White's usually solemn eyes were now gleaming with excitement I drew him and the Fiji man aside, and said to the latter quietly:—

"Sam, don't let these people think that these coins are of any more value than the copper bolts. Tell them that for every one hundred pieces they bring on board—no matter what size they may be—I will give them a cupful of fine red beads—full measure. Or, if they do not care for beads, I will give two sticks of tobacco, or a six-inch butcher knife of good, hard steel."

(The three last words made White smile—and whisper to me, "'A good, hard steal' some people would say—but not me".)

"And Sam," I went on, "you shall have an alofa (present) of two hundred dollars if you manage this carefully, and don't let these people think that we particularly care about these pieces of soft white metal. We came to Mayu for oil—understand?"

Sam did understand: and in a few minutes every boy and girl in Guasap were out on the reef picking up the money. That day they brought us over L200 in English and Indian silver, together with about L12 in Dutch coins. (From this latter circumstance White and I concluded that the wrecked vessel was the missing Dutch barque.)

On the following morning the reef at low tide presented an extraordinary spectacle. Every woman, boy and girl from Guasap and the adjacent villages were searching for the coins, and their clamour was terrific. Whilst all this was going on, White, and the mate, and crew were receiving the oil from the shore, putting it into our casks, driving the hoops, and stowing them in the hold, working in such a state of suppressed excitement that we were unable to exchange a word with each other, for as each cask was filled I, on the after-deck, paid for it, shunted off the seller, and took another one in hand.

At four o'clock in the afternoon we ceased work on board and went on shore to "buy money".

The village square was crowded with women and children, every one of whom had money—mostly in English five-shilling pieces. Some of these coins were bent and twisted into the most curious shape, some were imbedded in lumps of coral, and nearly all gave evidence of the terrific fury of the seas which had cast them up upon the reef from a depth of seven fathoms of water. Many were merely round lumps, having been rolled over and over among the sand and coral. These I demurred to accepting on the terms agreed upon for undamaged coins, and the natives cheerfully agreed to my decision.

That day we bought silver coin, damaged and undamaged, to the value of L350, for trade goods worth about L17 or L18.

And for the following two weeks, whilst White and our crew were hammering and coopering away at the oil casks, and stowing them under hatches, I was paying out the trade goods for the oil, and "buying money".

We remained at Mayu for a month, until there was no more money to be found—except a few coins (or rather what had once been coins); and then with a ship full of oil, and with L2,100 worth of money, we left and sailed for Sydney.

White sold the money en bloc to the Sydney mint for L1,850. The oil realised L2,400, and the copper, etc., L250. My share came to over L400—exclusive of four months' wages—making nearly L500. This was the best bit of trading luck that I ever met with.

I must add that even up to 1895 silver coins from the Dutch barque were still being found by the natives of Woodlark Islands.



CHAPTER XXVI ~ MODERN PIRATES

Piracy, as most people are aware, is not yet quite extinct in Chinese and East Indian waters, despite the efforts that have been made to utterly stamp it out. But it is not generally known that along the shores of Dutch New Guinea, on both sides of the great island, there are still vigorous communities of native pirates, who will not hesitate to attack even armed trading vessels. These savages combine the business of head-hunting with piracy, and although they do not possess modern firearms, and their crafts are simply huge canoes, they show the most determined courage, even when attacking a vessel manned by Europeans.

The annual reports of the Governors of Dutch, German and British New Guinea, detailing the murderous doings of these head-hunting pirates, are as interesting reading as the tales of Rajah Brooke and Stamford Raffles, and the practical suppression of piracy in the East Indian Archipelago, but seldom attract more than a few lines of comment in the public press.

In writing of pirates of the present day, I shall not go beyond my own beat of the North and South Pacific, and speak only of events within my own personal knowledge and observation. Before entering into an account of some of the doings of the New Guinea "Tugeri," or head-hunter pirates, I shall tell the story of two notable acts of piracy committed by white men in the South Pacific, less than ten years ago. The English newspapers gave some attention to one case, for the two principal criminals concerned were tried at Brest, and the case was known as the "Rorique tragedy". Much comment was made on the statement that the King of the Belgians went to France, after the prisoners had been sentenced to death (they were Belgian), to personally intercede for them. The French press stigmatised His Majesty's action as a scandal (one journal suggesting that perhaps the pirates were pretty women in men's garb); but no doubt King Leopold is a very tender-hearted man, despite the remarks of unkind English people on the subject of the eccentricities of the Belgian officers in the Congo Free State—such as cutting off the hands of a few thousands of stupid negroes who failed to bring in sufficient rubber. There are even people who openly state that the Sultan of Turkey dislikes Armenians, and has caused some of them to be hurt. But I am getting away from my subject The story of the Roriques, and the tragedy of the Niuroahiti which was the name of the vessel they seized, is one of the many grisly episodes with which the history of the South Seas is so prolific. Briefly it is as follows:—

About the end of 1891 the two brothers arrived at Papeite, the capital of Tahiti, from the Paumotu Group, where, it was subsequently learned, they had been put on shore by the captain of an island trader, who strongly suspected them of plotting with the crew to murder him and seize the ship. Nothing of this incident, however, was known at Tahiti among the white residents with whom they soon ingratiated themselves; they were exceedingly agreeable-mannered men, and the elder brother, who was a remarkably handsome man of about thirty-five, was an excellent linguist, speaking German, French, Italian, English, Dutch, Spanish and Zulu fluently. Although they had with them no property beyond firearms, their bonhomie and the generally accepted belief that they were men of means, made them the recipients of much hospitality and kindness. Eventually the younger man was given a position as a trader on one of the pearl-shell lagoon islands in the Paumotu Group, while the other took the berth of mate in the schooner Niuroahiti, a smart little native-built vessel owned by a Tahitian prince. The schooner was under the command of a half-caste, and her complement consisted, besides the captain, of Mr. William Gibson, the supercargo, Rorique the first mate, a second mate, four Society Island natives, and the cook, a Frenchman named Hippolyte Miret. The Niuroahiti traded between Tahiti and the Paumotus, and when she sailed on her last voyage she was bound to the Island of Kaukura, where the younger Rorique was stationed as trader. She never returned, but it was ascertained that she had called at Kaukura, and then left again with the second brother Rorique as passenger.

Long, long months passed, and the Australian relatives and friends of young Gibson, a cheery, adventurous young fellow, began to think, with the owner of the Niuroakiti, that she had met a fate common enough in the South Sea trade—turned turtle in a squall, and gone to the bottom with all hands.

About this time I was on a trading cruise in the Caroline Islands, and one day we spoke a Fiji schooner. I went on board for a chat with the skipper, and told him of the Niuroakiti affair, of which I had heard a month before.

"By Jove," he exclaimed, "I met a schooner exactly like her about ten days ago. She was going to the W.N.W.—Ponape way—and showed French colours. I bore up to speak her, but she evidently didn't want it, hoisted her squaresail and stood away."

From this I was sure that the vessel was the Niuroakiti, and therefore sent a letter to the Spanish governor at Ponape, relating the affair. It reached him just in time.

The Niuroakiti was then lying in Jakoits harbour in Ponape, and was to sail on the following day for Macao. She was promptly seized, and the brothers Rorique put in irons, and taken on board the Spanish cruiser Le Gaspi for conveyance to Manila Hippolyte Miret, the cook, confessed to the Spanish authorities that the brothers Rorique had shot dead in their sleep the captain, Mr. Gibson, the second mate, and the four native sailors.

The trial was a long one, but the evidence was most damning and convincing, although the brothers passionately declared that Miret's story was a pure invention. Sentence of death was passed, but was afterwards commuted to imprisonment for life, and the Roriques are now in chains in Cayenne.

The second case was of a very dreadful character, and has an additional interest from the fact that out of all the participators—the pirates and their victims—only one was left alive to tell the tale, and he was found in a dying condition on one of the Galapagos Islands, and only lived a few days. The story was told to me by the captain of the brigantine Isaac Revels, of San Francisco, who put into the Galapagos to repair his ship, which had started a butt-end and was leaking seriously. He had just anchored between Narborough and Albemarle Islands when he saw a man sitting on the shore, and waving his hands to the ship. A boat was lowered, and the man brought on board. He was in a ravenous state of hunger, and half-demented; but after he had been carefully attended to he was able to give some account of himself. He was a young Colombian Indian, could speak no English, and only a mongrel, halting kind of Spanish. The Portuguese cook of the Isaac Revels, however, understood him. This was his story:—

He was one of the peons of a wealthy Ecuadorian gentleman, who with another equally rich friend sailed from Guayaquil for the Galapagos Islands (which belong to Ecuador), and the largest of which, Albemarle Island, they had leased from that Government for sheep and cattle-breeding. They took with them a few thousand silver dollars, which the peon saw placed in "an iron box" (safe).

