could not of course ask, nor perhaps the
natives answer. Even the second was delicate; yet at last, and under
charming and strange circumstances, I found my opportunity to put it and
a man to reply. It was near the full of the moon, with a delicious
breeze; the isle was bright as day--to sleep would have been sacrilege;
and I walked in the bush, playing my pipe. It must have been the sound
of what I am pleased to call my music that attracted in my direction
another wanderer of the night. This was a young man attired in a fine
mat, and with a garland on his hair, for he was new come from dancing
and singing in the public hall; and his body, his face, and his eyes
were all of an enchanting beauty. Every here and there in the Gilberts
youth are to be found of this absurd perfection; I have seen five of us
pass half an hour in admiration of a boy at Mariki; and Te Kop (my
friend in the fine mat and garland) I had already several times
remarked, and long ago set down as the loveliest animal in Apemama. The
philtre of admiration must be very strong, or these natives specially
susceptible to its effects, for I have scarce ever admired a person in
the islands but what he has sought my particular acquaintance. So it was
with Te Kop. He led me to the ocean side; and for an hour or two we sat
smoking and talking on the resplendent sand and under the ineffable
brightness of the moon. My friend showed himself very sensible of the
beauty and amenity of the hour. "Good night! Good wind!" he kept
exclaiming, and as he said the words he seemed to hug myself. I had long
before invented such reiterated expressions of delight for a character
(Felipe, in the story of "Olalla") intended to be partly bestial. But
there was nothing bestial in Te Kop: only a childish pleasure in the
moment. He was no less pleased with his companion, or was good enough to
say so; honoured me, before he left, by calling me Te Kop; apostrophised
me as "My name!" with an intonation exquisitely tender, laying his hand
at the same time swiftly on my knee; and after we had risen, and our
paths began to separate in the bush, twice cried to me with a sort of
gentle ecstasy, "I like you too much!" From the beginning he had made no
secret of his terror of the king; would not sit down or speak above a
whisper till he had put the whole breadth of the isle between himself
and his monarch, then harmlessly asleep; and even there, even within a
stone-cast of the outer sea, our t