After dinner and supper in the cabin, a glass or two of “Hennetti”—the genuine article this time, with the kirsch bouquet,—and five hours’ lounging on the trade-room counter, royalty embarked for home. Three tacks grounded the boat before the palace; the wives were carried ashore on the backs of vassals; Tembinok’ stepped on a railed platform like a steamer’s gangway, and was borne shoulder-high through the shallows, up the beach, and by an inclined plane, paved with pebbles, to the glaring terrace where he dwells.


[8] In the Gilbert group.

[9] Copra: the dried kernel of the cocoa-nut, the chief article of commerce throughout the Pacific Islands.

[10] Houses.

[11] Suppose.


CHAPTER II

THE KING OF APEMAMA: FOUNDATION OF EQUATOR TOWN