As I got near the top of the hill, for the ground of the wood goes up in this place steep as a ladder, the wind began to sound straight on, and the leaves to toss and switch open and let in the sun.  This suited me better; it was the same noise all the time, and nothing to startle.  Well, I had got to a place where there was an underwood of what they call wild cocoanut — mighty pretty with its scarlet fruit — when there came a sound of singing in the wind that I thought I had never heard the like of.  It was all very fine to tell myself it was the branches; I knew better.  It was all very fine to tell myself it was a bird; I knew never a bird that sang like that.  It rose and swelled, and died away and swelled again; and now I thought it was like someone weeping, only prettier; and now I thought it was like harps; and there was one thing I made sure of, it was a sight too sweet to be wholesome in a place like that.  You may laugh if you like; but I declare I called to mind the six young ladies that came, with their scarlet necklaces, out of the cave at Fanga-anaana, and wondered if they sang like that.  We laugh at the natives and their superstitions; but see how many traders take them up, splendidly educated white men, that have been book-keepers (some of them) and clerks in the old country.  It’s my belief a superstition grows up in a place like the different kind of weeds; and as I stood there and listened to that wailing I twittered in my shoes.

You may call me a coward to be frightened; I thought myself brave enough to go on ahead.  But I went mighty carefully, with my gun cocked, spying all about me like a hunter, fully expecting to see a handsome young woman sitting somewhere in the bush, and fully determined (if I did) to try her with a charge of duck-shot.  And sure enough, I had not gone far when I met with a queer thing.  The wind came on the top of the wood in a strong puff, the leaves in front of me burst open, and I saw for a second something hanging in a tree.  It was gone in a wink, the puff blowing by and the leaves closing.  I tell you the truth:  I had made up my mind to see an AITU; and if the thing had looked like a pig or a woman, it wouldn’t have given me the same turn.  The trouble was that it seemed kind of square, and the idea of a square thing that was alive and sang knocked me sick and silly.  I must have stood quite a while; and I made pretty certain it was right out of the same tree that the singing came.  Then I began to come to myself a bit.

“Well,” says I, “if this is really so, if this is a place where there are square things that sing, I’m gone up anyway.  Let’s have my fun for my money.”

But I thought I might as well take the off chance of a prayer being any good; so I plumped on my knees and prayed out loud; and all the time I was praying the strange sounds came out of the tree, and went up and down, and changed, for all the world like music, only you could see it wasn’t human — there was nothing there that you could whistle.