t to their countrymen the glad tidings they had themselves
received.

"It was to this island, many years ago, that a native missionary swam on
shore with a few books, wrapped up in a cloth, on his head. Our savage
fathers stood on the rocks with clubs and spears, ready to kill him, but
his life was preserved by the mercy of God, who loved our souls though
we knew Him not. At first no one would listen to what the missionary
had to say, and laughed him to scorn; but by degrees one stopped to
hear, and then another and another, and found what he said to be very
good, till by degrees as they understood more clearly the tidings he
brought, hundreds flocked in and believed, and were converted."

Captain Harper corroborated all Charley had heard, and stated that
whereas once it was dangerous at most of the islands to land unless in a
strong body, well armed; now, throughout the whole of the eastern
groups, the inhabitants were as kind and courteous to strangers and as
well conducted as any people he had met on the face of the globe. One
day after they had left the island, the officers of a whaler becalmed
near them came on board, and complained bitterly of the altered state of
things, abusing the missionaries for being the cause of the change to
which they so much objected.

The surgeon of the ship, who ought to have known better, was especially
very indignant with them.

"Once we could go on shore, and for a few beads or a knife not worth
twopence buy as many provisions as we required, or any other article,
and we could play all sorts of pranks with the natives, and nobody
interfered with us. Now, if we ask them to buy or sell, or to dance, or
to do anything else on a Sunday, they won't do it, and we can have no
fun of any sort; and they say that we have lost our religion, and pull
long faces at us, and ask us all sorts of strange questions about our
souls. As a fact, these savages know more about religion than we do;
and they can write books, and print and bind them, and some of them can
preach for an hour at a time; indeed, I don't know what they can't do.
The missionaries have done it all--spoilt them, I say; they were jolly
fellows as savages, but they are desperately stupid now. To be sure,
they did now and then murder a whole ship's company if they had the
chance, and roast and eat them too, and they would steal anything they
could lay hands on; and they were always fighting among each other; and
they worshipp