The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1891-10-25
WALLED BY A TABOO.
Continued from PAGE 81

Continued from Pages)
Ii was in the afternoon ere the first
boat was beached, and the long procession
OF chests and crates and sacks began to
struggle through the sandy desert toward
Equator town. The grove of pandaners
was practically thing of the past. Fire
surrounded and smoke rose in the green
underbrush. In wide circuit the axes
were still crashing Those very advant-
ages Tor which the place was chosen, it
mad been the kings first idea to abolish !;
and in the midst of this devastation there
stood already good-sized moniap' and a
small, closed house. A mat was
spread near by for Tembinok'; here
he sat experimenting, in cardinal
red, a, pith helmet on his head, a meer-
schaum pipe in his mouth, a wife stretched
at his back with custody of the matches
and tobacco. Twenty or thirty feet in
front of him the bulk of the workers
squatted on the ground; some OF the bush
here survived, and in this the commons
sat nearly to their shoulders, and pre-
sented only an arc of brown faces, black
heads and attentive eyes fixed on his
majesty. Long pauses reigned, during
which the subjects stared and the king
smoked, Then Tembinok' would raise his
voice and speak shrilly and briefly.
There was never response in words, but
came by way of answer discreet,
obsequious laughter, such laughter as we
hear in schoolrOoms, and, if it were practi-
cli, the sudden uprising and departure
of the squad. Twice they so disappeared
and returned with further elements of the
city, second house and a second moniap'.
Il was singular to spy far off through the
cocoa stems the silent oncomng of the
monlap'; at first it seemed swimming
spontaneously in the air, but on nearer
view betraying under the caves many
score of moving naked legs. In all the af-
fair senile obedience was no less remarka-
BILE than senile elaboration. The gang
had here mustered by the note of deadly
weapon. The man who looked on was the
unquestioned master of their lives; and,
except for civility, they bestirred them
selves like so many American hotel clerks.
The spectator was aware of an unObtrusive
yet invincible inertia, at which the skip
per of a trading dandy might have torn
his hair.
Yet the work was accomplished. By
dusk, when his majesty withdrew, the
town was founded and complete, new
and ruder Amphion having called it from
nothing with three cracks of rifle. And
the next morning the same con urer
Obliged US with further miracle, mystic
rampant fencing US, SO that the path which
ran by our doors became suddenly i'm
passable, the inhabitants who had bust
ness across the isle must fetch wide cir
cult, and we sat in the midst in a trans
parent privacy, seeing, seen, but unap-
proachable, like bees in glass hive. The
outward and visible sign of this glamour
was no more than few ragged cocoa-leaf
garlands round the stems of the outlying
palms. but its significance reposed on the
tremendous sanction Of the taboo and the
guns of Tembinok'.
We made our first meal that night in the
improvised city. where we were to stay
two months, and which--so soon as we
had done with twas to vanish in day
as it appeared, its elements returning
whence they came, the taboo RACED the
traffic on the path resumed, the sun and
the moon peering in vain between the
palm trees for the bygone work, the wind
blowing over an empty site. Yet the place,
which is now only an episode in some
memories, seemed to have been built and
to be destined to endure for years. 1t was
n busy hamlet. One of the moniap's we
made our dining-roOm, one the kitchen.
The houses We reserved for sleeping.
They were on the admirable Ape
mama plan, out and away the best
house in the South Seas, standing some
three feet above the ground on posts: the
sides of woven flaps. which can be raised
TO admit light and air, or lowered to shut
out the wind and the rain; airy, healthy,
clean, and watertlght. We had a hen of
a remarkable kind-almost unique in my
experimenting hen that occasionally
laid eggs. Not far off Mrs. Stevenson
tended a garden of salad and shalotts. The
salad was devoured by the hen-which
was her bane. The shalotts were served
out a leaf at a time and welcomed and
relished like peaches. Teddy and green
cocoanuts were brought us daily. We once
had a present of fish from the king and
once of turtle. Sometimes we shot So
called plover along the shore, sometimes
wild chickens in the bush. The rest of our
diet was from tins.
Our occupations were various-all vary
ing Mr.. Osbourne and hammered away
at a novel; Mr.. Strong would be away
sketching. We read Gibbon and Carlyle
aloud, we blew on ilageolets, we strummed
on guitars, we took photographs by the
light of the sum- the moon and decorating
powder; sometimes employed cards. Pot
hunting engaged n part of our leisure.
| have myself passed afternoons in the
exciting but innOcuous pursuit of winged
animals with a revolver, and it was for
tunate there were better shots of the
party and fortunate the king could lend
us more suitable weapon in the form of
an excellent toYling-pieCe, or our spare
diet would have been sparer still.
Night was the time To see our city, after
the IlOoH WIS up amer the AdIiApS were
lighted and so long as the fire sparkled in
the cook house. We suffered from a
plague of flies and mosquitoes, compare
Bile 10 that of Egypt; our dinner table
(sent, like all our furniture, by the king
must he enclosed IN a tent of netting, our
citadel and refuge; and this became all
luminous, and bulged and beaconed under
the caves. like the globe Of some mon
strous lamp under the margin Of its shade.
glur cabins the sides hpiUp nrOpppi q a
variety OF inciinations, spilled out strange,
angular patterns of brightness. In his
rooted and open kitchen All Foo was TO be
seen by lamp and freight, dabbling among
pots. Over all there fell in the season an
extraordinary splendor of mellow moon
shine. The sand spanked as with the dust
of diamonds: the stars had vanished. At
intervals q dusky night bird, slow and low
flying, passed in the colonnade of the tree
stems and uttered a hoarse, CroakinE cry.
ROBERT Louis STEVENSON.