sixteen, pretty, gentle, and grave, more intelligent than most

Anaho women, and with a fair share of French; his grandchild, a

mite of a creature at the breast. I went up the den one day when

Tari was from home, and found the son making a cotton sack, and

madame suckling mademoiselle. When I had sat down with them on the

floor, the girl began to question me about England; which I tried

to describe, piling the pan and the cocoa shells one upon another

to represent the houses, and explaining, as best I was able, and by

word and gesture, the over-population, the hunger, and the

perpetual toil. 'Pas de cocotiers? pas do popoi?' she asked. I

told her it was too cold, and went through an elaborate

performance, shutting out draughts, and crouching over an imaginary

fire, to make sure she understood. But she understood right well;

remarked it must be bad for the health, and sat a while gravely

reflecting on that picture of unwonted sorrows. I am sure it

roused her pity, for it struck in her another thought always

uppermost in the Marquesan bosom; and she began with a smiling

sadness, and looking on me out of melancholy eyes, to lament the

decease of her own people. 'Ici pas de Kanaques,' said she; and

taking the baby from her breast, she held it out to me with both

her hands. 'Tenez--a little baby like this; then dead. All the

Kanaques die. Then no more.' The smile, and this instancing by

the girl-mother of her own tiny flesh and blood, affected me

strangely; they spoke of so tranquil a despair. Meanwhile the

husband smilingly made his sack; and the unconscious babe struggled

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