold, and some homely
household shrubs in his garden-plat shivered, and




KAHELE.                  281
blossomed while they shivered, but looked like so
many widows and orphans, the whole of them.
At the hospitable board life began afresh.  Another day, and we should again approach the borders of the earthly paradise that glorified the opposite side of the island.  Kahele's eyes sparkled;
my heart leaped within me; I felt that there was
a charm in living, after all; and the moment was
a critical one, for had the lad begged me to return
with him  to the beguilements of barbarism, I
think it possible that I might have consented.
But he did n't! He was the pink of propriety, and
an honor to his progenitors.  He said a brief
grace before eating, prayed audibly before retiring,
was patient to the pitch of stupidity, and amiable
to the verge of idiocy.
At last, I began to see through him.  Another
four-and-twenty hours, and he would be restored
to the arms of his guardians; the sweet lanes of
Lahaina would again blossom before him; and all
that he thought to be excellent in life would know
him as it had known him only a few weeks before.
It was time that he had again begun to walk the
strait path, and he knew it.  He was Kahele, the
two-sided; Kahele, the chameleon, whose character and disposition partook of the color of his surroundings; who was pious to the tune of the
church-bell, yet agile as any dancer of the lascivious hula at the thump of the tom-tom. He was a
representative worthy of some consideration; a




282           SOUTI-SEA IDYLS.
typical Hawaiian whose versatility was only excelled by the plausibility with which he developed
new phases of his kaleidoscopic character.  He
was very charming, and as diverting in one rOle as
another.  He was, moreover, worthy of much
praise for his skill in playing each part so perfectly that to this hour I am not sure which of his
dispositions he excelled in, nor in which he was
most at home.
Kahele, adieu! I might have upbraided thee
for thy inconstancy, had I not been accused of
that same myself.  I might have felt some modicum of contempt for thee, had thy skin been
white; but under the cover of thy darkness sin
hid her ugliness, and thy rich blood leaped to
many generous actions that a white-livered sycophant might not aspire to. I can but forgive all,
and sometimes long a little to live over the.two
sides of you, - extremes that met in your precious
corporosity, and made me contented with a changeful and sometimes cheerless pilgrimage; for I
knew, boy, that if I went astray you would meet
me upon the highest moral grounds; and, though
I could not rely upon you, somehow you came to
time when least expected, and filled me with admiration and surprise, -- a sentiment which time
and absence only threaten to perpetuate.




LOVE-LIFE  IN  A  LANAI.
-E'~ l-T was the witching hour of sunset, and
we sat at dinner with tearful eyes over
[   the Commodore's curry.  You see the
Commodore prided himself on the strength of this
identical dish, and kept a mahogany-tinted EastIndian steward for the sole sake of his skill in
concocting the same.
We dined, as usual, in the Comlmodore's unrivalled Lanai, -  the very thought of which is a
kind of spiritual feast to this hour, - and while
we sat at his board we heard for the twentieth
time the monotonous recital of his adventures by
flood and field.  Like most sea-stories, his narratives were ever fresh, as though they had been
stowed away in brine, were fished out of the vasty
deep expressly for the occasion, and put to soak
again in their natural element as soon as we had
tasted their quality.
The Commodore was a roaring old sea-dog, who
had been cast ashore somewhere in the early part
of the century; and finding himself in quarters




284            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
more comfortable than his wildest fancy dared to
paint, he resolved to end his amphibious days on
that strip of shining beach, and nevermore lose
sight of land until he should slip his cable for the
last time, and sail into undiscovered seas. Meanwhile, he entertained his friends at Wai-ki-ki, a
kind of tropical Long Branch a few miles out of
Honolulu; and the grace with which he introduced
Jack-ashore to the dreamy twilight of his Lcn.cai
is one of Jack's deathless memories.  We met the
Commodore in the interesting character of Jackashore, and with uncovered heads and hearts full
of emotion entered the Lanai.
And now for a word to the uninitiated concerning the Lanai in question.  Off there in the Pacific, under the vertical sun, all shadow is held at
a premium.   There are stationary caravans of
cocoa-trees, that seem  to be looking for their
desert-home, -  weird, slender trees, with tattered
plumes, and a hopeless air about them, as though
they were born to sorrow, but meant to make the
best of it. Still, these fine old palms cast a thin
shadow, about the size and shape of a colossal
spider, and there is no comfort in trying to. sit in
it.  Of course, there are other trees with more
foliage, and vines that run riot and blossom themselves to death; but somehow the sharp arrows
of sunshine dart in and sting a fellow in an unpleasant fashion, and nothing  short of a good
thatch is to be relied upon. So out from the low




LOVE-LIFE IN A LANAI.              285
eaves of the Commodore's cottage, on the seaward side, there was a dense roof of leaves and
grass, that ran clear to the edge of the sea, and
looked as though it wanted to go farther; but
the Commodore knew it was useless to attempt to
roof over that institution.  There was a leafy tapestry hanging two feet below the roof on the three
sides thereof, and from  the floor of the inclosure
rose a sort of trellis of woven rushes that hedged
us in to the waist.   There was a wicker-gate,
and an open space between the leafy stalactite and
stalagmite barricade for ventilation and view, and
everywhere there was a kind of semi-twilight that
seemed crammed full of dreams and delicious indolence, -  and this is the Hawaiian Lanai!
Of course, the Commodore always dined in his
LnaCi.  It was like taking curry on the quarterdeck of the Vaciatyoccallher, in the dead calm  of
the Indian seas; and when that mahogany steward entered with turban and mock-turtle, -he
always looked to me like a full-blooded snakecharmer, - I had the greatest difficulty in restraining myself, for it seemed to me incredible that any
Jack-ashore could dine in a Lanai with his Excellency, and not rise between each savory course to
make a dozen profound salaams to the fattish gentleman at the head of the table, who was literally
covered with invisible naval buttons, -  and the
hallucination increased as the dinner-courses multiplied.




286            SOUTHI-SEA IDYLS.
At this stage, -just as the snake-charmer was
entering with something that seemed to have come
to an untimely end in wine-sauce,-  at this stage
the Commodore turned to us as though he were
about to give some order that we might disregard
at the peril of our lives, — these sea-dogs never
quite outgrow that sort of thing.  "Gentlemen,"
said he, casting a watchful and suspicious eye over
the weather-bow, " there is to be a Luot -  a native feast - in the adjoining premises. Will you
do me the honor to accompany me thither after
we have lighted our cigars "
I forget what answer we made; but then dinner was well on toward dessert, and our answer
was immaterial.  We had our orders, couched in
courteous language, and we were thankful for this
consideration; moreover, we were wild to see a
native feast! There is a peculiar charm  in obeying our superiors, when we happen, by some dispensation of Divine Providence, to be exactly of
the same mind.
Black coffee was offered us, in cups of the pattern of gull's-eggs.  By this time all the sky was
saffron, all the sea a shadow of saffron, and in the
golden haze that lay between, a schooner with a
piratical slant to her masts swam  by, beyond the
foam that hissed along the reef. It was a wonderful picture, but it came in between the courses of
the Commodore's dinner as though it were nothing better than a panel-painting in the after-cabin




LOVE-LIFE IN A LANAL              287
of the Whatyoucallher.  However, as she swung in
toward the mouth of the harbor, and passed a
bottle of Burgundy in safety, but seemed in imminent danger of missing stays abreast of an enormous pyramid of fruit, — from  the Commodore's
point of sight, you know,- the old gentleman lost
his temper and gave an order in such peremptory
terms that I cheerfully refrain from  reproducing
it on this occasion. To cover our confusion, we
immediately adjourned to the native feast.
Hawaiian feast-days are not set down in the calendar.  Somebody's child has a birthday, or there
is a new house that needs christening; or perhaps a church is in want, and the feast can net a
hundred or two dollars for it, - since all the eatables in such cases are donated, and the eaters enter to the feast with the payment of one dollar
per head.  Our feast was not sanctified; a chief
of the best blood was in the humor to entertain
his friends, countrymen, and lovers. We belonged
to the first order; or, rather, the Commodore was
his friend, and we speedily became as friendly as
possible.  As we entered the premises, it appeared
to us that half the island was under cover; for
limitless Lancais seemed to run on to the end of
tilme in bewitching vistas.  Numberless lanterns
swung softly in the evening gale. A. multitude of
white-robed native girls passed to and fro, with
that inimitable grace which I have always supposed Eve copied from the serpent and imparted




288            SO UTH-SEA IDYLS.
to her daughters, who still affect the modern Edens
of the earth.  Young Hawaiian bloods, clad'in
snow-white trousers and ballet-shirts, with wreaths
of mailne around their necks and ginger-flowers in
their hair, grouped themselves along the evergreen
corridors, and looked unutterable things without
any noticeable effort on their part.
Through the central corridor, under a long line
of lanterns, was spread the corporeal feast, and on
either side of it, in two ravenous lines, sat, tailorfashion, the hungry and the thirsty.  It is useless
to attempt an idealization of the Hawaiian eater.
He simply devours whatever suits his palate, as
though he were a packing-case that needed filling,
and the sooner filled the more creditable the performance.  But the amount of filling that he is
equal to is the marvel; and the patient perseverance of the man, so long as there is a crumb left,
is something that I despair of reconciling with
any known system  of physiology.  The mastication began early in the. afternoon.  It was eight
P. M. when we looked in upon the orgie, and the
bones were not all picked, though they seemed
likely to be before midnight.
"Will you eat " said the host.  It was not
etiquette to decline, and we sat at the end of the
Lanai, with nameless dishes strewn about us in
hopeless confusion.  We dipped a finger into pink
poi, and took a pinch of baked dog. We had limpets with rock-salt; klukui-nuts roasted and pulver



LOVE-LIFE IN A LAYAL.              289
ized; and the pale, quivering bits of fish-flesh, not
an hour dead, and still cool with the native coolness of the sea.  It was a fishful feast, any way;
and not even the fruits or the flowers could entirely alleviate the inward agony consequent upon
a morsel of raw fish, swallowed to please our host.
There was music at the farther end of the palmleaf pavilion, and thither we w3nded our way.
The inner court was festooned with flags, and covered with a large mat.  Upon the mat sat, or reclined, several chiefesses.   I am  never able to
account for the audacious grace of these women,
who throw themselves upon the floor and stretch
their supple limbs like tigresses, with a kind of
imperial scorn  for your one-horse  proprieties.
Their voluminous light garments scarcely concealed the ample curves of their bodies, and the
marvellous creatures seemed to be breathing to
slow music, while their slumberous eyes regarded
us with a gentle indifference that was more tantalizing than any other species of coquetry that I
have knowledge of.
At one side of the enclosure sat a group of musicians, twanging upon native harps, and beating
the national calabash.  Song after song was sung,
pipe after pipe was smoked, and bits of easy and
playful conversation filled the  intervals.   The
evening waned.  The eaters and drinkers were
still unsatisfied, because the eatables and drinkables were not exhausted; but the moon was high
13                          s




