A BAPTISM OF BLOOD.

"Consume them, O Hauri, that we may slay them!" They cried out wildly as they fled :

"Na maté! Na maté! Death! Death! Run! Run!"

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And they did run, very fast too, but we gained a little upon them at last, and Toroa came up with them just in time to fell the hindermost with his club, before he could step into his Three chops of the murderer's tomahawk, and the headless body rolled on the sand at his feet. The head hung by its hair from his hand, which he raised, crying out to us as we came up :

canoe.

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'Behold the first-fruits of Béuko !"

And the baptism of his new canoe was complete.

This affair led to a great coolness, or as we should rather say warmness, between Malagai and Salatambu, who, having heard of the murder, paddled out to meet us on our way back. He swore that unless a certain sum of money were promised to be paid within a given time, "One of this party," and he pointed us out with his spear, "shall die in exchange for my Surakanas. I told you to make no mistakes."

We explained that, as is so often the case, it was nobody's fault but that the gods had brought it about. Malagai swore by his Forbidden Food that he had not given the order, as he had not; and Toroa could say the same; so finally the gods got the blame, and Salatambu the money: for our great men were wise enough to foresee an avenging host of Surakanas sheltered by Salatambu, burning our canoes and sacking our homes; a disaster which the payment of this money prevented. The quarrel was made up when the money was paid, by Malagai and Salatambu plucking and eating areca nuts from the same bunch.

When we got home to Tanasémbé, Talisi, Talana, and others crowded round us to welcome us. They asked us how many fish we had caught.

"The gods gave us none," was our modest answer.

In those days the principal use we made of the faculty of speech was either to deceive a hearer, or conceal a matter, or both.

CHAPTER IX.

AT LAST.

IN the small blank space between the end of the last chapter and the beginning of this one, I sink a whole year and proceed with my story.

It is evening, and you will find me at Rota West, helping Toroa to act as dentist to his dogs; a yelping, howling pack of the most degraded, uncivilised kind of curs you can conceive. Their bodies were very long and low; their legs short and thick; their necks long; their heads large and ugly; and their tails short and stumpy. But their eye-teeth were our "pounds sterling," and made up for all their short (and long) comings.

It was the day their teeth had to be taken out; the day that every dog had with us; and it was done in a thoughtlessly cruel manner: just for want of some one to teach us better. We were no worse than is your little son there, killing flies on the window pane.

Rogani had gone across to Halavo with his hunted father, Roé, who had made up his old mind to go and spend the rest of his days with his two brothers, Vili and Nola, and his niece, Koéndéré; all taking refuge in Halavo from the persecution of the great.

The approach to Toroa's village was adorned with six human heads on stakes, because, poor fellow ! he had no Temple Bar to hang them on. The hair was the only thing left to know them by. Two had the thin rusty tassels of the inshore Lama people; three, the straight band of hair across the top

OUR CLERK OF THE WEATHER.

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of the shaven head, to be seen at Galaga; and the newest one wore the long lank locks of the men of Surakana.

Rota West is perched about on the rising ridge of a high hill, crowned with a mighty banyan tree, on whose serpent-like roots we used to sit and look out over the Eastern sea.

Toroa had been working diligently and silently, except when the suffering dogs provoked him by their cries; until at last he jumped up, exclaiming:

"I am tired of it for to day, the dogs are so stupid, they worry me."

Then throwing aside to Uto his leaf-full of teeth, he told her to bring us something to eat. Meanwhile he and I and Haharo, the wizard, retired to our root, and enjoyed a smoke and a chew of betel in the high cool air and subdued light, which was soon to die out on the sea shore, and creep up to us on its way back to heaven.

Haharo had a mysterious habit of looking every evening and morning, in a dispensating manner, at the sea and clouds, and elements in general, as if taking thought as to what arrangements he should make about the weather for the next twentyfour hours. The constant weight of so grave a responsibility had imparted a very care-worn expression to his large square face.

