There was stationed upon one of the islands of the Samoan Group—there is no use of mentioning the island in particular—a young gentleman who had been sent out under the auspices of the Department of Agriculture of the United States, and, to speak more definitely, from that branch of the Department which is known as the Weather Bureau. His business was to sit at the top of a somewhat illy-constructed tower and note the variations of wind and temperature and all that sort of thing, and then send his report to the Department at Washington, when he could catch a steamer, which didn't always often happen, for this was some time ago. Still he sat up in the tower and took notes and glowered, and made the best of things, and the work in this region of mild latitude and much lassitude did not wear upon him to such an extent that he could not fall in love, not in the purely abstract way that he loved some things either, as for instance, the equation of the parabola, but vigorously and deeply.
He fell in love to such an extent that he became personally interested in the contest among the fair Samoans as to whom among the belles should show the most ardent and effective floral decoration of her mass of hair on the day appointed.
Now, be it known that the Atlantic Ocean is the Atlantic Ocean, that the Washington Monument is the Washington Monument. They exist as they are. Be it known also, that the hair of a Samoan beauty, a great burnished mass, also exists as it is and is rarely washed between the rising of the sun and the dropping into the ocean of the same luminary, or at any other time.
The name of the young man connected with the Weather Bureau was John Thompson. That is not a very poetic name, but John Thompson can love just as hard as Everard Argyle. This John Thompson did anyhow, and he vowed that his sweetheart should win in the contest of flowery decorations of the heads of the maidens. This resolve came upon him some six weeks before the time of trial. He visited Una Loa.
"How long is it, sweetheart, since you let your hair down?" said he.
"I do not remember," said she.
"That is all right," said he.
Now, John Thompson had entertained certain ideas regarding agricultural speculation in the Samoan Islands, and had imported for experimental purposes various small quantities of assorted delicate fertilizers—powdered bone and ammonia, or something of that sort. Here was material, and inspiration for action comes to a man sometimes in a way which makes it seem to him as if all the ancient gods were behind him and beside him, aiding him in every way. This sublimity of inspiration came to John Thompson at this moment.
This is how the man, thus sublimated, reasoned: "All the other girls must, necessarily, as in the past, wear cut flowers, which must, to an extent, wither before the judgment of the Wise Ones is declared. I will make a real, living garden of my darling's head, a garden in which shall bloom, not only flowers of the islands here, but of Europe and America, and all countries of the world. Above one of her dark eyes shall dangle such a bunch of glowing and living pansies as the Islanders have never seen; the phlox shall lift itself aloft from her coronet; sweet peas and old-fashioned pinks shall adorn one side of her shapely head, while the other side will be blazing with tossing poppies. She shall appear among the contestants with such a crest as never a queen has worn, though the jewelers of all ages have struggled to make a surpassing crown."
And the man did his work. "Eh," he said, as he patted the matted mass of dusky hair, "talk about farms in the States! Here is an area of the right kind for the support of a family! Talk about landscape gardening! I'll show them what real landscape gardening is!"