290           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
and full, and the reef moaned most musically, and
seemed to invite us to the shore.
The great charm of a native feast is the entire
absence of all formality. Every man is privileged
to seek whom his heart may most desire, and every
woman may receive him or reject him as her spirit
prompts.  We noticed that the Commodore was
uneasy.  He was as plump as a seal, and the
crowd oppressed him.  We resolved to get the old
gentleman out of his misery, and proposed an immediate adjournment to the beach.  The inner
court was soon deserted, and our little party 
which now embraced, figuratively, several magnificent chiefesses, as well as the primitive Hawaiian
orchestra - moved in silence toward the sea. The
long, curving beach glistened and sparkled in the
moonlight.  The sea, within the reef, was like a
tideless river, from whose pellucid depths, where
the coral spread its wilderness of branches, an unearthly radiance was reflected. A fleet of slender
canoes floated to and fro upon the water, and beyond them the creaming reef flashed like a girdle
of silver, belting us in from all the world.
The crowning luxury of savage life is the multitudinous bondsman who anticipates your every
wish, and makes you blush at your own poverty
of invention by his suggestions of unimagined joys.
Mats -broad, sweet, and clean- lay under foot,
and served our purpose better than Persian carpets. The sea itself fawned at our feet, and all




LOVE-LIFE IN A LANAL.            291
the air was shining and soft as though the moon
had dissolved in an ecstasy, and nothing but a
snap of cold weather could congeal her again.
Wherever we lay, pillows were  mysteriously
slipped under our heads, and the willingest hands
in the world began an involuntary performance
of the lomi-lomi.  Let me not think upon the lomilomni, for there is none of it within reach; but I
may say of it, that, before the skilful and magnetic hands of the manipulator are folded, every
nerve in the body is seized with an intense little
spasm of recognition, and dies happy. A dreamless sleep succeeds, and this is followed by an
awakening into new life, full of proud possibilities.
We were lomni-lomied to the murmurs of the
reef, and during the intervals of consciousness saw
an impromptu rehearsal of the " Naiad Queen," in
operatic form. The dancing-girls, being somewhat
heated, had plunged into the sea, and were complaining' to the moon in a chorus of fine harmonies. History does not record how long their
sea-song rang across the waters. I know that we
dozed, and woke to watch a silver sail wafted along
the vague and shadowy distance like a phantom.
We slept again, and woke to a sense of silence
broken only by the unceasing monody of the reef;
slept and woke yet again in the waning light, for
the moon had sunk to the ragged rim of an old
crater, and seemed to have a large piece bitten
out of her glorious disk.  Then we broke camp by




292           SOUTII-SEA IDYLS.
the shore, - for the air was a trifle chilly, - and
withdrew into the seclusion of the Commodore's
Lanai, where we threw ourselves into hammocks
and swung until daybreak.
In those days we fed on lotus-flowers. Ja:ckashore lives for the hour only, and the very air of
such a latitude breathes enchantment.  I believe
we bathed before sunrise, and then went regularly
to bed and slept till noon.  Such were the Conmodore's orders, and this is our apology. There
was a breakfast about one P. M., at which we were
permitted to appear in undress.  The Commodore
set the example by inviting us to the table in an
extraordinary suit of cream-colored silk, that was
suggestive of panjamas, but might have been some
Oriental regalia especially designed for morning
wear.  He looked like a ship under full sail, rocking good-naturedly in a dead calm. The Commodore was excessively formal at first sight, - that
is, just before breakfast,- but his heart warmed
toward mankind in general, and his guests in particular, as the meal progressed.  Some people
never are themselves until they have broken their
fast; they are so cranky, and seem to lack ballast.
The snaky steward sloughed his clothes twice a
day.  He was a slim, noiseless, gliding fellow at
breakfast, but he was positively gorgeous at dinner. Of course, the Commodore had ordered this
nice distinction in the temporal affairs of his servant, for he kept everything about the place in




LOVE-LIFE IN A LANAL             293
ship-shape, even to the flying of his private signal
from sunrise to sunset at the top of a tall staff,
that rivalled the royal ensign floating from a similar altitude not a quarter of a mile distant.  His
Majesty has a summer palace in Wai-ki-ki, and it
has been whispered that the Commodore refused
to recognize him, and never dipped his colors as
the King cantered by in a light buggy drawn by
a span of spanking bays.
After breakfast, the cribbag3-board was produced, and for three mortal hours the Commodore
kept his peg on the steady march.  At cribbage
the old gentleman was expected to lose his temper.
He stormed with the arrogance of a veteran cardplayer, than whom no man is supposed to make
himself more disagreeable on short notice.  Lieutenant Blanlk was usually the victim, but he deserved it.  The true story of Lieutenant Blank 
his name is suppressed out of consideration for his
family — is so common in tropical seaports that
I do not hope in this epitome to offer anything
novel.  The Lieutenant was a typical Jack-ashore.
He had twice the mail that came to the rest of us,
and he read his love-letters to the mess with a
gusto.  He boasted fresh victims in every port,
and gloried in his lack of principle.  It did not
surprise me at all that the Lieutenant had shalcen
his mother.  In fact, under the circumstances, I
think his mother would have been justified in
shaking him, if she could have got her hands on




294           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
him.  In the love-light of the Commodore's Lanai, life was very precious to this particular Jackashore.  To him  a Lanai was a city of refuge,
provided by an'all-wise Commodore for those fascinating lieutenants who were pursued by the chief
women of the tribe; yet he loved to loiter without
the walls, during the off-hours from cribbage.  No
man so relished the lomi-lomi; no man, except the
native-born, so clamored for the hula-hula; and no
man, not even the least of these, forgot himself to
the same alarming extent whenever there was the
slightest provocation.
Of course, he met a chiefess and surrendered;
of course, he meant in time to crush the heart
that pulsated with the blood-royal. He simpered
and tried to turn semi-savage, and was simply ridiculous.  He made silly speeches in the worst
possible Hawaiian, and afforded unlimited amusement to the women, who are wiser in their dark
skins than the children of light.  He tried to eat
poi, and ruined his linen.  He suffered himself to
be wreathed and garlanded, until he was the picture of a sacrificial calf. He gave gifts, and babbled in his sleep.  But in the hour when his
triumph  seemed inevitable he was beautifully
snubbed by his supposed victim.  The syrens of
Scylla. are a match for any mariner who sails with
unwadded ears.  The Lieutenant cannot hope to
hear the last of that adventure, though the subject is never broached by himself.




LOVE-LIFE IN A LANAL              295
If we had dwelt a thousand years with the Commodore, and sipped the elixir of life from the gourd
that hung by the door of the wine-closet, I suppose
we should have had the same daily and nightly
experiences to go through with, barring a slight
variation in the little matter of moonshine. But
there were orders superior to the Commodore's,
since he was off active duty, and these orders demanded our reappearance on shipboard at an early
hour of the day following.  There was a farewell
round of everything that had been introduced
during our brief stay at Wai-ki-ki, -  dances, songs,
sea-baths, and flirtations.  The moon rose later,
and was but a shadow of her former self; but the
stars burned brightly, and we could still trace the
noiseless flight of the solitary sail that passed like
a spirit over the dusky sea.
I know that in after years, whenever I come
within sound of surf under the prickly sunshine,
my fancy will conjure up a picture of that grass
cottage on the slope of a dazzling beach, and the
portly form of the old Commodore stowed snugly
in the spacious hollow of a bamboo settee, drawn
up on the stocks, as it were, for repairs, with a
bandanna spread. over his face and a dark-eyed
crouching figure beside him, fighting mosquitoes
with a tuft of parrot-feathers.  No wonder that
a body-guard of some kind was necessary, for I
believe that the old Commodore's veins ran nothing but wine, and mosquitoes are good tasters.




296            SOUTIH-SEA IDYLS.
The picture would not be complete without the
attendant houris, and with their image comes an
echo of barbarous chants and the monotonous
thump of the tom-tom.; of swaying figures; of
supple wrists; of slender, lascivious hands tossed
skilfully  in the air, seeking to interpret their
pantomimic dances, and doing it with remarkable freedom  and grace.  I shall hear that one
song, like an echo eternally repeated, -the song
that was sung by all the lips that had skill to
sing, in every valley under the Hawaiian sun.  I
remember it as a refrain that was first raised in
Honolulu, but for the copyright of which the respective residents of Hawaii and Nihau would
willingly lay down their lives with the last words
of the song rattling in their throats.
"Poli-camu," or " Cool-bosom," is a fair specimen
of the ballad literature of Hawaii, and the following free translation will perhaps give a suggestion
of the theme.  "Poli-ancu" is sung by the old
and decrepid, the lame, the halt, and the blind,
as well as by the merest children.  I have heard
it carolled by a solitary boy tending goats upon
the breezy heights of Kaupo.  I have listened to
it in the market-place, where a chorus of a dozen
voices held the customer entranced.  In the high
winds of the middle channel the song is raised,
as the schooner lays over at a perilous angle, and
ships water enough to dampen the ardor of most
singers. It is sung in the church-porch, by the




LOVE-LIFE IN  A LANAL.                 297
brackish well in the desert, under the moonlit
palms, and everywhere else.  It cheers the midnight vigil of the prisoner, and makes glad the
heart of the sorrowful. It is altogether useful as
well as ornamental, and the Hawaiian who does
not number among his accomplishments the ability to sing " Poli-anu " tolerably well, is unworthy
of the name.
POLI-ANU.
Bosom, here is love for you,
O bosom cool as night!
How you refresh me as with dew, -
Your coolness gives delight.
Rain is cold upon the hill,
And water in the pool,
Yet all my frame is colder still
For you, 0 bosom cool.
Face to face beneath a bough
I may not you embrace,
But feel a spell on breast and brow
While sitting face to face.
Thoughts in absence send a thrill
Like touch of sweeter air:
I sought you, and I seek you still,
O bosom cool and fair!
That is all of it; but your Hawaiian turns back
and begins over again, until he has enough.
I suppose it is no breach of confidence on my
part to state that the gorgeous old Commodore is
dead.  There was nothing in his Lcanai life to die
of, except an accident, and in course of time he
13*




298            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
met with one.  I forget the nature of it, but it
finished him.  There was wailing for three mortal
days in the solemn shadow  of the Lanai; and
then one of the large, motherly-looking creatures,
with numberless gauzy folds in a dress that fell
straight from  her broad  shoulders, moved in.
After three days of feasting, all vestiges of the
Commodore's atmosphere had disappeared from
the premises.  I fancy she always felt at home
there, although she was never known to open her
lips in the presence of the Commodore's guests.
Life was a little more intense after that. The
snaky steward disappeared, without any sort of
warning.  I have always believed that he crawled
under some rock, and laid himself away in a coil;
that he will sleep for a century or so, then come
out in his real character, and astonish the inhabitants with his length and his slimness.
Lieutenant Blank survives, and sails the stormy
seas on a moderate salary, the major portion of
which he turns into naval buttons.  I hear from
him once in a dog's age.  He is first at Callao,
with a daily jaunt into Lima; then at one of the
South Sea paradises; next at Australia, or in the
China Sea; and in the future —heaven knows
where!  He vibrates between  the two hemispheres, working out his time, and believing himself supremely happy.  I doubt not that he is
happy, being about as selfish as men are made.
As for myself, I am a landsman. After all that




