a Taking the remaining billies with us, I went off into the bush with him, looking wonderingly about me for the good fella place." The trees got thicker and the tangle underfoot denser. We were quite off any track, when after about 200 yards Uili stopped, and pointed to an old tree of considerable girth, with large buttressed roots on all sides of it. Just above these, at about four feet from the ground, large excrescent woody growth, as big as the trunk itself, projected out from its side. It was five or six feet high, ending in an abrupt flat top. It was just like a pulpit built out from the pillar of a church. The outside of it was sufficiently twiggy and nobbly to permit one to scramble up it with bare feet. Uili did so, I passed the billies up to him, he dipped them into the pulpit, and brought each one up filled with clear rain-water. It was perfectly clean and drinkable, and, in fact, made excellent tea. By the time I had got back from the tree-tank the fire was going, and the first two billies were nearly boiling. As Uili and I appeared by one track, one of our carriers appeared by a second, bearing by the wings two unlucky "kokoráko " -a nice pair of fowls, which he had managed to catch in the bush. Evening was coming on, and, all forgetful of human ways, these descendants of the tame hens of the now disappeared village had climbed on to their nightly perch, but scarcely had gone off into their beauty sleep before the stealthy "black hand" was on them, and they were caught away into another sphere of usefulness-the white man's potmess. My sharp hunting-knife -an absolutely essential comrade of the bush for those who tramp the islands-was requisitioned from its sheath at my waist for the necessary assassination, and by the time we were all really hungry, behold! tenderly cooked, and laid out on large leaves, fowls, sweet potatoes, pawpaws (green ones, cooked like a vegetable marrow), and bananas. The bush and the neighbouring garden had supplied us with all these things, as well as with water. It certainly was good fella place." The ship's biscuit and pickles and "Fanny Adams" (or preserved mutton) brought from the ship went to our hugely pleased carriers as a great and signal novelty, a feast indeed. Night had suddenly fallen, and I have never discovered at what moment of this "kaikai b'long white man" our carriers melted away into the surrounding woods; but when my party of bluejackets and I had reached the stage of tobacco, and the fire was dying down, we realised 66 that the night, blacker even than the Melanesians, had swallowed them up. Ground-sheets were amongst our equipment, a clear and flat place of soft grass by the side of the widest of the bush-tracks had been marked out beforehand for our bedroom, there was no symptom of rain, and we laid out our tired bodies to sleep in a row under the warm shelter of the green ceiling overhead. In the middle of the night a little sound of cautiously approaching feet awoke me, and equally cautiously I opened my eyes. The moon had risen since we lay down, and a dim white twilight glowed in the alley-way between the trees by the side of which we were lying. The men were all fast asleep. I looked down the path, and there beheld an advancing procession of wild pigs, pale and indistinct in the semi - darkness, evidently heading for the banana garden, the entrance to which was scarcely thirty yards from us. There may have been as many as twenty of them, great and small. They were disposed down the path like a fleet in single column of line ahead, and were led by a horrid-looking boar - flagship, humpbacked, heavily bristled and tusked. He seemed to be suspicious of something. Evidently the smell of the place was not all it should have been, and at each cautious pig-length of safe advance he uttered a small sotto voce grunt of encouragement to his following harem and nursery. Still the men slept, and I remained as one dead, enjoying my front and exclusive view of the passing squadron, which now had come into a streak of real moonlight through some rift in the branches overhead, and, like an enemy submarine, waiting the moment to fire my torpedo. Presently it came. The flagship, having arrived at the strong and high bamboo fence blocking the entrance to the garden, made a signal to the ships astern: "Stop engines - disregard admiral's motions," and therewith made a heavy butting jump at the stockade, the top of which he could only just reach with his trotter-tips. No result. Then a second, but still the barrier stood firm. With that, and with an angry grunt, he turned to the right, and made an attack with his ugly jaws and teeth at the stout hibiscus stakes forming the fence at that side. These had become firmly rooted in the ground, and so far were quite secure ; but the boar's sharp teeth and tusks were still able to rend effectively the stringy and pithy uprights of the fence, and some beginning was being made towards a complete breach of the woody wall. At this juncture I fired my shot. I jumped up, clapped my hands, and said "Shoo" (but oh, how I longed for a gun !) It was enough. With one immense concentrated grunt, squeal, almost howl of dismay and surprise, the pig fleet turned, each unit in its own length, and was off at about forty-five knots back along the bush-track, butting fringe of pandanus - trees, or and struggling and hustling each other as they fled, the admiral boar, in his haste to get to the head of the retreat, plunging regardlessly over the heads and bodies of his family. It was a most entertaining sight; but if the pigs had been startled, what shall be said of the four fast-sleeping bluejackets? It was not possible to arouse them beforehand without spoiling all the fun, and consequently they were as unconscious of what was about to happen as were the pigs themselves. They leapt to their feet in the midst of the tumult, half awake, imagining that a general massacre by savages from the bush was about to take place. They were just in time to see the last of the hurrying skurry of the departing squadron, and to join with me in applause of the smart carrying out of the pell-mell evolution. With the dawn next morning Uili and his companions returned. When the sun arose out of the sea to the east, as silently and from as hidden a chamber arose the natives out of the thick bush to the westward, and rejoined our party. I then discovered from Uili that we were encamped not far from the coast of the island. "Saal-water he shtop, close up," he said. The fact had not been disclosed the night before, presumably because it was to the natives so obvious. Three or four hundred yards of bushtrack led to the coral-fronted edge of the sea. There was a 66 screw pines" as they are often called. They look like pine-apple plants