I awoke from an uneasy nap, about midnight, as I supposed; and, raising myself partly from the mat, became sensible that we were enveloped in utter darkness. Toby lay still asleep, but our late companions had disappeared. The only sound that interrupted the silence of the place was the asthmatic breathing of the old men I have mentioned, who reposed at a little distance from us. Besides them, as well as I could judge, there was no one else in the house.

Apprehensive of some evil, I roused my comrade, and we were engaged in a whispered conference concerning the unexpected withdrawal of the natives when all at once, from the depths of the grove, in full view of us where we lay, shoots of flame were seen to rise, and in a few moments illuminated the surrounding trees, casting, by contrast, into still deeper gloom the darkness around us.

While we continued gazing at this sight, dark figures appeared moving to and fro before the flames; while others, dancing and capering about, looked like so many demons.

Regarding this new phenomenon with no small degree of trepidation, I said to my companion, ‘What can all this mean, Toby?’

‘Oh, nothing,’ replied he; ‘getting the fire ready, I suppose.’

‘Fire!’ exclaimed I, while my heart took to beating like a trip-hammer, ‘what fire?’

‘Why, the fire to cook us, to be sure, what else would the cannibals be kicking up such a row about if it were not for that?’

‘Oh, Toby! have done with your jokes; this is no time for them; something is about to happen, I feel confident.’

‘Jokes, indeed?’ exclaimed Toby indignantly. ‘Did you ever hear me joke? Why, for what do you suppose the devils have been feeding us up in this kind of style during the last three days, unless it were for something that you are too much frightened at to talk about? Look at that Kory-Kory there!—has he not been stuffing you with his confounded mushes, just in the way they treat swine before they kill them? Depend upon it, we will be eaten this blessed night, and there is the fire we shall be roasted by.’

This view of the matter was not at all calculated to allay my apprehensions, and I shuddered when I reflected that we were indeed at the mercy of a tribe of cannibals, and that the dreadful contingency to which Toby had alluded was by no means removed beyond the bounds of possibility.

‘There! I told you so! they are coming for us!’ exclaimed my companion the next moment, as the forms of four of the islanders were seen in bold relief against the illuminated back-ground mounting the pi-pi and approaching towards us.

They came on noiselessly, nay stealthily, and glided along through the gloom that surrounded us as if about to spring upon some object they were fearful of disturbing before they should make sure of it.—Gracious heaven! the horrible reflections which crowded upon me that moment.—A cold sweat stood upon my brow, and spell-bound with terror I awaited my fate!

Suddenly the silence was broken by the well-remembered tones of Mehevi, and at the kindly accents of his voice my fears were immediately dissipated. ‘Tommo, Toby, ki ki!’ (eat). He had waited to address us, until he had assured himself that we were both awake, at which he seemed somewhat surprised.

‘Ki ki! is it?’ said Toby in his gruff tones; ‘Well, cook us first, will you—but what’s this?’ he added, as another savage appeared, bearing before him a large trencher of wood containing some kind of steaming meat, as appeared from the odours it diffused, and which he deposited at the feet of Mehevi. ‘A baked baby, I dare say I but I will have none of it, never mind what it is.—A pretty fool I should make of myself, indeed, waked up here in the middle of the night, stuffing and guzzling, and all to make a fat meal for a parcel of booby-minded cannibals one of these mornings!—No, I see what they are at very plainly,