32 



THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



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iph by Ralph Stock 



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Tli is is 

 Island of 

 text, page 



not Peter discovering lost Tower 

 the Galapagos group, however (see 

 19). 



canal construction. The fever afterward 

 developed into the white plague by reason 

 of the natives' unresisting, if not acqui- 

 escent, nature. And when all were gone, 

 what then ? Chinese. 



The Chinese appear to be the answer 

 to most questions in the South Pacific 

 today. They come ; it costs them but $50 

 to land ; and after that they grow — mon 

 Dien, how they grow ! 



And can nothing be done? A shrug 

 of the shoulders and the offer of a re- 

 filled glass are the answers of the French- 

 man. But a short time now and he per- 

 sonally will be in a position to return to 

 his beloved Paris, or Marseilles, or Brit- 

 tany. 



But we had lately returned from deal- 

 ing with the Boche ; so had our hosts. 

 We drank respectively to the Royal Field 

 Artillery, the Mitrailleuse, the Machine- 

 gun Corps, and the incomparable French 

 Infantry. What of it, if we continue the 

 sport on the morrow, among the wild cat- 

 tle and goats of Nukuhiva? Tomorrow, 

 then, at 5 o'clock. 



OFF ON A HUNT FOR WILD CATTLE AND 

 GOATS 



The schooner, scheduled at daylight to 

 load copra worth $500 a ton, was cheer- 

 fully detained for the trip and loaded to 

 capacity with bottled beer, coughing 

 Marquesans, and a variegated armory of 

 firearms. 



We sailed down a coast that it is a sore 

 temptation to describe and landed by 

 whaleboat on a surf -pounded beach. 

 Thereafter we plodded, crawled, and 

 stumbled over as vicious a country as it 

 is possible to imagine — crumbling shale, 

 razor-edged ledges, and deceptive table- 

 lands of knee-high grass that only served 

 to hide the carpet of keen-edged volcanic 

 rocks beneath. 



And the heat ! But a representative of 

 the incomparable Infantry led the way ; 

 and who would not follow to the death, 

 out of very shame ? At each halting place 

 the elan of this same representative 

 seemed to increase. Sitting cross-legged 

 on a rock in the meagre shade of a scrub 

 tree, he weald discourse on any subject 

 under the sun, while his audience gasped, 

 emptied the perspiration out of their 

 boots, and cursed the cantene (a gigantic 



