198 THE CORAL LANDS OF THE PACIFIC. 



guard of the all-conquering Anglo-Saxon is on British soil in 

 the archipelago of Fiji. 



The cricket-match at Valaga duly came off. I never was 

 much of a player, but having made a decent score in the first 

 innings, I asked Mr. Dods, senior, a most charming old gentle- 

 man, to see me do the same in the second. Pride invariably 

 precedes a fall, and the first ball I received gracefully inter- 

 fered with the perpendicular of my middle wicket, and I then 

 remembered with satisfaction that I had told my companions 

 I was no hand at cricket. 



A day or so later I paid a visit to the hot springs which 

 bubble up on the other side of the bay. A native woman was 

 very contentedly boiling a chicken over them. In the appen- 

 dix to this volume I give a chemical analysis of this water, 

 obtained for me by my friend, Mr. Henry Bowmam. 



A few days later I quitted Savu Savu Bay and made for 

 Koro, an island which gives its name to the sea lying between 

 the windward island and Ovalau. Here I was hospitably 

 entertained by Mr. Chalmers, who has a comfortable house in 

 :i most lovely situation, similar in many respects to Wai- Wai. 

 He had, at the time I write, a large flourishing arrowroot 

 plantation, and was a regular exporter of that flour to 

 Australia and New Zealand. Mr. Chalmers is now a resident 

 of Levuka, and a member of the Legislative Council, a loncm 

 tenens for my friend the Hon. J. C. Smith. 



Taviuni has been called the 'garden of Fiji,' and well 

 deserves the name ; but where almost every island is a 

 garden, it is difficult to say which is the most perfect. To 

 my mind some of the coast walks in the island of Koro are the 

 most beautiful in the wide Pacific. In no other island did 

 I notice such a continuation of exquisite creepers, forming a 

 lattice-work of floral beauty through which could be seen the 



