[Note: this transcription was produced by an automatic OCR engine]

PEN TECOSTE 2 3 I

said, he had never done any wrong. His grief was
so real that I began to pity the man, and thought
he had probably been paying the penalty for the
misdeeds of another recruiter. Mr. I. was just
as emphatic in cursing the bloodthirstiness of the
natives, but while we were going home, he told me
that Mr. N. had kidnapped thirty-four natives at that
very place a year before, so that the behaviour of
the others was quite comprehensible. From that
moment I gave up trying to form an opinion on any
occurrence of the kind without having carefully ex-
amined the accounts of both parties. One can
hardly imagine how facts are distorted here, and what
innocent airs people can put on who are really
criminals. I have heard men deplore, in the most
pathetic language, acts of cruelty to natives, who
themselves had killed natives in cold blood for the
sake of a few pounds. It requires long and intimate
acquaintance with the people to see at all clearly in
these matters, and for a Resident it is quite impossible
not to be deceived unless he has been on the spot
for a year at least.

While waiting at Dip Point for an opportunity to
cross to Pentecoste, I saw the volcano in full activity,
and one day it rained ashes, so that the whole country
was black as if strewn with soot, and the eruptions
shook the house till the windows rattled. I made a
second ascent of the mountain, but had such bad
weather that I saw nothing at all. We came back,
black as chimney—sweeps from the volcanic dust we

had brushed off the bushes. I heard later that the