“There can be no doubt of that.  But how is it that you are here?  Were you shipwrecked like ourselves?”

“No; I may say I was deserted.  My name is Charles Irons, and I was left at Poseat by a trading vessel four years ago.”

“How came that?”

“I was to act as the agent of a company of traders on the Cocoanut Islands.  Well, the vessel left me, as I first told you, and that was the last of it.  They forgot all about me, or more likely, did not care to keep their promise, for I have never seen anything of the vessel since.”

“What an outrage!”

“It was, and there couldn’t have been a more wretched person than I was for several months.  I looked longingly out to sea for the ship that never came, and chafed like a man who is bound hand and foot.  But,” added the Englishman with a smile, “there is nothing like making the best of things.  You can accustom yourself almost to anything if you will only make up your mind to do so.  I was among these people and there was no help for it, so I decided to adopt their ways and become one of them.”

“You decided when in Rome to do as the Romans do,” suggested the captain, who, like his companions, was greatly cheered, not only by the presence and friendship of the Englishman, but by the fact that the savages, who watched the interview with interest, showed no disposition to interfere.

“That’s it.  There are a great many worse people in this world than these.  They are not cannibals, as are many of their neighbors, and they have never harmed me.”

“But what about us?” was the anxious inquiry.

The Englishman looked grave.

“I cannot say what their intentions are, but I am afraid they are bad.  They have been used ill by some of the vessels that have stopped here, and are naturally suspicious of all white people.  Then, too, they are revengeful, and like all barbarians are satisfied, if aggrieved against our race, to get their satisfaction out of any member of it, whether he is the one who injured them, or is entirely innocent.”

“You seem to be regarded with high favor here.”

“I am.  I stand next to the chief in authority, so you see I have reason to believe I may be of some service to you.  You may be sure that I shall leave no stone unturned to help you.”

The captain and his companions gave expression to their deep gratitude, and Irons continued in his bluff, pleasant manner: 

“I guess I am about as much a savage as any of them.  If I hadn’t been I never would have obtained any control over them.  I have seven native wives, and find I am forgetting a great many details of civilization, while my desire to return home is growing less every day.  After all, what difference does it make where you are?  A man has only a few years to live, and as long as he is contented, he is a fool to rebel.”

There may have been good philosophy in all this, and the captain did not attempt to gainsay it, but, all the same, it was hard for him to understand how any one could be so placed as to lose his yearning for his home and his native land.