Chapter III

Description of Tahiti--A volcanic rock and coral reef--Beauty of
the Scenery--Papeete the center of the South Seas--Appearance of
the Tahitians.

Tahiti was a molten rock, fused in a subterranean furnace, and cast in
some frightful throe of the cooling sphere, high up above the surface
of the sea, the seething mass forming into mountains and valleys, the
valleys hemmed in except at their mouths by lofty barriers that stretch
from thundering central ridges to the slanting shelf of alluvial
soil which extends to the sand of the beach. It is a mass of volcanic
matter to which the air, the rain, and the passage of a million years
have given an all-covering verdure except upon the loftiest peaks,
have cut into strangely shaped cliffs, sloping hills, spacious vales,
and shadowy glens and dingles, and have poured down the rich detritus
and humus to cover the coral beaches and afford sustenance for man
and beast. About the island countless trillions of tiny animals have
reared the shimmering reef which bears the brunt of the breaking
seas, and spares their impact upon the precious land. These minute
beings in the unfathomable scheme of the Will had worked and perished
for unguessed ages to leave behind this monument of their existence,
their charnel-house. Man had often told himself that a god had inspired
them thus to build havens for his vessels and abodes of marine life
where man might kill lesser beings for his food and sport.

Always, in the approach to the island in steamship, schooner, or