LOVE-LIFE IN A LANAI.              299
is said, the sea is rather a bore, you know; but
I do not forget the dreamy days of calm  in the
flowering equatorial waters, nor the troubled days
of storm.  There are a thousand-and-one trifling
events in the fragmentary experiences of the seafarer that are of more importance than this stray
leaf, but perhaps none that will serve my purpose
better. For this yarn is as fine-drawn as the episodes in an out-of-the-way port,-  with nothing
but the faint odor of its fruits a little overripe,
of its flowers a little overblown, and a general
sense of uncomfortable warmth, to give it individuality.  I have found these experiences excellent
memories; for though the dull "waits" between
the acts and the sluggishness of the action at
best are a little dreary at times, they are forgotten, together with most disagreeable matter.  I'11
warrant you, Lieutenant Blank, strutting his little
hour between-decks, or in the fleeting moments of
the delectable "dog-watch," muses upon the past.
When he has aroused the fever in his blood, and
can no longer hold his tongue, he heaves an ominous sigh, knits his brows, and, in a voice that quivers with unaffected emotion, he whispers to the
marines the beguiling romance of his Love-life in
a Lanai.
w,




IN A TRANSPORT.
LITTLE  French aspirant de  marine,
t   with an incipient mustache, said to me,
confidentially,  "Where  you  see  the
French flag you see France! " We were pacing to
and fro on the deck of a transport that swung at
anchor off San Francisco, and, as I looked shoreward for almost the last time,- we were to sail at
daybreak for a southern cruise — I hugged my
Ollendorf in despair, as I dreamed of " French in
six easy lessons," without a master, or a tolerable accent, or anything, save a suggestion of Babel and a confusion of tongues at sea.
Thanaron, the aspirant in question, embraced
me when I boarded the transport with my baggage, treated me like a long-lost brother all that
afternoon, and again embraced me when I went
ashore toward evening to take leave of my household.  There was something so impulsive and
boyish in his manner that I immediately returned
his salute, and with considerable fervor, feeling
that kind Heaven had thrown me into the arms of




IN A TRANSPORT.               301
the exceptional foreigner who would, to a certain
extent, console me for the loss of my whole family.
The mystery that hangs over the departure of
any craft that goes by wind is calculated to appall
the landsman; and when the date of sailing is
fixed the best thing he can do is to go aboard in
season and compose his soul in peace.  To be
sure, he may swing at anchor for a day or two, in
full sight of the domestic circle that he has shattered, but he is spared the repetition of those
last agonies, and cuts short the unravelling hours
just prior to a separation, which are probably the
most unsatisfactory in life.
Under cover of darkness a fellow can do almost
anything, and. I concluded to go on board.  There
was a late dinner and a parting toast at home,
and those ominous silences in the midst of a conversation that was as spasmodic and disconnected
and unnatural as possible. There was something
on our minds, and we relapsed in turn and forgot
ourselves in the fathomless abysses of speculation.
Some one saw me off that night, - some one who
will never again follow me to the sea, and welcome
me on my return to earth after my wandering.
We sauntered down the dark streets along the
city front, and tried to disguise our motives, but
it was hard work. Presently we heard the slow
swing of the tide under us, and the musty odor
of the docks regaled us; one or two shadows
seemed to be groping about in the neighborhood,




302           SOU7TH-SEA IDYLS.
making more noise than a shadow has any right
to make.
Then came the myriad-masted shipping, the
twinkling lights in the harbor, and a sense of
ceaseless motion in waters that never can be still.
We did not tarry there long.  The boat was
bumping her bow against a pair of slippery stairs
that led down to the water, and I entered the tottering thing that half sunk under me, dropped into
my seat in the stern, and tried to call out something or other as we shot away from  the place,
with a cloud over my eyes that was darker than
night itself, and a cloud over my heart that was as
heavy as lead.  After that there was nothing to
do but climb up one watery swell and slide down
on the other side of it, to count the shadow-ships
that shaped themselves out of chaos as we drew
near them, and dissolved again when we had
passed; while the oars seemed to grunt in the
row-locks, and the two jolly tars in uniform —
they might have been mutes, for all I know —
swung to and fro, to and fro, dragging me over
the water to my" ocean bride,"- I think that
is what they call a ship, when the mood is on
them!
She did look pretty as we swam up under her.
She looked like a great silhouette against the steelgray sky; but within was the sound of revelry,
and I hastened on board to find our little cabin
blue with smoke, which, however, was scarcely




IN A TRANSPORT.                303
dense enough to muffle the martial strains of the
Macrseillaise, as shouted by the whole mess.
Thanaron -  my Thanaron -  was in the centre
of the table, with his curly head out of the transom, - not that he was by any means a giant, but
we were all a little cramped between-decks, -  and
ha was leading the chorus with a sabre in one
hand and the head of' the Doctor in the other.
Without the support of' the faculty, he would
probably not have ended his song of triumph as
successfully as he ultimately did, when Nature
herself had fainted from  exhaustion.  It was the
last night in port, a few friends from  shore had
come to dine, and black coffee and cognac at a
late hour had finished the business.
If there is one thing in this world that astonishes me more than another, it is the rapidity with
which some people talk in French.  Thanaron's
French, when he once got started, sounded to me
like the well-executed trill of a prima-donna, and
quite as intelligible.  The joke of it was, that
Frenchmen seemed to find no difficulty in understanding him at his highest speed. On the whole,
perhaps, this fact astonishes me more than the
other.
Dinner was as far over as it could get without
beginning again and calling itself breakfast; so
the party broke up in a whirlwind of patriotic
songs, and, one by one, we dropped our guests
over the side of the vessel until there was none




304           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
left, and then we waved them a thousand adieus,
and kept up the last words as long as we could
catch the faintest syllable of a reply. There were
streaks of dull red in the east by this time, and
the outlines of the city were again becoming visible.  This I dreaded a little; and, when our boat
had returned and everything was put in shipshape, I deliberately dropped a tear in the presence of my messmates,'who were overcome with
emotion at the spectacle; and, having all embraced, we went below, where I threw  myself,
with some caution, into my hammock, and slept
until broad daylight.
I did not venture on deck again until after our
first breakfast,- an informal one, that set uneasily
on the table, and seemed inclined to make its escape from one side or the other. Of course, we
were well under way by this time.  I was assured
of the fact by the reckless rolling of the vessel
and the strange and unfamiliar feeling in my
stomach, as though it were some other fellow's
stomach, and not my own.  My legs were a trifle
uncertain; my head was queer.  Everybody was
rushing everywhere and doing things that had to
be undone or done over again in the course of the
next ten minutes.  I concluded to pace the deck,
which is probably the correct thing for a man to
do when he goes down to the sea in ships, and does
business -.you could hardly call it pleasure    on
great waters.




IN A TRANSPORT.               305
I went up the steep companion-way, and found
a deck-load of ropes, and the entire crew -  dressed
in blue flannel, with  broad  collars - skipping
about in the most fantastic manner.  It was like a
ballet scene in L'Africaize, and highly diverting
-  for a few minutes! From  my stronghold on
the top stair of the companion-way, I cast my eye
shoreward.  The long coast ran down the horizon
under a broadside of breakers that threatened to
ingulf the continent; the air was gray with scattering mist; the sea was much disturbed, and of
that ugly, yellowish - green tint that signifies
soundings.  Overhead, a few sea-birds whirled in
disorder, shrieking as though their hearts would
break. It looked ominous, yet I felt it my duty,
as an American under the shadow of the tricolor,
to keep a stiff upper lip, - and I flatter myself
that I did so. Figuratively speaking, I balanced
myself in the mouth of the companion-way, with a
bottle of claret in one pocket and a French roll in
the other, while I brushed the fog from my eyes
with the sleeve of my monkey-jacket, and exclaimed
with the hard, "My native land, good night."
It was morning at the time, but I did not seem
to care much.  In fact, time is not of the slightest consequence on shipboard. So I withdrew to
my hammock, and having climbed into it in safety
ended the day after a miserable fashion that I
have deplored a thousand times since, during the
prouder moments of my life.
T




306            S OU TH-SEA IDYLS.
A week passed by - I suppose it was a week,
for I could reckon only seven days, and seven
nights of about twice the length of the days —
during that interval; yet I should, in the innocence of my heart, have called it a month, without
a moment's hesitation.   We arose late in the
morning, - those of us who had a watch below;
ate a delightfully long and narrow breakfast, consisting of an interminable procession of dishes in
single file; paced the deck and canvassed the
weather; went below to read, but talked instead;
dined as we had breakfasted, only in a far more
elaborate and protracted manner, while a gentle
undercurrent of side-dishes lent interest to the
occasion.  There was a perpetual stream  of conversation playing over the table, from the moment
that heralded the soup until the last drop of
black coffee was sopped up with a bit of dry
bread. By the time we had come to cheese, everybody felt called upon to say his say, in the face of
everybody else. I alone kept my place, and held
it because the heaviest English I knew fell feebly
to the floor before the thunders of those five
prime Frenchmen, who were flushed with enthusiasm and good wine.  I dreamed of home over my
cigarette, and tried to look as though I were still
interested in life, when, Heaven knows, my face
was more like a half-obliterated cameo of despair
than anything human.  Thanaron, my foreign affinity, now and then threw me a semi-English nut




IN A TRANSPORT.               307
to crack, but by the time I had recovered myself,
-it is rather embarrassing to be assaulted even
in the most friendly manner with a batch of
broken English, -by the time I had framed an
intelligible response, Thanaron was in the heat
of a fresh argument, and keeping up a running
fire of small shot that nearly floored the mess.
But there is an end even to a French dinner, and
we ultimately adjourned to the deck, where, about
sunset, everybody took his station while the Angehls was said.  Then twilight, with a subdued kind
of skylarking in the forecastle, and genteel merriment amidships, while Monsieur le Capitaine paced
the high quarter-deck with the shadow of a smile
crouching between the fierce jungles of his intensely black side-whiskers.  Ah, sir, it was something to be at sea in a French transport with the
tricolor flaunting at the peak; to have four guns
with their mouths gagged, and oilcloth capes lashed
snugly over them; to see everybody in uniform,
each having the profoundest respect for those
who ranked a notch above him, and having, also,
an ill-disguised contempt for the unlucky fellow
beneath him! This spirit Was observable from
one end of the ship to the other, and, sirs, we had
a little world of our own revolving on a wabbling 
axis between the stanch ribs of the old transport
Chevert.
We were bound for Tahiti, God willing and the
winds favorable; and the common hope of ulti



308           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
mately finding port in that paradise is all that
held us together through thick and thin.  We
might wrangle at dinner, and come to breakfast
next morning with bitterness in our hearts; we
might sink into the bottomless pit of despond; we
might revile Monsieur le Capitaine and Monsieur
le Cuisinier, including in our anathemas the elements and some other things; they (the Frenchmen) might laugh to scorn the great American
people, - and they did it, two or three times —
and I, in my turn, might feel a secret contempt
for Paris, without having the power to express the
same in tolerable French, so I felt it and held my
tongue.  Even Thanaron gave me a French shrug
now and then that sent the cold shivers through
me; but there was sure to come a sunset like a sea
of fire, at which golden hour we were marshalled
amidships, and stood with uncovered heads and the
soft light playing over us, while the littlest French
boy in the crew said the evening prayer with exceeding sweetness,-being the youngest, he was
the most worthy of saying it, -and then we all
crossed ourselves, and our hearts melted within us.
There was something in the delicious atmosphere, growing warmer every day, and something
in the delicious sea, that was beginning to rock
her floating gardens of blooming weed under our
bows, and something in the aspect of Monsieur le
Capitaine, with his cap off and a shadow of prayer
softening his hard, proud face, that unmanned us;




