use were an
English woman and her child.

What pleasure this meeting gave to us and to the trader--for such he
was, those only can know who have sailed these Southern Seas through
long and nerveless tropic days, and have lived, as this man did with his
wife and child, for months never seeing a white face, and ever in danger
of an attack from cannibal tribes, who, when apparently most disposed to
amity, are really planning a massacre. Yet with that instinct of gain
so strong in the Anglo-Saxon, this trader had dared the worst for the
chance of making money quickly and plentifully by the sale of copra
to occasional vessels. The Chinaman had come with the trader from
Queensland, and we were assured was "as good as gold." If colour
counted, he looked it. At this the pro-Mongolian magnanimously forbore
to show any signs of triumph. The Correspondent, on the contrary, turned
to the Chinaman and began chaffing him; he continued it as the others,
save myself, passed on towards the house.

This was the close of the dialogue: "Well, John, how are you getting
on?"

"Welly good," was John's reply; "thirletty dollars a month, and learn
the plan of salvation."

The Correspondent laughed.

"Well, you good Englishman, John? You like British flag? You fight?"

And John, blinking jaundicely, replied: "John allee samee
Linglishman-muchee fightee blimeby--nigger no eatee China boy;" and he
chuckled.

A day and a night we lingered in the little Bay of Vivi, and then we
left it behind; each of us, however, watching till we could see the
house on the hillside and the flag no longer, and one at least wondering
if that secret passage into the hills from the palm-thatched home would
ever be used as the white dwellers fled for their lives.

We had promised that, if we came near Pentecost again on our cruise, we
would spend another idle day in the pretty bay. Two months passed
and then we kept our word. As we rounded the lofty headland the
Correspondent said: "Say, I'm hankering after that baby!" But the
Captain at the moment hoarsely cried: "God's love! but where are the
house and the flag?"

There was no house and there was no flag above the Bay of Vivi.

Ten minutes afterwards we stood beside the flag-staff, and at our feet
lay a moaning, mangled figure. It was the Chinaman, and over his gashed
misery were drawn the folds of the flag that had flown on the staff.
What horror we feared for those who were not to be seen needs no telli