Note 44 — Chapter XXI

Since the above was written, the home at Nananu has shared in this too common fate. A few months later, the family were awakened by sudden cry of fire, and, as usual with houses of such combustible material, a few moments sufficed to reduce the pleasant Robinson Crusoe home to ashes. The long-treasured piano, books, knick-knacks, all irreplaceable treasures, were gone, and the family left with only the night-dresses in which they stood. Of course it does not take long to rebuild a house in the Fijian style, and perhaps the new house is better than the ramshackle old place; but in so remote a home, new ornaments and books and keepsakes accumulate slowly; “and we cannot buy with gold the old associations.”