HISTORY OF THE ATOLL FROM 1871 33 



set out to learn a subject the right understanding of which is 

 given to very few. 



It was not enough for him that his mind was stored with 

 knowledge of matters never even imagined by his people ; it 

 Avas not enough that he was familiar with the constraction of 

 engines of the existence of which they did not dream, but he 

 early determined that what the natives could do he would do 

 too, and he would do better than any of them. 



It is difficult to speak of the accomplishment of this self- 

 imposed task without enthusiasm, for on their own ground he 

 met the natives, he learned all their crafts, and in the per- 

 formance of them he excelled them all. George Koss, who 

 came to the atoll an ardent engineer and a student of books, 

 had soon learned to cast the Jala-net and throw a fish-spear 

 with greater accuracy than any one of his subjects; and to 

 this day his pre-eminent skill remains. He learned to know 

 the native character in all its details, good and evil, and in 

 addition to his keen natural intuition, and his shrewd judg- 

 ments of his fellow men, he came to possess a wonderful power 

 to fathom the devious ways of the Asiatic mind which make 

 for faithful devotion, or lifelong enmity towards the man who 

 reads or misreads them. 



The knowledge that Ross Tertius gained from the study of 

 the natives was soon called into requisition, for during the 

 closing days of the reign of Ross Secundus trouble broke out 

 among a section of the imported Bantamese coolies. 



A series of law-breakings and disturbances culminated in 

 the particularly brutal murder of a woman at the hands of 

 the ringleader of the Bantam malcontents. It was a time for 

 action, and George Ross' blood was afire to avenge the 

 woman's death, and to restore order and obedience to 

 authority. He begged permission from his father to go in 

 search of the man, that he might execute prompt justice upon 

 him, but Ross Secundus was a man of more judicial instinct, 

 and forbade any sudden and violent form of veno-eance. 

 George Ross promised his father that if he went off into the 

 bush to find the murderer, and to avenge the death of the 



