the regular and irregular government.

_Mulinuu_. Mulinuu, the reader may remember, is a narrow finger of land
planted in cocoa-palms, which runs forth into the lagoon perhaps three
quarters of a mile. To the east is the bay of Apia. To the west, there
is, first of all, a mangrove swamp, the mangroves excellently green, the
mud ink-black, and its face crawled upon by countless insects and black
and scarlet crabs. Beyond the swamp is a wide and shallow bay of the
lagoon, bounded to the west by Faleula Point. Faleula is the next
village to Malie; so that from the top of some tall palm in Malie it
should be possible to descry against the eastern heavens the palms of
Mulinuu. The trade wind sweeps over the low peninsula and cleanses it
from the contagion of the swamp. Samoans have a quaint phrase in their
language; when out of health, they seek exposed places on the shore "to
eat the wind," say they; and there can be few better places for such a
diet than the point of Mulinuu.

Two European houses stand conspicuous on the harbour side; in Europe they
would seem poor enough, but they are fine houses for Samoa. One is new;
it was built the other day under the apologetic title of a Government
House, to be the residence of Baron Senfft. The other is historical; it
was built by Brandeis on a mortgage, and is now occupied by the chief
justice on conditions never understood, the rumour going uncontradicted
that he sits rent free. I do not say it is true, I say it goes
uncontradicted; and there is one peculiarity of our officials in a
nutshell,--their remarkable indifference to their own character. From the
one house to the other extends a scattering village for the Faipule or
native parliament men. In the days of Tamasese this was a brave place,
both his own house and those of the Faipule good, and the whole
excellently ordered and approached by a sanded way. It is now like a
neglected bush-town, and speaks of apathy in all concerned. But the chief
scandal of Mulinuu is elsewhere. The house of the president stands just
to seaward of the isthmus, where the watch is set nightly, and armed men
guard the uneasy slumbers of the government. On the landward side there
stands a monument to the poor German lads who fell at Fangalii, just
beyond which the passer-by may chance to observe a little house standing
backward from the road. It is such a house as a commoner might use in a
bush village; none could dream that it gave shelter even to