IN A TRANSPORT.              309
so we rushed to our own little cabin and hugged
one another, lest we should forget how when we
were restored to our sisters and our sweethearts,
and everything was forgiven and forgotten in one
intense moment of French remorse.
Who took me in his arms and carried me the
length of the cabin in three paces, at the imminent peril of my life 3 Thanaron! Who admired
Thanaron's gush of nature, and nearly squeezed the
life out of him in the vain hope of making their
joy known to him. Everybody else in the mess!
Who looked on in bewilderment, and was half glad
and half sorry, though more glad than sorry by
half, and wondered all the while what was coming
next 3 Bless you, it was I! And we kept doing
that sort of thing until I got very used to it, and
by the time we sighted the green summits of
Tahiti, my range of experience was so great that
nothing could touch me further.  It may be that
we were not governed by the laws of ordinary seafarers.  The Caevert was shaped a little like a
bath-tub, with a bow like a duck's breast, and a
high, old-fashioned  quarter-deck, resembling  a
Chinese junk with a reef in her stern. Forty bold
sailor-boys, who looked as though they had been
built on precisely the same model and dealt out to
the government by the dozen, managed to keep
the decks very clean and tidy, and the brass-work
in a state of dazzling brightness.  The ship was
wonderfully well ordered.  I could tell you by the




310            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
sounds on deck, while I swung in the comfortable
seclusion of my hammock, just the hour of the
day or night, hut that was after I had once learned
the order of events.  There was the Sunday morning inspection, the Wednesday sham naval battle,
the prayers night and morning, and the order to
shorten sail each evening.  Between times the
decks were scrubbed and the whole ship renovated;
sometimes the rigging was darkened with drying
clothes, and sometimes we felt like ancient mariners, the sea was so oily and the air so hot and
still. There was nothing stirring save the *eabirds, who paddled about like tame ducks, and the
faint, thin thread of smoke that ascended noiselessly from the dainty rolls of tobacco in the fingers
of the entire ship's crew.  In fact, when we moved
at all in these calm waters, we seemed to be propelled by forty-cigarette power, for there was not
a breath of air stirring.
It was at such times that we fought our bloodless battles.  The hours were ominous; breakfast
did not seem half a breakfast, because we hurried
through it with the dreadful knowledge that a
conflict was pending, and possibly —though not
probably —we might never gather at that board
again, for a naval engagement is something terrible,
and life is uncertain in the fairest weather. Breakfast is scarcely over when the alarm is given, and
with the utmost speed every Frenchman flies to
his post. Already the horizon is darkened with




IN A TRANSPOR T.             311
the Prussian navy, yet our confidence in the stanch
old Chevert, in each particular soul on board, and
in our undaunted leader, - Monsieur le Capitaine,
who is even now scouring the sea with an enormous marine glass that of itself is enough to strike
terror to the Prussian heart, - our implicit confidence in ourselves is such that we smilingly await
the approach of the doomed fleet. At last they come
within range of our guns, and the conflict begins.
I am unfortunately compelled to stay beneath the
hatches.  A sham battle is no sight for an inexperienced landsman to witness, and, moreover, I
would doubtless get in the way of the frantic crew,
who seem resolved to shed the last drop of French
blood in behalf of la belle France.
Marine engagements are, as a general thing, a
great bore. The noise is something terrific; ammunition is continually passed up through the transom
over our dinner-table, and a thousand feet are
rushing over the deck with a noise as of theatrical
thunder.  The engagement lasts for an hour or
two. Once or twice we are enveloped in sheets of
flame.  We are speedily deluged with water, and
the conflict'is renewed with the greatest enthusiasm.  Again, and again, and again, we pour a
broadside into the enemy's fleet, and always with
terrific effect.  We invariably do ourselves the
greatest credit, for, by the time our supplies are about
exhausted, not a vestige of the once glorious navy
of Prussia remains to tell the tale.  The sea is, of




312            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
course, blood-stained for miles around. The few
persistent Prussians who attempt to board us are
speedily despatched, and allowed to drop back into
the remorseless waves. A shout of triumph rings
up from  our triumphant crew, and the play is
over.
Once more the hatches are removed; once more
I breathe the sweet air of heaven, for not a grain
of powder has been burned through all this fearful conflict; once more my messmates rush into
our little cabin and regale themselves with copious
draughts of absinthe, and I am  pressed to the
proud bosom of Thanaron, who is restored to me
without a scar to disfigure his handsome little
body.  I grew used to these weekly wars, and before we came in sight of our green haven, there
was not a Prussian left in the Pacific.  It is impossible that any nation, though they be schooled
to hardships, could hope to survive such a succession of disastrous conflicts.  On the whole, I like
sham battles; they are deuced exciting, and they
don't hurt.
How different, how very different those sleepy
days when we were drifting on toward the Marquesas Islands!  The silvery phaetons darted
overhead like day-stars shooting from their spheres.
The sea-weed grew  denser, and a thousand floating things,  broken branches with a few small
leaves attached, the husk of a cocoa-nut, or straws
such as any cove from  any ark would be glad to




IN A TRANSPORT.                313
seize upon,- these gave us ample food for speculation.  " Piloted by the slow, unwilling winds,"
we came close to the star-lit Nouka Hiva, and
shortened sail right under its fragrant shadow. It
was a glorious night. There was the subtile odor
of earth in the warm, faint air, and before us that
impenetrable shadow that we knew to be an island,
yet whose outlines were traceable only by the obliterated stars.
At sunrise we were on deck, and, looking westward, saw the mists melt away like a veil swept
from before the face of a dusky Venus just rising
from the waves. The island seemed to give out a
kind of magnetic heat that made our blood tingle.
We gravitated toward it with an almost irresistible impulse. Something had to be done before we
yielded to the fascinations of this savage enchantress.  Our course lay to the windward of the
southeastern point of the land; but, finding that
we could not weather it, we went off before the
light wind and drifted down the northern coast,
swinging an hour or more under the lee of some
parched rocks, eying the " Needles," - the slender and symmetrical peaks, so called,- and then
we managed to work our way out into the open
sea again, and were saved.
Valleys lay here and there, running back from
the shore with green and inviting vistas; slim
waterfalls  made one desperate  leap from  the
clouds and buried themselves in the forests hun14




314           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
dreds of feet below, where they were lost forever.
Rain-clouds hung over the mountains, throwing
deep shadows across the slopes that but for this
relief would have been too bright for the sentimental beauty that usually identifies a tropical
island.
I happened to know something about the place,
and marked every inch of the scorching soil as we
floated past groves of rose-wood, sandal-wood, and
a hundred sorts of new and strange trees, looking
dark and velvety in the distance; past strips of
beach that shone like brass, while beyond them
the cocoa-palms that towered above the low, brown
huts of the natives seemed to reel and nod in the
intense meridian heat.  A moist cloud, far up the
mountain, hung above a serene and sacred haunt,
and under its shelter was hidden a deep valley,
whose secret has been carried to the ends of the
earth; for Herman Melville has plucked out the
heart of its mystery, and beautiful and barbarous
Typee lies naked and forsaken.
I was rather glad we could not get any nearer to
it, for fear of dispelling the ideal that has so long
charmed me.  Catching the wind again, late in
the afternoon, we lost the last outline of Nouka
Hiva in the soft twilight, and said our prayers
that evening as much at sea as ever.  Back' we
dropped into the solemn round of uneventful days.
Even the sham-battles no longer thrilled us. In
fact, the whole affair was a little too theatrical to




IN A TRANSPORT.               315
bear frequent repetition. There was but one of
our mess who could muster an episode whenever
we became too stagnant for our health's good, and
this was our first officer,-  a tall, slim fellow, with
a warlike beard, and very soft, dark eyes, whose
pupils seemed to be floating aimlessly about under
the shelter of long lashes.  His face was in a perpetual dispute with itself, and I never knew which
was the right or the wrong side of him.  B —
was the happy possessor of a tight little African,
known as Nero, although I always looked upon
him  as so much Jamaica ginger.  Nero was as
handsome a -specimen of tangible darkness as you
will sight in a summer's cruise.  B         loved
with the ardor of his vacillating eyes, yet governed
with the rigor of his beard. Nero was consequently prepared for any change in the weather, no
matter how sudden, or uncalled for. In the equatorial seas, while we sailed to the measure of the
Ancient Mariner, B —  summoned Nero to the
sacrifice, and, having tortured him to the extent
of his wits, there was a reconciliation more ludicrous than any other scene in the farce.  It was
at such moments that B's eyes literally swam,
when even his beard wilted, while he told of the
thousand pathetic eras in Nero's life, when he
might have had his liberty, but found the service
of his master more beguiling; of the adventures
by flood and field, where B-_ was distinguishing himself, yet at his side, through thick and




316           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
thin, struggled the faithful Nero.  Thrus Bwarmed himself at the fire his own enthusiasm
had kindled on the altar of self-love, and every
moment added to his fervor.  It was the yellowfever, and the cholera, and the small-pox, that
were powerless to separate that faithful slave from
the agonizing bedside of his master. It was shipwreck, and famine, and the smallest visible salary,
that seemed only to s engthen the ties that
bound them the one to the other. Death - cruel
death-alone could separate them; and Btook Nero by the throat and kissed him passionately upon his sooty cheek, and the floating eyes
came to a stand-still with an expression of virtuous
defiance that was calculated to put all conventionalities to the blush.  We were awed by the magnanimity of such conduct, until we got thoroughly
used to it, and then we were simply entertained.
We kept looking forward to the conclusion of the
scene, which usually followed in the course of half
an hour.  B        having fondled Nero to his
heart's content, and Nero having become somewhat bored, there was sure to arise some mild disturbance, aggravated by both parties, and B —,
believing he had endured as much as any Frenchman and first officer is expected to endure without
resentment, suddenly rises, and, seizing Nero by
the short, wiry moss of his scalp, kicks him deliberately from the cabin, and returns to us bursting
with indignation. This domestic equinox we soon




IN A TRANSPORT.               317
grew fond of, and, having become familiar with all
its signals of approach, we watched with agreeable interest the inevitable climax.  It was well for
Nero  that Nature  had  provided  against any
change of color in his skin, for he must have borne
the sensation of his chastisement for some hours,
though he was unable to give visible expression of
it.  By and by came B's own private birthday.  Nothing had been said of it at table, and,
in fact, nothing elsewhere, that I remember; but
Nero, who had survived several of those anniversaries, bore it in mind, and our dinner was something gorgeous -to look at! Unhappily, certain
necessary ingredients had been unavoidably omitted in the concocting of the dessert, ornamental
pastry not being set down in our regular bill of
fare; but B~   ate of pies that were built of
chips, and of puddings that were stuffed with sawdust, until I feared we should be called upon to
mourn the loss of a first officer before morning.
Moreover, B      insisted that everything was
unsurpassed; and, Heaven be thanked! I believe
the pastry could easily lay claim to that distinction. At any rate, never before or since have I
laid teeth to such a Dead Sea dessert. At this
point, B         - naturally called Nero to him  and
thanked him, with moist and truthful eyes, and
the ingenuous little Jamaican dropped a couple of
colorless tears that would easily have passed for
anybody's anywhere.  For this mutual exhibition




