Chapter 1 - Page 2

glance. They were man-eaters. Their faces were
asymmetrical, bestial; their bodies were ugly and ape-like. They
wore nose-rings of clam-shell and turtle-shell, and from the ends
of their noses which were also pierced, projected horns of beads
strung on stiff wire. Their ears were pierced and distended to
accommodate wooden plugs and sticks, pipes, and all manner of
barbaric ornaments. Their faces and bodies were tattooed or
scarred in hideous designs. In their sickness they wore no
clothing, not even loin-cloths, though they retained their shell
armlets, their bead necklaces, and their leather belts, between
which and the skin were thrust naked knives. The bodies of many
were covered with horrible sores. Swarms of flies rose and
settled, or flew back and forth in clouds.

The white man went down the line, dosing each man with medicine.
To some he gave chlorodyne. He was forced to concentrate with all
his will in order to remember which of them could stand
ipecacuanha, and which of them were constitutionally unable to
retain that powerful drug. One who lay dead he ordered to be
carried out. He spoke in the sharp, peremptory manner of a man who
would take no nonsense, and the well men who obeyed his orders
scowled malignantly. One muttered deep in his chest as he took the
corpse by the feet. The white man exploded in speech and action.
It cost him a painful effort, but his arm shot out, landing a back-
hand blow on the black's mouth.

"What name you, Angara?" he shouted. "What for talk 'long you, eh?
I knock seven bells out of you, too much, quick!"

With the automatic swiftness of a wild animal the black gathered
himself to spring. The anger of a wild animal was in his eyes; but
he saw the white man's hand dropping to the pistol in his belt.
The spring was never made. The tensed body relaxed, and the black,
stooping over the corpse, helped carry it out. This time there was
no muttering.

"Swine!" the white man gritted out through his teeth at the whole
breed of Solomon Islanders.

He was very sick, this white man, as sick as the black men who lay
helpless about him, and whom he attended. He never knew, each time
he entered the festering shambles, whether or not he would be able
to complete the round. But he did know in large degree of
certainty that, if he ever fainted there in the midst of the
blacks, those who were able would be at his throat like ravening
wolves.

Part way down the line a man was dying. He gave orders for his
removal as soon as he had breathed his last. A black stuck his
head inside the shed door, saying, -

"Four fella sick too much."

Fresh cases, still able to walk, they clustered about the
spokesman. The white man singled