One of the merchants had with him his two young daughters. The vessel was a small brig, and the captain and crew mostly Chilenos. One night, when the brig was half-way across to the Galapagos (600 miles from Ecuador) the peon, who was on deck asleep, was suddenly seized, pitched down into the fo'c'stle, and the scuttle closed. Here he was left alone until dawn, and then ordered on deck, aft. The captain pointed a pistol at his head, and threatened to shoot him dead if he ever spoke of what had happened in the night. The man—although he knew nothing of what had happened—promised to be secret, and was then given fifty dollars, and put in the mate's watch. He saw numerous blood-stains on the after-deck, and soon after was told by one of the hands that all the four passengers had been murdered, and thrown overboard. The captain, mate and four men, it appeared, had first made ready a boat, provisioned, and lowered it They made some noise, which aroused the male passengers, one of whom came on deck to see what was the matter. He was at once seized, but being a very powerful man, made a most determined fight. His friend rushed up from below with a revolver in his hand, and shot two of the assailants dead, and wounded the mate. But they were assailed on all sides—shot at and struck with various weapons, and then thrown overboard to drown. Then the pirates, after a hurried consultation, went below, and forcing open the girls' cabin door, ruthlessly shot them, carried them on deck, and cast them over the side. It had been their intention to have sent all four away in the boat, but the resistance made so enraged them that they murdered them instead.

For some days the pirates kept on a due west course towards the Galapagos. A barrel of spirits was broached, and night and day captain and crew were drunk. When Albemarle Island was sighted, every one except the peon and a boy was more or less intoxicated. A boat had been lowered, and was towing astern—for what purpose the peon did not know. At night it fell a dead calm, and a strong current set the brig dangerously close in shore. The captain ordered some of the hands into her to tow the brig out of danger; they refused, and shots were exchanged, but after a while peace was restored. The peon and the boy were then told to get into the boat, and bale her out, as she was leaky. They did so, and whilst so engaged a sudden squall struck the brig, and the boat's towline either parted, or was purposely cast off.

When the squall cleared, the peon and boy in the drifting boat could see nothing whatever of the brig—she had probably capsized—and the two unfortunate beings soon after daylight found themselves so close to the breakers on Narborough Island that they were unable to pull her clear—she being very heavy. She soon struck, and was rolled over and over, and the Chileno boy drowned. The peon also received internal injuries, but managed to reach the shore.

The people on board the Isaac Revels did all they could for the poor fellow, but he only survived a few days.

In another article in this volume I have told of my fruitless efforts to induce some of the Rook Island cannibals to "recruit" with me. It was on that voyage I first saw a party of New Guinea head-hunting pirates, and I shall never forget the experience.

After leaving Rook Island, we stood over to the coast of German New Guinea, and sailed along it for three hundred miles to the Dutch boundary (longitude 141 east of Greenwich) for we were in hopes of getting a full cargo of native labourers from some of the many islands which stud the coast. No other "labour" ship had ever been so far north, and Morel (the skipper) and I were keenly anxious to find a new ground. We had a fine vessel, with a high freeboard, a well-armed and splendid crew, and had no fear of being cut off by the natives. (I may here mention that I was grievously disappointed, for owing to the lack of a competent interpreter I failed to get a single recruit But in other respects the voyage was a success, for I did some very satisfactory trading business)

After visiting many of the islands, we anchored in what is now named in the German charts Krauel Bay, on the mainland. There were a few scattered villages on the shore, and some of the natives boarded us. They were all well-armed, with their usual weapons, but were very shy, distrustful and nervous.

Early one morning five large canoes appeared in the offing—evidently having come from the Schouten Islands group, about ten miles to the eastward. The moment they were seen by the natives on shore, the villages were abandoned, and the people fled into the bush.

In a most gallant style the five canoes came straight into the bay, and brought-to within a few hundred fathoms of our ship, and the first thing we noticed was a number of decapitated heads hanging over the sides of each craft, as boat-fenders are hung over the gunwale of a boat. This was intended to impress the White Men.

We certainly were impressed, but were yet quite ready to make short work of our visitors if they attempted mischief. Our ship's high freeboard alone would have made it very difficult for them to rush us, and the crew were so well-armed that, although we numbered but twenty-eight, we could have wiped out over five hundred possible assailants with ease had they attempted to board and capture the ship.

Some of the leaders of this party of pirates came on board our vessel, and Morel and I soon established very friendly relations with them. They told us that they had been two months out from their own territory (in Dutch New Guinea) had raided over thirty villages, and taken two hundred and fifteen heads, and were now returning home—well satisfied.

Morel and I went on board one of the great canoes, and were received in a very friendly manner, and shown many heads—some partly dried, some too fresh, and unpleasant-looking.

These head-hunting pirates were not cannibals, and behaved in an extremely decorous manner when they visited our ship. A finer, more stalwart, proud, self-possessed, and dignified lot of savages—if they could be so termed—I had never before seen.

They left Krauel bay two days later, without interfering with the people on shore, and Morel and I shook hands, and rubbed noses with the leading head-hunters, when we said farewell.



CHAPTER XXVII ~ PAUTOE

"Please, good White Man, wilt have me for tavini (servant)?"

Marsh, the trader, and the Reverend Harry Copley, the resident missionary on Motumoe, first looked at the speaker, then at each other, and then laughed hilariously.

A native girl, about thirteen years of age, was standing in the trader's doorway, clad only in a girdle of many-hued dracaena leaves. Her long, glossy black hair fell about her smooth red-brown shoulders like a mantle, and her big, deer-like eyes were filled with an eager expectancy.

"Come hither, Pautoe," said the missionary, speaking to the girl in the bastard Samoan dialect of the island. "And so thou dost want to become servant to Marsi?"

Pautoe's eyes sparkled.

"Aye," she replied, "I would be second tavini to him. No wages do I want, only let him give me my food, and a mat upon which to sleep, and I shall do much work for him—truly, much work."

The missionary drew her to him and patted her shoulder.

"Dost like sardines, Pautoe?"

She clasped her hands over her bosom, and looked at him demurely from underneath her beautiful long-lashed eyes, and then her red lips parted and she showed her even, pearly teeth as she smiled.

"Give her a tin of sardines, and a biscuit or two, Marsh," said the parson, "she's one of my pupils at the Mission House. You remember Bret Harte's story, The Right Eye of the Spanish Commander, and the little Indian maid Paquita? Well, this youngster is my Paquita. She's a most intelligent girl." He paused a moment and then added regretfully: "Unfortunately my wife dislikes her intensely—thinks she's too forward. As a matter of fact a more lovable child never breathed."

Marsh nodded. He was not surprised at Mrs. Copley disliking the child, for she—a thin, sharp-vis-aged and austere lady of forty years of age—was childless, and older than her cheerful, kind-hearted husband by twelve years. The natives bore her no love, and had given her the contemptuous nickname of Le Matua moa e le fua—"the eggless old hen".

Marsh himself told me this story. He and I had been shipmates together in many cruises until he tired of the sea, and, having saved a little money, started business as a trader among the Equatorial Islands—and I lost a good comrade and friend.

"I wish you would take the child, Marsh," said the missionary presently. "She is an orphan, and——"

"I'll take her, of course. She can help Leota, I daresay, and I'll give her a few dollars a month. But why isn't she dressed in the usual flaming style of your other pupils—skirt, blouse, brown paper-soled boots, and a sixpenny poke bonnet with artificial flowers, and otherwise made up as one of the 'brands plucked from the burning' whose photographs glorify the parish magazines in the old country?"

Copley's blue-grey eyes twinkled. "Ah, that's the rub with my wife. Pautoe won't 'put 'em on'. She is not a native of this island, as you can no doubt see. Look at her now—almost straight nose, but Semitic, thin nostrils, long silky hair, small hands and feet. Where do you think she hails from?"

"Somewhere to the eastward—Marquesas Group, perhaps."

"That is my idea, too. Do you know her story?"

"No. Who is she?"

"Ah, that no one knows. Early one morning twelve or thirteen years ago—long before I came here—the natives saw a small topsail-schooner becalmed off the island. Several canoes put off, and the people, as they drew near the vessel, were surprised and alarmed to see a number of armed men on deck, one of whom hailed them, and told them not to come on board, but that one canoe only might come alongside. But the natives hesitated, till the man stooped down and then held up a baby girl about a year old, and said:—

"'If you will take this child on shore and care for it I will give you a case of tobacco, a bag of bullets, two muskets and a keg of powder, some knives, axes and two fifty-pound tins of ship biscuit. The child's mother is dead, and there is no woman on board to care for it.'

