CHAPTER XXIII.

Waikato Times, Volume XXIV, Issue 2018, 13 June 1885, Page 5 (Supplement)

CHAPTER XXIII.

The day after the memorable evening on the Spirit's Repose was one of the loveliest the strangers had experienced since they arrived. The Bun shone in a cloudlet sky and the lake xlept, a refreshing but gentle breeze rippling itt waters almost imperceptibly. The climate of ti»i<3 wonderful land was one of its raarvela, yet it was easily explained. While other iglanda ia the Bame latitude would be sweltering in the torrid heat, relieved only by the Janguid breezes, the air in this Happy Valley ,was of a uniform temperature, and even cool and life inspiring. This waa caused by the tremendous blast that rushed ahvays through the gulf which let in the sea. This waa in its passage cooled to almost a frigid temperature. Once inside it spread over the lake and the valley, and waa robbed of its chill whioh tern-

pered the heat of the sun. The thermometer hardly ever varied, and tho season ivas a perpetual spring. Bud, leaf, blossom, and fruit wore to be found on the same tree. ; It needed little discrimination to; iind out that a great chango had taken I' place in Orinora. Her simplicity, which led her to say and do things that could have appeared outre to civilized persons, had vanished : she was shy and silent. That passionate embrace on the Spirit's Eepose had made her a woman, had opened up to he* all that a woman must suffer to enjoy. Yet the IO3S of the happy but tasteless state of innocence in which she had existed was compensated by a full deep joy that otherwise she could never have known. It is a wise saying that tkqpugh aultoring lies the road to happiness. Pleasure would be unknown but for pain, for privation. Orinora's nature had cried out for what it knew not: now it had come, and with it a sense of full and supremo happiness and content that words never can convey. What deep unutterable enjoyment wab the overwhelming love Bhe felt for Herbert. To her he was now more than lite. In him her personality had becomo absorbed ; her whole soul had gone out to him. Never could there have been a love so unselfish, so deep, so utterly free from earthly dross, from impurity, so unconscious of sin. Had Herbert been a man liko Ilarry, it would have been easy to have obtained possession of her body a-j Le had of her soul ; she would have thought no harm of it ; she would have looked upon it as a natural sequence, for she was innocent as our first parents ; she knew not what sin was. Bhe lived in tho first ecstacy of love : that glimpse of Heaven that is vouchsafed to us only for one fleeting moment in life, and then is known no more. This quietness and thought fulness, and for the matter the happiness, appeared also to have fallen upon Aranoah. He spoke little that night or the next morning, and he seemed often lost in thought. His eyea frequently wandered to Orinora and Herbert, and as they did his face was irradiated; and he seemed very happy. The next afternoon he asked Herbert to row him to an islet that was devoted to the growth of flowers — Orinora's gaiden it was called. Fiom this islet every mr.rmng the natives brought bouquets of surpassing loveliness. Orinora did not ask to go with them, though her eyes followed Herbert till he was out of sight, for she h»d an ini-tiactive knowledge of her father's intentk/U. Herbert found the islet a very paradise. Flowers such as he had only seen in the hot houses of great societies or rich men flourished luxuriantly, but all so tastefully trained and arranged that the islet itself resembled a beautiful bouquet. He thought of the floral pictures he fed eeen on canvas, in gardens, and in Imagination, but this far surpassed them. It was like everything else m this wonderful land, a dream, and yet a reality, a wonder, and yet the simple result of one man's brain and will, and other men's hands. When they had wandered through the alloys and parterres, they rested in a pleasant arbor which commanded a now view of the ever charming lake. Here tho natives in charge of the island had placed refreshments, decorated with the choicest flowers. Herbert aoticad these men. One was very old, his hair being white ; the other two quite young and, hKe Paranoa, of giant stature, for the island seemed to produce Auakies. He saw that when they thought their faces were not 3Pen, a sullen gloom or anger clouded them. Harry had.ibeing more penetrating than Herbert, noticed these symptoms in many of the natives long before. Herbert waß impressed with the idea that everything here was lovely and innocent except man. 3 " I cannot help wondering," ho said to Aranoah, while they were discussing the delicious fruits placed before them, " whether these people are happy. Some of them strike me as gloomy and morose. Work ia not natural to them, and your order, system, and industry must be to them unwelcome shackles." " I doubt not," replied Aranoah, but without appearing to bestow particular thought on the matter, " that what you say is fairly correct. I had trouble enough to teach them ; still more trouble to enferce order, system and industry. I would never have succeeded but for the mysterious powers I appear to them to popseas. Still, it is all for their own good as much as mine : though some of them, the idle and sensual, may think different. They never were happier or healthier, never had better food or greater comforts. I found them an idle, debauched, superstitious ridden race, with horrible practices, often starving in the richest land in the world, and I have made them what you see. I havo usod my poAver for their good. Occupation id man's natural condition : without it he becomes worthless. That the old men are not well affected towards me, that they long for the old days of license and tyranny, I know well enough. But they are dying out, and tho young, I think, will be a different race. The third generation will, I fancy, be ultogether superior and habituated to order and industry; and the race will gradually rise to better things : that is if they have a proper head. And it is that which brings me here with you this day." lie fixed his penetrating eyes upon the young man, who at once folt what he meant, and blushed. He almost wished for the disclosure, yet he dreaded it. " Herbert," continued Aranoah, in a gentle, earnest, loving voice, " long ago I lost faith in tho religion of my fathers, because I thought the God who had forsaken me, who had permitted my persecutors to become rich and respected, who allowed all the terrible sufferings and Injustice I h»d seen in tho world, was not a God ; that if he did exist he wag a Demon. I was insensibly led by reading philosophical works to conclude that there was no God at all, that he was a fiction, evolved from the brain of the ignorant darkness — fearing savage in the first instance and afterwards improved by cunning men for their own purposes. And I think I had reason to look upon tiie God raised up by the majority of Chriatians as a convenient fiction, a libel on the real Omnipotent, it such exists — which I will not attempt to deny or to affirm. But I am almost inclined to think now that I have condemned the Almighty because cf the errors of His creatures. The veil seems to lift and I appear to see a great purpose in my sufferings, a greater happiness through them than if I had not suffered at all. But for them I would have never come to this inland and raised its people from their fearful state ; but for them I would not have known that entrancing, ecstatic period I passed with my darling, the mother of Orinora ; but for them I would not have tho life of Borene unclouded happiness I have peacefully lived these many ysars ; but for them I would net now see a far-reaching happiness on this island after my death. You thought it was cruel to be cast for life upon this island : who knows but it is to fulfil the purpose of a Great Power that works ever towards a beneficial end." He paused here, looked out over the lake, and remained for some time in what was evidently a pleasant reverie. " Yes," ho resumed, " I almost feel that ere I die the old faith will return, that I will again believe in the God of my childhood, and die in the hope X will flee Hie face, not in Achernar but in the place He has prepared for those who have passed through tribulation. It is happier to believe, to have faith. I pray flic power may once more be Riven me." Herbert listened to the old man with vivid interest. His tone wa« bo impressive ; his language and manner so taking ; his face so calmly hopeful and joyful ; he seemed like