318            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
of sentiment every one of us was duly grateful,
and we never afterward scorned B       for his eccentricities, since we knew him  to be capable of
genuine feeling.  Moreover, he nearly died of his
birthday feast, yet did not once complain of the
unsuspecting cause of all his woe, who was at his
side night and day, anticipating all his wishes,
and deploring the unaccountable misfortunes of
his master.
So the winds blew us into the warm  south latitudes.  I was getting restless.  Perhaps we had
talked ourselves out of legitimate topics of conversation, and were forcing the social element.  It
was tedious beyond expression, passing day after
day within sound of the same voices, and being
utterly unable to flee into never so small a solitude, for there was not an inch of it on board.
Swinging at night in my hammock between decks,
wakefully dreaming of the fiuture and of the past,
again and again I have stolen up on deck, where
the watch lay in the moonlight, droning their interminable yarns and smoking their perpetual cigarettes, — for French sailors have privileges, and
improve them with considerable grace.
It was at such times that the wind sung in the
rigging, with a sound as of a thousand swaying
branches full of quivering leaves, -just as the soft
gale in the garden groves suggests pleasant nights
at sea, the vibration of the taut stays, and the
rush of waters along the smooth sides of the ves



IN A TRANSPORT.               319
sel.  A ship's rigging is a kind of sea-harp, played
upon by the four winds of heaven.
The sails were half in moonlight and half in
shadow.  Every object was well defined, and on
the high quarter-deck paced Thanaron, his boyish
figure looking strangely picturesque, for he showed
in every motion how deeply he felt the responsibility of his office.  There was usually a faint
light in the apartments of Mozsieur le Capitaine,
and I thought of him in his gold lace and dignity,
poring over a French novel, or cursing the light
winds.  I used to sit upon the neck of a gun, 
one of our four dummies, that were never known
to speak louder than a whisper, - lay my head
against the moist bulwarks, and listen to the halfsavage chants of the Tahitian sailors who helped
to swell our crew. As we drew down toward the
enchanted islands they seemed fairly bewitched,
and it was with the utmost difficulty that they
could keep their mouths shut until evening, when
they were sure to begin intoning an epic that usually lasted through the watch.  Sometimes a fish
leaped into the moonlight, and came down with a
splash; or a whale heaved a great sigh close to
us, and as I looked over the bulwarks, I would
catch a glimpse of the old fellow just going down,
like a submerged island.  Occasionally a flyingfish-a kind of tangible moonbeam -fell upon
deck, and was secured by one of the sailors; or a
bird, sailing about with an eye to roosting on one




320            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
of our yards, gave a plaintive, ominous cry, that
was echoed in falsetto by two or three voices, and
rung in with the Tahitian cantata of island delights.  Even this sort of thing lost its charm
after a little. Thanaron could not speak to me,
because Thanaron was officer of the deck at that
moment, and Thanaron himself had said to me,
"Order, Monsieur, order is the first law  of
France! "  I had always supposed that Heaven
had a finger in the making of that law,- but it is
all the same to a Frenchman.
Most sea-days have a tedious family resemblance, their chief characteristic being the almost
total absence of any distinguishing feature.  Fair
weather and foul; sunlight, moonlight, and starlight; moments of confidence; oaths of eternal
fidelity; plans for the future long enough to crowd
a century uncomfortably; relapses, rows, recoveries; then, after many days, the water subsided,
and we saw land at last.
Land, God bless it! Long, low  coral reefs,
with a strip of garden glorifying them; rocks towering out of the sea, palm-crowned, foam-fringed;
wreaths of verdure cast upon the bosom  of the
ocean, forever fragrant in  their imperishable
beauty; and, beyond and above them  all, gorgeous and glorious Tahiti.
On the morning of the thirty-third day out,
there came a revelation to the whole ship's company.  A faint blue peak was seen struggling with




IN A TRANSPORT.               321
the billows; presently it seemed to get the better
of them, growing broader and taller, but taking
hours to do so.  The wind was stiff, and the sea
covered with foam; we rolled frightfully all day.
Our French dinner lost its identity. Soup was
out of the question; we had hard work to keep
meat and vegetables from total wreck, while we
hung on to the legs of the table with all our
strength.  How the old Chevert "bucked," that
day, as though conscious that for months to come
she would swing in still waters by the edge of
green pastures, where any such conduct would be
highly inappropriate.
Every hour the island grew more and more
beautiful, as though it were some lovely fruit or
flower, swiftly and magically coming to maturity.
A  central peak, with a tiara of rocky points,
crowns it with majesty, and a neighboring island
of great beauty seems its faithful attendant.  I
do not wonder that the crew of the Bounty mutinied when they were ordered to make sail and
turn their backs on Tahiti; nor am  I surprised
that they put the captain and one or two other
objectionable features into a small boat, and advised them to continue their voyage if they were
anxious to do so: but as for them, give them Tahiti, or give them worse than death,- and, if convenient, give them  Tahiti straight, and keep all
the rest for the next party that came along.
As soon as we were within hailing distance, the
14*                        u




322            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
pilot came out and took us under his wing.  We
kissed the hand of a citizen of the new world, and,
for the first time since losing sight of the dear
California coast, dismissed it from  our minds,
There was very little wind right inder the great
green mountains, so the frigate Astrea sent a
dozen boats to tow us through the opening in the
reef to our most welcome anchorage.  No Doge
of Venice ever cruised more majestically than we;
and our sea-pageant was the sensation of the day.
"Click-click" went the anchor-chains through
the hawse-holes, down into a deep, sheltered bowl
of the sea, whose waters have never yet been ruffled by the storms that beat upon the coral wall
around  it.  Along  the  crescent shores  trees
dropped their yellow leaves into the water, and
tried their best to bury the slim canoes drawn
up among  their roots.  Beyond this  barricade
of verdure the  eye caught glimpses of every
sort of tropical habitation imaginable, together with
the high roofs and ponderous white walls of the
French government buildings.  The foliage broke
over the little town like a green sea, and every
possibility of a good view of it was lost in the inundation.  Above it towered the sublime crest of
the mountain, with a strip of cloud about its middle in true savage fashion.  Perpetual harvest lay
in its lap, and it basked in the smile of God.
Twilight, fragrant and cool; a fruity flavor in
the air, a flower-like tint in sea and sky, the ship's




IN A TRANSPORT.               323
boat waiting to convey us shoreward....    O
Thanaron, my Thanaron, with your arms about
my neck, and B's arms about you, and Nero
clinging to his master's knees, —in fact, with
everybody felicitating every other body, because
it was such an evening as descends only upon the
chosen places of the earth, and because, having
completed our voyage in safety, we were all literally in a transport!




A PRODIGAL IN TAHITI.
S:D,' ET this confession be topped with a vignette done in broad, shadowless lines and
t few of them, - something like this:A little, flyblown room, smelling of garlic; I
cooling my elbows on the oily slab of a table
(breakfast for one), and looking through a window
at a glaring, whitewashed fence high enough to
shut out the universe from  my point of sight.
Yet it hid not all, since it brought into relief a
panting cock (with one leg in a string), which had
so strained to compress itself into a doubtful inch
of shade that its suspended claw clutched the air
in real agony.
Having dazzled my eyes with this prospect, I
turned gratefully to the vanities of life that may
be had for two francs in Tahiti.  Vide bill of fare:
One fried egg, like the eye of some gigantic Albino; potatoes hollowed out bombshell fashion,
primed with liver-sausage, very ingenious and palatable; the naked corpse of a fowl that cared not




A PRODIGAL IN  TAIIITI            325
to live longer, from  appearances, yet looked not
happy in death.
Item: Wonder if there is a more ghastly spectacle than a chicken cooked in the French style;
its knees drawn up on its breast like an Indian
mummy, while its blue-back, parboiled, and melancholy visage tearfully surveys its own unshrouded remains. After a brief season of meditation I
said, and I trust I meant it, " I thank the Lord
for all these blessings."  Then I gave the corpse
of the chicken Christian burial under a fold of
the window curtain, disposed of the fried eye of the
Albino, and transformed myself into a mortar for
the time being, taking potato-bombshells according
to my calibre.
There was claret all the while and plenty of
butterless roll, a shaving of cheese, a banana, black
coffee and cognac, when I turned again to dazzle
myself with the white fence, and saw with infinite
pity,  a sentiment perhaps not unmixed with a
suspicion of cognac or some other temporary humanizing element, -I saw for a fact that the
poor cock had wilted, and lay flat in the sun like a
last year's duster.  That was too much for me.  I
wheeled towards the door where gleamed the bay
with its lovely ridges of light; canoes drifting
over it drew  the eye after them  irresistibly; I
heard the ship-calkers on the beach making their
monotonous clatter, and the drone of the bareheaded fruitsellers squatted in rows chatting in



326           SOU TH SEA ID YLS.
dolently, with their eyes half shut. I could think
of nothing but bees humming over their own
sweet wares.
About this time a young fellow at the next
table, who had scarcely a mouthful of English at
his command, implored me to take beer with him;
implying that we might, if desirable, become as
tight as two bricks.  I declined, much to his admiration, he regarding my refusal as a clear case
of moral courage, whereas it arose simply and
solely from my utter inability to see his treat and
go him one better.
A grown person in Tahiti has an eating hour
allotted to him twice a day, at 10 A. M. and 5
P.M.  My time being up, I returned to the store in
an indifferent frame of mind, and upon entering
the presence of my employer, who had arrived a
moment before me, I was immediately covered.
with the deep humiliation of servitude and withdrew to an obscure corner, while Monsieur and
some naval guests took absinthe unblushingly,
which was, of course, proper enough in them.
Call it by what name you will, you cannot sweeten servility to my taste. Then why was I there
and in bondage. The spirit of adventure that
keeps life in us, yet comes near to worrying it out
of us now and then, lured me with my handful of
dollars to the Garden of the Pacific.  " You can
easily get work," said some one who had been
there and didn't want it. If work I must, why




A PRODIGAL IN  TAHITI.            327
not better there than here q thought I; and the
less money I take with me the surer am I to seek
that which might not attract me under other circumstances. A few letters which proved almost
valueless; an abiding trust in Providence, afterward somewhat shaken I am sorry to state, which
convinces me that I can no longer hope to travel
as a shorn lamb; considerable confidence in the
good feeling of my fellow-men, together with the
few dollars above referred to, - comprised my all
when I set foot on the leaf-strewn and shady
beach of Papeete.
Before the day was over I saw my case was
almost hopeless; I was one too many in a very
meagre congregation of foreigners.  In a week I
was desperate, with poverty and disgrace brooding
like evil spirits on either hand. Every ten minutes some one suggested  something which was
almost immediately suppressed by the next man
I met, to whom I applied for further information.
Teach, said one: there was n't a pupil to be had in
the dominion. Clerkships were out of the question likewise. I might keep store, if I could get
anything to put in it; or go farther, as some one
suggested, if I had money enough to get there.  I
thought it wiser to endure the ills I had than fly
to others that I knew not of.  In this state I perambulated the green lanes of Papeete, conscious
that I was drawing down tons of immaterial sympathy from hearts of various nationalities, beat