"For humanity's sake alone the natives would have taken the infant, and said so, but at the same time they did not refuse the offer of the presents. So one of the canoes went alongside, the babe was passed down, and then the presents. Then the people were told to shove off. A few hours later a breeze sprang up, and the schooner stood away to the westward. That was how the youngster came here."

"I wonder what had occurred?"

"A tragedy of some sort—piracy and murder most likely. One of the natives named Rahili who went out to the vessel, was an ex-sailor, who spoke and could also read and write English well, and he noticed that although the schooner was much weather-worn as if she had been a long while at sea, there was a newly-painted name on her stern—Meta. That in itself was suspicious. I sent an account of the affair to the colonial papers, but nothing was known of any vessel named the Meta. Since then the child had lived first with one family, and then another. As I have said, she is extremely intelligent, but has a curiously independent spirit—'refractory' my wife calls it—and does not associate with the other native girls. One day, not long ago, she got into serious trouble through her temper getting the better of her. Lisa, my native assistant's daughter is, as I daresay you know, a very conceited, domineering young lady, and puts on very grand airs—all these native teachers and their wives and daughters are alike with regard to the 'side' they put on—and my wife has made so much of her that the girl has become a perfect female prig. Well, it seems that Pautoe refused to attend my wife's sewing class (which Lisa bosses) saying that she was going out on the reef to get crayfish. Thereupon Lisa called her a laakau tafea (a log of wood that had drifted on shore) and Pautoe, resenting the insult and the jeers and laughter of the other children, seized Mademoiselle Lisa by the hair, tore her blouse off her and called her 'a fat-faced, pig-eyed monster'."

Marsh laughed. "Description terse, but correct."

"The deacons expelled her from school, and ordered her a whipping, but the chief and I interfered, and stopped it."

The trader nodded approval. "Of course you did, Copley; just what any one who knows you would expect you to do. But although I am quite willing to give the child a home, I can't be a schoolmaster to her."

"Of course not. You are doing more than any other man would do for her."

Twelve months had passed, and Marsh had never had reason to regret his kindness to the orphan. To him she was wonderfully gentle and obedient, and from the very first had acceded to his wish to dress herself in semi-European fashion. The trader's household consisted of himself and his two servants, a Samoan man named Ali (Harry) and his wife, Leota. For some years they had followed his fortunes as a trader in the South Seas, and both were intensely devoted to him. A childless couple, Marsh at first had feared that they would resent the intrusion of Pautoe into his home But he was mistaken; for both Ali and Leota had but one motive for existence, and that was to please him—the now grown man, who eleven years before, when he was a mere youth, had run away from his ship in Samoa, and they had hidden him from pursuit And then when "Tikki" (Dick) Marsh, by his industrious habits, was enabled to begin life as a trader, they had come with him, sharing his good and his bad luck with him, and serving him loyally and devotedly in his wanderings throughout the Isles of the Pacific. So, when Pautoe came they took her to themselves as a matter of duty; then, as they began to know the girl, and saw the intense admiration she had for Marsh, they loved her, and took her deep into their warm hearts. And Pautoe would sometimes tell them that she knew not whom she loved most—"Tikki" or themselves.

Matters, from a business point of view, had not for two years prospered with Marsh on Motumoe. Successive seasons of drought had destroyed the cocoanut crop, and so one day he told Copley, who keenly sympathised with him, that he must leave the island. This was a twelvemonth after Pautoe had come to stay with him.

"I shall miss you very much, Marsh," said the missionary, "miss you more than you can imagine. My monthly visits to you here have been a great solace and pleasure to me. I have often wished that, instead of being thirty miles apart, we were but two or three, so that I could have come and seen you every few days."

Then he added: "Poor little Pautoe will break her heart over your going away".

"But I have no intention of leaving her behind, Copley. I am not so hard pressed that I cannot keep the youngster. I am thinking of putting her to school in Samoa for a few years."

"That is very generous of you, Marsh. I would have much liked to have taken her into my own house, but—my wife, you know."

Two weeks later Marsh left the island in an American whaleship, which was to touch at Samoa There he intended to buy a small cutter, and then proceed to the Western Pacific, where he hoped to better his fortunes by trading throughout the various islands of the wild New Hebrides and Solomon Groups.

During the voyage to Samoa he one day asked Pautoe if she would not like to go to school in Samoa with white and half-caste girls, some of her own age, and others older.

Such an extraordinary change came over the poor child's face that Marsh was astounded. For some seconds she did not speak, but breathed quickly and spasmodically as if she were physically exhausted, then her whole frame trembled violently. Then a sob broke from her.

"Be not angry with me, Tikki,... but I would rather die than stay in Samoa,... away from thee and Ali and Leota. Oh, master——" she ceased speaking and sobbed so unrestrainedly that Marsh was moved. He waited till she had somewhat calmed herself, and then said gravely:—

"'Twill be a great thing for thee, Pautoe, this school. Thou wilt be taught much that is good, and the English lady who has the school will be kind——"

"Nay, nay, Tikki," she cried brokenly, "send me not away, I beseech thee. Let me go with thee, and Ali and Leota, to those new, wild lands. Oh, cast me not away from thee. Where thou goest, let me go."

Marsh smiled. "Thou art another Ruth, little one. In such words did Ruth speak to Naomi when she went to another country. Dost know the story?"

"Aye, I know the story, and I have no fear of wild lands. Only have I fear of seeing no more all those I love if thou dost leave me to die in Samoa."

Again the trader smiled as he bade her dry her tears.

"Thou shalt come with us, little one Now, go tell Leota."

For many months Marsh remained in Apia, unable to find a suitable vessel. Then, not caring to remain in such a noisy and expensive port—he rented a native house at a charmingly situated village called Laulii, about ten miles from Apia, and standing at the head of a tiny bay, almost landlocked by verdant hills. So much was he pleased with the place, that he half formed a resolution to settle there permanently, or at least for a year or two.

Ali and Leota were delighted to learn this, for although they were willing to go anywhere in the world with their beloved "Tikki," they, like all Samoans, were passionately fond of their own beautiful land, with its lofty mountains and forests, and clear running streams.

And Pautoe, too, was intensely happy, for to her Samoa was a dream-land of light and beauty. Never before had she seen mountains, except in pictures shown her by Mr. Copley or Marsh, and never before had she seen a stream of running water. For Motumoe, where she had lived all her young life, was an atoll—low, flat, and sandy, and although densely covered with coco palms, there were but few other trees of any height And now, in Samoa, she was never tired of wandering alone in the deep, silent forest, treading with ecstasy the thick carpet of fallen leaves, gazing upwards at the canopy of branches, and listening with a thrilled delight to the booming notes of the great blue-plumaged, red-breasted pigeons, and the plaintive answering cries of the ring-doves. Then, too, in the forest at the back of the village were ruins of ancient dwellings of stone, build by hands unknown, preserved from decay by a binding net-work of ivy-like creepers and vines, and the haunt and resting-place of the wild boar and his mate, and their savage, quick-footed progeny. And sometimes she would hear the shrill, cackling scream of a wild mountain cock, and see the great, fierce-eyed bird, half-running, half-flying over the leaf-strewn ground. And to her the forest became a deep and holy mystery, to adore and to love.

Quite near to Laulii was another village—Lautonga, in which there lived a young American trader named Lester Meredith—like Marsh, an ex-sailor. He was an extremely reserved, quiet man, but he and Marsh soon became friends, and they exchanged almost daily visits. Meredith, like Marsh, was an unmarried man, and one day the local chief of the district jocularly reproached them.

"Thou, Tikki, art near to two-score years, and yet hast no wife, and thou, Lesta, art one score and five and yet live alone. Why is it so? Ye are both fine, handsome men, and pleasing to the eyes of women."

Marsh laughed. "O Tofia, thou would-be matchmaker! I am no marrying man. Once, indeed, I gave my heart to a woman in mine own country of England, but although she loved me, her people were both rich and proud, and I was poor. So she became wife to another man."

Pautoe, who was listening intently to the men's talk, set her white teeth, and clenched her shapely little hands, and then said slowly:—

"Didst kill the other man, Tikki?"

Marsh and Meredith both laughed, and the former shook his head, and then Tofia turned to Meredith:—

"Lesta, hast never thought of Maliea, the daughter of Tonu? There is no handsomer girl in Samoa, and she is of good family. And she would like to marry thee."

Meredith smiled, and then said jestingly, "Nay, Tofia, I care not for Maliea. I shall wait for Pautoe. Wilt have me, little one?"

The girl looked at him steadily, and then answered gravely:—

"Aye, if Tikki is willing that I should. But yet I will not be separated from him."

"Then you and I will have to become partners, Meredith," said Marsh, his eyes twinkling with amusement.

A few days after this Meredith returned from a visit to Apia.

