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<pre>
The Project Gutenberg eBook, In the South Seas, by Robert Louis Stevenson
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
Title: In the South Seas
Author: Robert Louis Stevenson
Release Date: November 16, 2012 [eBook #464]
[This file was first posted on January 23, 1996]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)
***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK IN THE SOUTH SEAS***
</pre>
<p>Transcribed from the 1908 Chatto & Windus edition by David
Price, email ccx074@pglaf.org</p>
<h1>IN THE SOUTH SEAS</h1>
<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">BEING AN
ACCOUNT OF EXPERIENCES AND</span><br />
<span class="GutSmall">OBSERVATIONS IN THE MARQUESAS,
PAUMOTUS</span><br />
<span class="GutSmall">AND GILBERT ISLANDS IN THE COURSE
OF</span><br />
<span class="GutSmall">TWO CRUSES, ON THE YACHT
‘CASCO’ (1888)</span><br />
<span class="GutSmall">AND THE SCHOONER ‘EQUATOR’
(1889)</span></p>
<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">BY</span><br
/>
ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON</p>
<p style="text-align: center">
<a href="images/p0b.jpg">
<img alt=
"Decorative graphic"
title=
"Decorative graphic"
src="images/p0s.jpg" />
</a></p>
<p style="text-align: center">FINE-PAPER EDITION</p>
<div class="gapspace"> </div>
<p style="text-align: center">LONDON<br />
CHATTO & WINDUS<br />
1908</p>
<div class="gapspace"> </div>
<p style="text-align: center"><i>All rights resverved</i></p>
<h2>CONTENTS</h2>
<table>
<tr>
<td colspan="2"><p style="text-align: center">PART 1: THE
MARQUESAS</p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">CHAPTER</span></p>
</td>
<td><p> </p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">I.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">AN ISLAND LANDFALL</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">II.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">MAKING FRIENDS</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">III.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">THE MAROON</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">IV.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">DEATH</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">V.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">DEPOPULATION</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">VI.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">CHIEFS AND TAPUS</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">VII.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">HATIHEU</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">VIII.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">THE PORT OF ENTRY</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">IX.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">THE HOUSE OF TEMOANA</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">X.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">A PORTRAIT AND A STORY</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">XI.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">LONG-PIG—A CANNIBAL HIGH
PLACE</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">XII.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">THE STORY OF A
PLANTATION</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">XIII.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">CHARACTERS</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">XIV.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">IN A CANNIBAL VALLEY</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">XV.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">THE TWO CHIEFS OF ATUONA</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td colspan="2"><p style="text-align: center">PART II: THE
PAUMOTUS</p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">I.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">THE DANGEROUS
ARCHIPELAGO—ATOLLS AT A DISTANCE</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">II.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">FAKARAVA: AN ATOLL AT
HAND</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">III.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">A HOUSE TO LET IN A LOW
ISLAND</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">IV.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">TRAITS AND SECTS IN THE
PAUMOTUS</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">V.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">A PAUMOTUAN FUNERAL</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">VI.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">GRAVEYARD STORIES</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td colspan="2"><p style="text-align: center">PART III: THE
GILBERTS</p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">I.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">BUTARITARI</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">II.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">THE FOUR BROTHERS</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">III.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">AROUND OUR HOUSE</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">IV.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">A TALE OF A TAPU</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">V.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">A TALE OF A TAPU—</span><span
class="GutSmall"><i>continued</i></span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">VI.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">THE FIVE DAYS’
FESTIVAL</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">VII.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">HUSBAND AND WIFE</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td colspan="2"><p style="text-align: center">PART IV: THE
GILBERTS—APEMAMA</p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">I.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">THE KING OF APEMAMA: THE ROYAL
TRADER</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">II.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">THE KING OF APEMAMA: FOUNDATION OF
EQUATOR TOWN</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">III.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">THE KING OF APEMAMA: THE PALACE OF
MANY WOMEN</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">IV.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">THE KING OF APEMAMA: EQUATOR TOWN
AND THE PALACE</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">V.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">KING AND COMMONS</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">VI.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">THE KING OF APEMAMA:
DEVIL-WORK</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
class="GutSmall">VII.</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">THE KING OF APEMAMA</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
<h2>PART 1: THE MARQUESAS</h2>
<h3>CHAPTER I—AN ISLAND LANDFALL</h3>
<p>For nearly ten years my health had been declining; and for
some while before I set forth upon my voyage, I believed I was
come to the afterpiece of life, and had only the nurse and
undertaker to expect. It was suggested that I should try
the South Seas; and I was not unwilling to visit like a ghost,
and be carried like a bale, among scenes that had attracted me in
youth and health. I chartered accordingly Dr.
Merrit’s schooner yacht, the <i>Casco</i>, seventy-four
tons register; sailed from San Francisco towards the end of June
1888, visited the eastern islands, and was left early the next
year at Honolulu. Hence, lacking courage to return to my
old life of the house and sick-room, I set forth to leeward in a
trading schooner, the <i>Equator</i>, of a little over seventy
tons, spent four months among the atolls (low coral islands) of
the Gilbert group, and reached Samoa towards the close of
’89. By that time gratitude and habit were beginning
to attach me to the islands; I had gained a competency of
strength; I had made friends; I had learned new interests; the
time of my voyages had passed like days in fairyland; and I
decided to remain. I began to prepare these pages at sea,
on a third cruise, in the trading steamer <i>Janet
Nicoll</i>. If more days are granted me, they shall be
passed where I have found life most pleasant and man most
interesting; the axes of my black boys are already clearing the
foundations of my future house; and I must learn to address
readers from the uttermost parts of the sea.</p>
<p>That I should thus have reversed the verdict of Lord
Tennyson’s hero is less eccentric than appears. Few
men who come to the islands leave them; they grow grey where they
alighted; the palm shades and the trade-wind fans them till they
die, perhaps cherishing to the last the fancy of a visit home,
which is rarely made, more rarely enjoyed, and yet more rarely
repeated. No part of the world exerts the same attractive
power upon the visitor, and the task before me is to communicate
to fireside travellers some sense of its seduction, and to
describe the life, at sea and ashore, of many hundred thousand
persons, some of our own blood and language, all our
contemporaries, and yet as remote in thought and habit as Rob Roy
or Barbarossa, the Apostles or the Cæsars.</p>
<p>The first experience can never be repeated. The first
love, the first sunrise, the first South Sea island, are memories
apart and touched a virginity of sense. On the 28th of July
1888 the moon was an hour down by four in the morning. In
the east a radiating centre of brightness told of the day; and
beneath, on the skyline, the morning bank was already building,
black as ink. We have all read of the swiftness of the
day’s coming and departure in low latitudes; it is a point
on which the scientific and sentimental tourist are at one, and
has inspired some tasteful poetry. The period certainly
varies with the season; but here is one case exactly noted.
Although the dawn was thus preparing by four, the sun was not up
till six; and it was half-past five before we could distinguish
our expected islands from the clouds on the horizon. Eight
degrees south, and the day two hours a-coming. The interval
was passed on deck in the silence of expectation, the customary
thrill of landfall heightened by the strangeness of the shores
that we were then approaching. Slowly they took shape in
the attenuating darkness. Ua-huna, piling up to a truncated
summit, appeared the first upon the starboard bow; almost abeam
arose our destination, Nuka-hiva, whelmed in cloud; and betwixt
and to the southward, the first rays of the sun displayed the
needles of Ua-pu. These pricked about the line of the
horizon; like the pinnacles of some ornate and monstrous church,
they stood there, in the sparkling brightness of the morning, the
fit signboard of a world of wonders.</p>
<p>Not one soul aboard the <i>Casco</i> had set foot upon the
islands, or knew, except by accident, one word of any of the
island tongues; and it was with something perhaps of the same
anxious pleasure as thrilled the bosom of discoverers that we
drew near these problematic shores. The land heaved up in
peaks and rising vales; it fell in cliffs and buttresses; its
colour ran through fifty modulations in a scale of pearl and rose
and olive; and it was crowned above by opalescent clouds.
The suffusion of vague hues deceived the eye; the shadows of
clouds were confounded with the articulations of the mountains;
and the isle and its unsubstantial canopy rose and shimmered
before us like a single mass. There was no beacon, no smoke
of towns to be expected, no plying pilot. Somewhere, in
that pale phantasmagoria of cliff and cloud, our haven lay
concealed; and somewhere to the east of it—the only
sea-mark given—a certain headland, known indifferently as
Cape Adam and Eve, or Cape Jack and Jane, and distinguished by
two colossal figures, the gross statuary of nature. These
we were to find; for these we craned and stared, focused glasses,
and wrangled over charts; and the sun was overhead and the land
close ahead before we found them. To a ship approaching,
like the <i>Casco</i>, from the north, they proved indeed the
least conspicuous features of a striking coast; the surf flying
high above its base; strange, austere, and feathered mountains
rising behind; and Jack and Jane, or Adam and Eve, impending like
a pair of warts above the breakers.</p>
<p>Thence we bore away along shore. On our port beam we
might hear the explosions of the surf; a few birds flew fishing
under the prow; there was no other sound or mark of life, whether
of man or beast, in all that quarter of the island. Winged
by her own impetus and the dying breeze, the <i>Casco</i> skimmed
under cliffs, opened out a cove, showed us a beach and some green
trees, and flitted by again, bowing to the swell. The
trees, from our distance, might have been hazel; the beach might
have been in Europe; the mountain forms behind modelled in little
from the Alps, and the forest which clustered on their ramparts a
growth no more considerable than our Scottish heath. Again
the cliff yawned, but now with a deeper entry; and the
<i>Casco</i>, hauling her wind, began to slide into the bay of
Anaho. The cocoa-palm, that giraffe of vegetables, so
graceful, so ungainly, to the European eye so foreign, was to be
seen crowding on the beach, and climbing and fringing the steep
sides of mountains. Rude and bare hills embraced the inlet
upon either hand; it was enclosed to the landward by a bulk of
shattered mountains. In every crevice of that barrier the
forest harboured, roosting and nestling there like birds about a
ruin; and far above, it greened and roughened the razor edges of
the summit.</p>
<p>Under the eastern shore, our schooner, now bereft of any
breeze, continued to creep in: the smart creature, when once
under way, appearing motive in herself. From close aboard
arose the bleating of young lambs; a bird sang in the hillside;
the scent of the land and of a hundred fruits or flowers flowed
forth to meet us; and, presently, a house or two appeared,
standing high upon the ankles of the hills, and one of these
surrounded with what seemed a garden. These conspicuous
habitations, that patch of culture, had we but known it, were a
mark of the passage of whites; and we might have approached a
hundred islands and not found their parallel. It was longer
ere we spied the native village, standing (in the universal
fashion) close upon a curve of beach, close under a grove of
palms; the sea in front growling and whitening on a concave arc
of reef. For the cocoa-tree and the island man are both
lovers and neighbours of the surf. ‘The coral waxes,
the palm grows, but man departs,’ says the sad Tahitian
proverb; but they are all three, so long as they endure,
co-haunters of the beach. The mark of anchorage was a
blow-hole in the rocks, near the south-easterly corner of the
bay. Punctually to our use, the blow-hole spouted; the
schooner turned upon her heel; the anchor plunged. It was a
small sound, a great event; my soul went down with these moorings
whence no windlass may extract nor any diver fish it up; and I,
and some part of my ship’s company, were from that hour the
bondslaves of the isles of Vivien.</p>
<p>Before yet the anchor plunged a canoe was already paddling
from the hamlet. It contained two men: one white, one brown
and tattooed across the face with bands of blue, both in
immaculate white European clothes: the resident trader, Mr.
Regler, and the native chief, Taipi-Kikino. ‘Captain,
is it permitted to come on board?’ were the first words we
heard among the islands. Canoe followed canoe till the ship
swarmed with stalwart, six-foot men in every stage of undress;
some in a shirt, some in a loin-cloth, one in a handkerchief
imperfectly adjusted; some, and these the more considerable,
tattooed from head to foot in awful patterns; some barbarous and
knived; one, who sticks in my memory as something bestial,
squatting on his hams in a canoe, sucking an orange and spitting
it out again to alternate sides with ape-like vivacity—all
talking, and we could not understand one word; all trying to
trade with us who had no thought of trading, or offering us
island curios at prices palpably absurd. There was no word
of welcome; no show of civility; no hand extended save that of
the chief and Mr. Regler. As we still continued to refuse
the proffered articles, complaint ran high and rude; and one, the
jester of the party, railed upon our meanness amid jeering
laughter. Amongst other angry
pleasantries—‘Here is a mighty fine ship,’ said
he, ‘to have no money on board!’ I own I was
inspired with sensible repugnance; even with alarm. The
ship was manifestly in their power; we had women on board; I knew
nothing of my guests beyond the fact that they were cannibals;
the Directory (my only guide) was full of timid cautions; and as
for the trader, whose presence might else have reassured me, were
not whites in the Pacific the usual instigators and accomplices
of native outrage? When he reads this confession, our kind
friend, Mr. Regler, can afford to smile.</p>
<p>Later in the day, as I sat writing up my journal, the cabin
was filled from end to end with Marquesans: three brown-skinned
generations, squatted cross-legged upon the floor, and regarding
me in silence with embarrassing eyes. The eyes of all
Polynesians are large, luminous, and melting; they are like the
eyes of animals and some Italians. A kind of despair came
over me, to sit there helpless under all these staring orbs, and
be thus blocked in a corner of my cabin by this speechless crowd:
and a kind of rage to think they were beyond the reach of
articulate communication, like furred animals, or folk born deaf,
or the dwellers of some alien planet.</p>
<p>To cross the Channel is, for a boy of twelve, to change
heavens; to cross the Atlantic, for a man of twenty-four, is
hardly to modify his diet. But I was now escaped out of the
shadow of the Roman empire, under whose toppling monuments we
were all cradled, whose laws and letters are on every hand of us,
constraining and preventing. I was now to see what men
might be whose fathers had never studied Virgil, had never been
conquered by Cæsar, and never been ruled by the wisdom of
Gaius or Papinian. By the same step I had journeyed forth
out of that comfortable zone of kindred languages, where the
curse of Babel is so easy to be remedied; and my new
fellow-creatures sat before me dumb like images. Methought,
in my travels, all human relation was to be excluded; and when I
returned home (for in those days I still projected my return) I
should have but dipped into a picture-book without a text.
Nay, and I even questioned if my travels should be much
prolonged; perhaps they were destined to a speedy end; perhaps my
subsequent friend, Kauanui, whom I remarked there, sitting silent
with the rest, for a man of some authority, might leap from his
hams with an ear-splitting signal, the ship be carried at a rush,
and the ship’s company butchered for the table.</p>
<p>There could be nothing more natural than these apprehensions,
nor anything more groundless. In my experience of the
islands, I had never again so menacing a reception; were I to
meet with such to-day, I should be more alarmed and tenfold more
surprised. The majority of Polynesians are easy folk to get
in touch with, frank, fond of notice, greedy of the least
affection, like amiable, fawning dogs; and even with the
Marquesans, so recently and so imperfectly redeemed from a
blood-boltered barbarism, all were to become our intimates, and
one, at least, was to mourn sincerely our departure.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER II—MAKING FRIENDS</h3>
<p>The impediment of tongues was one that I particularly
over-estimated. The languages of Polynesia are easy to
smatter, though hard to speak with elegance. And they are
extremely similar, so that a person who has a tincture of one or
two may risk, not without hope, an attempt upon the others.</p>
<p>And again, not only is Polynesian easy to smatter, but
interpreters abound. Missionaries, traders, and broken
white folk living on the bounty of the natives, are to be found
in almost every isle and hamlet; and even where these are
unserviceable, the natives themselves have often scraped up a
little English, and in the French zone (though far less commonly)
a little French-English, or an efficient pidgin, what is called
to the westward ‘Beach-la-Mar,’ comes easy to the
Polynesian; it is now taught, besides, in the schools of Hawaii;
and from the multiplicity of British ships, and the nearness of
the States on the one hand and the colonies on the other, it may
be called, and will almost certainly become, the tongue of the
Pacific. I will instance a few examples. I met in
Majuro a Marshall Island boy who spoke excellent English; this he
had learned in the German firm in Jaluit, yet did not speak one
word of German. I heard from a gendarme who had taught
school in Rapa-iti that while the children had the utmost
difficulty or reluctance to learn French, they picked up English
on the wayside, and as if by accident. On one of the most
out-of-the-way atolls in the Carolines, my friend Mr. Benjamin
Hird was amazed to find the lads playing cricket on the beach and
talking English; and it was in English that the crew of the
<i>Janet Nicoll</i>, a set of black boys from different
Melanesian islands, communicated with other natives throughout
the cruise, transmitted orders, and sometimes jested together on
the fore-hatch. But what struck me perhaps most of all was
a word I heard on the verandah of the Tribunal at Noumea. A
case had just been heard—a trial for infanticide against an
ape-like native woman; and the audience were smoking cigarettes
as they awaited the verdict. An anxious, amiable French
lady, not far from tears, was eager for acquittal, and declared
she would engage the prisoner to be her children’s
nurse. The bystanders exclaimed at the proposal; the woman
was a savage, said they, and spoke no language.
‘<i>Mais</i>, <i>vous savez</i>,’ objected the fair
sentimentalist; ‘<i>ils apprennent si vite
l’anglais</i>!’</p>
<p>But to be able to speak to people is not all. And in the
first stage of my relations with natives I was helped by two
things. To begin with, I was the show-man of the
<i>Casco</i>. She, her fine lines, tall spars, and snowy
decks, the crimson fittings of the saloon, and the white, the
gilt, and the repeating mirrors of the tiny cabin, brought us a
hundred visitors. The men fathomed out her dimensions with
their arms, as their fathers fathomed out the ships of Cook; the
women declared the cabins more lovely than a church; bouncing
Junos were never weary of sitting in the chairs and contemplating
in the glass their own bland images; and I have seen one lady
strip up her dress, and, with cries of wonder and delight, rub
herself bare-breeched upon the velvet cushions. Biscuit,
jam, and syrup was the entertainment; and, as in European
parlours, the photograph album went the round. This sober
gallery, their everyday costumes and physiognomies, had become
transformed, in three weeks’ sailing, into things wonderful
and rich and foreign; alien faces, barbaric dresses, they were
now beheld and fingered, in the swerving cabin, with innocent
excitement and surprise. Her Majesty was often recognised,
and I have seen French subjects kiss her photograph; Captain
Speedy—in an Abyssinian war-dress, supposed to be the
uniform of the British army—met with much acceptance; and
the effigies of Mr. Andrew Lang were admired in the
Marquesas. There is the place for him to go when he shall
be weary of Middlesex and Homer.</p>
<p>It was perhaps yet more important that I had enjoyed in my
youth some knowledge of our Scots folk of the Highlands and the
Islands. Not much beyond a century has passed since these
were in the same convulsive and transitionary state as the
Marquesans of to-day. In both cases an alien authority
enforced, the clans disarmed, the chiefs deposed, new customs
introduced, and chiefly that fashion of regarding money as the
means and object of existence. The commercial age, in each,
succeeding at a bound to an age of war abroad and patriarchal
communism at home. In one the cherished practice of
tattooing, in the other a cherished costume, proscribed. In
each a main luxury cut off: beef, driven under cloud of night
from Lowland pastures, denied to the meat-loving Highlander;
long-pig, pirated from the next village, to the man-eating
Kanaka. The grumbling, the secret ferment, the fears and
resentments, the alarms and sudden councils of Marquesan chiefs,
reminded me continually of the days of Lovat and Struan.
Hospitality, tact, natural fine manners, and a touchy punctilio,
are common to both races: common to both tongues the trick of
dropping medial consonants. Here is a table of two
widespread Polynesian words:—</p>
<table>
<tr>
<td><p> </p>
</td>
<td><p style="text-align: center"><i>House</i>.</p>
</td>
<td><p style="text-align: center"><i>Love</i>. <a
name="citation12"></a><a href="#footnote12"
class="citation">[12]</a></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p>Tahitian</p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">FARE</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">AROHA</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p>New Zealand</p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">WHARE</span></p>
</td>
<td><p> </p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p>Samoan</p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">FALE</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">TALOFA</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p>Manihiki</p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">FALE</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">ALOHA</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p>Hawaiian</p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">HALE</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">ALOHA</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><p>Marquesan</p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">HA’E</span></p>
</td>
<td><p><span class="GutSmall">KAOHA</span></p>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
<p>The elision of medial consonants, so marked in these Marquesan
instances, is no less common both in Gaelic and the Lowland
Scots. Stranger still, that prevalent Polynesian sound, the
so-called catch, written with an apostrophe, and often or always
the gravestone of a perished consonant, is to be heard in
Scotland to this day. When a Scot pronounces water, better,
or bottle—<i>wa’er</i>, <i>be’er</i>, or
<i>bo’le</i>—the sound is precisely that of the
catch; and I think we may go beyond, and say, that if such a
population could be isolated, and this mispronunciation should
become the rule, it might prove the first stage of transition
from <i>t</i> to <i>k</i>, which is the disease of Polynesian
languages. The tendency of the Marquesans, however, is to
urge against consonants, or at least on the very common letter
<i>l</i>, a war of mere extermination. A hiatus is
agreeable to any Polynesian ear; the ear even of the stranger
soon grows used to these barbaric voids; but only in the
Marquesan will you find such names as <i>Haaii</i> and
<i>Paaaeua</i>, when each individual vowel must be separately
uttered.</p>
<p>These points of similarity between a South Sea people and some
of my own folk at home ran much in my head in the islands; and
not only inclined me to view my fresh acquaintances with favour,
but continually modified my judgment. A polite Englishman
comes to-day to the Marquesans and is amazed to find the men
tattooed; polite Italians came not long ago to England and found
our fathers stained with woad; and when I paid the return visit
as a little boy, I was highly diverted with the backwardness of
Italy: so insecure, so much a matter of the day and hour, is the
pre-eminence of race. It was so that I hit upon a means of
communication which I recommend to travellers. When I
desired any detail of savage custom, or of superstitious belief,
I cast back in the story of my fathers, and fished for what I
wanted with some trait of equal barbarism: Michael Scott, Lord
Derwentwater’s head, the second-sight, the Water
Kelpie,—each of these I have found to be a killing bait;
the black bull’s head of Stirling procured me the legend of
<i>Rahero</i>; and what I knew of the Cluny Macphersons, or the
Appin Stewarts, enabled me to learn, and helped me to understand,
about the <i>Tevas</i> of Tahiti. The native was no longer
ashamed, his sense of kinship grew warmer, and his lips were
opened. It is this sense of kinship that the traveller must
rouse and share; or he had better content himself with travels
from the blue bed to the brown. And the presence of one
Cockney titterer will cause a whole party to walk in clouds of
darkness.</p>
<p>The hamlet of Anaho stands on a margin of flat land between
the west of the beach and the spring of the impending
mountains. A grove of palms, perpetually ruffling its green
fans, carpets it (as for a triumph) with fallen branches, and
shades it like an arbour. A road runs from end to end of
the covert among beds of flowers, the milliner’s shop of
the community; and here and there, in the grateful twilight, in
an air filled with a diversity of scents, and still within
hearing of the surf upon the reef, the native houses stand in
scattered neighbourhood. The same word, as we have seen,
represents in many tongues of Polynesia, with scarce a shade of
difference, the abode of man. But although the word be the
same, the structure itself continually varies; and the Marquesan,
among the most backward and barbarous of islanders, is yet the
most commodiously lodged. The grass huts of Hawaii, the
birdcage houses of Tahiti, or the open shed, with the crazy
Venetian blinds, of the polite Samoan—none of these can be
compared with the Marquesan <i>paepae-hae</i>, or dwelling
platform. The paepae is an oblong terrace built without
cement or black volcanic stone, from twenty to fifty feet in
length, raised from four to eight feet from the earth, and
accessible by a broad stair. Along the back of this, and
coming to about half its width, runs the open front of the house,
like a covered gallery: the interior sometimes neat and almost
elegant in its bareness, the sleeping space divided off by an
endlong coaming, some bright raiment perhaps hanging from a nail,
and a lamp and one of White’s sewing-machines the only
marks of civilization. On the outside, at one end of the
terrace, burns the cooking-fire under a shed; at the other there
is perhaps a pen for pigs; the remainder is the evening lounge
and <i>al fresco</i> banquet-hall of the inhabitants. To
some houses water is brought down the mountains in bamboo pipes,
perforated for the sake of sweetness. With the Highland
comparison in my mind, I was struck to remember the sluttish
mounds of turf and stone in which I have sat and been entertained
in the Hebrides and the North Islands. Two things, I
suppose, explain the contrast. In Scotland wood is rare,
and with materials so rude as turf and stone the very hope of
neatness is excluded. And in Scotland it is cold.
Shelter and a hearth are needs so pressing that a man looks not
beyond; he is out all day after a bare bellyful, and at night
when he saith, ‘Aha, it is warm!’ he has not appetite
for more. Or if for something else, then something higher;
a fine school of poetry and song arose in these rough shelters,
and an air like ‘<i>Lochaber no more</i>’ is an
evidence of refinement more convincing, as well as more
imperishable, than a palace.</p>
<p>To one such dwelling platform a considerable troop of
relatives and dependants resort. In the hour of the dusk,
when the fire blazes, and the scent of the cooked breadfruit
fills the air, and perhaps the lamp glints already between the
pillars and the house, you shall behold them silently assemble to
this meal, men, women, and children; and the dogs and pigs frisk
together up the terrace stairway, switching rival tails.
The strangers from the ship were soon equally welcome: welcome to
dip their fingers in the wooden dish, to drink cocoanuts, to
share the circulating pipe, and to hear and hold high debate
about the misdeeds of the French, the Panama Canal, or the
geographical position of San Francisco and New Yo’ko.
In a Highland hamlet, quite out of reach of any tourist, I have
met the same plain and dignified hospitality.</p>
<p>I have mentioned two facts—the distasteful behaviour of
our earliest visitors, and the case of the lady who rubbed
herself upon the cushions—which would give a very false
opinion of Marquesan manners. The great majority of
Polynesians are excellently mannered; but the Marquesan stands
apart, annoying and attractive, wild, shy, and refined. If
you make him a present he affects to forget it, and it must be
offered him again at his going: a pretty formality I have found
nowhere else. A hint will get rid of any one or any number;
they are so fiercely proud and modest; while many of the more
lovable but blunter islanders crowd upon a stranger, and can be
no more driven off than flies. A slight or an insult the
Marquesan seems never to forget. I was one day talking by
the wayside with my friend Hoka, when I perceived his eyes
suddenly to flash and his stature to swell. A white
horseman was coming down the mountain, and as he passed, and
while he paused to exchange salutations with myself, Hoka was
still staring and ruffling like a gamecock. It was a
Corsican who had years before called him <i>cochon
sauvage—coçon chauvage</i>, as Hoka mispronounced
it. With people so nice and so touchy, it was scarce to be
supposed that our company of greenhorns should not blunder into
offences. Hoka, on one of his visits, fell suddenly in a
brooding silence, and presently after left the ship with cold
formality. When he took me back into favour, he adroitly
and pointedly explained the nature of my offence: I had asked him
to sell cocoa-nuts; and in Hoka’s view articles of food
were things that a gentleman should give, not sell; or at least
that he should not sell to any friend. On another occasion
I gave my boat’s crew a luncheon of chocolate and
biscuits. I had sinned, I could never learn how, against
some point of observance; and though I was drily thanked, my
offerings were left upon the beach. But our worst mistake
was a slight we put on Toma, Hoka’s adoptive father, and in
his own eyes the rightful chief of Anaho. In the first
place, we did not call upon him, as perhaps we should, in his
fine new European house, the only one in the hamlet. In the
second, when we came ashore upon a visit to his rival,
Taipi-Kikino, it was Toma whom we saw standing at the head of the
beach, a magnificent figure of a man, magnificently tattooed; and
it was of Toma that we asked our question: ‘Where is the
chief?’ ‘What chief?’ cried Toma, and
turned his back on the blasphemers. Nor did he forgive
us. Hoka came and went with us daily; but, alone I believe
of all the countryside, neither Toma nor his wife set foot on
board the <i>Casco</i>. The temptation resisted it is hard
for a European to compute. The flying city of Laputa moored
for a fortnight in St. James’s Park affords but a pale
figure of the <i>Casco</i> anchored before Anaho; for the
Londoner has still his change of pleasures, but the Marquesan
passes to his grave through an unbroken uniformity of days.</p>
<p>On the afternoon before it was intended we should sail, a
valedictory party came on board: nine of our particular friends
equipped with gifts and dressed as for a festival. Hoka,
the chief dancer and singer, the greatest dandy of Anaho, and one
of the handsomest young fellows in the world-sullen, showy,
dramatic, light as a feather and strong as an ox—it would
have been hard, on that occasion, to recognise, as he sat there
stooped and silent, his face heavy and grey. It was strange
to see the lad so much affected; stranger still to recognise in
his last gift one of the curios we had refused on the first day,
and to know our friend, so gaily dressed, so plainly moved at our
departure, for one of the half-naked crew that had besieged and
insulted us on our arrival: strangest of all, perhaps, to find,
in that carved handle of a fan, the last of those curiosities of
the first day which had now all been given to us by their
possessors—their chief merchandise, for which they had
sought to ransom us as long as we were strangers, which they
pressed on us for nothing as soon as we were friends. The
last visit was not long protracted. One after another they
shook hands and got down into their canoe; when Hoka turned his
back immediately upon the ship, so that we saw his face no
more. Taipi, on the other hand, remained standing and
facing us with gracious valedictory gestures; and when Captain
Otis dipped the ensign, the whole party saluted with their
hats. This was the farewell; the episode of our visit to
Anaho was held concluded; and though the <i>Casco</i> remained
nearly forty hours at her moorings, not one returned on board,
and I am inclined to think they avoided appearing on the
beach. This reserve and dignity is the finest trait of the
Marquesan.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER III—THE MAROON</h3>
<p>Of the beauties of Anaho books might be written. I
remember waking about three, to find the air temperate and
scented. The long swell brimmed into the bay, and seemed to
fill it full and then subside. Gently, deeply, and silently
the <i>Casco</i> rolled; only at times a block piped like a
bird. Oceanward, the heaven was bright with stars and the
sea with their reflections. If I looked to that side, I
might have sung with the Hawaiian poet:</p>
<blockquote><p><i>Ua maomao ka lani</i>, <i>ua kahaea
luna</i>,<br />
<i>Ua pipi ka maka o ka hoku</i>.<br />
(The heavens were fair, they stretched above,<br />
Many were the eyes of the stars.)</p>
</blockquote>
<p>And then I turned shoreward, and high squalls were overhead;
the mountains loomed up black; and I could have fancied I had
slipped ten thousand miles away and was anchored in a Highland
loch; that when the day came, it would show pine, and heather,
and green fern, and roofs of turf sending up the smoke of peats;
and the alien speech that should next greet my ears must be
Gaelic, not Kanaka.</p>
<p>And day, when it came, brought other sights and
thoughts. I have watched the morning break in many quarters
of the world; it has been certainly one of the chief joys of my
existence, and the dawn that I saw with most emotion shone upon
the bay of Anaho. The mountains abruptly overhang the port
with every variety of surface and of inclination, lawn, and
cliff, and forest. Not one of these but wore its proper
tint of saffron, of sulphur, of the clove, and of the rose.
The lustre was like that of satin; on the lighter hues there
seemed to float an efflorescence; a solemn bloom appeared on the
more dark. The light itself was the ordinary light of
morning, colourless and clean; and on this ground of jewels,
pencilled out the least detail of drawing. Meanwhile,
around the hamlet, under the palms, where the blue shadow
lingered, the red coals of cocoa husk and the light trails of
smoke betrayed the awakening business of the day; along the beach
men and women, lads and lasses, were returning from the bath in
bright raiment, red and blue and green, such as we delighted to
see in the coloured little pictures of our childhood; and
presently the sun had cleared the eastern hill, and the glow of
the day was over all.</p>
<p>The glow continued and increased, the business, from the main
part, ceased before it had begun. Twice in the day there
was a certain stir of shepherding along the seaward hills.
At times a canoe went out to fish. At times a woman or two
languidly filled a basket in the cotton patch. At times a
pipe would sound out of the shadow of a house, ringing the
changes on its three notes, with an effect like <i>Que le jour me
dure</i>, repeated endlessly. Or at times, across a corner
of the bay, two natives might communicate in the Marquesan manner
with conventional whistlings. All else was sleep and
silence. The surf broke and shone around the shores; a
species of black crane fished in the broken water; the black pigs
were continually galloping by on some affair; but the people
might never have awaked, or they might all be dead.</p>
<p>My favourite haunt was opposite the hamlet, where was a
landing in a cove under a lianaed cliff. The beach was
lined with palms and a tree called the purao, something between
the fig and mulberry in growth, and bearing a flower like a great
yellow poppy with a maroon heart. In places rocks
encroached upon the sand; the beach would be all submerged; and
the surf would bubble warmly as high as to my knees, and play
with cocoa-nut husks as our more homely ocean plays with wreck
and wrack and bottles. As the reflux drew down, marvels of
colour and design streamed between my feet; which I would grasp
at, miss, or seize: now to find them what they promised, shells
to grace a cabinet or be set in gold upon a lady’s finger;
now to catch only <i>maya</i> of coloured sand, pounded fragments
and pebbles, that, as soon as they were dry, became as dull and
homely as the flints upon a garden path. I have toiled at
this childish pleasure for hours in the strong sun, conscious of
my incurable ignorance; but too keenly pleased to be
ashamed. Meanwhile, the blackbird (or his tropical
understudy) would be fluting in the thickets overhead.</p>
<p>A little further, in the turn of the bay, a streamlet trickled
in the bottom of a den, thence spilling down a stair of rock into
the sea. The draught of air drew down under the foliage in
the very bottom of the den, which was a perfect arbour for
coolness. In front it stood open on the blue bay and the
<i>Casco</i> lying there under her awning and her cheerful
colours. Overhead was a thatch of puraos, and over these
again palms brandished their bright fans, as I have seen a
conjurer make himself a halo out of naked swords. For in
this spot, over a neck of low land at the foot of the mountains,
the trade-wind streams into Anaho Bay in a flood of almost
constant volume and velocity, and of a heavenly coolness.</p>
<p>It chanced one day that I was ashore in the cove, with Mrs.
Stevenson and the ship’s cook. Except for the
<i>Casco</i> lying outside, and a crane or two, and the ever-busy
wind and sea, the face of the world was of a prehistoric
emptiness; life appeared to stand stock-still, and the sense of
isolation was profound and refreshing. On a sudden, the
trade-wind, coming in a gust over the isthmus, struck and
scattered the fans of the palms above the den; and, behold! in
two of the tops there sat a native, motionless as an idol and
watching us, you would have said, without a wink. The next
moment the tree closed, and the glimpse was gone. This
discovery of human presences latent overhead in a place where we
had supposed ourselves alone, the immobility of our tree-top
spies, and the thought that perhaps at all hours we were
similarly supervised, struck us with a chill. Talk
languished on the beach. As for the cook (whose conscience
was not clear), he never afterwards set foot on shore, and twice,
when the <i>Casco</i> appeared to be driving on the rocks, it was
amusing to observe that man’s alacrity; death, he was
persuaded, awaiting him upon the beach. It was more than a
year later, in the Gilberts, that the explanation dawned upon
myself. The natives were drawing palm-tree wine, a thing
forbidden by law; and when the wind thus suddenly revealed them,
they were doubtless more troubled than ourselves.</p>
<p>At the top of the den there dwelt an old, melancholy, grizzled
man of the name of Tari (Charlie) Coffin. He was a native
of Oahu, in the Sandwich Islands; and had gone to sea in his
youth in the American whalers; a circumstance to which he owed
his name, his English, his down-east twang, and the misfortune of
his innocent life. For one captain, sailing out of New
Bedford, carried him to Nuka-hiva and marooned him there among
the cannibals. The motive for this act was inconceivably
small; poor Tari’s wages, which were thus economised, would
scarce have shook the credit of the New Bedford owners. And
the act itself was simply murder. Tari’s life must
have hung in the beginning by a hair. In the grief and
terror of that time, it is not unlikely he went mad, an infirmity
to which he was still liable; or perhaps a child may have taken a
fancy to him and ordained him to be spared. He escaped at
least alive, married in the island, and when I knew him was a
widower with a married son and a granddaughter. But the
thought of Oahu haunted him; its praise was for ever on his lips;
he beheld it, looking back, as a place of ceaseless feasting,
song, and dance; and in his dreams I daresay he revisits it with
joy. I wonder what he would think if he could be carried
there indeed, and see the modern town of Honolulu brisk with
traffic, and the palace with its guards, and the great hotel, and
Mr. Berger’s band with their uniforms and outlandish
instruments; or what he would think to see the brown faces grown
so few and the white so many; and his father’s land sold,
for planting sugar, and his father’s house quite perished,
or perhaps the last of them struck leprous and immured between
the surf and the cliffs on Molokai? So simply, even in
South Sea Islands, and so sadly, the changes come.</p>
<p>Tari was poor, and poorly lodged. His house was a wooden
frame, run up by Europeans; it was indeed his official residence,
for Tari was the shepherd of the promontory sheep. I can
give a perfect inventory of its contents: three kegs, a tin
biscuit-box, an iron saucepan, several cocoa-shell cups, a
lantern, and three bottles, probably containing oil; while the
clothes of the family and a few mats were thrown across the open
rafters. Upon my first meeting with this exile he had
conceived for me one of the baseless island friendships, had
given me nuts to drink, and carried me up the den ‘to see
my house’—the only entertainment that he had to
offer. He liked the ‘Amelican,’ he said, and
the ‘Inglisman,’ but the ‘Flessman’ was
his abhorrence; and he was careful to explain that if he had
thought us ‘Fless,’ we should have had none of his
nuts, and never a sight of his house. His distaste for the
French I can partly understand, but not at all his toleration of
the Anglo-Saxon. The next day he brought me a pig, and some
days later one of our party going ashore found him in act to
bring a second. We were still strange to the islands; we
were pained by the poor man’s generosity, which he could
ill afford, and, by a natural enough but quite unpardonable
blunder, we refused the pig. Had Tari been a Marquesan we
should have seen him no more; being what he was, the most mild,
long-suffering, melancholy man, he took a revenge a hundred times
more painful. Scarce had the canoe with the nine villagers
put off from their farewell before the <i>Casco</i> was boarded
from the other side. It was Tari; coming thus late because
he had no canoe of his own, and had found it hard to borrow one;
coming thus solitary (as indeed we always saw him), because he
was a stranger in the land, and the dreariest of company.
The rest of my family basely fled from the encounter. I
must receive our injured friend alone; and the interview must
have lasted hard upon an hour, for he was loath to tear himself
away. ‘You go ’way. I see you no
more—no, sir!’ he lamented; and then looking about
him with rueful admiration, ‘This goodee ship—no,
sir!—goodee ship!’ he would exclaim: the ‘no,
sir,’ thrown out sharply through the nose upon a rising
inflection, an echo from New Bedford and the fallacious
whaler. From these expressions of grief and praise, he
would return continually to the case of the rejected pig.
‘I like give present all ’e same you,’ he
complained; ‘only got pig: you no take him!’ He
was a poor man; he had no choice of gifts; he had only a pig, he
repeated; and I had refused it. I have rarely been more
wretched than to see him sitting there, so old, so grey, so poor,
so hardly fortuned, of so rueful a countenance, and to
appreciate, with growing keenness, the affront which I had so
innocently dealt him; but it was one of those cases in which
speech is vain.</p>
<p>Tari’s son was smiling and inert; his daughter-in-law, a
girl of sixteen, pretty, gentle, and grave, more intelligent than
most Anaho women, and with a fair share of French; his
grandchild, a mite of a creature at the breast. I went up
the den one day when Tari was from home, and found the son making
a cotton sack, and madame suckling mademoiselle. When I had
sat down with them on the floor, the girl began to question me
about England; which I tried to describe, piling the pan and the
cocoa shells one upon another to represent the houses, and
explaining, as best I was able, and by word and gesture, the
over-population, the hunger, and the perpetual toil.
‘<i>Pas de cocotiers</i>? <i>pas do popoi</i>?’ she
asked. I told her it was too cold, and went through an
elaborate performance, shutting out draughts, and crouching over
an imaginary fire, to make sure she understood. But she
understood right well; remarked it must be bad for the health,
and sat a while gravely reflecting on that picture of unwonted
sorrows. I am sure it roused her pity, for it struck in her
another thought always uppermost in the Marquesan bosom; and she
began with a smiling sadness, and looking on me out of melancholy
eyes, to lament the decease of her own people.
‘<i>Ici pas de Kanaques</i>,’ said she; and taking
the baby from her breast, she held it out to me with both her
hands. ‘<i>Tenez</i>—a little baby like this;
then dead. All the Kanaques die. Then no
more.’ The smile, and this instancing by the
girl-mother of her own tiny flesh and blood, affected me
strangely; they spoke of so tranquil a despair. Meanwhile
the husband smilingly made his sack; and the unconscious babe
struggled to reach a pot of raspberry jam, friendship’s
offering, which I had just brought up the den; and in a
perspective of centuries I saw their case as ours, death coming
in like a tide, and the day already numbered when there should be
no more Beretani, and no more of any race whatever, and (what
oddly touched me) no more literary works and no more readers.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER IV—DEATH</h3>
<p>The thought of death, I have said, is uppermost in the mind of
the Marquesan. It would be strange if it were
otherwise. The race is perhaps the handsomest extant.
Six feet is about the middle height of males; they are strongly
muscled, free from fat, swift in action, graceful in repose; and
the women, though fatter and duller, are still comely
animals. To judge by the eye, there is no race more viable;
and yet death reaps them with both hands. When Bishop
Dordillon first came to Tai-o-hae, he reckoned the inhabitants at
many thousands; he was but newly dead, and in the same bay
Stanislao Moanatini counted on his fingers eight residual
natives. Or take the valley of Hapaa, known to readers of
Herman Melville under the grotesque misspelling of Hapar.
There are but two writers who have touched the South Seas with
any genius, both Americans: Melville and Charles Warren Stoddard;
and at the christening of the first and greatest, some
influential fairy must have been neglected: ‘He shall be
able to see,’ ‘He shall be able to tell,’
‘He shall be able to charm,’ said the friendly
godmothers; ‘But he shall not be able to hear,’
exclaimed the last. The tribe of Hapaa is said to have
numbered some four hundred, when the small-pox came and reduced
them by one-fourth. Six months later a woman developed
tubercular consumption; the disease spread like a fire about the
valley, and in less than a year two survivors, a man and a woman,
fled from that new-created solitude. A similar Adam and Eve
may some day wither among new races, the tragic residue of
Britain. When I first heard this story the date staggered
me; but I am now inclined to think it possible. Early in
the year of my visit, for example, or late the year before, a
first case of phthisis appeared in a household of seventeen
persons, and by the month of August, when the tale was told me,
one soul survived, and that was a boy who had been absent at his
schooling. And depopulation works both ways, the doors of
death being set wide open, and the door of birth almost
closed. Thus, in the half-year ending July 1888 there were
twelve deaths and but one birth in the district of the
Hatiheu. Seven or eight more deaths were to be looked for
in the ordinary course; and M. Aussel, the observant gendarme,
knew of but one likely birth. At this rate it is no matter
of surprise if the population in that part should have declined
in forty years from six thousand to less than four hundred; which
are, once more on the authority of M. Aussel, the estimated
figures. And the rate of decline must have even accelerated
towards the end.</p>
<p>A good way to appreciate the depopulation is to go by land
from Anaho to Hatiheu on the adjacent bay. The road is good
travelling, but cruelly steep. We seemed scarce to have
passed the deserted house which stands highest in Anaho before we
were looking dizzily down upon its roof; the <i>Casco</i> well
out in the bay, and rolling for a wager, shrank visibly; and
presently through the gap of Tari’s isthmus, Ua-huna was
seen to hang cloudlike on the horizon. Over the summit,
where the wind blew really chill, and whistled in the reed-like
grass, and tossed the grassy fell of the pandanus, we stepped
suddenly, as through a door, into the next vale and bay of
Hatiheu. A bowl of mountains encloses it upon three
sides. On the fourth this rampart has been bombarded into
ruins, runs down to seaward in imminent and shattered crags, and
presents the one practicable breach of the blue bay. The
interior of this vessel is crowded with lovely and valuable
trees,—orange, breadfruit, mummy-apple, cocoa, the island
chestnut, and for weeds, the pine and the banana. Four
perennial streams water and keep it green; and along the dell,
first of one, then of another, of these, the road, for a
considerable distance, descends into this fortunate valley.
The song of the waters and the familiar disarray of boulders gave
us a strong sense of home, which the exotic foliage, the
daft-like growth of the pandanus, the buttressed trunk of the
banyan, the black pigs galloping in the bush, and the
architecture of the native houses dissipated ere it could be
enjoyed.</p>
<p>The houses on the Hatiheu side begin high up; higher yet, the
more melancholy spectacle of empty paepaes. When a native
habitation is deserted, the superstructure—pandanus thatch,
wattle, unstable tropical timber—speedily rots, and is
speedily scattered by the wind. Only the stones of the
terrace endure; nor can any ruin, cairn, or standing stone, or
vitrified fort present a more stern appearance of
antiquity. We must have passed from six to eight of these
now houseless platforms. On the main road of the island,
where it crosses the valley of Taipi, Mr. Osbourne tells me they
are to be reckoned by the dozen; and as the roads have been made
long posterior to their erection, perhaps to their desertion, and
must simply be regarded as lines drawn at random through the
bush, the forest on either hand must be equally filled with these
survivals: the gravestones of whole families. Such ruins
are tapu <a name="citation29"></a><a href="#footnote29"
class="citation">[29]</a> in the strictest sense; no native must
approach them; they have become outposts of the kingdom of the
grave. It might appear a natural and pious custom in the
hundreds who are left, the rearguard of perished thousands, that
their feet should leave untrod these hearthstones of their
fathers. I believe, in fact, the custom rests on different
and more grim conceptions. But the house, the grave, and
even the body of the dead, have been always particularly honoured
by Marquesans. Until recently the corpse was sometimes kept
in the family and daily oiled and sunned, until, by gradual and
revolting stages, it dried into a kind of mummy. Offerings
are still laid upon the grave. In Traitor’s Bay, Mr.
Osbourne saw a man buy a looking-glass to lay upon his
son’s. And the sentiment against the desecration of
tombs, thoughtlessly ruffled in the laying down of the new roads,
is a chief ingredient in the native hatred for the French.</p>
<p>The Marquesan beholds with dismay the approaching extinction
of his race. The thought of death sits down with him to
meat, and rises with him from his bed; he lives and breathes
under a shadow of mortality awful to support; and he is so inured
to the apprehension that he greets the reality with relief.
He does not even seek to support a disappointment; at an affront,
at a breach of one of his fleeting and communistic love-affairs,
he seeks an instant refuge in the grave. Hanging is now the
fashion. I heard of three who had hanged themselves in the
west end of Hiva-oa during the first half of 1888; but though
this be a common form of suicide in other parts of the South
Seas, I cannot think it will continue popular in the
Marquesas. Far more suitable to Marquesan sentiment is the
old form of poisoning with the fruit of the eva, which offers to
the native suicide a cruel but deliberate death, and gives time
for those decencies of the last hour, to which he attaches such
remarkable importance. The coffin can thus be at hand, the
pigs killed, the cry of the mourners sounding already through the
house; and then it is, and not before, that the Marquesan is
conscious of achievement, his life all rounded in, his robes
(like Cæsar’s) adjusted for the final act.
Praise not any man till he is dead, said the ancients; envy not
any man till you hear the mourners, might be the Marquesan
parody. The coffin, though of late introduction, strangely
engages their attention. It is to the mature Marquesan what
a watch is to the European schoolboy. For ten years Queen
Vaekehu had dunned the fathers; at last, but the other day, they
let her have her will, gave her her coffin, and the woman’s
soul is at rest. I was told a droll instance of the force
of this preoccupation. The Polynesians are subject to a
disease seemingly rather of the will than of the body. I
was told the Tahitians have a word for it, <i>erimatua</i>, but
cannot find it in my dictionary. A gendarme, M. Nouveau,
has seen men beginning to succumb to this insubstantial malady,
has routed them from their houses, turned them on to do their
trick upon the roads, and in two days has seen them cured.
But this other remedy is more original: a Marquesan, dying of
this discouragement—perhaps I should rather say this
acquiescence—has been known, at the fulfilment of his
crowning wish, on the mere sight of that desired hermitage, his
coffin—to revive, recover, shake off the hand of death, and
be restored for years to his occupations—carving tikis
(idols), let us say, or braiding old men’s beards.
From all this it may be conceived how easily they meet death when
it approaches naturally. I heard one example, grim and
picturesque. In the time of the small-pox in Hapaa, an old
man was seized with the disease; he had no thought of recovery;
had his grave dug by a wayside, and lived in it for near a
fortnight, eating, drinking, and smoking with the passers-by,
talking mostly of his end, and equally unconcerned for himself
and careless of the friends whom he infected.</p>
<p>This proneness to suicide, and loose seat in life, is not
peculiar to the Marquesan. What is peculiar is the
widespread depression and acceptance of the national end.
Pleasures are neglected, the dance languishes, the songs are
forgotten. It is true that some, and perhaps too many, of
them are proscribed; but many remain, if there were spirit to
support or to revive them. At the last feast of the
Bastille, Stanislao Moanatini shed tears when he beheld the
inanimate performance of the dancers. When the people sang
for us in Anaho, they must apologise for the smallness of their
repertory. They were only young folk present, they said,
and it was only the old that knew the songs. The whole body
of Marquesan poetry and music was being suffered to die out with
a single dispirited generation. The full import is apparent
only to one acquainted with other Polynesian races; who knows how
the Samoan coins a fresh song for every trifling incident, or who
has heard (on Penrhyn, for instance) a band of little stripling
maids from eight to twelve keep up their minstrelsy for hours
upon a stretch, one song following another without pause.
In like manner, the Marquesan, never industrious, begins now to
cease altogether from production. The exports of the group
decline out of all proportion even with the death-rate of the
islanders. ‘The coral waxes, the palm grows, and man
departs,’ says the Marquesan; and he folds his hands.
And surely this is nature. Fond as it may appear, we labour
and refrain, not for the rewards of any single life, but with a
timid eye upon the lives and memories of our successors; and
where no one is to succeed, of his own family, or his own tongue,
I doubt whether Rothschilds would make money or Cato practise
virtue. It is natural, also, that a temporary stimulus
should sometimes rouse the Marquesan from his lethargy.
Over all the landward shore of Anaho cotton runs like a wild
weed; man or woman, whoever comes to pick it, may earn a dollar
in the day; yet when we arrived, the trader’s store-house
was entirely empty; and before we left it was near full. So
long as the circus was there, so long as the <i>Casco</i> was yet
anchored in the bay, it behoved every one to make his visit; and
to this end every woman must have a new dress, and every man a
shirt and trousers. Never before, in Mr. Regler’s
experience, had they displayed so much activity.</p>
<p>In their despondency there is an element of dread. The
fear of ghosts and of the dark is very deeply written in the mind
of the Polynesian; not least of the Marquesan. Poor Taipi,
the chief of Anaho, was condemned to ride to Hatiheu on a
moonless night. He borrowed a lantern, sat a long while
nerving himself for the adventure, and when he at last departed,
wrung the <i>Cascos</i> by the hand as for a final
separation. Certain presences, called Vehinehae, frequent
and make terrible the nocturnal roadside; I was told by one they
were like so much mist, and as the traveller walked into them
dispersed and dissipated; another described them as being shaped
like men and having eyes like cats; from none could I obtain the
smallest clearness as to what they did, or wherefore they were
dreaded. We may be sure at least they represent the dead;
for the dead, in the minds of the islanders, are
all-pervasive. ‘When a native says that he is a
man,’ writes Dr. Codrington, ‘he means that he is a
man and not a ghost; not that he is a man and not a beast.
