of color and curve and adornment that makes them exclusively the
Middle Kingdom's own; but here he had been content to have a simple,
whitewashed church which might be a meeting-house or school. It
was set in the center of a great garden in which mango and cocoa
and breadfruit abounded. We were struck by the superb breadth and
immense height of a breadfruit-tree the shadows of which fell over
a small brick pagoda. This tree was a hundred feet tall, and the
always glorious leaves, as large as aprons, indented and a glossy,
dark green, made it a temple in itself worthier of the ministrations
of priests than the ugly brick or frame structure of our cities. The
Druids in their groves were nearer to the real God than the pursy
bishop in the steam-heated cathedral.

A native woman, aged and bent, said "Ia ora na!" to us, and we
replied. With my few words of Tahitian I gained from her that the
joss-house was open. We entered it, and found no one there. The
center was wide to the sky, that the rain might fall and the stars
shine within it. The altars were brilliant with memorial tablets,
the green, red, and gold flower vases, and sandalwood taper-holders,
so familiar to me, and all about were the written prayers of devotees,
soliciting the favor of Heaven, asking success in business, or the
averting of illness. They were evidently painted by the bonze of the
fane, for his slab of India ink was on a table nearby, as also the
brushes for the ideographs.

Sons expressed their filial duties in glittering excerpts from
Confucius, carved and gilded on expansive boards, and the incense
of the poor arose from the humble punksticks stuck in dishes of sand
upon the floor.