e people here call Pitcairn
Islands.

"Four years passed by. My husband was making money fast, not only as
a trader among the Paumotus and the Society Islands, where he had two
small vessels constantly employed, but from his whale fishery. Then came
a time of sorrow and misfortune. A South Seaman, named the _Stirling
Castle_, touched here for provisions, and introduced small-pox, and
every one of my poor children contracted the disease and died; many
hundreds of the natives perished as well. My husband at this time was
away in one of his vessels at Fakarava Lagoon in the Paumotu Group,
and I spent a very lonely and unhappy seven months before he returned.
Almost every morning, accompanied by one or two of my native women
servants, I would ascend that rugged peak about two miles from here,
from where we had a complete view of the horizon all round the island,
and watch for a sail. Twice my heart gladdened, only to be disappointed
again, for the ships on both occasions were Nantucket whalers. And then,
as the months went by, I began to imagine that something dreadful
had happened to my husband and his ship among the wild people of the
Paumotus, for when he sailed he did not expect to be away more than
three months.

"At last, however, when I was quite worn out and ill with anxiety, he
returned. I was asleep when he arrived, for it was late at night, and
his vessel had not entered the harbour, though he had come ashore in a
boat. He awakened me very gently, and then, before I could speak to him
and tell him of our loss, he said--

"'Don't tell me, Molly. I have heard it all just now. But, there, I'm
home again, dear; and I shall never stay away so long again, now that
our children have been taken and you and I are alone.'

"After another year had passed, and when I was well and strong again,
the whaleship _Chalice_ of Sag Harbour, Captain Freeman, touched
here, and the master came on shore. He was an old acquaintance of my
husband's, and told us that he had come ashore purposely to warn us of
a piratical vessel which had made her appearance in these seas a few
months before, and had seized two or three English and American ships,
and murdered every living soul of their crews. She hailed from Coquimbo,
and her captain was said to be a Frenchman, whilst her crew was composed
of the worst ruffians to be found on the coast of South America--men
whose presence on shore would not be tolerated even by the authorities
at any