e first time our diplomatic commonplaces. The admiral
would not be answerable for the consequences. Think of it! A devil of a
position for a _de facto_ king. And here, the same afternoon, was Leary
in the Scanlon house, mopping it out for unknown designs by the hands of
an old woman, and proffering strange threats of bloodshed. Scanlon and
his pigs, the admiral and his gun, Leary and his bombardment,--what a
kettle of fish!

I dwell on the effect on Tamasese. Whatever the faults of Becker, he was
not timid; he had already braved so much for Mulinuu that I cannot but
think he might have continued to hold up his head even after the outrage
of the pigs, and that the weakness now shown originated with the king.
Late in the night, Blacklock was wakened to receive a despatch addressed
to Leary. "You have asked that I and my government go away from Mulinuu,
because you pretend a man who lives near Mulinuu and who is under your
protection, has been threatened by my soldiers. As your Excellency has
forbidden the man to accept any satisfaction, and as I do not wish to
make war against the United States, I shall remove my government from
Mulinuu to another place." It was signed by Tamasese, but I think more
heads than his had wagged over the direct and able letter. On the
morning of the 11th, accordingly, Mulinuu the much defended lay desert.
Tamasese and Brandeis had slipped to sea in a schooner; their troops had
followed them in boats; the German sailors and their war-flag had
returned on board the _Adler_; and only the German merchant flag blew
there for Weber's land-claim. Mulinuu, for which Becker had intrigued so
long and so often, for which he had overthrown the municipality, for
which he had abrogated and refused and invented successive schemes of
neutral territory, was now no more to the Germans than a very
unattractive, barren peninsula and a very much disputed land-claim of Mr.
Weber's. It will scarcely be believed that the tale of the Scanlon
outrages was not yet finished. Leary had gained his point, but Scanlon
had lost his compensation. And it was months later, and this time in the
shape of a threat of bombardment in black and white, that Tamasese heard
the last of the absurd affair. Scanlon had both his fun and his money,
and Leary's practical joke was brought to an artistic end.

Becker sought and missed an instant revenge. Mataafa, a devout Catholic,
was in the habit of walking every morning to mas