The intelligent agents of this world are to his mind the men who
are alive, and the ghosts the men who are dead.’ Dr.
Codrington speaks of Melanesia; from what I have learned his
words are equally true of the Polynesian. And yet
more. Among cannibal Polynesians a dreadful suspicion rests
generally on the dead; and the Marquesans, the greatest cannibals
of all, are scarce likely to be free from similar beliefs.
I hazard the guess that the Vehinehae are the hungry spirits of
the dead, continuing their life’s business of the cannibal
ambuscade, and lying everywhere unseen, and eager to devour the
living. Another superstition I picked up through the
troubled medium of Tari Coffin’s English. The dead,
he told me, came and danced by night around the paepae of their
former family; the family were thereupon overcome by some emotion
(but whether of pious sorrow or of fear I could not gather), and
must ‘make a feast,’ of which fish, pig, and popoi
were indispensable ingredients. So far this is clear
enough. But here Tari went on to instance the new house of
Toma and the house-warming feast which was just then in
preparation as instances in point. Dare we indeed string
them together, and add the case of the deserted ruin, as though
the dead continually besieged the paepaes of the living: were
kept at arm’s-length, even from the first foundation, only
by propitiatory feasts, and, so soon as the fire of life went out
upon the hearth, swarmed back into possession of their ancient
seat?</p>
<p>I speak by guess of these Marquesan superstitions. On
the cannibal ghost I shall return elsewhere with certainty.
And it is enough, for the present purpose, to remark that the men
of the Marquesas, from whatever reason, fear and shrink from the
presence of ghosts. Conceive how this must tell upon the
nerves in islands where the number of the dead already so far
exceeds that of the living, and the dead multiply and the living
dwindle at so swift a rate. Conceive how the remnant
huddles about the embers of the fire of life; even as old Red
Indians, deserted on the march and in the snow, the kindly tribe
all gone, the last flame expiring, and the night around populous
with wolves.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER V—DEPOPULATION</h3>
<p>Over the whole extent of the South Seas, from one tropic to
another, we find traces of a bygone state of over-population,
when the resources of even a tropical soil were taxed, and even
the improvident Polynesian trembled for the future. We may
accept some of the ideas of Mr. Darwin’s theory of coral
islands, and suppose a rise of the sea, or the subsidence of some
former continental area, to have driven into the tops of the
mountains multitudes of refugees. Or we may suppose, more
soberly, a people of sea-rovers, emigrants from a crowded
country, to strike upon and settle island after island, and as
time went on to multiply exceedingly in their new seats. In
either case the end must be the same; soon or late it must grow
apparent that the crew are too numerous, and that famine is at
hand. The Polynesians met this emergent danger with various
expedients of activity and prevention. A way was found to
preserve breadfruit by packing it in artificial pits; pits forty
feet in depth and of proportionate bore are still to be seen, I
am told, in the Marquesas; and yet even these were insufficient
for the teeming people, and the annals of the past are gloomy
with famine and cannibalism. Among the Hawaiians—a
hardier people, in a more exacting climate—agriculture was
carried far; the land was irrigated with canals; and the
fish-ponds of Molokai prove the number and diligence of the old
inhabitants. Meanwhile, over all the island world, abortion
and infanticide prevailed. On coral atolls, where the
danger was most plainly obvious, these were enforced by law and
sanctioned by punishment. On Vaitupu, in the Ellices, only
two children were allowed to a couple; on Nukufetau, but
one. On the latter the punishment was by fine; and it is
related that the fine was sometimes paid, and the child
spared.</p>
<p>This is characteristic. For no people in the world are
so fond or so long-suffering with children—children make
the mirth and the adornment of their homes, serving them for
playthings and for picture-galleries. ‘Happy is the
man that has his quiver full of them.’ The stray
bastard is contended for by rival families; and the natural and
the adopted children play and grow up together
undistinguished. The spoiling, and I may almost say the
deification, of the child, is nowhere carried so far as in the
eastern islands; and furthest, according to my opportunities of
observation, in the Paumotu group, the so-called Low or Dangerous
Archipelago. I have seen a Paumotuan native turn from me
with embarrassment and disaffection because I suggested that a
brat would be the better for a beating. It is a daily
matter in some eastern islands to see a child strike or even
stone its mother, and the mother, so far from punishing, scarce
ventures to resist. In some, when his child was born, a
chief was superseded and resigned his name; as though, like a
drone, he had then fulfilled the occasion of his being. And
in some the lightest words of children had the weight of
oracles. Only the other day, in the Marquesas, if a child
conceived a distaste to any stranger, I am assured the stranger
would be slain. And I shall have to tell in another place
an instance of the opposite: how a child in Manihiki having taken
a fancy to myself, her adoptive parents at once accepted the
situation and loaded me with gifts.</p>
<p>With such sentiments the necessity for child-destruction would
not fail to clash, and I believe we find the trace of divided
feeling in the Tahitian brotherhood of Oro. At a certain
date a new god was added to the Society-Island Olympus, or an old
one refurbished and made popular. Oro was his name, and he
may be compared with the Bacchus of the ancients. His
zealots sailed from bay to bay, and from island to island; they
were everywhere received with feasting; wore fine clothes; sang,
danced, acted; gave exhibitions of dexterity and strength; and
were the artists, the acrobats, the bards, and the harlots of the
group. Their life was public and epicurean; their
initiation a mystery; and the highest in the land aspired to join
the brotherhood. If a couple stood next in line to a
high-chieftaincy, they were suffered, on grounds of policy, to
spare one child; all other children, who had a father or a mother
in the company of Oro, stood condemned from the moment of
conception. A freemasonry, an agnostic sect, a company of
artists, its members all under oath to spread unchastity, and all
forbidden to leave offspring—I do not know how it may
appear to others, but to me the design seems obvious.
Famine menacing the islands, and the needful remedy repulsive, it
was recommended to the native mind by these trappings of mystery,
pleasure, and parade. This is the more probable, and the
secret, serious purpose of the institution appears the more
plainly, if it be true that, after a certain period of life, the
obligation of the votary was changed; at first, bound to be
profligate: afterwards, expected to be chaste.</p>
<p>Here, then, we have one side of the case. Man-eating
among kindly men, child-murder among child-lovers, industry in a
race the most idle, invention in a race the least progressive,
this grim, pagan salvation-army of the brotherhood of Oro, the
report of early voyagers, the widespread vestiges of former
habitation, and the universal tradition of the islands, all point
to the same fact of former crowding and alarm. And to-day
we are face to face with the reverse. To-day in the
Marquesas, in the Eight Islands of Hawaii, in Mangareva, in
Easter Island, we find the same race perishing like flies.
Why this change? Or, grant that the coming of the whites,
the change of habits, and the introduction of new maladies and
vices, fully explain the depopulation, why is that depopulation
not universal? The population of Tahiti, after a period of
alarming decrease, has again become stationary. I hear of a
similar result among some Maori tribes; in many of the Paumotus a
slight increase is to be observed; and the Samoans are to-day as
healthy and at least as fruitful as before the change.
Grant that the Tahitians, the Maoris, and the Paumotuans have
become inured to the new conditions; and what are we to make of
the Samoans, who have never suffered?</p>
<p>Those who are acquainted only with a single group are apt to
be ready with solutions. Thus I have heard the mortality of
the Maoris attributed to their change of residence—from
fortified hill-tops to the low, marshy vicinity of their
plantations. How plausible! And yet the Marquesans
are dying out in the same houses where their fathers
multiplied. Or take opium. The Marquesas and Hawaii
are the two groups the most infected with this vice; the
population of the one is the most civilised, that of the other by
far the most barbarous, of Polynesians; and they are two of those
that perish the most rapidly. Here is a strong case against
opium. But let us take unchastity, and we shall find the
Marquesas and Hawaii figuring again upon another count.
Thus, Samoans are the most chaste of Polynesians, and they are to
this day entirely fertile; Marquesans are the most debauched: we
have seen how they are perishing; Hawaiians are notoriously lax,
and they begin to be dotted among deserts. So here is a
case stronger still against unchastity; and here also we have a
correction to apply. Whatever the virtues of the Tahitian,
neither friend nor enemy dares call him chaste; and yet he seems
to have outlived the time of danger. One last example:
syphilis has been plausibly credited with much of the
sterility. But the Samoans are, by all accounts, as
fruitful as at first; by some accounts more so; and it is not
seriously to be argued that the Samoans have escaped
syphilis.</p>
<p>These examples show how dangerous it is to reason from any
particular cause, or even from many in a single group. I
have in my eye an able and amiable pamphlet by the Rev. S. E.
Bishop: ‘Why are the Hawaiians Dying Out?’ Any
one interested in the subject ought to read this tract, which
contains real information; and yet Mr. Bishop’s views would
have been changed by an acquaintance with other groups.
Samoa is, for the moment, the main and the most instructive
exception to the rule. The people are the most chaste and
one of the most temperate of island peoples. They have
never been tried and depressed with any grave pestilence.
Their clothing has scarce been tampered with; at the simple and
becoming tabard of the girls, Tartuffe, in many another island,
would have cried out; for the cool, healthy, and modest lava-lava
or kilt, Tartuffe has managed in many another island to
substitute stifling and inconvenient trousers. Lastly, and
perhaps chiefly, so far from their amusements having been
curtailed, I think they have been, upon the whole,
extended. The Polynesian falls easily into despondency:
bereavement, disappointment, the fear of novel visitations, the
decay or proscription of ancient pleasures, easily incline him to
be sad; and sadness detaches him from life. The melancholy
of the Hawaiian and the emptiness of his new life are striking;
and the remark is yet more apposite to the Marquesas. In
Samoa, on the other hand, perpetual song and dance, perpetual
games, journeys, and pleasures, make an animated and a smiling
picture of the island life. And the Samoans are to-day the
gayest and the best entertained inhabitants of our planet.
The importance of this can scarcely be exaggerated. In a
climate and upon a soil where a livelihood can be had for the
stooping, entertainment is a prime necessity. It is
otherwise with us, where life presents us with a daily problem,
and there is a serious interest, and some of the heat of
conflict, in the mere continuing to be. So, in certain
atolls, where there is no great gaiety, but man must bestir
himself with some vigour for his daily bread, public health and
the population are maintained; but in the lotos islands, with the
decay of pleasures, life itself decays. It is from this
point of view that we may instance, among other causes of
depression, the decay of war. We have been so long used in
Europe to that dreary business of war on the great scale,
trailing epidemics and leaving pestilential corpses in its train,
that we have almost forgotten its original, the most healthful,
if not the most humane, of all field
sports—hedge-warfare. From this, as well as from the
rest of his amusements and interests, the islander, upon a
hundred islands, has been recently cut off. And to this, as
well as to so many others, the Samoan still makes good a special
title.</p>
<p>Upon the whole, the problem seems to me to stand
thus:—Where there have been fewest changes, important or
unimportant, salutary or hurtful, there the race survives.
Where there have been most, important or unimportant, salutary or
hurtful, there it perishes. Each change, however small,
augments the sum of new conditions to which the race has to
become inured. There may seem, <i>a priori</i>, no
comparison between the change from ‘sour toddy’ to
bad gin, and that from the island kilt to a pair of European
trousers. Yet I am far from persuaded that the one is any
more hurtful than the other; and the unaccustomed race will
sometimes die of pin-pricks. We are here face to face with
one of the difficulties of the missionary. In Polynesian
islands he easily obtains pre-eminent authority; the king becomes
his <i>mairedupalais</i>; he can proscribe, he can command; and
the temptation is ever towards too much. Thus (by all
accounts) the Catholics in Mangareva, and thus (to my own
knowledge) the Protestants in Hawaii, have rendered life in a
more or less degree unliveable to their converts. And the
mild, uncomplaining creatures (like children in a prison) yawn
and await death. It is easy to blame the missionary.
But it is his business to make changes. It is surely his
business, for example, to prevent war; and yet I have instanced
war itself as one of the elements of health. On the other
hand, it were, perhaps, easy for the missionary to proceed more
gently, and to regard every change as an affair of weight.
I take the average missionary; I am sure I do him no more than
justice when I suppose that he would hesitate to bombard a
village, even in order to convert an archipelago.
Experience begins to show us (at least in Polynesian islands)
that change of habit is bloodier than a bombardment.</p>
<p>There is one point, ere I have done, where I may go to meet
criticism. I have said nothing of faulty hygiene, bathing
during fevers, mistaken treatment of children, native doctoring,
or abortion—all causes frequently adduced. And I have
said nothing of them because they are conditions common to both
epochs, and even more efficient in the past than in the
present. Was it not the same with unchastity, it may be
asked? Was not the Polynesian always unchaste?
Doubtless he was so always: doubtless he is more so since the
coming of his remarkably chaste visitors from Europe. Take
the Hawaiian account of Cook: I have no doubt it is entirely
fair. Take Krusenstern’s candid, almost innocent,
description of a Russian man-of-war at the Marquesas; consider
the disgraceful history of missions in Hawaii itself, where (in
the war of lust) the American missionaries were once shelled by
an English adventurer, and once raided and mishandled by the crew
of an American warship; add the practice of whaling fleets to
call at the Marquesas, and carry off a complement of women for
the cruise; consider, besides, how the whites were at first
regarded in the light of demi-gods, as appears plainly in the
reception of Cook upon Hawaii; and again, in the story of the
discovery of Tutuila, when the really decent women of Samoa
prostituted themselves in public to the French; and bear in mind
how it was the custom of the adventurers, and we may almost say
the business of the missionaries, to deride and infract even the
most salutary tapus. Here we see every engine of
dissolution directed at once against a virtue never and nowhere
very strong or popular; and the result, even in the most degraded
islands, has been further degradation. Mr. Lawes, the
missionary of Savage Island, told me the standard of female
chastity had declined there since the coming of the whites.
In heathen time, if a girl gave birth to a bastard, her father or
brother would dash the infant down the cliffs; and to-day the
scandal would be small. Or take the Marquesas.
Stanislao Moanatini told me that in his own recollection, the
young were strictly guarded; they were not suffered so much as to
look upon one another in the street, but passed (so my informant
put it) like dogs; and the other day the whole school-children of
Nuka-hiva and Ua-pu escaped in a body to the woods, and lived
there for a fortnight in promiscuous liberty. Readers of
travels may perhaps exclaim at my authority, and declare
themselves better informed. I should prefer the statement
of an intelligent native like Stanislao (even if it stood alone,
which it is far from doing) to the report of the most honest
traveller. A ship of war comes to a haven, anchors, lands a
party, receives and returns a visit, and the captain writes a
chapter on the manners of the island. It is not considered
what class is mostly seen. Yet we should not be pleased if
a Lascar foremast hand were to judge England by the ladies who
parade Ratcliffe Highway, and the gentlemen who share with them
their hire. Stanislao’s opinion of a decay of virtue
even in these unvirtuous islands has been supported to me by
others; his very example, the progress of dissolution amongst the
young, is adduced by Mr. Bishop in Hawaii. And so far as
Marquesans are concerned, we might have hazarded a guess of some
decline in manners. I do not think that any race could ever
have prospered or multiplied with such as now obtain; I am sure
they would have been never at the pains to count paternal
kinship. It is not possible to give details; suffice it
that their manners appear to be imitated from the dreams of
ignorant and vicious children, and their debauches persevered in
until energy, reason, and almost life itself are in abeyance.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER VI—CHIEFS AND TAPUS</h3>
<p>We used to admire exceedingly the bland and gallant manners of
the chief called Taipi-Kikino. An elegant guest at table,
skilled in the use of knife and fork, a brave figure when he
shouldered a gun and started for the woods after wild chickens,
always serviceable, always ingratiating and gay, I would
sometimes wonder where he found his cheerfulness. He had
enough to sober him, I thought, in his official budget. His
expenses—for he was always seen attired in virgin
white—must have by far exceeded his income of six dollars
in the year, or say two shillings a month. And he was
himself a man of no substance; his house the poorest in the
village. It was currently supposed that his elder brother,
Kauanui, must have helped him out. But how comes it that
the elder brother should succeed to the family estate, and be a
wealthy commoner, and the younger be a poor man, and yet rule as
chief in Anaho? That the one should be wealthy, and the
other almost indigent is probably to be explained by some
adoption; for comparatively few children are brought up in the
house or succeed to the estates of their natural begetters.
That the one should be chief instead of the other must be
explained (in a very Irish fashion) on the ground that neither of
them is a chief at all.</p>
<p>Since the return and the wars of the French, many chiefs have
been deposed, and many so-called chiefs appointed. We have
seen, in the same house, one such upstart drinking in the company
of two such extruded island Bourbons, men, whose word a few years
ago was life and death, now sunk to be peasants like their
neighbours. So when the French overthrew hereditary
tyrants, dubbed the commons of the Marquesas freeborn citizens of
the republic, and endowed them with a vote for a
<i>conseiller-général</i> at Tahiti, they probably
conceived themselves upon the path to popularity; and so far from
that, they were revolting public sentiment. The deposition
of the chiefs was perhaps sometimes needful; the appointment of
others may have been needful also; it was at least a delicate
business. The Government of George II. exiled many Highland
magnates. It never occurred to them to manufacture
substitutes; and if the French have been more bold, we have yet
to see with what success.</p>
<p>Our chief at Anaho was always called, he always called
himself, Taipi-Kikino; and yet that was not his name, but only
the wand of his false position. As soon as he was appointed
chief, his name—which signified, if I remember exactly,
<i>Prince born among flowers</i>—fell in abeyance, and he
was dubbed instead by the expressive byword,
Taipi-Kikino—<i>Highwater man-of-no-account</i>—or,
Englishing more boldly, <i>Beggar on horseback</i>—a witty
and a wicked cut. A nickname in Polynesia destroys almost
the memory of the original name. To-day, if we were
Polynesians, Gladstone would be no more heard of. We should
speak of and address our Nestor as the Grand Old Man, and it is
so that himself would sign his correspondence. Not the
prevalence, then, but the significancy of the nickname is to be
noted here. The new authority began with small
prestige. Taipi has now been some time in office; from all
I saw he seemed a person very fit. He is not the least
unpopular, and yet his power is nothing. He is a chief to
the French, and goes to breakfast with the Resident; but for any
practical end of chieftaincy a rag doll were equally
efficient.</p>
<p>We had been but three days in Anaho when we received the visit
of the chief of Hatiheu, a man of weight and fame, late leader of
a war upon the French, late prisoner in Tahiti, and the last
eater of long-pig in Nuka-hiva. Not many years have elapsed
since he was seen striding on the beach of Anaho, a dead
man’s arm across his shoulder. ‘So does Kooamua
to his enemies!’ he roared to the passers-by, and took a
bite from the raw flesh. And now behold this gentleman,
very wisely replaced in office by the French, paying us a morning
visit in European clothes. He was the man of the most
character we had yet seen: his manners genial and decisive, his
person tall, his face rugged, astute, formidable, and with a
certain similarity to Mr. Gladstone’s—only for the
brownness of the skin, and the high-chief’s tattooing, all
one side and much of the other being of an even blue.
Further acquaintance increased our opinion of his sense. He
viewed the <i>Casco</i> in a manner then quite new to us,
examining her lines and the running of the gear; to a piece of
knitting on which one of the party was engaged, he must have
devoted ten minutes’ patient study; nor did he desist
before he had divined the principles; and he was interested even
to excitement by a type-writer, which he learned to work.
When he departed he carried away with him a list of his family,
with his own name printed by his own hand at the bottom. I
should add that he was plainly much of a humorist, and not a
little of a humbug. He told us, for instance, that he was a
person of exact sobriety; such being the obligation of his high
estate: the commons might be sots, but the chief could not stoop
so low. And not many days after he was to be observed in a
state of smiling and lop-sided imbecility, the <i>Casco</i>
ribbon upside down on his dishonoured hat.</p>
<p>But his business that morning in Anaho is what concerns us
here. The devil-fish, it seems, were growing scarce upon
the reef; it was judged fit to interpose what we should call a
close season; for that end, in Polynesia, a tapu (vulgarly spelt
‘taboo’) has to be declared, and who was to declare
it? Taipi might; he ought; it was a chief part of his duty;
but would any one regard the inhibition of a Beggar on
Horse-back? He might plant palm branches: it did not in the
least follow that the spot was sacred. He might recite the
spell: it was shrewdly supposed the spirits would not
hearken. And so the old, legitimate cannibal must ride over
the mountains to do it for him; and the respectable official in
white clothes could but look on and envy. At about the same
time, though in a different manner, Kooamua established a forest
law. It was observed the cocoa-palms were suffering, for
the plucking of green nuts impoverishes and at last endangers the
tree. Now Kooamua could tapu the reef, which was public
property, but he could not tapu other people’s palms; and
the expedient adopted was interesting. He tapu’d his
own trees, and his example was imitated over all Hatiheu and
Anaho. I fear Taipi might have tapu’d all that he
possessed and found none to follow him. So much for the
esteem in which the dignity of an appointed chief is held by
others; a single circumstance will show what he thinks of it
himself. I never met one, but he took an early opportunity
to explain his situation. True, he was only an appointed
chief when I beheld him; but somewhere else, perhaps upon some
other isle, he was a chieftain by descent: upon which ground, he
asked me (so to say it) to excuse his mushroom honours.</p>
<p>It will be observed with surprise that both these tapus are
for thoroughly sensible ends. With surprise, I say, because
the nature of that institution is much misunderstood in
Europe. It is taken usually in the sense of a meaningless
or wanton prohibition, such as that which to-day prevents women
in some countries from smoking, or yesterday prevented any one in
Scotland from taking a walk on Sunday. The error is no less
natural than it is unjust. The Polynesians have not been
trained in the bracing, practical thought of ancient Rome; with
them the idea of law has not been disengaged from that of morals
or propriety; so that tapu has to cover the whole field, and
implies indifferently that an act is criminal, immoral, against
sound public policy, unbecoming or (as we say) ‘not in good
form.’ Many tapus were in consequence absurd enough,
such as those which deleted words out of the language, and
particularly those which related to women. Tapu encircled
women upon all hands. Many things were forbidden to men; to
women we may say that few were permitted. They must not sit
on the paepae; they must not go up to it by the stair; they must
not eat pork; they must not approach a boat; they must not cook
at a fire which any male had kindled. The other day, after
the roads were made, it was observed the women plunged along
margin through the bush, and when they came to a bridge waded
through the water: roads and bridges were the work of men’s
hands, and tapu for the foot of women. Even a man’s
saddle, if the man be native, is a thing no self-respecting lady
dares to use. Thus on the Anaho side of the island, only
two white men, Mr. Regler and the gendarme, M. Aussel, possess
saddles; and when a woman has a journey to make she must borrow
from one or other. It will be noticed that these
prohibitions tend, most of them, to an increased reserve between
the sexes. Regard for female chastity is the usual excuse
for these disabilities that men delight to lay upon their wives
and mothers. Here the regard is absent; and behold the
women still bound hand and foot with meaningless
proprieties! The women themselves, who are survivors of the
old regimen, admit that in those days life was not worth
living. And yet even then there were exceptions.
There were female chiefs and (I am assured) priestesses besides;
nice customs curtseyed to great dames, and in the most sacred
enclosure of a High Place, Father Siméon Delmar was shown
a stone, and told it was the throne of some well-descended
lady. How exactly parallel is this with European practice,
when princesses were suffered to penetrate the strictest
cloister, and women could rule over a land in which they were
denied the control of their own children.</p>
<p>But the tapu is more often the instrument of wise and needful
restrictions. We have seen it as the organ of paternal
government. It serves besides to enforce, in the rare case
of some one wishing to enforce them, rights of private
property. Thus a man, weary of the coming and going of
Marquesan visitors, tapus his door; and to this day you may see
the palm-branch signal, even as our great-grandfathers saw the
peeled wand before a Highland inn. Or take another
case. Anaho is known as ‘the country without
popoi.’ The word popoi serves in different islands to
indicate the main food of the people: thus, in Hawaii, it implies
a preparation of taro; in the Marquesas, of breadfruit. And
a Marquesan does not readily conceive life possible without his
favourite diet. A few years ago a drought killed the
breadfruit trees and the bananas in the district of Anaho; and
from this calamity, and the open-handed customs of the island, a
singular state of things arose. Well-watered Hatiheu had
escaped the drought; every householder of Anaho accordingly
crossed the pass, chose some one in Hatiheu, ‘gave him his
name’—an onerous gift, but one not to be
rejected—and from this improvised relative proceeded to
draw his supplies, for all the world as though he had paid for
them. Hence a continued traffic on the road. Some
stalwart fellow, in a loin-cloth, and glistening with sweat, may
be seen at all hours of the day, a stick across his bare
shoulders, tripping nervously under a double burthen of green
fruits. And on the far side of the gap a dozen stone posts
on the wayside in the shadow of a grove mark the breathing-space
of the popoi-carriers. A little back from the beach, and
not half a mile from Anaho, I was the more amazed to find a
cluster of well-doing breadfruits heavy with their harvest.
‘Why do you not take these?’ I asked.
‘Tapu,’ said Hoka; and I thought to myself (after the
manner of dull travellers) what children and fools these people
were to toil over the mountain and despoil innocent neighbours
when the staff of life was thus growing at their door. I
was the more in error. In the general destruction these
surviving trees were enough only for the family of the
proprietor, and by the simple expedient of declaring a tapu he
enforced his right.</p>
<p>The sanction of the tapu is superstitious; and the punishment
of infraction either a wasting or a deadly sickness. A slow
disease follows on the eating of tapu fish, and can only be cured
with the bones of the same fish burned with the due
mysteries. The cocoa-nut and breadfruit tapu works more
swiftly. Suppose you have eaten tapu fruit at the evening
meal, at night your sleep will be uneasy; in the morning,
swelling and a dark discoloration will have attacked your neck,
whence they spread upward to the face; and in two days, unless
the cure be interjected, you must die. This cure is
prepared from the rubbed leaves of the tree from which the
patient stole; so that he cannot be saved without confessing to
the Tahuku the person whom he wronged. In the experience of
my informant, almost no tapu had been put in use, except the two
described: he had thus no opportunity to learn the nature and
operation of the others; and, as the art of making them was
jealously guarded amongst the old men, he believed the mystery
would soon die out. I should add that he was no Marquesan,
but a Chinaman, a resident in the group from boyhood, and a
reverent believer in the spells which he described. White
men, amongst whom Ah Fu included himself, were exempt; but he had
a tale of a Tahitian woman, who had come to the Marquesas, eaten
tapu fish, and, although uninformed of her offence and danger,
had been afflicted and cured exactly like a native.</p>
<p>Doubtless the belief is strong; doubtless, with this weakly
and fanciful race, it is in many cases strong enough to kill; it
should be strong indeed in those who tapu their trees secretly,
so that they may detect a depredator by his sickness. Or,
perhaps, we should understand the idea of the hidden tapu
otherwise, as a politic device to spread uneasiness and extort
confessions: so that, when a man is ailing, he shall ransack his
brain for any possible offence, and send at once for any
proprietor whose rights he has invaded. ‘Had you
hidden a tapu?’ we may conceive him asking; and I cannot
imagine the proprietor gainsaying it; and this is perhaps the
strangest feature of the system—that it should be regarded
from without with such a mental and implicit awe, and, when
examined from within, should present so many apparent evidences
of design.</p>
<p>We read in Dr. Campbell’s <i>Poenamo</i> of a New
Zealand girl, who was foolishly told that she had eaten a tapu
yam, and who instantly sickened, and died in the two days of
simple terror. The period is the same as in the Marquesas;
doubtless the symptoms were so too. How singular to
consider that a superstition of such sway is possibly a
manufactured article; and that, even if it were not originally
invented, its details have plainly been arranged by the
authorities of some Polynesian Scotland Yard. Fitly enough,
the belief is to-day—and was probably always—far from
universal. Hell at home is a strong deterrent with some; a
passing thought with others; with others, again, a theme of
public mockery, not always well assured; and so in the Marquesas
with the tapu. Mr. Regler has seen the two extremes of
scepticism and implicit fear. In the tapu grove he found
one fellow stealing breadfruit, cheerful and impudent as a street
arab; and it was only on a menace of exposure that he showed
himself the least discountenanced. The other case was
opposed in every point. Mr. Regler asked a native to
accompany him upon a voyage; the man went gladly enough, but
suddenly perceiving a dead tapu fish in the bottom of the boat,
leaped back with a scream; nor could the promise of a dollar
prevail upon him to advance.</p>
<p>The Marquesan, it will be observed, adheres to the old idea of
the local circumscription of beliefs and duties. Not only
are the whites exempt from consequences; but their transgressions
seem to be viewed without horror. It was Mr. Regler who had
killed the fish; yet the devout native was not shocked at Mr.
Regler—only refused to join him in his boat. A white
is a white: the servant (so to speak) of other and more liberal
gods; and not to be blamed if he profit by his liberty. The
Jews were perhaps the first to interrupt this ancient comity of
faiths; and the Jewish virus is still strong in
Christianity. All the world must respect our tapus, or we
gnash our teeth.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER VII—HATIHEU</h3>
<p>The bays of Anaho and Hatiheu are divided at their roots by
the knife-edge of a single hill—the pass so often
mentioned; but this isthmus expands to the seaward in a
considerable peninsula: very bare and grassy; haunted by sheep
and, at night and morning, by the piercing cries of the
shepherds; wandered over by a few wild goats; and on its
sea-front indented with long, clamorous caves, and faced with
cliffs of the colour and ruinous outline of an old
peat-stack. In one of these echoing and sunless gullies we
saw, clustered like sea-birds on a splashing ledge, shrill as
sea-birds in their salutation to the passing boat, a group of
fisherwomen, stripped to their gaudy under-clothes. (The
clash of the surf and the thin female voices echo in my
memory.) We had that day a native crew and steersman,
Kauanui; it was our first experience of Polynesian seamanship,
which consists in hugging every point of land. There is no
thought in this of saving time, for they will pull a long way in
to skirt a point that is embayed. It seems that, as they
can never get their houses near enough the surf upon the one
side, so they can never get their boats near enough upon the
other. The practice in bold water is not so dangerous as it
looks—the reflex from the rocks sending the boat off.
Near beaches with a heavy run of sea, I continue to think it very
hazardous, and find the composure of the natives annoying to
behold. We took unmingled pleasure, on the way out, to see
so near at hand the beach and the wonderful colours of the
surf. On the way back, when the sea had risen and was
running strong against us, the fineness of the steersman’s
aim grew more embarrassing. As we came abreast of the
sea-front, where the surf broke highest, Kauanui embraced the
occasion to light his pipe, which then made the circuit of the
boat—each man taking a whiff or two, and, ere he passed it
on, filling his lungs and cheeks with smoke. Their faces
were all puffed out like apples as we came abreast of the cliff
foot, and the bursting surge fell back into the boat in
showers. At the next point ‘cocanetti’ was the
word, and the stroke borrowed my knife, and desisted from his
labours to open nuts. These untimely indulgences may be
compared to the tot of grog served out before a ship goes into
action.</p>
<p>My purpose in this visit led me first to the boys’
school, for Hatiheu is the university of the north islands.
The hum of the lesson came out to meet us. Close by the
door, where the draught blew coolest, sat the lay brother; around
him, in a packed half-circle, some sixty high-coloured faces set
with staring eyes; and in the background of the barn-like room
benches were to be seen, and blackboards with sums on them in
chalk. The brother rose to greet us, sensibly humble.
Thirty years he had been there, he said, and fingered his white
locks as a bashful child pulls out his pinafore. ‘<i>Et
point de résultats</i>, <i>monsieur</i>, <i>presque pas de
résultats</i>.’ He pointed to the scholars:
‘You see, sir, all the youth of Nuka-hiva and Ua-pu.
Between the ages of six and fifteen this is all that remains; and
it is but a few years since we had a hundred and twenty from
Nuka-hiva alone. <i>Oui</i>, <i>monsieur</i>, <i>cela se
dépérit</i>.’ Prayers, and reading and
writing, prayers again and arithmetic, and more prayers to
conclude: such appeared to be the dreary nature of the
course. For arithmetic all island people have a natural
taste. In Hawaii they make good progress in
mathematics. In one of the villages on Majuro, and
generally in the Marshall group, the whole population sit about
the trader when he is weighing copra, and each on his own slate
takes down the figures and computes the total. The trader,
finding them so apt, introduced fractions, for which they had
been taught no rule. At first they were quite gravelled but
ultimately, by sheer hard thinking, reasoned out the result, and
came one after another to assure the trader he was right.
Not many people in Europe could have done the like. The
course at Hatiheu is therefore less dispiriting to Polynesians
than a stranger might have guessed; and yet how bald it is at
best! I asked the brother if he did not tell them stories,
and he stared at me; if he did not teach them history, and he
said, ‘O yes, they had a little Scripture
history—from the New Testament’; and repeated his
lamentations over the lack of results. I had not the heart
to put more questions; I could but say it must be very
discouraging, and resist the impulse to add that it seemed also
very natural. He looked up—‘My days are far
spent,’ he said; ‘heaven awaits me.’ May
that heaven forgive me, but I was angry with the old man and his
simple consolation. For think of his opportunity! The
youth, from six to fifteen, are taken from their homes by
Government, centralised at Hatiheu, where they are supported by a
weekly tax of food; and, with the exception of one month in every
year, surrendered wholly to the direction of the priests.
Since the escapade already mentioned the holiday occurs at a
different period for the girls and for the boys; so that a
Marquesan brother and sister meet again, after their education is
complete, a pair of strangers. It is a harsh law, and
highly unpopular; but what a power it places in the hands of the
instructors, and how languidly and dully is that power employed
by the mission! Too much concern to make the natives pious,
a design in which they all confess defeat, is, I suppose, the
explanation of their miserable system. But they might see
in the girls’ school at Tai-o-hae, under the brisk,
housewifely sisters, a different picture of efficiency, and a
scene of neatness, airiness, and spirited and mirthful occupation
that should shame them into cheerier methods. The sisters
themselves lament their failure. They complain the annual
holiday undoes the whole year’s work; they complain
particularly of the heartless indifference of the girls.
Out of so many pretty and apparently affectionate pupils whom
they have taught and reared, only two have ever returned to pay a
visit of remembrance to their teachers. These, indeed, come
regularly, but the rest, so soon as their school-days are over,
disappear into the woods like captive insects. It is hard
to imagine anything more discouraging; and yet I do not believe
these ladies need despair. For a certain interval they keep
the girls alive and innocently busy; and if it be at all possible
to save the race, this would be the means. No such praise
can be given to the boys’ school at Hatiheu. The day
is numbered already for them all; alike for the teacher and the
scholars death is girt; he is afoot upon the march; and in the
frequent interval they sit and yawn. But in life there
seems a thread of purpose through the least significant; the
drowsiest endeavour is not lost, and even the school at Hatiheu
may be more useful than it seems.</p>
<p>Hatiheu is a place of some pretensions. The end of the
bay towards Anaho may be called the civil compound, for it boasts
the house of Kooamua, and close on the beach, under a great tree,
that of the gendarme, M. Armand Aussel, with his garden, his
pictures, his books, and his excellent table, to which strangers
are made welcome. No more singular contrast is possible
than between the gendarmerie and the priesthood, who are besides
in smouldering opposition and full of mutual complaints. A
priest’s kitchen in the eastern islands is a depressing
spot to see; and many, or most of them, make no attempt to keep a
garden, sparsely subsisting on their rations. But you will
never dine with a gendarme without smacking your lips; and M.
Aussel’s home-made sausage and the salad from his garden
are unforgotten delicacies. Pierre Loti may like to know
that he is M. Aussel’s favourite author, and that his books
are read in the fit scenery of Hatiheu bay.</p>
<p>The other end is all religious. It is here that an
overhanging and tip-tilted horn, a good sea-mark for Hatiheu,
bursts naked from the verdure of the climbing forest, and breaks
down shoreward in steep taluses and cliffs. From the edge
of one of the highest, perhaps seven hundred or a thousand feet
above the beach, a Virgin looks insignificantly down, like a poor
lost doll, forgotten there by a giant child. This laborious
symbol of the Catholics is always strange to Protestants; we
conceive with wonder that men should think it worth while to toil
so many days, and clamber so much about the face of precipices,
for an end that makes us smile; and yet I believe it was the wise
Bishop Dordillon who chose the place, and I know that those who
had a hand in the enterprise look back with pride upon its
vanquished dangers. The boys’ school is a recent
importation; it was at first in Tai-o-hae, beside the
girls’; and it was only of late, after their joint
escapade, that the width of the island was interposed between the
sexes. But Hatiheu must have been a place of missionary
importance from before. About midway of the beach no less
than three churches stand grouped in a patch of bananas,
intermingled with some pine-apples. Two are of wood: the
original church, now in disuse; and a second that, for some
mysterious reason, has never been used. The new church is
of stone, with twin towers, walls flangeing into buttresses, and
sculptured front. The design itself is good, simple, and
shapely; but the character is all in the detail, where the
architect has bloomed into the sculptor. It is impossible
to tell in words of the angels (although they are more like
winged archbishops) that stand guard upon the door, of the
cherubs in the corners, of the scapegoat gargoyles, or the quaint
and spirited relief, where St. Michael (the artist’s
patron) makes short work of a protesting Lucifer. We were
never weary of viewing the imagery, so innocent, sometimes so
funny, and yet in the best sense—in the sense of inventive
gusto and expression—so artistic. I know not whether
it was more strange to find a building of such merit in a corner
of a barbarous isle, or to see a building so antique still bright
with novelty. The architect, a French lay brother, still
alive and well, and meditating fresh foundations, must have
surely drawn his descent from a master-builder in the age of the
cathedrals; and it was in looking on the church of Hatiheu that I
seemed to perceive the secret charm of mediæval sculpture;
that combination of the childish courage of the amateur,
attempting all things, like the schoolboy on his slate, with the
manly perseverance of the artist who does not know when he is
conquered.</p>
<p>I had always afterwards a strong wish to meet the architect,
Brother Michel; and one day, when I was talking with the Resident
in Tai-o-hae (the chief port of the island), there were shown in
to us an old, worn, purblind, ascetic-looking priest, and a lay
brother, a type of all that is most sound in France, with a
broad, clever, honest, humorous countenance, an eye very large
and bright, and a strong and healthy body inclining to
obesity. But that his blouse was black and his face shaven
clean, you might pick such a man to-day, toiling cheerfully in
his own patch of vines, from half a dozen provinces of France;
and yet he had always for me a haunting resemblance to an old
kind friend of my boyhood, whom I name in case any of my readers
should share with me that memory—Dr. Paul, of the West
Kirk. Almost at the first word I was sure it was my
architect, and in a moment we were deep in a discussion of
Hatiheu church. Brother Michel spoke always of his labours
with a twinkle of humour, underlying which it was possible to spy
a serious pride, and the change from one to another was often
very human and diverting. ‘<i>Et vos gargouilles
moyen-âge</i>,’ cried I; ‘<i>comme elles sont
originates</i>!’ ‘<i>N’est-ce
pas</i>? <i>Elles sont bien drôles</i>!’ he
said, smiling broadly; and the next moment, with a sudden
gravity: ‘<i>Cependant il y en a une qui a une patte de
cassé</i>; <i>il faut que je voie cela</i>.’ I
asked if he had any model—a point we much discussed.
‘<i>Non</i>,’ said he simply; ‘<i>c’est
une église idéale</i>.’ The relievo was
his favourite performance, and very justly so. The angels
at the door, he owned, he would like to destroy and
replace. ‘<i>Ils n’ont pas de vie</i>, <i>ils
manquent de vie</i>. <i>Vous devriez voir mon église
à la Dominique</i>; <i>j’ai là une Vierge qui
est vraiment gentille</i>.’ ‘Ah,’ I
cried, ‘they told me you had said you would never build
another church, and I wrote in my journal I could not believe
it.’ ‘<i>Oui</i>, <i>j’aimerais bien en
fairs une autre</i>,’ he confessed, and smiled at the
confession. An artist will understand how much I was
attracted by this conversation. There is no bond so near as
a community in that unaffected interest and slightly shame-faced
pride which mark the intelligent man enamoured of an art.
He sees the limitations of his aim, the defects of his practice;
he smiles to be so employed upon the shores of death, yet sees in
his own devotion something worthy. Artists, if they had the
same sense of humour with the Augurs, would smile like them on
meeting, but the smile would not be scornful.</p>
<p>I had occasion to see much of this excellent man. He
sailed with us from Tai-o-hae to Hiva-oa, a dead beat of ninety
miles against a heavy sea. It was what is called a good
passage, and a feather in the <i>Casco’s</i> cap; but among
the most miserable forty hours that any one of us had ever
passed. We were swung and tossed together all that time
like shot in a stage thunder-box. The mate was thrown down
and had his head cut open; the captain was sick on deck; the cook
sick in the galley. Of all our party only two sat down to
dinner. I was one. I own that I felt wretchedly; and
I can only say of the other, who professed to feel quite well,
that she fled at an early moment from the table. It was in
these circumstances that we skirted the windward shore of that
indescribable island of Ua-pu; viewing with dizzy eyes the coves,
the capes, the breakers, the climbing forests, and the
inaccessible stone needles that surmount the mountains. The
place persists, in a dark corner of our memories, like a piece of
the scenery of nightmares. The end of this distressful
passage, where we were to land our passengers, was in a similar
vein of roughness. The surf ran high on the beach at
Taahauku; the boat broached-to and capsized; and all hands were
submerged. Only the brother himself, who was well used to
the experience, skipped ashore, by some miracle of agility, with
scarce a sprinkling. Thenceforward, during our stay at
Hiva-oa, he was our cicerone and patron; introducing us, taking
us excursions, serving us in every way, and making himself daily
more beloved.</p>
<p>Michel Blanc had been a carpenter by trade; had made money and
retired, supposing his active days quite over; and it was only
when he found idleness dangerous that he placed his capital and
acquirements at the service of the mission. He became their
carpenter, mason, architect, and engineer; added sculpture to his
accomplishments, and was famous for his skill in gardening.
He wore an enviable air of having found a port from life’s
contentions and lying there strongly anchored; went about his
business with a jolly simplicity; complained of no lack of
results—perhaps shyly thinking his own statuary result
enough; and was altogether a pattern of the missionary
layman.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER VIII—THE PORT OF ENTRY</h3>
<p>The port—the mart, the civil and religious capital of
these rude islands—is called Tai-o-hae, and lies strung
along the beach of a precipitous green bay in Nuka-hiva. It
was midwinter when we came thither, and the weather was sultry,
boisterous, and inconstant. Now the wind blew squally from
the land down gaps of splintered precipice; now, between the
sentinel islets of the entry, it came in gusts from
seaward. Heavy and dark clouds impended on the summits; the
rain roared and ceased; the scuppers of the mountain gushed; and
the next day we would see the sides of the amphitheatre bearded
with white falls. Along the beach the town shows a thin
file of houses, mostly white, and all ensconced in the foliage of
an avenue of green puraos; a pier gives access from the sea
across the belt of breakers; to the eastward there stands, on a
projecting bushy hill, the old fort which is now the calaboose,
or prison; eastward still, alone in a garden, the Residency flies
the colours of France. Just off Calaboose Hill, the tiny
Government schooner rides almost permanently at anchor, marks
eight bells in the morning (there or thereabout) with the
unfurling of her flag, and salutes the setting sun with the
report of a musket.</p>
<p>Here dwell together, and share the comforts of a club (which
may be enumerated as a billiard-board, absinthe, a map of the
world on Mercator’s projection, and one of the most
agreeable verandahs in the tropics), a handful of whites of
varying nationality, mostly French officials, German and Scottish
merchant clerks, and the agents of the opium monopoly.
There are besides three tavern-keepers, the shrewd Scot who runs
the cotton gin-mill, two white ladies, and a sprinkling of people
‘on the beach’—a South Sea expression for which
there is no exact equivalent. It is a pleasant society, and
a hospitable. But one man, who was often to be seen seated
on the logs at the pier-head, merits a word for the singularity
of his history and appearance. Long ago, it seems, he fell
in love with a native lady, a High Chiefess in Ua-pu. She,
on being approached, declared she could never marry a man who was
untattooed; it looked so naked; whereupon, with some greatness of
soul, our hero put himself in the hands of the Tahukus, and, with
still greater, persevered until the process was complete.
He had certainly to bear a great expense, for the Tahuku will not
work without reward; and certainly exquisite pain. Kooamua,
high chief as he was, and one of the old school, was only part
tattooed; he could not, he told us with lively pantomime, endure
the torture to an end. Our enamoured countryman was more
resolved; he was tattooed from head to foot in the most approved
methods of the art; and at last presented himself before his
mistress a new man. The fickle fair one could never behold
him from that day except with laughter. For my part, I
could never see the man without a kind of admiration; of him it
might be said, if ever of any, that he had loved not wisely, but
too well.</p>
<p>The Residency stands by itself, Calaboose Hill screening it
from the fringe of town along the further bay. The house is
commodious, with wide verandahs; all day it stands open, back and
front, and the trade blows copiously over its bare floors.
On a week-day the garden offers a scene of most untropical
animation, half a dozen convicts toiling there cheerfully with
spade and barrow, and touching hats and smiling to the visitor
like old attached family servants. On Sunday these are
gone, and nothing to be seen but dogs of all ranks and sizes
peacefully slumbering in the shady grounds; for the dogs of
Tai-o-hae are very courtly-minded, and make the seat of
Government their promenade and place of siesta. In front
and beyond, a strip of green down loses itself in a low wood of
many species of acacia; and deep in the wood a ruinous wall
encloses the cemetery of the Europeans. English and
Scottish sleep there, and Scandinavians, and French
<i>maîtres de manœuvres</i> and <i>maîtres
ouvriers</i>: mingling alien dust. Back in the woods,
perhaps, the blackbird, or (as they call him there) the island
nightingale, will be singing home strains; and the ceaseless
requiem of the surf hangs on the ear. I have never seen a
resting-place more quiet; but it was a long thought how far these
sleepers had all travelled, and from what diverse homes they had
set forth, to lie here in the end together.</p>
<p>On the summit of its promontory hill, the calaboose stands all
day with doors and window-shutters open to the trade. On my
first visit a dog was the only guardian visible. He,
indeed, rose with an attitude so menacing that I was glad to lay
hands on an old barrel-hoop; and I think the weapon must have
been familiar, for the champion instantly retreated, and as I
wandered round the court and through the building, I could see
him, with a couple of companions, humbly dodging me about the
corners. The prisoners’ dormitory was a spacious,
airy room, devoid of any furniture; its whitewashed walls covered
with inscriptions in Marquesan and rude drawings: one of the
pier, not badly done; one of a murder; several of French soldiers
in uniform. There was one legend in French: ‘<i>Je
n’est</i>’ (sic) ‘<i>pas le
sou</i>.’ From this noontide quietude it must not be
supposed the prison was untenanted; the calaboose at Tai-o-hae
does a good business. But some of its occupants were
gardening at the Residency, and the rest were probably at work
upon the streets, as free as our scavengers at home, although not
so industrious. On the approach of evening they would be
called in like children from play; and the harbour-master (who is
also the jailer) would go through the form of locking them up
until six the next morning. Should a prisoner have any call
in town, whether of pleasure or affairs, he has but to unhook the
window-shutters; and if he is back again, and the shutter
decently replaced, by the hour of call on the morrow, he may have
met the harbour-master in the avenue, and there will be no
complaint, far less any punishment. But this is not
all. The charming French Resident, M. Delaruelle, carried
me one day to the calaboose on an official visit. In the
green court, a very ragged gentleman, his legs deformed with the
island elephantiasis, saluted us smiling. ‘One of our
political prisoners—an insurgent from Raiatea,’ said
the Resident; and then to the jailer: ‘I thought I had
ordered him a new pair of trousers.’ Meanwhile no
other convict was to be seen—‘<i>Eh bien</i>,’
said the Resident, ‘<i>où sont vos
prisonniers</i>?’ ‘<i>Monsieur le
Résident</i>,’ replied the jailer, saluting with
soldierly formality, ‘<i>comme c’est jour de
fête</i>, <i>je les ai laissé aller à la
chasse</i>.’ They were all upon the mountains hunting
goats! Presently we came to the quarters of the women,
likewise deserted—‘<i>Où sont vos bonnes
femmes</i>?’ asked the Resident; and the jailer cheerfully
responded: ‘<i>Je crois</i>, <i>Monsieur le
Résident</i>, <i>qu’elles sont allées
quelquepart faire une visite</i>.’ It had been the
design of M. Delaruelle, who was much in love with the
whimsicalities of his small realm, to elicit something comical;
but not even he expected anything so perfect as the last.
To complete the picture of convict life in Tai-o-hae, it remains
to be added that these criminals draw a salary as regularly as
the President of the Republic. Ten sous a day is their
hire. Thus they have money, food, shelter, clothing, and, I
was about to write, their liberty. The French are certainly
a good-natured people, and make easy masters. They are
besides inclined to view the Marquesans with an eye of humorous
indulgence. ‘They are dying, poor devils!’ said
M. Delaruelle: ‘the main thing is to let them die in
peace.’ And it was not only well said, but I believe
expressed the general thought. Yet there is another element
to be considered; for these convicts are not merely useful, they
are almost essential to the French existence. With a people
incurably idle, dispirited by what can only be called endemic
pestilence, and inflamed with ill-feeling against their new
masters, crime and convict labour are a godsend to the
Government.</p>
<p>Theft is practically the sole crime. Originally petty
pilferers, the men of Tai-o-hae now begin to force locks and
attack strong-boxes. Hundreds of dollars have been taken at
a time; though, with that redeeming moderation so common in
Polynesian theft, the Marquesan burglar will always take a part
and leave a part, sharing (so to speak) with the
proprietor. If it be Chilian coin—the island
currency—he will escape; if the sum is in gold, French
silver, or bank-notes, the police wait until the money begins to
come in circulation, and then easily pick out their man.
