te
mists of time, when a tribe set out upon its wanderings from the
home land, one man, perhaps, hesitated, dimly felt the dangers and
uncertainties before it, weighed the advantages of remaining behind,
and did not go. Had he gone, I or any one of Caucasian blood in the
world to-day, might have been a Marquesan.

It would be interesting, I thought, to consider what the hundred
thousand years that have passed since that day have given us of joy,
of wealth of mind and soul and body, of real value in customs and
manners and attitude toward life, compared to what would have been
our portion in the islands of the South Seas before his white cousin
fell upon the Marquesan.

CHAPTER XXXI

Fishing in Hanavave; a deep-sea battle with a shark; Red Chicken
shows how to tie ropes to shark's tails; night-fishing for dolphins,
and the monster sword-fish that overturned the canoe; the native
doctor dresses Red Chicken's wounds and discourses on medicine.

Grelet returned to Oomoa in the whale-boat, but I remained in
Hanavave for the fishing. My presence had stimulated the waning
interest of the few remaining Marquesans, and the handful of young
men and women went with me often to the sea outside the Bay of
Virgins, where we lay in the blazing sunshine having great sport
with spear or hook and line.

We speared a dozen kinds of fish, specially the cuttlefish and
sunfish, the latter more for fun and practice than food. They are
huge masses, these pig-like, tailless clowns among the graceful
families of the ocean, with their small mouths and clumsy-looking
bodies, but they made a fine target at which to launch harpoon or
spear from the dancing bow of a canoe. Keeping one's balance is the
finest art of the Marquesan fisherman, and he will stand firm while
the boat rises and falls, rolls and pitches, his body swaying and
balancing with the nice adjustment that is second nature to him. It
is an art that should be learned in childhood. Many were the
splashes into the salt sea that fell to my lot as I practised it,
one moment standing alert with poised spear in the sunlight, the
next overwhelmed with the green water, and striking out on the
surface again amid the joyous, unridiculing laughter of my merry
companions.

Wearying of the spear, we trolled for swordfish with hook and line,
or used the baitless hook to entice the sportful albicore, or dolphin,
whose curving black bodies splashed the sea about us. A piece of
mother