, not a solitary bread-fruit grew in Odo.
A noteworthy circumstance, observable in these regions, where islands
close adjoining, so differ in their soil, that certain fruits growing
genially in one, are foreign to another. But Odo was famed for its
guavas, whose flavor was likened to the flavor of new-blown lips; and
for its grapes, whose juices prompted many a laugh and many a groan.

Beside the city where Media dwelt, there were few other
clusters of habitations in Odo. The higher classes living, here and
there, in separate households; but not as eremites. Some buried
themselves in the cool, quivering bosoms of the groves. Others,
fancying a marine vicinity, dwelt hard by the beach in little cages
of bamboo; whence of mornings they sallied out with jocund cries, and
went plunging into the refreshing bath, whose frothy margin was the
threshold of their dwellings. Others still, like birds, built their
nests among the sylvan nooks of the elevated interior; whence all
below, and hazy green, lay steeped in languor the island's throbbing
heart.

Thus dwelt the chiefs and merry men of mark. The common sort,
including serfs, and Helots, war-captives held in bondage, lived in
secret places, hard to find. Whence it came, that, to a stranger, the
whole isle looked care-free and beautiful. Deep among the ravines and
the rocks, these beings lived in noisome caves, lairs for beasts, not
human homes; or built them coops of rotten boughs--living trees were
banned them--whose mouldy hearts hatched vermin. Fearing infection of
some plague, born of this filth, the chiefs of Odo seldom passed that
way and looking round within their green retreats, and pouring out
their wine, and plucking from orchards of the best, marveled how
these swine could grovel in the mire, and wear such sallow cheeks.
But they offered no sweet homes; from that mire they never sought to
drag them out; they open threw no orchard; and intermitted not the
mandates that condemned their drudges to a life of deaths. Sad sight!
to see those round-shouldered Helots, stooping in their trenches:
artificial, three in number, and concentric: the isle well nigh
surrounding. And herein, fed by oozy loam, and kindly dew from
heaven, and bitter sweat from men, grew as in hot-beds the nutritious
Taro.

Toil is man's allotment; toil of brain, or toil of hands, or a grief
that's more than either, the grief and sin of idleness. But when man
toils and slays himself for masters who