of the Arioi
because her husband had adopted the white convention of jealousy and
monogamy. Only Tahitians like Tetuanui now knew anything about the
order, and so many generations had they been taught shame of it that
the very name was unspoken, as that of the mistletoe god was among
the Druids after St. Patrick had accomplished his mission in Ireland.

Chapter XX

Rupert Brooke and I discuss Tahiti--We go to a wedding feast--How the
cloth was spread--What we ate and drank--A Gargantuan feeder--Songs
and dances of passion--The royal feast at Tetuanui's--I leave for
Vairao--Butscher and the Lermontoffs.

At Mataiea weeks passed without incident other than those of the
peaceful, pleasant round of walking, swimming, fishing, thinking,
and refreshing slumber. My mind dismissed the cares of the mainland,
and the interests thrust upon me there--business, convention, the
happenings throughout the world. I achieved to a degree the state in
which body and spirit were pliant instruments for the simple needs and
indulgences of my being, and my mind, relieved of the cark of custom
in advanced communities, considered, and clarified as never before,
the values of life. It was as if one who had been confined indoors
for years at a task supervised by critical guardians was moved to
a beautiful garden with only laughing children for playmates and a
kindly nature alone for contemplation and guide.

Brooke, who was busied an hour or two a day at poems and letters, and
was physically active most of the time, spoke of this with me. There
were few whites in Tahiti outside Papeete except in the suburbs. The
French in the time of Louis le Debonnaire and of all that period
thought nature unbeautiful. The nation has ever been afraid of it, but
let natural thoughts be freely spoken and written, and natural acts be
less censured than elsewhere. Even in late years their conception of
nature has been that of the painter Corot, delicate, tender, and sad;
not free and primitive. They had possessed Tahiti scores of years,
and yet one hardly saw a Frenchman, and never a Frenchwoman, in the
districts. The French seldom ever ventured in the sea or the stream or
to the reef. Other Europeans and Americans found those interesting,
at least, a little. Brooke and I swam every day off the wharf of the
chefferie. The water was four or five fathoms deep, dazzling in the
vibrance of the Southern sun, and Brooke, a brilliant blond, gleamed
in the violet ra