"Marsh," he said to his friend, "I think it would be a good thing for us both if we really did go into partnership, and put our little capitals together. Are you so disposed?"

"Quite. There is nothing I should like better."

"Good. Well, now I have some news. I have just been looking at a little schooner in Apia harbour. She arrived a few days ago, leaking, and the owner will sell her for $ 1,800. She will suit us very well. I overhauled her, and except that she is old and leaks badly, from having been ashore, she is well worth the money. You and I can easily put her on the beach here, get at the leak, and recopper her at a cost of a few hundred dollars. We can have her ready for sea in three weeks. You, Ali and myself can do all the work ourselves."

Marsh was delighted, and in less than an hour the two men, accompanied by Ali and Tofia, were on the way to Apia, much to the wonder of Leota and Pautoe, who were not then let into the secret—the newly-made partners intending to give them a pleasant surprise.

On boarding the little craft, Marsh was much pleased with her, and during the day the business of transferring the vessel to her new owners was completed at the American Consulate, the money paid over, and the partners put in possession.

The same evening, Ali, a splendid diver, succeeded in finding and partly stopping the main leak, which was on the bilge on the port side, and preparations were made to sail early in the morning for Laulii.

The partners were seated in the little cabin, smoking, and talking over their plans for the future, when the former master and owner of the schooner came on board to see, as he said, "how they were getting on".

He was a good-natured, intelligent old man, and had had a life-long experience in the South Seas. By birth he was a Genoese, but he was intensely proud of being a naturalised British subject, and, from his youth, having sailed under the red ensign of Old England. Marsh and Meredith made him very welcome, and he, being mightily pleased at having sold The Dove (as the schooner was called), and also having dined exceedingly well at the one hotel then in Apia, became very talkative.

"I can tell you, gentlemen, that The Dove, although she is not a new ship, is as strong and sound as if she were only just built. I have had her now for nearly thirteen years, and have made my little fortune by her, and I could kiss her, from the end of her jibboom to the upper rudder gudgeon. But I am an old man now, and want to go back to my own country to die among my people—or else"—and here he twisted his long moustaches and laughed hilariously—"settle down in England, and become a grand man like old General Rosas of South America, and die pious, and have a bishop and a mile-long procession at my funeral."

The partners joined the old sailor in his laugh, and then Marsh said casually, and to make conversation:—

"By-the-way, Captain, where did you buy The Dove?"

"I didn't buy her, my bold breezy lads. And I didn't steal her, as many a ship is stolen in the South Seas. I came by her honestly enough."

"A present?" said Meredith interrogatively.

"Wrong, my lad—neither was she a present" Then the ancient squared his broad shoulders, helped himself to some refreshment (more than was needed for his good) and clapping Marsh on the shoulder, said: "I'll tell you the yarn, my lads—for you are only lads, aren't you? Well, here it is:—

"About twelve or thirteen years ago I was mate of a San Francisco trading brig, the Lola Montez, and one afternoon, when we were running down the east coast of New Caledonia, we sighted a vessel drifting in shore—this very same schooner. The skipper of the brig sent me with a boat's crew to take possession of her—for we could see that no one was on board.

"I boarded her and found that her decks had been swept by a heavy sea—which, I suppose, had carried away every one on board. I overhauled the cabin, but could not find her papers, but her name was on the stern—Meta."

Marsh started, and was about to speak, but the old skipper went on:—

"During the night heavy weather came on, and the Lola Montez and the Meta parted company. The Lola was never heard of again—she was old and as rotten as an over-ripe pear, and I suppose her seams opened, and she went down.

"So I stuck to the Meta brought her to Sydney, and re-named her The Dove. And she's a bully little ship, I can tell you. I think that she was built in the Marquesas Islands, for all her knees and stringers are of ngiia wood (lignum vitae) cut in the Marquesan fashion, and set so closely together that any one would think she was meant for a Greenland whaler. Then there is another thing about her that you will notice, and which makes me feel sure that she was built by a whaleman, and that is the carvings of whales on each end of the windlass barrel, and on every deck stanchion there are the same, although you can hardly see them now—they are so much covered up by yearly coatings of paint for over a dozen years."

Meredith rose suddenly from his seat. "You'll excuse me, but I feel tired, and must turn in." The visitor took the hint, and did not stay. Wishing the partners good luck, he got into his boat, and pushed off for the shore. Then Meredith turned to Marsh, and said quietly:—"Marsh, I know that you can trust Ali, but what of Tofia?"

"He's all right, I think. But what is the matter?" "I'll let you know presently. But first tell Tofia that he had better go on shore to sleep. You and I are going to have a quiet talk, and then do a little overhauling of this cabin."

Wondering what possibly was afoot, Marsh got rid of the friendly chief by asking him to go on shore and buy some fresh provisions, but not to trouble about bringing them off until daylight, as he and his partner were tired, and wanted to turn in.

Leaving Ali on deck to keep watch, the two men went below, and sat down at the cabin table.

"Marsh," began the young American, "I have a mighty queer yarn to tell you—I know that this schooner, once the Meta, and now The Dove, was originally the Juliette, and was built by my father at Nukahiva in the Marquesas. Now, I'll get through the story as quickly as possible, but as I don't want to be interrupted I'll ask Ali not to let any chance visitor come aboard to-night."

He went on deck, and on returning first filled and lit his pipe in his cool, leisurely manner, and resumed his story.

"My father, as I one day told you, was a whaling skipper, and was lost at sea about thirteen years ago—that is all I ever did say about him, I think. He was a hard old man, and there was no love between us, so that is why I have not spoken of him. He used me very roughly, and when my mother died I left him after a stormy scene. That was eighteen or nineteen years ago, and I never saw him again.

"When my poor mother died, he sold his ship and went to the Marquesas Islands, and opened a business there as a trader. He had made a lot of money at sperm whaling; and, I suppose, thought that as I had left him, swearing I never wished to see him again, that he would spend the rest of his days in the South Seas—money grubbing to the last.

"Sometimes I heard of him as being very prosperous. Once, when I was told that he had been badly hurt by a gun accident, I wrote to him and asked if he would care for me to come and stay with him. This I did for the sake of my dead mother. Nearly a year and a half passed before I got an answer—an answer that cut me to the quick:—

"'I want no undutiful son near me. I do well by myself'.

"Several years went by, and then when I was mate of a trading schooner in the Fijis I was handed a letter by the American Consul. It was two years old, and was from my father—a long, long letter, written in such a kindly manner, and with such affectionate expressions that I forgave the old man all the savage and unmerited thrashings he had given me when I sailed with him as a lad.

"In this letter he told me that he wanted to see me again—that made me feel good—and that he had built a schooner which he had named Juliette after my mother, who was a French Canadienne. He described the labour and trouble he had taken over her, the knees and stringers of ngiia wood, and the carvings of sperm whales he had had cut on the windlass butts and stanchions. Then he went on to say that he had been having a lot of trouble with the French naval authorities, who wanted to drive all Englishmen and Americans out of the group, and had made up his mind to leave the Marquesas and settle down again either in Samoa or Tonga, where he hoped I would join him and forget how hardly he had used me in the past.

"The gun accident, he wrote, had rendered him all but blind, and he had engaged a man named Krause, a German, as mate, and to navigate the Juliette to Tonga or Samoa. Krause, he said, was a man he did not like, nor trust; but as he was a good sailor-man and could navigate, he had engaged him, as he could get no one else at Nukahiva.

"With my father were a party of Marquesan natives—a chief and his wife and her infant, and two young men. The schooner's crew were four Dagoes—deserters from some ship. He did not care about taking them, but had no choice.

"Some ten days before the German and the crew came on board, my father secretly took all his money—$8,000 in gold—and, aided by the Marquesan chief, made a secure hiding-place for it by removing the skin in the transoms, and then packing it in oakum and wedging each package in between the timbers. Then he carefully relaid the skin, and repainted the whole. He said, 'If anything happens to me through treachery, no one will ever discover that money, although they will get a couple of thousand of Mexican silver dollars in my chest'.

"Well, the Juliette sailed, and was never again heard of.

"That brings my story to an end, and if this is the Juliette, and the money has not been taken, it is within six feet of us—there," and he pointed calmly to the transoms.

Marsh was greatly excited.

"We shall soon see, Meredith. But first let me say that I am sure that this is your father's missing schooner, and that she is the vessel that thirteen years ago called at Motumoe, and those who sailed her sent Pautoe on shore when she was an infant."

Then he hurriedly related the story as told to him by Mr. Copley.

Meredith nodded. "No doubt the missionary was right and my father's fears were well-founded. I suppose the German and the Dagoes murdered him and the four Marquesans. Krause, of course, would know that my poor father had money on board. And I daresay that the Dagoes spared the child out of piety—their Holy Roman consciences wouldn't let 'em cut the throat of a probably unbaptised child. Now, Marsh, if you'll clear away the cushions and all the other gear from the transoms, I'll get an auger and an axe, and we'll investigate."

