such an abject state would
require a man of very different virtues from those claimed by the not
unvirtuous Laupepa. He is not designed to ride the whirlwind or direct
the storm, rather to be the ornament of private life. He is kind,
gentle, patient as Job, conspicuously well-intentioned, of charming
manners; and when he pleases, he has one accomplishment in which he now
begins to be alone--I mean that he can pronounce correctly his own
beautiful language.

The government of Brandeis accomplished a good deal and was continually
and heroically attempting more. The government of our two whites has
confined itself almost wholly to paying and receiving salaries. They
have built, indeed, a house for the president; they are believed (if
that be a merit) to have bought the local newspaper with government
funds; and their rule has been enlivened by a number of scandals, into
which I feel with relief that it is unnecessary I should enter. Even if
the three Powers do not remove these gentlemen, their absurd and
disastrous government must perish by itself of inanition. Native taxes
(except perhaps from Mataafa, true to his own private policy) have long
been beyond hope. And only the other day (May 6th, 1892), on the
expressed ground that there was no guarantee as to how the funds would
be expended, and that the president consistently refused to allow the
verification of his cash balances, the municipal council has negatived
the proposal to call up further taxes from the whites. All is well that
ends even ill, so that it end; and we believe that with the last dollar
we shall see the last of the last functionary. Now when it is so nearly
over, we can afford to smile at this extraordinary passage, though we
must still sigh over the occasion lost.

* * * * *

_Malie._ The way to Malie lies round the shores of Faleula bay and
through a succession of pleasant groves and villages. The road, one of
the works of Brandeis, is now cut up by pig fences. Eight times you must
leap a barrier of cocoa posts; the take-off and the landing both in a
patch of mire planted with big stones, and the stones sometimes reddened
with the blood of horses that have gone before. To make these obstacles
more annoying, you have sometimes to wait while a black boar clambers
sedately over the so-called pig fence. Nothing can more thoroughly
depict the worst side of the Samoan character than these useless
barriers which deface thei