20 THE CORAL LANDS OF THE PACIFIC. 



the chiefs as Tui Viti, or Chief of Viti. In the concluding years 

 of his sovereignty Cacobau found his throne anything but a bed 

 of roses ; in fact, until he ceded his kingdom to Great Britain, 

 he was always in hot water. 



Any sketch of Coral Lands would be incomplete without the 

 story of Cacobau's experiences with the Tongan chief Maafu. 

 This latter personage began life in 1842 by hiring himself and 

 companies of his people to the unprincipled scoundrels who at 

 that time were carrying on the trade of the South Sea Islands. 

 These gentry, when persuasion failed, tried bullets ; and Maafu, 

 to put it pleasantly, became a first-class sandal-wood appro- 

 priator. A New Zealand Government blue-book calls the 

 business by an uglier name. 



Maafu first appeared in Fiji in 1847, having been exiled from 

 his native country by his royal relative King George, who 

 sagaciously thought his room safer than his company. He took 

 up his abode at Loma Loma, and, espousing the cause of the 

 weaker of two fighting Fijian chiefs, he defeated his enemies 

 and at once became master of the whole of the islands of Vanua 

 Balavu. He soon wanted a 'rectification of territory,' and 

 naturally determined to seize the entire group of Fiji. To this 

 end he began building a schooner of about thirty-five tons' 

 register, and taking other steps which demonstrated that fire 

 and sword were to be carried all over the islands. 



The first appointed British consul, however, put a stop to 

 his proceedings, and ' the Bismarck of the Pacific ' was quiet 

 for a short time. Everything conies to him who waits, and 

 Maafu had not to wait very long. Fiji about 1859 was like 

 some of the South American republics, where you may count 

 on an annual revolution, accompanied by civil war, as safely 

 as on the return of Eastertide. 



Two chiefs on the northern side of Vanua Levu differed, 



