ABSTRACT
Pape-ete is a collection of two or three hundred wooden houses hidden among two or three thousand trees; a place of wooden fences and trellised verandahs, of gardens with big-leaved plants, of long grass-grown streets and quiet-footed pedestrians; here and there a bicycle; carts and shays trot by occasionally; sometimes a smart gig with a French fonctionnaire in it and a white terrier galloping after. Civilisation circulates in Tahiti, so to speak, peripherally, or round the edge, flowing this way and that about the island by the coast road. It is by this road that the tilted post-cart, drawn by a hopeful mule and a despondent mare, carries letters and parcels to Papenoo, and a box of ice for some well-to-do German at Haapape; it is by this road that the fast-trotting wagonette carries American tourists to the house of Tati, the half-caste chief of Papara, and the little caravan of carriages containing the Governor, two secretaries and three interpreters, with native chiefs, galloping outrider, bowls on its progress to Taravao.
