also started the cheering with an English hip-hip-hip. There was never a
more fortunate conception; the heart of the fatted king exulted in his
bosom at the sound.

Take him for all in all, I have never known a more engaging creature
than this parson of Butaritari: his mirth, his kindness, his noble,
friendly feelings, brimmed from the man in speech and gesture. He loved
to exaggerate, to act and overact the momentary part, to exercise his
lungs and muscles, and to speak and laugh with his whole body. He had
the morning cheerfulness of birds and healthy children; and his humour
was infectious. We were next neighbours and met daily, yet our
salutations lasted minutes at a stretch--shaking hands, slapping
shoulders, capering like a pair of Merry-Andrews, laughing to split our
sides upon some pleasantry that would scarce raise a titter in an
infant school. It might be five in the morning, the toddy-cutters just
gone by, the road empty, the shade of the island lying far on the
lagoon: and the ebullition cheered me for the day.

Yet I always suspected Maka of a secret melancholy; these jubilant
extremes could scarce be constantly maintained. He was besides long, and
lean, and lined, and corded, and a trifle grizzled; and his Sabbath
countenance was even saturnine. On that day we made a procession to the
church, or (as I must always call it) the cathedral: Maka (a blot on the
hot landscape) in tall hat, black frock-coat, black trousers; under his
arm the hymn-book and the Bible; in his face, a reverent
gravity:--beside him Mary his wife, a quiet, wise, and handsome elderly
lady, seriously attired:--myself following with singular and moving
thoughts. Long before, to the sound of bells and streams and birds,
through a green Lothian glen, I had accompanied Sunday by Sunday a
minister in whose house I lodged; and the likeness, and the difference,
and the series of years and deaths, profoundly touched me. In the great,
dusky, palm-tree cathedral the congregation rarely numbered thirty: the
men on one side, the women on the other, myself posted (for a privilege)
amongst the women, and the small missionary contingent gathered close
around the platform, we were lost in that round vault. The lessons were
read antiphonally, the flock was catechised, a blind youth repeated
weekly a long string of psalms, hymns were sung--I never heard worse
singing,--and the sermon followed. To say I understood nothing were
untrue; there were points th