ions of exasperating rivalry. The one
returned from the dead of exile to find himself replaced and excelled.
The other, at the end of a long, anxious, and successful struggle, beheld
his only possible competitor resuscitated from the grave. The qualities
of both, in this difficult moment, shone out nobly. I feel I seem always
less than partial to the lovable Laupepa; his virtues are perhaps not
those which chiefly please me, and are certainly not royal; but he found
on his return an opportunity to display the admirable sweetness of his
nature. The two entered into a competition of generosity, for which I
can recall no parallel in history, each waiving the throne for himself,
each pressing it upon his rival; and they embraced at last a compromise
the terms of which seem to have been always obscure and are now disputed.
Laupepa at least resumed his style of King of Samoa; Mataafa retained
much of the conduct of affairs, and continued to receive much of the
attendance and respect befitting royalty; and the two Malietoas, with so
many causes of disunion, dwelt and met together in the same town like
kinsmen. It was so, that I first saw them; so, in a house set about with
sentries--for there was still a haunting fear of Germany,--that I heard
them relate their various experience in the past; heard Laupepa tell with
touching candour of the sorrows of his exile, and Mataafa with mirthful
simplicity of his resources and anxieties in the war. The relation was
perhaps too beautiful to last; it was perhaps impossible but the titular
king should grow at last uneasily conscious of the _maire de palais_ at
his side, or the king-maker be at last offended by some shadow of
distrust or assumption in his creature. I repeat the words king-maker
and creature; it is so that Mataafa himself conceives of their relation:
surely not without justice; for, had he not contended and prevailed, and
been helped by the folly of consuls and the fury of the storm, Laupepa
must have died in exile.

Foreigners in these islands know little of the course of native intrigue.
Partly the Samoans cannot explain, partly they will not tell. Ask how
much a master can follow of the puerile politics in any school; so much
and no more we may understand of the events which surround and menace us
with their results. The missions may perhaps have been to blame.
Missionaries are perhaps apt to meddle overmuch outside their discipline;
it is a fault which should be