ght according to
the law of the Church, was a holy act which brought the giver a
blessing, and so the subtle Chinese thought to make his blessing
greater by offering a drink better than water.

Ah Kee Au drank with fervor. "My makee holee thliss morn'," he said
gladly. "Makee Napoleon more happy." Sincerity is not a matter of
broken English or a drink of rum; the poor old grandfather of the
Little Corporal's namesake believed earnestly that Napoleon would
improve by his sacramental offering. He, like most Marquesans, took
the white man's religion with little understanding. It is new magic
to them, a comfort, an occupation, and an entertainment. But who
knows the human heart, or understands the soul?

That afternoon while Neo and I lay on my _paepae_ awaiting the
favoring wind which should carry him back to his own isle, my
neighbors gathered from far and near to lounge the sunny hours away
in conversation. Squatted on the mats, they engaged in serious
discussion of the puzzles of religion, appealing to me often to
settle vexing questions which they had long wearied of asking their
better-informed instructors in religious mysteries.

Their native tongue has no word for religion. Bishop Dordillon had
been obliged to translate it, "_Te mea e hakatika me te mea e hana
mea koaha toitoi i te Etua_" which might be rendered, "Belief in the
works and love of a just God." Etua, often spelled Atua, was the
name of divinity among all Maori peoples, but religion was so
associated with natural things, the phenomena of nature, of living
things, and of the heavens and sea, that it was part of daily life
and needed no word to distinguish it.

Never were people less able to comprehend the creeds and formulas in
which the religious beliefs of the white men are clothed. Marquesans
are not deep thinkers. In fact, they have a word, _tahoa_, which
means, "a headache from thinking." Ten years of ardent and nobly
self-sacrificing work by missionaries left the islands still without
a single soul converted. It was not until the chiefs began to set
the seal of their approval on the new outlandish faiths that the
people flocked to the standard of the cross. And when they did begin
to meditate the doctrines preached to them as necessary beliefs in
order to win salvation, their heads ached indeed.

Even after years of faithful church-going many of my friends still
struggled with their doubts, and when these were propounded to me I
was fain to