“Interpret then,” said I.

“Shall I, then, be your Flora’s flute, and Hautia’s dragoman?  Held aloft, the Iris signified a message.  These purple-woven Circe flowers mean that some spell is weaving.  That golden, pining jonquil, which you hold, buried in those wormwood leaves, says plainly to you—­ Bitter love in absence.”

Said Media, “Well done, Taji, you have killed a queen.”  “Yet no Queen Hautia have these eyes beheld.”

Said Babbalanja, “The thrice waved oleanders, Yoomy; what meant they?”

“Beware—­beware—­beware.”

“Then that, at least, seems kindly meant,” said Babbalanja; “Taji, beware of Hautia.”

CHAPTER LXXI They Land Upon The Island Of Juam

Crossing the lagoon, our course now lay along the reel to Juam; a name bestowed upon one of the largest islands hereabout; and also, collectively, upon several wooded isles engulfing it, which together were known as the dominions of one monarch.  That monarch was Donjalolo.  Just turned of twenty-five, he was accounted not only the handsomest man in his dominions, but throughout the lagoon.  His comeliness, however, was so feminine, that he was sometimes called “Fonoo,” or the Girl.

Our first view of Juam was imposing.  A dark green pile of cliffs, towering some one hundred toises; at top, presenting a range of steep, gable-pointed projections; as if some Titanic hammer and chisel had shaped the mass.

Sailing nearer, we perceived an extraordinary rolling of the sea; which bursting into the lagoon through an adjoining breach in the reef, surged toward Juam in enormous billows.  At last, dashing against the wall of the cliff; they played there in unceasing fountains.  But under the brow of a beetling crag, the spray came and went unequally.  There, the blue billows seemed swallowed up, and lost.

Right regally was Juam guarded.  For, at this point, the rock was pierced by a cave, into which the great waves chased each other like lions; after a hollow, subterraneous roaring issuing forth with manes disheveled.

Cautiously evading the dangerous currents here ruffling the lagoon, we rounded the wall of cliff; and shot upon a smooth expanse; on one side, hemmed in by the long, verdent, northern shore of Juam; and across the water, sentineled by its tributary islets.

With sonorous Vee-Vee in the shark’s mouth, we swept toward the beach, tumultuous with a throng.

Our canoes were secured.  And surrounded by eager glances, we passed the lower ends of several populous valleys; and crossing a wide, open meadow, gradually ascending, came to a range of light-green bluffs.  Here, we wended our way down a narrow defile, almost cleaving this quarter of the island to its base.  Black crags frowned overhead:  among them the shouts of the Islanders reverberated.  Yet steeper grew the defile, and more overhanging the crags till at last, the keystone of the arch seemed dropped into its place.  We found ourselves in a subterranean tunnel, dimly lighted by a span of white day at the end.