lour.

Having heard only four reports from the muskets, I was led to believe that
they were worked by the islanders in the same manner as the Sultan
Solyman's ponderous artillery at the siege of Byzantium, one of them
taking an hour or two to load and train. At last, no sound whatever
proceeding from the mountains, I concluded that the contest had been
determined one way or the other. Such appeared, indeed, to be the case,
for in a little while a courier arrived at the "Ti," almost breathless
with his exertions, and communicated the news of a great victory having
been achieved by his countrymen: "Happar poo arva!--Happar poo arva!" (the
cowards had fled). Kory-Kory was in ecstasies, and commenced a vehement
harangue, which, so far as I understood it, implied that the result
exactly agreed with his expectations, and which, moreover, was intended to
convince me that it would be a perfectly useless undertaking, even for an
army of fire-eaters, to offer battle to the irresistible heroes of our
valley. In all this I of course acquiesced, and looked forward with no
little interest to the return of the conquerors, whose victory I feared
might not have been purchased without cost to themselves.

But here I was again mistaken; for Mehevi, in conducting his warlike
operations, rather inclined to the Fabian than to the Buonapartean
tactics, husbanding his resources and exposing his troops to no
unnecessary hazards. The total loss of the victors in this obstinately
contested affair was,--in killed, wounded, and missing--one forefinger and
part of a thumb-nail (which the late proprietor brought along with him in
his hand), a severely contused arm, and a considerable effusion of blood
flowing from the thigh of a chief who had received an ugly thrust from a
Happar spear. What the enemy had suffered I could not discover, but I
presume they had succeeded in taking off with them the bodies of their
slain.

Such was the issue of the battle, as far as its results came under my
observation; and as it appeared to be considered an event of prodigious
importance, I reasonably concluded that the wars of the natives were
marked by no very sanguinary traits. I afterwards learned how the skirmish
had originated. A number of the Happars had been discovered prowling for
no good purpose on the Typee side of the mountain; the alarm sounded, and
the invaders, after a protracted resistance, had been chased over the
frontier. But why had not the intrep