served up on the table of Naungavuli, whose mediocre string of stones
numbered only forty-eight.

The hard-worked, fever-stricken missionaries stuck doggedly to their
task, at times despairing, and looking forward for some special
manifestation, some outburst of Pentecostal fire that would bring a
glorious harvest of souls. But cannibal Fiji had remained obdurate.
The frizzle-headed man-eaters were loath to leave their fleshpots so
long as the harvest of human carcases was plentiful. Sometimes, when
the harvest was too plentiful, they imposed on the missionaries by
letting the word slip out that on such a day there would be a killing
and a barbecue. Promptly the missionaries would buy the lives of the
victims with stick tobacco, fathoms of calico, and quarts of trade
beads. Natheless the chiefs drove a handsome trade in thus disposing
of their surplus live meat. Also, they could always go out and catch
more.

It was at this juncture that John Starhurst proclaimed that he would
carry the Gospel from coast to coast of the Great Land, and that he
would begin by penetrating the mountain fastnesses of the headwaters
of the Rewa River. His words were received with consternation.

The native teachers wept softly. His two fellow missionaries strove to
dissuade him. The King of Rewa warned him that the mountain dwellers
would surely kai-kai him--kai-kai meaning "to eat"--and that he, the
King of Rewa, having become Lotu, would be put to the necessity of
going to war with the mountain dwellers. That he could not conquer
them he was perfectly aware. That they might come down the river and
sack Rewa Village he was likewise perfectly aware. But what was he to
do? If John Starhurst persisted in going out and being eaten, there