Once, when Pola had been particularly adorable, I told him, in a burst
of affection, that he could have anything in the world he wanted, only
begging him to name it.

He smiled, looked thoughtful for an instant, and then answered, that of
all things in the world, he would like ear-rings, like those the sailors
wear.

I bought him a pair the next time I went to town. Then, armed with a
cork and a needleful of white silk, I called Pola, and asked if he
wanted the ear-rings badly enough to endure the necessary operation.

He smiled and walked up to me.

"Now, this is going to hurt, Pola," I said.

He stood perfectly straight when I pushed the needle through his ear and
cut off a little piece of silk. I looked anxiously in his face as he
turned his head for me to pierce the other one. I was so nervous that my
hands trembled.

"Are you _sure_ it does not hurt, Pola, my pigeon?" I asked, and I have
never forgotten his answer.

"My father is a soldier," he said.

Pola's dress was a simple garment, a square of white muslin hemmed by
his adopted mother. Like all Samoans, he was naturally very clean, going
with the rest of the "Vailima men" to swim in the waterfall twice a day.
He would wash his hair in the juice of wild oranges, clean his teeth
with the inside husk of the cocoanut, and, putting on a fresh
_lava-lava_, would wash out the discarded one in the river, laying it
out in the sunshine to dry. He was always decorated with flowers in some
way--a necklace of jessamine buds, pointed red peppers, or the scarlet
fruit of the pandanas. Little white boys looked naked without their
clothes, but Pola in a strip of muslin, with his wreath of flowers, or
sea-shells, some ferns twisted about one ankle, perhaps, or a boar's
tusk fastened to his left arm with strands of horse-hair, looked
completely, even handsomely, dressed.

He was not too proud to lend a helping hand at any work going--setting
the table, polishing the floor of the hall or the brass handles of the
old cabinet, leading the horses to water, carrying pails for the
milkmen, helping the cook in the kitchen, the butler in the pantry, or
the cowboy in the fields; holding skeins of wool for Mr. Stevenson's
mother, or trotting beside the lady of the house, "Tamaitai," as they
all called her, carrying seeds or plants for her garden. When my brother
went out with a number of natives laden with surveying implements, Pola
only stopped long enough to beg for a cane-kn