“This chap here is Erebus,” said my host, and the appropriateness of the name was apparent, for he was certainly the blackest negro I had ever seen, as superbly black as some women are superbly white.

“And this is Samson.  Let’s have a look at your muscles, Samson—­there’s a good boy!”

And, with grins of pleasure, Samson proudly stripped off his thin calico jacket and exposed a torso of terrifying power, but beautiful in its play of muscles as that of a god.

    “But since my name is Hercules, the man
    Who owes me hatred hides it if he can,

“eh, Samson?” was his master’s characteristic comment.

“Yaas, sar!” said Samson, as pleased as a flattered bulldog, and understanding the compliment precisely in the same instinctive fashion.

Leaving Samson and Erebus to continue their savage play with their machetes, we walked on through the palms, which here gave a particularly jungle-like appearance to the scene, from the fact of their being bowed out from their roots, and sweeping upward in great curves.  One involuntarily looked for a man-eating tiger at any moment, standing striped and splendid in one of the openings.

Then suddenly to the right, there came a flash of level green, suggesting lawns, and the outlines of a house, partly covered with brilliant purple flowers—­a marvellous splash of colour.

“Bougainvillea!  Bougainvillea spectabilis—­of course, you know it.  Was there ever such a purple?  Not Solomon in all his glory, et cetera. And here we are at the house of King Alcinoues—­a humble version of it indeed.”

It was evidently quite impossible for my friend to speak otherwise than in images, picturesque scraps from the coloured rag-bag of a mind stored with memories of the classics, all manner of romantic literature, and tags of Greek and Latin which he mouthed with the relish of an epicure.

It was a large rambling stucco house, somewhat decayed looking, and evidently built on the ruins of an older building.  We came upon it at a broad Italian-looking loggia, supported by stone pillars bowered in with vines—­very cool and pleasant—­with mossy slabs for its floor, here and there tropical ferns set out in tubs, some wicker chairs standing about, and a table at one side on which two little barelegged negro girls were busy setting out yellow fruit, and other appurtenances of luncheon, on a dazzling white cloth.

“Has your mistress returned yet, my children?” asked the master.

“No, sar,” said the older girl, with a giggle, twisting and grimacing with embarrassment.

“My daughter,” explained my host, “has gone to the town on an errand.  She will be back at any moment.  Meanwhile, I shall introduce you to a cooling drink of my own manufacture, with a basis of that cocoanut milk which I need not ask you whether you appreciate, recalling the pleasant circumstance of our first acquaintance.”