328           S OUTII-SEA IDYLS.
ing to the music of regular salaries in hard cash,
and the inevitable ringing of their daily dinnerbell; and I continued to perambulate under the
same depressing avalanches for a fortnight or
more, —a warning to the generation of the inexperienced that persists in sowing itself broadcast upon
the edges of the earth, and learns too late how
hard a thing it is to take root under the circumstances.
One gloomy day I was seized in the marketplace and led before a French gentleman who
offered me a bed and board for such manual compensation as I might be able to give him  in his
office during the usual business hours, namely, from
daybreak to some time in the afternoon, unless it
rained, when business was suspended, and I was
dropped until fair weather should set that little
world wagging again.
I was invited to enter into the bosom of his
family, in fact, to be one of them, and no single
man could ask to be more; to sit at his table and
hope for better days, in which diversion he proposed to join me with all his soul.
With an emotion of gratitude and a pang at
being thus early a subject of charity, I began business in Papeete, and learned within the hour how
sharper than most sharps it is to know only your
own mother-tongue when you're away from home.
Nightly I walked two hot and dusty miles
through groves of bread-fruit and colonnades of




A PRODIGAL IN  TAHITI.            329
palms to my new master's. I skirted, with loitering steps, a placid sea whose crystalline depths
sheltered leagues and leagues of sun-painted corals,
where a myriad fish, dyed like the rainbow, sported unceasingly.  Springs gushed from  the nmountain, singling their song of joy; the winds sang in
the dark locks of the sycamore, while the palmboughs clashed like cymbals in rhythmical accompaniment; glad children chanted their choruses,
and I alone couldn't sing, nor hum, nor whistle,
because it does n't pay to work for your board, and
settle for little necessities out of your own pocket,
in any latitude that I ever heard of.
We lived in a grove of ten thousand cocoapalms crowning a hill-slope to the west.  How allsufficient it sounds as I write it now, but how little I cared then, for many reasons!  My cottage
had prior tenants, who disputed possession with
me, -winged tenants who sought admission at
every cranny and frequently obtained it in spite
of me; these were not angels, but hens.  My cottage had been a granary until it got too poor a receptacle for grains, and a better shelter left it open
to the barn-fowls until I arrived. They hated me,
these hungry chickens; they used to sit in rows
on the window-sill and stare me out of countenance. A wide bedstead, corded with thongs, did
its best to furnish my apartment.  A narrow, a
very narrow  and thin  ship's mattress, that had
been a bed of torture for many a sea-sick soul be



330            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
fore it descended to me; a flat pillow like a pancake; a condemned horse-blanket contributed by a
good-natured Kanack who raked it from  a heap
of refuse in the yard, together with two sacks of
rice, the despair of those hens in the window,
were all I could boast of.  With this inventory I
strove (by particular request) to be one of those
who were comfortable enough in the chateau adjoining.  Summoned peremptorily to dinner, I
entered a little latticed saloon connected with the
chateau by a covered walk, discovered Monsieur
seated at table and already served with soup
and claret; the remainder of the company helped
themselves as they best could; and I saw plainly
enough that the family bosom was so crowded
already, that I might seek in vain to wedge myself into any corner of it, at least until some
vacancy occurred.
After dinner, sat on a sack of rice in my room
while it grew dark and Monsieur received calls;
wandered down to the beach at the foot of the
hill and lay a long time on a bed of leaves, while'
the tide was out and the crabs clattered along
shore and were very sociable.  Natives began to
kindle their evening fires of cocoa-nut husks;
smoke, sweet as incense, climbed up to the plumes
of the palm-trees and was lost among the stars.
Morsels of fish and bread-fruit were offered me by
the untutored savage, who welcomed me to his
frugal meal and desired that I should at least




A PRODIGAL IN  TAHITI.             331
taste before he broke his fast.  Canoes shot out
from  dense, shadowy points, fishers standing  in
the bows with a poised spear in one hand; a blazing palm-branch held aloft in the other shed a
warm  glow of light over their superb nakedness.
Bathed by the sea, in a fresh, cool spring, and returned to my little coop, which was illuminated
by the glare of fifty floating beacons; looking
back from the door I could see the dark outlines
of the torch-bearers and  hear their signal calls
above the low growl of the reef a half-mile farther
out from shore.  It was a blessing to lie awake in
my little room  and watch the flicker of those
fires; to think how Tahiti must look on a cloudless  night from  some heavenly  altitude, - the
ocean still as death, the procession of fishermen
sweeping from point to point within the reef, till
the island, flooded with starlight and torchlight,
lies like a green sea-garden in a girdle of flame.
A shrill bell called me from my bed at dawn.
I was not unwilling to rise, for half the night I
lay like a saint on the tough thongs, having turned
over in sleep, thereby missing the mattress entirely.  Made my toilet at a spring on the way
into town; saw a glorious sunrise that was as good
as breakfast, and found the whole earth and sea
and all that in them  is singing again while I listened and gave thanks for that privilege. At 10
A. M. I went to breakfast in the small restaurant
where I have sketched myself at the top of this




332            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
chronicle, and whither we may return and begin
over again if it please you.
I was about to remark that probably most melancholy and homesickness may be cured or alleviated by a wholesome meal of victuals; but I think
I won't, for, on referring to my note-book, I find that
within an hour after my return to the store I was as
heart-sick as ever and was n't afraid to say so. It
is scarcely to be wondered at: the sky was dark;
aboard a schooner some sailors were making that
doleful whine peculiar to them, as they hauled in
to shore and tied up to a tree in a sifting rain;
then everything was ominously still as though
something disagreeable were about to happen;
thereupon I doubled myself over the counter like
a half-shut jack-knife, and burying my face in my
hands said to myself, "0, to be alone with Nature! her silence is religion and her sounds sweet
music."  After which the rain blew over, and I
was sent with a hand-cart and one underfed Kanack to a wharf half a mile away to drag back several loads of potatoes.  We two hungry creatures
struggled heroically to do our duty.  Starting
with a multitude of sacks it was quite impossible
to proceed with, we grew weaker the farther we
went, so that the load had to be reduced from
time to time, and I believe the amount of potatoes deposited by the way considerably exceeded
the amount we subsequently arrived at the store
with.  Finding life a burden, and seeing the legs




A PRODIGAL  IN  TAH[TI.                  333
of the young fellow  in harness with  me bend  under him  in his frantic efforts to get our cart out
of a rut without emptying it entirely, I resolved
to hire a substitute at my own expense, and save
my remaining strength for a new line of business.
Thus I was enabled to  sit on the wharf the rest
of the afternoon and  enjoy myself devising  new
means of subsistence  and  watching  the natives
swim.
Some one before me found a modicum  of sweets
in his cup of bitterness, and in a complacent hour
set the good against the evil in single entry, summing up the same to his advantage.  I concluded
to do it myself, and did it, thus:EVIL.                        GOOD.
I find myself in a foreign    But I may do as I please
land with no one to love and  in consequence, and it is nonone to love me.              body's business save my own.
I am working for my board    But I may quit as soon as I
and lo(dging (no extras), and  feel like it, and shall have no
find it very unprofitable.    occasion to dun my employer
for back salary so long as I
stop with him.
My clothes are in rags. I    But the weather is mild and
shall soon be without a stitch  the fig-tree flourisheth. Moreto my back.                   over many a good savage has
gone naked before me.
I get hungry before break-    But fasting is saintly. Day
fast and feel faint after dinner. by day I grow more spiritual,
What are two meals a day to a  and shall shortly be a fit subman of my appetite?          ject for translation to that better world which is doubtless
the envy of all those who have
lost it by over eating and
drinking.




334            SOUTII-SEA IDYLS.
Nothing can exceed the satisfaction with which
I read and re-read this philosophical summary, but
I had relapses every few minutes so long as I lived
in Tahiti.  I remember one Sunday morning, a
day I had all to myself, when I cried out of the
depths and felt better after it. It was a real Sunday.  The fowls confessed it by the indifference
with which they picked up a grain of rice now
and then as though they were n't hungry.  The
family were moving about in an unnatural way;
some people are never themselves on the Lord's
day.  The canoes lay asleep off upon the water,
evidently conscious of the long hours of rest they
were sure of having.  To sum it all, it seemed as
though the cover had been taken off from  the
earth, and the angels were sitting in big circles
looking at us.  Our clock had run down, and I
found myself half an hour too early at mass.
Some diminutive native children talked together
with infinite gesticulation, like little old men.
At every lag in the conversation, two or three
of them would steal away to the fence that surrounded the church  and begin diligently counting the pickets thereof.  They were evidently
amazed at what they considered a singular coincidence, namely, that the number of pickets, beginning at the front gate and counting to the right,
tallied exactly with the do. do. beginning at the
do. do. and counting to the left; while they were
making repeated efforts to get at the heart of this




A PRODIGAL IN  TAIITI.            335
mystery, the priest rode up on horseback, dismounted in our midst, and we all followed him
into chapel to mass.
A young Frenchman offered me holy-water on
the tips of his fingers, and I immediately decided
to confide in him  to an unlimited extent if he
gave me the opportunity. It was a serious disappointment when I found later, that we did n't
know six words in any common tongue.  Concluded to be independent and walked off by myself.
Got very lonesome immediately.  Tried to be
meditative, philosophical, botanical, conchological,
and in less than an hour gave it up, — homesick
again, by Jove!
Strolled to the beach and sat a long time on a
bit of wreck partly imbedded in the sand; consoled
by the surpassing radiance of sunset, wondered
how I could ever have repined, but proceeded to
do it again as soon as it grew dark. Some natives
drew near, greeting me kindly.  They were evidently lovers; talked in low tones, deeply interested in the most trivial things, such as a leaf falling into the sea at our feet and floating stem  up,
like a bowsprit; he probably made some poetic
allusion to it, may have proposed braving the seas
with her in a shallop as fairy-like, for both fell a
dreaming and were silent for some time, he worshipping her with fascinated eyes, while she, woman-like, pretended to be all unconscious of his
admiration.




