d on
the table, scratched a banana from the basket, threw it to the floor,
and pulled it to his den near the wardrobe. The joists and floor
boards were eaten away by the ants, and in one hole six or seven
inches long this rat had entrance to his den between the floor and
the ceiling of the room below. He had trading proclivities, and in
exchange brought me old and valueless trifles. I once knew a miner
in Arizona who found a rich gold-vein through a rat bringing him a
piece of ore in exchange for a bit of bacon. He traced the rat to his
nest and discovered the source of the ore. The rats had their ancient
enemies to guard against, and the cats of Tahiti, not indigenous,
slept by day and hunted by night. They cavorted through the Annexe
in the smallest hours, and one often wakened to their shrieks and
squeals of combat. The tom-cats had tails longer than their bodies,
the climate, their habits and food developing them extraordinarily.

The roosters grew to a size unequaled, and those in the garden of the
Annexe roused me almost at dawn. Their voices were horrific, and one
that had fathered a quartet of ducks--an angry tourist had killed the
drake because of his quacking--was a vrai Chantecler. When he waked me,
the sun was coming over the hills from Hitiaa, brightened Papenoo and
leaped the summits to Papeete, but it was long before the phantom of
false morning died and the god of day rode his golden chariot to the
sea. The Diadem was gilded first, and down the beach the long light
tremulously disclosed the faint scarlet of the flamboyant-trees,
their full, magnificent color yet to be revealed, and their elegant
contours like those graceful, red-tiled pagodas on the journey to
Canton in far Cathay.

Motu Uta crept from the obscurity of the night, and the battlements
of Moorea were but dim silhouettes. The lagoon between the reef and
the beach was turning from dark blue to azure pink. The miracle of
the advent of the day was never more delicately painted before my eyes.

In my crimson pareu I descended the grand staircase, which had often
echoed to the booted tread of admiral and sailor, of diplomat and
bureaucrat, and outside the building I passed along the lower rear
balcony to the bath. The Annexe, like the Tiare Hotel, made no pretense
to elegance or convenience. The French never demand the latter at home,
and the Tahitian is so much an outdoor man that water-pipes and what
they signify are not of interest to him.