self. "People would call me very dishonourable
if they knew; but what can I do? There
is no forcing these things—and no preventing
them."

THE NEW COLONISTS OF NORFOLK
ISLAND.

THE story of the Pitcairn islanders, the
descendants of the mutineers of the Bounty,
is well known. Having so multiplied that
they have outgrown the agricultural resources
of Pitcairn Island, they have lately been
removed at their own request, at the expense
of the British government, to Norfolk Island,
a place hitherto only known as a crowded
convict settlement—a horror of horrors. The
following description is extracted from a
pamphlet published by the Roman Catholic
Bishop Ullathorne, about twenty years ago.
It will be seen that the descendants of Adams
are now planted on a fertile soil under a
genial sun. We have a right to expect
remarkable agricultural and horticultural
results from their industry.

"Norfolk Island is one thousand miles
from Sydney, about twenty-one miles in
circumference, of volcanic origin, and one of the
most beautiful spots in the world.

"Rising abruptly on all sides but one from
the sea, clustering columns of basalt spring
out of the sea, securing at intervals its
endurance with the strong architecture of God.

"That one side presents a low sandy level,
on which is, or was formerly, situated the
penal settlement. It is approachable only by
boats, through a narrow bar in the reef of
coral, which, visible here, invisibly circles the
island.

"The island consists of a series of hills
curiously interfolded, the green ridges rising
one above another until they reach the craggy
sides and crowning summit of Mount Pitt, at
the height of three thousand feet above the
level of the sea.

"The establishment consists of a spacious
quadrangle of buildings for the prisoners, the
military barracks, and a series of offices in
two ranges. A little further beyond, on a
green mound, the mansion of the commandant,
with barred windows, guarded by cannon and
a pacing sentinel.

"Straying some distance along a footpath,
we came upon the cemetery, closed in on
three sides by close, thick, melancholy groves
of tear-dropping manchineel; the fourth is
open to the booming sea. The graves are
numerous; most of the tenants have reached
their last abode by an untimely end. I
myself have witnessed fifteen descents into those
houses of mortality: in every one is a hand
of blood.

"Passing on by a ledge cut in the cliff that
hangs over the resounding shore, we suddenly
turn into an amphitheatre of hills, which
rise all around until they close in a circle of
the blue cloudless heavens above, their sides
being thickly clothed with curious wild
shrubs, wild flowers, and wild vines. Passing
a brawling brook, and long and slowly
ascending, we again reach the open varied
ground: here a tree-crested mound, there a
plantation of pines, and yonder below,
descending into the very bowels of the earth,
and covered with an intricacy of dark foliage,
interluminated with chequers of sun-light,
until beyond it opens a receding vista to the
blue sea. And now the path closes, so that
the sun is almost shut out; whilst giant
creepers shoot, twist, and contort themselves
upon your path; beautiful lories, parrots,
paroquets, and other birds, rich and varied
in plumage, spring up at your approach.

"We next reach a valley of exquisite
beauty, in the middle of which, where the
winding gurgling stream is jagged in its
course, spring up a cluster of some eight
fern-trees, with a clear, black, mossy stem,
from the crown of which shoots out on every
side one long arching fern-leaf.

"Ascending again through the dank forest,
we meet rising on every side, amongst other
strange forest trees, the gigantic pine of
Norfolk Island; which, ascending with a clear
stem of vast circumference some twelve feet,
shoots out a coronal of dark boughs, each in
shape like the feathers of the ostrich indefinably
prolonged, until rising with clear intervals,
horizontal, stage above stage, the green,
pyramid cuts with its point the blue ether at
the height of two hundred feet.

"Through these groves we at length reach
the summit of Mount Pitt. Below us lies a
wondrous scene in a narrow space—rock,
valley, forest, corn-field, islet, alive with
purple, crimson, snow-white birds of land
and sea, in a light of glowing sunshine
framed in the vast expanse of the Pacific
Ocean.

"Descending, we take a new path. After
awhile, emerging from the deep gloom of the
forest, amid glades and openings may be seen
the guava and the lemon, the fern and the
palmetto, rising to the height of twenty-five
feet, and then spreading into a shade of
bright broad green fans.

"Then parasite creepers and climbers rise
up in columns, shoot over arch after arch,
and again descend in every variety of Gothic
fantasy—now form a high, long wall, dense,
impenetrable; then tumble down in a cascade
of green leaves, frothed over with the delicate
white convolvulus.

"Our way at length becomes a long vista
of lemon-trees, forming overhead an arcade
of green, gold, and sunlight. Orange-trees
once crowded the island as thickly, but were
cut down by a former commandant, as too
great a luxury for the convict.

"On the farms, the yellow hulm bends
with the fat of corn; in the gardens, by
the broad-breasted English oak, grows the
delicate cinnamon-tree, the tea, the coffee-shrub,
the sugarcane, the banana, with its
long weeping streamers and creamy fruit,—the