m the three ships of war, was
forthwith begun; on its success was staked the hopes of the little
clique who had so lightly adopted the cause of a divinity student of
seventeen, against the vote and wish of well-nigh all Samoa.

On that day the Oa party held the center of the Mataafa line, a stone
wall stretching across a wide clearing to the forest on either side. It
was the post of honor, for it crossed the road up which the enemy were
toiling with their guns, and guarded the headquarters of the patriot
king, not a hundred yards behind. In the trampled grass two hundred men
sat or lay with their rifles in their hands and listened to the measured
periods of the orators exhorting them to remember their wrongs and die
fighting. These old men, white-haired, scarred with the wounds of bygone
battles, their wrinkled hands clasping the staves on which they leaned,
never winced as the shells whistled above their heads, nor abated by a
hair's breadth their tone of strident warning and encouragement. At
such a distance, and against a target six hundred feet above the sea
level, the men-of-war made poor practice and did little more than waste
their ammunition. But the shattering detonations of their guns, and the
thundering echoes rolling and re-rolling round the bay, made pleasant
music for their crews ashore. It seemed incredible that such
earth-shaking explosions could be wholly without effect, and the tired
seamen sweating up the hill were kindled by the thought that the rebels
were already suffering heavily and likely to run at the first encounter.

Sitting listlessly on a boulder, Jack scarcely took in the fact that
anything out of the way was about to happen. His only concern was not to
be too far from Fetuao, and so long as he had her in his sight he was
dumbly content. He was as solitary among the thronging warriors as any
castaway in mid-ocean, and his patient, stolid, inexpressive face, grown
older in a month by a dozen years, was the only one which failed to
reflect the coming conflict. Fetuao, on the contrary, was on fire from
top to toe; her saucy tongue was loosened, and her bright eyes dancing
in wild excitement. Joking and laughing in the roaring circle of her
admirers, she matched her quick wit against them all in a victorious
scream of banter and repartee.

Suddenly a shot rang out in the lower woods; then two, with a faltering
third; then a scattered volley like a bunch of firecrackers going off at
once. A s