Rising from his seat in his usual leisurely manner, he went on deck, and returned in a few minutes with a couple of augers, an axe, two wedges, and a heavy hammer.

Marsh had cleared away the cushions and some boxes of provisions, and was eagerly awaiting him.

Meredith, first of all, took the axe, and, with the back of the head, struck the casing of the transoms.

"It's all right, Marsh. Either the money, or something else is there right enough, I believe. Bore away on your side."

The two augers were quickly biting away through the hard wood of the casing, and in less than two minutes Marsh felt the point of his break through the inner skin, and then enter something soft; then it clogged, and finally stuck. Reversing the auger, he withdrew it, and saw that on the end were some threads of oakum and canvas, which he excitedly showed to his partner, who nodded, and went on boring in an unmoved manner, until the point of his auger penetrated the planking, stuck, and then came a sound of it striking loose metal. The wedges were then driven in between the planking, and one strip prised off, and there before them was the money in small canvas bags, each bag parcelled round with oakum, which was also packed tightly between the skin and timbers, forming a compact mass.

Removing one bag only, Marsh placed it aside, then they replaced the plank, plugged the auger holes, and hid the marks from view by stacking the provision cases along the transoms.

Ali was called below, and told of the discovery. He, of course, was highly delighted, and his eyes gleamed when Meredith unfastened the bag, and poured out a stream of gold coin upon the cabin table.

That night the partners did not sleep. They talked over their plans for the future, and decided to take the schooner to San Francisco, sell her, and buy a larger vessel and a cargo of trade goods. Meredith was to command, and Tahiti in the Society Group was to be their headquarters. Here Marsh (with the faithful Ali and Leota, and, of course, Pautoe) was to buy land and form a trading station, whilst the vessel was to cruise throughout the South Seas, trading for oil, pearl-shell and other island produce.

Soon after daylight the anchor of the Juliette was lifted and she sailed out of Apia harbour, and by noon, Leota and Pautoe were astonished to see the little craft bring-to abreast of Laulii village, and Marsh and Meredith come on shore.

Later on in the day, when the house was free of the kindly, but somewhat intrusive native visitors, the partners told the strange story of the Juliette to Leota and Pautoe, and of their plans for the future.

"Pautoe," said Meredith, "in three years' time will you marry me, and sail with me in the new ship?"

"Aye, that will I, Lesta. Did I not say so before?"



CHAPTER XXVIII ~ THE MAN WHO KNEW EVERYTHING

The Man Who Knew Everything came to Samoa in November, when dark days were on the land, and the nearing Christmas time seemed likely to be as that of the preceding one, when burning villages and the crackle of musketry, and the battle cries of opposing factions, engaged in slaughtering one another, turned the once restful and beautiful Samoa into a hell of evil passions, misery and suffering. For the poor King Malietoa was making a game fight with his scanty and ill-armed troops against the better-armed rebel forces, who were supplied, sub rosa, with all the arms and ammunition they desired by the German commercial agents of Bismarck, who had impressed upon that statesman the necessity of making Samoa the base of German trading enterprise in the South Seas by stirring up rebellion throughout the group to such an extent that Germany, under the plea of humanity, would intervene—buy out the British and American interests, and force the natives to accept a German protectorate.

At this time the white population of Apia numbered about two hundred, of whom one half were Germans—the rest were principally English and Americans. For two years past a very bitter feeling had existed between the staff of the great German trading firm, and the British and American community. The latter had their places of business in Apia, and the suburb of Matautu, the Germans occupied the suburb of Matafele, and although there was a business intercourse between the people of the three nationalities, there was absolutely none of a social character. The British and American traders and residents were supporters of King Malietoa, the Germans backed up the rebel party, and the natives themselves were equally divided into pro-British, and pro-Germans.

At this time—when the Man Who Knew Everything arrived in Samoa from New Zealand—I was living on shore. The vessel in which I was employed as "recruiter" in the Kanaka labour trade was laid up in Apia harbour. Two months previously we had brought a cargo of native labourers from the Gilbert Islands to be indentured to the cotton planters in Samoa, and finding the country in such a disturbed state, with business paralysed, and no further demand for a fresh cargo of Kanaka "recruits," we decided to pay off most of the ship's company, and let the brigantine lie up till the end of the rainy and bad weather season—from the end of November till March, The skipper and a few of the native crew remained on board, but I took up my quarters on shore, at a little Samoan village named Lelepa—two miles from Apia. Here I was the "paying guest" of our boatswain—a stalwart native of the island of Rarotonga. He had sailed with me on several vessels during a period of some years; and on one of our visits to Apia had married a Samoan girl of a good family.

Having much spare time on my hands I occupied it in deep-sea fishing and shooting, and in making boat voyages along the coast, visiting a number of native villages, where I was well-known to the people, who always made me and my boat's crew very welcome—for the Samoans are naturally a most hospitable race, and love visiting and social intercourse. On these excursions Marama (the native boatswain) and some other of the ship's crew sometimes came with me; on other occasions my party would be made up of the two half-caste sons of the American Consul, two or three Samoans and myself.

Towards the end of November there arrived from Auckland (N.Z.) the trading schooner Dauntless. She brought one passenger whose acquaintance I soon made, and whom I will call Marchmont. He was a fine, well-set-up young fellow of about five and twenty years of age, and I was delighted to find that he was a good all-round sportsman—I could never induce any of the white traders or merchants of Apia to join me in any of my many delightful trips. Marchmont was making a tour through the Pacific Islands, partly on business, and partly on pleasure. He was visiting the various groups on behalf of a Liverpool firm, who were buying up land suitable for cotton-growing, and was to spend two months in Samoa.

He and I soon made arrangements for a series of fishing and shooting trips along the south coast of Upolu, where the country was quiet, and as yet undisturbed by the war. But, although Marchmont was a most estimable and companionable man in many respects, he had some serious defects in his character, which, from a sportsman's point of view, were most objectionable, and were soon to bring him into trouble. One was that he was most intensely self-opinionated, and angrily resented being contradicted—even when he knew he was in the wrong; another was his bad temper—whenever he did anything particularly foolish he would not stand a little good-natured "chaff"—he either flew into a violent rage and "said things" or sulked like a boy of ten years of age. Then, too, another regrettable feature about him was the fact that he, being a young man of wealth, had the idea that he should always be deferred to, never argued with upon any subject, and his advice sought upon everything pertaining to sport. These unpromising traits in his character soon got him into hot water, and before he had been a week in Samoa he was nicknamed by both whites and natives "Misi Ulu Poto—masani mea uma,"—"Mr. Wise Head—the Man Who Knows Everything". The term stuck—and Marchmont took it quite seriously, as a well-deserved compliment to his abilities.

My new acquaintance, I must mention, had a most extensive and costly sporting outfit—all of it was certainly good, but much of it quite useless for such places as Samoa and other Polynesian Islands. Of rifles and guns he had about a dozen, with an enormous quantity of ammunition and fittings, bags, water-proofing, tents, fishing-boots, spirit stoves, hatchets in leather covers, hunting knives, etc., etc.; and his fishing gear alone must have run into a tidy sum of money. This latter especially interested me, but there was nothing in it that I would have exchanged for any of my own—that is, few-deep-sea fishing, a sport in which I was always very keen during a past residence of fifteen years in the South Seas. When I showed my gear to Marchmont he criticised it with great cheerfulness and freedom, and somewhat irritated me by frequently ejaculating "Bosh!" when I explained why in fishing at a depth of 100 to 150 fathoms for a certain species of Ruvettus (a nocturnal-feeding fish that attains a weight of over 100 lb.) a heavy wooden hook was always used by the natives in preference to a steel hook of European manufacture. I saw that it was impossible to convince him, so dropped the subject; and showed him other gear of mine—flying-fish tackle, barb-less pearl-shell hooks for bonito, etc., etc He "bosh-ed" nearly everything, and wound up by saying that he wondered why people of sense accepted the dicta of natives in sporting matters generally.

"But I imagine that they do know a little about such things," I observed.

"Bosh!—they pretend to, that's all. Now, I've never yet met a Kanaka who could show me anything, and I've been to Tonga, Fiji and Tahiti."

Early one morning, I sent off my whaleboat with Marama in charge to proceed round the south end of Upolu, and meet Marchmont and me at a village on the lee side of the island named Siumu, which is about eighteen miles distant from, and almost opposite to Apia, across the range that traverses the island. An hour or so later Marchmont and I set out, accompanied by two boys to carry our game bags, provisions, etc. Each of them wore suspended from his neck a large white cowrie shell—the Samoan badge of neutrality—for we had to pass first through King Malietoa's lines, and then through those of the besieging rebel forces.

