end it
as quickly as it was made; and Manton's Hotel on Levuka beach was filled
night after night with crowds of hilarious and excited people, and the
popping of the champagne corks went on from dusk till dawn of the tropic
day, and men talked and drank and talked and drank again, and told each
other of the lucky strokes they had made; and sun-tanned skippers from
the wild and murderous Solomons and the fever-stricken New Hebrides
spoke of the cargoes of "blackbirds" they had sold at two hundred and
fifty dollars a head, and dashed down a handful of yellow sovereigns
on Manton's bar "for a drink all round." And then, sometimes, a long
snaky-looking brigantine, with the name _Atlantic_ on her stern, and the
Stars and Stripes flying from her gaff, would sail into the noisy little
port nestling under the verdured hills of Ovalau Island, and a big man,
with a black, flowing beard, and a deep but merry voice, would be rowed
ashore by a crew of wild-eyed, brown-skinned Polynesians, and "'Bully'
Hayes has come! 'Bully' Hayes has come!" would be cried from one end of
Levuka to the other, as every one, white, black, and brown, ran to the
beach to see the famous and much-maligned "pirate" land, with a smile
on his handsome face, his pockets full of gold, and he himself ready for
anything or everything--a _liaison_ with some other man's wife, a story
of his last cruise, a fight "for love" with some recently discovered
pugilist of local renown; a sentimental Spanish song to the strumming of
his guitar; or the reading of the burial service according to the rites
of either the Roman Catholic Church, or that of the Church of England,
over the remains of some acquaintance or stranger who had succumbed to
fever or a bullet, or Levuka whiskey. Brave, halcyon days were those,
when men lived their lives quickly, and then disappeared or were ruined,
or committed suicide, and were soon forgotten.

Brabant had gone ashore, and Lester and the second mate--a thin,
sallow-faced Chileno named Diaz--were seated under the awning, smoking,
and occasionally watching the progress of a small cutter which was about
a mile distant, and under the influence of a light air which had sprung
up, was heading towards the _Maritana_. She was owned by Dr. Bruce, a
planter friend of Lester. His estate was some miles down the coast, and
he had been an old shipmate of Lester's ten years before, when Brabant
was living in Samoa as manager of the American Plantation Co