s day's work does not run
foot-races. Yet in gatherings these people often vied for supremacy
in every sort of sea sport, and beforetime, in bays free of coral,
developed an astonishing skill in surf-riding on boards, in canoes,
and without artificial support. Such skill was ranked on a par with
or perhaps the same as proficiency in the pastimes of war, as did the
Greeks, who addressed Diagoras, after he and his two sons had been
crowned in the arena: "Die, for thou hast nothing short of divinity
to desire." These ambitions had been ended in Tahiti by the frowns
of the missionaries, to whom athletics were a species of diabolical
possession, unworthy souls destined for hell or heaven, with but
a brief span to avert their birthright of damnation in sackcloth
and ashes.

We entered the river regularly at eleven and four, but Choti, T'yonni,
and I also swam in the lagoon at the mouth of the river, and never
suffered bad consequences unless we cut or scraped ourselves on
coral. About noon I prepared my dejeuner a la fourchette, and had a
wide choice of shrimp, eels, fish, taro, chicken, breadfruit, yams,
and all the other fruits. The solicitude of the homesick missionaries
had added to those indigenous, oranges, limes, shaddocks, citrons,
tamarinds, guavas, custard apples, peaches, figs, grapes, pineapples,
watermelons, pumpkins, cucumbers and cabbages. They had grown these
foreign flora many years before they made sprout a single shoot
of Christianity.

I invented a stove from a five-gallon oil tin. With a can-opener I
cut a strip out on opposite sides ten inches from the bottom, and
laid two iron bars across, and under them, inside the receptacle,
built a fire. Upon this I cooked my coffee in the percolator, while
upon the earth and hot stones other delicious dishes boiled, stewed,
and fried. If I baked, I used the native oven in the ground, with
earth and leaves inclosing.

I passed hours on the reef with Raiere and Matatini or in canoes,
drawing the nets and catching shrimp and eels. In the lagoon we usually
secured a plentiful draft of fish, brilliant creatures of silver and
crimson, as they leaped from the sea into the nets, and were later
tumbled into canoes or on the beach. The orare, aturi, and paaihere
were like the gleaming mesh purses worn by the women of our cities,
but the ihi was as red as the beard of the Greek god T'yonni. These
fish we kept in tubs of sea water, alive and even moderately happy
until co