So Ha'o of Kapaa'a became the Man's man's man. And the first sparks of light for the Dark Islands leaped from the match that set fire to the village thatch ten days before.
So good comes out of evil, and no man may safely say this is good and that is ill. For no man knows, save Him Who knows all things; and His ways are so very different from man's ways that wisdom and experience drive one only to the doing with one's might the thing that is in hand, in the faithful hope that He will round the corners and shape the work to its appointed end.
CHAPTER XIV
CLIPPING A BLACKBIRD
Before we proceed to other matters, let us get rid of the Blackbirder.
She lay like a black blot on the smooth swell of the lagoon, and till we are quit of her the place will not feel clean. Civilisation, as represented by the dismantled brig, was as foul a thing as any the Dark Islands could show—not excepting even the terrors of the feasting-places. For what the dark men did they did in their darkness, and what the yellow men did they did in their light, and condemnation goes with knowledge.
And as it was here, so it was elsewhere. Vicious civilisation gashed Nature with a broad red wound and trampled her to earth. Fortunately, in this case there was healing and reparation. But it was not always so.
Blair and Cathie had had ample time during the return voyage to arrange their plans, Blair's part in the discussions consisting chiefly of acting as brake to the captain's whirring wheels. For Captain Cathie, honest man, foresaw such certain trouble from letting the raiders go that he would have strained many points to put it out of their power ever to return.
But Blair would have none of it.