"Dead!"

"Yes. A few months after he arrived here, that pretty little wife of
his died. He came to me, and asked if I would come and take stock with
him. I said he seemed in a bit of a hurry to start stocktaking before
the poor thing was buried; but anyhow, I went, and we took stock, and
he counted his cash, and asked me to lock the place up if anything
happened to him. Then we had a drink, and he bade me good-day, and said
he was going to sit with Taloi awhile, before they took her away. He
sent the native women out of the bedroom, and the next minute I heard a
shot. He'd done it, right enough. Right through his brain, poor chap. I
can tell you he thought a lot of that girl of his. There's the two
graves, over there by that FETAU tree. Here's his stock-list and bag of
cash and keys. Would you mind giving me that pair of rubber sea-boots
he left?"




A BASKET OF BREAD-FRUIT



It was in Steinberger's time [Colonel Steinberger, who in 1874 succeeded
in forming a government in Samoa]. A trader had come up to Apia in his
boat from the end of Savaii, the largest of the Samoan Group, and was on
his way home again, when the falling tide caused him to stop awhile at
Mulinu'u Point, about two miles from Apia. Here he designed to smoke and
talk, and drink kava at the great camp with some hospitable native
acquaintances, during the rising of the water. Soon he was taking his