As for the old lady, you know her as well as I do.  She’s only the one fault.  If you don’t keep your eye lifting she would give away the roof off the station.  Well, it seems it’s natural in Kanakas.  She’s turned a powerful big woman now, and could throw a London bobby over her shoulder.  But that’s natural in Kanakas too, and there’s no manner of doubt that she’s an A 1 wife.

Mr. Tarleton’s gone home, his trick being over.  He was the best missionary I ever struck, and now, it seems, he’s parsonising down Somerset way.  Well, that’s best for him; he’ll have no Kanakas there to get luny over.

My public-house?  Not a bit of it, nor ever likely.  I’m stuck here, I fancy.  I don’t like to leave the kids, you see:  and — there’s no use talking — they’re better here than what they would be in a white man’s country, though Ben took the eldest up to Auckland, where he’s being schooled with the best.  But what bothers me is the girls.  They’re only half-castes, of course; I know that as well as you do, and there’s nobody thinks less of half-castes than I do; but they’re mine, and about all I’ve got.  I can’t reconcile my mind to their taking up with Kanakas, and I’d like to know where I’m to find the whites?

THE BOTTLE IMP.

Note. — Any student of that very unliterary product, the English drama of the early part of the century, will here recognise the name and the root idea of a piece once rendered popular by the redoubtable O. Smith.  The root idea is there and identical, and yet I hope I have made it a new thing.  And the fact that the tale has been designed and written for a Polynesian audience may lend it some extraneous interest nearer home. — R. L. S.

There was a man of the Island of Hawaii, whom I shall call Keawe; for the truth is, he still lives, and his name must be kept secret; but the place of his birth was not far from Honaunau, where the bones of Keawe the Great lie hidden in a cave.  This man was poor, brave, and active; he could read and write like a schoolmaster; he was a first-rate mariner besides, sailed for some time in the island steamers, and steered a whaleboat on the Hamakua coast.  At length it came in Keawe’s mind to have a sight of the great world and foreign cities, and he shipped on a vessel bound to San Francisco.

This is a fine town, with a fine harbour, and rich people uncountable; and, in particular, there is one hill which is covered with palaces.  Upon this hill Keawe was one day taking a walk with his pocket full of money, viewing the great houses upon either hand with pleasure, “What fine houses these are!” he was thinking, “and how happy must those people be who dwell in them, and take no care for the morrow!” The thought was in his mind when he came abreast of a house that was smaller than some others, but all finished and beautified like a toy; the steps of that house shone like silver,