tifully made, and they were
ignorant of poverty. I never saw a beggar on the island; and Christians,
unhappily, do not share their goods with each other, and with the poor,
so freely as did these benighted heathens. Often have I laboured to make
them understand what our Pauper Question means, but they could not
comprehend me.

"How can a man lack home, and food, and fire?" they would say; "do people
not love each other in your country?"

I explained that we love each other _as Christians_, but this did not
seem to enlighten their benighted minds. On the other hand, it is true
that they settle their population question by strangling or exposing the
majority of their infant daughters.

Rocked on the smooth green swell of the sea, beneath the white rocks, I
was brooding over these and many other matters, when I heard sudden and
violent movements in the deep vegetation on the hillside. The laurel
groves were stirred, and Bill Bludger, with a basket in his hand, bounded
down the slope, and swam for dear life to the boat.

"They're after me," he cried; and at that moment an arrow quivered in the
side of the boat.

I helped William on board as well as I might, under a shower of arrows
from the hill-top, most of which, owing to the distance, were ill
directed and fell short, or went wide.

Into the boat, at last, I got him, and thrusting an oar in his direction,
I said, "Pull for your life," and began rowing. To my horror, the boat
made no way, but kept spinning round. A glance in the bow showed me what
was the matter: _William Bludger was hopelessly intoxicated_! He had got
at the jars of wine in the chief's cellar,--thalamos, they call it,--and
had not taken the precaution of mixing the liquor with water, as the
natives invariably do when they drink. The excitement of running had
sent the alcoholic fumes direct to his brain, and now he lay, a useless
and embarrassing cargo, in the bows. Meanwhile, the shouts of the
natives rang nearer and louder, and I knew that boats would soon be
launched for our capture. I thought of throwing Bludger overboard, and
sculling, but determined not to stain what might be my last moments with
an act of selfishness. I therefore pulled hard for the open sea, but to
no avail. On every side boats crowded round me, and I should probably
have been shot, or speared, but for the old priest, who, erect in the
bows of the largest vessel, kept yelling that we were to be taken alive.

Al