he best of them, and much cleverer."

Dominick received this compliment with a laugh and a shake of the head.

"No, my boy; I am not nearly as strong as Malines or Morris, or the
Binneys. Besides, you forget that `the race is not always to the swift,
nor the battle to the strong,' and as to cleverness, that does not
consist in a superior education or a head crammed full of knowledge, but
in the right and ready application of knowledge. No; I have no ambition
to be a king. But it won't do for us to stand here talking, else we
shall be set down as idlers. Come, let us lend a helping hand."

While the men were busy at the boats on the lagoon side of the reef,
Pauline was winning golden opinions among the women at the camp by the
hearty, unaffected way in which she went about making herself generally
useful. O blessed simplicity, how adorable art thou in man and woman!
Self-forgetfulness was a salient point in Pauline's character, and,
being conjoined with strong powers of sympathy, active good-will to man
and beast, and more than the average of intellectual capacity, with an
under-current of rippling fun, the girl's influence quickly made itself
felt.

Mrs Lynch said she was a jewel, and that was extraordinary praise from
the strapping widow, who seldom complimented her sex, whatever she may
have felt. Mrs Welsh said she was a "dear, pritty creetur'," and
laughter-loving little Mrs Nobbs, the wife of a jovial harum-scarum
blacksmith, pronounced her a "perfect darling." As for the children,
after one hour's acquaintance they adored her, and would have "bored her
to death" had that been possible. What the men thought of her we cannot
tell, for they spake not, but furtively stared at her in a sort of
reverential amazement, and some of them, in a state of mild enthusiasm,
gave murmured utterance to the sentence quoted above, "Blessed
simplicity!" for Pauline Rigonda was, at first, utterly unaware of the
sensation she created.

When the two boats were loaded down to the gunwales, a select party of
men embarked and rowed them over the calm lagoon to Big Island. Of
course they were well armed, for no one could tell what they might meet
with there. Dominick and Otto were of the party, and, being regarded in
some measure as owners of the soil, the former was tacitly recognised as
leader on this their first visit.

The distance they had to row was not more than a quarter of a mile, so
the lagoon was soon crossed. Th