And now comes the shameful part. In plain English, the
prisoner is tortured until he confesses and (if that be possible)
restores the money. To keep him alone, day and night, in
the black hole, is to inflict on the Marquesan torture
inexpressible. Even his robberies are carried on in the
plain daylight, under the open sky, with the stimulus of
enterprise, and the countenance of an accomplice; his terror of
the dark is still insurmountable; conceive, then, what he endures
in his solitary dungeon; conceive how he longs to confess, become
a full-fledged convict, and be allowed to sleep beside his
comrades. While we were in Tai-o-hae a thief was under
prevention. He had entered a house about eight in the
morning, forced a trunk, and stolen eleven hundred francs; and
now, under the horrors of darkness, solitude, and a bedevilled
cannibal imagination, he was reluctantly confessing and giving up
his spoil. From one cache, which he had already pointed
out, three hundred francs had been recovered, and it was expected
that he would presently disgorge the rest. This would be
ugly enough if it were all; but I am bound to say, because it is
a matter the French should set at rest, that worse is continually
hinted. I heard that one man was kept six days with his
arms bound backward round a barrel; and it is the universal
report that every gendarme in the South Seas is equipped with
something in the nature of a thumbscrew. I do not know
this. I never had the face to ask any of the
gendarmes—pleasant, intelligent, and kindly
fellows—with whom I have been intimate, and whose
hospitality I have enjoyed; and perhaps the tale reposes (as I
hope it does) on a misconstruction of that ingenious
cat’s-cradle with which the French agent of police so
readily secures a prisoner. But whether physical or moral,
torture is certainly employed; and by a barbarous injustice, the
state of accusation (in which a man may very well be innocently
placed) is positively painful; the state of conviction (in which
all are supposed guilty) is comparatively free, and positively
pleasant. Perhaps worse still,—not only the accused,
but sometimes his wife, his mistress, or his friend, is subjected
to the same hardships. I was admiring, in the tapu system,
the ingenuity of native methods of detection; there is not much
to admire in those of the French, and to lock up a timid child in
a dark room, and, if he proved obstinate, lock up his sister in
the next, is neither novel nor humane.</p>
<p>The main occasion of these thefts is the new vice of
opium-eating. ‘Here nobody ever works, and all eat
opium,’ said a gendarme; and Ah Fu knew a woman who ate a
dollar’s worth in a day. The successful thief will
give a handful of money to each of his friends, a dress to a
woman, pass an evening in one of the taverns of Tai-o-hae, during
which he treats all comers, produce a big lump of opium, and
retire to the bush to eat and sleep it off. A trader, who
did not sell opium, confessed to me that he was at his
wit’s end. ‘I do not sell it, but others
do,’ said he. ‘The natives only work to buy it;
if they walk over to me to sell their cotton, they have just to
walk over to some one else to buy their opium with my
money. And why should they be at the bother of two
walks? There is no use talking,’ he
added—‘opium is the currency of this
country.’</p>
<p>The man under prevention during my stay at Tai-o-hae lost
patience while the Chinese opium-seller was being examined in his
presence. ‘Of course he sold me opium!’ he
broke out; ‘all the Chinese here sell opium. It was
only to buy opium that I stole; it is only to buy opium that
anybody steals. And what you ought to do is to let no opium
come here, and no Chinamen.’ This is precisely what
is done in Samoa by a native Government; but the French have
bound their own hands, and for forty thousand francs sold native
subjects to crime and death. This horrid traffic may be
said to have sprung up by accident. It was Captain Hart who
had the misfortune to be the means of beginning it, at a time
when his plantations flourished in the Marquesas, and he found a
difficulty in keeping Chinese coolies. To-day the
plantations are practically deserted and the Chinese gone; but in
the meanwhile the natives have learned the vice, the patent
brings in a round sum, and the needy Government at Papeete shut
their eyes and open their pockets. Of course, the patentee
is supposed to sell to Chinamen alone; equally of course, no one
could afford to pay forty thousand francs for the privilege of
supplying a scattered handful of Chinese; and every one knows the
truth, and all are ashamed of it. French officials shake
their heads when opium is mentioned; and the agents of the farmer
blush for their employment. Those that live in glass houses
should not throw stones; as a subject of the British crown, I am
an unwilling shareholder in the largest opium business under
heaven. But the British case is highly complicated; it
implies the livelihood of millions; and must be reformed, when it
can be reformed at all, with prudence. This French
business, on the other hand, is a nostrum and a mere
excrescence. No native industry was to be encouraged: the
poison is solemnly imported. No native habit was to be
considered: the vice has been gratuitously introduced. And
no creature profits, save the Government at Papeete—the not
very enviable gentlemen who pay them, and the Chinese underlings
who do the dirty work.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER IX—THE HOUSE OF TEMOANA</h3>
<p>The history of the Marquesas is, of late years, much confused
by the coming and going of the French. At least twice they
have seized the archipelago, at least once deserted it; and in
the meanwhile the natives pursued almost without interruption
their desultory cannibal wars. Through these events and
changing dynasties, a single considerable figure may be seen to
move: that of the high chief, a king, Temoana. Odds and
ends of his history came to my ears: how he was at first a
convert to the Protestant mission; how he was kidnapped or exiled
from his native land, served as cook aboard a whaler, and was
shown, for small charge, in English seaports; how he returned at
last to the Marquesas, fell under the strong and benign influence
of the late bishop, extended his influence in the group, was for
a while joint ruler with the prelate, and died at last the chief
supporter of Catholicism and the French. His widow remains
in receipt of two pounds a month from the French
Government. Queen she is usually called, but in the
official almanac she figures as ‘<i>Madame Vaekehu</i>,
<i>Grande Chefesse</i>.’ His son (natural or
adoptive, I know not which), Stanislao Moanatini, chief of Akaui,
serves in Tai-o-hae as a kind of Minister of Public Works; and
the daughter of Stanislao is High Chiefess of the southern island
of Tauata. These, then, are the greatest folk of the
archipelago; we thought them also the most estimable. This
is the rule in Polynesia, with few exceptions; the higher the
family, the better the man—better in sense, better in
manners, and usually taller and stronger in body. A
stranger advances blindfold. He scrapes acquaintance as he
can. Save the tattoo in the Marquesas, nothing indicates
the difference of rank; and yet almost invariably we found, after
we had made them, that our friends were persons of station.
I have said ‘usually taller and stronger.’ I
might have been more absolute,—over all Polynesia, and a
part of Micronesia, the rule holds good; the great ones of the
isle, and even of the village, are greater of bone and muscle,
and often heavier of flesh, than any commoner. The usual
explanation—that the high-born child is more industriously
shampooed, is probably the true one. In New Caledonia, at
least, where the difference does not exist, has never been
remarked, the practice of shampooing seems to be itself
unknown. Doctors would be well employed in a study of the
point.</p>
<p>Vaekehu lives at the other end of the town from the Residency,
beyond the buildings of the mission. Her house is on the
European plan: a table in the midst of the chief room;
photographs and religious pictures on the wall. It commands
to either hand a charming vista: through the front door, a peep
of green lawn, scurrying pigs, the pendent fans of the coco-palm
and splendour of the bursting surf: through the back, mounting
forest glades and coronals of precipice. Here, in the
strong thorough-draught, Her Majesty received us in a simple gown
of print, and with no mark of royalty but the exquisite finish of
her tattooed mittens, the elaboration of her manners, and the
gentle falsetto in which all the highly refined among Marquesan
ladies (and Vaekehu above all others) delight to sing their
language. An adopted daughter interpreted, while we gave
the news, and rehearsed by name our friends of Anaho. As we
talked, we could see, through the landward door, another lady of
the household at her toilet under the green trees; who presently,
when her hair was arranged, and her hat wreathed with flowers,
appeared upon the back verandah with gracious salutations.</p>
<p>Vaekehu is very deaf; ‘<i>merci</i>’ is her only
word of French; and I do not know that she seemed clever.
An exquisite, kind refinement, with a shade of quietism, gathered
perhaps from the nuns, was what chiefly struck us. Or
rather, upon that first occasion, we were conscious of a sense as
of district-visiting on our part, and reduced evangelical
gentility on the part of our hostess. The other impression
followed after she was more at ease, and came with Stanislao and
his little girl to dine on board the <i>Casco</i>. She had
dressed for the occasion: wore white, which very well became her
strong brown face; and sat among us, eating or smoking her
cigarette, quite cut off from all society, or only now and then
included through the intermediary of her son. It was a
position that might have been ridiculous, and she made it
ornamental; making believe to hear and to be entertained; her
face, whenever she met our eyes, lighting with the smile of good
society; her contributions to the talk, when she made any, and
that was seldom, always complimentary and pleasing. No
attention was paid to the child, for instance, but what she
remarked and thanked us for. Her parting with each, when
she came to leave, was gracious and pretty, as had been every
step of her behaviour. When Mrs. Stevenson held out her
hand to say good-bye, Vaekehu took it, held it, and a moment
smiled upon her; dropped it, and then, as upon a kindly
after-thought, and with a sort of warmth of condescension, held
out both hands and kissed my wife upon both cheeks. Given
the same relation of years and of rank, the thing would have been
so done on the boards of the <i>Comédie
Française</i>; just so might Madame Brohan have warmed and
condescended to Madame Broisat in the <i>Marquis de
Villemer</i>. It was my part to accompany our guests
ashore: when I kissed the little girl good-bye at the pier steps,
Vaekehu gave a cry of gratification, reached down her hand into
the boat, took mine, and pressed it with that flattering softness
which seems the coquetry of the old lady in every quarter of the
earth. The next moment she had taken Stanislao’s arm,
and they moved off along the pier in the moonlight, leaving me
bewildered. This was a queen of cannibals; she was tattooed
from hand to foot, and perhaps the greatest masterpiece of that
art now extant, so that a while ago, before she was grown prim,
her leg was one of the sights of Tai-o-hae; she had been passed
from chief to chief; she had been fought for and taken in war;
perhaps, being so great a lady, she had sat on the high place,
and throned it there, alone of her sex, while the drums were
going twenty strong and the priests carried up the blood-stained
baskets of long-pig. And now behold her, out of that past
of violence and sickening feasts, step forth, in her age, a
quiet, smooth, elaborate old lady, such as you might find at home
(mittened also, but not often so well-mannered) in a score of
country houses. Only Vaekehu’s mittens were of dye,
not of silk; and they had been paid for, not in money, but the
cooked flesh of men. It came in my mind with a clap, what
she could think of it herself, and whether at heart, perhaps, she
might not regret and aspire after the barbarous and stirring
past. But when I asked Stanislao—‘Ah!’
said he, ‘she is content; she is religious, she passes all
her days with the sisters.’</p>
<p>Stanislao (Stanislaos, with the final consonant evaded after
the Polynesian habit) was sent by Bishop Dordillon to South
America, and there educated by the fathers. His French is
fluent, his talk sensible and spirited, and in his capacity of
ganger-in-chief, he is of excellent service to the French.
With the prestige of his name and family, and with the stick when
needful, he keeps the natives working and the roads
passable. Without Stanislao and the convicts, I am in doubt
what would become of the present regimen in Nuka-hiva; whether
the highways might not be suffered to close up, the pier to wash
away, and the Residency to fall piecemeal about the ears of
impotent officials. And yet though the hereditary favourer,
and one of the chief props of French authority, he has always an
eye upon the past. He showed me where the old public place
had stood, still to be traced by random piles of stone; told me
how great and fine it was, and surrounded on all sides by
populous houses, whence, at the beating of the drums, the folk
crowded to make holiday. The drum-beat of the Polynesian
has a strange and gloomy stimulation for the nerves of all.
White persons feel it—at these precipitate sounds their
hearts beat faster; and, according to old residents, its effect
on the natives was extreme. Bishop Dordillon might entreat;
Temoana himself command and threaten; at the note of the drum
wild instincts triumphed. And now it might beat upon these
ruins, and who should assemble? The houses are down, the
people dead, their lineage extinct; and the sweepings and
fugitives of distant bays and islands encamp upon their
graves. The decline of the dance Stanislao especially
laments. ‘<i>Chaque pays a ses coutumes</i>,’
said he; but in the report of any gendarme, perhaps corruptly
eager to increase the number of <i>délits</i> and the
instruments of his own power, custom after custom is placed on
the expurgatorial index. ‘<i>Tenez</i>, <i>une danse
qui n’est pas permise</i>,’ said Stanislao:
‘<i>je ne sais pas pourquoi</i>, <i>elle est très
jolie</i>, <i>elle va comme ça</i>,’ and sticking
his umbrella upright in the road, he sketched the steps and
gestures. All his criticisms of the present, all his
regrets for the past, struck me as temperate and sensible.
The short term of office of the Resident he thought the chief
defect of the administration; that officer having scarce begun to
be efficient ere he was recalled. I thought I gathered,
too, that he regarded with some fear the coming change from a
naval to a civil governor. I am sure at least that I regard
it so myself; for the civil servants of France have never
appeared to any foreigner as at all the flower of their country,
while her naval officers may challenge competition with the
world. In all his talk, Stanislao was particular to speak
of his own country as a land of savages; and when he stated an
opinion of his own, it was with some apologetic preface, alleging
that he was ‘a savage who had travelled.’ There
was a deal, in this elaborate modesty, of honest pride. Yet
there was something in the precaution that saddened me; and I
could not but fear he was only forestalling a taunt that he had
heard too often.</p>
<p>I recall with interest two interviews with Stanislao.
The first was a certain afternoon of tropic rain, which we passed
together in the verandah of the club; talking at times with
heightened voices as the showers redoubled overhead, passing at
times into the billiard-room, to consult, in the dim, cloudy
daylight, that map of the world which forms its chief
adornment. He was naturally ignorant of English history, so
that I had much of news to communicate. The story of Gordon
I told him in full, and many episodes of the Indian Mutiny,
Lucknow, the second battle of Cawn-pore, the relief of Arrah, the
death of poor Spottis-woode, and Sir Hugh Rose’s hotspur,
midland campaign. He was intent to hear; his brown face,
strongly marked with small-pox, kindled and changed with each
vicissitude. His eyes glowed with the reflected light of
battle; his questions were many and intelligent, and it was
chiefly these that sent us so often to the map. But it is
of our parting that I keep the strongest sense. We were to
sail on the morrow, and the night had fallen, dark, gusty, and
rainy, when we stumbled up the hill to bid farewell to
Stanislao. He had already loaded us with gifts; but more
were waiting. We sat about the table over cigars and green
cocoa-nuts; claps of wind blew through the house and extinguished
the lamp, which was always instantly relighted with a single
match; and these recurrent intervals of darkness were felt as a
relief. For there was something painful and embarrassing in
the kindness of that separation. ‘<i>Ah</i>, <i>vous
devriez rester ici</i>, <i>mon cher ami</i>!’ cried
Stanislao. ‘<i>Vous êtes les gens qu’il
faut pour les Kanaques</i>; <i>vous êtes doux</i>, <i>vous
et votre famille</i>; <i>vous seriez obéis dans toutes les
îles</i>.’ We had been civil; not always that,
my conscience told me, and never anything beyond; and all this
to-do is a measure, not of our considerateness, but of the want
of it in others. The rest of the evening, on to
Vaekehu’s and back as far as to the pier, Stanislao walked
with my arm and sheltered me with his umbrella; and after the
boat had put off, we could still distinguish, in the murky
darkness, his gestures of farewell. His words, if there
were any, were drowned by the rain and the loud surf.</p>
<p>I have mentioned presents, a vexed question in the South Seas;
and one which well illustrates the common, ignorant habit of
regarding races in a lump. In many quarters the Polynesian
gives only to receive. I have visited islands where the
population mobbed me for all the world like dogs after the waggon
of cat’s-meat; and where the frequent proposition,
‘You my pleni (friend),’ or (with more of pathos)
‘You all ’e same my father,’ must be received
with hearty laughter and a shout. And perhaps everywhere,
among the greedy and rapacious, a gift is regarded as a sprat to
catch a whale. It is the habit to give gifts and to receive
returns, and such characters, complying with the custom, will
look to it nearly that they do not lose. But for persons of
a different stamp the statement must be reversed. The
shabby Polynesian is anxious till he has received the return
gift; the generous is uneasy until he has made it. The
first is disappointed if you have not given more than he; the
second is miserable if he thinks he has given less than
you. This is my experience; if it clash with that of
others, I pity their fortune, and praise mine: the circumstances
cannot change what I have seen, nor lessen what I have
received. And indeed I find that those who oppose me often
argue from a ground of singular presumptions; comparing
Polynesians with an ideal person, compact of generosity and
gratitude, whom I never had the pleasure of encountering; and
forgetting that what is almost poverty to us is wealth almost
unthinkable to them. I will give one instance: I chanced to
speak with consideration of these gifts of Stanislao’s with
a certain clever man, a great hater and contemner of
Kanakas. ‘Well! what were they?’ he
cried. ‘A pack of old men’s beards.
Trash!’ And the same gentleman, some half an hour
later, being upon a different train of thought, dwelt at length
on the esteem in which the Marquesans held that sort of property,
how they preferred it to all others except land, and what fancy
prices it would fetch. Using his own figures, I computed
that, in this commodity alone, the gifts of Vaekehu and Stanislao
represented between two and three hundred dollars; and the
queen’s official salary is of two hundred and forty in the
year.</p>
<p>But generosity on the one hand, and conspicuous meanness on
the other, are in the South Seas, as at home, the
exception. It is neither with any hope of gain, nor with
any lively wish to please, that the ordinary Polynesian chooses
and presents his gifts. A plain social duty lies before
him, which he performs correctly, but without the least
enthusiasm. And we shall best understand his attitude of
mind, if we examine our own to the cognate absurdity of marriage
presents. There we give without any special thought of a
return; yet if the circumstance arise, and the return be
withheld, we shall judge ourselves insulted. We give them
usually without affection, and almost never with a genuine desire
to please; and our gift is rather a mark of our own status than a
measure of our love to the recipients. So in a great
measure and with the common run of the Polynesians; their gifts
are formal; they imply no more than social recognition; and they
are made and reciprocated, as we pay and return our morning
visits. And the practice of marking and measuring events
and sentiments by presents is universal in the island
world. A gift plays with them the part of stamp and seal;
and has entered profoundly into the mind of islanders.
Peace and war, marriage, adoption and naturalisation, are
celebrated or declared by the acceptance or the refusal of gifts;
and it is as natural for the islander to bring a gift as for us
to carry a card-case.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER X—A PORTRAIT AND A STORY</h3>
<p>I have had occasion several times to name the late bishop,
Father Dordillon, ‘Monseigneur,’ as he is still
almost universally called, Vicar-Apostolic of the Marquesas and
Bishop of Cambysopolis <i>in partibus</i>. Everywhere in
the islands, among all classes and races, this fine, old, kindly,
cheerful fellow is remembered with affection and respect.
His influence with the natives was paramount. They reckoned
him the highest of men—higher than an admiral; brought him
their money to keep; took his advice upon their purchases; nor
would they plant trees upon their own land till they had the
approval of the father of the islands. During the time of
the French exodus he singly represented Europe, living in the
Residency, and ruling by the hand of Temoana. The first
roads were made under his auspices and by his persuasion.
The old road between Hatiheu and Anaho was got under way from
either side on the ground that it would be pleasant for an
evening promenade, and brought to completion by working on the
rivalry of the two villages. The priest would boast in
Hatiheu of the progress made in Anaho, and he would tell the folk
of Anaho, ‘If you don’t take care, your neighbours
will be over the hill before you are at the top.’ It
could not be so done to-day; it could then; death, opium, and
depopulation had not gone so far; and the people of Hatiheu, I
was told, still vied with each other in fine attire, and used to
go out by families, in the cool of the evening, boat-sailing and
racing in the bay. There seems some truth at least in the
common view, that this joint reign of Temoana and the bishop was
the last and brief golden age of the Marquesas. But the
civil power returned, the mission was packed out of the Residency
at twenty-four hours’ notice, new methods supervened, and
the golden age (whatever it quite was) came to an end. It
is the strongest proof of Father Dordillon’s prestige that
it survived, seemingly without loss, this hasty deposition.</p>
<p>His method with the natives was extremely mild. Among
these barbarous children he still played the part of the smiling
father; and he was careful to observe, in all indifferent
matters, the Marquesan etiquette. Thus, in the singular
system of artificial kinship, the bishop had been adopted by
Vaekehu as a grandson; Miss Fisher, of Hatiheu, as a
daughter. From that day, Monseigneur never addressed the
young lady except as his mother, and closed his letters with the
formalities of a dutiful son. With Europeans he could be
strict, even to the extent of harshness. He made no
distinction against heretics, with whom he was on friendly terms;
but the rules of his own Church he would see observed; and once
at least he had a white man clapped in jail for the desecration
of a saint’s day. But even this rigour, so
intolerable to laymen, so irritating to Protestants, could not
shake his popularity. We shall best conceive him by
examples nearer home; we may all have known some divine of the
old school in Scotland, a literal Sabbatarian, a stickler for the
letter of the law, who was yet in private modest, innocent,
genial and mirthful. Much such a man, it seems, was Father
Dordillon. And his popularity bore a test yet
stronger. He had the name, and probably deserved it, of a
shrewd man in business and one that made the mission pay.
Nothing so much stirs up resentment as the inmixture in commerce
of religious bodies; but even rival traders spoke well of
Monseigneur.</p>
<p>His character is best portrayed in the story of the days of
his decline. A time came when, from the failure of sight,
he must desist from his literary labours: his Marquesan hymns,
grammars, and dictionaries; his scientific papers, lives of
saints, and devotional poetry. He cast about for a new
interest: pitched on gardening, and was to be seen all day, with
spade and water-pot, in his childlike eagerness, actually running
between the borders. Another step of decay, and he must
leave his garden also. Instantly a new occupation was
devised, and he sat in the mission cutting paper flowers and
wreaths. His diocese was not great enough for his activity;
the churches of the Marquesas were papered with his handiwork,
and still he must be making more. ‘Ah,’ said
he, smiling, ‘when I am dead what a fine time you will have
clearing out my trash!’ He had been dead about six
months; but I was pleased to see some of his trophies still
exposed, and looked upon them with a smile: the tribute (if I
have read his cheerful character aright) which he would have
preferred to any useless tears. Disease continued
progressively to disable him; he who had clambered so stalwartly
over the rude rocks of the Marquesas, bringing peace to warfaring
clans, was for some time carried in a chair between the mission
and the church, and at last confined to bed, impotent with
dropsy, and tormented with bed-sores and sciatica. Here he
lay two months without complaint; and on the 11th January 1888,
in the seventy-ninth year of his life, and the thirty-fourth of
his labours in the Marquesas, passed away.</p>
<p>Those who have a taste for hearing missions, Protestant or
Catholic, decried, must seek their pleasure elsewhere than in my
pages. Whether Catholic or Protestant, with all their gross
blots, with all their deficiency of candour, of humour, and of
common sense, the missionaries are the best and the most useful
whites in the Pacific. This is a subject which will follow
us throughout; but there is one part of it that may conveniently
be treated here. The married and the celibate missionary,
each has his particular advantage and defect. The married
missionary, taking him at the best, may offer to the native what
he is much in want of—a higher picture of domestic life;
but the woman at his elbow tends to keep him in touch with Europe
and out of touch with Polynesia, and to perpetuate, and even to
ingrain, parochial decencies far best forgotten. The mind
of the female missionary tends, for instance, to be continually
busied about dress. She can be taught with extreme
difficulty to think any costume decent but that to which she grew
accustomed on Clapham Common; and to gratify this prejudice, the
native is put to useless expense, his mind is tainted with the
morbidities of Europe, and his health is set in danger. The
celibate missionary, on the other hand, and whether at best or
worst, falls readily into native ways of life; to which he adds
too commonly what is either a mark of celibate man at large, or
an inheritance from mediæval saints—I mean slovenly
habits and an unclean person. There are, of course, degrees
in this; and the sister (of course, and all honour to her) is as
fresh as a lady at a ball. For the diet there is nothing to
be said—it must amaze and shock the Polynesian—but
for the adoption of native habits there is much.
‘<i>Chaque pays a ses coutumes</i>,’ said Stanislao;
these it is the missionary’s delicate task to modify; and
the more he can do so from within, and from a native standpoint,
the better he will do his work; and here I think the Catholics
have sometimes the advantage; in the Vicariate of Dordillon, I am
sure they had it. I have heard the bishop blamed for his
indulgence to the natives, and above all because he did not rage
with sufficient energy against cannibalism. It was a part
of his policy to live among the natives like an elder brother; to
follow where he could; to lead where it was necessary; never to
drive; and to encourage the growth of new habits, instead of
violently rooting up the old. And it might be better, in
the long-run, if this policy were always followed.</p>
<p>It might be supposed that native missionaries would prove more
indulgent, but the reverse is found to be the case. The new
broom sweeps clean; and the white missionary of to-day is often
embarrassed by the bigotry of his native coadjutor. What
else should we expect? On some islands, sorcery, polygamy,
human sacrifice, and tobacco-smoking have been prohibited, the
dress of the native has been modified, and himself warned in
strong terms against rival sects of Christianity; all by the same
man, at the same period of time, and with the like
authority. By what criterion is the convert to distinguish
the essential from the unessential? He swallows the nostrum
whole; there has been no play of mind, no instruction, and,
except for some brute utility in the prohibitions, no
advance. To call things by their proper names, this is
teaching superstition. It is unfortunate to use the word;
so few people have read history, and so many have dipped into
little atheistic manuals, that the majority will rush to a
conclusion, and suppose the labour lost. And far from that:
These semi-spontaneous superstitions, varying with the sect of
the original evangelist and the customs of the island, are found
in practice to be highly fructifying; and in particular those who
have learned and who go forth again to teach them offer an
example to the world. The best specimen of the Christian
hero that I ever met was one of these native missionaries.
He had saved two lives at the risk of his own; like Nathan, he
had bearded a tyrant in his hour of blood; when a whole white
population fled, he alone stood to his duty; and his behaviour
under domestic sorrow with which the public has no concern filled
the beholder with sympathy and admiration. A poor little
smiling laborious man he looked; and you would have thought he
had nothing in him but that of which indeed he had too
much—facile good-nature. <a name="citation86"></a><a
href="#footnote86" class="citation">[86]</a></p>
<p>It chances that the only rivals of Monseigneur and his mission
in the Marquesas were certain of these brown-skinned evangelists,
natives from Hawaii. I know not what they thought of Father
Dordillon: they are the only class I did not question; but I
suspect the prelate to have regarded them askance, for he was
eminently human. During my stay at Tai-o-hae, the time of
the yearly holiday came round at the girls’ school; and a
whole fleet of whale-boats came from Ua-pu to take the daughters
of that island home. On board of these was Kauwealoha, one
of the pastors, a fine, rugged old gentleman, of that leonine
type so common in Hawaii. He paid me a visit in the
<i>Casco</i>, and there entertained me with a tale of one of his
colleagues, Kekela, a missionary in the great cannibal isle of
Hiva-oa. It appears that shortly after a kidnapping visit
from a Peruvian slaver, the boats of an American whaler put into
a bay upon that island, were attacked, and made their escape with
difficulty, leaving their mate, a Mr. Whalon, in the hands of the
natives. The captive, with his arms bound behind his back,
was cast into a house; and the chief announced the capture to
Kekela. And here I begin to follow the version of
Kauwealoha; it is a good specimen of Kanaka English; and the
reader is to conceive it delivered with violent emphasis and
speaking pantomime.</p>
<p>‘“I got ’Melican mate,” the chief he
say. “What you go do ’Melican mate?”
Kekela he say. “I go make fire, I go kill, I go eat
him,” he say; “you come to-mollow eat
piece.” “I no <i>want</i> eat ’Melican
mate!” Kekela he say; “why you want?”
“This bad shippee, this slave shippee,” the chief he
say. “One time a shippee he come from Pelu, he take
away plenty Kanaka, he take away my son. ’Melican
mate he bad man. I go eat him; you eat piece.”
“I no <i>want</i> eat ’Melican mate!” Kekela he
say; and he <i>cly</i>—all night he cly! To-mollow
Kekela he get up, he put on blackee coat, he go see chief; he see
Missa Whela, him hand tie’ like this.
(<i>Pantomime</i>.) Kekela he cly. He say
chief:—“Chief, you like things of mine? you like
whale-boat?” “Yes,” he say.
“You like file-a’m?” (fire-arms).
“Yes,” he say. “You like blackee
coat?” “Yes,” he say. Kekela he
take Missa Whela by he shoul’a’ (shoulder), he take
him light out house; he give chief he whale-boat, he
file-a’m, he blackee coat. He take Missa Whela he
house, make him sit down with he wife and chil’en.
Missa Whela all-the-same pelison (prison); he wife, he
chil’en in Amelica; he cly—O, he cly. Kekela he
solly. One day Kekela he see ship.
(<i>Pantomime</i>.) He say Missa Whela, “Ma’
Whala?” Missa Whela he say, “Yes.”
Kanaka they begin go down beach. Kekela he get eleven
Kanaka, get oa’ (oars), get evely thing. He say Missa
Whela, “Now you go quick.” They jump in
whale-boat. “Now you low!” Kekela he say:
“you low quick, quick!” (<i>Violent
pantomime</i>, <i>and a change indicating that the narrator has
left the boat and returned to the beach</i>.) All the
Kanaka they say, “How! ’Melican mate he go
away?”—jump in boat; low afta. (<i>Violent
pantomime</i>, <i>and change again to boat</i>.) Kekela he
say, “Low quick!”’</p>
<p>Here I think Kauwealoha’s pantomime had confused me; I
have no more of his <i>ipsissima verba</i>; and can but add, in
my own less spirited manner, that the ship was reached, Mr.
Whalon taken aboard, and Kekela returned to his charge among the
cannibals. But how unjust it is to repeat the stumblings of
a foreigner in a language only partly acquired! A
thoughtless reader might conceive Kauwealoha and his colleague to
be a species of amicable baboon; but I have here the
anti-dote. In return for his act of gallant charity, Kekela
was presented by the American Government with a sum of money, and
by President Lincoln personally with a gold watch. From his
letter of thanks, written in his own tongue, I give the following
extract. I do not envy the man who can read it without
emotion.</p>
<blockquote><p>‘When I saw one of your countrymen, a
citizen of your great nation, ill-treated, and about to be baked
and eaten, as a pig is eaten, I ran to save him, full of pity and
grief at the evil deed of these benighted people. I gave my
boat for the stranger’s life. This boat came from
James Hunnewell, a gift of friendship. It became the ransom
of this countryman of yours, that he might not be eaten by the
savages who knew not Jehovah. This was Mr. Whalon, and the
date, Jan. 14, 1864.</p>
<p>‘As to this friendly deed of mine in saving Mr. Whalon,
its seed came from your great land, and was brought by certain of
your countrymen, who had received the love of God. It was
planted in Hawaii, and I brought it to plant in this land and in
these dark regions, that they might receive the root of all that
is good and true, which is <i>love</i>.</p>
<p>‘1. Love to Jehovah.</p>
<p>‘2. Love to self.</p>
<p>‘3. Love to our neighbour.</p>
<p>‘If a man have a sufficiency of these three, he is good
and holy, like his God, Jehovah, in his triune character (Father,
Son, and Holy Ghost), one-three, three-one. If he have two
and wants one, it is not well; and if he have one and wants two,
indeed, is not well; but if he cherishes all three, then is he
holy, indeed, after the manner of the Bible.</p>
<p>‘This is a great thing for your great nation to boast
of, before all the nations of the earth. From your great
land a most precious seed was brought to the land of
darkness. It was planted here, not by means of guns and
men-of-war and threatening. It was planted by means of the
ignorant, the neglected, the despised. Such was the
introduction of the word of the Almighty God into this group of
Nuuhiwa. Great is my debt to Americans, who have taught me
all things pertaining to this life and to that which is to
come.</p>
<p>‘How shall I repay your great kindness to me? Thus
David asked of Jehovah, and thus I ask of you, the President of
the United States. This is my only payment—that which
I have received of the Lord, love—(aloha).’</p>
</blockquote>
<h3>CHAPTER XI—LONG-PIG—A CANNIBAL HIGH PLACE</h3>
<p>Nothing more strongly arouses our disgust than cannibalism,
nothing so surely unmortars a society; nothing, we might
plausibly argue, will so harden and degrade the minds of those
that practise it. And yet we ourselves make much the same
appearance in the eyes of the Buddhist and the vegetarian.
We consume the carcasses of creatures of like appetites,
passions, and organs with ourselves; we feed on babes, though not
our own; and the slaughter-house resounds daily with screams of
pain and fear. We distinguish, indeed; but the
unwillingness of many nations to eat the dog, an animal with whom
we live on terms of the next intimacy, shows how precariously the
distinction is grounded. The pig is the main element of
animal food among the islands; and I had many occasions, my mind
being quickened by my cannibal surroundings, to observe his
character and the manner of his death. Many islanders live
with their pigs as we do with our dogs; both crowd around the
hearth with equal freedom; and the island pig is a fellow of
activity, enterprise, and sense. He husks his own
cocoa-nuts, and (I am told) rolls them into the sun to burst; he
is the terror of the shepherd. Mrs. Stevenson, senior, has
seen one fleeing to the woods with a lamb in his mouth; and I saw
another come rapidly (and erroneously) to the conclusion that the
<i>Casco</i> was going down, and swim through the flush water to
the rail in search of an escape. It was told us in
childhood that pigs cannot swim; I have known one to leap
overboard, swim five hundred yards to shore, and return to the
house of his original owner. I was once, at Tautira, a
pig-master on a considerable scale; at first, in my pen, the
utmost good feeling prevailed; a little sow with a belly-ache
came and appealed to us for help in the manner of a child; and
there was one shapely black boar, whom we called Catholicus, for
he was a particular present from the Catholics of the village,
and who early displayed the marks of courage and friendliness; no
other animal, whether dog or pig, was suffered to approach him at
his food, and for human beings he showed a full measure of that
toadying fondness so common in the lower animals, and possibly
their chief title to the name. One day, on visiting my
piggery, I was amazed to see Catholicus draw back from my
approach with cries of terror; and if I was amazed at the change,
I was truly embarrassed when I learnt its reason. One of
the pigs had been that morning killed; Catholicus had seen the
murder, he had discovered he was dwelling in the shambles, and
from that time his confidence and his delight in life were
ended. We still reserved him a long while, but he could not
endure the sight of any two-legged creature, nor could we, under
the circumstances, encounter his eye without confusion. I
have assisted besides, by the ear, at the act of butchery itself;
the victim’s cries of pain I think I could have borne, but
the execution was mismanaged, and his expression of terror was
contagious: that small heart moved to the same tune with
ours. Upon such ‘dread foundations’ the life of
the European reposes, and yet the European is among the less
cruel of races. The paraphernalia of murder, the
preparatory brutalities of his existence, are all hid away; an
extreme sensibility reigns upon the surface; and ladies will
faint at the recital of one tithe of what they daily expect of
their butchers. Some will be even crying out upon me in
their hearts for the coarseness of this paragraph. And so
with the island cannibals. They were not cruel; apart from
this custom, they are a race of the most kindly; rightly
speaking, to cut a man’s flesh after he is dead is far less
hateful than to oppress him whilst he lives; and even the victims
of their appetite were gently used in life and suddenly and
painlessly despatched at last. In island circles of
refinement it was doubtless thought bad taste to expatiate on
what was ugly in the practice.</p>
<p>Cannibalism is traced from end to end of the Pacific, from the
Marquesas to New Guinea, from New Zealand to Hawaii, here in the
lively haunt of its exercise, there by scanty but significant
survivals. Hawaii is the most doubtful. We find
cannibalism chronicled in Hawaii, only in the history of a single
war, where it seems to have been thought exception, as in the
case of mountain outlaws, such as fell by the hand of
Theseus. In Tahiti, a single circumstance survived, but
that appears conclusive. In historic times, when human
oblation was made in the marae, the eyes of the victim were
formally offered to the chief: a delicacy to the leading
guest. All Melanesia appears tainted. In Micronesia,
in the Marshalls, with which my acquaintance is no more than that
of a tourist, I could find no trace at all; and even in the
Gilbert zone I long looked and asked in vain. I was told
tales indeed of men who had been eaten in a famine; but these
were nothing to my purpose, for the same thing is done under the
same stress by all kindreds and generations of men. At
last, in some manuscript notes of Dr. Turner’s, which I was
allowed to consult at Malua, I came on one damning evidence: on
the island of Onoatoa the punishment for theft was to be killed
and eaten. How shall we account for the universality of the
practice over so vast an area, among people of such varying
civilisation, and, with whatever intermixture, of such different
blood? What circumstance is common to them all, but that
they lived on islands destitute, or very nearly so, of animal
food? I can never find it in my appetite that man was meant
to live on vegetables only. When our stores ran low among
the islands, I grew to weary for the recurrent day when economy
allowed us to open another tin of miserable mutton. And in
at least one ocean language, a particular word denotes that a man
is ‘hungry for fish,’ having reached that stage when
vegetables can no longer satisfy, and his soul, like those of the
Hebrews in the desert, begins to lust after flesh-pots. Add
to this the evidences of over-population and imminent famine
already adduced, and I think we see some ground of indulgence for
the island cannibal.</p>
<p>It is right to look at both sides of any question; but I am
far from making the apology of this worse than bestial
vice. The higher Polynesian races, such as the Tahitians,
Hawaiians, and Samoans, had one and all outgrown, and some of
them had in part forgot, the practice, before Cook or
Bougainville had shown a top-sail in their waters. It
lingered only in some low islands where life was difficult to
maintain, and among inveterate savages like the New-Zealanders or
the Marquesans. The Marquesans intertwined man-eating with
the whole texture of their lives; long-pig was in a sense their
currency and sacrament; it formed the hire of the artist,
illustrated public events, and was the occasion and attraction of
a feast. To-day they are paying the penalty of this bloody
commixture. The civil power, in its crusade against
man-eating, has had to examine one after another all Marquesan
arts and pleasures, has found them one after another tainted with
a cannibal element, and one after another has placed them on the
proscript list. Their art of tattooing stood by itself, the
execution exquisite, the designs most beautiful and intricate;
nothing more handsomely sets off a handsome man; it may cost some
pain in the beginning, but I doubt if it be near so painful in
the long-run, and I am sure it is far more becoming than the
ignoble European practice of tight-lacing among women. And
now it has been found needful to forbid the art. Their
songs and dances were numerous (and the law has had to abolish
them by the dozen). They now face empty-handed the tedium
of their uneventful days; and who shall pity them? The
least rigorous will say that they were justly served.</p>
<p>Death alone could not satisfy Marquesan vengeance: the flesh
must be eaten. The chief who seized Mr. Whalon preferred to
eat him; and he thought he had justified the wish when he
explained it was a vengeance. Two or three years ago, the
people of a valley seized and slew a wretch who had offended
them. His offence, it is to be supposed, was dire; they
could not bear to leave their vengeance incomplete, and, under
the eyes of the French, they did not dare to hold a public
festival. The body was accordingly divided; and every man
retired to his own house to consummate the rite in secret,
carrying his proportion of the dreadful meat in a Swedish
match-box. The barbarous substance of the drama and the
European properties employed offer a seizing contrast to the
imagination. Yet more striking is another incident of the
very year when I was there myself, 1888. In the spring, a
man and woman skulked about the school-house in Hiva-oa till they
found a particular child alone. Him they approached with
honeyed words and carneying manners—‘You are
So-and-so, son of So-and-so?’ they asked; and caressed and
beguiled him deeper in the woods. Some instinct woke in the
child’s bosom, or some look betrayed the horrid purpose of
his deceivers. He sought to break from them; he screamed;
and they, casting off the mask, seized him the more strongly and
began to run. His cries were heard; his schoolmates,
playing not far off, came running to the rescue; and the sinister
couple fled and vanished in the woods. They were never
identified; no prosecution followed; but it was currently
supposed they had some grudge against the boy’s father, and
designed to eat him in revenge. All over the islands, as at
home among our own ancestors, it will be observed that the
avenger takes no particular heed to strike an individual. A
family, a class, a village, a whole valley or island, a whole
race of mankind, share equally the guilt of any member. So,
in the above story, the son was to pay the penalty for his
father; so Mr. Whalon, the mate of an American whaler, was to
bleed and be eaten for the misdeeds of a Peruvian slaver. I
am reminded of an incident in Jaluit in the Marshall group, which
was told me by an eye-witness, and which I tell here again for
the strangeness of the scene. Two men had awakened the
animosity of the Jaluit chiefs; and it was their wives who were
selected to be punished. A single native served as
executioner. Early in the morning, in the face of a large
concourse of spectators, he waded out upon the reef between his
victims. These neither complained nor resisted; accompanied
their destroyer patiently; stooped down, when they had waded deep
enough, at his command; and he (laying one hand upon the
shoulders of each) held them under water till they drowned.
Doubtless, although my informant did not tell me so, their
families would be lamenting aloud upon the beach.</p>
<p>It was from Hatiheu that I paid my first visit to a cannibal
high place.</p>
<p>The day was sultry and clouded. Drenching tropical
showers succeeded bursts of sweltering sunshine. The green
pathway of the road wound steeply upward. As we went, our
little schoolboy guide a little ahead of us, Father Simeon had
his portfolio in his hand, and named the trees for me, and read
aloud from his notes the abstract of their virtues.
Presently the road, mounting, showed us the vale of Hatiheu, on a
larger scale; and the priest, with occasional reference to our
guide, pointed out the boundaries and told me the names of the
larger tribes that lived at perpetual war in the old days: one on
the north-east, one along the beach, one behind upon the
mountain. With a survivor of this latter clan Father Simeon
had spoken; until the pacification he had never been to the
sea’s edge, nor, if I remember exactly, eaten of
sea-fish. Each in its own district, the septs lived
cantoned and beleaguered. One step without the boundaries
was to affront death. If famine came, the men must out to
the woods to gather chestnuts and small fruits; even as to this
day, if the parents are backward in their weekly doles, school
must be broken up and the scholars sent foraging. But in
the old days, when there was trouble in one clan, there would be
activity in all its neighbours; the woods would be laid full of
ambushes; and he who went after vegetables for himself might
remain to be a joint for his hereditary foes. Nor was the
pointed occasion needful. A dozen different natural signs
and social junctures called this people to the war-path and the
cannibal hunt. Let one of chiefly rank have finished his
tattooing, the wife of one be near upon her time, two of the
debauching streams have deviated nearer on the beach of Hatiheu,
a certain bird have been heard to sing, a certain ominous
formation of cloud observed above the northern sea; and instantly
the arms were oiled, and the man-hunters swarmed into the wood to
lay their fratricidal ambuscades. It appears besides that
occasionally, perhaps in famine, the priest would shut himself in
his house, where he lay for a stated period like a person
dead. When he came forth it was to run for three days
through the territory of the clan, naked and starving, and to
sleep at night alone in the high place. It was now the turn
of the others to keep the house, for to encounter the priest upon
his rounds was death. On the eve of the fourth day the time
of the running was over; the priest returned to his roof, the
laymen came forth, and in the morning the number of the victims
was announced. I have this tale of the priest on one
authority—I think a good one,—but I set it down with
diffidence. The particulars are so striking that, had they
been true, I almost think I must have heard them oftener referred
to. Upon one point there seems to be no question: that the
feast was sometimes furnished from within the clan. In
times of scarcity, all who were not protected by their family
connections—in the Highland expression, all the commons of
the clan—had cause to tremble. It was vain to resist,
it was useless to flee. They were begirt upon all hands by
cannibals; and the oven was ready to smoke for them abroad in the
country of their foes, or at home in the valley of their
fathers.</p>
<p>At a certain corner of the road our scholar-guide struck off
to his left into the twilight of the forest. We were now on
one of the ancient native roads, plunged in a high vault of wood,
and clambering, it seemed, at random over boulders and dead
trees; but the lad wound in and out and up and down without a
check, for these paths are to the natives as marked as the
king’s highway is to us; insomuch that, in the days of the
man-hunt, it was their labour rather to block and deface than to
improve them. In the crypt of the wood the air was clammy
and hot and cold; overhead, upon the leaves, the tropical rain
uproariously poured, but only here and there, as through holes in
a leaky roof, a single drop would fall, and make a spot upon my
mackintosh. Presently the huge trunk of a banyan hove in
sight, standing upon what seemed the ruins of an ancient fort;
and our guide, halting and holding forth his arm, announced that
we had reached the <i>paepae tapu</i>.</p>
<p><i>Paepae</i> signifies a floor or platform such as a native
house is built on; and even such a paepae—a paepae
hae—may be called a paepae tapu in a lesser sense when it
is deserted and becomes the haunt of spirits; but the public high
place, such as I was now treading, was a thing on a great
scale. As far as my eyes could pierce through the dark
undergrowth, the floor of the forest was all paved. Three
tiers of terrace ran on the slope of the hill; in front, a
crumbling parapet contained the main arena; and the pavement of
that was pierced and parcelled out with several wells and small
enclosures. No trace remained of any superstructure, and
the scheme of the amphitheatre was difficult to seize. I
visited another in Hiva-oa, smaller but more perfect, where it
was easy to follow rows of benches, and to distinguish isolated
seats of honour for eminent persons; and where, on the upper
platform, a single joist of the temple or dead-house still
remained, its uprights richly carved. In the old days the
high place was sedulously tended. No tree except the sacred
banyan was suffered to encroach upon its grades, no dead leaf to
rot upon the pavement. The stones were smoothly set, and I
am told they were kept bright with oil. On all sides the
guardians lay encamped in their subsidiary huts to watch and
cleanse it. No other foot of man was suffered to draw near;
only the priest, in the days of his running, came there to
sleep—perhaps to dream of his ungodly errand; but, in the
time of the feast, the clan trooped to the high place in a body,
and each had his appointed seat. There were places for the
chiefs, the drummers, the dancers, the women, and the
priests. The drums—perhaps twenty strong, and some of
them twelve feet high—continuously throbbed in time.
In time the singers kept up their long-drawn, lugubrious,
ululating song; in time, too, the dancers, tricked out in
singular finery, stepped, leaped, swayed, and
gesticulated—their plumed fingers fluttering in the air
like butterflies. The sense of time, in all these ocean
races, is extremely perfect; and I conceive in such a festival
that almost every sound and movement fell in one. So much
the more unanimously must have grown the agitation of the
feasters; so much the more wild must have been the scene to any
European who could have beheld them there, in the strong sun and
the strong shadow of the banyan, rubbed with saffron to throw in
a more high relief the arabesque of the tattoo; the women
bleached by days of confinement to a complexion almost European;
the chiefs crowned with silver plumes of old men’s beards
and girt with kirtles of the hair of dead women. All manner
of island food was meanwhile spread for the women and the
commons; and, for those who were privileged to eat of it, there
were carried up to the dead-house the baskets of long-pig.
It is told that the feasts were long kept up; the people came
from them brutishly exhausted with debauchery, and the chiefs
heavy with their beastly food. There are certain sentiments
which we call emphatically human—denying the honour of that
name to those who lack them. In such
feasts—particularly where the victim has been slain at
home, and men banqueted on the poor clay of a comrade with whom
they had played in infancy, or a woman whose favours they had
shared—the whole body of these sentiments is
outraged. To consider it too closely is to understand, if
not to excuse, the fervours of self-righteous old ship-captains,
who would man their guns, and open fire in passing, on a cannibal
island.</p>
<p>And yet it was strange. There, upon the spot, as I stood
under the high, dripping vault of the forest, with the young
priest on the one hand, in his kilted gown, and the bright-eyed
Marquesan schoolboy on the other, the whole business appeared
infinitely distant, and fallen in the cold perspective and dry
light of history. The bearing of the priest, perhaps,
affected me. He smiled; he jested with the boy, the heir both of
these feasters and their meat; he clapped his hands, and gave me
a stave of one of the old, ill-omened choruses. Centuries
might have come and gone since this slimy theatre was last in
operation; and I beheld the place with no more emotion than I
might have felt in visiting Stonehenge. In Hiva-oa, as I
began to appreciate that the thing was still living and latent
about my footsteps, and that it was still within the bounds of
possibility that I might hear the cry of the trapped victim, my
historic attitude entirely failed, and I was sensible of some
repugnance for the natives. But here, too, the priests
maintained their jocular attitude: rallying the cannibals as upon
an eccentricity rather absurd than horrible; seeking, I should
say, to shame them from the practice by good-natured ridicule, as
we shame a child from stealing sugar. We may here recognise
the temperate and sagacious mind of Bishop Dordillon.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER XII—THE STORY OF A PLANTATION</h3>
<p>Taahauku, on the south-westerly coast of the island of
Hiva-oa—Tahuku, say the slovenly whites—may be called
the port of Atuona. It is a narrow and small anchorage, set
between low cliffy points, and opening above upon a woody valley:
a little French fort, now disused and deserted, overhangs the
valley and the inlet. Atuona itself, at the head of the
next bay, is framed in a theatre of mountains, which dominate the
more immediate settling of Taahauku and give the salient
character of the scene. They are reckoned at no higher than
four thousand feet; but Tahiti with eight thousand, and Hawaii
with fifteen, can offer no such picture of abrupt, melancholy
alps. In the morning, when the sun falls directly on their
front, they stand like a vast wall: green to the summit, if by
any chance the summit should be clear—water-courses here
and there delineated on their face, as narrow as cracks.
Towards afternoon, the light falls more obliquely, and the
sculpture of the range comes in relief, huge gorges sinking into
shadow, huge, tortuous buttresses standing edged with sun.
At all hours of the day they strike the eye with some new beauty,
and the mind with the same menacing gloom.</p>
<p>The mountains, dividing and deflecting the endless airy deluge
of the Trade, are doubtless answerable for the climate. A
strong draught of wind blew day and night over the
anchorage. Day and night the same fantastic and attenuated
clouds fled across the heavens, the same dusky cap of rain and
vapour fell and rose on the mountain. The land-breezes came
very strong and chill, and the sea, like the air, was in
perpetual bustle. The swell crowded into the narrow
anchorage like sheep into a fold; broke all along both sides,
high on the one, low on the other; kept a certain blowhole
sounding and smoking like a cannon; and spent itself at last upon
the beach.</p>
<p>On the side away from Atuona, the sheltering promontory was a
nursery of coco-trees. Some were mere infants, none had
attained to any size, none had yet begun to shoot skyward with
that whip-like shaft of the mature palm. In the young trees
the colour alters with the age and growth. Now all is of a
grass-like hue, infinitely dainty; next the rib grows golden, the
fronds remaining green as ferns; and then, as the trunk continues
to mount and to assume its final hue of grey, the fans put on
manlier and more decided depths of verdure, stand out dark upon
the distance, glisten against the sun, and flash like silver
fountains in the assault of the wind. In this young wood of
Taahauku, all these hues and combinations were exampled and
repeated by the score. The trees grew pleasantly spaced
upon a hilly sward, here and there interspersed with a rack for
drying copra, or a tumble-down hut for storing it. Every
here and there the stroller had a glimpse of the <i>Casco</i>
tossing in the narrow anchorage below; and beyond he had ever
before him the dark amphitheatre of the Atuona mountains and the
cliffy bluff that closes it to seaward. The trade-wind
moving in the fans made a ceaseless noise of summer rain; and
from time to time, with the sound of a sudden and distant
drum-beat, the surf would burst in a sea-cave.</p>
<p>At the upper end of the inlet, its low, cliffy lining sinks,
at both sides, into a beach. A copra warehouse stands in
the shadow of the shoreside trees, flitted about for ever by a
clan of dwarfish swallows; and a line of rails on a high wooden
staging bends back into the mouth of the valley. Walking on
this, the new-landed traveller becomes aware of a broad
fresh-water lagoon (one arm of which he crosses), and beyond, of
a grove of noble palms, sheltering the house of the trader, Mr.
Keane. Overhead, the cocos join in a continuous and lofty
roof; blackbirds are heard lustily singing; the island cock
springs his jubilant rattle and airs his golden plumage;
cow-bells sound far and near in the grove; and when you sit in
the broad verandah, lulled by this symphony, you may say to
yourself, if you are able: ‘Better fifty years of Europe .
. .’ Farther on, the floor of the valley is flat and
green, and dotted here and there with stripling coco-palms.
