OF THE SOUTH SEAS 273 



Already the buyers are coming fast, householders and 

 cooks and bachelors and beaux, tourists and native 

 beauties. 



A score of groups are smoking and chatting, flirting 

 and running over their lists. Carriages and carts are 

 tied everywhere, country folk who have come to sell or to 

 buy, or both, and automobiles, too, are ranged beside 

 the Mairie. 



Matrons and daughters, many nationals, are assem- 

 bling. The wife of a new consul, a charming blonde, 

 just from New Jersey, has her basket on her arm. She 

 is a bride, and must make the consul's two thousand 

 dollars a year go far. A priest in a black gown and a 

 young Mormon elder from Utah regard each other 

 coldly. A hundred Chinese cafe-keepers, stewards, and 

 merchants are endeavoring to pierce the exteriors of the 

 foods and estimate their true value. The market is not 

 open yet. It awaits the sound of the gong, rung by 

 the police about half past five. Four or five of these 

 officials are about, all natives in gaudy uniforms, their 

 bicycles at the curb, smoking, and exchanging greetings 

 with friends. 



The question of deepest interest to the marketers is 

 the fish. The tables for these are railed off, and, peer- 

 ing through the barriers, the onlookers comment upon 

 the kinds and guess at the prices. 



The market-house is a shed over concrete floors, clean, 

 sanitary, and occupied but an hour or two a day. There 

 are three main divisions of the market, meat, fish, and 

 green things. Meat in Tahiti is better uneaten and un- 

 sung. It comes on the hoof from New Zealand. Now, 

 if you are an epicure, you may rent a cold-storage cham- 