It was a lovely day, and in half an hour we were in the delightful gloom of the sweet-smelling mountain forest. In passing through King Malietoa's trenches, the local chief of Apia, Se'u Manu, who was in command, requested me to stay and drink kava with him. Politeness required consent, and we were delayed an hour; this made the Man Who Knew Everything very cross and rather rude, and the stalwart chief (afterwards to become famous for his magnanimous conduct to his German foes, when their squadron was destroyed in the great Calliope gale of March, 1889) looked at him with mild surprise, wondering at his discourtesy. However, his temper balanced itself a little while after leaving the lines, when he brought down a brace of fine pigeons with a right and left shot, and a few minutes later knocked over a mountain cock with my Winchester. It was a very clever shot—for the wild cock of Samoa, the descendant of the domestic rooster, is a hard bird to shoot even with a shot gun—and my friend was much elated. He really was a first-class shot with either gun or rifle, though he had had but little experience with the latter.

A few miles farther brought us to the little mountain village of Tagiamamanono. It was occupied by the rebel troops from the Island of Savai'i. Their chiefs were very courteous, and, of course, we were asked to "stay and rest and drink kava". To refuse would have been looked upon as boorish and insulting, so I cheerfully acquiesced, and Marchmont and I were escorted to a large house, where I formally presented him to our hosts as a traveller from "Peretania," whom I was "showing around Samoa". Any man of fine physique attracts the Samoans, and a number of pretty girls who were preparing the kava cast many admiring glances at my friend, and commented audibly on his good looks.

Presently, as we were all smoking and exchanging compliments in the high-flown, stilted Samoan style, there entered the house a strapping young warrior, carrying a wickerwork cage, in which were two of the rare and famous Manu Mea (red-bird) of Samoa—the Didunculus or tooth-billed pigeon. These were the property of the young chief commanding the rebel troops, and had simply been brought into the house as a mark of respect and attention to Marchmont and me. Money cannot always buy these birds, and the rebel chief looked upon them as mascottes. No one but himself, or the young man who was their custodian, dared touch them, for a Samoan chief's property—like his person—is sacred and inviolate from touch except by persons of higher rank than himself. I hurriedly and quietly explained this to Marchmont.

"Bosh! Look here! You tell him that I want to buy those birds, and will give him a sovereign each for them."

"I shall do no such thing. I know what I am talking about, and you don't. Fifty sovereigns would not buy those birds—so don't say anything more on the subject. If you do, you will give offence—and these Samoans are very touchy."

"Bah—that's all bosh, my dear fellow. Any way, I'll give five pounds for the pair," and to my horror, and before I could stay him, he took out five sovereigns, and "skidded" them along the matted floor towards the chief, a particularly irascible young man named Asi (Sandalwood).

"There, my friend, are five good English sovereigns for your birds. I suppose I can trust you to send them to the English Consul at Apia for me. Eh?"

There was a dead silence. Asi spoke English perfectly, but hitherto, out of politeness, had only addressed me in Samoan. His eyes flashed with quick anger at Marchmont, then he looked at me reproachfully, made a sign to the custodian of the birds, and rising proudly to his feet, said to me in Samoan:—

"I will drink kava with you alone, friend. Will you come to my own house," and he motioned me to precede him. Never before had I seen a naturally passionate man exhibit such a sense of dignity and self-restraint under what was, to him, a stupid insult.

I turned to Marchmont: "Look what you have done, confound you for an ass! If you are beginning this way in Samoa you will get yourself into no end of trouble. Have you no sense?"

"I have sense enough to see that you are making a lot of fuss over nothing. Tell the beastly savage that he can keep his wretched birds. I would only have wrung their necks and had them cooked."

The young warrior who held the cage, set it down, and striding up beside the Man Who Knew Everything dealt him an open-handed back-hand blow on the side of the head—a favourite trick of Samoan wrestlers and fighters—and Marchmont went down upon the matted floor with a smash. I thought he was killed—he lay so motionless—and in an instant there flashed across my memory a story told to me by a medical missionary in Samoa, of how one of these terrific back-handed "smacks" dealt by a native had broken a man's neck.

However, in a few minutes, Marchmont recovered, and rose to his feet, spoiling for a fight The natives regarded him with a sullen but assumed indifference, and drew back, looking at me inquiringly. The matter might have ended seriously, but for two things—Marchmont was at heart a gentleman, and in response to my urgent request to him to apologise for the gross affront he had put upon our host—did so frankly by first extending his hand to the man who had knocked him down. And then, as he never did things by halves, he came with me to Asi and said, as he shook hands with him:—

"By Jove, Mr. Asi, that man of yours could knock down a bullock. I never had such a thundering smack in my life."

The chief smiled, then said gravely, in English, that he was sorry that such an unpleasant incident had occurred. Then, after—with its many attendant ceremonies—we had drunk our bowls of kava, and were smoking and chatting, Asi asked Marchmont to let him examine his gun and rifle (Marchmont had a Soper rifle and one of Manton's best make of guns; I had my Winchester and a fairly good gun). The moment Asi saw the Soper rifle his eyes lit up, and he produced another from one of the house beams overhead, and said regretfully that he had no cartridges left, and was using a Snider instead. Marchmont promptly offered to give him fifty.

"You must not do that," I said, "it will get us into serious trouble. Asi"—and I turned to the chief—"will understand why we must not give him cartridges to be used for warfare. It would be a great breach of faith for us to do so—would it not?"

Keenly anxious as he was to obtain possession of the ammunition, the chief, with a sigh of regret, acquiesced, but Marchmont sulked, and for quite two hours after we had left the rebel village did not exchange a word with me.

After getting over the range, and whilst we were descending the slope to the southern littoral, some mongrel curs that belonged to our carriers, and had gone on ahead of us, put up a wild sow with seven suckers, and at once started off in pursuit. The old, razor-backed sow doubled and came flying past us, with her nimble-footed and striped progeny following. Marchmont and I both fired simultaneously—at the sow. I missed her, but my charge of No 3 shot tumbled over one of the piglets, which was at her heels, and Marchmont's Soper bullet took her in the belly, and passed clean through her. But although she went down for a few moments she was up again like a Jack-in-the-box, and with an angry squeal scurried along the thick carpet of dead leaves, and then darted into the buttressed recesses of a great masa'oi (cedar) tree, which was evidently her home, followed by two or three game mongrels.

Dropping his rifle, Marchmont ran to the trees, seized the nearest cur by the tail, and slung it away down the side of the slope, then he kicked the others out of his way, and kneeling down peered into the dark recess formed by two of the buttresses.

"Come out of that," I shouted, "you'll get bitten if you go near her. What are you trying to do? Get out, and give the dogs a chance to turn her out."

"Bosh! Mind your own business. I know what I'm about. She's lying inside, as dead as a brickbat I'll have her out in a jiffy," and then his head and shoulders disappeared—then came a wild, blood-curdling yell of rage and pain, and the Man Who Knew Everything backed out with the infuriated sow's teeth deeply imbedded into both sides of his right hand; his left gripped her by the loose and pendulous skin of her throat. One of the native boys darted to his aid, and with one blow of his hatchet split open the animal's skull.

"Well, of all the born idiots——" I began, when I stopped, for I saw that Marchmont's face was very pale, and that he was suffering excruciating pain. A pig bite is always dangerous and that which he had sustained was a serious one. Fortunately, it was bleeding profusely, and as quickly as possible we procured water, and thoroughly cleansed, and then bound up his hand.

As soon as we got to Siumu I hurried to the house of the one white trader, and was lucky in getting a bottle of that good old-fashioned remedy—Friar's balsam. I poured it into a clean basin, and Marchmont unhesitatingly put in his hand, and let it stay there. The agony was great, and the language that poured from the patient was of an extremely lurid character. But he had wonderful grit, and I had to laugh when he began abusing himself for being such an idiot. He then allowed a native woman to cover the entire hand with a huge poultice, made of the beaten-up pulp of wild oranges—a splendid antiseptic. But it was a week before he could use his hand again, and his temper was something abominable. However, we managed to put in the time very pleasantly by paying a round of visits to the villages along the coast, and were entertained and feasted to our heart's content by the natives. Then followed some days' grand pig hunting and pigeon shooting in the mountains, amidst some of the most lovely tropical scenery in the world. Marchmont killed a grand old tusker, and presented the tusks to the local chief, who in return gave him a very old kava bowl—a valuable article to Samoans. He was, as usual, incredulous when I told him that it was worth L10, and that Theodor Weber, the German Consul General, who was a collector, would be only too glad to get it at that price.

"What, for that thing?"