Through the midst, with many changes of music, the river trots
and brawls; and along its course, where we should look for
willows, puraos grow in clusters, and make shadowy pools after an
angler’s heart. A vale more rich and peaceful,
sweeter air, a sweeter voice of rural sounds, I have found
nowhere. One circumstance alone might strike the
experienced: here is a convenient beach, deep soil, good water,
and yet nowhere any paepaes, nowhere any trace of island
habitation.</p>
<p>It is but a few years since this valley was a place choked
with jungle, the debatable land and battle-ground of
cannibals. Two clans laid claim to it—neither could
substantiate the claim, and the roads lay desert, or were only
visited by men in arms. It is for this very reason that it
wears now so smiling an appearance: cleared, planted, built upon,
supplied with railways, boat-houses, and bath-houses. For,
being no man’s land, it was the more readily ceded to a
stranger. The stranger was Captain John Hart: Ima Hati,
‘Broken-arm,’ the natives call him, because when he
first visited the islands his arm was in a sling. Captain
Hart, a man of English birth, but an American subject, had
conceived the idea of cotton culture in the Marquesas during the
American War, and was at first rewarded with success. His
plantation at Anaho was highly productive; island cotton fetched
a high price, and the natives used to debate which was the
stronger power, Ima Hati or the French: deciding in favour of the
captain, because, though the French had the most ships, he had
the more money.</p>
<p>He marked Taahauku for a suitable site, acquired it, and
offered the superintendence to Mr. Robert Stewart, a Fifeshire
man, already some time in the islands, who had just been ruined
by a war on Tauata. Mr. Stewart was somewhat averse to the
adventure, having some acquaintance with Atuona and its notorious
chieftain, Moipu. He had once landed there, he told me,
about dusk, and found the remains of a man and woman partly
eaten. On his starting and sickening at the sight, one of
Moipu’s young men picked up a human foot, and provocatively
staring at the stranger, grinned and nibbled at the heel.
None need be surprised if Mr. Stewart fled incontinently to the
bush, lay there all night in a great horror of mind, and got off
to sea again by daylight on the morrow. ‘It was
always a bad place, Atuona,’ commented Mr. Stewart, in his
homely Fifeshire voice. In spite of this dire introduction,
he accepted the captain’s offer, was landed at Taahauku
with three Chinamen, and proceeded to clear the jungle.</p>
<p>War was pursued at that time, almost without interval, between
the men of Atuona and the men of Haamau; and one day, from the
opposite sides of the valley, battle—or I should rather say
the noise of battle—raged all the afternoon: the shots and
insults of the opposing clans passing from hill to hill over the
heads of Mr. Stewart and his Chinamen. There was no genuine
fighting; it was like a bicker of schoolboys, only some fool had
given the children guns. One man died of his exertions in
running, the only casualty. With night the shots and
insults ceased; the men of Haamau withdrew; and victory, on some
occult principle, was scored to Moipu. Perhaps, in
consequence, there came a day when Moipu made a feast, and a
party from Haamau came under safe-conduct to eat of it.
These passed early by Taahauku, and some of Moipu’s young
men were there to be a guard of honour. They were not long
gone before there came down from Haamau, a man, his wife, and a
girl of twelve, their daughter, bringing fungus. Several
Atuona lads were hanging round the store; but the day being one
of truce none apprehended danger. The fungus was weighed
and paid for; the man of Haamau proposed he should have his axe
ground in the bargain; and Mr. Stewart demurring at the trouble,
some of the Atuona lads offered to grind it for him, and set it
on the wheel. While the axe was grinding, a friendly native
whispered Mr. Stewart to have a care of himself, for there was
trouble in hand; and, all at once, the man of Haamau was seized,
and his head and arm stricken from his body, the head at one
sweep of his own newly sharpened axe. In the first alert,
the girl escaped among the cotton; and Mr. Stewart, having thrust
the wife into the house and locked her in from the outside,
supposed the affair was over. But the business had not
passed without noise, and it reached the ears of an older girl
who had loitered by the way, and who now came hastily down the
valley, crying as she came for her father. Her, too, they
seized and beheaded; I know not what they had done with the axe,
it was a blunt knife that served their butcherly turn upon the
girl; and the blood spurted in fountains and painted them from
head to foot. Thus horrible from crime, the party returned
to Atuona, carrying the heads to Moipu. It may be fancied
how the feast broke up; but it is notable that the guests were
honourably suffered to retire. These passed back through
Taahauku in extreme disorder; a little after the valley began to
be overrun with shouting and triumphing braves; and a letter of
warning coming at the same time to Mr. Stewart, he and his
Chinamen took refuge with the Protestant missionary in
Atuona. That night the store was gutted, and the bodies
cast in a pit and covered with leaves. Three days later the
schooner had come in; and things appearing quieter, Mr. Stewart
and the captain landed in Taahauku to compute the damage and to
view the grave, which was already indicated by the stench.
While they were so employed, a party of Moipu’s young men,
decked with red flannel to indicate martial sentiments, came over
the hills from Atuona, dug up the bodies, washed them in the
river, and carried them away on sticks. That night the
feast began.</p>
<p>Those who knew Mr. Stewart before this experience declare the
man to be quite altered. He stuck, however, to his post;
and somewhat later, when the plantation was already well
established, and gave employment to sixty Chinamen and seventy
natives, he found himself once more in dangerous times. The
men of Haamau, it was reported, had sworn to plunder and erase
the settlement; letters came continually from the Hawaiian
missionary, who acted as intelligence department; and for six
weeks Mr. Stewart and three other whites slept in the
cotton-house at night in a rampart of bales, and (what was their
best defence) ostentatiously practised rifle-shooting by day upon
the beach. Natives were often there to watch them; the
practice was excellent; and the assault was never
delivered—if it ever was intended, which I doubt, for the
natives are more famous for false rumours than for deeds of
energy. I was told the late French war was a case in point;
the tribes on the beach accusing those in the mountains of
designs which they had never the hardihood to entertain.
And the same testimony to their backwardness in open battle
reached me from all sides. Captain Hart once landed after
an engagement in a certain bay; one man had his hand hurt, an old
woman and two children had been slain; and the captain improved
the occasion by poulticing the hand, and taunting both sides upon
so wretched an affair. It is true these wars were often
merely formal—comparable with duels to the first
blood. Captain Hart visited a bay where such a war was
being carried on between two brothers, one of whom had been
thought wanting in civility to the guests of the other.
About one-half of the population served day about on alternate
sides, so as to be well with each when the inevitable peace
should follow. The forts of the belligerents were over
against each other, and close by. Pigs were cooking.
Well-oiled braves, with well-oiled muskets, strutted on the
paepae or sat down to feast. No business, however needful,
could be done, and all thoughts were supposed to be centred in
this mockery of war. A few days later, by a regrettable
accident, a man was killed; it was felt at once the thing had
gone too far, and the quarrel was instantly patched up. But
the more serious wars were prosecuted in a similar spirit; a gift
of pigs and a feast made their inevitable end; the killing of a
single man was a great victory, and the murder of defenceless
solitaries counted a heroic deed.</p>
<p>The foot of the cliffs, about all these islands, is the place
of fishing. Between Taahauku and Atuona we saw men, but
chiefly women, some nearly naked, some in thin white or crimson
dresses, perched in little surf-beat promontories—the brown
precipice overhanging them, and the convolvulus overhanging that,
as if to cut them off the more completely from assistance.
There they would angle much of the morning; and as fast as they
caught any fish, eat them, raw and living, where they
stood. It was such helpless ones that the warriors from the
opposite island of Tauata slew, and carried home and ate, and
were thereupon accounted mighty men of valour. Of one such
exploit I can give the account of an eye-witness.
‘Portuguese Joe,’ Mr. Keane’s cook, was once
pulling an oar in an Atuona boat, when they spied a stranger in a
canoe with some fish and a piece of tapu. The Atuona men
cried upon him to draw near and have a smoke. He complied,
because, I suppose, he had no choice; but he knew, poor devil,
what he was coming to, and (as Joe said) ‘he didn’t
seem to care about the smoke.’ A few questions
followed, as to where he came from, and what was his
business. These he must needs answer, as he must needs draw
at the unwelcome pipe, his heart the while drying in his
bosom. And then, of a sudden, a big fellow in Joe’s
boat leaned over, plucked the stranger from his canoe, struck him
with a knife in the neck—inward and downward, as Joe showed
in pantomime more expressive than his words—and held him
under water, like a fowl, until his struggles ceased.
Whereupon the long-pig was hauled on board, the boat’s head
turned about for Atuona, and these Marquesan braves pulled home
rejoicing. Moipu was on the beach and rejoiced with them on
their arrival. Poor Joe toiled at his oar that day with a
white face, yet he had no fear for himself. ‘They
were very good to me—gave me plenty grub: never wished to
eat white man,’ said he.</p>
<p>If the most horrible experience was Mr. Stewart’s, it
was Captain Hart himself who ran the nearest danger. He had
bought a piece of land from Timau, chief of a neighbouring bay,
and put some Chinese there to work. Visiting the station
with one of the Godeffroys, he found his Chinamen trooping to the
beach in terror: Timau had driven them out, seized their effects,
and was in war attire with his young men. A boat was
despatched to Taahauku for reinforcement; as they awaited her
return, they could see, from the deck of the schooner, Timau and
his young men dancing the war-dance on the hill-top till past
twelve at night; and so soon as the boat came (bringing three
gendarmes, armed with chassepots, two white men from Taahauku
station, and some native warriors) the party set out to seize the
chief before he should awake. Day was not come, and it was
a very bright moonlight morning, when they reached the hill-top
where (in a house of palm-leaves) Timau was sleeping off his
debauch. The assailants were fully exposed, the interior of
the hut quite dark; the position far from sound. The
gendarmes knelt with their pieces ready, and Captain Hart
advanced alone. As he drew near the door he heard the snap
of a gun cocking from within, and in sheer
self-defence—there being no other escape—sprang into
the house and grappled Timau. ‘Timau, come with
me!’ he cried. But Timau—a great fellow, his
eyes blood-red with the abuse of kava, six foot three in
stature—cast him on one side; and the captain, instantly
expecting to be either shot or brained, discharged his pistol in
the dark. When they carried Timau out at the door into the
moonlight, he was already dead, and, upon this unlooked-for
termination of their sally, the whites appeared to have lost all
conduct, and retreated to the boats, fired upon by the natives as
they went. Captain Hart, who almost rivals Bishop Dordillon
in popularity, shared with him the policy of extreme indulgence
to the natives, regarding them as children, making light of their
defects, and constantly in favour of mild measures. The
death of Timau has thus somewhat weighed upon his mind; the more
so, as the chieftain’s musket was found in the house
unloaded. To a less delicate conscience the matter will
seem light. If a drunken savage elects to cock a fire-arm,
a gentleman advancing towards him in the open cannot wait to make
sure if it be charged.</p>
<p>I have touched on the captain’s popularity. It is
one of the things that most strikes a stranger in the
Marquesas. He comes instantly on two names, both new to
him, both locally famous, both mentioned by all with affection
and respect—the bishop’s and the
captain’s. It gave me a strong desire to meet with
the survivor, which was subsequently gratified—to the
enrichment of these pages. Long after that again, in the
Place Dolorous—Molokai—I came once more on the traces
of that affectionate popularity. There was a blind white
leper there, an old sailor—‘an old tough,’ he
called himself—who had long sailed among the eastern
islands. Him I used to visit, and, being fresh from the
scenes of his activity, gave him the news. This (in the
true island style) was largely a chronicle of wrecks; and it
chanced I mentioned the case of one not very successful captain,
and how he had lost a vessel for Mr. Hart; thereupon the blind
leper broke forth in lamentation. ‘Did he lose a ship
of John Hart’s?’ he cried; ‘poor John
Hart! Well, I’m sorry it was Hart’s,’
with needless force of epithet, which I neglect to reproduce.</p>
<p>Perhaps, if Captain Hart’s affairs had continued to
prosper, his popularity might have been different. Success
wins glory, but it kills affection, which misfortune
fosters. And the misfortune which overtook the
captain’s enterprise was truly singular. He was at
the top of his career. Ile Masse belonged to him, given by
the French as an indemnity for the robberies at Taahauku.
But the Ile Masse was only suitable for cattle; and his two chief
stations were Anaho, in Nuka-hiva, facing the north-east, and
Taahauku in Hiva-oa, some hundred miles to the southward, and
facing the south-west. Both these were on the same day
swept by a tidal wave, which was not felt in any other bay or
island of the group. The south coast of Hiva-oa was
bestrewn with building timber and camphor-wood chests, containing
goods; which, on the promise of a reasonable salvage, the natives
very honestly brought back, the chests apparently not opened, and
some of the wood after it had been built into their houses.
But the recovery of such jetsam could not affect the
result. It was impossible the captain should withstand this
partiality of fortune; and with his fall the prosperity of the
Marquesas ended. Anaho is truly extinct, Taahauku but a
shadow of itself; nor has any new plantation arisen in their
stead.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER XIII—CHARACTERS</h3>
<p>There was a certain traffic in our anchorage at Atuona;
different indeed from the dead inertia and quiescence of the
sister island, Nuka-hiva. Sails were seen steering from its
mouth; now it would be a whale-boat manned with native rowdies,
and heavy with copra for sale; now perhaps a single canoe come
after commodities to buy. The anchorage was besides
frequented by fishers; not only the lone females perched in
niches of the cliff, but whole parties, who would sometimes camp
and build a fire upon the beach, and sometimes lie in their
canoes in the midst of the haven and jump by turns in the water;
which they would cast eight or nine feet high, to drive, as we
supposed, the fish into their nets. The goods the
purchasers came to buy were sometimes quaint. I remarked
one outrigger returning with a single ham swung from a pole in
the stern. And one day there came into Mr. Keane’s
store a charming lad, excellently mannered, speaking French
correctly though with a babyish accent; very handsome too, and
much of a dandy, as was shown not only in his shining raiment,
but by the nature of his purchases. These were five
ship-biscuits, a bottle of scent, and two balls of washing
blue. He was from Tauata, whither he returned the same
night in an outrigger, daring the deep with these young-ladyish
treasures. The gross of the native passengers were more
ill-favoured: tall, powerful fellows, well tattooed, and with
disquieting manners. Something coarse and jeering
distinguished them, and I was often reminded of the slums of some
great city. One night, as dusk was falling, a whale-boat
put in on that part of the beach where I chanced to be
alone. Six or seven ruffianly fellows scrambled out; all
had enough English to give me ‘good-bye,’ which was
the ordinary salutation; or ‘good-morning,’ which
they seemed to regard as an intensitive; jests followed, they
surrounded me with harsh laughter and rude looks, and I was glad
to move away. I had not yet encountered Mr. Stewart, or I
should have been reminded of his first landing at Atuona and the
humorist who nibbled at the heel. But their neighbourhood
depressed me; and I felt, if I had been there a castaway and out
of reach of help, my heart would have been sick.</p>
<p>Nor was the traffic altogether native. While we lay in
the anchorage there befell a strange coincidence. A
schooner was observed at sea and aiming to enter. We knew
all the schooners in the group, but this appeared larger than
any; she was rigged, besides, after the English manner; and,
coming to an anchor some way outside the <i>Casco</i>, showed at
last the blue ensign. There were at that time, according to
rumour, no fewer than four yachts in the Pacific; but it was
strange that any two of them should thus lie side by side in that
outlandish inlet: stranger still that in the owner of the
<i>Nyanza</i>, Captain Dewar, I should find a man of the same
country and the same county with myself, and one whom I had seen
walking as a boy on the shores of the Alpes Maritimes.</p>
<p>We had besides a white visitor from shore, who came and
departed in a crowded whale-boat manned by natives; having read
of yachts in the Sunday papers, and being fired with the desire
to see one. Captain Chase, they called him, an old
whaler-man, thickset and white-bearded, with a strong Indiana
drawl; years old in the country, a good backer in battle, and one
of those dead shots whose practice at the target struck terror in
the braves of Haamau. Captain Chase dwelt farther east in a
bay called Hanamate, with a Mr. M’Callum; or rather they
had dwelt together once, and were now amicably separated.
The captain is to be found near one end of the bay, in a wreck of
a house, and waited on by a Chinese. At the point of the
opposing corner another habitation stands on a tall paepae.
The surf runs there exceeding heavy, seas of seven and eight feet
high bursting under the walls of the house, which is thus
continually filled with their clamour, and rendered fit only for
solitary, or at least for silent, inmates. Here it is that
Mr. M’Callum, with a Shakespeare and a Burns, enjoys the
society of the breakers. His name and his Burns testify to
Scottish blood; but he is an American born, somewhere far east;
followed the trade of a ship-carpenter; and was long employed,
the captain of a hundred Indians, breaking up wrecks about Cape
Flattery. Many of the whites who are to be found scattered
in the South Seas represent the more artistic portion of their
class; and not only enjoy the poetry of that new life, but came
there on purpose to enjoy it. I have been shipmates with a
man, no longer young, who sailed upon that voyage, his first time
to sea, for the mere love of Samoa; and it was a few letters in a
newspaper that sent him on that pilgrimage. Mr.
M’Callum was another instance of the same. He had
read of the South Seas; loved to read of them; and let their
image fasten in his heart: till at length he could refrain no
longer—must set forth, a new Rudel, for that unseen
homeland—and has now dwelt for years in Hiva-oa, and will
lay his bones there in the end with full content; having no
desire to behold again the places of his boyhood, only,
perhaps—once, before he dies—the rude and wintry
landscape of Cape Flattery. Yet he is an active man, full
of schemes; has bought land of the natives; has planted five
thousand coco-palms; has a desert island in his eye, which he
desires to lease, and a schooner in the stocks, which he has laid
and built himself, and even hopes to finish. Mr.
M’Callum and I did not meet, but, like gallant troubadours,
corresponded in verse. I hope he will not consider it a
breach of copyright if I give here a specimen of his muse.
He and Bishop Dordillon are the two European bards of the
Marquesas.</p>
<blockquote><p>‘Sail, ho! Ahoy!
<i>Casco</i>,<br />
First among the pleasure fleet<br />
That came around to greet<br />
These isles from San Francisco,</p>
<p>And first, too; only one<br />
Among the literary men<br />
That this way has ever been—<br />
Welcome, then, to Stevenson.</p>
<p>Please not offended be<br />
At this little notice<br />
Of the <i>Casco</i>, Captain Otis,<br />
With the novelist’s family.</p>
<p><i>Avoir une voyage magnifical</i><br />
Is our wish sincere,<br />
That you’ll have from here<br />
<i>Allant sur la Grande Pacifical</i>.’</p>
</blockquote>
<p>But our chief visitor was one Mapiao, a great
Tahuku—which seems to mean priest, wizard, tattooer,
practiser of any art, or, in a word, esoteric person—and a
man famed for his eloquence on public occasions and witty talk in
private. His first appearance was typical of the man.
He came down clamorous to the eastern landing, where the surf was
running very high; scorned all our signals to go round the bay;
carried his point, was brought aboard at some hazard to our
skiff, and set down in one corner of the cockpit to his appointed
task. He had been hired, as one cunning in the art, to make
my old men’s beards into a wreath: what a wreath for
Celia’s arbour! His own beard (which he carried, for
greater safety, in a sailor’s knot) was not merely the
adornment of his age, but a substantial piece of property.
One hundred dollars was the estimated value; and as Brother
Michel never knew a native to deposit a greater sum with Bishop
Dordillon, our friend was a rich man in virtue of his chin.
He had something of an East Indian cast, but taller and stronger:
his nose hooked, his face narrow, his forehead very high, the
whole elaborately tattooed. I may say I have never
entertained a guest so trying. In the least particular he
must be waited on; he would not go to the scuttle-butt for water;
he would not even reach to get the glass, it must be given him in
his hand; if aid were denied him, he would fold his arms, bow his
head, and go without: only the work would suffer. Early the
first forenoon he called aloud for biscuit and salmon; biscuit
and ham were brought; he looked on them inscrutably, and signed
they should be set aside. A number of considerations
crowded on my mind; how the sort of work on which he was engaged
was probably tapu in a high degree; should by rights, perhaps, be
transacted on a tapu platform which no female might approach; and
it was possible that fish might be the essential diet. Some
salted fish I therefore brought him, and along with that a glass
of rum: at sight of which Mapiao displayed extraordinary
animation, pointed to the zenith, made a long speech in which I
picked up <i>umati</i>—the word for the sun—and
signed to me once more to place these dainties out of
reach. At last I had understood, and every day the
programme was the same. At an early period of the morning
his dinner must be set forth on the roof of the house and at a
proper distance, full in view but just out of reach; and not
until the fit hour, which was the point of noon, would the
artificer partake. This solemnity was the cause of an
absurd misadventure. He was seated plaiting, as usual, at
the beards, his dinner arrayed on the roof, and not far off a
glass of water standing. It appears he desired to drink;
was of course far too great a gentleman to rise and get the water
for himself; and spying Mrs. Stevenson, imperiously signed to her
to hand it. The signal was misunderstood; Mrs. Stevenson
was, by this time, prepared for any eccentricity on the part of
our guest; and instead of passing him the water, flung his dinner
overboard. I must do Mapiao justice: all laughed, but his
laughter rang the loudest.</p>
<p>These troubles of service were at worst occasional; the
embarrassment of the man’s talk incessant. He was
plainly a practised conversationalist; the nicety of his
inflections, the elegance of his gestures, and the fine play of
his expression, told us that. We, meanwhile, sat like
aliens in a playhouse; we could see the actors were upon some
material business and performing well, but the plot of the drama
remained undiscoverable. Names of places, the name of
Captain Hart, occasional disconnected words, tantalised without
enlightening us; and the less we understood, the more gallantly,
the more copiously, and with still the more explanatory gestures,
Mapiao returned to the assault. We could see his vanity was
on the rack; being come to a place where that fine jewel of his
conversational talent could earn him no respect; and he had times
of despair when he desisted from the endeavour, and instants of
irritation when he regarded us with unconcealed contempt.
Yet for me, as the practitioner of some kindred mystery to his
own, he manifested to the last a measure of respect. As we
sat under the awning in opposite corners of the cockpit, he
braiding hairs from dead men’s chins, I forming runes upon
a sheet of folio paper, he would nod across to me as one Tahuku
to another, or, crossing the cockpit, study for a while my
shapeless scrawl and encourage me with a heartfelt
‘<i>mitai</i>!—good!’ So might a deaf
painter sympathise far off with a musician, as the slave and
master of some uncomprehended and yet kindred art. A silly
trade, he doubtless considered it; but a man must make allowance
for barbarians—<i>chaque pays a ses coutumes</i>—and
he felt the principle was there.</p>
<p>The time came at last when his labours, which resembled those
rather of Penelope than Hercules, could be no more spun out, and
nothing remained but to pay him and say farewell. After a
long, learned argument in Marquesan, I gathered that his mind was
set on fish-hooks; with three of which, and a brace of dollars, I
thought he was not ill rewarded for passing his forenoons in our
cockpit, eating, drinking, delivering his opinions, and pressing
the ship’s company into his menial service. For all
that, he was a man of so high a bearing, and so like an uncle of
my own who should have gone mad and got tattooed, that I applied
to him, when we were both on shore, to know if he were
satisfied. ‘<i>Mitai ehipe</i>?’ I asked.
And he, with rich unction, offering at the same time his
hand—‘<i>Mitai ehipe</i>, <i>mitai kaehae</i>;
<i>kaoha nui</i>!’—or, to translate freely:
‘The ship is good, the victuals are up to the mark, and we
part in friendship.’ Which testimonial uttered, he
set off along the beach with his head bowed and the air of one
deeply injured.</p>
<p>I saw him go, on my side, with relief. It would be more
interesting to learn how our relation seemed to Mapiao. His
exigence, we may suppose, was merely loyal. He had been
hired by the ignorant to do a piece of work; and he was bound
that he would do it the right way. Countless obstacles,
continual ignorant ridicule, availed not to dissuade him.
He had his dinner laid out; watched it, as was fit, the while he
worked; ate it at the fit hour; was in all things served and
waited on; and could take his hire in the end with a clear
conscience, telling himself the mystery was performed duly, the
beards rightfully braided, and we (in spite of ourselves)
correctly served. His view of our stupidity, even he, the
mighty talker, must have lacked language to express. He
never interfered with my Tahuku work; civilly praised it, idle as
it seemed; civilly supposed that I was competent in my own
mystery: such being the attitude of the intelligent and the
polite. And we, on the other hand—who had yet the
most to gain or lose, since the product was to be ours—who
had professed our disability by the very act of hiring him to do
it—were never weary of impeding his own more important
labours, and sometimes lacked the sense and the civility to
refrain from laughter.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER XIV—IN A CANNIBAL VALLEY</h3>
<p>The road from Taahauku to Atuona skirted the north-westerly
side of the anchorage, somewhat high up, edged, and sometimes
shaded, by the splendid flowers of the
<i>flamboyant</i>—its English name I do not know. At
the turn of the hand, Atuona came in view: a long beach, a heavy
and loud breach of surf, a shore-side village scattered among
trees, and the guttered mountains drawing near on both sides
above a narrow and rich ravine. Its infamous repute perhaps
affected me; but I thought it the loveliest, and by far the most
ominous and gloomy, spot on earth. Beautiful it surely was;
and even more salubrious. The healthfulness of the whole
group is amazing; that of Atuona almost in the nature of a
miracle. In Atuona, a village planted in a shore-side
marsh, the houses standing everywhere intermingled with the pools
of a taro-garden, we find every condition of tropical danger and
discomfort; and yet there are not even mosquitoes—not even
the hateful day-fly of Nuka-hiva—and fever, and its
concomitant, the island fe’efe’e, <a
name="citation122"></a><a href="#footnote122"
class="citation">[122]</a> are unknown.</p>
<p>This is the chief station of the French on the man-eating isle
of Hiva-oa. The sergeant of gendarmerie enjoys the style of
the vice-resident, and hoists the French colours over a quite
extensive compound. A Chinaman, a waif from the plantation,
keeps a restaurant in the rear quarters of the village; and the
mission is well represented by the sister’s school and
Brother Michel’s church. Father Orens, a wonderful
octogenarian, his frame scarce bowed, the fire of his eye
undimmed, has lived, and trembled, and suffered in this place
since 1843. Again and again, when Moipu had made
coco-brandy, he has been driven from his house into the
woods. ‘A mouse that dwelt in a cat’s
ear’ had a more easy resting-place; and yet I have never
seen a man that bore less mark of years. He must show us
the church, still decorated with the bishop’s artless
ornaments of paper—the last work of industrious old hands,
and the last earthly amusement of a man that was much of a
hero. In the sacristy we must see his sacred vessels, and,
in particular, a vestment which was a ‘<i>vraie
curiosité</i>,’ because it had been given by a
gendarme. To the Protestant there is always something
embarrassing in the eagerness with which grown and holy men
regard these trifles; but it was touching and pretty to see
Orens, his aged eyes shining in his head, display his sacred
treasures.</p>
<p><i>August</i> 26.—The vale behind the village, narrowing
swiftly to a mere ravine, was choked with profitable trees.
A river gushed in the midst. Overhead, the tall coco-palms
made a primary covering; above that, from one wall of the
mountain to another, the ravine was roofed with cloud; so that we
moved below, amid teeming vegetation, in a covered house of
heat. On either hand, at every hundred yards, instead of
the houseless, disembowelling paepaes of Nuka-hiva, populous
houses turned out their inhabitants to cry ‘Kaoha!’
to the passers-by. The road, too, was busy: strings of
girls, fair and foul, as in less favoured countries; men bearing
breadfruit; the sisters, with a little guard of pupils; a fellow
bestriding a horse—passed and greeted us continually; and
now it was a Chinaman who came to the gate of his flower-yard,
and gave us ‘Good-day’ in excellent English; and a
little farther on it would be some natives who set us down by the
wayside, made us a feast of mummy-apple, and entertained us as we
ate with drumming on a tin case. With all this fine plenty
of men and fruit, death is at work here also. The
population, according to the highest estimate, does not exceed
six hundred in the whole vale of Atuona; and yet, when I once
chanced to put the question, Brother Michel counted up ten whom
he knew to be sick beyond recovery. It was here, too, that
I could at last gratify my curiosity with the sight of a native
house in the very article of dissolution. It had fallen
flat along the paepae, its poles sprawling ungainly; the rains
and the mites contended against it; what remained seemed sound
enough, but much was gone already; and it was easy to see how the
insects consumed the walls as if they had been bread, and the air
and the rain ate into them like vitriol.</p>
<p>A little ahead of us, a young gentleman, very well tattooed,
and dressed in a pair of white trousers and a flannel shirt, had
been marching unconcernedly. Of a sudden, without apparent
cause, he turned back, took us in possession, and led us
undissuadably along a by-path to the river’s edge.
There, in a nook of the most attractive amenity, he bade us to
sit down: the stream splashing at our elbow, a shock of
nondescript greenery enshrining us from above; and thither, after
a brief absence, he brought us a cocoa-nut, a lump of
sandal-wood, and a stick he had begun to carve: the nut for
present refreshment, the sandal-wood for a precious gift, and the
stick—in the simplicity of his vanity—to harvest
premature praise. Only one section was yet carved, although
the whole was pencil-marked in lengths; and when I proposed to
buy it, Poni (for that was the artist’s name) recoiled in
horror. But I was not to be moved, and simply refused
restitution, for I had long wondered why a people who displayed,
in their tattooing, so great a gift of arabesque invention,
should display it nowhere else. Here, at last, I had found
something of the same talent in another medium; and I held the
incompleteness, in these days of world-wide brummagem, for a
happy mark of authenticity. Neither my reasons nor my
purpose had I the means of making clear to Poni; I could only
hold on to the stick, and bid the artist follow me to the
gendarmerie, where I should find interpreters and money; but we
gave him, in the meanwhile, a boat-call in return for his
sandal-wood. As he came behind us down the vale he sounded
upon this continually. And continually, from the wayside
houses, there poured forth little groups of girls in crimson, or
of men in white. And to these must Poni pass the news of
who the strangers were, of what they had been doing, of why it
was that Poni had a boat-whistle; and of why he was now being
haled to the vice-residency, uncertain whether to be punished or
rewarded, uncertain whether he had lost a stick or made a
bargain, but hopeful on the whole, and in the meanwhile highly
consoled by the boat-whistle. Whereupon he would tear
himself away from this particular group of inquirers, and once
more we would hear the shrill call in our wake.</p>
<p><i>August</i> 27.—I made a more extended circuit in the
vale with Brother Michel. We were mounted on a pair of
sober nags, suitable to these rude paths; the weather was
exquisite, and the company in which I found myself no less
agreeable than the scenes through which I passed. We
mounted at first by a steep grade along the summit of one of
those twisted spurs that, from a distance, mark out provinces of
sun and shade upon the mountain-side. The ground fell away
on either hand with an extreme declivity. From either hand,
out of profound ravines, mounted the song of falling water and
the smoke of household fires. Here and there the hills of
foliage would divide, and our eye would plunge down upon one of
these deep-nested habitations. And still, high in front,
arose the precipitous barrier of the mountain, greened over where
it seemed that scarce a harebell could find root, barred with the
zigzags of a human road where it seemed that not a goat could
scramble. And in truth, for all the labour that it cost,
the road is regarded even by the Marquesans as impassable; they
will not risk a horse on that ascent; and those who lie to the
westward come and go in their canoes. I never knew a hill
to lose so little on a near approach: a consequence, I must
suppose, of its surprising steepness. When we turned about,
I was amazed to behold so deep a view behind, and so high a
shoulder of blue sea, crowned by the whale-like island of
Motane. And yet the wall of mountain had not visibly
dwindled, and I could even have fancied, as I raised my eyes to
measure it, that it loomed higher than before.</p>
<p>We struck now into covert paths, crossed and heard more near
at hand the bickering of the streams, and tasted the coolness of
those recesses where the houses stood. The birds sang about
us as we descended. All along our path my guide was being
hailed by voices: ‘Mikaël—Kaoha,
Mikaël!’ From the doorstep, from the
cotton-patch, or out of the deep grove of island-chestnuts, these
friendly cries arose, and were cheerily answered as we
passed. In a sharp angle of a glen, on a rushing brook and
under fathoms of cool foliage, we struck a house upon a
well-built paepae, the fire brightly burning under the popoi-shed
against the evening meal; and here the cries became a chorus, and
the house folk, running out, obliged us to dismount and
breathe. It seemed a numerous family: we saw eight at
least; and one of these honoured me with a particular
attention. This was the mother, a woman naked to the waist,
of an aged countenance, but with hair still copious and black,
and breasts still erect and youthful. On our arrival I
could see she remarked me, but instead of offering any greeting,
disappeared at once into the bush. Thence she returned with
two crimson flowers. ‘Good-bye!’ was her
salutation, uttered not without coquetry; and as she said it she
pressed the flowers into my hand—‘Good-bye! I
speak Inglis.’ It was from a whaler-man, who (she
informed me) was ‘a plenty good chap,’ that she had
learned my language; and I could not but think how handsome she
must have been in these times of her youth, and could not but
guess that some memories of the dandy whaler-man prompted her
attentions to myself. Nor could I refrain from wondering
what had befallen her lover; in the rain and mire of what
sea-ports he had tramped since then; in what close and garish
drinking-dens had found his pleasure; and in the ward of what
infirmary dreamed his last of the Marquesas. But she, the
more fortunate, lived on in her green island. The talk, in
this lost house upon the mountains, ran chiefly upon Mapiao and
his visits to the <i>Casco</i>: the news of which had probably
gone abroad by then to all the island, so that there was no
paepae in Hiva-oa where they did not make the subject of excited
comment.</p>
<p>Not much beyond we came upon a high place in the foot of the
ravine. Two roads divided it, and met in the midst.
Save for this intersection the amphitheatre was strangely
perfect, and had a certain ruder air of things Roman.
Depths of foliage and the bulk of the mountain kept it in a
grateful shadow. On the benches several young folk sat
clustered or apart. One of these, a girl perhaps fourteen
years of age, buxom and comely, caught the eye of Brother
Michel. Why was she not at school?—she was done with
school now. What was she doing here?—she lived here
now. Why so?—no answer but a deepening blush.
There was no severity in Brother Michel’s manner; the
girl’s own confusion told her story. ‘<i>Elle a
honte</i>,’ was the missionary’s comment, as we rode
away. Near by in the stream, a grown girl was bathing naked
in a goyle between two stepping-stones; and it amused me to see
with what alacrity and real alarm she bounded on her
many-coloured under-clothes. Even in these daughters of
cannibals shame was eloquent.</p>
<p>It is in Hiva-oa, owing to the inveterate cannibalism of the
natives, that local beliefs have been most rudely trodden
underfoot. It was here that three religious chiefs were set
under a bridge, and the women of the valley made to defile over
their heads upon the road-way: the poor, dishonoured fellows
sitting there (all observers agree) with streaming tears.
Not only was one road driven across the high place, but two roads
intersected in its midst. There is no reason to suppose
that the last was done of purpose, and perhaps it was impossible
entirely to avoid the numerous sacred places of the
islands. But these things are not done without
result. I have spoken already of the regard of Marquesans
for the dead, making (as it does) so strange a contrast with
their unconcern for death. Early on this day’s ride,
for instance, we encountered a petty chief, who inquired (of
course) where we were going, and suggested by way of
amendment. ‘Why do you not rather show him the
cemetery?’ I saw it; it was but newly opened, the
third within eight years. They are great builders here in
Hiva-oa; I saw in my ride paepaes that no European dry-stone
mason could have equalled, the black volcanic stones were laid so
justly, the corners were so precise, the levels so true; but the
retaining-wall of the new graveyard stood apart, and seemed to be
a work of love. The sentiment of honour for the dead is
therefore not extinct. And yet observe the consequence of
violently countering men’s opinions. Of the four
prisoners in Atuona gaol, three were of course thieves; the
fourth was there for sacrilege. He had levelled up a piece
of the graveyard—to give a feast upon, as he informed the
court—and declared he had no thought of doing wrong.
Why should he? He had been forced at the point of the
bayonet to destroy the sacred places of his own piety; when he
had recoiled from the task, he had been jeered at for a
superstitious fool. And now it is supposed he will respect
our European superstitions as by second nature.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER XV—THE TWO CHIEFS OF ATUONA</h3>
<p>It had chanced (as the <i>Casco</i> beat through the Bordelais
Straits for Taahauku) she approached on one board very near the
land in the opposite isle of Tauata, where houses were to be seen
in a grove of tall coco-palms. Brother Michel pointed out
the spot. ‘I am at home now,’ said he.
‘I believe I have a large share in these cocoa-nuts; and in
that house madame my mother lives with her two
husbands!’ ‘With two husbands?’ somebody
inquired. ‘<i>C’est ma honte</i>,’
replied the brother drily.</p>
<p>A word in passing on the two husbands. I conceive the
brother to have expressed himself loosely. It seems common
enough to find a native lady with two consorts; but these are not
two husbands. The first is still the husband; the wife
continues to be referred to by his name; and the position of the
coadjutor, or <i>pikio</i>, although quite regular, appears
undoubtedly subordinate. We had opportunities to observe
one household of the sort. The <i>pikio</i> was recognised;
appeared openly along with the husband when the lady was thought
to be insulted, and the pair made common cause like
brothers. At home the inequality was more apparent.
The husband sat to receive and entertain visitors; the
<i>pikio</i> was running the while to fetch cocoa-nuts like a
hired servant, and I remarked he was sent on these errands in
preference even to the son. Plainly we have here no second
husband; plainly we have the tolerated lover. Only, in the
Marquesas, instead of carrying his lady’s fan and mantle,
he must turn his hand to do the husband’s housework.</p>
<p>The sight of Brother Michel’s family estate led the
conversation for some while upon the method and consequence of
artificial kinship. Our curiosity became extremely whetted;
the brother offered to have the whole of us adopted, and some two
days later we became accordingly the children of Paaaeua,
appointed chief of Atuona. I was unable to be present at
the ceremony, which was primitively simple. The two Mrs.
Stevensons and Mr. Osbourne, along with Paaaeua, his wife, and an
adopted child of theirs, son of a shipwrecked Austrian, sat down
to an excellent island meal, of which the principal and the only
necessary dish was pig. A concourse watched them through
the apertures of the house; but none, not even Brother Michel,
might partake; for the meal was sacramental, and either creative
or declaratory of the new relationship. In Tahiti things
are not so strictly ordered; when Ori and I ‘made
brothers,’ both our families sat with us at table, yet only
he and I, who had eaten with intention were supposed to be
affected by the ceremony. For the adoption of an infant I
believe no formality to be required; the child is handed over by
the natural parents, and grows up to inherit the estates of the
adoptive. Presents are doubtless exchanged, as at all
junctures of island life, social or international; but I never
heard of any banquet—the child’s presence at the
daily board perhaps sufficing. We may find the rationale in
the ancient Arabian idea that a common diet makes a common blood,
with its derivative axiom that ‘he is the father who gives
the child its morning draught.’ In the Marquesan
practice, the sense would thus be evanescent; from the Tahitian,
a mere survival, it will have entirely fled. An interesting
parallel will probably occur to many of my readers.</p>
<p>What is the nature of the obligation assumed at such a
festival? It will vary with the characters of those
engaged, and with the circumstances of the case. Thus it
would be absurd to take too seriously our adoption at
Atuona. On the part of Paaaeua it was an affair of social
ambition; when he agreed to receive us in his family the man had
not so much as seen us, and knew only that we were inestimably
rich and travelled in a floating palace. We, upon our side,
ate of his baked meats with no true <i>animus affiliandi</i>, but
moved by the single sentiment of curiosity. The affair was
formal, and a matter of parade, as when in Europe sovereigns call
each other cousin. Yet, had we stayed at Atuona, Paaaeua
would have held himself bound to establish us upon his land, and
to set apart young men for our service, and trees for our
support. I have mentioned the Austrian. He sailed in
one of two sister ships, which left the Clyde in coal; both
rounded the Horn, and both, at several hundred miles of distance,
though close on the same point of time, took fire at sea on the
Pacific. One was destroyed; the derelict iron frame of the
second, after long, aimless cruising, was at length recovered,
refitted, and hails to-day from San Francisco. A
boat’s crew from one of these disasters reached, after
great hardships, the isle of Hiva-oa. Some of these men
vowed they would never again confront the chances of the sea; but
alone of them all the Austrian has been exactly true to his
engagement, remains where he landed, and designs to die where he
has lived. Now, with such a man, falling and taking root
among islanders, the processes described may be compared to a
gardener’s graft. He passes bodily into the native
stock; ceases wholly to be alien; has entered the commune of the
blood, shares the prosperity and consideration of his new family,
and is expected to impart with the same generosity the fruits of
his European skill and knowledge. It is this implied
engagement that so frequently offends the ingrafted white.
To snatch an immediate advantage—to get (let us say) a
station for his store—he will play upon the native custom
and become a son or a brother for the day, promising himself to
cast down the ladder by which he shall have ascended, and
repudiate the kinship so soon as it shall grow burdensome.
And he finds there are two parties to the bargain. Perhaps
his Polynesian relative is simple, and conceived the blood-bond
literally; perhaps he is shrewd, and himself entered the covenant
with a view to gain. And either way the store is ravaged,
the house littered with lazy natives; and the richer the man
grows, the more numerous, the more idle, and the more
affectionate he finds his native relatives. Most men thus
circumstanced contrive to buy or brutally manage to enforce their
independence; but many vegetate without hope, strangled by
parasites.</p>
<p>We had no cause to blush with Brother Michel. Our new
parents were kind, gentle, well-mannered, and generous in gifts;
the wife was a most motherly woman, the husband a man who stood
justly high with his employers. Enough has been said to
show why Moipu should be deposed; and in Paaaeua the French had
found a reputable substitute. He went always scrupulously
dressed, and looked the picture of propriety, like a dark,
handsome, stupid, and probably religious young man hot from a
European funeral. In character he seemed the ideal of what
is known as the good citizen. He wore gravity like an
ornament. None could more nicely represent the desired
character as an appointed chief, the outpost of civilisation and
reform. And yet, were the French to go and native manners
to revive, fancy beholds him crowned with old men’s beards
and crowding with the first to a man-eating festival. But I
must not seem to be unjust to Paaaeua. His respectability
went deeper than the skin; his sense of the becoming sometimes
nerved him for unexpected rigours.</p>
<p>One evening Captain Otis and Mr. Osbourne were on shore in the
village. All was agog; dancing had begun; it was plain it
was to be a night of festival, and our adventurers were overjoyed
at their good fortune. A strong fall of rain drove them for
shelter to the house of Paaaeua, where they were made welcome,
wiled into a chamber, and shut in. Presently the rain took
off, the fun was to begin in earnest, and the young bloods of
Atuona came round the house and called to my fellow-travellers
through the interstices of the wall. Late into the night
the calls were continued and resumed, and sometimes mingled with
taunts; late into the night the prisoners, tantalised by the
noises of the festival, renewed their efforts to escape.
But all was vain; right across the door lay that god-fearing
householder, Paaaeua, feigning sleep; and my friends had to
forego their junketing. In this incident, so delightfully
European, we thought we could detect three strands of
sentiment. In the first place, Paaaeua had a charge of
souls: these were young men, and he judged it right to withhold
them from the primrose path. Secondly, he was a public
character, and it was not fitting that his guests should
countenance a festival of which he disapproved. So might
some strict clergyman at home address a worldly visitor:
‘Go to the theatre if you like, but, by your leave, not
from my house!’ Thirdly, Paaaeua was a man jealous,
and with some cause (as shall be shown) for jealousy; and the
feasters were the satellites of his immediate rival, Moipu.</p>
<p>For the adoption had caused much excitement in the village; it
made the strangers popular. Paaaeua, in his difficult
posture of appointed chief, drew strength and dignity from their
alliance, and only Moipu and his followers were malcontent.
For some reason nobody (except myself) appears to dislike
Moipu. Captain Hart, who has been robbed and threatened by
him; Father Orens, whom he has fired at, and repeatedly driven to
the woods; my own family, and even the French officials—all
seemed smitten with an irrepressible affection for the man.
His fall had been made soft; his son, upon his death, was to
succeed Paaaeua in the chieftaincy; and he lived, at the time of
our visit, in the shoreward part of the village in a good house,
and with a strong following of young men, his late braves and
pot-hunters. In this society, the coming of the
<i>Casco</i>, the adoption, the return feast on board, and the
presents exchanged between the whites and their new parents, were
doubtless eagerly and bitterly canvassed. It was felt that
a few years ago the honours would have gone elsewhere. In
this unwonted business, in this reception of some hitherto
undreamed-of and outlandish potentate—some Prester John or
old Assaracus—a few years back it would have been the part
of Moipu to play the hero and the host, and his young men would
have accompanied and adorned the various celebrations as the
acknowledged leaders of society. And now, by a malign
vicissitude of fortune, Moipu must sit in his house quite
unobserved; and his young men could but look in at the door while
their rivals feasted. Perhaps M. Grévy felt a touch
of bitterness towards his successor when he beheld him figure on
the broad stage of the centenary of eighty-nine; the visit of the
<i>Casco</i> which Moipu had missed by so few years was a more
unusual occasion in Atuona than a centenary in France; and the
dethroned chief determined to reassert himself in the public
eye.</p>
<p>Mr. Osbourne had gone into Atuona photographing; the
population of the village had gathered together for the occasion
on the place before the church, and Paaaeua, highly delighted
with this new appearance of his family, played the master of
ceremonies. The church had been taken, with its jolly
architect before the door; the nuns with their pupils; sundry
damsels in the ancient and singularly unbecoming robes of tapa;
and Father Orens in the midst of a group of his
parishioners. I know not what else was in hand, when the
photographer became aware of a sensation in the crowd, and,
looking around, beheld a very noble figure of a man appear upon
the margin of a thicket and stroll nonchalantly near. The
nonchalance was visibly affected; it was plain he came there to
arouse attention, and his success was instant. He was
introduced; he was civil, he was obliging, he was always
ineffably superior and certain of himself; a well-graced
actor. It was presently suggested that he should appear in
his war costume; he gracefully consented; and returned in that
strange, inappropriate and ill-omened array (which very well
became his handsome person) to strut in a circle of admirers, and
be thenceforth the centre of photography. Thus had Moipu
effected his introduction, as by accident, to the white
strangers, made it a favour to display his finery, and reduced
his rival to a secondary <i>rôle</i> on the theatre of the
disputed village. Paaaeua felt the blow; and, with a spirit
which we never dreamed he could possess, asserted his
priority. It was found impossible that day to get a
photograph of Moipu alone; for whenever he stood up before the
camera his successor placed himself unbidden by his side, and
gently but firmly held to his position. The portraits of
the pair, Jacob and Esau, standing shoulder to shoulder, one in
his careful European dress, one in his barbaric trappings, figure
the past and present of their island. A graveyard with its
humble crosses would be the aptest symbol of the future.</p>
<p>We are all impressed with the belief that Moipu had planned
his campaign from the beginning to the end. It is certain
that he lost no time in pushing his advantage. Mr. Osbourne
was inveigled to his house; various gifts were fished out of an
old sea-chest; Father Orens was called into service as
interpreter, and Moipu formally proposed to ‘make
brothers’ with Mata-Galahi—Glass-Eyes,—the not
very euphonious name under which Mr. Osbourne passed in the
Marquesas. The feast of brotherhood took place on board the
<i>Casco</i>. Paaaeua had arrived with his family, like a
plain man; and his presents, which had been numerous, had
followed one another, at intervals through several days.
Moipu, as if to mark at every point the opposition, came with a
certain feudal pomp, attended by retainers bearing gifts of all
descriptions, from plumes of old men’s beard to little,
pious, Catholic engravings.</p>
<p>I had met the man before this in the village, and detested him
on sight; there was something indescribably raffish in his looks
and ways that raised my gorge; and when man-eating was referred
to, and he laughed a low, cruel laugh, part boastful, part
bashful, like one reminded of some dashing peccadillo, my
repugnance was mingled with nausea. This is no very human
attitude, nor one at all becoming in a traveller. And, seen
more privately, the man improved. Something negroid in
character and face was still displeasing; but his ugly mouth
became attractive when he smiled, his figure and bearing were
certainly noble, and his eyes superb. In his appreciation
of jams and pickles, in is delight in the reverberating mirrors
of the dining cabin, and consequent endless repetition of Moipus
and Mata-Galahis, he showed himself engagingly a child. And
yet I am not sure; and what seemed childishness may have been
rather courtly art. His manners struck me as beyond the
mark; they were refined and caressing to the point of grossness,
and when I think of the serene absent-mindedness with which he
first strolled in upon our party, and then recall him running on
hands and knees along the cabin sofas, pawing the velvet, dipping
into the beds, and bleating commendatory
‘<i>mitais</i>’ with exaggerated emphasis, like some
enormous over-mannered ape, I feel the more sure that both must
have been calculated. And I sometimes wonder next, if Moipu
were quite alone in this polite duplicity, and ask myself whether
the <i>Casco</i> were quite so much admired in the Marquesas as
our visitors desired us to suppose.</p>
<p>I will complete this sketch of an incurable cannibal grandee
with two incongruous traits. His favourite morsel was the
human hand, of which he speaks to-day with an ill-favoured
lustfulness. And when he said good-bye to Mrs. Stevenson,
holding her hand, viewing her with tearful eyes, and chanting his
farewell improvisation in the falsetto of Marquesan high society,
he wrote upon her mind a sentimental impression which I try in
vain to share.</p>
<h2>PART II: THE PAUMOTUS</h2>
<h3>CHAPTER I—THE DANGEROUS ARCHIPELAGO—ATOLLS AT A
DISTANCE</h3>
<p>In the early morning of 4th September a whale-boat manned by
natives dragged us down the green lane of the anchorage and round
the spouting promontory. On the shore level it was a hot,
breathless, and yet crystal morning; but high overhead the hills
of Atuona were all cowled in cloud, and the ocean-river of the
trades streamed without pause. As we crawled from under the
immediate shelter of the land, we reached at last the limit of
their influence. The wind fell upon our sails in puffs,
which strengthened and grew more continuous; presently the
<i>Casco</i> heeled down to her day’s work; the whale-boat,
quite outstripped, clung for a noisy moment to her quarter; the
stipulated bread, rum, and tobacco were passed in; a moment more
and the boat was in our wake, and our late pilots were cheering
our departure.</p>
<p>This was the more inspiriting as we were bound for scenes so
different, and though on a brief voyage, yet for a new province
of creation. That wide field of ocean, called loosely the
South Seas, extends from tropic to tropic, and from perhaps 123
degrees W. to 150 degrees E., a parallelogram of one hundred
degrees by forty-seven, where degrees are the most
spacious. Much of it lies vacant, much is closely sown with
isles, and the isles are of two sorts. No distinction is so
continually dwelt upon in South Sea talk as that between the
‘low’ and the ‘high’ island, and there is
none more broadly marked in nature. The Himalayas are not
more different from the Sahara. On the one hand, and
chiefly in groups of from eight to a dozen, volcanic islands rise
above the sea; few reach an altitude of less than 4000 feet; one
exceeds 13,000; their tops are often obscured in cloud, they are
all clothed with various forests, all abound in food, and are all
remarkable for picturesque and solemn scenery. On the other
hand, we have the atoll; a thing of problematic origin and
history, the reputed creature of an insect apparently
unidentified; rudely annular in shape; enclosing a lagoon; rarely
extending beyond a quarter of a mile at its chief width; often
rising at its highest point to less than the stature of a
man—man himself, the rat and the land crab, its chief
inhabitants; not more variously supplied with plants; and
offering to the eye, even when perfect, only a ring of glittering
beach and verdant foliage, enclosing and enclosed by the blue
sea.</p>
<p>In no quarter are the atolls so thickly congregated, in none
are they so varied in size from the greatest to the least, and in
none is navigation so beset with perils, as in that archipelago
that we were now to thread. The huge system of the trades
is, for some reason, quite confounded by this multiplicity of
reefs, the wind intermits, squalls are frequent from the west and
south-west, hurricanes are known. The currents are,
besides, inextricably intermixed; dead reckoning becomes a farce;
the charts are not to be trusted; and such is the number and
similarity of these islands that, even when you have picked one
up, you may be none the wiser. The reputation of the place
is consequently infamous; insurance offices exclude it from their
field, and it was not without misgiving that my captain risked
the <i>Casco</i> in such waters. I believe, indeed, it is
almost understood that yachts are to avoid this baffling
archipelago; and it required all my instances—and all Mr.
