to whom my superfluity
had proved more useful; but the next morning saw me at the pest-house,
under convoy of the schoolmaster and the policeman.

The doors were again open. A fire was burning and a pot cooking on the
lava, under the supervision of an old woman in a grass-green sacque.
This dame, who seemed more merry than refined, hailed me, seized me, and
tried to seat me in her lap; a jolly and coarse old girl from whom, in
my hour of sentiment, I fled with craven shrinking: to whom, upon a
retrospect, I do more justice. The two lepers (both women) sat in the
midst of their visitors, even the children (to my grief) touching them
freely; the elder chatting at intervals--the girl in the same black weed
and bowed in the same attitude as yesterday. It was painfully plain she
would conceal, if possible, her face. Perhaps she had been beautiful:
certainly, poor soul, she had been vain--a gift of equal value. Some
consultation followed; I was told that nothing was required for outfit,
but a gift in money would be gratefully received; and this (forgetting I
was in the South Seas) I was about to make in silence. The confounded
expression of the schoolmaster reminded me of where I was. We stood up,
accordingly, side by side before the lepers; I made the necessary
speech, which the schoolmaster translated sentence by sentence; the
money (thus hallowed by oratory) was handed over and received; and the
two women each returned a dry "Mahalo," the girl not even then
exhibiting her face.

Between nine and ten of the same morning, the schooner lay-to off
Hookena and a whaleboat came ashore. The village clustered on the rocks
for the farewell: a grief perhaps--a performance certainly. We miss in
our modern life these operatic consolations of the past. The lepers came
singly and unattended; the elder first; the girl a little after, tricked
out in a red dress and with a fine red feather in her hat. In this
bravery, it was the more affecting to see her move apart on the rocks
and crouch in her accustomed attitude. But this time I had seen her
face; it was scarce horribly affected, but had a haunting look of an
unfinished wooden doll, at once expressionless and disproportioned;
doubtless a sore spectacle in the mirror of youth. Next there appeared a
woman of the middle life, of a swaggering gait, a gallant figure, and a
bold, handsome face. She came, swinging her hat, rolling her eyes and
shoulders, visibly working herself up; the crowd