“Then, I am sure, sir, the fault must be wholly or for the most part your own.—Officer, remove him.”
“Has no one anything more definite to complain of?” he again asked, looking round the assembly, which by this time had begun to thin, as it became obvious to all present that no attention would be given to mere vague grumblings.
“I’m sure it’s very hard,” sighed a knot of young ladies, who had listened from the outside to what had been going on, and were afraid to speak out more plainly. “We shall be moped to death if we’re kept here any longer,” muttered one or two fast young men, shrugging their shoulders. But to these remarks the commissioner turned a deaf ear; and no one coming forward to lodge any distinct charge against another, the court broke up, and the commissioner proceeded to make a tour of inspection among the islanders.
He found, as he had indeed expected to find, that the necessity for exertion, and the peculiarity of the circumstances in which they were now placed, had already got rid of a good deal of the selfishness which had only formed a sort of crust over the characters of many who, in the main, were not without kind and generous feelings; so that the looking after the due supply of provisions, and the cooking of them and serving them to the different families, had been cheerfully undertaken by a duly organised body of young and middle-aged workers of both sexes,—the result of which was, not only an improvement in character in the workers themselves, but also a drawing forth of expressions of gratitude from some who formerly took all attentions as a right, but now had been made to feel their dependence on their fellows. And it was pleasant to see how cordially working men and women were united in striving for the good of the community in conjunction with those who had hitherto occupied a higher social position than themselves.
Some, indeed, of the lower orders, whose tastes had been of an utterly low and degraded cast, had been summarily ejected from the island after they had more than once endangered the lives and stores of the islanders in their brutal drunken sprees. They had talked big, indeed, and made at first a show of resistance; but the general body of the exiles had authorised a powerful force of young and middle-aged men to take them into custody, and convey them on a raft, constructed for the purpose, to an island some ten miles distant. Here the rioters were left with a sufficient supply of provisions; a warning being given them that, should they attempt to return to Comoro, they would be put in irons, and kept in custody till they could be brought up before the commissioner. The island being thus happily rid of this disturbing element, there was, at any rate, outward peace among the inhabitants of Comoro, though, of course, there was yet abundance of discontent and bitterness beneath the surface in the hearts of many.
As the commissioner was making his way to the shore preparatory to his return to the mainland, he passed a tent from which there issued such deep-fetched sighs that, having obtained permission to enter, he inquired of the inmate the cause of so much trouble.
“Ah, sir!” replied the poor sufferer, who was a man some sixty years of age, with grey hair, and a countenance whose expression was one of mingled shrewdness, discontent, and ill-temper, “our sovereign little knows the cruelty he has been guilty of in sending me all alone to a place like this.”
“How alone, my friend?” asked the other; “you have plenty of companions within reach.”
“Why, sir,” was the poor man’s reply, “I have been torn from the best and most loving of wives—I who am so entirely dependent on her for my happiness—I who love her so tenderly;—alas! Wretched man that I am, what shall I do?”
“Do you know this gentleman?” said the commissioner, turning to his secretary, who had accompanied him into the tent.