AT FUTUNA, BECRUITINQ. 301 



wooded, many of the trees having been fruit-bearing 

 once, but now, much to our disappointment, barren 

 from neglect. 



A ruined house, surrounded by other vestiges of what 

 had once been a homestead, stood in the middle of this 

 piece of land. Feeling curious to know what the history 

 of this isolated settlement might be, I asked the mate if 

 he knew anything of it. He told me that an American 

 named Halstead, with his family, lived here for years, 

 visited only by an occasional whaler, to whom they sold 

 such produce as they might have and be able to spare 

 at the time. What their previous history had been, or 

 why they thus chose to cut themselves off from the 

 world, he did not know; but they seemed contented 

 enough with their tiny kingdom, nor had any wish to 

 leave it. But it came to pass that one night they felt 

 the sure and firm- set earth trembling convulsively 

 beneath their feet. Eushing out of their house, they 

 saw the heavens bespread with an awful pall of smoke, 

 the under-side of which was glowing with the reflected 

 fires of some vast furnace. Their terror was increased 

 by a smart shower of falling ashes and the reverbera- 

 tions of subterranean thunders. At first they thought 

 of flight in their boat, not reckoning the wide stretch of 

 sea which rolled between them and the nearest land, 

 but the height and frequency of the breakers then 

 prevailing made that impossible. 



Their situation was pitiable in the extreme. During 

 the years of peace and serenity they had spent here, no 

 thought of the insecurity of their tenure had troubled 

 them. Though they had but been dwellers on the 

 threshold of the mountain, as it were, and any exten- 

 sion of their territory impossible by reason of the 



insurmountable barrier around them, they had led an 

 .21 



