EXPERIENCES OF MR. STALE, 
given forth from the old cracked tumbler lamp. He* 
looked up, and saw that a quantity of thatch had 
been displaced, through which the full moon was 
shining brightly into the room. Not very cheering 
prospect, thinks he, for the setting in of the rainy 
season ; the house must at all eyents be made water- 
tight before the beginning of May, but it will cost a 
lot, far more than the crazy old hut is worth, for it 
is a far way off to the nearest patches of mana grass, 
and I don’t believe the men can possibly carry more 
than two bundles a day, and it will take at least four 
hundred bundles to do it, and it is no us© fitting up 
the cracks in the walls unless the house is thatched ; 
it must be done. When this course of proceeding was 
definitely settled in his own mind, he did what many 
others have done, do, and will do, under somewhat 
similar circumstances — resolved that as the house 
would be under repairs at any rate, and everything 
in a mess, he might as well put up a fire-place and 
chimney, and the very idea of a fire made him quite 
warm and cheerful. How comfortable it would make 
the dreary old room look, in having a red ember 
glow, on a night like this, during the rainy season ; 
it would be invaluable, and keep everything dry ; he 
would even dry his own wet clothes, and not have 
them brought in from the cook-house every morning 
in a damp state, smelling strongly of smoke. His shoes 
also, what an uncomfortable thing it was to put on 
wet shoes in the morning, or to have them brought 
in from the kitchen so dry as to have become 
quite hard and brittle ! So brittle, that in the 
very act of putting them on they cracked and burst ! 
Besides, he was an early riser, and was always 
up long before the hoy, and bad great diffi- 
culty in getting his coffee, so he would have the kettle 
and ®^ff'ee pot brought in at night, at five in the 
morning would blow up the embers in the fire-place, 
and make and drink his own coffee, long before the boy 
was up ; and the best of it all would be, he would be 
sure to have it hot — he would take very good care 
of that. Why, the fire-place would pay its expenses 
in no time, for would he not be able to be out to 
muster the coolies half an hour sooner, and not even 
be under the necessity of going back afterwards to 
the house for his coffee. This would be a great saving 
of work and time to the proprietor, but see also what 
he would save himself ; he would keep that black 
bottle which contained the coffee powder locked up, 
safe out of the clutches of the boy, upon whom the 
tables would now be turned, for he would now have 
to drink master’s leavings, weak, watery and cold. 
What would the boy do ? It migkt perhaps be 
