proved to be
valuable--A change of course--The "Rain of Blood"--In Tasmania.

At Apia I had the pleasure of meeting Mr. A. Young, the father of the
late Queen Margaret, who was Queen of Manua from 1891 to 1895. Her
grandfather was an English sailor who married a princess. Mr. Young is
now the only survivor of the family, two of his children, the last of
them all, having been lost in an island trader which a few months
before had sailed, never to return. Mr. Young was a Christian
gentleman, and his daughter Margaret was accomplished in graces that
would become any lady. It was with pain that I saw in the newspapers a
sensational account of her life and death, taken evidently from a
paper in the supposed interest of a benevolent society, but without
foundation in fact. And the startling head-lines saying, "Queen
Margaret of Manua is dead," could hardly be called news in 1898, the
queen having then been dead three years.

While hobnobbing, as it were, with royalty, I called on the king
himself, the late Malietoa. King Malietoa was a great ruler; he never
got less than forty-five dollars a month for the job, as he told me
himself, and this amount had lately been raised, so that he could live
on the fat of the land and not any longer be called "Tin-of-salmon
Malietoa" by graceless beach-combers.

As my interpreter and I entered the front door of the palace, the
king's brother, who was viceroy, sneaked in through a taro-patch by
the back way, and sat cowering by the door while I told my story to
the king. Mr. W---of New York, a gentleman interested in missionary
work, had charged me, when I sailed, to give his remembrance to the
king of the Cannibal Islands, other islands of course being meant; but
the good King Malietoa, notwithstanding that his people have not eaten
a missionary in a hundred years, received the message himself, and
seemed greatly pleased to hear so directly from the publishers of the
"Missionary Review," and wished me to make his compliments in return.
His Majesty then excused himself, while I talked with his daughter,
the beautiful Faamu-Sami (a name signifying "To make the sea burn"),
and soon reappeared in the full-dress uniform of the German
commander-in-chief, Emperor William himself; for, stupidly enough, I
had not sent my credentials ahead that the king might be in full
regalia to receive me. Calling a few days later to say good-by to
Faamu-Sami, I saw King Malietoa for the last time.

Of the la