aller noise! Nobody is asleep!"

At two in the morning the gendarmes advised the last revelers to
retire, and the Tiare became quiet. But Atupu slept in a little
alcove by the bar, and any one in her favor had but to enter her
chamber and pull her shapely leg to be served in case of dire need.

The incidents of the departure of the Noa-Noa that day for San
Francisco will live in the annals of Papeete. Its calamitous happenings
are "in the archives." I have the word of the secretary-general of the
Etablissments Francais de l'Oceanie for that, and in the saloons and
coffee-houses they talked loudly of the "bataille entre les cochons
Anglais et les heros les Francais et les Tahitiens."

It was a battle that would have rejoiced the heart of Don Quixote,
and that redoubtable knight had his prototype here in the van of it,
the second in command of the police of Papeete, M. Lontane, the mimic
of the Tiare celebration.

The Noa-Noa's amateur crew of wretched beach-combers, farm laborers,
and impossible firemen, stokers, and stewards, a pitiable set, were
about the waterfront all day, dirty, dressed in hot woolen clothes,
bedraggled and as drunk as their money would allow. The ship was down
to leave at three-thirty o'clock, but it was four when the last bag
of copra was aboard. There were few passengers, and those who booked
here were dismayed at the condition of the passageways, the cabins,
and the decks. The crowd of "scabs," untrained white sailors, and
coal passers was supplemented by Raratonga natives, lounging about
the gangway and sitting on the rails. On the wharf hundreds of people
had gathered as usual to see the liner off. Lovaina was there in a
pink lace dress, seated in her carriage, with Vava at the horse's
head. Prince Hinoe had gathered about him a group of pretty girls,
to whom he was promising a feast in the country. All the tourists,
the loafers, the merchants, and the schooner crews were there, too,
and the iron-roofed shed in which it is forbidden to smoke was filled
with them. The Noa-Noa blew and blew her whistle, but still she
did not go. The lines to the wharf were loosened, the captain was
on the bridge, the last farewells were being called and waved, but
there was delay. Word was spread that some of the crew were missing,
and as at the best the vessel was short-handed, it had to tarry.

At last came three of the missing men. They, too, had welcomed the
New Year, and their gait was as at sea when t