Do you realise that one-third of the whole population has died?—that is to say, 40,000 have died out of a population of 120,000. And the saddest thing of all is, that the terrible scourge was brought here in an English man-of-war, H.M.S. Dido, in which, last January, Thakombau and his sons returned from Sydney, where they had gone to visit Sir Hercules Robinson, and so prove their implicit confidence in their new friends and protectors. At Sydney, Ratu Joe and Ratu Timothy, the king’s younger sons, took measles of a mild type, as did also two servants; and on the return voyage the old chief was slightly unwell,—so slightly, that the question of quarantine was never even suggested, and on reaching Levuka he was allowed at once to go ashore. Vassals and kindred came from all parts of the group to receive him, and, according to custom, fervently sniffed his hand or his face, thereby, alas! breathing the unsuspected poison. A few days later Mr Layard held a meeting on the Rewa, to which came chiefs from all parts of the interior of Viti Levu, representing the mountain tribes; there were about a thousand people present. To this meeting went some from Levuka, who had already caught the measles, without being as yet unwell. The infection spread, and the seeds of the disease were thus carried by the mountain chiefs to their respective districts, where it rapidly extended, proving fatal to a vast number of the people, and to nearly all the chiefs who had been present at the meeting with the white chief (Mr Layard). Of course it was only natural that they should attribute this to poison or witchcraft, and that the tribes who had only recently accepted Christianity, or were on the eve of doing so, should conclude that this was a Heaven-sent punishment for forsaking the gods of their fathers and giving up their lands to the white men. So they retreated to their mountain strongholds, banished their teachers, returned to heathenism, and openly repudiated the recently accepted British rule. We heard of an instance in which one of the teachers having died, even the Christian villagers deemed it expedient so far to return to their old customs as to bury his wife and children in the same grave with him as a propitiation to the spirit of the murrain. But, as a rule, the Christians stood their ground firmly, and the marvel is that so very few should have relapsed. Among the first victims was a very good man, Ratu Savanatha, one of the most able and intelligent of the chiefs, and who had done all in his power to explain to the Kai Tholos (_i.e._, people of the mountains) the advantages of English rule.