152 MYSTIC ISLES 



and these far Southerners — danced hke these Tahitians, 

 so that every muscle quivered at every moment. 



The dancing in the bower was at intervals, as the desire 

 moved the performers and bodily force allowed. The 

 himene went on continuously, varying with the inspira- 

 tion of the dancer or the whim of the accordion-player. 

 They snatched this instrument from one another's hands 

 as the mood struck them, and among the natives, men 

 and women alike had facility in its playing. Pepe of 

 Papara, and Tehau of Papeari, their eyes flashing, their 

 bosoms rising and falling tumultuously, and their voices 

 and bodies alternating in their expressions of passion, 

 were joined by Temanu of Lovaina's, the oblique-eyed 

 girl whom they called a half-Chinese, but whose ancestral 

 tree, she said, showed no celestial branch. Temanu was 

 tall, slender, serpent-like, her body flexuous and undula- 

 tory, responding to every quaver of the music. Her un- 

 corseted figure, with only a thin silken gown upon it, 

 wreathed harmoniously in tortile oscillations, her long, 

 black hair flying about her flushed face, and her soul 

 afire with her thoughts and simulations. 



Now entered the bower Mamoe of JMoorea, a big girl of 

 eighteen. She was of the ancient chief ess type, as large 

 as a man, perfectly modeled, a tawny Juno. Her hair 

 was in two plaits, wound with red peppers, and on her 

 head a crown of tuberoses. She wore a single garment, 

 which outlined her figure, and her feet were bare. She 

 surveyed the company, and her glance fell on Landers. 



She began to dance. Her face, distinctly Semitic, 

 as is not seldom the case in Polynesia, was fixed a little 

 sternly at first; but as she continued, it began to glow. 

 She did not sing. Her dance was the upaupa, the na- 



