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 absence of many weary and dusty summers,—tones filling the mind with even such vague blending of tenderness and of awe as the pious traveler might feel when, returning after long sojourn in a land of strange, grim gods, whose temple pavements may never be trodden by Occidental feet, he hears again the pacific harmonies of some cathedral organ, breaking all about him in waves of golden thunder.)

. . . Then with a joyous shock we bump the ancient wooden wharf,—where groups of the brown island people are already waiting to scrutinize each new face with kindliest curiosity; for the advent of the mail-packet is ever a great and gladsome event. Even the dogs bark merry welcome, and nm to be caressed. A tramway car receives the visitors,—baggage is piled on,—the driver clacks his tongue, —the mule starts,—the dogs rush on in advance to announce our coming.

III In the autumn of the old feudal years, all this sea-girdled land was one quivering splendor of sugar-cane, walled in from besieging tides with impregnable miles of levee. But