Otis’s private taste for adventure—to deflect our
course across its midst.</p>
<p>For a few days we sailed with a steady trade, and a steady
westerly current setting us to leeward; and toward sundown of the
seventh it was supposed we should have sighted Takaroa, one of
Cook’s so-called King George Islands. The sun set;
yet a while longer the old moon—semi-brilliant herself, and
with a silver belly, which was her successor—sailed among
gathering clouds; she, too, deserted us; stars of every degree of
sheen, and clouds of every variety of form disputed the
sub-lustrous night; and still we gazed in vain for Takaroa.
The mate stood on the bowsprit, his tall grey figure slashing up
and down against the stars, and still</p>
<blockquote><p> ‘nihil
astra praeter<br />
Vidit et undas.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The rest of us were grouped at the port anchor davit, staring
with no less assiduity, but with far less hope on the obscure
horizon. Islands we beheld in plenty, but they were of
‘such stuff as dreams are made on,’ and vanished at a
wink, only to appear in other places; and by and by not only
islands, but refulgent and revolving lights began to stud the
darkness; lighthouses of the mind or of the wearied optic nerve,
solemnly shining and winking as we passed. At length the
mate himself despaired, scrambled on board again from his
unrestful perch, and announced that we had missed our
destination. He was the only man of practice in these
waters, our sole pilot, shipped for that end at Tai-o-hae.
If he declared we had missed Takaroa, it was not for us to
quarrel with the fact, but, if we could, to explain it. We
had certainly run down our southing. Our canted wake upon
the sea and our somewhat drunken-looking course upon the chart
both testified with no less certainty to an impetuous westward
current. We had no choice but to conclude we were again set
down to leeward; and the best we could do was to bring the
<i>Casco</i> to the wind, keep a good watch, and expect
morning.</p>
<p>I slept that night, as was then my somewhat dangerous
practice, on deck upon the cockpit bench. A stir at last
awoke me, to see all the eastern heaven dyed with faint orange,
the binnacle lamp already dulled against the brightness of the
day, and the steersman leaning eagerly across the wheel.
‘There it is, sir!’ he cried, and pointed in the very
eyeball of the dawn. For awhile I could see nothing but the
bluish ruins of the morning bank, which lay far along the
horizon, like melting icebergs. Then the sun rose, pierced
a gap in these <i>débris</i> of vapours, and displayed an
inconsiderable islet, flat as a plate upon the sea, and spiked
with palms of disproportioned altitude.</p>
<p>So far, so good. Here was certainly an atoll; and we
were certainly got among the archipelago. But which?
And where? The isle was too small for either Takaroa: in
all our neighbourhood, indeed, there was none so inconsiderable,
save only Tikei; and Tikei, one of Roggewein’s so-called
Pernicious Islands, seemed beside the question. At that
rate, instead of drifting to the west, we must have fetched up
thirty miles to windward. And how about the current?
It had been setting us down, by observation, all these days: by
the deflection of our wake, it should be setting us down that
moment. When had it stopped? When had it begun again?
and what kind of torrent was that which had swept us eastward in
the interval? To these questions, so typical of navigation
in that range of isles, I have no answer. Such were at
least the facts; Tikei our island turned out to be; and it was
our first experience of the dangerous archipelago, to make our
landfall thirty miles out.</p>
<p>The sight of Tikei, thrown direct against the splendour of the
morning, robbed of all its colour, and deformed with
disproportioned trees like bristles on a broom, had scarce
prepared us to be much in love with atolls. Later the same
day we saw under more fit conditions the island of Taiaro.
<i>Lost in the Sea</i> is possibly the meaning of the name.
And it was so we saw it; lost in blue sea and sky: a ring of
white beach, green underwood, and tossing palms, gem-like in
colour; of a fairy, of a heavenly prettiness. The surf ran
all around it, white as snow, and broke at one point, far to
seaward, on what seems an uncharted reef. There was no
smoke, no sign of man; indeed, the isle is not inhabited, only
visited at intervals. And yet a trader (Mr. Narii Salmon)
was watching from the shore and wondering at the unexpected
ship. I have spent since then long months upon low islands;
I know the tedium of their undistinguished days; I know the
burden of their diet. With whatever envy we may have looked
from the deck on these green coverts, it was with a tenfold
greater that Mr. Salmon and his comrades saw us steer, in our
trim ship, to seaward.</p>
<p>The night fell lovely in the extreme. After the moon
went down, the heaven was a thing to wonder at for stars.
And as I lay in the cockpit and looked upon the steersman I was
haunted by Emerson’s verses:</p>
<blockquote><p>‘And the lone seaman all the night<br />
Sails astonished among stars.’</p>
</blockquote>
<p>By this glittering and imperfect brightness, about four bells
in the first watch we made our third atoll, Raraka. The low
line of the isle lay straight along the sky; so that I was at
first reminded of a towpath, and we seemed to be mounting some
engineered and navigable stream. Presently a red star
appeared, about the height and brightness of a danger signal, and
with that my simile was changed; we seemed rather to skirt the
embankment of a railway, and the eye began to look instinctively
for the telegraph-posts, and the ear to expect the coming of a
train. Here and there, but rarely, faint tree-tops broke
the level. And the sound of the surf accompanied us, now in
a drowsy monotone, now with a menacing swing.</p>
<p>The isle lay nearly east and west, barring our advance on
Fakarava. We must, therefore, hug the coast until we gained
the western end, where, through a passage eight miles wide, we
might sail southward between Raraka and the next isle,
Kauehi. We had the wind free, a lightish air; but clouds of
an inky blackness were beginning to arise, and at times it
lightened—without thunder. Something, I know not
what, continually set us up upon the island. We lay more
and more to the nor’ard; and you would have thought the
shore copied our manœuvre and outsailed us. Once and twice
Raraka headed us again—again, in the sea fashion, the quite
innocent steersman was abused—and again the <i>Casco</i>
kept away. Had I been called on, with no more light than
that of our experience, to draw the configuration of that island,
I should have shown a series of bow-window promontories, each
overlapping the other to the nor’ard, and the trend of the
land from the south-east to the north-west, and behold, on the
chart it lay near east and west in a straight line.</p>
<p>We had but just repeated our manœuvre and kept
away—for not more than five minutes the railway embankment
had been lost to view and the surf to hearing—when I was
aware of land again, not only on the weather bow, but dead
ahead. I played the part of the judicious landsman, holding
my peace till the last moment; and presently my mariners
perceived it for themselves.</p>
<p>‘Land ahead!’ said the steersman.</p>
<p>‘By God, it’s Kauehi!’ cried the mate.</p>
<p>And so it was. And with that I began to be sorry for
cartographers. We were scarce doing three and a half; and
they asked me to believe that (in five minutes) we had dropped an
island, passed eight miles of open water, and run almost high and
dry upon the next. But my captain was more sorry for
himself to be afloat in such a labyrinth; laid the <i>Casco</i>
to, with the log line up and down, and sat on the stern rail and
watched it till the morning. He had enough of night in the
Paumotus.</p>
<p>By daylight on the 9th we began to skirt Kauehi, and had now
an opportunity to see near at hand the geography of atolls.
Here and there, where it was high, the farther side loomed up;
here and there the near side dipped entirely and showed a broad
path of water into the lagoon; here and there both sides were
equally abased, and we could look right through the discontinuous
ring to the sea horizon on the south. Conceive, on a vast
scale, the submerged hoop of the duck-hunter, trimmed with green
rushes to conceal his head—water within, water
without—you have the image of the perfect atoll.
Conceive one that has been partly plucked of its rush fringe; you
have the atoll of Kauehi. And for either shore of it at
closer quarters, conceive the line of some old Roman highway
traversing a wet morass, and here sunk out of view and there
re-arising, crowned with a green tuft of thicket; only instead of
the stagnant waters of a marsh, the live ocean now boiled
against, now buried the frail barrier. Last night’s
impression in the dark was thus confirmed by day, and not
corrected. We sailed indeed by a mere causeway in the sea,
of nature’s handiwork, yet of no greater magnitude than
many of the works of man.</p>
<p>The isle was uninhabited; it was all green brush and white
sand, set in transcendently blue water; even the coco-palms were
rare, though some of these completed the bright harmony of colour
by hanging out a fan of golden yellow. For long there was
no sign of life beyond the vegetable, and no sound but the
continuous grumble of the surf. In silence and desertion
these fair shores slipped past, and were submerged and rose again
with clumps of thicket from the sea. And then a bird or two
appeared, hovering and crying; swiftly these became more
numerous, and presently, looking ahead, we were aware of a vast
effervescence of winged life. In this place the annular
isle was mostly under water, carrying here and there on its
submerged line a wooded islet. Over one of these the birds
hung and flew with an incredible density like that of gnats or
hiving bees; the mass flashed white and black, and heaved and
quivered, and the screaming of the creatures rose over the voice
of the surf in a shrill clattering whirr. As you descend
some inland valley a not dissimilar sound announces the nearness
of a mill and pouring river. Some stragglers, as I said,
came to meet our approach; a few still hung about the ship as we
departed. The crying died away, the last pair of wings was
left behind, and once more the low shores of Kauehi streamed past
our eyes in silence like a picture. I supposed at the time
that the birds lived, like ants or citizens, concentred where we
saw them. I have been told since (I know not if correctly)
that the whole isle, or much of it, is similarly peopled; and
that the effervescence at a single spot would be the mark of a
boat’s crew of egg-hunters from one of the neighbouring
inhabited atolls. So that here at Kauehi, as the day before
at Taiaro, the <i>Casco</i> sailed by under the fire of
unsuspected eyes. And one thing is surely true, that even
on these ribbons of land an army might lie hid and no passing
mariner divine its presence.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER II—FAKARAVA: AN ATOLL AT HAND</h3>
<p>By a little before noon we were running down the coast of our
destination, Fakarava: the air very light, the sea near smooth;
though still we were accompanied by a continuous murmur from the
beach, like the sound of a distant train. The isle is of a
huge longitude, the enclosed lagoon thirty miles by ten or
twelve, and the coral tow-path, which they call the land, some
eighty or ninety miles by (possibly) one furlong. That part
by which we sailed was all raised; the underwood excellently
green, the topping wood of coco-palms continuous—a mark, if
I had known it, of man’s intervention. For once more,
and once more unconsciously, we were within hail of
fellow-creatures, and that vacant beach was but a pistol-shot
from the capital city of the archipelago. But the life of
an atoll, unless it be enclosed, passes wholly on the shores of
the lagoon; it is there the villages are seated, there the canoes
ply and are drawn up; and the beach of the ocean is a place
accursed and deserted, the fit scene only for wizardry and
shipwreck, and in the native belief a haunting ground of
murderous spectres.</p>
<p>By and by we might perceive a breach in the low barrier; the
woods ceased; a glittering point ran into the sea, tipped with an
emerald shoal the mark of entrance. As we drew near we met
a little run of sea—the private sea of the lagoon having
there its origin and end, and here, in the jaws of the gateway,
trying vain conclusions with the more majestic heave of the
Pacific. The <i>Casco</i> scarce avowed a shock; but there
are times and circumstances when these harbour mouths of inland
basins vomit floods, deflecting, burying, and dismasting
ships. For, conceive a lagoon perfectly sealed but in the
one point, and that of merely navigable width; conceive the tide
and wind to have heaped for hours together in that coral fold a
superfluity of waters, and the tide to change and the wind
fall—the open sluice of some great reservoirs at home will
give an image of the unstemmable effluxion.</p>
<p>We were scarce well headed for the pass before all heads were
craned over the rail. For the water, shoaling under our
board, became changed in a moment to surprising hues of blue and
grey; and in its transparency the coral branched and blossomed,
and the fish of the inland sea cruised visibly below us, stained
and striped, and even beaked like parrots. I have paid in
my time to view many curiosities; never one so curious as that
first sight over the ship’s rail in the lagoon of
Fakarava. But let not the reader be deceived with
hope. I have since entered, I suppose, some dozen atolls in
different parts of the Pacific, and the experience has never been
repeated. That exquisite hue and transparency of submarine
day, and these shoals of rainbow fish, have not enraptured me
again.</p>
<p>Before we could raise our eyes from that engaging spectacle
the schooner had slipped betwixt the pierheads of the reef, and
was already quite committed to the sea within. The
containing shores are so little erected, and the lagoon itself is
so great, that, for the more part, it seemed to extend without a
check to the horizon. Here and there, indeed, where the
reef carried an inlet, like a signet-ring upon a finger, there
would be a pencilling of palms; here and there, the green wall of
wood ran solid for a length of miles; and on the port hand, under
the highest grove of trees, a few houses sparkled
white—Rotoava, the metropolitan settlement of the
Paumotus. Hither we beat in three tacks, and came to an
anchor close in shore, in the first smooth water since we had
left San Francisco, five fathoms deep, where a man might look
overboard all day at the vanishing cable, the coral patches, and
the many-coloured fish.</p>
<p>Fakarava was chosen to be the seat of Government from nautical
considerations only. It is eccentrically situate; the
productions, even for a low island, poor; the population neither
many nor—for Low Islanders—industrious. But the
lagoon has two good passages, one to leeward, one to windward, so
that in all states of the wind it can be left and entered, and
this advantage, for a government of scattered islands, was
decisive. A pier of coral, landing-stairs, a harbour light
upon a staff and pillar, and two spacious Government bungalows in
a handsome fence, give to the northern end of Rotoava a great air
of consequence. This is confirmed on the one hand by an
empty prison, on the other by a gendarmerie pasted over with
hand-bills in Tahitian, land-law notices from Papeete, and
republican sentiments from Paris, signed (a little after date)
‘Jules Grévy, <i>Perihidente</i>.’ Quite
at the far end a belfried Catholic chapel concludes the town; and
between, on a smooth floor of white coral sand and under the
breezy canopy of coco-palms, the houses of the natives stand
irregularly scattered, now close on the lagoon for the sake of
the breeze, now back under the palms for love of shadow.</p>
<p>Not a soul was to be seen. But for the thunder of the
surf on the far side, it seemed you might have heard a pin drop
anywhere about that capital city. There was something
thrilling in the unexpected silence, something yet more so in the
unexpected sound. Here before us a sea reached to the
horizon, rippling like an inland mere; and behold! close at our
back another sea assaulted with assiduous fury the reverse of the
position. At night the lantern was run up and lit a vacant
pier. In one house lights were seen and voices heard, where
the population (I was told) sat playing cards. A little
beyond, from deep in the darkness of the palm-grove, we saw the
glow and smelt the aromatic odour of a coal of cocoa-nut husk, a
relic of the evening kitchen. Crickets sang; some shrill
thing whistled in a tuft of weeds; and the mosquito hummed and
stung. There was no other trace that night of man, bird, or
insect in the isle. The moon, now three days old, and as
yet but a silver crescent on a still visible sphere, shone
through the palm canopy with vigorous and scattered lights.
The alleys where we walked were smoothed and weeded like a
boulevard; here and there were plants set out; here and there
dusky cottages clustered in the shadow, some with
verandahs. A public garden by night, a rich and fashionable
watering-place in a by-season, offer sights and vistas not
dissimilar. And still, on the one side, stretched the
lapping mere, and from the other the deep sea still growled in
the night. But it was most of all on board, in the dead
hours, when I had been better sleeping, that the spell of
Fakarava seized and held me. The moon was down. The
harbour lantern and two of the greater planets drew vari-coloured
wakes on the lagoon. From shore the cheerful watch-cry of
cocks rang out at intervals above the organ-point of surf.
And the thought of this depopulated capital, this protracted
thread of annular island with its crest of coco-palms and fringe
of breakers, and that tranquil inland sea that stretched before
me till it touched the stars, ran in my head for hours with
delight.</p>
<p>So long as I stayed upon that isle these thoughts were
constant. I lay down to sleep, and woke again with an
unblunted sense of my surroundings. I was never weary of
calling up the image of that narrow causeway, on which I had my
dwelling, lying coiled like a serpent, tail to mouth, in the
outrageous ocean, and I was never weary of passing—a mere
quarter-deck parade—from the one side to the other, from
the shady, habitable shores of the lagoon to the blinding desert
and uproarious breakers of the opposite beach. The sense of
insecurity in such a thread of residence is more than
fanciful. Hurricanes and tidal waves over-leap these humble
obstacles; Oceanus remembers his strength, and, where houses
stood and palms flourished, shakes his white beard again over the
barren coral. Fakarava itself has suffered; the trees
immediately beyond my house were all of recent replantation; and
Anaa is only now recovered from a heavier stroke. I knew
one who was then dwelling in the isle. He told me that he
and two ship captains walked to the sea beach. There for a
while they viewed the oncoming breakers, till one of the captains
clapped suddenly his hand before his eyes and cried aloud that he
could endure no longer to behold them. This was in the
afternoon; in the dark hours of the night the sea burst upon the
island like a flood; the settlement was razed all but the church
and presbytery; and, when day returned, the survivors saw
themselves clinging in an abattis of uprooted coco-palms and
ruined houses.</p>
<p>Danger is but a small consideration. But men are more
nicely sensible of a discomfort; and the atoll is a
discomfortable home. There are some, and these probably
ancient, where a deep soil has formed and the most valuable
fruit-trees prosper. I have walked in one, with equal
admiration and surprise, through a forest of huge breadfruits,
eating bananas and stumbling among taro as I went. This was
in the atoll of Namorik in the Marshall group, and stands alone
in my experience. To give the opposite extreme, which is
yet far more near the average, I will describe the soil and
productions of Fakarava. The surface of that narrow strip
is for the more part of broken coral lime-stone, like volcanic
clinkers, and excruciating to the naked foot; in some atolls, I
believe, not in Fakarava, it gives a fine metallic ring when
struck. Here and there you come upon a bank of sand,
exceeding fine and white, and these parts are the least
productive. The plants (such as they are) spring from and
love the broken coral, whence they grow with that wonderful
verdancy that makes the beauty of the atoll from the sea.
The coco-palm in particular luxuriates in that stern
<i>solum</i>, striking down his roots to the brackish, percolated
water, and bearing his green head in the wind with every evidence
of health and pleasure. And yet even the coco-palm must be
helped in infancy with some extraneous nutriment, and through
much of the low archipelago there is planted with each nut a
piece of ship’s biscuit and a rusty nail. The
pandanus comes next in importance, being also a food tree; and
he, too, does bravely. A green bush called <i>miki</i> runs
everywhere; occasionally a purao is seen; and there are several
useless weeds. According to M. Cuzent, the whole number of
plants on an atoll such as Fakarava will scarce exceed, even if
it reaches to, one score. Not a blade of grass appears; not
a grain of humus, save when a sack or two has been imported to
make the semblance of a garden; such gardens as bloom in cities
on the window-sill. Insect life is sometimes dense; a cloud
o’ mosquitoes, and, what is far worse, a plague of flies
blackening our food, has sometimes driven us from a meal on
Apemama; and even in Fakarava the mosquitoes were a pest.
The land crab may be seen scuttling to his hole, and at night the
rats besiege the houses and the artificial gardens. The
crab is good eating; possibly so is the rat; I have not
tried. Pandanus fruit is made, in the Gilberts, into an
agreeable sweetmeat, such as a man may trifle with at the end of
a long dinner; for a substantial meal I have no use for it.
The rest of the food-supply, in a destitute atoll such as
Fakarava, can be summed up in the favourite jest of the
archipelago—cocoa-nut beefsteak. Cocoa-nut green,
cocoa-nut ripe, cocoa-nut germinated; cocoa-nut to eat and
cocoa-nut to drink; cocoa-nut raw and cooked, cocoa-nut hot and
cold—such is the bill of fare. And some of the
entrées are no doubt delicious. The germinated nut,
cooked in the shell and eaten with a spoon, forms a good pudding;
cocoa-nut milk—the expressed juice of a ripe nut, not the
water of a green one—goes well in coffee, and is a valuable
adjunct in cookery through the South Seas; and cocoa-nut salad,
if you be a millionaire, and can afford to eat the value of a
field of corn for your dessert, is a dish to be remembered with
affection. But when all is done there is a sameness, and
the Israelites of the low islands murmur at their manna.</p>
<p>The reader may think I have forgot the sea. The two
beaches do certainly abound in life, and they are strangely
different. In the lagoon the water shallows slowly on a
bottom of the fine slimy sand, dotted with clumps of growing
coral. Then comes a strip of tidal beach on which the
ripples lap. In the coral clumps the great holy-water clam
(<i>Tridacna</i>) grows plentifully; a little deeper lie the beds
of the pearl-oyster and sail the resplendent fish that charmed us
at our entrance; and these are all more or less vigorously
coloured. But the other shells are white like lime, or
faintly tinted with a little pink, the palest possible display;
many of them dead besides, and badly rolled. On the ocean
side, on the mounds of the steep beach, over all the width of the
reef right out to where the surf is bursting, in every cranny,
under every scattered fragment of the coral, an incredible plenty
of marine life displays the most wonderful variety and brilliancy
of hues. The reef itself has no passage of colour but is
imitated by some shell. Purple and red and white, and green
and yellow, pied and striped and clouded, the living shells wear
in every combination the livery of the dead reef—if the
reef be dead—so that the eye is continually baffled and the
collector continually deceived. I have taken shells for
stones and stones for shells, the one as often as the
other. A prevailing character of the coral is to be dotted
with small spots of red, and it is wonderful how many varieties
of shell have adopted the same fashion and donned the disguise of
the red spot. A shell I had found in plenty in the
Marquesas I found here also unchanged in all things else, but
there were the red spots. A lively little crab wore the
same markings. The case of the hermit or soldier crab was
more conclusive, being the result of conscious choice. This
nasty little wrecker, scavenger, and squatter has learned the
value of a spotted house; so it be of the right colour he will
choose the smallest shard, tuck himself in a mere corner of a
broken whorl, and go about the world half naked; but I never
found him in this imperfect armour unless it was marked with the
red spot.</p>
<p>Some two hundred yards distant is the beach of the
lagoon. Collect the shells from each, set them side by
side, and you would suppose they came from different hemispheres;
the one so pale, the other so brilliant; the one prevalently
white, the other of a score of hues, and infected with the
scarlet spot like a disease. This seems the more strange,
since the hermit crabs pass and repass the island, and I have met
them by the Residency well, which is about central, journeying
either way. Without doubt many of the shells in the lagoon
are dead. But why are they dead? Without doubt the
living shells have a very different background set for
imitation. But why are these so different? We are
only on the threshold of the mysteries.</p>
<p>Either beach, I have said, abounds with life. On the
sea-side and in certain atolls this profusion of vitality is even
shocking: the rock under foot is mined with it. I have
broken off—notably in Funafuti and Arorai <a
name="citation156"></a><a href="#footnote156"
class="citation">[156]</a>—great lumps of ancient weathered
rock that rang under my blows like iron, and the fracture has
been full of pendent worms as long as my hand, as thick as a
child’s finger, of a slightly pinkish white, and set as
close as three or even four to the square inch. Even in the
lagoon, where certain shell-fish seem to sicken, others (it is
notorious) prosper exceedingly and make the riches of these
islands. Fish, too, abound; the lagoon is a closed
fish-pond, such as might rejoice the fancy of an abbot; sharks
swarm there, and chiefly round the passages, to feast upon this
plenty, and you would suppose that man had only to prepare his
angle. Alas! it is not so. Of these painted fish that
came in hordes about the entering <i>Casco</i>, some bore
poisonous spines, and others were poisonous if eaten. The
stranger must refrain, or take his chance of painful and
dangerous sickness. The native, on his own isle, is a safe
guide; transplant him to the next, and he is helpless as
yourself. For it is a question both of time and
place. A fish caught in a lagoon may be deadly; the same
fish caught the same day at sea, and only a few hundred yards
without the passage, will be wholesome eating: in a neighbouring
isle perhaps the case will be reversed; and perhaps a fortnight
later you shall be able to eat of them indifferently from within
and from without. According to the natives, these
bewildering vicissitudes are ruled by the movement of the
heavenly bodies. The beautiful planet Venus plays a great
part in all island tales and customs; and among other functions,
some of them more awful, she regulates the season of good
fish. With Venus in one phase, as we had her, certain fish
were poisonous in the lagoon: with Venus in another, the same
fish was harmless and a valued article of diet. White men
explain these changes by the phases of the coral.</p>
<p>It adds a last touch of horror to the thought of this
precarious annular gangway in the sea, that even what there is of
it is not of honest rock, but organic, part alive, part
putrescent; even the clean sea and the bright fish about it
poisoned, the most stubborn boulder burrowed in by worms, the
lightest dust venomous as an apothecary’s drugs.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER III—A HOUSE TO LET IN A LOW ISLAND</h3>
<p>Never populous, it was yet by a chapter of accidents that I
found the island so deserted that no sound of human life
diversified the hours; that we walked in that trim public garden
of a town, among closed houses, without even a lodging-bill in a
window to prove some tenancy in the back quarters; and, when we
visited the Government bungalow, that Mr. Donat, acting
Vice-Resident, greeted us alone, and entertained us with
cocoa-nut punches in the Sessions Hall and seat of judgment of
that widespread archipelago, our glasses standing arrayed with
summonses and census returns. The unpopularity of a late
Vice-Resident had begun the movement of exodus, his native
employés resigning court appointments and retiring each to
his own coco-patch in the remoter districts of the isle.
Upon the back of that, the Governor in Papeete issued a decree:
All land in the Paumotus must be defined and registered by a
certain date. Now, the folk of the archipelago are half
nomadic; a man can scarce be said to belong to a particular
atoll; he belongs to several, perhaps holds a stake and counts
cousinship in half a score; and the inhabitants of Rotoava in
particular, man, woman, and child, and from the gendarme to the
Mormon prophet and the schoolmaster, owned—I was going to
say land—owned at least coral blocks and growing coco-palms
in some adjacent isle. Thither—from the gendarme to
the babe in arms, the pastor followed by his flock, the
schoolmaster carrying along with him his scholars, and the
scholars with their books and slates—they had taken ship
some two days previous to our arrival, and were all now engaged
disputing boundaries. Fancy overhears the shrillness of
their disputation mingle with the surf and scatter
sea-fowl. It was admirable to observe the completeness of
their flight, like that of hibernating birds; nothing left but
empty houses, like old nests to be reoccupied in spring; and even
the harmless necessary dominie borne with them in their
transmigration. Fifty odd set out, and only seven, I was
informed, remained. But when I made a feast on board the
<i>Casco</i>, more than seven, and nearer seven times seven,
appeared to be my guests. Whence they appeared, how they
were summoned, whither they vanished when the feast was eaten, I
have no guess. In view of Low Island tales, and that awful
frequentation which makes men avoid the seaward beaches of an
atoll, some two score of those that ate with us may have
returned, for the occasion, from the kingdom of the dead.</p>
<p>It was this solitude that put it in our minds to hire a house,
and become, for the time being, indwellers of the isle—a
practice I have ever since, when it was possible, adhered
to. Mr. Donat placed us, with that intent, under the convoy
of one Taniera Mahinui, who combined the incongruous characters
of catechist and convict. The reader may smile, but I
affirm he was well qualified for either part. For that of
convict, first of all, by a good substantial felony, such as in
all lands casts the perpetrator in chains and dungeons.
Taniera was a man of birth—the chief a while ago, as he
loved to tell, of a district in Anaa of 800 souls. In an
evil hour it occurred to the authorities in Papeete to charge the
chiefs with the collection of the taxes. It is a question
if much were collected; it is certain that nothing was handed on;
and Taniera, who had distinguished himself by a visit to Papeete
and some high living in restaurants, was chosen for the
scapegoat. The reader must understand that not Taniera but
the authorities in Papeete were first in fault. The charge
imposed was disproportioned. I have not yet heard of any
Polynesian capable of such a burden; honest and upright
Hawaiians—one in particular, who was admired even by the
whites as an inflexible magistrate—have stumbled in the
narrow path of the trustee. And Taniera, when the pinch
came, scorned to denounce accomplices; others had shared the
spoil, he bore the penalty alone. He was condemned in five
years. The period, when I had the pleasure of his
friendship, was not yet expired; he still drew prison rations,
the sole and not unwelcome reminder of his chains, and, I
believe, looked forward to the date of his enfranchisement with
mere alarm. For he had no sense of shame in the position;
complained of nothing but the defective table of his place of
exile; regretted nothing but the fowls and eggs and fish of his
own more favoured island. And as for his parishioners, they
did not think one hair the less of him. A schoolboy,
mulcted in ten thousand lines of Greek and dwelling sequestered
in the dormitories, enjoys unabated consideration from his
fellows. So with Taniera: a marked man, not a dishonoured;
having fallen under the lash of the unthinkable gods; a Job,
perhaps, or say a Taniera in the den of lions. Songs are
likely made and sung about this saintly Robin Hood. On the
other hand, he was even highly qualified for his office in the
Church; being by nature a grave, considerate, and kindly man; his
face rugged and serious, his smile bright; the master of several
trades, a builder both of boats and houses; endowed with a fine
pulpit voice; endowed besides with such a gift of eloquence that
at the grave of the late chief of Fakarava he set all the
assistants weeping. I never met a man of a mind more
ecclesiastical; he loved to dispute and to inform himself of
doctrine and the history of sects; and when I showed him the cuts
in a volume of Chambers’s
<i>Encyclopædia</i>—except for one of an
ape—reserved his whole enthusiasm for cardinals’
hats, censers, candlesticks, and cathedrals. Methought when
he looked upon the cardinal’s hat a voice said low in his
ear: ‘Your foot is on the ladder.’</p>
<p>Under the guidance of Taniera we were soon installed in what I
believe to have been the best-appointed private house in
Fakarava. It stood just beyond the church in an oblong
patch of cultivation. More than three hundred sacks of soil
were imported from Tahiti for the Residency garden; and this must
shortly be renewed, for the earth blows away, sinks in crevices
of the coral, and is sought for at last in vain. I know not
how much earth had gone to the garden of my villa; some at least,
for an alley of prosperous bananas ran to the gate, and over the
rest of the enclosure, which was covered with the usual
clinker-like fragments of smashed coral, not only coco-palms and
mikis but also fig-trees flourished, all of a delicious
greenness. Of course there was no blade of grass. In
front a picket fence divided us from the white road, the
palm-fringed margin of the lagoon, and the lagoon itself,
reflecting clouds by day and stars by night. At the back, a
bulwark of uncemented coral enclosed us from the narrow belt of
bush and the nigh ocean beach where the seas thundered, the roar
and wash of them still humming in the chambers of the house.</p>
<p>This itself was of one story, verandahed front and back.
It contained three rooms, three sewing-machines, three
sea-chests, chairs, tables, a pair of beds, a cradle, a
double-barrelled gun, a pair of enlarged coloured photographs, a
pair of coloured prints after Wilkie and Mulready, and a French
lithograph with the legend: ‘<i>Le brigade du
Général Lepasset brûlant son drapeau devant
Metz</i>.’ Under the stilts of the house a stove was
rusting, till we drew it forth and put it in commission.
Not far off was the burrow in the coral whence we supplied
ourselves with brackish water. There was live stock,
besides, on the estate—cocks and hens and a brace of
ill-regulated cats, whom Taniera came every morning with the sun
to feed on grated cocoa-nut. His voice was our regular
réveille, ringing pleasantly about the garden:
‘Pooty—pooty—poo—poo—poo!’</p>
<p>Far as we were from the public offices, the nearness of the
chapel made our situation what is called eligible in
advertisements, and gave us a side look on some native
life. Every morning, as soon as he had fed the fowls,
Taniera set the bell agoing in the small belfry; and the
faithful, who were not very numerous, gathered to prayers.
I was once present: it was the Lord’s day, and seven
females and eight males composed the congregation. A woman
played precentor, starting with a longish note; the catechist
joined in upon the second bar; and then the faithful in a
body. Some had printed hymn-books which they followed; some
of the rest filled up with ‘eh—eh—eh,’
the Paumotuan tol-de-rol. After the hymn, we had an
antiphonal prayer or two; and then Taniera rose from the front
bench, where he had been sitting in his catechist’s robes,
passed within the altar-rails, opened his Tahitian Bible, and
began to preach from notes. I understood one word—the
name of God; but the preacher managed his voice with taste, used
rare and expressive gestures, and made a strong impression of
sincerity. The plain service, the vernacular Bible, the
hymn-tunes mostly on an English pattern—‘God save the
Queen,’ I was informed, a special favourite,—all,
save some paper flowers upon the altar, seemed not merely but
austerely Protestant. It is thus the Catholics have met
their low island proselytes half-way.</p>
<p>Taniera had the keys of our house; it was with him I made my
bargain, if that could be called a bargain in which all was
remitted to my generosity; it was he who fed the cats and
poultry, he who came to call and pick a meal with us like an
acknowledged friend; and we long fondly supposed he was our
landlord. This belief was not to bear the test of
experience; and, as my chapter has to relate, no certainty
succeeded it.</p>
<p>We passed some days of airless quiet and great heat;
shell-gatherers were warned from the ocean beach, where sunstroke
waited them from ten till four; the highest palm hung motionless,
there was no voice audible but that of the sea on the far
side. At last, about four of a certain afternoon, long
cat’s-paws flawed the face of the lagoon; and presently in
the tree-tops there awoke the grateful bustle of the trades, and
all the houses and alleys of the island were fanned out. To
more than one enchanted ship, that had lain long becalmed in view
of the green shore, the wind brought deliverance; and by daylight
on the morrow a schooner and two cutters lay moored in the port
of Rotoava. Not only in the outer sea, but in the lagoon
itself, a certain traffic woke with the reviving breeze; and
among the rest one François, a half-blood, set sail with
the first light in his own half-decked cutter. He had held
before a court appointment; being, I believe, the Residency
sweeper-out. Trouble arising with the unpopular
Vice-Resident, he had thrown his honours down, and fled to the
far parts of the atoll to plant cabbages—or at least
coco-palms. Thence he was now driven by such need as even a
Cincinnatus must acknowledge, and fared for the capital city, the
seat of his late functions, to exchange half a ton of copra for
necessary flour. And here, for a while, the story leaves to
tell of his voyaging.</p>
<p>It must tell, instead, of our house, where, toward seven at
night, the catechist came suddenly in with his pleased air of
being welcome; armed besides with a considerable bunch of
keys. These he proceeded to try on the sea-chests, drawing
each in turn from its place against the wall. Heads of
strangers appeared in the doorway and volunteered
suggestions. All in vain. Either they were the wrong
keys or the wrong boxes, or the wrong man was trying them.
For a little Taniera fumed and fretted; then had recourse to the
more summary method of the hatchet; one of the chests was broken
open, and an armful of clothing, male and female, baled out and
handed to the strangers on the verandah.</p>
<p>These were François, his wife, and their child.
About eight a.m., in the midst of the lagoon, their cutter had
capsized in jibbing. They got her righted, and though she
was still full of water put the child on board. The
mainsail had been carried away, but the jib still drew her
sluggishly along, and François and the woman swam astern
and worked the rudder with their hands. The cold was cruel;
the fatigue, as time went on, became excessive; and in that
preserve of sharks, fear hunted them. Again and again,
François, the half-breed, would have desisted and gone
down; but the woman, whole blood of an amphibious race, still
supported him with cheerful words. I am reminded of a woman
of Hawaii who swam with her husband, I dare not say how many
miles, in a high sea, and came ashore at last with his dead body
in her arms. It was about five in the evening, after nine
hours’ swimming, that François and his wife reached
land at Rotoava. The gallant fight was won, and instantly
the more childish side of native character appears. They
had supped, and told and retold their story, dripping as they
came; the flesh of the woman, whom Mrs. Stevenson helped to
shift, was cold as stone; and François, having changed to
a dry cotton shirt and trousers, passed the remainder of the
evening on my floor and between open doorways, in a thorough
draught. Yet François, the son of a French father,
speaks excellent French himself and seems intelligent.</p>
<p>It was our first idea that the catechist, true to his
evangelical vocation, was clothing the naked from his
superfluity. Then it came out that François was but
dealing with his own. The clothes were his, so was the
chest, so was the house. François was in fact the
landlord. Yet you observe he had hung back on the verandah
while Taniera tried his ’prentice hand upon the locks: and
even now, when his true character appeared, the only use he made
of the estate was to leave the clothes of his family drying on
the fence. Taniera was still the friend of the house, still
fed the poultry, still came about us on his daily visits,
François, during the remainder of his stay, holding
bashfully aloof. And there was stranger matter. Since
François had lost the whole load of his cutter, the half
ton of copra, an axe, bowls, knives, and clothes—since he
had in a manner to begin the world again, and his necessary flour
was not yet bought or paid for—I proposed to advance him
what he needed on the rent. To my enduring amazement he
refused, and the reason he gave—if that can be called a
reason which but darkens counsel—was that Taniera was his
friend. His friend, you observe; not his creditor. I
inquired into that, and was assured that Taniera, an exile in a
strange isle, might possibly be in debt himself, but certainly
was no man’s creditor.</p>
<p>Very early one morning we were awakened by a bustling presence
in the yard, and found our camp had been surprised by a tall,
lean old native lady, dressed in what were obviously
widow’s weeds. You could see at a glance she was a
notable woman, a housewife, sternly practical, alive with energy,
and with fine possibilities of temper. Indeed, there was
nothing native about her but the skin; and the type abounds, and
is everywhere respected, nearer home. It did us good to see
her scour the grounds, examining the plants and chickens;
watering, feeding, trimming them; taking angry, purpose-like
possession. When she neared the house our sympathy abated;
when she came to the broken chest I wished I were
elsewhere. We had scarce a word in common; but her whole
lean body spoke for her with indignant eloquence. ‘My
chest!’ it cried, with a stress on the possessive.
‘My chest—broken open! This is a fine state of
things!’ I hastened to lay the blame where it
belonged—on François and his wife—and found I
had made things worse instead of better. She repeated the
names at first with incredulity, then with despair. A while
she seemed stunned, next fell to disembowelling the box, piling
the goods on the floor, and visibly computing the extent of
François’s ravages; and presently after she was
observed in high speech with Taniera, who seemed to hang an ear
like one reproved.</p>
<p>Here, then, by all known marks, should be my land-lady at
last; here was every character of the proprietor fully
developed. Should I not approach her on the still depending
question of my rent? I carried the point to an
adviser. ‘Nonsense!’ he cried.
‘That’s the old woman, the mother. It
doesn’t belong to her. I believe that’s the man
the house belongs to,’ and he pointed to one of the
coloured photographs on the wall. On this I gave up all
desire of understanding; and when the time came for me to leave,
in the judgment-hall of the archipelago, and with the awful
countenance of the acting Governor, I duly paid my rent to
Taniera. He was satisfied, and so was I. But what had
he to do with it? Mr. Donat, acting magistrate and a man of
kindred blood, could throw no light upon the mystery; a plain
private person, with a taste for letters, cannot be expected to
do more.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER IV—TRAITS AND SECTS IN THE PAUMOTUS</h3>
<p>The most careless reader must have remarked a change of air
since the Marquesas. The house, crowded with effects, the
bustling housewife counting her possessions, the serious,
indoctrinated island pastor, the long fight for life in the
lagoon: here are traits of a new world. I read in a
pamphlet (I will not give the author’s name) that the
Marquesan especially resembles the Paumotuan. I should take
the two races, though so near in neighbourhood, to be extremes of
Polynesian diversity. The Marquesan is certainly the most
beautiful of human races, and one of the tallest—the
Paumotuan averaging a good inch shorter, and not even handsome;
the Marquesan open-handed, inert, insensible to religion,
childishly self-indulgent—the Paumotuan greedy, hardy,
enterprising, a religious disputant, and with a trace of the
ascetic character.</p>
<p>Yet a few years ago, and the people of the archipelago were
crafty savages. Their isles might be called sirens’
isles, not merely from the attraction they exerted on the passing
mariner, but from the perils that awaited him on shore.
Even to this day, in certain outlying islands, danger lingers;
and the civilized Paumotuan dreads to land and hesitates to
accost his backward brother. But, except in these, to-day
the peril is a memory. When our generation were yet in the
cradle and playroom it was still a living fact. Between
1830 and 1840, Hao, for instance, was a place of the most
dangerous approach, where ships were seized and crews
kidnapped. As late as 1856, the schooner <i>Sarah Ann</i>
sailed from Papeete and was seen no more. She had women on
board, and children, the captain’s wife, a nursemaid, a
baby, and the two young sons of a Captain Steven on their way to
the mainland for schooling. All were supposed to have
perished in a squall. A year later, the captain of the
<i>Julia</i>, coasting along the island variously called Bligh,
Lagoon, and Tematangi saw armed natives follow the course of his
schooner, clad in many-coloured stuffs. Suspicion was at
once aroused; the mother of the lost children was profuse of
money; and one expedition having found the place deserted, and
returned content with firing a few shots, she raised and herself
accompanied another. None appeared to greet or to oppose
them; they roamed a while among abandoned huts and empty
thickets; then formed two parties and set forth to beat, from end
to end, the pandanus jungle of the island. One man remained
alone by the landing-place—Teina, a chief of Anaa, leader
of the armed natives who made the strength of the
expedition. Now that his comrades were departed this way
and that, on their laborious exploration, the silence fell
profound; and this silence was the ruin of the islanders. A
sound of stones rattling caught the ear of Teina. He
looked, thinking to perceive a crab, and saw instead the brown
hand of a human being issue from a fissure in the ground. A
shout recalled the search parties and announced their doom to the
buried caitiffs. In the cave below, sixteen were found
crouching among human bones and singular and horrid
curiosities. One was a head of golden hair, supposed to be
a relic of the captain’s wife; another was half of the body
of a European child, sun-dried and stuck upon a stick, doubtless
with some design of wizardry.</p>
<p>The Paumotuan is eager to be rich. He saves, grudges,
buries money, fears not work. For a dollar each, two
natives passed the hours of daylight cleaning our ship’s
copper. It was strange to see them so indefatigable and so
much at ease in the water—working at times with their pipes
lighted, the smoker at times submerged and only the glowing bowl
above the surface; it was stranger still to think they were next
congeners to the incapable Marquesan. But the Paumotuan not
only saves, grudges, and works, he steals besides; or, to be more
precise, he swindles. He will never deny a debt, he only
flees his creditor. He is always keen for an advance; so
soon as he has fingered it he disappears. He knows your
ship; so soon as it nears one island, he is off to another.
You may think you know his name; he has already changed it.
Pursuit in that infinity of isles were fruitless. The
result can be given in a nutshell. It has been actually
proposed in a Government report to secure debts by taking a
photograph of the debtor; and the other day in Papeete credits on
the Paumotus to the amount of sixteen thousand pounds were sold
for less than forty—<i>quatre cent mille francs pour moins
de mille francs</i>. Even so, the purchase was thought
hazardous; and only the man who made it and who had special
opportunities could have dared to give so much.</p>
<p>The Paumotuan is sincerely attached to those of his own blood
and household. A touching affection sometimes unites wife
and husband. Their children, while they are alive,
completely rule them; after they are dead, their bones or their
mummies are often jealously preserved and carried from atoll to
atoll in the wanderings of the family. I was told there
were many houses in Fakarava with the mummy of a child locked in
a sea-chest; after I heard it, I would glance a little jealously
at those by my own bed; in that cupboard, also, it was possible
there was a tiny skeleton.</p>
<p>The race seems in a fair way to survive. From fifteen
islands, whose rolls I had occasion to consult, I found a
proportion of 59 births to 47 deaths for 1887. Dropping
three out of the fifteen, there remained for the other twelve the
comfortable ratio of 50 births to 32 deaths. Long habits of
hardship and activity doubtless explain the contrast with
Marquesan figures. But the Paumotuan displays, besides, a
certain concern for health and the rudiments of a sanitary
discipline. Public talk with these free-spoken people plays
the part of the Contagious Diseases Act; in-comers to fresh
islands anxiously inquire if all be well; and syphilis, when
contracted, is successfully treated with indigenous herbs.
Like their neighbours of Tahiti, from whom they have perhaps
imbibed the error, they regard leprosy with comparative
indifference, elephantiasis with disproportionate fear.
But, unlike indeed to the Tahitian, their alarm puts on the guise
of self-defence. Any one stricken with this painful and
ugly malady is confined to the ends of villages, denied the use
of paths and highways, and condemned to transport himself between
his house and coco-patch by water only, his very footprint being
held infectious. Fe’efe’e, being a creature of
marshes and the sequel of malarial fever, is not original in
atolls. On the single isle of Makatea, where the lagoon is
now a marsh, the disease has made a home. Many suffer; they
are excluded (if Mr. Wilmot be right) from much of the comfort of
society; and it is believed they take a secret vengeance.
The defections of the sick are considered highly poisonous.
Early in the morning, it is narrated, aged and malicious persons
creep into the sleeping village, and stealthily make water at the
doors of the houses of young men. Thus they propagate
disease; thus they breathe on and obliterate comeliness and
health, the objects of their envy. Whether horrid fact or
more abominable legend, it equally depicts that something bitter
and energetic which distinguishes Paumotuan man.</p>
<p>The archipelago is divided between two main religions,
Catholic and Mormon. They front each other proudly with a
false air of permanence; yet are but shapes, their membership in
a perpetual flux. The Mormon attends mass with devotion:
the Catholic sits attentive at a Mormon sermon, and to-morrow
each may have transferred allegiance. One man had been a
pillar of the Church of Rome for fifteen years; his wife dying,
he decided that must be a poor religion that could not save a man
his wife, and turned Mormon. According to one informant,
Catholicism was the more fashionable in health, but on the
approach of sickness it was judged prudent to secede. As a
Mormon, there were five chances out of six you might recover; as
a Catholic, your hopes were small; and this opinion is perhaps
founded on the comfortable rite of unction.</p>
<p>We all know what Catholics are, whether in the Paumotus or at
home. But the Paumotuan Mormon seemed a phenomenon
apart. He marries but the one wife, uses the Protestant
Bible, observes Protestant forms of worship, forbids the use of
liquor and tobacco, practises adult baptism by immersion, and
after every public sin, rechristens the backslider. I
advised with Mahinui, whom I found well informed in the history
of the American Mormons, and he declared against the least
connection. ‘<i>Pour moi</i>,’ said he, with a
fine charity, ‘<i>les Mormons ici un petit
Catholiques</i>.’ Some months later I had an
opportunity to consult an orthodox fellow-countryman, an old
dissenting Highlander, long settled in Tahiti, but still
breathing of the heather of Tiree. ‘Why do they call
themselves Mormons?’ I asked. ‘My dear, and
that is my question!’ he exclaimed. ‘For by all
that I can hear of their doctrine, I have nothing to say against
it, and their life, it is above reproach.’ And for
all that, Mormons they are, but of the earlier sowing: the
so-called Josephites, the followers of Joseph Smith, the
opponents of Brigham Young.</p>
<p>Grant, then, the Mormons to be Mormons. Fresh points at
once arise: What are the Israelites? and what the Kanitus?
For a long while back the sect had been divided into Mormons
proper and so-called Israelites, I never could hear why. A
few years since there came a visiting missionary of the name of
Williams, who made an excellent collection, and retired, leaving
fresh disruption imminent. Something irregular (as I was
told) in his way of ‘opening the service’ had raised
partisans and enemies; the church was once more rent asunder; and
a new sect, the Kanitu, issued from the division. Since
then Kanitus and Israelites, like the Cameronians and the United
Presbyterians, have made common cause; and the ecclesiastical
history of the Paumotus is, for the moment, uneventful.
There will be more doing before long, and these isles bid fair to
be the Scotland of the South. Two things I could never
learn. The nature of the innovations of the Rev. Mr.
Williams none would tell me, and of the meaning of the name
Kanitu none had a guess. It was not Tahitian, it was not
Marquesan; it formed no part of that ancient speech of the
Paumotus, now passing swiftly into obsolescence. One man, a
priest, God bless him! said it was the Latin for a little
dog. I have found it since as the name of a god in New
Guinea; it must be a bolder man than I who should hint at a
connection. Here, then, is a singular thing: a brand-new
sect, arising by popular acclamation, and a nonsense word
invented for its name.</p>
<p>The design of mystery seems obvious, and according to a very
intelligent observer, Mr. Magee of Mangareva, this element of the
mysterious is a chief attraction of the Mormon Church. It
enjoys some of the status of Freemasonry at home, and there is
for the convert some of the exhilaration of adventure.
Other attractions are certainly conjoined. Perpetual
rebaptism, leading to a succession of baptismal feasts, is found,
both from the social and the spiritual side, a pleasing
feature. More important is the fact that all the faithful
enjoy office; perhaps more important still, the strictness of the
discipline. ‘The veto on liquor,’ said Mr.
Magee, ‘brings them plenty members.’ There is
no doubt these islanders are fond of drink, and no doubt they
refrain from the indulgence; a bout on a feast-day, for instance,
may be followed by a week or a month of rigorous sobriety.
Mr. Wilmot attributes this to Paumotuan frugality and the love of
hoarding; it goes far deeper. I have mentioned that I made
a feast on board the <i>Casco</i>. To wash down
ship’s bread and jam, each guest was given the choice of
rum or syrup, and out of the whole number only one man
voted—in a defiant tone, and amid shouts of mirth—for
‘Trum’! This was in public. I had the
meanness to repeat the experiment, whenever I had a chance,
within the four walls of my house; and three at least, who had
refused at the festival, greedily drank rum behind a door.
But there were others thoroughly consistent. I said the
virtues of the race were bourgeois and puritan; and how bourgeois
is this! how puritanic! how Scottish! and how Yankee!—the
temptation, the resistance, the public hypocritical conformity,
the Pharisees, the Holy Willies, and the true disciples.
With such a people the popularity of an ascetic Church appears
legitimate; in these strict rules, in this perpetual supervision,
the weak find their advantage, the strong a certain pleasure; and
the doctrine of rebaptism, a clean bill and a fresh start, will
comfort many staggering professors.</p>
<p>There is yet another sect, or what is called a sect—no
doubt improperly—that of the Whistlers. Duncan
Cameron, so clear in favour of the Mormons, was no less loud in
condemnation of the Whistlers. Yet I do not know; I still
fancy there is some connection, perhaps fortuitous, probably
disavowed. Here at least are some doings in the house of an
Israelite clergyman (or prophet) in the island of Anaa, of which
I am equally sure that Duncan would disclaim and the Whistlers
hail them for an imitation of their own. My informant, a
Tahitian and a Catholic, occupied one part of the house; the
prophet and his family lived in the other. Night after
night the Mormons, in the one end, held their evening sacrifice
of song; night after night, in the other, the wife of the
Tahitian lay awake and listened to their singing with
amazement. At length she could contain herself no longer,
woke her husband, and asked him what he heard. ‘I
hear several persons singing hymns,’ said he.
‘Yes,’ she returned, ‘but listen again!
Do you not hear something supernatural?’ His
attention thus directed, he was aware of a strange buzzing
voice—and yet he declared it was beautiful—which
justly accompanied the singers. The next day he made
inquiries. ‘It is a spirit,’ said the prophet,
with entire simplicity, ‘which has lately made a practice
of joining us at family worship.’ It did not appear
the thing was visible, and like other spirits raised nearer home
in these degenerate days, it was rudely ignorant, at first could
only buzz, and had only learned of late to bear a part correctly
in the music.</p>
<p>The performances of the Whistlers are more
business-like. Their meetings are held publicly with open
doors, all being ‘cordially invited to attend.’
