then we pushed off, and using canoe paddles, made for
the passage through the reef out into the open sea. When the dawn broke,
we were half-way across the straits which divide Savai'i from Upolu,
and only two leagues away we saw the clustering houses of Tufa on the
iron-bound coast. We did not dare to hoist the sail for fear of being
seen, so continued to paddle, keeping well into the middle of the
straits. Only that the current was so fierce, Manaia would have
steered north, and gone round the great island of Savai'i and then made
westward, but the current was setting against the wind, and we should
have all perished had we tried to go the north way.

Presently Manaia turned and looked astern, and there we saw the great
mat sail of my father's double canoe, just rising above the water, and
knew that we were pursued. So we ceased paddling, and hoisted our own
sail, which made us leap along very quickly over the seas, though every
now and then the outrigger would lift itself out of the water, and we
feared that we might capsize. But we knew that Death was behind us, and
so sat still, and no one spoke but in a whisper as we looked astern, and
saw the sail of the great canoe growing higher and higher. It was a very
large canoe and carried a hundred men, and on the raised platform was a
cannon which my father had bought from a whale-ship when it was in his
mind to fight against Tamalefaiga, who was the king of Upolu.

Suddenly Selema cried out that she saw a _taumualua_{*} and a boat with
a sail coming towards us from Tufa, and my heart sank within me, for I
knew that if they saw we were pursued by Pule-o-Vaitafe, they would, out
of respect for him, stop us from escaping. Still there was naught for us
to do but go on, and so we leapt and sprang from sea to sea, and Manaia
bade us be of good heart, as he turned the head of the canoe toward the
land.

* A large native-built boat

"If this _taumualua_ and the boat seek to stay us, I shall run ashore,"
he said, "and we will take to the mountains. It is Manka's boat, for
now I can see the flag from the peak--the flag of America." "And the
_taumualua_ is that of Tamavili of Tufa," said Selema quietly, for she
is a girl of great heart, "and it races with the white man's boat."

I, who was shaking with fear, cannot now well remember all that
followed, after Manaia headed our canoe for the shore, and tried to
escape, but suddenly, it seemed to me, the white man's boat, wit