hree half-caste children--a boy of thirteen, another of
ten, and a girl of six. Such education as he could give them during
his continuous wanderings over the North and South Pacific had been but
scanty; for he was often away on trading cruises, and his wife, though
she could read and write, like all Hawaiian women, was not competent to
instruct her children, though in all other respects she was everything
that a mother should be, except, as Flemming would often tell her, she
was too indulgent and too ready to gratify their whims and fancies.
However, they were now not so much under her control, for soon after
coming to the island, he found that one of the three Marist Brothers
living at the mission was able to, and willing to give them a few hours'
instruction several times a week. For this, Flemming, who was really
anxious about his children's welfare, made a liberal payment to the
Mission, and the arrangement had worked very satisfactorily--Father
Billot, who was a good English scholar, giving them their lessons in
that language.

I must now make mention of the remaining persons constituting the
trader's household--the two servants--one a man about thirty years
of age, the other not more than eighteen or nineteen. They were both
natives of Arorai (Hurd Island), one of the Eingsmill Group, and
situated something less than three degrees south of the Equator.
They had both taken service with him on their own island six years
previously, and had followed his and his family's fortunes ever since,
for they were both devotedly attached to the children; and when, a year
after he had settled on their island, misfortune befell him through
the destruction of his trading station by fire, and he found himself a
ruined man, they refused to leave him, and declared they would work
for him without payment until he was again in a position to begin
trading--no matter how long it might be ere that took place.

For some months after the loss of all his property, Flemming worked
hard and lived meanly. Most fortunately for him, he had a very good
whaleboat, and night after night, and day after day, he and his two
faithful helpers, as long as the weather held fine, toiled at the
dangerous pursuit of shark-catching, cutting off the fins and tails, and
drying them in the sun, until finally he had secured over a ton's weight
of the ill-smelling commodity, for which he received L60 in cash from
the master of a Chinese-owned trading barque, whi