the sun alter a tempestuous day, sinking in paaco to reot. " Herbert," said Aranoab,^ turning to his companion, " since the day you came hero I have been taken with you. I have grown to admiie you everj hour. I have found in you ail that I desired in man. And all this although your name was associated with the terrible past, though your father was one of my bitterest enomies. So much have I believed in you that I have trusted you] with my greatest treasure, with her who i 3 more than life to me — Orinora — my trust has not been betrayed. You have won her love from the first moment ; she is now yours as no woman ever was man's. Complete her happiness, mine, the islands. Take her aa your wife, and raise up a race who will bo able to take our places, to guide these men, and make this island a Paradise restored." Herbert could not answer Aranoah, whose face wad glowing wtth rapture. Sweet as the picture was it had its sombre tints. Lack into hi 3 mind rushed the image of the darling who was far away, whom he had promised to love through life, who might now be pining to death for loss of him. How could ho cast her oat of his heart, and give possession of himself to another 1 Would it not be the unworthiest reason ? " I know," continued Aranoah, who divined his thoughts, for ho had passed through tho same ordeal, " what you think, how you suffer. You have loft behind your first love ; you think it would be treason to take to your bosom another, even though you do love her. But bring your reason to bear ; reflect upon the position. You are in the dilemma in which I found myself years ago. Mino was even more diflicult. You left behind you a betrothed bride ; I left a wife. But what was Itodo ? Was I to pass my life in widowhood, was I to reject the love that had come to me, when my own love was for ever lost ? Such would not be the command of the Creator. I felt that when years would pass and I would not appear, my wife's sorrow would become a remembrance, sweet, but only a memory, and that she might take another partner who could blame her ? And I knew I had a duty to make the darling who had surrendered her heart to me happy, to raise up a race that would continue my works. The same obligation is upon you. The hand of God, the God in which you believe, is in this ; do not resist his fiat. Think of your happiness, possessed of the loveliest and best of womankind, whom it will be your delightful task to instruct and lead ; provided with the necessary occupation to occupy your mind and exercise your faculties in governing and w«rking this island. Think of the halcyon days that will pass in the great work of founding a nation. You will take up the work I have left undone ; you will introduce knowledge and religion. I worked in the garden of nature and transformed her face ; you will work in the garden of man and create a people. Think, 100, of what will happen if you refuse. Orinora will die, and with her the hope of a bother race. You will live in misery, and at last probahly end your life in despair. Weigh everything well, Herbert, and do not answer until you have reasoned it all out. But, oh, my boy, give us hope, give us life ; for all now depends upon you. Prove that it was the hand of an Overruling Providence that guided you here, not the mere chance of the winds and waves, and I will die in the faith of my fathers, confident that there does exist a just (rod, not the creature men for their own purposes have imagined ; not the Demon of Superstition and self-interest, but the Just, the Merciful, the Omniscient, and Omnipresent, the Father of the human raoe. Herbert turned away, utterly powerless to speak, his breast the Bcene of a thousand conflicts. Was he to surrender the bright world which held so much that was dear to him, wife, woalth, honor, fame, civilisation, and to become a barbarioua island king? Were all his youthful visions to vanish for ever ? And yet tho picture that was drawn of this ideal life, of this sphere of quiet but beneficent usefulness, of the happiness that a union with Orinora must produce, had a powerful effeat. He did love Orinora ; when he thought of parting with faer his heart was rent in twain. Never was man so dividod in himself. And then in favour of this proposition, which had been in his mind for days, came the unswerable argument that it was inevitable, that the world and Aliqe were lost to him for ever ; that nothing remained but to accept the fate stretched out. The kind but searching oyea of Aranoah followed the workings of Herbert's face, and his keen intellect, sharpened by experience, understood the terrible but unavailing struggle. He felt he bfcd aohieved enough. " Come, my son," he said, rising ; " we have said sufficient for the present. Viprk the matter out in your own mind : I feel you will only come to one decision." As they rowed away from the island Herbert looked back for a moment, and received an unpleasant start, lie caught tho old guardian looking at them through a camellia bush. Herbert did not that night forget the Satanic expression of that dark, forbidding face. She was waiting for them on the pier in the golden glory of the sunset, lovely as an angel. Herbert was not proof against that loving, pleading, passionate face. In the presence of her father he took her to his heart and kissed her. The cup of her joy was full 1