"It is going better than I had hoped," he said, as we sat in his stateroom that evening. "They brought in about two tons of shell to-day, and the quality is superb--nothing like it has ever been seen in this part of the Pacific. Your canoe had no luck, but the others netted four handsome pearls and a number of small ones for the day. That alone proves that there must be something in von Tesmar's theory. I've seen thousands of black-lipped oysters opened without a pearl. Old Maruia found a beauty to-day, with her usual luck. I gave her a thousand dollars for it, and any jeweler in Paris would jump at a chance to offer twice as much. You are smiling, eh, to think of that funny old woman having a thousand dollars, all at once? Why, in the eyes of her people Maruia is a millionaire! Twenty years of diving have made her the owner of a fine plantation, and one of the prettiest villas on Tahiti. Ah--I almost forgot to show you our first pearls." He leaned over to twirl the knob of the safe, swung open the door, and took from the shelf a small tobacco-tin, which he opened and handed to me. It was lined with cotton and there, lying side by side like tiny eggs in a nest, were four pearls, pale, lustrous, and without a flaw. Three of them were like peas in size and the other was larger than the three together,--I had never seen a pearl of such size and beauty,--shimmering with a soft opalescence in its bed. My uncle took it in his hand, turning it to admire the perfection of its shape. "You won't see a pearl like this five times in a season," he remarked. "There are many larger ones of greater value, but there is nearly always something wrong with them--a flattened spot, a flaw on the surface, a dullness in orient. Though not of great size, this is a really perfect pearl. If I had a mate for it I could ask my own price for the pair! "I wish now that I had brought a few more men," he went on, "but I think we can make out by shutting down the copra-making and putting everyone at work. I am going to put Fatu and Ofai to diving, with a couple of stern-men from the village; they say we can find trees to build two or three more canoes. The others will have to work at cleaning shell, and from now on I'm counting on you and Marama to feed us. Tins are all right in an emergency, but it would be absurd to make ourselves ill on canned stuff in a place swarming with excellent fish. There are eight of us on board, counting the new cook, and I want you to supply us with fish. You can begin to-morrow--I'll give you the small canoe and whatever gear you need." VII SOUTH SEA FISHERMEN