[CHAPTER XIV.]

AT TAHITI.

The cava feast, the yam, the cocoa's root,
Which bears at once the cup, and milk, and fruit,
The bread-tree which, without the ploughshare, yields
The unreap'd harvest of unfurrowed fields.

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These, with the luxuries of seas and woods,
The airy joys of social solitudes,
Tamed each rude wanderer.

Under the Trees, Papeete
[View full size illustration.]

Saturday, December 2nd.—The anchor was dropped in the harbour of Papeete at nine o'clock, and a couple of hours later, by which time the weather had cleared, we went ashore, and at once found ourselves in the midst of a fairy-like scene, to describe which is almost impossible, so bewildering is it in the brightness and variety of its colouring. The magnolias and yellow and scarlet hibiscus, overshadowing the water, the velvety turf, on to which one steps from the boat, the white road running between rows of wooden houses, whose little gardens are a mass of flowers, the men and women clad in the gayest robes and decked with flowers, the piles of unfamiliar fruit lying on the grass, waiting to be transported to the coasting vessels in the harbour, the wide-spreading background of hills clad in verdure to their summits—these are but a few of the objects which greet the new-comer in his first contact with the shore.