336           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
Silently we sat looking over the sea at Moorea,
just visible in the light of the young moon, like a
spirit brooding upon the waters, till I broke the
spell by saying "Good night," which was repeated
in a chorus as I withdrew  to my coop and found
my feathered guests had beaten in the temporary
barricade erected in the broken window, entered
and made themselves at home during my absence,
- a fact that scarcely endeared the spot to me.
Next morning I was unusually merry; couldn't
tell why, but tried to sing as I made my toilet at
the spring; laughed nearly all the way into town,
saying my prayers, and blessing God, when I
came suddenly upon a horse-shoe in the middle of
the road.  Took it as an omen and a keepsake;
horse-shoes are n't shed everywhere nor for everybody.  I thought it the prophecy of a change,
and at once cancelled my engagement with my
employer without having set foot into his house
farther than the dining-room, or made any apparent impression upon the adamantine bosom of his
family.
After formally expressing my gratitude to Monsieur for his renewed offers of hospitality, I turned
myself into the street, and was once more adrift
in the world.  For the space of three minutes I
was wild with joy at the thought of my perfect
liberty.  Then I grew nervous, began to feel unhappy, nay, even guilty, as though I had thrown
up a good thing.  Concluded it was rash of me to




A PRODIGAL IN  TAtIITI.           337
leave a situation where I got two meals and a mattress, with the privilege of washing at my own expense.  Am not sure that it was n't unwise, for I
had no dinner that afternoon; and having no bed
either, I crept into the veranda of a house to let
and dozed till daybreak.
There was but one thing to live for now, namely, to see as much of Tahiti as possible, and at my
earliest convenience return like the prodigal son to
that father who would doubtless feel like killing
something appropriate as soon as he saw me coming.  I said as much to a couple of Frenchmen,
brothers, who are living a dream-life over yonder,
and whose wildest species of dissipation for the
last seven years has been to rise at intervals from
their settees in the arbor, go deliberately to the
farther end of the garden and eat several mangoes
in cold blood.
To comprehend Tahiti, a man must lose himself in forests whose resinous boughs are knotted
with ribbons of sea-grass; there, overcome by the
music of sibilant waters sifting through the antlers of the coral, he is supposed to sink upon
drifts of orange-blossoms only to be resuscitated
ly the spray of an approaching shower crashing
through the green solitudes like an army- with
chariots, -so those brothers said, with a mango
poised in each hand; and they added that I should
have an official document addressed to the best
blood in the kingdom, namely, Forty Chiefs of
15                         v




338           SOUTH-SEA ID YLS.
Tahiti, who would undoubtedly entertain me with
true barbarian hospitality, better the world knows
not.  There was a delay for some reason; I, rather impatient, and scarcely hoping to receive so
graceful a compliment from head-quarters, trudged
on alone with a light purse and an infinitesimal
bundle of necessities, caring nothing for the weather nor the number of miles cleared per day, since
I laid no plans save the one, to see as much as I
might.with the best grace possible, keeping an eye
on the road for horse-shoes. Through leagues of
verdure I wandered, feasting my five senses and
finding life a holiday at last. There were numberless streams to be crossed, where I loafed for
hours on the bridges, satisfying myself with sunshine.  Not a savage in the land was freer than I.
No man could say to me, "Why stand ye here
idle?" for I could continue to stand as long as I
liked and as idly as it pleased me in spite of him!
There were bridgeless streams to be forded; but the
Tahitian is a nomad continually wandering from
one edge of his fruitful world to the other; moreover, he is the soul of peace towards men of goodwill: I was invariably picked up by some barebacked Hercules, who volunteered to take me over
the water on his brawny brown shoulders, and
could have easily taken two like me. It was good
to be up there while he strode through the swift
current, for I felt that he was perfectly able to
carry me to the ends of the earth without stop



A PRODIGAL IN TAHIT.             339
ping, and that sense of reliance helped to reassure
my faith in humanity.
As I wandered, from  most native houses came
the invitation to enter and eat. Night after night
I found my bed in the corner of some dwelling
whither I had been led by the master of it, with
unaffected grace.  It was n't simply showing me
to a spare room, but rather unrolling the best mat
and turning everything to my account so long as
it pleased me to tarry.  Sometimes the sea talked
in its sleep not a rod from the house; frequently
the mosquitoes accepted me as a delicacy and did
their best to dispose of me.  Once I awoke with a
headache, the air was so dense with the odor of
orange-blossoms.
There was frequently a strip of blue bay that
ebbed  and  flowed  languidly  and  had  to  be
lunched with; or a very deep and  melodious
spring, asking for an interview, and, I may add, it
always got it.  I remember one miniature castle
built in the midst of a grassy Venice by the shore.
Its moats, shining with gold-fish, were spanned
with slender bridges; toy feaces of bamboo enclosed the rarer clumps of foliage; and there was
such an air of tranquillity pervading it I thought I
must belong there.  Something seemed to say,
"Come in."  I went in, but left very soon; the
place was so fairy-like, I felt as though I were
liable to step through it and come out on some
other side, and I was n't anxious for such  a
change.




340            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
I ate when I got hungry, a very good sort of a
meal, consisting usually of a tiny piglet cooked in
the native fashion, swathed in succulent leaves
and laid between hot stones till ready for eating;
bread-fruit, like mashed potato, but a great deal
better; orange-tea and cocoa-rnilk, surely enough
for two or three francs.  Took a sleep whenever
sleep came along, resting always till the clouds or
a shadow from the mountain covered me so as to
keep cool and comfortable.  Natives passed me
with salutations.  A  white man now  and then
went by barely nodding, or more frequently eying
me with suspicion and giving me as much of his
dust as he found convenient. In the wider fellowship of nature, I forswore all blood relations and
blushed for those representatives of my own color
as I footed it right royally.  Therefore, I was enabled to scorn the fellow who scorned me while he
flashed the steel hoofs of his charger in my face
and dashed on to the village we were both approaching with the dusk.
What a spot it was! A long lane as green as a
spring meadow, lying between wall-like masses of
foliage whose deep arcades were frescoed with blossoms and festooned with vines. It seemed a pathway leading to infinity, for the blood-red bars of
sunset glared at its farther end as though Providence had placed them there to keep out the unregenerated.  Not a house visible all this time,
nor a human, though I was in the heart of the




A PRODIGAL IN TAHITL             341
hamlet.  Passing up the turf-cushioned road I
beheld on either hand, through a screen of leaves,
a log spanning a rivulet that was softly singing its
monody; at the end of each log the summerhouse of some Tahitian, who sat in his door smoking complacently. It was a picture of still life
with a suggestion of possible motion; a village to
put into a greenhouse, water, and keep fresh forever.  Let me picture it once more, -one mossy
street between two babbling brooks, and every
house thereof set each in its own moated wilderness. This was Papeali.
Like rows of cages full of chirping birds those
bamboo huts were distributed up and down the
street.  As I walked I knew something would
cause me to turn at the right time and find a new
friend ready to receive me, for it always does. So
I walked slowly and without hesitation or impatience until I turned and met him  coming out of
his cage, crossing the rill by his log and holding
out his hand to me in welcome.  Back we went
together, and I ate and slept there as though it
had been arranged a thousand years ago; perhaps
it was! There was a racket up at the farther end
of the lane, by the chief's house; songs and noseflutings upon the night air; moreover, a bonfire
and doubtless much nectar,- too much, as usual,
for I heard such cheers as the soul gives when it is
careless of consequences, and caught a glimpse of
the joys of barbarism such as even we poor Chris



342            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
tians cannot wholly withstand, but turning our
backs think we are safe enough.  Commend me to
him who has known temptation and not shunned
it, but actually withstood it!
It was the dance, as ever it is the dance where
all the aspirations of the soul find expression in
the body; those bodies that are incarnate souls or
those souls that are spiritualized bodies, inseparable, whatever they are, for the time being.  The
fire glowed fervently; bananas hung out their tattered banners like decorations; palms rustled their
silver plumes aloft in the moonlight; the  sea
panted upon its sandy bed in heavy sleep; the
night-blooming cereus opened its waxen chambers
and gave forth its treasured sweets. Circle after
circle of swart savage faces were turned upon the
flame-lit arena where the dancers posed for a moment with their light drapery gathered about them
and held carelessly in one hand. Anon the music
chimed forth,   a reiteration of chords caught
from the birds' treble and the wind's bass; full and
resounding syllables, richly poetical, telling of
orgies and of the mysteries of the forbidden revels
in the charmed valleys of the gods, hearing which
it were impossible not to be wrought to madness;
and the dancers thereat went mad, dancing with
infinite gesticulation, dancing to whirlwinds of applause till the undulation of their bodies was
serpentine, and at last in frenzy they shrieked
with joy, threw off their garments, and were na



A PRODIGAL IN TAIITL.            343
ked as the moon.  So much for a vision that kept
me awake till morning, when I plodded on in the
damp grass and tried to forget it, but could n't exactly and never have to this hour.  Went on and
on over more bridges spanning still-flowing streams
of silver, past springs that lay like great crystals
framed in moss under dripping, fern-clad cliffs that
the sun never reaches.  Came at last to a shining,
whitewashed fort, on an eminence that commands
the isthmus connecting the two hemispheres of
Tahiti, where down I dropped into a narrow valley
full of wind and discord and a kind of dreary
neglect that made me sick for any other place.
More refreshment for the wayfarer, but to be paid
for by the dish, and therefore  limited.  Was
obliged to hate a noisy fellow with too much bushy
black beard and a freckled nose, and to like another who eyed me kindly over his absinthe, having
first mixed a glass for me.  A native asked me
where I was going; being unable to give any satisfactory answer, he conducted me to his canoe,
about a mile distant, where he cut a sapling for a
mast, another for a gaff, twisted, in a few moments,
a cord of its fibrous bark, rigged a sail of his
sleeping-blanket, and we were shortly wafted onward before a light breeze between the reef and
shore.
Three of us with a bull-pup in the bows dozed
under the afternoon sun.  He of the paddle awoke
now and then to shift sail, beat the sea impetuous



344           SOUTH-SEA  D YLS.
ly for a few seconds, and fall asleep again. Voices
roused me occasionally, greetings from colonies of
indolent Kanacks on shore, whose business it was
to sit there till they got hungry, laughing weariness to scorn.
Close upon our larboard-bow lay one of the islands that had bewitched me as I paced the shore
but a few  days previous; under us the measureless gardens of the sea unmasked a myriad
imperishable  blossoms, centuries  old some  of
them, but as fair and fresh as though born within
the hour.  All that afternoon we drifted between
sea and shore, and beached at sunset in a new
land. Foot-sore and weary, I approached a stable
from which thrice a week stages were despatched
to Papeete.
A modern pilgrim finds his scrip cumbersome,
if he has any, and deems it more profitable to
pay his coachman than his cobbler.
I climbed to my seat by the jolly French driver,
who was continually chatting with three merry
nuns sitting just back of us, returning to the convent in Papeete after a vacation retreat among the
hills. How they enjoyed the ride, as three children
might  and were quite wild with delight at meeting a corpulent pere, who smiled amiably from his
saddle and offered to show them the interior of
the pretty chapel at Faaa (only three a's in that
word), - the very one I grew melancholy in when I
was a man of business.




