For that of convict, first of all, by a good substantial felony, such as in all lands casts the perpetrator in chains and dungeons.  Taniera was a man of birth—­the chief a while ago, as he loved to tell, of a district in Anaa of 800 souls.  In an evil hour it occurred to the authorities in Papeete to charge the chiefs with the collection of the taxes.  It is a question if much were collected; it is certain that nothing was handed on; and Taniera, who had distinguished himself by a visit to Papeete and some high living in restaurants, was chosen for the scapegoat.  The reader must understand that not Taniera but the authorities in Papeete were first in fault.  The charge imposed was disproportioned.  I have not yet heard of any Polynesian capable of such a burden; honest and upright Hawaiians—­one in particular, who was admired even by the whites as an inflexible magistrate—­have stumbled in the narrow path of the trustee.  And Taniera, when the pinch came, scorned to denounce accomplices; others had shared the spoil, he bore the penalty alone.  He was condemned in five years.  The period, when I had the pleasure of his friendship, was not yet expired; he still drew prison rations, the sole and not unwelcome reminder of his chains, and, I believe, looked forward to the date of his enfranchisement with mere alarm.  For he had no sense of shame in the position; complained of nothing but the defective table of his place of exile; regretted nothing but the fowls and eggs and fish of his own more favoured island.  And as for his parishioners, they did not think one hair the less of him.  A schoolboy, mulcted in ten thousand lines of Greek and dwelling sequestered in the dormitories, enjoys unabated consideration from his fellows.  So with Taniera:  a marked man, not a dishonoured; having fallen under the lash of the unthinkable gods; a Job, perhaps, or say a Taniera in the den of lions.  Songs are likely made and sung about this saintly Robin Hood.  On the other hand, he was even highly qualified for his office in the Church; being by nature a grave, considerate, and kindly man; his face rugged and serious, his smile bright; the master of several trades, a builder both of boats and houses; endowed with a fine pulpit voice; endowed besides with such a gift of eloquence that at the grave of the late chief of Fakarava he set all the assistants weeping.  I never met a man of a mind more ecclesiastical; he loved to dispute and to inform himself of doctrine and the history of sects; and when I showed him the cuts in a volume of Chambers’s Encyclopaedia—­except for one of an ape—­reserved his whole enthusiasm for cardinals’ hats, censers, candlesticks, and cathedrals.  Methought when he looked upon the cardinal’s hat a voice said low in his ear:  ’Your foot is on the ladder.’