un-Civil War, and as I started on the Southern side, I stayed on
it. I left the navy to go with John Mosby and burn houses. When
the war was over, and I recovered from my wound, I went to 'Frisco
and crossed to Siberia, and thus back to Moscow. No, I never was an
exile in Siberia or in a Russian prison. I knew and worked for the
leaders of the old Nihilists. I was with them till I knew them, and
then I saw they were selfish and fakers. I knew the socialist chiefs
in France and Germany, the fathers of the present movement there. I
was red-hot for the cause until I knew them, and I quit."

He sat meditatively for a few moments.

"I'm all but eighty years old," the raider of the '60's continued
sorrowfully. "I work now for Chinese, preparing their mail, their
custom-house papers, and orders. I scrape along like a watch-dog in a
sausage factory, getting sufficient to eat, but fearful all the time
that the job will kill me. Most of the time I live a few kilometers
from Papeete, toward Fa'a, and come in to town about steamer-time. I
sleep in the chicken-coop or anywhere. I make about forty francs a
month." He stamped upon the grass. "I take it you are a journalist,
and, do you know, what is needed here most is publicity. Graft
permeates the whole scheme. Mind you, there are no secrets. You
could not whisper anything to a cocoanut-tree but that the entire
island would know it to-morrow. But there is no open publicity. Start
a newspaper!"

"In what language?" I demanded, interested.

"Huh? That's it. If in French, only the French would read it; and if
in Tahitian, the French won't touch it; and English is known only