The faithful sit about the room—according to one informant,
singing hymns; according to another, now singing and now
whistling; the leader, the wizard—let me rather say, the
medium—sits in the midst, enveloped in a sheet and silent;
and presently, from just above his head, or sometimes from the
midst of the roof, an aerial whistling proceeds, appalling to the
inexperienced. This, it appears, is the language of the
dead; its purport is taken down progressively by one of the
experts, writing, I was told, ‘as fast as a telegraph
operator’; and the communications are at last made
public. They are of the baldest triviality; a schooner is,
perhaps, announced, some idle gossip reported of a neighbour, or
if the spirit shall have been called to consultation on a case of
sickness, a remedy may be suggested. One of these,
immersion in scalding water, not long ago proved fatal to the
patient. The whole business is very dreary, very silly, and
very European; it has none of the picturesque qualities of
similar conjurations in New Zealand; it seems to possess no
kernel of possible sense, like some that I shall describe among
the Gilbert islanders. Yet I was told that many hardy,
intelligent natives were inveterate Whistlers. ‘Like
Mahinui?’ I asked, willing to have a standard; and I was
told ‘Yes.’ Why should I wonder? Men more
enlightened than my convict-catechist sit down at home to follies
equally sterile and dull.</p>
<p>The medium is sometimes female. It was a woman, for
instance, who introduced these practices on the north coast of
Taiarapu, to the scandal of her own connections, her
brother-in-law in particular declaring she was drunk. But
what shocked Tahiti might seem fit enough in the Paumotus, the
more so as certain women there possess, by the gift of nature,
singular and useful powers. They say they are honest,
well-intentioned ladies, some of them embarrassed by their weird
inheritance. And indeed the trouble caused by this
endowment is so great, and the protection afforded so
infinitesimally small, that I hesitate whether to call it a gift
or a hereditary curse. You may rob this lady’s
coco-patch, steal her canoes, burn down her house, and slay her
family scatheless; but one thing you must not do: you must not
lay a hand upon her sleeping-mat, or your belly will swell, and
you can only be cured by the lady or her husband. Here is
the report of an eye-witness, Tasmanian born, educated, a man who
has made money—certainly no fool. In 1886 he was
present in a house on Makatea, where two lads began to skylark on
the mats, and were (I think) ejected. Instantly after,
their bellies began to swell; pains took hold on them; all manner
of island remedies were exhibited in vain, and rubbing only
magnified their sufferings. The man of the house was
called, explained the nature of the visitation, and prepared the
cure. A cocoa-nut was husked, filled with herbs, and with
all the ceremonies of a launch, and the utterance of spells in
the Paumotuan language, committed to the sea. From that
moment the pains began to grow more easy and the swelling to
subside. The reader may stare. I can assure him, if
he moved much among old residents of the archipelago, he would be
driven to admit one thing of two—either that there is
something in the swollen bellies or nothing in the evidence of
man.</p>
<p>I have not met these gifted ladies; but I had an experience of
my own, for I have played, for one night only, the part of the
whistling spirit. It had been blowing wearily all day, but
with the fall of night the wind abated, and the moon, which was
then full, rolled in a clear sky. We went southward down
the island on the side of the lagoon, walking through long-drawn
forest aisles of palm, and on a floor of snowy sand. No
life was abroad, nor sound of life; till in a clear part of the
isle we spied the embers of a fire, and not far off, in a dark
house, heard natives talking softly. To sit without a
light, even in company, and under cover, is for a Paumotuan a
somewhat hazardous extreme. The whole scene—the
strong moonlight and crude shadows on the sand, the scattered
coals, the sound of the low voices from the house, and the lap of
the lagoon along the beach—put me (I know not how) on
thoughts of superstition. I was barefoot, I observed my
steps were noiseless, and drawing near to the dark house, but
keeping well in shadow, began to whistle. ‘The
Heaving of the Lead’ was my air—no very tragic
piece. With the first note the conversation and all
movement ceased; silence accompanied me while I continued; and
when I passed that way on my return I found the lamp was lighted
in the house, but the tongues were still mute. All night,
as I now think, the wretches shivered and were silent. For
indeed, I had no guess at the time at the nature and magnitude of
the terrors I inflicted, or with what grisly images the notes of
that old song had peopled the dark house.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER V—A PAUMOTUAN FUNERAL</h3>
<p>No, I had no guess of these men’s terrors. Yet I
had received ere that a hint, if I had understood; and the
occasion was a funeral.</p>
<p>A little apart in the main avenue of Rotoava, in a low hut of
leaves that opened on a small enclosure, like a pigsty on a pen,
an old man dwelt solitary with his aged wife. Perhaps they
were too old to migrate with the others; perhaps they were too
poor, and had no possessions to dispute. At least they had
remained behind; and it thus befell that they were invited to my
feast. I dare say it was quite a piece of politics in the
pigsty whether to come or not to come, and the husband long
swithered between curiosity and age, till curiosity conquered,
and they came, and in the midst of that last merrymaking death
tapped him on the shoulder. For some days, when the sky was
bright and the wind cool, his mat would be spread in the main
highway of the village, and he was to be seen lying there inert,
a mere handful of a man, his wife inertly seated by his
head. They seemed to have outgrown alike our needs and
faculties; they neither spoke nor listened; they suffered us to
pass without a glance; the wife did not fan, she seemed not to
attend upon her husband, and the two poor antiques sat juxtaposed
under the high canopy of palms, the human tragedy reduced to its
bare elements, a sight beyond pathos, stirring a thrill of
curiosity. And yet there was one touch of the pathetic
haunted me: that so much youth and expectation should have run in
these starved veins, and the man should have squandered all his
lees of life on a pleasure party.</p>
<p>On the morning of 17th September the sufferer died, and, time
pressing, he was buried the same day at four. The cemetery
lies to seaward behind Government House; broken coral, like so
much road-metal, forms the surface; a few wooden crosses, a few
inconsiderable upright stones, designate graves; a mortared wall,
high enough to lean on, rings it about; a clustering shrub
surrounds it with pale leaves. Here was the grave dug that
morning, doubtless by uneasy diggers, to the sound of the nigh
sea and the cries of sea-birds; meanwhile the dead man waited in
his house, and the widow and another aged woman leaned on the
fence before the door, no speech upon their lips, no speculation
in their eyes.</p>
<p>Sharp at the hour the procession was in march, the coffin
wrapped in white and carried by four bearers; mourners
behind—not many, for not many remained in Rotoava, and not
many in black, for these were poor; the men in straw hats, white
coats, and blue trousers or the gorgeous parti-coloured pariu,
the Tahitian kilt; the women, with a few exceptions, brightly
habited. Far in the rear came the widow, painfully carrying
the dead man’s mat; a creature aged beyond humanity, to the
likeness of some missing link.</p>
<p>The dead man had been a Mormon; but the Mormon clergyman was
gone with the rest to wrangle over boundaries in the adjacent
isle, and a layman took his office. Standing at the head of
the open grave, in a white coat and blue pariu, his Tahitian
Bible in his hand and one eye bound with a red handkerchief, he
read solemnly that chapter in Job which has been read and heard
over the bones of so many of our fathers, and with a good voice
offered up two prayers. The wind and the surf bore a
burthen. By the cemetery gate a mother in crimson suckled
an infant rolled in blue. In the midst the widow sat upon
the ground and polished one of the coffin-stretchers with a piece
of coral; a little later she had turned her back to the grave and
was playing with a leaf. Did she understand? God
knows. The officiant paused a moment, stooped, and gathered
and threw reverently on the coffin a handful of rattling
coral. Dust to dust: but the grains of this dust were gross
like cherries, and the true dust that was to follow sat near by,
still cohering (as by a miracle) in the tragic semblance of a
female ape.</p>
<p>So far, Mormon or not, it was a Christian funeral. The
well-known passage had been read from Job, the prayers had been
rehearsed, the grave was filled, the mourners straggled
homeward. With a little coarser grain of covering earth, a
little nearer outcry of the sea, a stronger glare of sunlight on
the rude enclosure, and some incongruous colours of attire, the
well-remembered form had been observed.</p>
<p>By rights it should have been otherwise. The mat should
have been buried with its owner; but, the family being poor, it
was thriftily reserved for a fresh service. The widow
should have flung herself upon the grave and raised the voice of
official grief, the neighbours have chimed in, and the narrow
isle rung for a space with lamentation. But the widow was
old; perhaps she had forgotten, perhaps never understood, and she
played like a child with leaves and coffin-stretchers. In
all ways my guest was buried with maimed rites. Strange to
think that his last conscious pleasure was the <i>Casco</i> and
my feast; strange to think that he had limped there, an old
child, looking for some new good. And the good thing, rest,
had been allotted him.</p>
<p>But though the widow had neglected much, there was one part
she must not utterly neglect. She came away with the
dispersing funeral; but the dead man’s mat was left behind
upon the grave, and I learned that by set of sun she must return
to sleep there. This vigil is imperative. From
sundown till the rising of the morning star the Paumotuan must
hold his watch above the ashes of his kindred. Many
friends, if the dead have been a man of mark, will keep the
watchers company; they will be well supplied with coverings
against the weather; I believe they bring food, and the rite is
persevered in for two weeks. Our poor survivor, if, indeed,
she properly survived, had little to cover, and few to sit with
her; on the night of the funeral a strong squall chased her from
her place of watch; for days the weather held uncertain and
outrageous; and ere seven nights were up she had desisted, and
returned to sleep in her low roof. That she should be at
the pains of returning for so short a visit to a solitary house,
that this borderer of the grave should fear a little wind and a
wet blanket, filled me at the time with musings. I could
not say she was indifferent; she was so far beyond me in
experience that the court of my criticism waived jurisdiction;
but I forged excuses, telling myself she had perhaps little to
lament, perhaps suffered much, perhaps understood nothing.
And lo! in the whole affair there was no question whether of
tenderness or piety, and the sturdy return of this old remnant
was a mark either of uncommon sense or of uncommon fortitude.</p>
<p>Yet one thing had occurred that partly set me on the
trail. I have said the funeral passed much as at
home. But when all was over, when we were trooping in
decent silence from the graveyard gate and down the path to the
settlement, a sudden inbreak of a different spirit startled and
perhaps dismayed us. Two people walked not far apart in our
procession: my friend Mr. Donat—Donat-Rimarau: ‘Donat
the much-handed’—acting Vice-Resident, present ruler
of the archipelago, by far the man of chief importance on the
scene, but known besides for one of an unshakable good temper;
and a certain comely, strapping young Paumotuan woman, the
comeliest on the isle, not (let us hope) the bravest or the most
polite. Of a sudden, ere yet the grave silence of the
funeral was broken, she made a leap at the Resident, with pointed
finger, shrieked a few words, and fell back again with a
laughter, not a natural mirth. ‘What did she say to
you?’ I asked. ‘She did not speak to
<i>me</i>,’ said Donat, a shade perturbed; ‘she spoke
to the ghost of the dead man.’ And the purport of her
speech was this: ‘See there! Donat will be a fine
feast for you to-night.’</p>
<p>‘M. Donat called it a jest,’ I wrote at the time
in my diary. ‘It seemed to me more in the nature of a
terrified conjuration, as though she would divert the
ghost’s attention from herself. A cannibal race may
well have cannibal phantoms.’ The guesses of the
traveller appear foredoomed to be erroneous; yet in these I was
precisely right. The woman had stood by in terror at the
funeral, being then in a dread spot, the graveyard. She
looked on in terror to the coming night, with that ogre, a new
spirit, loosed upon the isle. And the words she had cried
in Donat’s face were indeed a terrified conjuration, basely
to shield herself, basely to dedicate another in her stead.
One thing is to be said in her excuse. Doubtless she partly
chose Donat because he was a man of great good-nature, but
partly, too, because he was a man of the half-caste. For I
believe all natives regard white blood as a kind of talisman
against the powers of hell. In no other way can they
explain the unpunished recklessness of Europeans.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER VI—GRAVEYARD STORIES</h3>
<p>With my superstitious friend, the islander, I fear I am not
wholly frank, often leading the way with stories of my own, and
being always a grave and sometimes an excited hearer. But
the deceit is scarce mortal, since I am as pleased to hear as he
to tell, as pleased with the story as he with the belief; and,
besides, it is entirely needful. For it is scarce possible
to exaggerate the extent and empire of his superstitions; they
mould his life, they colour his thinking; and when he does not
speak to me of ghosts, and gods, and devils, he is playing the
dissembler and talking only with his lips. With thoughts so
different, one must indulge the other; and I would rather that I
should indulge his superstition than he my incredulity. Of
one thing, besides, I may be sure: Let me indulge it as I please,
I shall not hear the whole; for he is already on his guard with
me, and the amount of the lore is boundless.</p>
<p>I will give but a few instances at random, chiefly from my own
doorstep in Upolu, during the past month (October 1890).
One of my workmen was sent the other day to the banana patch,
there to dig; this is a hollow of the mountain, buried in woods,
out of all sight and cry of mankind; and long before dusk Lafaele
was back again beside the cook-house with embarrassed looks; he
dared not longer stay alone, he was afraid of ‘spirits in
the bush.’ It seems these are the souls of the
unburied dead, haunting where they fell, and wearing woodland
shapes of pig, or bird, or insect; the bush is full of them, they
seem to eat nothing, slay solitary wanderers apparently in spite,
and at times, in human form, go down to villages and consort with
the inhabitants undetected. So much I learned a day or so
after, walking in the bush with a very intelligent youth, a
native. It was a little before noon; a grey day and
squally; and perhaps I had spoken lightly. A dark squall
burst on the side of the mountain; the woods shook and cried; the
dead leaves rose from the ground in clouds, like butterflies; and
my companion came suddenly to a full stop. He was afraid,
he said, of the trees falling; but as soon as I had changed the
subject of our talk he proceeded with alacrity. A day or
two before a messenger came up the mountain from Apia with a
letter; I was in the bush, he must await my return, then wait
till I had answered: and before I was done his voice sounded
shrill with terror of the coming night and the long forest
road. These are the commons. Take the chiefs.
There has been a great coming and going of signs and omens in our
group. One river ran down blood; red eels were captured in
another; an unknown fish was thrown upon the coast, an ominous
word found written on its scales. So far we might be
reading in a monkish chronicle; now we come on a fresh note, at
once modern and Polynesian. The gods of Upolu and Savaii,
our two chief islands, contended recently at cricket. Since
then they are at war. Sounds of battle are heard to roll
along the coast. A woman saw a man swim from the high seas
and plunge direct into the bush; he was no man of that
neighbourhood; and it was known he was one of the gods, speeding
to a council. Most perspicuous of all, a missionary on
Savaii, who is also a medical man, was disturbed late in the
night by knocking; it was no hour for the dispensary, but at
length he woke his servant and sent him to inquire; the servant,
looking from a window, beheld crowds of persons, all with
grievous wounds, lopped limbs, broken heads, and bleeding
bullet-holes; but when the door was opened all had
disappeared. They were gods from the field of battle.
Now these reports have certainly significance; it is not hard to
trace them to political grumblers or to read in them a threat of
coming trouble; from that merely human side I found them ominous
myself. But it was the spiritual side of their significance
that was discussed in secret council by my rulers. I shall
best depict this mingled habit of the Polynesian mind by two
connected instances. I once lived in a village, the name of
which I do not mean to tell. The chief and his sister were
persons perfectly intelligent: gentlefolk, apt of speech.
The sister was very religious, a great church-goer, one that used
to reprove me if I stayed away; I found afterwards that she
privately worshipped a shark. The chief himself was
somewhat of a freethinker; at the least, a latitudinarian: he was
a man, besides, filled with European knowledge and
accomplishments; of an impassive, ironical habit; and I should as
soon have expected superstition in Mr. Herbert Spencer.
Hear the sequel. I had discovered by unmistakable signs
that they buried too shallow in the village graveyard, and I took
my friend, as the responsible authority, to task.
‘There is something wrong about your graveyard,’ said
I, ‘which you must attend to, or it may have very bad
results.’ ‘Something wrong? What is
it?’ he asked, with an emotion that surprised me.
‘If you care to go along there any evening about nine
o’clock you can see for yourself,’ said I. He
stepped backward. ‘A ghost!’ he cried.</p>
<p>In short, in the whole field of the South Seas, there is not
one to blame another. Half blood and whole, pious and
debauched, intelligent and dull, all men believe in ghosts, all
men combine with their recent Christianity fear of and a
lingering faith in the old island deities. So, in Europe,
the gods of Olympus slowly dwindled into village bogies; so
to-day, the theological Highlander sneaks from under the eye of
the Free Church divine to lay an offering by a sacred well.</p>
<p>I try to deal with the whole matter here because of a
particular quality in Paumotuan superstitions. It is true I
heard them told by a man with a genius for such narrations.
Close about our evening lamp, within sound of the island surf, we
hung on his words, thrilling. The reader, in far other
scenes, must listen close for the faint echo.</p>
<p>This bundle of weird stories sprang from the burial and the
woman’s selfish conjuration. I was dissatisfied with
what I heard, harped upon questions, and struck at last this vein
of metal. It is from sundown to about four in the morning
that the kinsfolk camp upon the grave; and these are the hours of
the spirits’ wanderings. At any time of the
night—it may be earlier, it may be later—a sound is
to be heard below, which is the noise of his liberation; at four
sharp, another and a louder marks the instant of the
re-imprisonment; between-whiles, he goes his malignant
rounds. ‘Did you ever see an evil spirit?’ was
once asked of a Paumotuan. ‘Once.’
‘Under what form?’ ‘It was in the form of
a crane.’ ‘And how did you know that crane to
be a spirit?’ was asked. ‘I will tell
you,’ he answered; and this was the purport of his
inconclusive narrative. His father had been dead nearly a
fortnight; others had wearied of the watch; and as the sun was
setting, he found himself by the grave alone. It was not
yet dark, rather the hour of the afterglow, when he was aware of
a snow-white crane upon the coral mound; presently more cranes
came, some white, some black; then the cranes vanished, and he
saw in their place a white cat, to which there was silently
joined a great company of cats of every hue conceivable; then
these also disappeared, and he was left astonished.</p>
<p>This was an anodyne appearance. Take instead the
experience of Rua-a-mariterangi on the isle of Katiu. He
had a need for some pandanus, and crossed the isle to the
sea-beach, where it chiefly flourishes. The day was still,
and Rua was surprised to hear a crashing sound among the
thickets, and then the fall of a considerable tree. Here
must be some one building a canoe; and he entered the margin of
the wood to find and pass the time of day with this chance
neighbour. The crashing sounded more at hand; and then he
was aware of something drawing swiftly near among the
tree-tops. It swung by its heels downward, like an ape, so
that its hands were free for murder; it depended safely by the
slightest twigs; the speed of its coming was incredible; and soon
Rua recognised it for a corpse, horrible with age, its bowels
hanging as it came. Prayer was the weapon of Christian in
the Valley of the Shadow, and it is to prayer that
Rua-a-mariterangi attributes his escape. No merely human
expedition had availed.</p>
<p>This demon was plainly from the grave; yet you will observe he
was abroad by day. And inconsistent as it may seem with the
hours of the night watch and the many references to the rising of
the morning star, it is no singular exception. I could
never find a case of another who had seen this ghost, diurnal and
arboreal in its habits; but others have heard the fall of the
tree, which seems the signal of its coming. Mr. Donat was
once pearling on the uninhabited isle of Haraiki. It was a
day without a breath of wind, such as alternate in the
archipelago with days of contumelious breezes. The divers
were in the midst of the lagoon upon their employment; the cook,
a boy of ten, was over his pots in the camp. Thus were all
souls accounted for except a single native who accompanied Donat
into the wood in quest of sea-fowls’ eggs. In a
moment, out of the stillness, came the sound of the fall of a
great tree. Donat would have passed on to find the
cause. ‘No,’ cried his companion, ‘that
was no tree. It was something <i>not right</i>. Let
us go back to camp.’ Next Sunday the divers were
turned on, all that part of the isle was thoroughly examined, and
sure enough no tree had fallen. A little later Mr. Donat
saw one of his divers flee from a similar sound, in similar
unaffected panic, on the same isle. But neither would
explain, and it was not till afterwards, when he met with Rua,
that he learned the occasion of their terrors.</p>
<p>But whether by day or night, the purpose of the dead in these
abhorred activities is still the same. In Samoa, my
informant had no idea of the food of the bush spirits; no such
ambiguity would exist in the mind of a Paumotuan. In that
hungry archipelago, living and dead must alike toil for
nutriment; and the race having been cannibal in the past, the
spirits are so still. When the living ate the dead,
horrified nocturnal imagination drew the shocking inference that
the dead might eat the living. Doubtless they slay men,
doubtless even mutilate them, in mere malice. Marquesan
spirits sometimes tear out the eyes of travellers; but even that
may be more practical than appears, for the eye is a cannibal
dainty. And certainly the root-idea of the dead, at least
in the far eastern islands, is to prowl for food. It was as
a dainty morsel for a meal that the woman denounced Donat at the
funeral. There are spirits besides who prey in particular
not on the bodies but on the souls of the dead. The point
is clearly made in a Tahitian story. A child fell sick,
grew swiftly worse, and at last showed signs of death. The
mother hastened to the house of a sorcerer, who lived hard
by. ‘You are yet in time,’ said he; ‘a
spirit has just run past my door carrying the soul of your child
wrapped in the leaf of a purao; but I have a spirit stronger and
swifter who will run him down ere he has time to eat
it.’ Wrapped in a leaf: like other things edible and
corruptible.</p>
<p>Or take an experience of Mr. Donat’s on the island of
Anaa. It was a night of a high wind, with violent squalls;
his child was very sick, and the father, though he had gone to
bed, lay wakeful, hearkening to the gale. All at once a
fowl was violently dashed on the house wall. Supposing he
had forgot to put it in shelter with the rest, Donat arose, found
the bird (a cock) lying on the verandah, and put it in the
hen-house, the door of which he securely fastened. Fifteen
minutes later the business was repeated, only this time, as it
was being dashed against the wall, the bird crew. Again
Donat replaced it, examining the hen-house thoroughly and finding
it quite perfect; as he was so engaged the wind puffed out his
light, and he must grope back to the door a good deal
shaken. Yet a third time the bird was dashed upon the wall;
a third time Donat set it, now near dead, beside its mates; and
he was scarce returned before there came a rush, like that of a
furious strong man, against the door, and a whistle as loud as
that of a railway engine rang about the house. The
sceptical reader may here detect the finger of the tempest; but
the women gave up all for lost and clustered on the beds
lamenting. Nothing followed, and I must suppose the gale
somewhat abated, for presently after a chief came visiting.
He was a bold man to be abroad so late, but doubtless carried a
bright lantern. And he was certainly a man of counsel, for
as soon as he heard the details of these disturbances he was in a
position to explain their nature. ‘Your child,’
said he, ‘must certainly die. This is the evil spirit
of our island who lies in wait to eat the spirits of the newly
dead.’ And then he went on to expatiate on the
strangeness of the spirit’s conduct. He was not
usually, he explained, so open of assault, but sat silent on the
house-top waiting, in the guise of a bird, while within the
people tended the dying and bewailed the dead, and had no thought
of peril. But when the day came and the doors were opened,
and men began to go abroad, blood-stains on the wall betrayed the
tragedy.</p>
<p>This is the quality I admire in Paumotuan legend. In
Tahiti the spirit-eater is said to assume a vesture which has
much more of pomp, but how much less of horror. It has been
seen by all sorts and conditions, native and foreign; only the
last insist it is a meteor. My authority was not so
sure. He was riding with his wife about two in the morning;
both were near asleep, and the horses not much better. It
was a brilliant and still night, and the road wound over a
mountain, near by a deserted marae (old Tahitian temple).
All at once the appearance passed above them: a form of light;
the head round and greenish; the body long, red, and with a focus
of yet redder brilliancy about the midst. A buzzing hoot
accompanied its passage; it flew direct out of one marae, and
direct for another down the mountain side. And this, as my
informant argued, is suggestive. For why should a mere
meteor frequent the altars of abominable gods? The horses,
I should say, were equally dismayed with their riders. Now
I am not dismayed at all—not even agreeably. Give me
rather the bird upon the house-top and the morning blood-gouts on
the wall.</p>
<p>But the dead are not exclusive in their diet. They carry
with them to the grave, in particular, the Polynesian taste for
fish, and enter at times with the living into a partnership in
fishery. Rua-a-mariterangi is again my authority; I feel it
diminishes the credit of the fact, but how it builds up the image
of this inveterate ghost-seer! He belongs to the miserably
poor island of Taenga, yet his father’s house was always
well supplied. As Rua grew up he was called at last to go
a-fishing with this fortunate parent. They rowed the lagoon
at dusk, to an unlikely place, and the lay down in the stern, and
the father began vainly to cast his line over the bows. It
is to be supposed that Rua slept; and when he awoke there was the
figure of another beside his father, and his father was pulling
in the fish hand over hand. ‘Who is that man,
father?’ Rua asked. ‘It is none of your
business,’ said the father; and Rua supposed the stranger
had swum off to them from shore. Night after night they
fared into the lagoon, often to the most unlikely places; night
after night the stranger would suddenly be seen on board, and as
suddenly be missed; and morning after morning the canoe returned
laden with fish. ‘My father is a very lucky
man,’ thought Rua. At last, one fine day, there came
first one boat party and then another, who must be entertained;
father and son put off later than usual into the lagoon; and
before the canoe was landed it was four o’clock, and the
morning star was close on the horizon. Then the stranger
appeared seized with some distress; turned about, showing for the
first time his face, which was that of one long dead, with
shining eyes; stared into the east, set the tips of his fingers
to his mouth like one a-cold, uttered a strange, shuddering sound
between a whistle and a moan—a thing to freeze the blood;
and, the day-star just rising from the sea, he suddenly was
not. Then Rua understood why his father prospered, why his
fishes rotted early in the day, and why some were always carried
to the cemetery and laid upon the graves. My informant is a
man not certainly averse to superstition, but he keeps his head,
and takes a certain superior interest, which I may be allowed to
call scientific. The last point reminding him of some
parallel practice in Tahiti, he asked Rua if the fish were left,
or carried home again after a formal dedication. It appears
old Mariterangi practised both methods; sometimes treating his
shadowy partner to a mere oblation, sometimes honestly leaving
his fish to rot upon the grave.</p>
<p>It is plain we have in Europe stories of a similar complexion;
and the Polynesian <i>varua ino</i> or <i>aitu o le vao</i> is
clearly the near kinsman of the Transylvanian vampire. Here
is a tale in which the kinship appears broadly marked. On
the atoll of Penrhyn, then still partly savage, a certain chief
was long the salutary terror of the natives. He died, he
was buried; and his late neighbours had scarce tasted the
delights of licence ere his ghost appeared about the
village. Fear seized upon all; a council was held of the
chief men and sorcerers; and with the approval of the Rarotongan
missionary, who was as frightened as the rest, and in the
presence of several whites—my friend Mr. Ben Hird being
one—the grave was opened, deepened until water came, and
the body re-interred face down. The still recent staking of
suicides in England and the decapitation of vampires in the east
of Europe form close parallels.</p>
<p>So in Samoa only the spirits of the unburied awake fear.
During the late war many fell in the bush; their bodies,
sometimes headless, were brought back by native pastors and
interred; but this (I know not why) was insufficient, and the
spirit still lingered on the theatre of death. When peace
returned a singular scene was enacted in many places, and chiefly
round the high gorges of Lotoanuu, where the struggle was long
centred and the loss had been severe. Kinswomen of the dead
came carrying a mat or sheet and guided by survivors of the
fight. The place of death was earnestly sought out; the
sheet was spread upon the ground; and the women, moved with pious
anxiety, sat about and watched it. If any living thing
alighted it was twice brushed away; upon the third coming it was
known to be the spirit of the dead, was folded in, carried home
and buried beside the body; and the aitu rested. The rite
was practised beyond doubt in simple piety; the repose of the
soul was its object: its motive, reverent affection. The
present king disowns indeed all knowledge of a dangerous aitu; he
declares the souls of the unburied were only wanderers in limbo,
lacking an entrance to the proper country of the dead, unhappy,
nowise hurtful. And this severely classic opinion doubtless
represents the views of the enlightened. But the flight of
my Lafaele marks the grosser terrors of the ignorant.</p>
<p>This belief in the exorcising efficacy of funeral rites
perhaps explains a fact, otherwise amazing, that no Polynesian
seems at all to share our European horror of human bones and
mummies. Of the first they made their cherished ornaments;
they preserved them in houses or in mortuary caves; and the
watchers of royal sepulchres dwelt with their children among the
bones of generations. The mummy, even in the making, was as
little feared. In the Marquesas, on the extreme coast, it
was made by the household with continual unction and exposure to
the sun; in the Carolines, upon the farthest west, it is still
cured in the smoke of the family hearth. Head-hunting,
besides, still lives around my doorstep in Samoa. And not
ten years ago, in the Gilberts, the widow must disinter, cleanse,
polish, and thenceforth carry about her, by day and night, the
head of her dead husband. In all these cases we may suppose
the process, whether of cleansing or drying, to have fully
exorcised the aitu.</p>
<p>But the Paumotuan belief is more obscure. Here the man
is duly buried, and he has to be watched. He is duly
watched, and the spirit goes abroad in spite of watches.
Indeed, it is not the purpose of the vigils to prevent these
wanderings; only to mollify by polite attention the inveterate
malignity of the dead. Neglect (it is supposed) may
irritate and thus invite his visits, and the aged and weakly
sometimes balance risks and stay at home. Observe, it is
the dead man’s kindred and next friends who thus deprecate
his fury with nocturnal watchings. Even the placatory vigil
is held perilous, except in company, and a boy was pointed out to
me in Rotoava, because he had watched alone by his own
father. Not the ties of the dead, nor yet their proved
character, affect the issue. A late Resident, who died in
Fakarava of sunstroke, was beloved in life and is still
remembered with affection; none the less his spirit went about
the island clothed with terrors, and the neighbourhood of
Government House was still avoided after dark. We may sum
up the cheerful doctrine thus: All men become vampires, and the
vampire spares none. And here we come face to face with a
tempting inconsistency. For the whistling spirits are
notoriously clannish; I understood them to wait upon and to
enlighten kinsfolk only, and that the medium was always of the
race of the communicating spirit. Here, then, we have the
bonds of the family, on the one hand, severed at the hour of
death; on the other, helpfully persisting.</p>
<p>The child’s soul in the Tahitian tale was wrapped in
leaves. It is the spirits of the newly dead that are the
dainty. When they are slain, the house is stained with
blood. Rua’s dead fisherman was decomposed;
so—and horribly—was his arboreal demon. The
spirit, then, is a thing material; and it is by the material
ensigns of corruption that he is distinguished from the living
man. This opinion is widespread, adds a gross terror to the
more ugly Polynesian tales, and sometimes defaces the more
engaging with a painful and incongruous touch. I will give
two examples sufficiently wide apart, one from Tahiti, one from
Samoa.</p>
<p>And first from Tahiti. A man went to visit the husband
of his sister, then some time dead. In her life the sister
had been dainty in the island fashion, and went always adorned
with a coronet of flowers. In the midst of the night the
brother awoke and was aware of a heavenly fragrance going to and
fro in the dark house. The lamp I must suppose to have
burned out; no Tahitian would have lain down without one
lighted. A while he lay wondering and delighted; then
called upon the rest. ‘Do none of you smell
flowers?’ he asked. ‘O,’ said his
brother-in-law, ‘we are used to that here.’ The
next morning these two men went walking, and the widower
confessed that his dead wife came about the house continually,
and that he had even seen her. She was shaped and dressed
and crowned with flowers as in her lifetime; only she moved a few
inches above the earth with a very easy progress, and flitted
dryshod above the surface of the river. And now comes my
point: It was always in a back view that she appeared; and these
brothers-in-law, debating the affair, agreed that this was to
conceal the inroads of corruption.</p>
<p>Now for the Samoan story. I owe it to the kindness of
Dr. F. Otto Sierich, whose collection of folk-tales I expect with
a high degree of interest. A man in Manu’a was
married to two wives and had no issue. He went to Savaii,
married there a third, and was more fortunate. When his
wife was near her time he remembered he was in a strange island,
like a poor man; and when his child was born he must be shamed
for lack of gifts. It was in vain his wife dissuaded
him. He returned to his father in Manu’a seeking
help; and with what he could get he set off in the night to
re-embark. Now his wives heard of his coming; they were
incensed that he did not stay to visit them; and on the beach, by
his canoe, intercepted and slew him. Now the third wife lay
asleep in Savaii;—her babe was born and slept by her side;
and she was awakened by the spirit of her husband.
‘Get up,’ he said, ‘my father is sick in
Manu’a and we must go to visit him.’ ‘It
is well,’ said she; ‘take you the child, while I
carry its mats.’ ‘I cannot carry the
child,’ said the spirit; ‘I am too cold from the
sea.’ When they were got on board the canoe the wife
smelt carrion. ‘How is this?’ she said.
‘What have you in the canoe that I should smell
carrion?’ ‘It is nothing in the canoe,’
said the spirit. ‘It is the land-wind blowing down
the mountains, where some beast lies dead.’ It
appears it was still night when they reached
Manu’a—the swiftest passage on record—and as
they entered the reef the bale-fires burned in the village.
Again she asked him to carry the child; but now he need no more
dissemble. ‘I cannot carry your child,’ said
he, ‘for I am dead, and the fires you see are burning for
my funeral.’</p>
<p>The curious may learn in Dr. Sierich’s book the
unexpected sequel of the tale. Here is enough for my
purpose. Though the man was but new dead, the ghost was
already putrefied, as though putrefaction were the mark and of
the essence of a spirit. The vigil on the Paumotuan grave
does not extend beyond two weeks, and they told me this period
was thought to coincide with that of the resolution of the
body. The ghost always marked with decay—the danger
seemingly ending with the process of dissolution—here is
tempting matter for the theorist. But it will not do.
The lady of the flowers had been long dead, and her spirit was
still supposed to bear the brand of perishability. The
Resident had been more than a fortnight buried, and his vampire
was still supposed to go the rounds.</p>
<p>Of the lost state of the dead, from the lurid Mangaian legend,
in which infernal deities hocus and destroy the souls of all, to
the various submarine and aerial limbos where the dead feast,
float idle, or resume the occupations of their life on earth, it
would be wearisome to tell. One story I give, for it is
singular in itself, is well-known in Tahiti, and has this of
interest, that it is post-Christian, dating indeed from but a few
years back. A princess of the reigning house died; was
transported to the neighbouring isle of Raiatea; fell there under
the empire of a spirit who condemned her to climb coco-palms all
day and bring him the nuts; was found after some time in this
miserable servitude by a second spirit, one of her own house; and
by him, upon her lamentations, reconveyed to Tahiti, where she
found her body still waked, but already swollen with the
approaches of corruption. It is a lively point in the tale
that, on the sight of this dishonoured tabernacle, the princess
prayed she might continue to be numbered with the dead. But
it seems it was too late, her spirit was replaced by the least
dignified of entrances, and her startled family beheld the body
move. The seemingly purgatorial labours, the helpful
kindred spirit, and the horror of the princess at the sight of
her tainted body, are all points to be remarked.</p>
<p>The truth is, the tales are not necessarily consistent in
themselves; and they are further darkened for the stranger by an
ambiguity of language. Ghosts, vampires, spirits, and gods
are all confounded. And yet I seem to perceive that (with
exceptions) those whom we would count gods were less
maleficent. Permanent spirits haunt and do murder in
corners of Samoa; but those legitimate gods of Upolu and Savaii,
whose wars and cricketings of late convulsed society, I did not
gather to be dreaded, or not with a like fear. The spirit
of Aana that ate souls is certainly a fearsome inmate; but the
high gods, even of the archipelago, seem helpful.
Mahinui—from whom our convict-catechist had been
named—the spirit of the sea, like a Proteus endowed with
endless avatars, came to the assistance of the shipwrecked and
carried them ashore in the guise of a ray fish. The same
divinity bore priests from isle to isle about the archipelago,
and by his aid, within the century, persons have been seen to
fly. The tutelar deity of each isle is likewise helpful,
and by a particular form of wedge-shaped cloud on the horizon
announces the coming of a ship.</p>
<p>To one who conceives of these atolls, so narrow, so barren, so
beset with sea, here would seem a superfluity of ghostly
denizens. And yet there are more. In the various
brackish pools and ponds, beautiful women with long red hair are
seen to rise and bathe; only (timid as mice) on the first sound
of feet upon the coral they dive again for ever. They are
known to be healthy and harmless living people, dwellers of an
underworld; and the same fancy is current in Tahiti, where also
they have the hair red. <i>Tetea</i> is the Tahitian name;
the Paumotuan, <i>Mokurea</i>.</p>
<h2>PART III: THE GILBERTS</h2>
<h3>CHAPTER I—BUTARITARI</h3>
<p>At Honolulu we had said farewell to the <i>Casco</i> and to
Captain Otis, and our next adventure was made in changed
conditions. Passage was taken for myself, my wife, Mr.
Osbourne, and my China boy, Ah Fu, on a pigmy trading schooner,
the <i>Equator</i>, Captain Dennis Reid; and on a certain bright
June day in 1889, adorned in the Hawaiian fashion with the
garlands of departure, we drew out of port and bore with a fair
wind for Micronesia.</p>
<p>The whole extent of the South Seas is a desert of ships; more
especially that part where we were now to sail. No post
runs in these islands; communication is by accident; where you
may have designed to go is one thing, where you shall be able to
arrive another. It was my hope, for instance, to have
reached the Carolines, and returned to the light of day by way of
Manila and the China ports; and it was in Samoa that we were
destined to re-appear and be once more refreshed with the sight
of mountains. Since the sunset faded from the peaks of Oahu
six months had intervened, and we had seen no spot of earth so
high as an ordinary cottage. Our path had been still on the
flat sea, our dwellings upon unerected coral, our diet from the
pickle-tub or out of tins; I had learned to welcome shark’s
flesh for a variety; and a mountain, an onion, an Irish potato or
a beef-steak, had been long lost to sense and dear to
aspiration.</p>
<p>The two chief places of our stay, Butaritari and Apemama, lie
near the line; the latter within thirty miles. Both enjoy a
superb ocean climate, days of blinding sun and bracing wind,
nights of a heavenly brightness. Both are somewhat wider
than Fakarava, measuring perhaps (at the widest) a quarter of a
mile from beach to beach. In both, a coarse kind of
<i>taro</i> thrives; its culture is a chief business of the
natives, and the consequent mounds and ditches make miniature
scenery and amuse the eye. In all else they show the
customary features of an atoll: the low horizon, the expanse of
the lagoon, the sedge-like rim of palm-tops, the sameness and
smallness of the land, the hugely superior size and interest of
sea and sky. Life on such islands is in many points like
life on shipboard. The atoll, like the ship, is soon taken
for granted; and the islanders, like the ship’s crew,
become soon the centre of attention. The isles are
populous, independent, seats of kinglets, recently civilised,
little visited. In the last decade many changes have crept
in; women no longer go unclothed till marriage; the widow no
longer sleeps at night and goes abroad by day with the skull of
her dead husband; and, fire-arms being introduced, the spear and
the shark-tooth sword are sold for curiosities. Ten years
ago all these things and practices were to be seen in use; yet
ten years more, and the old society will have entirely
vanished. We came in a happy moment to see its institutions
still erect and (in Apemama) scarce decayed.</p>
<p>Populous and independent—warrens of men, ruled over with
some rustic pomp—such was the first and still the recurring
impression of these tiny lands. As we stood across the
lagoon for the town of Butaritari, a stretch of the low shore was
seen to be crowded with the brown roofs of houses; those of the
palace and king’s summer parlour (which are of corrugated
iron) glittered near one end conspicuously bright; the royal
colours flew hard by on a tall flagstaff; in front, on an
artificial islet, the gaol played the part of a martello.
Even upon this first and distant view, the place had scarce the
air of what it truly was, a village; rather of that which it was
also, a petty metropolis, a city rustic and yet royal.</p>
<p>The lagoon is shoal. The tide being out, we waded for
some quarter of a mile in tepid shallows, and stepped ashore at
last into a flagrant stagnancy of sun and heat. The lee
side of a line island after noon is indeed a breathless place; on
the ocean beach the trade will be still blowing, boisterous and
cool; out in the lagoon it will be blowing also, speeding the
canoes; but the screen of bush completely intercepts it from the
shore, and sleep and silence and companies of mosquitoes brood
upon the towns.</p>
<p>We may thus be said to have taken Butaritari by
surprise. A few inhabitants were still abroad in the north
end, at which we landed. As we advanced, we were soon done
with encounter, and seemed to explore a city of the dead.
Only, between the posts of open houses, we could see the
townsfolk stretched in the siesta, sometimes a family together
veiled in a mosquito-net, sometimes a single sleeper on a
platform like a corpse on a bier.</p>
<p>The houses were of all dimensions, from those of toys to those
of churches. Some might hold a battalion, some were so
minute they could scarce receive a pair of lovers; only in the
playroom, when the toys are mingled, do we meet such
incongruities of scale. Many were open sheds; some took the
form of roofed stages; others were walled and the walls pierced
with little windows. A few were perched on piles in the
lagoon; the rest stood at random on a green, through which the
roadway made a ribbon of sand, or along the embankments of a
sheet of water like a shallow dock. One and all were the
creatures of a single tree; palm-tree wood and palm-tree leaf
their materials; no nail had been driven, no hammer sounded, in
their building, and they were held together by lashings of
palm-tree sinnet.</p>
<p>In the midst of the thoroughfare, the church stands like an
island, a lofty and dim house with rows of windows; a rich
tracery of framing sustains the roof; and through the door at
either end the street shows in a vista. The proportions of
the place, in such surroundings, and built of such materials,
appeared august; and we threaded the nave with a sentiment
befitting visitors in a cathedral. Benches run along either
side. In the midst, on a crazy dais, two chairs stand ready
for the king and queen when they shall choose to worship; over
their heads a hoop, apparently from a hogshead, depends by a
strip of red cotton; and the hoop (which hangs askew) is dressed
with streamers of the same material, red and white.</p>
<p>This was our first advertisement of the royal dignity, and
presently we stood before its seat and centre. The palace
is built of imported wood upon a European plan; the roof of
corrugated iron, the yard enclosed with walls, the gate
surmounted by a sort of lych-house. It cannot be called
spacious; a labourer in the States is sometimes more commodiously
lodged; but when we had the chance to see it within, we found it
was enriched (beyond all island expectation) with coloured
advertisements and cuts from the illustrated papers. Even
before the gate some of the treasures of the crown stand public:
a bell of a good magnitude, two pieces of cannon, and a single
shell. The bell cannot be rung nor the guns fired; they are
curiosities, proofs of wealth, a part of the parade of the
royalty, and stand to be admired like statues in a square.
A straight gut of water like a canal runs almost to the palace
door; the containing quay-walls excellently built of coral; over
against the mouth, by what seems an effect of landscape art, the
martello-like islet of the gaol breaks the lagoon. Vassal
chiefs with tribute, neighbour monarchs come a-roving, might here
sail in, view with surprise these extensive public works, and be
awed by these mouths of silent cannon. It was impossible to
see the place and not to fancy it designed for pageantry.
But the elaborate theatre then stood empty; the royal house
deserted, its doors and windows gaping; the whole quarter of the
town immersed in silence. On the opposite bank of the
canal, on a roofed stage, an ancient gentleman slept publicly,
sole visible inhabitant; and beyond on the lagoon a canoe spread
a striped lateen, the sole thing moving.</p>
<p>The canal is formed on the south by a pier or causeway with a
parapet. At the far end the parapet stops, and the quay
expands into an oblong peninsula in the lagoon, the
breathing-place and summer parlour of the king. The midst
is occupied by an open house or permanent marquee—called
here a maniapa, or, as the word is now pronounced, a
maniap’—at the lowest estimation forty feet by
sixty. The iron roof, lofty but exceedingly low-browed, so
that a woman must stoop to enter, is supported externally on
pillars of coral, within by a frame of wood. The floor is
of broken coral, divided in aisles by the uprights of the frame;
the house far enough from shore to catch the breeze, which enters
freely and disperses the mosquitoes; and under the low eaves the
sun is seen to glitter and the waves to dance on the lagoon.</p>
<p>It was now some while since we had met any but slumberers; and
when we had wandered down the pier and stumbled at last into this
bright shed, we were surprised to find it occupied by a society
of wakeful people, some twenty souls in all, the court and
guardsmen of Butaritari. The court ladies were busy making
mats; the guardsmen yawned and sprawled. Half a dozen
rifles lay on a rock and a cutlass was leaned against a pillar:
the armoury of these drowsy musketeers. At the far end, a
little closed house of wood displayed some tinsel curtains, and
proved, upon examination, to be a privy on the European
model. In front of this, upon some mats, lolled Tebureimoa,
the king; behind him, on the panels of the house, two crossed
rifles represented fasces. He wore pyjamas which
sorrowfully misbecame his bulk; his nose was hooked and cruel,
his body overcome with sodden corpulence, his eye timorous and
dull: he seemed at once oppressed with drowsiness and held awake
by apprehension: a pepper rajah muddled with opium, and listening
for the march of a Dutch army, looks perhaps not otherwise.
We were to grow better acquainted, and first and last I had the
same impression; he seemed always drowsy, yet always to hearken
and start; and, whether from remorse or fear, there is no doubt
he seeks a refuge in the abuse of drugs.</p>
<p>The rajah displayed no sign of interest in our coming.
But the queen, who sat beside him in a purple sacque, was more
accessible; and there was present an interpreter so willing that
his volubility became at last the cause of our departure.
He had greeted us upon our entrance:—‘That is the
honourable King, and I am his interpreter,’ he had said,
with more stateliness than truth. For he held no
appointment in the court, seemed extremely ill-acquainted with
the island language, and was present, like ourselves, upon a
visit of civility. Mr. Williams was his name: an American
darkey, runaway ship’s cook, and bar-keeper at <i>The Land
we Live in</i> tavern, Butaritari. I never knew a man who
had more words in his command or less truth to communicate;
neither the gloom of the monarch, nor my own efforts to be
distant, could in the least abash him; and when the scene closed,
the darkey was left talking.</p>
<p>The town still slumbered, or had but just begun to turn and
stretch itself; it was still plunged in heat and silence.
So much the more vivid was the impression that we carried away of
the house upon the islet, the Micronesian Saul wakeful amid his
guards, and his unmelodious David, Mr. Williams, chattering
through the drowsy hours.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER II—THE FOUR BROTHERS</h3>
<p>The kingdom of Tebureimoa includes two islands, Great and
Little Makin; some two thousand subjects pay him tribute, and two
semi-independent chieftains do him qualified homage. The
importance of the office is measured by the man; he may be a
nobody, he may be absolute; and both extremes have been
exemplified within the memory of residents.</p>
<p>On the death of king Tetimararoa, Tebureimoa’s father,
Nakaeia, the eldest son, succeeded. He was a fellow of huge
physical strength, masterful, violent, with a certain barbaric
thrift and some intelligence of men and business. Alone in
his islands, it was he who dealt and profited; he was the planter
and the merchant; and his subjects toiled for his behoof in
servitude. When they wrought long and well their taskmaster
declared a holiday, and supplied and shared a general
debauch. The scale of his providing was at times
magnificent; six hundred dollars’ worth of gin and brandy
was set forth at once; the narrow land resounded with the noise
of revelry: and it was a common thing to see the subjects
(staggering themselves) parade their drunken sovereign on the
fore-hatch of a wrecked vessel, king and commons howling and
singing as they went. At a word from Nakaeia’s mouth
the revel ended; Makin became once more an isle of slaves and of
teetotalers; and on the morrow all the population must be on the
roads or in the taro-patches toiling under his bloodshot eye.</p>
<p>The fear of Nakaeia filled the land. No regularity of
justice was affected; there was no trial, there were no officers
of the law; it seems there was but one penalty, the capital; and
daylight assault and midnight murder were the forms of
process. The king himself would play the executioner: and
his blows were dealt by stealth, and with the help and
countenance of none but his own wives. These were his
oarswomen; one that caught a crab, he slew incontinently with the
tiller; thus disciplined, they pulled him by night to the scene
of his vengeance, which he would then execute alone and return
well-pleased with his connubial crew. The inmates of the
harem held a station hard for us to conceive. Beasts of
draught, and driven by the fear of death, they were yet
implicitly trusted with their sovereign’s life; they were
still wives and queens, and it was supposed that no man should
behold their faces. They killed by the sight like
basilisks; a chance view of one of those boatwomen was a crime to
be wiped out with blood. In the days of Nakaeia the palace
was beset with some tall coco-palms which commanded the
enclosure. It chanced one evening, while Nakaeia sat below
at supper with his wives, that the owner of the grove was in a
tree-top drawing palm-tree wine; it chanced that he looked down,
and the king at the same moment looking up, their eyes
encountered. Instant flight preserved the involuntary
criminal. But during the remainder of that reign he must
lurk and be hid by friends in remote parts of the isle; Nakaeia
hunted him without remission, although still in vain; and the
palms, accessories to the fact, were ruthlessly cut down.
Such was the ideal of wifely purity in an isle where nubile
virgins went naked as in paradise. And yet scandal found
its way into Nakaeia’s well-guarded harem. He was at
that time the owner of a schooner, which he used for a
pleasure-house, lodging on board as she lay anchored; and thither
one day he summoned a new wife. She was one that had been
sealed to him; that is to say (I presume), that he was married to
her sister, for the husband of an elder sister has the call of
the cadets. She would be arrayed for the occasion; she
would come scented, garlanded, decked with fine mats and family
jewels, for marriage, as her friends supposed; for death, as she
well knew. ‘Tell me the man’s name, and I will
spare you,’ said Nakaeia. But the girl was staunch;
she held her peace, saved her lover and the queens strangled her
between the mats.</p>
<p>Nakaeia was feared; it does not appear that he was
hated. Deeds that smell to us of murder wore to his
subjects the reverend face of justice; his orgies made him
popular; natives to this day recall with respect the firmness of
his government; and even the whites, whom he long opposed and
kept at arm’s-length, give him the name (in the canonical
South Sea phrase) of ‘a perfect gentleman when
sober.’</p>
<p>When he came to lie, without issue, on the bed of death, he
summoned his next brother, Nanteitei, made him a discourse on
royal policy, and warned him he was too weak to reign. The
warning was taken to heart, and for some while the government
moved on the model of Nakaeia’s. Nanteitei dispensed
with guards, and walked abroad alone with a revolver in a leather
mail-bag. To conceal his weakness he affected a rude
silence; you might talk to him all day; advice, reproof, appeal,
and menace alike remained unanswered.</p>
<p>The number of his wives was seventeen, many of them heiresses;
for the royal house is poor, and marriage was in these days a
chief means of buttressing the throne. Nakaeia kept his
harem busy for himself; Nanteitei hired it out to others.
In his days, for instance, Messrs. Wightman built a pier
with a verandah at the north end of the town. The masonry
was the work of the seventeen queens, who toiled and waded there
like fisher lasses; but the man who was to do the roofing durst
not begin till they had finished, lest by chance he should look
down and see them.</p>
<p>It was perhaps the last appearance of the harem gang.
For some time already Hawaiian missionaries had been seated at
Butaritari—Maka and Kanoa, two brave childlike men.
Nakaeia would none of their doctrine; he was perhaps jealous of
their presence; being human, he had some affection for their
persons. In the house, before the eyes of Kanoa, he slew
with his own hand three sailors of Oahu, crouching on their backs
to knife them, and menacing the missionary if he interfered; yet
he not only spared him at the moment, but recalled him afterwards
(when he had fled) with some expressions of respect.