"Yes, for that thing. Quite apart from its size, its age makes it valuable. I daresay that more than half a century has passed since the tree from which it was made was felled by stone axes, and the bowl cut out from a solid piece." It was fifteen inches high, two feet in diameter, and the four legs and exterior were black with age, whilst the interior, from constant use of kava, was coated with a bright yellow enamel. The labour of cutting out such a vessel with such implements—it being, legs and bowl, in one piece—must have taken long months. Then came the filing down with strips of shark skin, which had first been softened, and then allowed to dry and contract over pieces of wood, round and flat; then the final polishing with the rough underside of wild fig-leaves, and then its final presentation, with such ceremony, to the chief who had ordered it to be made.

I explained all this to Marchgiont, and he actually believed me and did not say "Bosh!"

"I thought that you made a fearfully long-winded oration on my behalf when the chief gave me the thing," he remarked.

"I did. I can tell you, Marchmont, that I should have felt highly flattered if he had presented it to me. He seems to have taken a violent fancy to you. But, for Heaven's sake, don't think that, because he has been told that you are a rich man, he has any ulterior motive. And don't, I beg of you, offer him money. He has a reason for showing his liking for you."

I knew what that reason was. Suisala, the chief of Siumu, had, from the very first, expressed to me his admiration of Marchmont's stalwart, athletic figure, and his fair complexion, and was anxious to confer on him a very great honour—that of exchanging names. Suisala was of one of the oldest and most chiefly families in Samoa, and was proud of the fact that the French navigator Bougainville had taken especial notice of his grandfather (who was also a Suisala) and who had been presented with a fowling piece and ammunition by the French officer. As I have before mentioned, physical strength and manliness always attract the Samoan mind, and the chief of Siumu had, as I afterwards explained to March-mont, fallen a victim to his "fatal beauty".

One morning, a few days after the presentation of the tanoa (kava-bowl) to the Man Who Knew Everything, a schooner appeared outside the reef and hove-to, there being no harbour at Siumu. She was an American vessel, and had come to buy copra from, and land goods for, the local trader. There was a rather heavy sea running on the reef at the time, and the work of shipping the copra and landing the stores proved so difficult and tedious that I lent my boat and crew to help. Unfortunately Marama was laid up with influenza, so could not take charge of the boat; I also was on the sick list, with a heavy cold. However, my crew were to be trusted, and they made several trips during the morning. Marchmont, after lunch, wanted to board the schooner, and also offered to take charge of the boat and crew for the rest of the day. Knowing that he was not used to surf work, I declined his offer, but told him he could go off on board if he did not mind a wetting. He was quite nettled, and angrily asked me if I thought he could not take a whaleboat through a bit of surf as well as either Marama or myself. I replied frankly that I did not.

He snorted with contempt "Bosh. I've taken boats through surf five times as bad as it is now—a tinker could manage a boat in the little sea that is running now. You fellows are all alike—you think that you and your natives know everything."

"Oh, then, do as you like," I replied angrily, "but if you smash that boat it means a loss of L50, and——"

"Hang your L50! If I hurt your boat, I'll pay for the damage. But don't begin to preach at me."

With great misgivings, I saw the boat start off, manned by eight men, using native paddles, instead of oars, as was customary in surf work. Marchmont, certainly, by good luck, managed to get her over the reef, for I could see that he was quite unused to handling a steer oar. However, my native crew, by watching the sea and taking no heed of the steersman, shot the boat over the reef into deep water beyond. But in getting alongside the schooner he nearly swamped, and I was told began abusing my crew for a set of blockheads. This, of course, made them sulky—to be abused for incompetence by an incompetent stranger, was hard to bear, especially as the men, like all the natives of their islands (Rotumah and Niue), were splendid fellows at boat work.

However, the boat at last cast off, and headed for the shore, and then I saw something that filled me with wrath. As the lug sail was being hoisted, March-mont drew in his steer-oar, and shipped the rudder, and in another minute the boat was bounding over the rolling seas at a great rate towards the white breakers on the reef, but steering so wildly that I foresaw disaster. The crew, in vain, urged Marchmont to ship the steer-oar again, but he told them to mind their own business, and sat there, calm and strong, in his mighty conceit.

On came the boat, and we on shore watched her as she rose stern up to a big comber, then down she sank from view into the trough, broached to, and the next roller fell upon and smothered her, and rolled her over and over into the wild boil of surf on the reef.

The Man Who Knew Everything came off badly, and was brought on shore full of salt water, and unconscious. He had been dashed against the jagged coral, and from his left thigh down to his foot had been terribly lacerated; then as the crew swam to his assistance—for his clothing had caught in the coral, and he was under water and drowning—and brought him to the surface, the despised steer-oar (perhaps out of revenge) came hurtling along on a swirling sea, and the haft of it struck him a fearful blow on the head, nearly fracturing his skull.

Fearing his injuries would prove fatal, I sent a canoe off to the schooner with a message to the captain to come on shore, but the vessel, having finished her business, was off under full sail, and did not see the canoe. Then the trader and I did our best for the poor fellow, who, as soon as he regained consciousness, began to suffer agonies from the poison of the wounds inflicted by the coral. We sent a runner to Apia for a doctor, and early next morning one arrived.

Marchmont was quite a month recovering, and when he was fully convalescent, he kept his opinions to himself, and I think that the lesson he had received did him good. He afterwards told me that he determined to sail the boat in with a rudder purely to annoy me, and was sorry for it.

When he was able to get about again as usual, the devil of restlessness again took possession of him and he was soon in trouble again—through the bursting of a gun. I was away from Apia at the time—at the little island of Manono, buying yams for the ship which was getting ready for sea again—when I received a letter from a friend giving me the Apia gossip, and was not surprised that Marchmont figured therein.

"Your friend Marchmont," so ran the letter, "is around, as usual, and in great form, though he had a narrow squeak of having his head blown off last week through his gun bursting while out pigeon-shooting up by Lano-to lake. It seems that it was raining at the time, and the track down the mountain to the lake was very slippery. He had Johnny Coe the half-caste, and two Samoans with him. Was carrying his gun under his arm and going down the track in his usual careless, cock-a-hoopy style when he tripped over a root of a tree and went down, flat on his face, into the red slippery soil. He picked himself up again quick enough, and began swearing at the top of his voice, when a lot of ducks rose from the lake and came dead on towards him. Without waiting to see if his gun was all right, although it was covered with mud, he pulled the trigger of his right barrel, and it burst; one of the fragments gave him a nasty jagged wound on the chin and the Samoan buck got a lot of small splinters in his face. After the idiot had pulled himself together he examined his gun and found that the left barrel was plugged up with hard red earth. No doubt the other one had also been choked up, for Johnny Coe said that when he fell the muzzle of the gun was rammed some inches into the ground."

When I returned to Apia with a cutter load of yams, I called on Marchmont and found him his old self. He casually mentioned his mishap and cursed the greasy mountain track as the cause. At the same time he told me that he was beginning to like the country and that the natives were "not a bad lot of fellows—if you know how to take 'em".

Then came his final exploit.

There is, in the waters of the Pacific Isles, a species of the trevalli, or rudder fish, which attains an enormous size and weight. It is a good eating fish, like all the trevalli tribe, and much thought of by both Europeans and natives, for, being an exceedingly wary fish, it is not often caught, at least in Samoa. In the Live Islands, where it is more common, it is called La'heu and in Fiji Sanka. One evening Lama, one of the Coe half-caste boys, and I succeeded in hooking and capturing one of these fish, weighing a little over 100 lb. In the morning the Man Who Knew Everything came to look at it, was much interested, and said he would have a try for one himself after lunch.

"No use trying in clear daylight," I said; "after dusk, at night (if not moonlight), or before daybreak is the time."

"Bosh!" was his acidulous comment "I've caught the same fish in New Zealand in broad daylight." I shook my head, knowing that he was wrong. He became angry, and remarked that he had found that all white men who had lived in foreign countries for a few years accepted the rubbishy dictum of natives regarding sporting matters of any kind as infallible. Refusing to show me the tackle he intended using, at two o'clock he hired a native canoe, and paddled off alone into Apia Harbour. Then he began to fish for La'heu, using a mullet as bait. In five minutes he was fast to a good-sized and lusty shark, which promptly upset the canoe, went off with the line and left him to swim. The officer of the deck of the French gunboat Vaudreuil, then lying in the port, sent a boat and picked him up. This annoyed him greatly, as he wanted, like an idiot, to swim on shore—a thing that a native would not always care to do in a shark-infested place like Apia Harbour, especially during the rainy season (as it then was), when the dreaded tanifa sharks come into all bays or ports into which rivers or streams debouch.

