This book is a collection of sketches written on lonely evenings during my voyage; some of them have been published in daily papers, and were so kindly received by the public as to encourage me to issue them in book form. In order to retain the freshness of first impressions, the original form has been but slightly changed, and only so much ethnological detail has been added as will help to an understanding of native life. The book does not pretend to give a scientific description of the people of the New Hebrides; that will appear later; it is meant simply to transmit some of the indelible impressions the traveller was privileged to receive, - impressions both stern and sweet. The author will be amply repaid if he succeeds in giving the reader some slight idea of the charm and the terrors of the islands. He will be proud if his words can convey a vision of the incomparable beauty and peacefulness of the glittering lagoon, and of the sublimity of the virgin forest; if the reader can divine the charm of the native when gay and friendly, and his ferocity when gloomy and hostile.