Nanteitei, the weaker man, fell more completely under the
spell. Maka, a light-hearted, lovable, yet in his own trade
very rigorous man, gained and improved an influence on the king
which soon grew paramount. Nanteitei, with the royal house,
was publicly converted; and, with a severity which liberal
missionaries disavow, the harem was at once reduced. It was
a compendious act. The throne was thus impoverished, its
influence shaken, the queen’s relatives mortified, and
sixteen chief women (some of great possessions) cast in a body on
the market. I have been shipmates with a Hawaiian sailor
who was successively married to two of these <i>impromptu</i>
widows, and successively divorced by both for misconduct.
That two great and rich ladies (for both of these were rich)
should have married ‘a man from another island’ marks
the dissolution of society. The laws besides were wholly
remodelled, not always for the better. I love Maka as a
man; as a legislator he has two defects: weak in the punishment
of crime, stern to repress innocent pleasures.</p>
<p>War and revolution are the common successors of reform; yet
Nanteitei died (of an overdose of chloroform), in quiet
possession of the throne, and it was in the reign of the third
brother, Nabakatokia, a man brave in body and feeble of
character, that the storm burst. The rule of the high
chiefs and notables seems to have always underlain and perhaps
alternated with monarchy. The Old Men (as they were called)
have a right to sit with the king in the Speak House and debate:
and the king’s chief superiority is a form of
closure—‘The Speaking is over.’ After the
long monocracy of Nakaeia and the changes of Nanteitei, the Old
Men were doubtless grown impatient of obscurity, and they were
beyond question jealous of the influence of Maka. Calumny,
or rather caricature, was called in use; a spoken cartoon ran
round society; Maka was reported to have said in church that the
king was the first man in the island and himself the second; and,
stung by the supposed affront, the chiefs broke into rebellion
and armed gatherings. In the space of one forenoon the
throne of Nakaeia was humbled in the dust. The king sat in
the maniap’ before the palace gate expecting his recruits;
Maka by his side, both anxious men; and meanwhile, in the door of
a house at the north entry of the town, a chief had taken post
and diverted the succours as they came. They came singly or
in groups, each with his gun or pistol slung about his
neck. ‘Where are you going?’ asked the
chief. ‘The king called us,’ they would
reply. ‘Here is your place. Sit down,’
returned the chief. With incredible disloyalty, all obeyed;
and sufficient force being thus got together from both sides,
Nabakatokia was summoned and surrendered. About this
period, in almost every part of the group, the kings were
murdered; and on Tapituea, the skeleton of the last hangs to this
day in the chief Speak House of the isle, a menace to
ambition. Nabakatokia was more fortunate; his life and the
royal style were spared to him, but he was stripped of
power. The Old Men enjoyed a festival of public speaking;
the laws were continually changed, never enforced; the commons
had an opportunity to regret the merits of Nakaeia; and the king,
denied the resource of rich marriages and the service of a troop
of wives, fell not only in disconsideration but in debt.</p>
<p>He died some months before my arrival on the islands, and no
one regretted him; rather all looked hopefully to his
successor. This was by repute the hero of the family.
Alone of the four brothers, he had issue, a grown son, Natiata,
and a daughter three years old; it was to him, in the hour of the
revolution, that Nabakatokia turned too late for help; and in
earlier days he had been the right hand of the vigorous
Nakaeia. Nontemat’, <i>Mr. Corpse</i>, was his
appalling nickname, and he had earned it well. Again and
again, at the command of Nakaeia, he had surrounded houses in the
dead of night, cut down the mosquito bars and butchered
families. Here was the hand of iron; here was Nakaeia
<i>redux</i>. He came, summoned from the tributary rule of
Little Makin: he was installed, he proved a puppet and a
trembler, the unwieldy shuttlecock of orators; and the reader has
seen the remains of him in his summer parlour under the name of
Tebureimoa.</p>
<p>The change in the man’s character was much commented on
in the island, and variously explained by opium and
Christianity. To my eyes, there seemed no change at all,
rather an extreme consistency. Mr. Corpse was afraid of his
brother: King Tebureimoa is afraid of the Old Men. Terror
of the first nerved him for deeds of desperation; fear of the
second disables him for the least act of government. He
played his part of bravo in the past, following the line of least
resistance, butchering others in his own defence: to-day, grown
elderly and heavy, a convert, a reader of the Bible, perhaps a
penitent, conscious at least of accumulated hatreds, and his
memory charged with images of violence and blood, he capitulates
to the Old Men, fuddles himself with opium, and sits among his
guards in dreadful expectation. The same cowardice that put
into his hand the knife of the assassin deprives him of the
sceptre of a king.</p>
<p>A tale that I was told, a trifling incident that fell in my
observation, depicts him in his two capacities. A chief in
Little Makin asked, in an hour of lightness, ‘Who is
Kaeia?’ A bird carried the saying; and Nakaeia placed
the matter in the hands of a committee of three. Mr. Corpse
was chairman; the second commissioner died before my arrival; the
third was yet alive and green, and presented so venerable an
appearance that we gave him the name of Abou ben Adhem. Mr.
Corpse was troubled with a scruple; the man from Little Makin was
his adopted brother; in such a case it was not very delicate to
appear at all, to strike the blow (which it seems was otherwise
expected of him) would be worse than awkward. ‘I will
strike the blow,’ said the venerable Abou; and Mr. Corpse
(surely with a sigh) accepted the compromise. The quarry
was decoyed into the bush; he was set to carrying a log; and
while his arms were raised Abou ripped up his belly at a
blow. Justice being thus done, the commission, in a
childish horror, turned to flee. But their victim recalled
them to his side. ‘You need not run away now,’
he said. ‘You have done this thing to me.
Stay.’ He was some twenty minutes dying, and his
murderers sat with him the while: a scene for Shakespeare.
All the stages of a violent death, the blood, the failing voice,
the decomposing features, the changed hue, are thus present in
the memory of Mr. Corpse; and since he studied them in the
brother he betrayed, he has some reason to reflect on the
possibilities of treachery. I was never more sure of
anything than the tragic quality of the king’s thoughts;
and yet I had but the one sight of him at unawares. I had
once an errand for his ear. It was once more the hour of
the siesta; but there were loiterers abroad, and these directed
us to a closed house on the bank of the canal where Tebureimoa
lay unguarded. We entered without ceremony, being in some
haste. He lay on the floor upon a bed of mats, reading in
his Gilbert Island Bible with compunction. On our sudden
entrance the unwieldy man reared himself half-sitting so that the
Bible rolled on the floor, stared on us a moment with blank eyes,
and, having recognised his visitors, sank again upon the
mats. So Eglon looked on Ehud.</p>
<p>The justice of facts is strange, and strangely just; Nakaeia,
the author of these deeds, died at peace discoursing on the craft
of kings; his tool suffers daily death for his enforced
complicity. Not the nature, but the congruity of
men’s deeds and circumstances damn and save them; and
Tebureimoa from the first has been incongruously placed. At
home, in a quiet bystreet of a village, the man had been a worthy
carpenter, and, even bedevilled as he is, he shows some private
virtues. He has no lands, only the use of such as are
impignorate for fines; he cannot enrich himself in the old way by
marriages; thrift is the chief pillar of his future, and he knows
and uses it. Eleven foreign traders pay him a patent of a
hundred dollars, some two thousand subjects pay capitation at the
rate of a dollar for a man, half a dollar for a woman, and a
shilling for a child: allowing for the exchange, perhaps a total
of three hundred pounds a year. He had been some nine
months on the throne: had bought his wife a silk dress and hat,
figure unknown, and himself a uniform at three hundred dollars;
had sent his brother’s photograph to be enlarged in San
Francisco at two hundred and fifty dollars; had greatly reduced
that brother’s legacy of debt and had still sovereigns in
his pocket. An affectionate brother, a good economist; he
was besides a handy carpenter, and cobbled occasionally on the
woodwork of the palace. It is not wonderful that Mr. Corpse
has virtues; that Tebureimoa should have a diversion filled me
with surprise.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER III—AROUND OUR HOUSE</h3>
<p>When we left the palace we were still but seafarers ashore;
and within the hour we had installed our goods in one of the six
foreign houses of Butaritari, namely, that usually occupied by
Maka, the Hawaiian missionary. Two San Francisco firms are
here established, Messrs. Crawford and Messrs. Wightman Brothers;
the first hard by the palace of the mid town, the second at the
north entry; each with a store and bar-room. Our house was
in the Wightman compound, betwixt the store and bar, within a
fenced enclosure. Across the road a few native houses
nestled in the margin of the bush, and the green wall of palms
rose solid, shutting out the breeze. A little sandy cove of
the lagoon ran in behind, sheltered by a verandah pier, the
labour of queens’ hands. Here, when the tide was
high, sailed boats lay to be loaded; when the tide was low, the
boats took ground some half a mile away, and an endless series of
natives descended the pier stair, tailed across the sand in
strings and clusters, waded to the waist with the bags of copra,
and loitered backward to renew their charge. The mystery of
the copra trade tormented me, as I sat and watched the profits
drip on the stair and the sands.</p>
<p>In front, from shortly after four in the morning until nine at
night, the folk of the town streamed by us intermittingly along
the road: families going up the island to make copra on their
lands; women bound for the bush to gather flowers against the
evening toilet; and, twice a day, the toddy-cutters, each with
his knife and shell. In the first grey of the morning, and
again late in the afternoon, these would straggle past about
their tree-top business, strike off here and there into the bush,
and vanish from the face of the earth. At about the same
hour, if the tide be low in the lagoon, you are likely to be
bound yourself across the island for a bath, and may enter close
at their heels alleys of the palm wood. Right in front,
although the sun is not yet risen, the east is already lighted
with preparatory fires, and the huge accumulations of the
trade-wind cloud glow with and heliograph the coming day.
The breeze is in your face; overhead in the tops of the palms,
its playthings, it maintains a lively bustle; look where you
will, above or below, there is no human presence, only the earth
and shaken forest. And right overhead the song of an
invisible singer breaks from the thick leaves; from farther on a
second tree-top answers; and beyond again, in the bosom of the
woods, a still more distant minstrel perches and sways and
sings. So, all round the isle, the toddy-cutters sit on
high, and are rocked by the trade, and have a view far to
seaward, where they keep watch for sails, and like huge birds
utter their songs in the morning. They sing with a certain
lustiness and Bacchic glee; the volume of sound and the
articulate melody fall unexpected from the tree-top, whence we
anticipate the chattering of fowls. And yet in a sense
these songs also are but chatter; the words are ancient,
obsolete, and sacred; few comprehend them, perhaps no one
perfectly; but it was understood the cutters ‘prayed to
have good toddy, and sang of their old wars.’ The
prayer is at least answered; and when the foaming shell is
brought to your door, you have a beverage well ‘worthy of a
grace.’ All forenoon you may return and taste; it
only sparkles, and sharpens, and grows to be a new drink, not
less delicious; but with the progress of the day the fermentation
quickens and grows acid; in twelve hours it will be yeast for
bread, in two days more a devilish intoxicant, the counsellor of
crime.</p>
<p>The men are of a marked Arabian cast of features, often
bearded and mustached, often gaily dressed, some with bracelets
and anklets, all stalking hidalgo-like, and accepting salutations
with a haughty lip. The hair (with the dandies of either
sex) is worn turban-wise in a frizzled bush; and like the daggers
of the Japanese a pointed stick (used for a comb) is thrust
gallantly among the curls. The women from this bush of hair
look forth enticingly: the race cannot be compared with the
Tahitian for female beauty; I doubt even if the average be high;
but some of the prettiest girls, and one of the handsomest women
I ever saw, were Gilbertines. Butaritari, being the
commercial centre of the group, is Europeanised; the coloured
sacque or the white shift are common wear, the latter for the
evening; the trade hat, loaded with flowers, fruit, and ribbons,
is unfortunately not unknown; and the characteristic female dress
of the Gilberts no longer universal. The <i>ridi</i> is its
name: a cutty petticoat or fringe of the smoked fibre of
cocoa-nut leaf, not unlike tarry string: the lower edge not
reaching the mid-thigh, the upper adjusted so low upon the
haunches that it seems to cling by accident. A sneeze, you
think, and the lady must surely be left destitute.
‘The perilous, hairbreadth ridi’ was our word for it;
and in the conflict that rages over women’s dress it has
the misfortune to please neither side, the prudish condemning it
as insufficient, the more frivolous finding it unlovely in
itself. Yet if a pretty Gilbertine would look her best,
that must be her costume. In that and naked otherwise, she
moves with an incomparable liberty and grace and life, that marks
the poetry of Micronesia. Bundle her in a gown, the charm
is fled, and she wriggles like an Englishwoman.</p>
<p>Towards dusk the passers-by became more gorgeous. The
men broke out in all the colours of the rainbow—or at least
of the trade-room,—and both men and women began to be
adorned and scented with new flowers. A small white blossom
is the favourite, sometimes sown singly in a woman’s hair
like little stars, now composed in a thick wreath. With the
night, the crowd sometimes thickened in the road, and the padding
and brushing of bare feet became continuous; the promenades
mostly grave, the silence only interrupted by some giggling and
scampering of girls; even the children quiet. At nine,
bed-time struck on a bell from the cathedral, and the life of the
town ceased. At four the next morning the signal is
repeated in the darkness, and the innocent prisoners set free;
but for seven hours all must lie—I was about to say within
doors, of a place where doors, and even walls, are an
exception—housed, at least, under their airy roofs and
clustered in the tents of the mosquito-nets. Suppose a
necessary errand to occur, suppose it imperative to send abroad,
the messenger must then go openly, advertising himself to the
police with a huge brand of cocoa-nut, which flares from house to
house like a moving bonfire. Only the police themselves go
darkling, and grope in the night for misdemeanants. I used
to hate their treacherous presence; their captain in particular,
a crafty old man in white, lurked nightly about my premises till
I could have found it in my heart to beat him. But the
rogue was privileged.</p>
<p>Not one of the eleven resident traders came to town, no
captain cast anchor in the lagoon, but we saw him ere the hour
was out. This was owing to our position between the store
and the bar—the <i>Sans Souci</i>, as the last was
called. Mr. Rick was not only Messrs. Wightman’s
manager, but consular agent for the States; Mrs. Rick was the
only white woman on the island, and one of the only two in the
archipelago; their house besides, with its cool verandahs, its
bookshelves, its comfortable furniture, could not be rivalled
nearer than Jaluit or Honolulu. Every one called in
consequence, save such as might be prosecuting a South Sea
quarrel, hingeing on the price of copra and the odd cent, or
perhaps a difference about poultry. Even these, if they did
not appear upon the north, would be presently visible to the
southward, the <i>Sans Souci</i> drawing them as with
cords. In an island with a total population of twelve white
persons, one of the two drinking-shops might seem superfluous:
but every bullet has its billet, and the double accommodation of
Butaritari is found in practice highly convenient by the captains
and the crews of ships: <i>The Land we Live in</i> being tacitly
resigned to the forecastle, the <i>Sans Souci</i> tacitly
reserved for the afterguard. So aristocratic were my
habits, so commanding was my fear of Mr. Williams, that I have
never visited the first; but in the other, which was the club or
rather the casino of the island, I regularly passed my
evenings. It was small, but neatly fitted, and at night
(when the lamp was lit) sparkled with glass and glowed with
coloured pictures like a theatre at Christmas. The pictures
were advertisements, the glass coarse enough, the carpentry
amateur; but the effect, in that incongruous isle, was of
unbridled luxury and inestimable expense. Here songs were
sung, tales told, tricks performed, games played. The
Ricks, ourselves, Norwegian Tom the bar-keeper, a captain or two
from the ships, and perhaps three or four traders come down the
island in their boats or by the road on foot, made up the usual
company. The traders, all bred to the sea, take a humorous
pride in their new business; ‘South Sea Merchants’ is
the title they prefer. ‘We are all sailors
here’—‘Merchants, if you
please’—‘<i>South Sea</i>
Merchants,’—was a piece of conversation endlessly
repeated, that never seemed to lose in savour. We found
them at all times simple, genial, gay, gallant, and obliging;
and, across some interval of time, recall with pleasure the
traders of Butaritari. There was one black sheep
indeed. I tell of him here where he lived, against my rule;
for in this case I have no measure to preserve, and the man is
typical of a class of ruffians that once disgraced the whole
field of the South Seas, and still linger in the rarely visited
isles of Micronesia. He had the name on the beach of
‘a perfect gentleman when sober,’ but I never saw him
otherwise than drunk. The few shocking and savage traits of
the Micronesian he has singled out with the skill of a collector,
and planted in the soil of his original baseness. He has
been accused and acquitted of a treacherous murder; and has since
boastfully owned it, which inclines me to suppose him
innocent. His daughter is defaced by his erroneous cruelty,
for it was his wife he had intended to disfigure, and in the
darkness of the night and the frenzy of coco-brandy, fastened on
the wrong victim. The wife has since fled and harbours in
the bush with natives; and the husband still demands from deaf
ears her forcible restoration. The best of his business is
to make natives drink, and then advance the money for the fine
upon a lucrative mortgage. ‘Respect for whites’
is the man’s word: ‘What is the matter with this
island is the want of respect for whites.’ On his way
to Butaritari, while I was there, he spied his wife in the bush
with certain natives and made a dash to capture her; whereupon
one of her companions drew a knife and the husband retreated:
‘Do you call that proper respect for whites?’ he
cried. At an early stage of the acquaintance we proved our
respect for his kind of white by forbidding him our enclosure
under pain of death. Thenceforth he lingered often in the
neighbourhood with I knew not what sense of envy or design of
mischief; his white, handsome face (which I beheld with loathing)
looked in upon us at all hours across the fence; and once, from a
safe distance, he avenged himself by shouting a recondite island
insult, to us quite inoffensive, on his English lips incredibly
incongruous.</p>
<p>Our enclosure, round which this composite of degradations
wandered, was of some extent. In one corner was a trellis
with a long table of rough boards. Here the Fourth of July
feast had been held not long before with memorable consequences,
yet to be set forth; here we took our meals; here entertained to
a dinner the king and notables of Makin. In the midst was
the house, with a verandah front and back, and three is rooms
within. In the verandah we slung our man-of-war hammocks,
worked there by day, and slept at night. Within were beds,
chairs, a round table, a fine hanging lamp, and portraits of the
royal family of Hawaii. Queen Victoria proves nothing;
Kalakaua and Mrs. Bishop are diagnostic; and the truth is we were
the stealthy tenants of the parsonage. On the day of our
arrival Maka was away; faithless trustees unlocked his doors; and
the dear rigorous man, the sworn foe of liquor and tobacco,
returned to find his verandah littered with cigarettes and his
parlour horrible with bottles. He made but one
condition—on the round table, which he used in the
celebration of the sacraments, he begged us to refrain from
setting liquor; in all else he bowed to the accomplished fact,
refused rent, retired across the way into a native house, and,
plying in his boat, beat the remotest quarters of the isle for
provender. He found us pigs—I could not fancy
where—no other pigs were visible; he brought us fowls and
taro; when we gave our feast to the monarch and gentry, it was he
who supplied the wherewithal, he who superintended the cooking,
he who asked grace at table, and when the king’s health was
proposed, he also started the cheering with an English
hip-hip-hip. There was never a more fortunate conception;
the heart of the fatted king exulted in his bosom at the
sound.</p>
<p>Take him for all in all, I have never known a more engaging
creature than this parson of Butaritari: his mirth, his kindness,
his noble, friendly feelings, brimmed from the man in speech and
gesture. He loved to exaggerate, to act and overact the
momentary part, to exercise his lungs and muscles, and to speak
and laugh with his whole body. He had the morning
cheerfulness of birds and healthy children; and his humour was
infectious. We were next neighbours and met daily, yet our
salutations lasted minutes at a stretch—shaking hands,
slapping shoulders, capering like a pair of Merry-Andrews,
laughing to split our sides upon some pleasantry that would
scarce raise a titter in an infant-school. It might be five
in the morning, the toddy-cutters just gone by, the road empty,
the shade of the island lying far on the lagoon: and the
ebullition cheered me for the day.</p>
<p>Yet I always suspected Maka of a secret melancholy—these
jubilant extremes could scarce be constantly maintained. He
was besides long, and lean, and lined, and corded, and a trifle
grizzled; and his Sabbath countenance was even saturnine.
On that day we made a procession to the church, or (as I must
always call it) the cathedral: Maka (a blot on the hot landscape)
in tall hat, black frock-coat, black trousers; under his arm the
hymn-book and the Bible; in his face, a reverent
gravity:—beside him Mary his wife, a quiet, wise, and
handsome elderly lady, seriously attired:—myself following
with singular and moving thoughts. Long before, to the
sound of bells and streams and birds, through a green Lothian
glen, I had accompanied Sunday by Sunday a minister in whose
house I lodged; and the likeness, and the difference, and the
series of years and deaths, profoundly touched me. In the
great, dusky, palm-tree cathedral the congregation rarely
numbered thirty: the men on one side, the women on the other,
myself posted (for a privilege) amongst the women, and the small
missionary contingent gathered close around the platform, we were
lost in that round vault. The lessons were read
antiphonally, the flock was catechised, a blind youth repeated
weekly a long string of psalms, hymns were sung—I never
heard worse singing,—and the sermon followed. To say
I understood nothing were untrue; there were points that I
learned to expect with certainty; the name of Honolulu, that of
Kalakaua, the word Cap’n-man-o’-wa’, the word
ship, and a description of a storm at sea, infallibly occurred;
and I was not seldom rewarded with the name of my own Sovereign
in the bargain. The rest was but sound to the ears, silence
for the mind: a plain expanse of tedium, rendered unbearable by
heat, a hard chair, and the sight through the wide doors of the
more happy heathen on the green. Sleep breathed on my
joints and eyelids, sleep hummed in my ears; it reigned in the
dim cathedral. The congregation stirred and stretched; they
moaned, they groaned aloud; they yawned upon a singing note, as
you may sometimes hear a dog when he has reached the tragic
bitterest of boredom. In vain the preacher thumped the
table; in vain he singled and addressed by name particular
hearers. I was myself perhaps a more effective excitant;
and at least to one old gentleman the spectacle of my successful
struggles against sleep—and I hope they were
successful—cheered the flight of time. He, when he
was not catching flies or playing tricks upon his neighbours,
gloated with a fixed, truculent eye upon the stages of my agony;
and once, when the service was drawing towards a close, he winked
at me across the church.</p>
<p>I write of the service with a smile; yet I was always
there—always with respect for Maka, always with admiration
for his deep seriousness, his burning energy, the fire of his
roused eye, the sincere and various accents of his voice.
To see him weekly flogging a dead horse and blowing a cold fire
was a lesson in fortitude and constancy. It may be a
question whether if the mission were fully supported, and he was
set free from business avocations, more might not result; I think
otherwise myself; I think not neglect but rigour has reduced his
flock, that rigour which has once provoked a revolution, and
which to-day, in a man so lively and engaging, amazes the
beholder. No song, no dance, no tobacco, no liquor, no
alleviative of life—only toil and church-going; so says a
voice from his face; and the face is the face of the Polynesian
Esau, but the voice is the voice of a Jacob from a different
world. And a Polynesian at the best makes a singular
missionary in the Gilberts, coming from a country recklessly
unchaste to one conspicuously strict; from a race hag-ridden with
bogies to one comparatively bold against the terrors of the
dark. The thought was stamped one morning in my mind, when
I chanced to be abroad by moonlight, and saw all the town
lightless, but the lamp faithfully burning by the
missionary’s bed. It requires no law, no fire, and no
scouting police, to withhold Maka and his countrymen from
wandering in the night unlighted.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER IV—A TALE OF A TAPU</h3>
<p>On the morrow of our arrival (Sunday, 14th July 1889) our
photographers were early stirring. Once more we traversed a
silent town; many were yet abed and asleep; some sat drowsily in
their open houses; there was no sound of intercourse or
business. In that hour before the shadows, the quarter of
the palace and canal seemed like a landing-place in the
<i>Arabian Nights</i> or from the classic poets; here were the
fit destination of some ‘faery frigot,’ here some
adventurous prince might step ashore among new characters and
incidents; and the island prison, where it floated on the
luminous face of the lagoon, might have passed for the repository
of the Grail. In such a scene, and at such an hour, the
impression received was not so much of foreign
travel—rather of past ages; it seemed not so much degrees
of latitude that we had crossed, as centuries of time that we had
re-ascended; leaving, by the same steps, home and to-day. A
few children followed us, mostly nude, all silent; in the clear,
weedy waters of the canal some silent damsels waded, baring their
brown thighs; and to one of the maniap’s before the palace
gate we were attracted by a low but stirring hum of speech.</p>
<p>The oval shed was full of men sitting cross-legged. The
king was there in striped pyjamas, his rear protected by four
guards with Winchesters, his air and bearing marked by unwonted
spirit and decision; tumblers and black bottles went the round;
and the talk, throughout loud, was general and animated. I
was inclined at first to view this scene with suspicion.
But the hour appeared unsuitable for a carouse; drink was besides
forbidden equally by the law of the land and the canons of the
church; and while I was yet hesitating, the king’s rigorous
attitude disposed of my last doubt. We had come, thinking
to photograph him surrounded by his guards, and at the first word
of the design his piety revolted. We were reminded of the
day—the Sabbath, in which thou shalt take no
photographs—and returned with a flea in our ear, bearing
the rejected camera.</p>
<p>At church, a little later, I was struck to find the throne
unoccupied. So nice a Sabbatarian might have found the
means to be present; perhaps my doubts revived; and before I got
home they were transformed to certainties. Tom, the
bar-keeper of the <i>Sans Souci</i>, was in conversation with two
emissaries from the court. The ‘keen,’ they
said, wanted ‘din,’ failing which
‘perandi.’ <a name="citation231"></a><a
href="#footnote231" class="citation">[231]</a> No din, was
Tom’s reply, and no perandi; but ‘pira’ if they
pleased. It seems they had no use for beer, and departed
sorrowing.</p>
<p>‘Why, what is the meaning of all this?’ I
asked. ‘Is the island on the spree?’</p>
<p>Such was the fact. On the 4th of July a feast had been
made, and the king, at the suggestion of the whites, had raised
the tapu against liquor. There is a proverb about horses;
it scarce applies to the superior animal, of whom it may be
rather said, that any one can start him drinking, not any twenty
can prevail on him to stop. The tapu, raised ten days
before, was not yet re-imposed; for ten days the town had been
passing the bottle or lying (as we had seen it the afternoon
before) in hoggish sleep; and the king, moved by the Old Men and
his own appetites, continued to maintain the liberty, to squander
his savings on liquor, and to join in and lead the debauch.
The whites were the authors of this crisis; it was upon their own
proposal that the freedom had been granted at the first; and for
a while, in the interests of trade, they were doubtless pleased
it should continue. That pleasure had now sometime ceased;
the bout had been prolonged (it was conceded) unduly; and it now
began to be a question how it might conclude. Hence
Tom’s refusal. Yet that refusal was avowedly only for
the moment, and it was avowedly unavailing; the king’s
foragers, denied by Tom at the <i>Sans Souci</i>, would be
supplied at <i>The Land we Live in</i> by the gobbling Mr.
Williams.</p>
<p>The degree of the peril was not easy to measure at the time,
and I am inclined to think now it was easy to exaggerate.
Yet the conduct of drunkards even at home is always matter for
anxiety; and at home our populations are not armed from the
highest to the lowest with revolvers and repeating rifles,
neither do we go on a debauch by the whole townful—and I
might rather say, by the whole polity—king, magistrates,
police, and army joining in one common scene of
drunkenness. It must be thought besides that we were here
in barbarous islands, rarely visited, lately and partly
civilised. First and last, a really considerable number of
whites have perished in the Gilberts, chiefly through their own
misconduct; and the natives have displayed in at least one
instance a disposition to conceal an accident under a butchery,
and leave nothing but dumb bones. This last was the chief
consideration against a sudden closing of the bars; the
bar-keepers stood in the immediate breach and dealt direct with
madmen; too surly a refusal might at any moment precipitate a
blow, and the blow might prove the signal for a massacre.</p>
<p><i>Monday</i>, 15th.—At the same hour we returned to the
same muniap’. Kümmel (of all drinks) was served
in tumblers; in the midst sat the crown prince, a fatted youth,
surrounded by fresh bottles and busily plying the corkscrew; and
king, chief, and commons showed the loose mouth, the uncertain
joints, and the blurred and animated eye of the early
drinker. It was plain we were impatiently expected; the
king retired with alacrity to dress, the guards were despatched
after their uniforms; and we were left to await the issue of
these preparations with a shedful of tipsy natives. The
orgie had proceeded further than on Sunday. The day
promised to be of great heat; it was already sultry, the
courtiers were already fuddled; and still the kümmel
continued to go round, and the crown prince to play butler.
Flemish freedom followed upon Flemish excess; and a funny dog, a
handsome fellow, gaily dressed, and with a full turban of frizzed
hair, delighted the company with a humorous courtship of a lady
in a manner not to be described. It was our diversion, in
this time of waiting, to observe the gathering of the
guards. They have European arms, European uniforms, and (to
their sorrow) European shoes. We saw one warrior (like
Mars) in the article of being armed; two men and a stalwart woman
were scarce strong enough to boot him; and after a single
appearance on parade the army is crippled for a week.</p>
<p>At last, the gates under the king’s house opened; the
army issued, one behind another, with guns and epaulettes; the
colours stooped under the gateway; majesty followed in his
uniform bedizened with gold lace; majesty’s wife came next
in a hat and feathers, and an ample trained silk gown; the royal
imps succeeded; there stood the pageantry of Makin marshalled on
its chosen theatre. Dickens might have told how serious
they were; how tipsy; how the king melted and streamed under his
cocked hat; how he took station by the larger of his two
cannons—austere, majestic, but not truly vertical; how the
troops huddled, and were straightened out, and clubbed again; how
they and their firelocks raked at various inclinations like the
masts of ships; and how an amateur photographer reviewed,
arrayed, and adjusted them, to see his dispositions change before
he reached the camera.</p>
<p>The business was funny to see; I do not know that it is
graceful to laugh at; and our report of these transactions was
received on our return with the shaking of grave heads.</p>
<p>The day had begun ill; eleven hours divided us from sunset;
and at any moment, on the most trifling chance, the trouble might
begin. The Wightman compound was in a military sense
untenable, commanded on three sides by houses and thick bush; the
town was computed to contain over a thousand stand of excellent
new arms; and retreat to the ships, in the case of an alert, was
a recourse not to be thought of. Our talk that morning must
have closely reproduced the talk in English garrisons before the
Sepoy mutiny; the sturdy doubt that any mischief was in prospect,
the sure belief that (should any come) there was nothing left but
to go down fighting, the half-amused, half-anxious attitude of
mind in which we were awaiting fresh developments.</p>
<p>The kümmel soon ran out; we were scarce returned before
the king had followed us in quest of more. Mr. Corpse was
now divested of his more awful attitude, the lawless bulk of him
again encased in striped pyjamas; a guardsman brought up the rear
with his rifle at the trail: and his majesty was further
accompanied by a Rarotongan whalerman and the playful courtier
with the turban of frizzed hair. There was never a more
lively deputation. The whalerman was gapingly, tearfully
tipsy: the courtier walked on air; the king himself was even
sportive. Seated in a chair in the Ricks’
sitting-room, he bore the brunt of our prayers and menaces
unmoved. He was even rated, plied with historic instances,
threatened with the men-of-war, ordered to restore the tapu on
the spot—and nothing in the least affected him. It
should be done to-morrow, he said; to-day it was beyond his
power, to-day he durst not. ‘Is that royal?’
cried indignant Mr. Rick. No, it was not royal; had the
king been of a royal character we should ourselves have held a
different language; and royal or not, he had the best of the
dispute. The terms indeed were hardly equal; for the king
was the only man who could restore the tapu, but the Ricks were
not the only people who sold drink. He had but to hold his
ground on the first question, and they were sure to weaken on the
second. A little struggle they still made for the
fashion’s sake; and then one exceedingly tipsy deputation
departed, greatly rejoicing, a case of brandy wheeling beside
them in a barrow. The Rarotongan (whom I had never seen
before) wrung me by the hand like a man bound on a far
voyage. ‘My dear frien’!’ he cried,
‘good-bye, my dear frien’!’—tears of
kümmel standing in his eyes; the king lurched as he went,
the courtier ambled,—a strange party of intoxicated
children to be entrusted with that barrowful of madness.</p>
<p>You could never say the town was quiet; all morning there was
a ferment in the air, an aimless movement and congregation of
natives in the street. But it was not before half-past one
that a sudden hubbub of voices called us from the house, to find
the whole white colony already gathered on the spot as by
concerted signal. The <i>Sans Souci</i> was overrun with
rabble, the stair and verandah thronged. From all these
throats an inarticulate babbling cry went up incessantly; it
sounded like the bleating of young lambs, but angrier. In
the road his royal highness (whom I had seen so lately in the
part of butler) stood crying upon Tom; on the top step, tossed in
the hurly-burly, Tom was shouting to the prince. Yet a
while the pack swayed about the bar, vociferous. Then came
a brutal impulse; the mob reeled, and returned, and was rejected;
the stair showed a stream of heads; and there shot into view,
through the disbanding ranks, three men violently dragging in
their midst a fourth. By his hair and his hands, his head
forced as low as his knees, his face concealed, he was wrenched
from the verandah and whisked along the road into the village,
howling as he disappeared. Had his face been raised, we
should have seen it bloodied, and the blood was not his
own. The courtier with the turban of frizzed hair had paid
the costs of this disturbance with the lower part of one ear.</p>
<p>So the brawl passed with no other casualty than might seem
comic to the inhumane. Yet we looked round on serious faces
and—a fact that spoke volumes—Tom was putting up the
shutters on the bar. Custom might go elsewhere, Mr.
Williams might profit as he pleased, but Tom had had enough of
bar-keeping for that day. Indeed the event had hung on a
hair. A man had sought to draw a revolver—on what
quarrel I could never learn, and perhaps he himself could not
have told; one shot, when the room was so crowded, could scarce
have failed to take effect; where many were armed and all tipsy,
it could scarce have failed to draw others; and the woman who
spied the weapon and the man who seized it may very well have
saved the white community.</p>
<p>The mob insensibly melted from the scene; and for the rest of
the day our neighbourhood was left in peace and a good deal in
solitude. But the tranquillity was only local; <i>din</i>
and<i> perandi</i> still flowed in other quarters: and we had one
more sight of Gilbert Island violence. In the church, where
we had wandered photographing, we were startled by a sudden
piercing outcry. The scene, looking forth from the doors of
that great hall of shadow, was unforgettable. The palms,
the quaint and scattered houses, the flag of the island streaming
from its tall staff, glowed with intolerable sunshine. In
the midst two women rolled fighting on the grass. The
combatants were the more easy to be distinguished, because the
one was stripped to the <i>ridi</i> and the other wore a holoku
(sacque) of some lively colour. The first was uppermost,
her teeth locked in her adversary’s face, shaking her like
a dog; the other impotently fought and scratched. So for a
moment we saw them wallow and grapple there like vermin; then the
mob closed and shut them in.</p>
<p>It was a serious question that night if we should sleep
ashore. But we were travellers, folk that had come far in
quest of the adventurous; on the first sign of an adventure it
would have been a singular inconsistency to have withdrawn; and
we sent on board instead for our revolvers. Mindful of
Taahauku, Mr. Rick, Mr. Osbourne, and Mrs. Stevenson held an
assault of arms on the public highway, and fired at bottles to
the admiration of the natives. Captain Reid of the
<i>Equator</i> stayed on shore with us to be at hand in case of
trouble, and we retired to bed at the accustomed hour, agreeably
excited by the day’s events. The night was exquisite,
the silence enchanting; yet as I lay in my hammock looking on the
strong moonshine and the quiescent palms, one ugly picture
haunted me of the two women, the naked and the clad, locked in
that hostile embrace. The harm done was probably not much,
yet I could have looked on death and massacre with less
revolt. The return to these primeval weapons, the vision of
man’s beastliness, of his ferality, shocked in me a deeper
sense than that with which we count the cost of battles.
There are elements in our state and history which it is a
pleasure to forget, which it is perhaps the better wisdom not to
dwell on. Crime, pestilence, and death are in the
day’s work; the imagination readily accepts them. It
instinctively rejects, on the contrary, whatever shall call up
the image of our race upon its lowest terms, as the partner of
beasts, beastly itself, dwelling pell-mell and hugger-mugger,
hairy man with hairy woman, in the caves of old. And yet to
be just to barbarous islanders we must not forget the slums and
dens of our cities; I must not forget that I have passed
dinnerward through Soho, and seen that which cured me of my
dinner.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER V—A TALE OF A TAPU—<i>continued</i></h3>
<p><i>Tuesday</i>, <i>July</i> 16.—It rained in the night,
sudden and loud, in Gilbert Island fashion. Before the day,
the crowing of a cock aroused me and I wandered in the compound
and along the street. The squall was blown by, the moon
shone with incomparable lustre, the air lay dead as in a room,
and yet all the isle sounded as under a strong shower, the eaves
thickly pattering, the lofty palms dripping at larger intervals
and with a louder note. In this bold nocturnal light the
interior of the houses lay inscrutable, one lump of blackness,
save when the moon glinted under the roof, and made a belt of
silver, and drew the slanting shadows of the pillars on the
floor. Nowhere in all the town was any lamp or ember; not a
creature stirred; I thought I was alone to be awake; but the
police were faithful to their duty; secretly vigilant, keeping
account of time; and a little later, the watchman struck slowly
and repeatedly on the cathedral bell; four o’clock, the
warning signal. It seemed strange that, in a town resigned
to drunkenness and tumult, curfew and réveille should
still be sounded and still obeyed.</p>
<p>The day came, and brought little change. The place still
lay silent; the people slept, the town slept. Even the few
who were awake, mostly women and children, held their peace and
kept within under the strong shadow of the thatch, where you must
stop and peer to see them. Through the deserted streets,
and past the sleeping houses, a deputation took its way at an
early hour to the palace; the king was suddenly awakened, and
must listen (probably with a headache) to unpalatable
truths. Mrs. Rick, being a sufficient mistress of that
difficult tongue, was spokeswoman; she explained to the sick
monarch that I was an intimate personal friend of Queen
Victoria’s; that immediately on my return I should make her
a report upon Butaritari; and that if my house should have been
again invaded by natives, a man-of-war would be despatched to
make reprisals. It was scarce the fact—rather a just
and necessary parable of the fact, corrected for latitude; and it
certainly told upon the king. He was much affected; he had
conceived the notion (he said) that I was a man of some
importance, but not dreamed it was as bad as this; and the
missionary house was tapu’d under a fine of fifty
dollars.</p>
<p>So much was announced on the return of the deputation; not any
more; and I gathered subsequently that much more had
passed. The protection gained was welcome. It had
been the most annoying and not the least alarming feature of the
day before, that our house was periodically filled with tipsy
natives, twenty or thirty at a time, begging drink, fingering our
goods, hard to be dislodged, awkward to quarrel with. Queen
Victoria’s friend (who was soon promoted to be her son) was
free from these intrusions. Not only my house, but my
neighbourhood as well, was left in peace; even on our walks
abroad we were guarded and prepared for; and, like great persons
visiting a hospital, saw only the fair side. For the matter
of a week we were thus suffered to go out and in and live in a
fool’s paradise, supposing the king to have kept his word,
the tapu to be revived and the island once more sober.</p>
<p><i>Tuesday</i>, <i>July</i> 23.—We dined under a bare
trellis erected for the Fourth of July; and here we used to
linger by lamplight over coffee and tobacco. In that
climate evening approaches without sensible chill; the wind dies
out before sunset; heaven glows a while and fades, and darkens
into the blueness of the tropical night; swiftly and insensibly
the shadows thicken, the stars multiply their number; you look
around you and the day is gone. It was then that we would
see our Chinaman draw near across the compound in a lurching
sphere of light, divided by his shadows; and with the coming of
the lamp the night closed about the table. The faces of the
company, the spars of the trellis, stood out suddenly bright on a
ground of blue and silver, faintly designed with palm-tops and
the peaked roofs of houses. Here and there the gloss upon a
leaf, or the fracture of a stone, returned an isolated
sparkle. All else had vanished. We hung there,
illuminated like a galaxy of stars <i>in vacuo</i>; we sat,
manifest and blind, amid the general ambush of the darkness; and
the islanders, passing with light footfalls and low voices in the
sand of the road, lingered to observe us, unseen.</p>
<p>On Tuesday the dusk had fallen, the lamp had just been
brought, when a missile struck the table with a rattling smack
and rebounded past my ear. Three inches to one side and
this page had never been written; for the thing travelled like a
cannon ball. It was supposed at the time to be a nut,
though even at the time I thought it seemed a small one and fell
strangely.</p>
<p><i>Wednesday</i>, <i>July</i> 24.—The dusk had fallen
once more, and the lamp been just brought out, when the same
business was repeated. And again the missile whistled past
my ear. One nut I had been willing to accept; a second, I
rejected utterly. A cocoa-nut does not come slinging along
on a windless evening, making an angle of about fifteen degrees
with the horizon; cocoa-nuts do not fall on successive nights at
the same hour and spot; in both cases, besides, a specific moment
seemed to have been chosen, that when the lamp was just carried
out, a specific person threatened, and that the head of the
family. I may have been right or wrong, but I believed I
was the mark of some intimidation; believed the missile was a
stone, aimed not to hit, but to frighten.</p>
<p>No idea makes a man more angry. I ran into the road,
where the natives were as usual promenading in the dark; Maka
joined me with a lantern; and I ran from one to another, glared
in quite innocent faces, put useless questions, and proffered
idle threats. Thence I carried my wrath (which was worthy
the son of any queen in history) to the Ricks. They heard
me with depression, assured me this trick of throwing a stone
into a family dinner was not new; that it meant mischief, and was
of a piece with the alarming disposition of the natives.
And then the truth, so long concealed from us, came out.
The king had broken his promise, he had defied the deputation;
the tapu was still dormant, <i>The Land we Live in</i> still
selling drink, and that quarter of the town disturbed and menaced
by perpetual broils. But there was worse ahead: a feast was
now preparing for the birthday of the little princess; and the
tributary chiefs of Kuma and Little Makin were expected
daily. Strong in a following of numerous and somewhat
savage clansmen, each of these was believed, like a Douglas of
old, to be of doubtful loyalty. Kuma (a little pot-bellied
fellow) never visited the palace, never entered the town, but sat
on the beach on a mat, his gun across his knees, parading his
mistrust and scorn; Karaiti of Makin, although he was more bold,
was not supposed to be more friendly; and not only were these
vassals jealous of the throne, but the followers on either side
shared in the animosity. Brawls had already taken place;
blows had passed which might at any moment be repaid in
blood. Some of the strangers were already here and already
drinking; if the debauch continued after the bulk of them had
come, a collision, perhaps a revolution, was to be expected.</p>
<p>The sale of drink is in this group a measure of the jealousy
of traders; one begins, the others are constrained to follow; and
to him who has the most gin, and sells it the most recklessly,
the lion’s share of copra is assured. It is felt by
all to be an extreme expedient, neither safe, decent, nor
dignified. A trader on Tarawa, heated by an eager rivalry,
brought many cases of gin. He told me he sat afterwards day
and night in his house till it was finished, not daring to arrest
the sale, not venturing to go forth, the bush all round him
filled with howling drunkards. At night, above all, when he
was afraid to sleep, and heard shots and voices about him in the
darkness, his remorse was black.</p>
<p>‘My God!’ he reflected, ‘if I was to lose my
life on such a wretched business!’ Often and often,
in the story of the Gilberts, this scene has been repeated; and
the remorseful trader sat beside his lamp, longing for the day,
listening with agony for the sound of murder, registering
resolutions for the future. For the business is easy to
begin, but hazardous to stop. The natives are in their way
a just and law-abiding people, mindful of their debts, docile to
the voice of their own institutions; when the tapu is re-enforced
they will cease drinking; but the white who seeks to antedate the
movement by refusing liquor does so at his peril.</p>
<p>Hence, in some degree, the anxiety and helplessness of Mr.
Rick. He and Tom, alarmed by the rabblement of the <i>Sans
Souci</i>, had stopped the sale; they had done so without danger,
because <i>The Land we Live in</i> still continued selling; it
was claimed, besides, that they had been the first to
begin. What step could be taken? Could Mr. Rick visit
Mr. Muller (with whom he was not on terms) and address him thus:
‘I was getting ahead of you, now you are getting ahead of
me, and I ask you to forego your profit. I got my place
closed in safety, thanks to your continuing; but now I think you
have continued long enough. I begin to be alarmed; and
because I am afraid I ask you to confront a certain
danger’? It was not to be thought of. Something
else had to be found; and there was one person at one end of the
town who was at least not interested in copra. There was
little else to be said in favour of myself as an
ambassador. I had arrived in the Wightman schooner, I was
living in the Wightman compound, I was the daily associate of the
Wightman coterie. It was egregious enough that I should now
intrude unasked in the private affairs of Crawford’s agent,
and press upon him the sacrifice of his interests and the venture
of his life. But bad as I might be, there was none better;
since the affair of the stone I was, besides, sharp-set to be
doing, the idea of a delicate interview attracted me, and I
thought it policy to show myself abroad.</p>
<p>The night was very dark. There was service in the
church, and the building glimmered through all its crevices like
a dim Kirk Allowa’. I saw few other lights, but was
indistinctly aware of many people stirring in the darkness, and a
hum and sputter of low talk that sounded stealthy. I
believe (in the old phrase) my beard was sometimes on my shoulder
as I went. Muller’s was but partly lighted, and quite
silent, and the gate was fastened. I could by no means
manage to undo the latch. No wonder, since I found it
afterwards to be four or five feet long—a fortification in
itself. As I still fumbled, a dog came on the inside and
sniffed suspiciously at my hands, so that I was reduced to
calling ‘House ahoy!’ Mr. Muller came down and
put his chin across the paling in the dark. ‘Who is
that?’ said he, like one who has no mind to welcome
strangers.</p>
<p>‘My name is Stevenson,’ said I.</p>
<p>‘O, Mr. Stevens! I didn’t know you.
Come inside.’ We stepped into the dark store, when I
leaned upon the counter and he against the wall. All the
light came from the sleeping-room, where I saw his family being
put to bed; it struck full in my face, but Mr. Muller stood in
shadow. No doubt he expected what was Coming, and sought
the advantage of position; but for a man who wished to persuade
and had nothing to conceal, mine was the preferable.</p>
<p>‘Look here,’ I began, ‘I hear you are
selling to the natives.’</p>
<p>‘Others have done that before me,’ he returned
pointedly.</p>
<p>‘No doubt,’ said I, ‘and I have nothing to
do with the past, but the future. I want you to promise you
will handle these spirits carefully.’</p>
<p>‘Now what is your motive in this?’ he asked, and
then, with a sneer, ‘Are you afraid of your
life?’</p>
<p>‘That is nothing to the purpose,’ I replied.
‘I know, and you know, these spirits ought not to be used
at all.’</p>
<p>‘Tom and Mr. Rick have sold them before.’</p>
<p>‘I have nothing to do with Tom and Mr. Rick. All I
know is I have heard them both refuse.’</p>
<p>‘No, I suppose you have nothing to do with them.
Then you are just afraid of your life.’</p>
<p>‘Come now,’ I cried, being perhaps a little stung,
‘you know in your heart I am asking a reasonable
thing. I don’t ask you to lose your
profit—though I would prefer to see no spirits brought
here, as you would—’</p>
<p>‘I don’t say I wouldn’t. I
didn’t begin this,’ he interjected.</p>
<p>‘No, I don’t suppose you did,’ said I.
‘And I don’t ask you to lose; I ask you to give me
your word, man to man, that you will make no native
drunk.’</p>
<p>Up to now Mr. Muller had maintained an attitude very trying to
my temper; but he had maintained it with difficulty, his
sentiment being all upon my side; and here he changed ground for
the worse. ‘It isn’t me that sells,’ said
he.</p>
<p>‘No, it’s that nigger,’ I agreed.
‘But he’s yours to buy and sell; you have your hand
on the nape of his neck; and I ask you—I have my wife
here—to use the authority you have.’</p>
<p>He hastily returned to his old ward. ‘I
don’t deny I could if I wanted,’ said he.
‘But there’s no danger, the natives are all
quiet. You’re just afraid of your life.’</p>
<p>I do not like to be called a coward, even by implication; and
here I lost my temper and propounded an untimely ultimatum.
‘You had better put it plain,’ I cried.
‘Do you mean to refuse me what I ask?’</p>
<p>‘I don’t want either to refuse it or grant
it,’ he replied.</p>
<p>‘You’ll find you have to do the one thing or the
other, and right now!’ I cried, and then, striking into a
happier vein, ‘Come,’ said I, ‘you’re a
better sort than that. I see what’s wrong with
you—you think I came from the opposite camp. I see
the sort of man you are, and you know that what I ask is
right.’</p>
<p>Again he changed ground. ‘If the natives get any
drink, it isn’t safe to stop them,’ he objected.</p>
<p>‘I’ll be answerable for the bar,’ I
said. ‘We are three men and four revolvers;
we’ll come at a word, and hold the place against the
village.’</p>
<p>‘You don’t know what you’re talking about;
it’s too dangerous!’ he cried.</p>
<p>‘Look here,’ said I, ‘I don’t mind
much about losing that life you talk so much of; but I mean to
lose it the way I want to, and that is, putting a stop to all
this beastliness.’</p>
<p>He talked a while about his duty to the firm; I minded not at
all, I was secure of victory. He was but waiting to
capitulate, and looked about for any potent to relieve the
strain. In the gush of light from the bedroom door I spied
a cigar-holder on the desk. ‘That is well
coloured,’ said I.</p>
<p>‘Will you take a cigar?’ said he.</p>
<p>I took it and held it up unlighted. ‘Now,’
said I, ‘you promise me.’</p>
<p>‘I promise you you won’t have any trouble from
natives that have drunk at my place,’ he replied.</p>
<p>‘That is all I ask,’ said I, and showed it was not
by immediately offering to try his stock.</p>
<p>So far as it was anyway critical our interview here
ended. Mr. Muller had thenceforth ceased to regard me as an
emissary from his rivals, dropped his defensive attitude, and
spoke as he believed. I could make out that he would
already, had he dared, have stopped the sale himself. Not
quite daring, it may be imagined how he resented the idea of
interference from those who had (by his own statement) first led
him on, then deserted him in the breach, and now (sitting
themselves in safety) egged him on to a new peril, which was all
gain to them, all loss to him! I asked him what he thought
of the danger from the feast.</p>
<p>‘I think worse of it than any of you,’ he
answered. ‘They were shooting around here last night,
and I heard the balls too. I said to myself,
“That’s bad.” What gets me is why you
should be making this row up at your end. I should be the
first to go.’</p>
<p>It was a thoughtless wonder. The consolation of being
second is not great; the fact, not the order of going—there
was our concern.</p>
<p>Scott talks moderately of looking forward to a time of
fighting ‘with a feeling that resembled
pleasure.’ The resemblance seems rather an
identity. In modern life, contact is ended; man grows
impatient of endless manœuvres; and to approach the fact,
to find ourselves where we can push an advantage home, and stand
a fair risk, and see at last what we are made of, stirs the
blood. It was so at least with all my family, who bubbled
with delight at the approach of trouble; and we sat deep into the
night like a pack of schoolboys, preparing the revolvers and
arranging plans against the morrow. It promised certainly
to be a busy and eventful day. The Old Men were to be
summoned to confront me on the question of the tapu; Muller might
call us at any moment to garrison his bar; and suppose Muller to
fail, we decided in a family council to take that matter into our
own hands, <i>The Land we Live in</i> at the pistol’s
mouth, and with the polysyllabic Williams, dance to a new
tune. As I recall our humour I think it would have gone
hard with the mulatto.</p>
<p><i>Wednesday</i>, <i>July</i> 24.—It was as well, and
yet it was disappointing that these thunder-clouds rolled off in
silence. Whether the Old Men recoiled from an interview
with Queen Victoria’s son, whether Muller had secretly
intervened, or whether the step flowed naturally from the fears
of the king and the nearness of the feast, the tapu was early
that morning re-enforced; not a day too soon, from the manner the
boats began to arrive thickly, and the town was filled with the
big rowdy vassals of Karaiti.</p>
<p>The effect lingered for some time on the minds of the traders;
it was with the approval of all present that I helped to draw up
a petition to the United States, praying for a law against the
liquor trade in the Gilberts; and it was at this request that I
added, under my own name, a brief testimony of what had
passed;—useless pains; since the whole reposes, probably
unread and possibly unopened, in a pigeon-hole at Washington.</p>
<p><i>Sunday</i>, <i>July</i> 28.—This day we had the
afterpiece of the debauch. The king and queen, in European
clothes, and followed by armed guards, attended church for the
first time, and sat perched aloft in a precarious dignity under
the barrel-hoops. Before sermon his majesty clambered from
the dais, stood lopsidedly upon the gravel floor, and in a few
words abjured drinking. The queen followed suit with a yet
briefer allocution. All the men in church were next
addressed in turn; each held up his right hand, and the affair
was over—throne and church were reconciled.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER VI—THE FIVE DAYS’ FESTIVAL</h3>
<p><i>Thursday</i>, <i>July</i> 25.—The street was this day
much enlivened by the presence of the men from Little Makin; they
average taller than Butaritarians, and being on a holiday, went
wreathed with yellow leaves and gorgeous in vivid colours.
