One gentleman whose opinion I respect, and am so bold as to hope I may in some points modify, will understand the allusion and appreciate my reserve.

About the same time there occurred an incident, upon which I must be more particular.
_A_ was a gentleman who had long been an intimate of Mataafa's, and had recently (upon account, indeed, of the secession to Malie) more or less wholly broken off relations.

To him came one whom I shall call _B_ with a dastardly proposition.

It may have been _B_'s own, in which case he were the more unpardonable; but from the closeness of his intercourse with the chief justice, as well as from the terms used in the interview, men judged otherwise.

It was proposed that _A_ should simulate a renewal of the friendship, decoy Mataafa to a suitable place, and have him there arrested.