That evening, however, Marchmont condescended to look at the tackle I used for La'heu, said it was clumsy, and only fit for sharks, but, on the whole, there were "some good ideas" about it; also that he would have another try that night. I suggested that either one of the Coe lads or Lama should go with him, to which he said "Bosh!" Then, after sunset, I sent some of my boat's-crew to catch flying-fish for bait. They brought a couple of dozen, and I told Marchmont that he should bait with a whole flying-fish, make his line ready for casting, and then throw over some "burley"—half a dozen flying-fish chopped into small pieces. He would not show me the tackle he intended using, so I was quite in the dark as to what manner of gear it was. But I ascertained later on that it was good and strong enough to hold any deep sea fish, and the hook was of the right sort—a six-inch flatted, with curved shank, and swivel mounted on to three feet of fine twisted steel seizing wire. My obstinate friend had a keen eye, even when he was most disparaging in his remarks, and had copied my La'heu tackle most successfully, although he had "bosh-ed" it when I first showed it to him.

Refusing to let any one accompany him, although the local pilot candidly informed him that he was a dunderhead to go fishing alone at night in Apia Harbour, Marchmont started off about 2 A.M. in an ordinary native canoe, meant to hold not more than three persons when in smooth water. It was a calm night, but rainy, and the crew of the French gunboat noticed him fishing near the ship about 2.30. A little while after, the officer of the watch saw a heavy rain squall coming down from the mountain gorges, and good-naturedly called out to the fisherman to either come alongside or paddle ashore, to avoid being swamped. The clever man replied in French, somewhat ungraciously, that he could quite well look after himself. A little after 3 A.M. the squall ceased, and as neither Marchmont nor the canoe was visible, the French sailors concluded that he had taken their officer's advice and gone on shore.

About seven o'clock in the morning, as I was bathing in the little river that runs into Apia Harbour, a native servant girl of the local resident medical missionary came to the bank and called to me, and told me a startling story. My obstinate friend had been picked up at sea, four miles from Apia Harbour, by a taumualua (native-built whaleboat). He was in a state of exhaustion and collapse, and when brought into Apia was more dead than alive, and the doctor was quickly summoned I at once went to see him, but was not admitted to his room, and for three days he had to lie up, suffering from shock—and, I trust, a feeling of humility for being such an obstinate blockhead.

His story was simple enough: During the heavy rain squall his bait was taken by some large and powerful fish (he maintained that it was a La'heu, though most probably it was a shark), and thirty or forty yards of line flew out before he could get the pull of it. When he did, he foolishly made the loose part fast to the canoe seat amidships, and the canoe promptly capsized, and the fore end of the outrigger unshipped. Clinging to the side of the frail craft, he shouted to the gunboat for help, but no one heard in the noise of the wind and heavy rain, and in ten minutes he found himself in the passage between the reefs, and rapidly being towed out to sea. He tried to sever the line by biting it through (he had lost his knife), but only succeeded in losing a tooth. Then, as the canoe was being dragged through the water broadside on, a heavy sea submerged her and the line parted, the shark or whatever it was going off. Never losing his pluck, he tried in the darkness to secure the loose end of the outrigger, but failed, owing to the heavy, lumpy seas. Then for two anxious, miserable hours he clung to the canoe, expecting every moment to find himself minus his legs by the jaws of a shark, and when sighted and picked up by the native boat he was barely conscious.

He learnt a lesson that did him good. He never again went out alone in a canoe at night, and for many days after his recovery he never uttered the word "Bosh!"



CHAPTER XXIX ~ THE PATTERING OF THE MULLET

It is a night of myriad stars, shining from a dome of deepest blue. The lofty, white-barked swamp gums stand silent and ghost-like on the river's bank, and the river itself is almost as silent as it flows to meet the roaring surf on the bar of the rock-bound coast fifteen miles away, where when the south-east wind blows lustily by day and dies away at night the long billows of the blue Pacific roll on unceasingly.

Overhead, far up in the topmost boughs of one of the giant gums some opossums squeal angrily at an intruding native bear, which, like themselves, has climbed to feed upon the young and tender eucalyptus leaves. Below, a prowling dingo steals slowly over the thick carpet of leaves, then sitting on his haunches gazes at the prone figures of two men stretched out upon their blankets at the foot of the great tree. His green, hungry eyes have discerned a pair of saddle-bags and his keen nostrils tell him that therein are salt beef and damper. He sinks gently down upon the yielding leaves and for a minute watches the motionless forms; then he rises and creeps, creeps along. A horse bell tinkles from beyond the scrub and in an instant the wild dog lies flat again. Did he not see one of the men move? No, all is quiet, and once more he creeps forward. Then from beneath the tree there comes a flash and a report and a bullet flies and the night prowler leaps in the air with a snarling yelp and falls writhing in his death agony, as from the sand flats in the river arises the clamour of startled wild fowl and the rush and whirr of a thousand wings. Then silence again, save for the long-drawn wail of a curlew.

One of the men rises, kicks together the dying camp fire and throws on a handful of sticks and leaves. It blazes up and a long spear of light shoots waveringly across the smooth current of the river.

"Get him, Harry?" sleepily asks his companion as he sits up and feels for his pipe.

"Yes—couldn't miss him. He's lying there. Great Scott! Didn't he jump."

"Poor beggar—smelt the tucker, I suppose. Well, better a dead dog than a torn saddle-bag. Hear the horses?"

"Yes, they're all right—feeding outside the timber belt How's the time, Ted?"

"Three o'clock. What a deuce of a row those duck and plover kicked up when you fired! We ought to get a shot or two at them when daylight comes."

"Harry," a big, bearded fellow of six feet, nodded as he lit his pipe.

"Yes, we ought to get all we want up along the blind creeks, and we'll have to shift camp soon. It's going to rain before daybreak, and we might as well stay here over to-morrow and give the horses a spell."

"It's clouding over a bit, but I don't think it means rain."

"I do. Listen," and he held up his hand towards the river.

His companion listened, and a low and curious sound—like rain and yet not like rain—a gentle and incessant pit-a-pat, pit-a-pat, pit-a-pat, then a break for a few seconds, then again, sometimes sounding loud and near, at others faintly and far away.

"Sounds like a thousand people knockin' their finger nails on tables. Why, it must be rainin' somewhere close to on the river."

"No, it's the pattering of mullet, heading up the river—thousands, tens of thousands, aye hundreds of thousands. It is a sure sign of heavy rain. We'll see them presently when they come abreast of us. That queer lip, lap, lip, lap you hear is made by their tails. They sail along with heads well up out of the water—the blacks tell me that they smell the coming rain—then swim on an even keel for perhaps twenty yards or so, and the upper lobe of their tails keeps a constant flapping on the water. You know how clearly you can hear the flip of a single fish's tail in a pond on a quiet night? Well, to-night you'll hear the sound of fifty thousand. Once, when I was prospecting in the Shoalhaven River district I camped with some net fishermen near the Heads. It was a calm, quiet night like this, and something awakened me It sounded like heavy rain falling on big leaves. 'Is it raining, mate?' I said to one of the fishermen. 'No,' he replied, 'but there's a heavy thunderstorm gathering; and that noise you hear is mullet coming up from the Heads, three miles away.' That was the first time I ever saw fish packed so closely together—it was a wonderful sight, and when they began to pass us they stretched in a solid line almost across the river and the noise they made was deafening. But we must hurry up, lad, shift our traps a bit back into the scrub and up with the tent. Then we'll come back and have a look at the fish, and get some for breakfast."

The two hardy prospectors (for such they were) were old and experienced bushmen, and soon had their tent up, and their saddles, blankets and guns and provisions under its shelter, just as the first low muttering of thunder hushed the squealing opossums overhead into silence. But, as it died away, the noise of the myriad mullet sounded nearer and nearer as they swam steadily onward up the river.

Ten minutes passed, and then a heavy thunder-clap shook the mighty trees and echoed and re-echoed among the spurs and gullies of the coastal range twenty miles away; another and another, and from the now leaden sky the rain fell in torrents and continued to pour unceasingly for an hour. Inside the tent the men sat and smoked and waited Then the downfall ceased with a "snap," the sky cleared as if by magic, revealing the stars now paling before the coming dawn, and the cries of birds resounded through the dripping bush.

Picking up a prospecting dish the elder man told his "mate" that it was time to start. Louder than ever now sounded the noise made by the densely packed masses of fish, and as the rays of the rising sun, aided by a gentle air, dispelled the river mist, the younger man gave a gasp of astonishment when they reached the bank and he looked down—from shore to shore the water was agitated and churned into foam showing a broad sheet of flapping fins and tails and silvery scales. So close were the fish to the bank and so overcrowded that hundreds stranded upon the sand.

The big man stepped down, picked up a dozen and put them into the dish; then he and his companion sat on the bank and watched the passage of the thousands till the last of them had rounded a bend of the river and the waters flowed silently once more.