My Dear Colvin, — One page out of my picture book I must give you. Fine burning day; half past two P.M. We four begin to rouse up from reparatory slumbers¹, yawn, and groan², get a cup of tea, and miserably³ dress: we have had a party the day before, X’mas Day, with all the boys absent but one, and latterly two; we had cooked all day long, a cold dinner, and lo! at two our guests began to arrive, though dinner was not till six; they were sixteen, and fifteen slept the night and breakfasted. Conceive, then, how unwillingly⁴ we climb on our horses and start off in the hottest part of the afternoon to ride 4 and a half miles, attend a native feast in the gaol⁵, and ride four and a half miles back. But there is no help for it. I am a sort of father of the political prisoners, and have charge d’ames in that riotously⁶ absurd establishment, Apia Gaol. The twenty-three (I think it is) chiefs act as under gaolers. The other day they told the Captain of an attempt to escape. One of the lesser⁷ political prisoners the other day effected a swift capture, while the Captain was trailing about with the warrant; the man came to see what was wanted; came, too, flanked by the former gaoler; my prisoner offers to show him the dark cell, shoves him in, and locks the door. ‘Why do you do that?’ cries the former gaoler. ‘A warrant,’ says he. Finally, the chiefs actually feed the soldiery who watch them!

The gaol is a wretched little building, containing a little room, and three cells, on each side of a central passage; it is surrounded by a fence of corrugated⁸ iron, and shows, over the top of that, only a gable end with the inscription⁹ O le fale puipui. It is on the edge of the

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