"Do you see that rainbow upon the clouds above the Lama hills?" asked Toroa of Haharo.

"Yes," replied the seer, in a tone of proprietorship. "And what does it foretell?" inquired Toroa, who was busily boring the fang of a tooth with a pump-drill.

"It is the harbinger of the vaka," replied the wizard. "And is this vaka of yours near at hand?" asked the impatient chief.

"Well, not exactly far," answered the wise man; begging, at the same time, a few areca nuts and betel leaves, as if he were determined not to divine for nothing.

"I must get my sambeeree ready," said Toroa. fond the white men are of trade !"

"How

"And how fond am I of their water-bottles," cried Haharo. "Ten cocoanuts for one water-bottle," said I, anticipating the market price.

“I am dying to see my friend Matey again," murmured Haharo, between the puffs of a contemplative pipe.

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"Your friend for ever, and not mine!" exclaimed Toroa, letting fall his drill with the shock of an unpleasant recollection; "didn't he rope's-end me,-Matey, with anger in his eyes?" 'And I saw Beesopay come and smile it down," said I. Toroa had been showing great curiosity respecting the material and use of an iron belaying-pin, whose further connection with the vaka was becoming doubtful.

At sundown the trade wind was roaring out of a lurid sky, and Haharo presaged a speedy arrival of the stranger. It was too chilly to sit long up there, so we dispersed.

That night, so big with fate to me and Pombuana, passed away to the thrum of the hurrying breeze in the feathery palm-tops. The early dawn awoke a distant shout, which rolled along the hill-tops from village to village, until it reached our eager ears. It said, "The Vaka-a-a!" No need for an electric telegraph. With beating heart and straining eye, I stood upon the highest height, and thence beheld the object of my burning curiosity. In the cold death of the calm morning, against the low-lying vapours which enshrouded the opposite Lama shores and spread far out to sea, ghostly and grey, stood the winged visitor, as if she had just alighted from the clouds.

Seizing whatever articles of trade we could lay hands upon, we skipped down to Siolo Bay, ready to launch and paddle after the vessel, as she passed by to the highly-favoured Uri folks, where there was a better lee. The whole face of the island was like a stirred ants' nest. Everybody was in wild

good humour, laughing, jesting, crowing, talking eagerly to friends, and running and capering about with joy and excite

ment.

Haharo was busy saying his prayers and sacrificing, and piling up great thunder-clouds in the north-west to dam up the current of the winds; for we had no idea then that man had lost his power over nature, but believed that every weather change was brought about by man. Haharo succeeded in making a calm; or, at all events, a calm succeeded Haharo's enchantments.

The sun leaped up, and it was day. The vaka lay motionless upon the pool-like sea. We could not wait any longer, but dashed madly off. As we got near the floating monster, a breeze sprang up, and she moved quickly through the water. This, we said, was the work of their gods. But Haharo was not to be so easily overcome. We whisked and splashed along

a little astern of her, calling out:

"Sambeeree! Sambeeree! Trade! trade! Cappytaney! Beesopay! Stop the vaka! stop the vaka! Sambee-ree-e-e!"

Only a railway whistle could imitate the queer, shrill twist with which the yell wound up.

White faces leaned over the bulwarks, laughing at our vigorous but vain attempts to catch hold of the slippery sides; for a squall, in spite of Haharo, came down and made sport of us altogether. I was in a small canoe with Diara and another fellow of our village, sorry, indeed, that poor Rogani, who was with his father, was missing all this fun. Our cargo was a mixed one. It consisted of a huge conch-shell, a parcel of clubs and spears, some green cocoanuts, stone adzes, a parrot, a 'possum, a tame cockatoo, and an infant alligator.

Canoes of all sizes and shapes wore shooting out from every creek, and being launched from every beach; for in those days we had no fear of the white man. Some of these canoes were dotted with thirty or forty heads, forested with spears, glit