grown up into a tree twelve feet high, having its long sharp leaves growing spirally out from the stems in the manner of a screw, with pine-apples (apparently) hanging from the ends. These are tempting enough in appearance, and you wonder why the natives allow them to remain in such numbers, until you try one yourself, and find that they are shams, and consist within of a dry woody fibre, quite uneatable. They are one of the greatest frauds in the islands. It was pleasant to taste the fresh ocean breeze, unspoilt by blowing through damp trees; but the coast was unencouraging as a place on which to spend two entire days, as we were about to do. From where we stood it bent round to right and left in flat uninteresting points of rough coral strand, fronted by wide terraces of grey, dead, coral rock, descending about 100 yards to the low-water line in shallow steps, the lower flights holding large flat pools of tidal water, a few inches deep in most parts, but with deeper holes and pockets. I went down the coral terraces to the lowest of them, where the surf was sucking and surging in the crevices of the rock, and as I went by I saw that several of the pools held fish of quite eatable size, left behind by the tide, which was now at its lowest point. I halloed to the men, who were getting together dry beach firewood for cooking breakfast, to bring sticks and baskets, and it was not long before we had scooped out a dozen nice-looking halfpounders after an exciting but decidedly drenching fish-hunt. Wrapped in banana leaves and put instantly to broil on the wood fire, they made a breakfast on which a man might lean comfortably till dinnertime, and put in a long tramp over a rough coast-line meanwhile. That was our work for the day, interspersed with the erection of survey marks at intervals of a mile or so. These consisted of large tripods cut from the adjoining bush, and cairns, and flagstaffs adorned with large white-and-red calico flags. Over all the stones and woodwork was laid a thick coating of whitewash, so that each mark might show up clearly from seaward against the dark-green background of the bush, with which the whole coast was backed. Thus for this day and for most of the next we worked southward and westward around the desolate and unpeopled coast, until on the afternoon of the third day it was time to strike inland, and to cut across the base of a certain headland to reach the bay on the other side of it, where the ship was to be at anchor and where we were to be picked up. We were rather later than we wanted to be in reaching this turning-point, which was at about four miles from the appointed rendezvous. Our burdens of lime, calico, and spun yarn had by this time all disappeared in the making of the marks, and the provisions also were nearly run out. Keeping Uili as a guide, I paid off the carriers-in fact, I have no doubt I overpaid them off, and in order still further to lessen our loads, I spoiled altogether the labour market by giving the men the remaining ship's biscuit and preserved "bullamacow sheepy." After our two tiring days of tramping I wished to travel the last lap as lightly as possible, with only the instruments and books on our backs, especially as Uili said that it would be a rough untravelled track over which we would have to go. "Bad fella road shtop, too much, no man he go b'long him." It was indeed, and hilly too. It was far from his own country, and Uili was not very certain of his way. At last at one point, where there was a fork in the path, he stopped and remarked, "Me lose him." It was by this time nearly sunset, and this fortunately is a time at which the natives have their evening meal, for a short exploration down one of the two paths revealed a small twinkle of light from a cooking place, which meant that there would be some one there to set us right. "Wá-o, Wá-o, Wa-o!" called out Uili to announce our presence; for it is a dangerous breach of etiquette in the bush suddenly to appear, strangers, out of an unexpected nowhere without 66 at dead of night, regardless of debbleums," and would creep noiselessly along them until he was outside the huts of the enemy. The walls of a native house are a mere thatching of coconut leaves, and there the old soldier would wait outside until he heard the voices of the unsuspecting inhabitants. Then softly moving round to the point at which the voices were most clearly heard from outside, he would place the muzzle of his musket at that fatal spot, and let rip. By this means many of the enemy were slain. any warning. Disregarded, it accustomed to walk the most might have meant the end of ghost-pervaded of bush-tracks all earthly journeys. Instantly there popped up half a dozen heads and lean naked bodies from the fireplace where kaikai was proceeding, and an ugly pariah dog gave forth several indignant barks; then, smelling the strange and terrifying odour of white man, he retired growling into one of the native huts. It was a tiny bush village on which we had hit, but it contained at least one hero. This was an oldish man, swathed from the waist towards his skinny knees in a short "cal'co," while his body was proudly wrapped (and oh, how abominably hot it must have been !) in a British soldier's red tunic of high antiquity. It had (once) white facings, but all its regimental markings and brass buttons had long since disappeared. On its left breast were the tattered remnants of the ribbons of the Egyptian War medal of 1882, and of the Khedive's Star. It was impossible to discover how he had come by this garment, but there it was. He was a little, thin, white-haired man, with a small pleasant face and bright eyes. Uili seemed to know all about him, for he told me later on that he was a great soldier and a very brave man, and that it was right for him to have such a coat. He had greatly distinguished himself in a war that, years ago, had taken place between his village and another not far distant. It appeared that this venerable hero was I remarked to Uili that this did not seem to be a very brave proceeding. "Oh!" said he, "s'pose man he come out, dis fella man he no run away, him he shtop." Such gallantry deserved to win the war, and, I gathered, actually did so. of The village consisted of not more than four or five huts, surrounding a small irregularly shaped open space. I did not count heads, but there were about twenty inhabitants, of whom more than three-quarters were men. Such excess males over females in these bush villages is not uncommon, and it is the invariable signal of the dying-off of the race: one of Nature's methods of extinction when it has run its appointed course. A long and heated conversation passed between Uili and the Chief of the village, much longer than was at all necessary for direct |