A PRODIGAL IN  TA41TI.            345
So they hurled themselves madly from the high
seat, one after the other, scorning to touch anything so contaminating as a man's hand, though it
looked suicidal, as the driver and I agreed while
the three were at prayers by the altar.  Whipping
up over the road townward, I could almost recognize my own footprints left since the time I used
to take the dust in my face three mornings a week
from the wheels of that very vehicle as I footed it
in to business. Passing the spring, my toilet of
other days, drawing to the edge of the town, we
stopped being jolly and were as proper as befitted
travellers.  We looked over the wall of the convent garden as we drove up to the gate, and saw
th3 mother-superior hurrying down to us with a
cumbersome chair for the relief of the nuns, but
before she reached us they had cast themselves to
earth again in the face of destiny, and there was
kissing, crying, and commotion as they withdrew
under the gateway like so many doves seeking
shelter.  When the gate closed after them, I heard
them all cooing at once, but the world knows nothing further.
Where would I be dropped   asked the driver.
In the middle of the street, please you, and take
half my little whole for your ride, sir! He took
it, dropped me where we stood, and drove away, I
pretending to be very much at my ease. God help
me and all poor hypocrites!
I sought a place of shelter, or rather retirement,
15*




346           SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
for the air is balm in that country. There was an
old house in the middle of a grassy lawn on a bystreet; two of its rooms were furnished with a
few papers and books, and certain gentlemen who
contribute to its support lounge in when they have
leisure for reading or a chat.  I grew to know the
place familiarly.  I stole a night's lodging on its
veranda in the shadow of a passion-vine; but, for
fear of embarrassing some early student in pursuit
of knowledge, I passed the second night on the
floor of the dilapidated cook-house, where the ants
covered me.  I endured the tortures of one who
bares his body to an unceasing shower of sparks;
but I survived.
There was, in this very cook-house, a sink six feet
in length and as wide as a coffin; the third night
I lay like a galvanized corpse with his lid off till a
rat sought to devour me, when I took to the streets
and walked till morning.  By this time the president of the club, whose acquaintance I had the
honor of, tendered me the free use of any portion of
the premises that might not be otherwise engaged.
With a gleam  of hope I began my explorations.
Up a narrow and winding stair I found a spacious
loft. It was like a mammoth tent, a solitary centre-pole its only ornament. Creeping into it on allfours, I found a fragment of matting, a dry crust,
an empty soda-bottle, -footprints on the sands
of time.
"Poor soul!" I gasped, "where did you come




A PRODIGAL IN TAHITI.            347
from  What did you come for   Whither, 0,
whither, have you flown? "
I might have added, How did you manage to get
there. But the present was so important a consideration, I had no heart to look beyond it.  The
next ten nights I passed in the silent and airy
apartment of my anonymous predecessor.  Ten
nights I crossed the unswept floor that threatened
at every step to precipitate me into the readingroom below.  With a faint heart and hollow stomach I threw myself upon my elbow and strove to
sleep.  I lay till my heart stopped beating, my
joints were wooden, and my four limbs corky beyond all hope of reanimation.  There the mosquito
revelled, and it was a promising place for centipedes.
At either end of the building an open window
admitted the tip of a banana-leaf; up their green
ribs the sprightly mouse careered. I broke the
backbones of these banana-leaves, though they
were the joy of my soul and would have adorned
the choicest conservatory in the land. Day was
equally unprofitable  to me.  My best friends
said, "Why not return to California?"  Every
one I met invited me to leave the country at my
earliest convenience.  The American consul secured me a passage, to be settled for at home, and
my career in that latitude was evidently at an end.
In my superfluous confidence in humanity, I had
announced myself as a correspondent for the press.




348            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
It was quite necessary that I should give some
plausible reason for making my appearance in
Tahiti friendless and  poor.  Therefore, I said
plainly, " I am  a correspondent, friendless and
poor," believing that any one would see truth in
the face of it, with half an eye.  " Prove it," said
one who knew more of the world than I.  Then
flashed upon me the alarming fact that I could n't
prove it, having nothing whatever in my possession
referring to it in the slightest degree. It was a fatal
mistake that might easily have been avoided, but
was too well established to be rectified.
In my chagrin I looked to the good old bishop
for consolation. Approaching the Mission House
through sunlit cloisters of palms, I was greeted
most tenderly.  I would have gladly taken any
amount of holy orders for the privilege of ending
my troublous days in the sweet seclusion of the
Mission House.
As it was, I received a blessing, an autograph
and a " God speed" to some other part of creation. Added to this I learned how the address to
the Forty Chiefs of Tahiti in behalf of the foreign
traveller, my poor self, had been despatched to me
by a special courier, who found me not; and doubtless the fetes I heard of and was forever missing
marked the march of that messenger, my proxy, in
his triumphal progress. In my innocent degradation it was still necessary to nourish the inner
man.




A PRODIGAL IN TAHIITI.           349
There is a market in Papeete where, under one
broad roof, threescore hucksters of both sexes congregate long before daylight, and, while a few candles illumine their wares, patiently await custom.
A half-dozen coolies with an eye to business serve
hot coffee and chocolate at a dime per cup to any
who choose to ask for it.  By 7 A. M. the market
is so nearly sold out that only the more plentiful
fruits of the country are to be obtained at any
price. A prodigal cannot long survive on husks,
unless he have coffee to wash them  down. I took
my cup of it, with two spoonfuls of sugar and ants
dipped out of a cigar-box, and a crust of bread
into the bargain, sitting on a bench in the marketplace, with a coolie and a Kanack on either hand.
It was not the coffee nor the sugared ants that
I gave my dime for, but rather the privilege of
sitting in the midst of men and women who were
willing to accept me as a friend and helpmatewithout questioning my ancestry, and any one of
whom would go me halves in the most disinterested manner.' Then there was sure to be some siiperb fellow close at hand, with a sensuous lip curled
under his nostril, a glimpse of which gave me a
dime's worth of satisfaction and more too.  Having secreted a French roll, five cents, all hot, under
my coat, and gathered the bananas that would fall
in the yard so seasonably, I made my day as brief
and comfortable as possible by filling up with water from time to time.




350           SOUTII-SEA IDYLS.
The manl who has passed a grimy chop-house,
wherein a frowzy fellow sat at his cheap spread,
without envying the frowzy fellow his cheap spread,
cannot truly sympathize with me.
The man who has not felt a great hollow in his
stomach which he found necessary to fill at the
first fountain he came to, or go over on his beam
ends for lack of ballast, cannot fall upon my neck
and call me brother.
At daybreak I haunted those street fountains,
waiting my turn while French cooks filled almost
fathomless kegs, and coolies filled potbellied jars,
and Kanacks. filled their hollow  bamboos that
seemed fully a quarter of a mile in length. There
I meekly made my toilet, took my first course of
breakfast, rinsed out my handkerchiefs and stockingS, and went my way. The whole performance
was embarrassing, because I was a novice and a
dozen people watched me in curious silence.  I
had also a boot with a suction in the toe; there
is dust in Papeete; while I walked that boot
loaded and discharged itself in a manner that
anazed an amused a small mob of little natives
who followed me in my free exhibition, advertising
my shooting-boot gratuitously.
I was altogether shabby in my outward appearance, and cannot honestly upbraid any resident of
the town for his neglect of me.  1 know that I
suffered the agony of shame  and the pangs of
hunger; but they were nothing to the utter lone




A PRODIGAL IN  TAIIIT.              351
liness I felt as I wandered about with my heart
on my sleeve, and never a bite from  so much as
a daw.
Did you ever question the possibility of a man's
temporary transformation  under certain  mental,
moral, or physical conditions. There are seasons
when he certainly is n't what he was, yet may be
more and better than he has been, if you give him
time enough.
I began to think I had either suffered this transformation or been maliciously misinformed as to
my personality.  Was I truly what I represented
myself to be, or had I been a living deception all
my days?  No longer, able to identify myself as
any one in particular, it occurred to me that it
would be well to address a few lines to the gentleman I had been in the habit of calling "father,"
asking for some particulars concerning his absent
son.  I immediately drew up this document ready
for mailing: -
MOSQUITO HALL,
CENTIPEDE AVENUE, PAPEETE.
DEAR SIR: A  nondescript awaits identification at
this office. Answers to the names at the foot of this
page, believes himself to be your son, to have been
your son, or about to be something equally near and
dear to you. He can repeat several chapters of the
New Testament at the shortest notice; recites most of
the Catechism and Commandments; thinks he would
recognize two sisters and three brothers at sight, and
know his mother with his eyes shut.




352            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
He likewise confesses to the usual strawberry-mark
in fast colors. If you will kindly send by return mail
a few dollars, he will clothe, feed, and water himself
and return immediately to those arms which, if his
memory does not belie him, have more than once sheltered his unworthy frame. I have, dear sir, the singular fortune to be the article above described.
The six months which would elapse before I
could hope for an answer would probably have
found me past all recognition, so I ceased crying
to the compassionate bowels of Tom, Dick, and
Harry, waiting with haggard patience the departture of the vessel that wasto bear me home with
a palpable C. O. D. tacked on to me. Those last
hours were brightened by the delicate attentions of
a few good souls who learned, too late, the shocking state of my case.  Thanks to them, I slept
well thereafter in a real bed, and was sure of dinners that would n't rattle in me like a withered
kernel in an old nutshell.
I had but to walk to the beach, wave my lily
hand, heavily tanned about that time, when lo  a
boat was immediately despatched from the plump
little corvette Cheveret, where the tricolor waved
triumphantly from  sunrise to sunset, all the year
round.
Such capital French dinners as I had there, such
offers of bed and board and boundless sympathy
as were made me by those dear fellows who wore
the gold-lace and had a piratical-looking cabin all




A PRODIGAL IN TAHITI.            353
to themselves, were enough to wring a heart that
had been nearly wrung out in its battle with life
in Tahiti.
No longer I walked the streets as one smitten
with the plague, or revolved in envious circles
about the market-place, where I could have got
my fill for a half-dollar, but had neither the one
nor the other.  No longer I went at daybreak to
swell the procession at the water-spout, or sat on
the shore the picture of despair, waiting sunrise,
finding it my sole happiness to watch a canoe-load
of children drifting out upon the bay, singing like
a railful of larks; nor walked solitarily through
the night up and down the narrow streets wherein the gendarmes had learned to pass me unnoticed,
with my hat under my arm  and my heart in my
throat. Those delicious moons always seduced me
from my natural sleep, and I sauntered through
the cocoa-groves whose boughs glistened like row
after row of crystals, whose shadows were as mosaics wrought in blocks of silver.
I used to nod at the low, whitewashed "calabooses" fairly steaming in the sun, wherein Herman Melville got some chapters of " Omoo."
Over and over again I tracked the ground of
that delicious story, saying to the bread-fruit
trees that had sheltered him, "Shelter me also,
and whoever shall follow after, so long as your
branches quiver in the wind!"
0 reader of "Omoo," think of "Motoo-Otoo,"
w




354            SOUTH-SEA IDYLS.
actually looking warlike in these sad days, with a
row of new cannons around its edge, and pyramids
of balls as big as cocoa-nuts covering its shady
centre.
Walking alone in those splendid nights I used
to hear a dry, ominous coughing in the huts of
the natives.  I felt as though I were treading
upon the brinks of half-dug graves, and I longed
to bring a respite to the doomed race.
One windy afternoon we cut our stern hawser
in a fair wind and sailed out of the harbor; I felt
a sense of relief, and mo-ralized for five minutes
without stopping.  Then I turned away from  all
listeners and saw those glorious green peaks growing dim in the distance; the clouds embraced them
in their profound secrecy; like a lovely mirage
Tahiti floated upon the bosom  of the sea.  Between sea and sky was swallowed up vale, garden,
and waterfall; point after point crowded with
palms; peak above peak in that eternal crown of
beauty; and with them the nation of warriors and
lovers falling like the leaf, but, unlike it, with no
followers in the new season.
Cambridge: Electrotyped and Printed by Welch, Bigelow, & Co.