It is bold water at the mouth of the bay; you can steer a ship about
either sentinel, close enough to toss a biscuit on the rocks. Thus
it chanced that, as the tattooed man sat dozing and dreaming, he was
startled into wakefulness and animation by the appearance of a flying
jib beyond the western islet. Two more headsails followed; and before
the tattooed man had scrambled to his feet, a topsail schooner, of some
hundred tons, had luffed about the sentinel and was standing up the bay,
close-hauled.

The sleeping city awakened by enchantment. Natives appeared upon all
sides, hailing each other with the magic cry "Ehippy"--ship; the Queen
stepped forth on her verandah, shading her eyes under a hand that was
a miracle of the fine art of tattooing; the commandant broke from his
domestic convicts and ran into the residency for his glass; the harbour
master, who was also the gaoler, came speeding down the Prison Hill; the
seventeen brown Kanakas and the French boatswain's mate, that make up
the complement of the war-schooner, crowded on the forward deck; and the
various English, Americans, Germans, Poles, Corsicans, and Scots--the
merchants and the clerks of Tai-o-hae--deserted their places of
business, and gathered, according to invariable custom, on the road
before the club.

So quickly did these dozen whites collect, so short are the distances
in Tai-o-hae, that they were already exchanging guesses as to the
nationality and business of the strange vessel, before she had gone
about upon her second board towards the anchorage. A moment after,
English colours were broken out at the main truck.

"I told you she was a Johnny Bull--knew it by her headsails," said an