HOW. WE PEA GED ak © BINS @ NmiG RUS Ose

WO hours steam south from Singapore out into the famous Straits of Ma-
lacca, or one day’s steam north from the equator, stands Raffles’s Light-
house. Sir Stamford Raffles, the man from whom it took its name, rests in
Westminster Abbey, and a heroic-sized bronze statue of him graces the center
of the beautiful ocean esplanade of Singapore, the city he founded.

It was on the rocky island on which stands this light, that we — the mistress
and I—played Robinson Crusoe or, to be nearer the truth, Swiss Family
Robinson.

It was hard to imagine, I confess, that the beautiful steam launch that
brought us was a wreck; that our half-dozen Chinese servants were members of
the family; that the ton of impedimenta was the flotsam of the sea; that the
Eurasian keeper and his attendants were cannibals; but we closed our eyes to
all disturbing elements, and only remembered that we were alone on a sun-lit
rock in the midst of a sun-lit sea, and that the dreams of our childhood were, to |
some extent, realized.

What live American boy has not had the desire, possibly but half-admitted,
to some day be like his hero, dear old Crusoe, on a tropical island, monarch of
all, hampered by no dictates of society or fashion? I admit my desire, and,
further, that it did not leave me as I grew older.

We had just time to inspect our little island home before the sun went
down, far out in the Indian Ocean.