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My house or rather the collection of thatched huts which formed the trading station stood quite apart from the native village, but not so far that I could not hear the murmur of voices talking in their deep, hoarse, guttural tongue, and see, moving to and fro on the beach, the figures of women and children sent out to see that the fleet of canoes lying on the beach was safe beyond the reach of the waves which the coming storm would send in sweeping, endless lines across the outer reef to the foot of the coco-palms fringing the low-lying, monotonous shore.
He lit his pipe, and began to pace to and fro on the sandy path under the cool shade of the coco-palms and bread-fruit trees, thinking of an incident of his past life, which, although six long years had passed, neither his subsequent wanderings in many lands, nor his three latter years' monotonously happy and lazy existence with Melanie at Fana 'alu, had yet quite banished from his memory.
Overhead the broad leaves of the coco-palms, towering above the darker green of the surrounding vegetation, drooped languidly to the calm of the coming night, and great crested grey and purple-plumaged pigeons lit with crooning note upon their perches to rest.
But this particular cruise I would not recommend to any one in search of a variety of beautiful scenery, for nearly all of the islands visited are of the one type low-lying sandy atolls, densely verdured with coco-palms, and very monotonous from their sameness of appearance. Their inhabitants, however, are widely different in manners, customs, and general mode of life.
We gradually draw off from the coast, but still the mountain chain known as the Western Ghâts, which extends to the southern extremity of India, is visible. Next morning we leave Goa behind, and at noon have the Laccadive group of islands to starboard. The coast of India is still in sight a belt of sand, over which the surf rolls in from the sea, surmounted by a fringe of coco-palms.
For as the dawn broke there came to the listening ears in the boat the low hum of the surf upon the coral reef; and then, as the rain-cloud dissolved and vanished to leeward, a long line of coco-palms stood up from the sea three miles away, and the bright golden rays of the rising sun shone upon a beach of snow-white sand, between which and the curling breakers that fell upon the barrier reef there lay a belt of pale green water as smooth as a mountain lake.
Now I must explain: Apaian Lagoon is a vast atoll completely enclosed on the eastern and southern sides by a low, narrow strip of land, densely covered with coco-palms, and on the northern and western by a continuous chain of tiny islets connected by the reef.
The houses, nests, were the better word were formed by a most naive adaptation of natural surroundings to natural needs. The curving fronds of the towering coco-palms and panjandrus had been interlaced; and nature did the rest, the gigantic leaves interweaving, blending, over-lapping, meeting in a passionate and successful desire to form a roof, proof alike against sun and rain.
And the thought of this depopulated capital, this protracted thread of annular island with its crest of coco-palms and fringe of breakers, and that tranquil inland sea that stretched before me till it touched the stars, ran in my head for hours with delight. So long as I stayed upon that isle these thoughts were constant.
The rain had ceased, but the fronds of the coco-palms along the lonely shore swayed and beat together with the wind, which still blew strongly, though the sun was now shining brightly upon the white horses of the heaving sea.
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