"But the men——"
"Now you just leave the men to us. If you good ladies will just keep on at your own proper work, and let these big brown children watch you and see the pleasant results, you will be doing the very best thing possible for them. Make friends with them, pick up all the words you can lay hold of, and, in fact, get in touch with them all round as quickly as possible. But we must lead them; we can't drive them."
His own example was an inspiration to them all. Evans and Stuart seconded him loyally, and by degrees the ladies, who one and all, Jean included, sympathised considerably with Aunt Jannet in her not unnatural discrimination in favour of clothing, desisted from their well-meant efforts and grew accustomed to the scant attire of their brown friends.
They had no lack of personal cleanliness to combat, for which "Thank goodness!" said Aunt Jannet more than once. "If they let you see plenty of skin, it is at all events clean skin. If they'd stop rubbing themselves all over with that nasty rotten coco-nut oil and wear some decent clothes, I wouldn't have a fault to find with them—except in their eating and a few other things."
The mission-settlement lay on the left bank of the little river which ran through the spear of white sand at the head of the bay. On the other side of the river the mountains where Ra'a lived rolled up, shoulder on shoulder, till the farther ones were lost to sight. Behind the mission the ground lay level for a space, where the valley came down to the sea, and here were masses of coco-palms and a great tangle of undergrowth, and farther up, past the village, were the disputed taro fields, and the yam and banana plantations.
On the mission side of the river, behind the level lands, another great hill flung one rough protecting arm into the sea a quarter of a mile beyond the houses. The great ridge, full of cracks and cavities, as though it had broken in its fall, shot right into the lagoon, and the barrier reef started from its outermost point. On the other side the great waves roared everlastingly up a white shell beach, but landing there was impossible, as no boat built by man could survive the tumult of the surf.
This was the island bathing-place, and here, all day long, men, women, and children were slipping and tumbling like seals in the creaming rollers. They shot deftly through the combers before they broke, and away out to sea, then came skimming back stretched flat on their swimming-boards, sitting on them, standing on them, marvels of grace and beauty, with shouts and laughter and life's tide at its fullest.
It was their most rational enjoyment, and the finest possible outlet for their activities. It kept them healthy and it kept them clean.
It also led to friction between the various factions, just as the taro fields had done. This was the only place available for surf-swimming for many miles on either side. Until the late troubles it had been common to all. Now the nearest dwellers, Ha'o's people and the atoll men, monopolised it, and when the others desired to join the sport they were received with taunts and jibes which came quickly to blows, and Blair had to adopt the rôle of peacemaker once more.
Ha'o and his men would have kept the others from the surf, just as they would have kept them from the taro swamps. But Blair would not have it. He reasoned with them, talked to them and at them, in a voluble mixture of Samoan, Kapaa'an, and English, and made them understand what he meant if many of his words were beyond them.