They are said to be more savage, and to be proud of the
distinction. Indeed, it seemed to us they swaggered in the
town, like plaided Highlanders upon the streets of Inverness,
conscious of barbaric virtues.</p>
<p>In the afternoon the summer parlour was observed to be packed
with people; others standing outside and stooping to peer under
the eaves, like children at home about a circus. It was the
Makin company, rehearsing for the day of competition.
Karaiti sat in the front row close to the singers, where we were
summoned (I suppose in honour of Queen Victoria) to join
him. A strong breathless heat reigned under the iron roof,
and the air was heavy with the scent of wreaths. The
singers, with fine mats about their loins, cocoa-nut feathers set
in rings upon their fingers, and their heads crowned with yellow
leaves, sat on the floor by companies. A varying number of
soloists stood up for different songs; and these bore the chief
part in the music. But the full force of the companies,
even when not singing, contributed continuously to the effect,
and marked the ictus of the measure, mimicking, grimacing,
casting up their heads and eyes, fluttering the feathers on their
fingers, clapping hands, or beating (loud as a kettledrum) on the
left breast; the time was exquisite, the music barbarous, but
full of conscious art. I noted some devices constantly
employed. A sudden change would be introduced (I think of
key) with no break of the measure, but emphasised by a sudden
dramatic heightening of the voice and a swinging, general
gesticulation. The voices of the soloists would begin far
apart in a rude discord, and gradually draw together to a unison;
which, when, they had reached, they were joined and drowned by
the full chorus. The ordinary, hurried, barking unmelodious
movement of the voices would at times be broken and glorified by
a psalm-like strain of melody, often well constructed, or seeming
so by contrast. There was much variety of measure, and
towards the end of each piece, when the fun became fast and
furious, a recourse to this figure—</p>
<p style="text-align: center">
<a href="images/p252.jpg">
<img alt=
"Music. It means two/four time with quaver, quaver, crotchet
repeated for three bars"
title=
"Music. It means two/four time with quaver, quaver, crotchet
repeated for three bars"
src="images/p252.jpg" />
</a></p>
<p>It is difficult to conceive what fire and devilry they get
into these hammering finales; all go together, voices, hands,
eyes, leaves, and fluttering finger-rings; the chorus swings to
the eye, the song throbs on the ear; the faces are convulsed with
enthusiasm and effort.</p>
<p>Presently the troop stood up in a body, the drums forming a
half-circle for the soloists, who were sometimes five or even
more in number. The songs that followed were highly
dramatic; though I had none to give me any explanation, I would
at times make out some shadowy but decisive outline of a plot;
and I was continually reminded of certain quarrelsome concerted
scenes in grand operas at home; just so the single voices issue
from and fall again into the general volume; just so do the
performers separate and crowd together, brandish the raised hand,
and roll the eye to heaven—or the gallery. Already
this is beyond the Thespian model; the art of this people is
already past the embryo: song, dance, drums, quartette and
solo—it is the drama full developed although still in
miniature. Of all so-called dancing in the South Seas, that
which I saw in Butaritari stands easily the first. The
<i>hula</i>, as it may be viewed by the speedy globe-trotter in
Honolulu, is surely the most dull of man’s inventions, and
the spectator yawns under its length as at a college lecture or a
parliamentary debate. But the Gilbert Island dance leads on
the mind; it thrills, rouses, subjugates; it has the essence of
all art, an unexplored imminent significance. Where so many
are engaged, and where all must make (at a given moment) the same
swift, elaborate, and often arbitrary movement, the toil of
rehearsal is of course extreme. But they begin as
children. A child and a man may often be seen together in a
maniap’: the man sings and gesticulates, the child stands
before him with streaming tears and tremulously copies him in act
and sound; it is the Gilbert Island artist learning (as all
artists must) his art in sorrow.</p>
<p>I may seem to praise too much; here is a passage from my
wife’s diary, which proves that I was not alone in being
moved, and completes the picture:—‘The conductor gave
the cue, and all the dancers, waving their arms, swaying their
bodies, and clapping their breasts in perfect time, opened with
an introductory. The performers remained seated, except
two, and once three, and twice a single soloist. These
stood in the group, making a slight movement with the feet and
rhythmical quiver of the body as they sang. There was a
pause after the introductory, and then the real business of the
opera—for it was no less—began; an opera where every
singer was an accomplished actor. The leading man, in an
impassioned ecstasy which possessed him from head to foot, seemed
transfigured; once it was as though a strong wind had swept over
the stage—their arms, their feathered fingers thrilling
with an emotion that shook my nerves as well: heads and bodies
followed like a field of grain before a gust. My blood came
hot and cold, tears pricked my eyes, my head whirled, I felt an
almost irresistible impulse to join the dancers. One drama,
I think, I very nearly understood. A fierce and savage old
man took the solo part. He sang of the birth of a prince,
and how he was tenderly rocked in his mother’s arms; of his
boyhood, when he excelled his fellows in swimming, climbing, and
all athletic sports; of his youth, when he went out to sea with
his boat and fished; of his manhood, when he married a wife who
cradled a son of his own in her arms. Then came the alarm
of war, and a great battle, of which for a time the issue was
doubtful; but the hero conquered, as he always does, and with a
tremendous burst of the victors the piece closed. There
were also comic pieces, which caused great amusement.
During one, an old man behind me clutched me by the arm, shook
his finger in my face with a roguish smile, and said something
with a chuckle, which I took to be the equivalent of “O,
you women, you women; it is true of you all!” I fear
it was not complimentary. At no time was there the least
sign of the ugly indecency of the eastern islands. All was
poetry pure and simple. The music itself was as complex as
our own, though constructed on an entirely different basis; once
or twice I was startled by a bit of something very like the best
English sacred music, but it was only for an instant. At
last there was a longer pause, and this time the dancers were all
on their feet. As the drama went on, the interest
grew. The performers appealed to each other, to the
audience, to the heaven above; they took counsel with each other,
the conspirators drew together in a knot; it was just an opera,
the drums coming in at proper intervals, the tenor, baritone, and
bass all where they should be—except that the voices were
all of the same calibre. A woman once sang from the back
row with a very fine contralto voice spoilt by being made
artificially nasal; I notice all the women affect that
unpleasantness. At one time a boy of angelic beauty was the
soloist; and at another, a child of six or eight, doubtless an
infant phenomenon being trained, was placed in the centre.
The little fellow was desperately frightened and embarrassed at
first, but towards the close warmed up to his work and showed
much dramatic talent. The changing expressions on the faces
of the dancers were so speaking, that it seemed a great stupidity
not to understand them.’</p>
<p>Our neighbour at this performance, Karaiti, somewhat favours
his Butaritarian majesty in shape and feature, being, like him,
portly, bearded, and Oriental. In character he seems the
reverse: alert, smiling, jovial, jocular, industrious. At
home in his own island, he labours himself like a slave, and
makes his people labour like a slave-driver. He takes an
interest in ideas. George the trader told him about
flying-machines. ‘Is that true, George?’ he
asked. ‘It is in the papers,’ replied
George. ‘Well,’ said Karaiti, ‘if that
man can do it with machinery, I can do it without’; and he
designed and made a pair of wings, strapped them on his
shoulders, went to the end of a pier, launched himself into
space, and fell bulkily into the sea. His wives fished him
out, for his wings hindered him in swimming.
‘George,’ said he, pausing as he went up to change,
‘George, you lie.’ He had eight wives, for his
small realm still follows ancient customs; but he showed
embarrassment when this was mentioned to my wife.
‘Tell her I have only brought one here,’ he said
anxiously. Altogether the Black Douglas pleased us much;
and as we heard fresh details of the king’s uneasiness, and
saw for ourselves that all the weapons in the summer parlour had
been hid, we watched with the more admiration the cause of all
this anxiety rolling on his big legs, with his big smiling face,
apparently unarmed, and certainly unattended, through the hostile
town. The Red Douglas, pot-bellied Kuma, having perhaps
heard word of the debauch, remained upon his fief; his vassals
thus came uncommanded to the feast, and swelled the following of
Karaiti.</p>
<p><i>Friday</i>, <i>July</i> 26.—At night in the dark, the
singers of Makin paraded in the road before our house and sang
the song of the princess. ‘This is the day; she was
born to-day; Nei Kamaunave was born to-day—a beautiful
princess, Queen of Butaritari.’ So I was told it went
in endless iteration. The song was of course out of season,
and the performance only a rehearsal. But it was a serenade
besides; a delicate attention to ourselves from our new friend,
Karaiti.</p>
<p><i>Saturday</i>, <i>July</i> 27.—We had announced a
performance of the magic lantern to-night in church; and this
brought the king to visit us. In honour of the Black
Douglas (I suppose) his usual two guardsmen were now increased to
four; and the squad made an outlandish figure as they straggled
after him, in straw hats, kilts and jackets. Three carried
their arms reversed, the butts over their shoulders, the muzzles
menacing the king’s plump back; the fourth had passed his
weapon behind his neck, and held it there with arms extended like
a backboard. The visit was extraordinarily long. The
king, no longer galvanised with gin, said and did nothing.
He sat collapsed in a chair and let a cigar go out. It was
hot, it was sleepy, it was cruel dull; there was no resource but
to spy in the countenance of Tebureimoa for some remaining trait
of <i>Mr. Corpse</i> the butcher. His hawk nose, crudely
depressed and flattened at the point, did truly seem to us to
smell of midnight murder. When he took his leave, Maka bade
me observe him going down the stair (or rather ladder) from the
verandah. ‘Old man,’ said Maka.
‘Yes,’ said I, ‘and yet I suppose not old
man.’ ‘Young man,’ returned Maka,
‘perhaps fo’ty.’ And I have heard since
he is most likely younger.</p>
<p>While the magic lantern was showing, I skulked without in the
dark. The voice of Maka, excitedly explaining the Scripture
slides, seemed to fill not the church only, but the
neighbourhood. All else was silent. Presently a
distant sound of singing arose and approached; and a procession
drew near along the road, the hot clean smell of the men and
women striking in my face delightfully. At the corner,
arrested by the voice of Maka and the lightening and darkening of
the church, they paused. They had no mind to go nearer,
that was plain. They were Makin people, I believe, probably
staunch heathens, contemners of the missionary and his
works. Of a sudden, however, a man broke from their
company, took to his heels, and fled into the church; next moment
three had followed him; the next it was a covey of near upon a
score, all pelting for their lives. So the little band of
the heathen paused irresolute at the corner, and melted before
the attractions of a magic lantern, like a glacier in
spring. The more staunch vainly taunted the deserters;
three fled in a guilty silence, but still fled; and when at
length the leader found the wit or the authority to get his troop
in motion and revive the singing, it was with much diminished
forces that they passed musically on up the dark road.</p>
<p>Meanwhile inside the luminous pictures brightened and
faded. I stood for some while unobserved in the rear of the
spectators, when I could hear just in front of me a pair of
lovers following the show with interest, the male playing the
part of interpreter and (like Adam) mingling caresses with his
lecture. The wild animals, a tiger in particular, and that
old school-treat favourite, the sleeper and the mouse, were
hailed with joy; but the chief marvel and delight was in the
gospel series. Maka, in the opinion of his aggrieved wife,
did not properly rise to the occasion. ‘What is the
matter with the man? Why can’t he talk?’ she
cried. The matter with the man, I think, was the greatness
of the opportunity; he reeled under his good fortune; and whether
he did ill or well, the exposure of these pious
‘phantoms’ did as a matter of fact silence in all
that part of the island the voice of the scoffer.
‘Why then,’ the word went round, ‘why then, the
Bible is true!’ And on our return afterwards we were
told the impression was yet lively, and those who had seen might
be heard telling those who had not, ‘O yes, it is all true;
these things all happened, we have seen the
pictures.’ The argument is not so childish as it
seems; for I doubt if these islanders are acquainted with any
other mode of representation but photography; so that the picture
of an event (on the old melodrama principle that ‘the
camera cannot lie, Joseph,’) would appear strong proof of
its occurrence. The fact amused us the more because our
slides were some of them ludicrously silly, and one (Christ
before Pilate) was received with shouts of merriment, in which
even Maka was constrained to join.</p>
<p><i>Sunday</i>, <i>July</i> 28.—Karaiti came to ask for a
repetition of the ‘phantoms’—this was the
accepted word—and, having received a promise, turned and
left my humble roof without the shadow of a salutation. I
felt it impolite to have the least appearance of pocketing a
slight; the times had been too difficult, and were still too
doubtful; and Queen Victoria’s son was bound to maintain
the honour of his house. Karaiti was accordingly summoned
that evening to the Ricks, where Mrs. Rick fell foul of him in
words, and Queen Victoria’s son assailed him with indignant
looks. I was the ass with the lion’s skin; I could
not roar in the language of the Gilbert Islands; but I could
stare. Karaiti declared he had meant no offence; apologised
in a sound, hearty, gentlemanly manner; and became at once at his
ease. He had in a dagger to examine, and announced he would
come to price it on the morrow, to-day being Sunday; this nicety
in a heathen with eight wives surprised me. The dagger was
‘good for killing fish,’ he said roguishly; and was
supposed to have his eye upon fish upon two legs. It is at
least odd that in Eastern Polynesia fish was the accepted
euphemism for the human sacrifice. Asked as to the
population of his island, Karaiti called out to his vassals who
sat waiting him outside the door, and they put it at four hundred
and fifty; but (added Karaiti jovially) there will soon be plenty
more, for all the women are in the family way. Long before
we separated I had quite forgotten his offence. He,
however, still bore it in mind; and with a very courteous
inspiration returned early on the next day, paid us a long visit,
and punctiliously said farewell when he departed.</p>
<p><i>Monday</i>, <i>July</i> 29.—The great day came round
at last. In the first hours the night was startled by the
sound of clapping hands and the chant of Nei Kamaunava; its
melancholy, slow, and somewhat menacing measures broken at
intervals by a formidable shout. The little morsel of
humanity thus celebrated in the dark hours was observed at midday
playing on the green entirely naked, and equally unobserved and
unconcerned.</p>
<p>The summer parlour on its artificial islet, relieved against
the shimmering lagoon, and shimmering itself with sun and tinned
iron, was all day crowded about by eager men and women.
Within, it was boxed full of islanders, of any age and size, and
in every degree of nudity and finery. So close we squatted,
that at one time I had a mighty handsome woman on my knees, two
little naked urchins having their feet against my back.
There might be a dame in full attire of <i>holoku</i> and hat and
flowers; and her next neighbour might the next moment strip some
little rag of a shift from her fat shoulders and come out a
monument of flesh, painted rather than covered by the hairbreadth
<i>ridi</i>. Little ladies who thought themselves too great
to appear undraped upon so high a festival were seen to pause
outside in the bright sunshine, their miniature ridis in their
hand; a moment more and they were full-dressed and entered the
concert-room.</p>
<p>At either end stood up to sing, or sat down to rest, the
alternate companies of singers; Kuma and Little Makin on the
north, Butaritari and its conjunct hamlets on the south; both
groups conspicuous in barbaric bravery. In the midst,
between these rival camps of troubadours, a bench was placed; and
here the king and queen throned it, some two or three feet above
the crowded audience on the floor—Tebureimoa as usual in
his striped pyjamas with a satchel strapped across one shoulder,
doubtless (in the island fashion) to contain his pistols; the
queen in a purple <i>holoku</i>, her abundant hair let down, a
fan in her hand. The bench was turned facing to the
strangers, a piece of well-considered civility; and when it was
the turn of Butaritari to sing, the pair must twist round on the
bench, lean their elbows on the rail, and turn to us the
spectacle of their broad backs. The royal couple
occasionally solaced themselves with a clay pipe; and the pomp of
state was further heightened by the rifles of a picket of the
guard.</p>
<p>With this kingly countenance, and ourselves squatted on the
ground, we heard several songs from one side or the other.
Then royalty and its guards withdrew, and Queen Victoria’s
son and daughter-in-law were summoned by acclamation to the
vacant throne. Our pride was perhaps a little modified when
we were joined on our high places by a certain thriftless loafer
of a white; and yet I was glad too, for the man had a smattering
of native, and could give me some idea of the subject of the
songs. One was patriotic, and dared Tembinok’ of
Apemama, the terror of the group, to an invasion. One mixed
the planting of taro and the harvest-home. Some were
historical, and commemorated kings and the illustrious chances of
their time, such as a bout of drinking or a war. One, at
least, was a drama of domestic interest, excellently played by
the troop from Makin. It told the story of a man who has
lost his wife, at first bewails her loss, then seeks another: the
earlier strains (or acts) are played exclusively by men; but
towards the end a woman appears, who has just lost her husband;
and I suppose the pair console each other, for the finale seemed
of happy omen. Of some of the songs my informant told me
briefly they were ‘like about the <i>weemen</i>’;
this I could have guessed myself. Each side (I should have
said) was strengthened by one or two women. They were all
soloists, did not very often join in the performance, but stood
disengaged at the back part of the stage, and looked (in
<i>ridi</i>, necklace, and dressed hair) for all the world like
European ballet-dancers. When the song was anyway broad
these ladies came particularly to the front; and it was singular
to see that, after each entry, the <i>première
danseuse</i> pretended to be overcome by shame, as though led on
beyond what she had meant, and her male assistants made a feint
of driving her away like one who had disgraced herself.
Similar affectations accompany certain truly obscene dances of
Samoa, where they are very well in place. Here it was
different. The words, perhaps, in this free-spoken world,
were gross enough to make a carter blush; and the most suggestive
feature was this feint of shame. For such parts the women
showed some disposition; they were pert, they were neat, they
were acrobatic, they were at times really amusing, and some of
them were pretty. But this is not the artist’s field;
there is the whole width of heaven between such capering and
ogling, and the strange rhythmic gestures, and strange,
rapturous, frenzied faces with which the best of the male dancers
held us spellbound through a Gilbert Island ballet.</p>
<p>Almost from the first it was apparent that the people of the
city were defeated. I might have thought them even good,
only I had the other troop before my eyes to correct my standard,
and remind me continually of ‘the little more, and how much
it is.’ Perceiving themselves worsted, the choir of
Butaritari grew confused, blundered, and broke down; amid this
hubbub of unfamiliar intervals I should not myself have
recognised the slip, but the audience were quick to catch it, and
to jeer. To crown all, the Makin company began a dance of
truly superlative merit. I know not what it was about, I
was too much absorbed to ask. In one act a part of the
chorus, squealing in some strange falsetto, produced very much
the effect of our orchestra; in another, the dancers, leaping
like jumping-jacks, with arms extended, passed through and
through each other’s ranks with extraordinary speed,
neatness, and humour. A more laughable effect I never saw;
in any European theatre it would have brought the house down, and
the island audience roared with laughter and applause. This
filled up the measure for the rival company, and they forgot
themselves and decency. After each act or figure of the
ballet, the performers pause a moment standing, and the next is
introduced by the clapping of hands in triplets. Not until
the end of the whole ballet do they sit down, which is the signal
for the rivals to stand up. But now all rules were to be
broken. During the interval following on this great
applause, the company of Butaritari leaped suddenly to their feet
and most unhandsomely began a performance of their own. It
was strange to see the men of Makin staring; I have seen a tenor
in Europe stare with the same blank dignity into a hissing
theatre; but presently, to my surprise, they sobered down, gave
up the unsung remainder of their ballet, resumed their seats, and
suffered their ungallant adversaries to go on and finish.
Nothing would suffice. Again, at the first interval,
Butaritari unhandsomely cut in; Makin, irritated in turn,
followed the example; and the two companies of dancers remained
permanently standing, continuously clapping hands, and regularly
cutting across each other at each pause. I expected blows
to begin with any moment; and our position in the midst was
highly unstrategical. But the Makin people had a better
thought; and upon a fresh interruption turned and trooped out of
the house. We followed them, first because these were the
artists, second because they were guests and had been scurvily
ill-used. A large population of our neighbours did the
same, so that the causeway was filled from end to end by the
procession of deserters; and the Butaritari choir was left to
sing for its own pleasure in an empty house, having gained the
point and lost the audience. It was surely fortunate that
there was no one drunk; but, drunk or sober, where else would a
scene so irritating have concluded without blows?</p>
<p>The last stage and glory of this auspicious day was of our own
providing—the second and positively the last appearance of
the phantoms. All round the church, groups sat outside, in
the night, where they could see nothing; perhaps ashamed to
enter, certainly finding some shadowy pleasure in the mere
proximity. Within, about one-half of the great shed was
densely packed with people. In the midst, on the royal
dais, the lantern luminously smoked; chance rays of light struck
out the earnest countenance of our Chinaman grinding the
hand-organ; a fainter glimmer showed off the rafters and their
shadows in the hollow of the roof; the pictures shone and
vanished on the screen; and as each appeared, there would run a
hush, a whisper, a strong shuddering rustle, and a chorus of
small cries among the crowd. There sat by me the mate of a
wrecked schooner. ‘They would think this a strange
sight in Europe or the States,’ said he, ‘going on in
a building like this, all tied with bits of string.’</p>
<h3>CHAPTER VII—HUSBAND AND WIFE</h3>
<p>The trader accustomed to the manners of Eastern Polynesia has
a lesson to learn among the Gilberts. The <i>ridi</i> is
but a spare attire; as late as thirty years back the women went
naked until marriage; within ten years the custom lingered; and
these facts, above all when heard in description, conveyed a very
false idea of the manners of the group. A very intelligent
missionary described it (in its former state) as a
‘Paradise of naked women’ for the resident
whites. It was at least a platonic Paradise, where Lothario
ventured at his peril. Since 1860, fourteen whites have
perished on a single island, all for the same cause, all found
where they had no business, and speared by some indignant father
of a family; the figure was given me by one of their
contemporaries who had been more prudent and survived. The
strange persistence of these fourteen martyrs might seem to point
to monomania or a series of romantic passions; gin is the more
likely key. The poor buzzards sat alone in their houses by
an open case; they drank; their brain was fired; they stumbled
towards the nearest houses on chance; and the dart went through
their liver. In place of a Paradise the trader found an
archipelago of fierce husbands and of virtuous women.
‘Of course if you wish to make love to them, it’s the
same as anywhere else,’ observed a trader innocently; but
he and his companions rarely so choose.</p>
<p>The trader must be credited with a virtue: he often makes a
kind and loyal husband. Some of the worst beachcombers in
the Pacific, some of the last of the old school, have fallen in
my path, and some of them were admirable to their native wives,
and one made a despairing widower. The position of a
trader’s wife in the Gilberts is, besides, unusually
enviable. She shares the immunities of her husband.
Curfew in Butaritari sounds for her in vain. Long after the
bell is rung and the great island ladies are confined for the
night to their own roof, this chartered libertine may scamper and
giggle through the deserted streets or go down to bathe in the
dark. The resources of the store are at her hand; she goes
arrayed like a queen, and feasts delicately everyday upon tinned
meats. And she who was perhaps of no regard or station
among natives sits with captains, and is entertained on board of
schooners. Five of these privileged dames were some time
our neighbours. Four were handsome skittish lasses,
gamesome like children, and like children liable to fits of
pouting. They wore dresses by day, but there was a tendency
after dark to strip these lendings and to career and squall about
the compound in the aboriginal <i>ridi</i>. Games of cards
were continually played, with shells for counters; their course
was much marred by cheating; and the end of a round (above all if
a man was of the party) resolved itself into a scrimmage for the
counters. The fifth was a matron. It was a picture to
see her sail to church on a Sunday, a parasol in hand, a
nursemaid following, and the baby buried in a trade hat and armed
with a patent feeding-bottle. The service was enlivened by
her continual supervision and correction of the maid. It
was impossible not to fancy the baby was a doll, and the church
some European playroom. All these women were legitimately
married. It is true that the certificate of one, when she
proudly showed it, proved to run thus, that she was
‘married for one night,’ and her gracious partner was
at liberty to ‘send her to hell’ the next morning;
but she was none the wiser or the worse for the dastardly
trick. Another, I heard, was married on a work of mine in a
pirated edition; it answered the purpose as well as a Hall
Bible. Notwithstanding all these allurements of social
distinction, rare food and raiment, a comparative vacation from
toil, and legitimate marriage contracted on a pirated edition,
the trader must sometimes seek long before he can be mated.
While I was in the group one had been eight months on the quest,
and he was still a bachelor.</p>
<p>Within strictly native society the old laws and practices were
harsh, but not without a certain stamp of high-mindedness.
Stealthy adultery was punished with death; open elopement was
properly considered virtue in comparison, and compounded for a
fine in land. The male adulterer alone seems to have been
punished. It is correct manners for a jealous man to hang
himself; a jealous woman has a different remedy—she bites
her rival. Ten or twenty years ago it was a capital offence
to raise a woman’s <i>ridi</i>; to this day it is still
punished with a heavy fine; and the garment itself is still
symbolically sacred. Suppose a piece of land to be disputed
in Butaritari, the claimant who shall first hang a <i>ridi</i> on
the tapu-post has gained his cause, since no one can remove or
touch it but himself.</p>
<p>The <i>ridi</i> was the badge not of the woman but the wife,
the mark not of her sex but of her station. It was the
collar on the slave’s neck, the brand on merchandise.
The adulterous woman seems to have been spared; were the husband
offended, it would be a poor consolation to send his draught
cattle to the shambles. Karaiti, to this day, calls his
eight wives ‘his horses,’ some trader having
explained to him the employment of these animals on farms; and
Nanteitei hired out his wives to do mason-work. Husbands,
at least when of high rank, had the power of life and death; even
whites seem to have possessed it; and their wives, when they had
transgressed beyond forgiveness, made haste to pronounce the
formula of deprecation—<i>I Kana Kim</i>. This form
of words had so much virtue that a condemned criminal repeating
it on a particular day to the king who had condemned him, must be
instantly released. It is an offer of abasement, and,
strangely enough, the reverse—the imitation—is a
common vulgar insult in Great Britain to this day. I give a
scene between a trader and his Gilbert Island wife, as it was
told me by the husband, now one of the oldest residents, but then
a freshman in the group.</p>
<p>‘Go and light a fire,’ said the trader, ‘and
when I have brought this oil I will cook some fish.’
The woman grunted at him, island fashion. ‘I am not a
pig that you should grunt at me,’ said he.</p>
<p>‘I know you are not a pig,’ said the woman,
‘neither am I your slave.’</p>
<p>‘To be sure you are not my slave, and if you do not care
to stop with me, you had better go home to your people,’
said he. ‘But in the mean time go and light the fire;
and when I have brought this oil I will cook some
fish.’</p>
<p>She went as if to obey; and presently when the trader looked
she had built a fire so big that the cook-house was catching in
flames.</p>
<p>‘<i>I Kana Kim</i>!’ she cried, as she saw him
coming; but he recked not, and hit her with a cooking-pot.
The leg pierced her skull, blood spouted, it was thought she was
a dead woman, and the natives surrounded the house in a menacing
expectation. Another white was present, a man of older
experience. ‘You will have us both killed if you go
on like this,’ he cried. ‘She had said <i>I
Kana Kim</i>!’ If she had not said <i>I Kana Kim</i>
he might have struck her with a caldron. It was not the
blow that made the crime, but the disregard of an accepted
formula.</p>
<p>Polygamy, the particular sacredness of wives, their
semi-servile state, their seclusion in kings’ harems, even
their privilege of biting, all would seem to indicate a
Mohammedan society and the opinion of the soullessness of
woman. And not so in the least. It is a mere
appearance. After you have studied these extremes in one
house, you may go to the next and find all reversed, the woman
the mistress, the man only the first of her thralls. The
authority is not with the husband as such, nor the wife as
such. It resides in the chief or the chief-woman; in him or
her who has inherited the lands of the clan, and stands to the
clansman in the place of parent, exacting their service,
answerable for their fines. There is but the one source of
power and the one ground of dignity—rank. The king
married a chief-woman; she became his menial, and must work with
her hands on Messrs. Wightman’s pier. The king
divorced her; she regained at once her former state and
power. She married the Hawaiian sailor, and behold the man
is her flunkey and can be shown the door at pleasure. Nay,
and such low-born lords are even corrected physically, and, like
grown but dutiful children, must endure the discipline.</p>
<p>We were intimate in one such household, that of Nei Takauti
and Nan Tok’; I put the lady first of necessity.
During one week of fool’s paradise, Mrs. Stevenson had gone
alone to the sea-side of the island after shells. I am very
sure the proceeding was unsafe; and she soon perceived a man and
woman watching her. Do what she would, her guardians held
her steadily in view; and when the afternoon began to fall, and
they thought she had stayed long enough, took her in charge, and
by signs and broken English ordered her home. On the way
the lady drew from her earring-hole a clay pipe, the husband
lighted it, and it was handed to my unfortunate wife, who knew
not how to refuse the incommodious favour; and when they were all
come to our house, the pair sat down beside her on the floor, and
improved the occasion with prayer. From that day they were
our family friends; bringing thrice a day the beautiful island
garlands of white flowers, visiting us any evening, and
frequently carrying us down to their own maniap’ in return,
the woman leading Mrs. Stevenson by the hand like one child with
another.</p>
<p>Nan Tok’, the husband, was young, extremely handsome, of
the most approved good humour, and suffering in his precarious
station from suppressed high spirits. Nei Takauti, the
wife, was getting old; her grown son by a former marriage had
just hanged himself before his mother’s eyes in despair at
a well-merited rebuke. Perhaps she had never been
beautiful, but her face was full of character, her eye of sombre
fire. She was a high chief-woman, but by a strange
exception for a person of her rank, was small, spare, and sinewy,
with lean small hands and corded neck. Her full dress of an
evening was invariably a white chemise—and for adornment,
green leaves (or sometimes white blossoms) stuck in her hair and
thrust through her huge earring-holes. The husband on the
contrary changed to view like a kaleidoscope. Whatever
pretty thing my wife might have given to Nei Takauti—a
string of beads, a ribbon, a piece of bright
fabric—appeared the next evening on the person of Nan
Tok’. It was plain he was a clothes-horse; that he
wore livery; that, in a word, he was his wife’s wife.
They reversed the parts indeed, down to the least particular; it
was the husband who showed himself the ministering angel in the
hour of pain, while the wife displayed the apathy and
heartlessness of the proverbial man.</p>
<p>When Nei Takauti had a headache Nan Tok’ was full of
attention and concern. When the husband had a cold and a
racking toothache the wife heeded not, except to jeer. It
is always the woman’s part to fill and light the pipe; Nei
Takauti handed hers in silence to the wedded page; but she
carried it herself, as though the page were not entirely
trusted. Thus she kept the money, but it was he who ran the
errands, anxiously sedulous. A cloud on her face dimmed
instantly his beaming looks; on an early visit to their
maniap’ my wife saw he had cause to be wary. Nan
Tok’ had a friend with him, a giddy young thing, of his own
age and sex; and they had worked themselves into that stage of
jocularity when consequences are too often disregarded. Nei
Takauti mentioned her own name. Instantly Nan Tok’
held up two fingers, his friend did likewise, both in an ecstasy
of slyness. It was plain the lady had two names; and from
the nature of their merriment, and the wrath that gathered on her
brow, there must be something ticklish in the second. The
husband pronounced it; a well-directed cocoa-nut from the hand of
his wife caught him on the side of the head, and the voices and
the mirth of these indiscreet young gentlemen ceased for the
day.</p>
<p>The people of Eastern Polynesia are never at a loss; their
etiquette is absolute and plenary; in every circumstance it tells
them what to do and how to do it. The Gilbertines are
seemingly more free, and pay for their freedom (like ourselves)
in frequent perplexity. This was often the case with the
topsy-turvy couple. We had once supplied them during a
visit with a pipe and tobacco; and when they had smoked and were
about to leave, they found themselves confronted with a problem:
should they take or leave what remained of the tobacco? The
piece of plug was taken up, it was laid down again, it was handed
back and forth, and argued over, till the wife began to look
haggard and the husband elderly. They ended by taking it,
and I wager were not yet clear of the compound before they were
sure they had decided wrong. Another time they had been
given each a liberal cup of coffee, and Nan Tok’ with
difficulty and disaffection made an end of his. Nei Takauti
had taken some, she had no mind for more, plainly conceived it
would be a breach of manners to set down the cup unfinished, and
ordered her wedded retainer to dispose of what was left.
‘I have swallowed all I can, I cannot swallow more, it is a
physical impossibility,’ he seemed to say; and his stern
officer reiterated her commands with secret imperative
signals. Luckless dog! but in mere humanity we came to the
rescue and removed the cup.</p>
<p>I cannot but smile over this funny household; yet I remember
the good souls with affection and respect. Their attention
to ourselves was surprising. The garlands are much
esteemed, the blossoms must be sought far and wide; and though
they had many retainers to call to their aid, we often saw
themselves passing afield after the blossoms, and the wife
engaged with her own in putting them together. It was no
want of only that disregard so incident to husbands, that made
Nei Takauti despise the sufferings of Nan Tok’. When
my wife was unwell she proved a diligent and kindly nurse; and
the pair, to the extreme embarrassment of the sufferer, became
fixtures in the sick-room. This rugged, capable, imperious
old dame, with the wild eyes, had deep and tender qualities: her
pride in her young husband it seemed that she dissembled, fearing
possibly to spoil him; and when she spoke of her dead son there
came something tragic in her face. But I seemed to trace in
the Gilbertines a virility of sense and sentiment which
distinguishes them (like their harsh and uncouth language) from
their brother islanders in the east.</p>
<h2>PART IV: THE GILBERTS—APEMAMA</h2>
<h3>CHAPTER I—THE KING OF APEMAMA: THE ROYAL TRADER</h3>
<p>There is one great personage in the Gilberts: Tembinok’
of Apemama: solely conspicuous, the hero of song, the butt of
gossip. Through the rest of the group the kings are slain
or fallen in tutelage: Tembinok’ alone remains, the last
tyrant, the last erect vestige of a dead society. The white
man is everywhere else, building his houses, drinking his gin,
getting in and out of trouble with the weak native
governments. There is only one white on Apemama, and he on
sufferance, living far from court, and hearkening and watching
his conduct like a mouse in a cat’s ear. Through all
the other islands a stream of native visitors comes and goes,
travelling by families, spending years on the grand tour.
Apemama alone is left upon one side, the tourist dreading to risk
himself within the clutch of Tembinok’. And fear of
the same Gorgon follows and troubles them at home. Maiana
once paid him tribute; he once fell upon and seized Nonuti: first
steps to the empire of the archipelago. A British warship
coming on the scene, the conqueror was driven to disgorge, his
career checked in the outset, his dear-bought armoury sunk in his
own lagoon. But the impression had been made; periodical
fear of him still shakes the islands; rumour depicts him
mustering his canoes for a fresh onfall; rumour can name his
destination; and Tembinok’ figures in the patriotic
war-songs of the Gilberts like Napoleon in those of our
grandfathers.</p>
<p>We were at sea, bound from Mariki to Nonuti and Tapituea, when
the wind came suddenly fair for Apemama. The course was at
once changed; all hands were turned-to to clean ship, the decks
holy-stoned, all the cabin washed, the trade-room
overhauled. In all our cruising we never saw the
<i>Equator</i> so smart as she was made for
Tembinok’. Nor was Captain Reid alone in these
coquetries; for, another schooner chancing to arrive during my
stay in Apemama, I found that she also was dandified for the
occasion. And the two cases stand alone in my experience of
South Sea traders.</p>
<p>We had on board a family of native tourists, from the
grandsire to the babe in arms, trying (against an extraordinary
series of ill-luck) to regain their native island of Peru. <a
name="citation275"></a><a href="#footnote275"
class="citation">[275]</a> Five times already they had paid
their fare and taken ship; five times they had been disappointed,
dropped penniless upon strange islands, or carried back to
Butaritari, whence they sailed. This last attempt had been
no better-starred; their provisions were exhausted. Peru
was beyond hope, and they had cheerfully made up their minds to a
fresh stage of exile in Tapituea or Nonuti. With this slant
of wind their random destination became once more changed; and
like the Calendar’s pilot, when the ‘black
mountains’ hove in view, they changed colour and beat upon
their breasts. Their camp, which was on deck in the
ship’s waist, resounded with complaint. They would be
set to work, they must become slaves, escape was hopeless, they
must live and toil and die in Apemama, in the tyrant’s
den. With this sort of talk they so greatly terrified their
children, that one (a big hulking boy) must at last be torn
screaming from the schooner’s side. And their fears
were wholly groundless. I have little doubt they were not
suffered to be idle; but I can vouch for it that they were kindly
and generously used. For, the matter of a year later, I was
once more shipmate with these inconsistent wanderers on board the
<i>Janet Nicoll</i>. Their fare was paid by
Tembinok’; they who had gone ashore from the <i>Equator</i>
destitute, reappeared upon the <i>Janet</i> with new clothes,
laden with mats and presents, and bringing with them a magazine
of food, on which they lived like fighting-cocks throughout the
voyage; I saw them at length repatriated, and I must say they
showed more concern on quitting Apemama than delight at reaching
home.</p>
<p>We entered by the north passage (Sunday, September 1st),
dodging among shoals. It was a day of fierce equatorial
sunshine; but the breeze was strong and chill; and the mate, who
conned the schooner from the cross-trees, returned shivering to
the deck. The lagoon was thick with many-tinted wavelets; a
continuous roaring of the outer sea overhung the anchorage; and
the long, hollow crescent of palm ruffled and sparkled in the
wind. Opposite our berth the beach was seen to be
surmounted for some distance by a terrace of white coral seven or
eight feet high and crowned in turn by the scattered and
incongruous buildings of the palace. The village adjoins on
the south, a cluster of high-roofed maniap’s. And
village and palace seemed deserted.</p>
<p>We were scarce yet moored, however, before distant and busy
figures appeared upon the beach, a boat was launched, and a crew
pulled out to us bringing the king’s ladder.
Tembinok’ had once an accident; has feared ever since to
entrust his person to the rotten chandlery of South Sea traders;
and devised in consequence a frame of wood, which is brought on
board a ship as soon as she appears, and remains lashed to her
side until she leave. The boat’s crew, having applied
this engine, returned at once to shore. They might not come
on board; neither might we land, or not without danger of
offence; the king giving pratique in person. An interval
followed, during which dinner was delayed for the great
man—the prelude of the ladder, giving us some notion of his
weighty body and sensible, ingenious character, had highly
whetted our curiosity; and it was with something like excitement
that we saw the beach and terrace suddenly blacken with attendant
vassals, the king and party embark, the boat (a man-of-war gig)
come flying towards us dead before the wind, and the royal
coxswain lay us cleverly aboard, mount the ladder with a jealous
diffidence, and descend heavily on deck.</p>
<p>Not long ago he was overgrown with fat, obscured to view, and
a burthen to himself. Captains visiting the island advised
him to walk; and though it broke the habits of a life and the
traditions of his rank, he practised the remedy with
benefit. His corpulence is now portable; you would call him
lusty rather than fat; but his gait is still dull, stumbling, and
elephantine. He neither stops nor hastens, but goes about
his business with an implacable deliberation. We could
never see him and not be struck with his extraordinary natural
means for the theatre: a beaked profile like Dante’s in the
mask, a mane of long black hair, the eye brilliant, imperious,
and inquiring: for certain parts, and to one who could have used
it, the face was a fortune. His voice matched it well,
being shrill, powerful, and uncanny, with a note like a
sea-bird’s. Where there are no fashions, none to set
them, few to follow them if they were set, and none to criticise,
he dresses—as Sir Charles Grandison lived—‘to
his own heart.’ Now he wears a woman’s frock,
now a naval uniform; now (and more usually) figures in a
masquerade costume of his own design: trousers and a singular
jacket with shirt tails, the cut and fit wonderful for island
workmanship, the material always handsome, sometimes green
velvet, sometimes cardinal red silk. This masquerade
becomes him admirably. In the woman’s frock he looks
ominous and weird beyond belief. I see him now come pacing
towards me in the cruel sun, solitary, a figure out of
Hoffmann.</p>
<p>A visit on board ship, such as that at which we now assisted,
makes a chief part and by far the chief diversion of the life of
Tembinok’. He is not only the sole ruler, he is the
sole merchant of his triple kingdom, Apemama, Aranuka, and Kuria,
well-planted islands. The taro goes to the chiefs, who
divide as they please among their immediate adherents; but
certain fish, turtles—which abound in Kuria,—and the
whole produce of the coco-palm, belong exclusively to
Tembinok’. ‘A’ cobra <a
name="citation279a"></a><a href="#footnote279a"
class="citation">[279a]</a> berong me,’ observed his
majesty with a wave of his hand; and he counts and sells it by
the houseful. ‘You got copra, king?’ I have
heard a trader ask. ‘I got two, three outches,’
<a name="citation279b"></a><a href="#footnote279b"
class="citation">[279b]</a> his majesty replied: ‘I think
three.’ Hence the commercial importance of Apemama,
the trade of three islands being centred there in a single hand;
hence it is that so many whites have tried in vain to gain or to
preserve a footing; hence ships are adorned, cooks have special
orders, and captains array themselves in smiles, to greet the
king. If he be pleased with his welcome and the fare he may
pass days on board, and, every day, and sometimes every hour,
will be of profit to the ship. He oscillates between the
cabin, where he is entertained with strange meats, and the
trade-room, where he enjoys the pleasures of shopping on a scale
to match his person. A few obsequious attendants squat by
the house door, awaiting his least signal. In the boat,
which has been suffered to drop astern, one or two of his wives
lie covered from the sun under mats, tossed by the short sea of
the lagoon, and enduring agonies of heat and tedium. This
severity is now and then relaxed and the wives allowed on
board. Three or four were thus favoured on the day of our
arrival: substantial ladies airily attired in <i>ridis</i>.
Each had a share of copra, her <i>peculium</i>, to dispose of for
herself. The display in the trade-room—hats,
ribbbons, dresses, scents, tins of salmon—the pride of the
eye and the lust of the flesh—tempted them in vain.
They had but the one idea—tobacco, the island currency,
tantamount to minted gold; returned to shore with it, burthened
but rejoicing; and late into the night, on the royal terrace,
were to be seen counting the sticks by lamplight in the open
air.</p>
<p>The king is no such economist. He is greedy of things
new and foreign. House after house, chest after chest, in
the palace precinct, is already crammed with clocks, musical
boxes, blue spectacles, umbrellas, knitted waistcoats, bolts of
stuff, tools, rifles, fowling-pieces, medicines, European foods,
sewing-machines, and, what is more extraordinary, stoves: all
that ever caught his eye, tickled his appetite, pleased him for
its use, or puzzled him with its apparent inutility. And
still his lust is unabated. He is possessed by the seven
devils of the collector. He hears a thing spoken of, and a
shadow comes on his face. ‘I think I no got
him,’ he will say; and the treasures he has seem worthless
in comparison. If a ship be bound for Apemama, the merchant
racks his brain to hit upon some novelty. This he leaves
carelessly in the main cabin or partly conceals in his own berth,
so that the king shall spy it for himself. ‘How much
you want?’ inquires Tembinok’, passing and
pointing. ‘No, king; that too dear,’ returns
the trader. ‘I think I like him,’ says the
king. This was a bowl of gold-fish. On another
occasion it was scented soap. ‘No, king; that cost
too much,’ said the trader; ‘too good for a
Kanaka.’ ‘How much you got? I take him
all,’ replied his majesty, and became the lord of seventeen
boxes at two dollars a cake. Or again, the merchant feigns
the article is not for sale, is private property, an heirloom or
a gift; and the trick infallibly succeeds. Thwart the king
and you hold him. His autocratic nature rears at the
affront of opposition. He accepts it for a challenge; sets
his teeth like a hunter going at a fence; and with no mark of
emotion, scarce even of interest, stolidly piles up the
price. Thus, for our sins, he took a fancy to my
wife’s dressing-bag, a thing entirely useless to the man,
and sadly battered by years of service. Early one forenoon
he came to our house, sat down, and abruptly offered to purchase
it. I told him I sold nothing, and the bag at any rate was
a present from a friend; but he was acquainted with these
pretexts from of old, and knew what they were worth and how to
meet them. Adopting what I believe is called ‘the
object method,’ he drew out a bag of English gold,
sovereigns and half-sovereigns, and began to lay them one by one
in silence on the table; at each fresh piece reading our faces
with a look. In vain I continued to protest I was no
trader; he deigned not to reply. There must have been
twenty pounds on the table, he was still going on, and irritation
had begun to mingle with our embarrassment, when a happy idea
came to our delivery. Since his majesty thought so much of
the bag, we said, we must beg him to accept it as a
present. It was the most surprising turn in
Tembinok’s experience. He perceived too late that his
persistence was unmannerly; hung his head a while in silence;
then, lifting up a sheepish countenance, ‘I
‘shamed,’ said the tyrant. It was the first and
the last time we heard him own to a flaw in his behaviour.
Half an hour after he sent us a camphor-wood chest worth only a
few dollars—but then heaven knows what Tembinok’ had
paid for it.</p>
<p>Cunning by nature, and versed for forty years in the
government of men, it must not be supposed that he is cheated
blindly, or has resigned himself without resistance to be the
milch-cow of the passing trader. His efforts have been even
heroic. Like Nakaeia of Makin, he has owned
schooners. More fortunate than Nakaeia, he has found
captains. Ships of his have sailed as far as to the
colonies. He has trafficked direct, in his own bottoms,
with New Zealand. And even so, even there, the
world-enveloping dishonesty of the white man prevented him; his
profit melted, his ship returned in debt, the money for the
insurance was embezzled, and when the <i>Coronet</i> came to be
lost, he was astonished to find he had lost all. At this he
dropped his weapons; owned he might as hopefully wrestle with the
winds of heaven; and like an experienced sheep, submitted his
fleece thenceforward to the shearers. He is the last man in
the world to waste anger on the incurable; accepts it with
cynical composure; asks no more in those he deals with than a
certain decency of moderation; drives as good a bargain as he
can; and when he considers he is more than usually swindled,
writes it in his memory against the merchant’s name.
He once ran over to me a list of captains and supercargoes with
whom he had done business, classing them under three heads:
‘He cheat a litty’—‘He cheat
plenty’—and ‘I think he cheat too
much.’ For the first two classes he expressed perfect
toleration; sometimes, but not always, for the third. I was
present when a certain merchant was turned about his business,
and was the means (having a considerable influence ever since the
bag) of patching up the dispute. Even on the day of our
arrival there was like to have been a hitch with Captain Reid:
the ground of which is perhaps worth recital. Among goods
exported specially for Tembinok’ there is a beverage known
(and labelled) as Hennessy’s brandy. It is neither
Hennessy, nor even brandy; is about the colour of sherry, but is
not sherry; tastes of kirsch, and yet neither is it kirsch.
The king, at least, has grown used to this amazing brand, and
rather prides himself upon the taste; and any substitution is a
double offence, being at once to cheat him and to cast a doubt
upon his palate. A similar weakness is to be observed in
all connoisseurs. Now the last case sold by the
<i>Equator</i> was found to contain a different and I would
fondly fancy a superior distillation; and the conversation opened
very black for Captain Reid. But Tembinok’ is a
moderate man. He was reminded and admitted that all men
were liable to error, even himself; accepted the principle that a
fault handsomely acknowledged should be condoned; and wound the
matter up with this proposal: ‘Tuppoti <a
name="citation283"></a><a href="#footnote283"
class="citation">[283]</a> I mi’take, you ’peakee
me. Tuppoti you mi’take, I ’peakee you.
Mo’ betta.’</p>
<p>After dinner and supper in the cabin, a glass or two of
‘Hennetti’—the genuine article this time, with
the kirsch bouquet,—and five hours’ lounging on the
trade-room counter, royalty embarked for home. Three tacks
grounded the boat before the palace; the wives were carried
ashore on the backs of vassals; Tembinok’ stepped on a
railed platform like a steamer’s gangway, and was borne
shoulder high through the shallows, up the beach, and by an
inclined plane, paved with pebbles, to the glaring terrace where
he dwells.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER II—THE KING OF APEMAMA: FOUNDATION OF EQUATOR
TOWN</h3>
<p>Our first sight of Tembinok’ was a matter of concern,
almost alarm, to my whole party. We had a favour to seek;
we must approach in the proper courtly attitude of a suitor; and
must either please him or fail in the main purpose of our
voyage. It was our wish to land and live in Apemama, and
see more near at hand the odd character of the man and the odd
(or rather ancient) condition of his island. In all other
isles of the South Seas a white man may land with his chest, and
set up house for a lifetime, if he choose, and if he have the
money or the trade; no hindrance is conceivable. But
Apemama is a close island, lying there in the sea with closed
doors; the king himself, like a vigilant officer, ready at the
wicket to scrutinise and reject intrenching visitors. Hence
the attraction of our enterprise; not merely because it was a
little difficult, but because this social quarantine, a curiosity
in itself, has been the preservative of others.</p>
<p>Tembinok’, like most tyrants, is a conservative; like
many conservatives, he eagerly welcomes new ideas, and, except in
the field of politics, leans to practical reform. When the
missionaries came, professing a knowledge of the truth, he
readily received them; attended their worship, acquired the
accomplishment of public prayer, and made himself a student at
their feet. It is thus—it is by the cultivation of
similar passing chances—that he has learned to read, to
write, to cipher, and to speak his queer, personal English, so
different from ordinary ‘Beach de Mar,’ so much more
obscure, expressive, and condensed. His education attended
to, he found time to become critical of the new inmates.
Like Nakaeia of Makin, he is an admirer of silence in the island;
broods over it like a great ear; has spies who report daily; and
had rather his subjects sang than talked. The service, and
in particular the sermon, were thus sure to become offences:
‘Here, in my island, <i>I</i> ’peak,’ he once
observed to me. ‘My chieps no ’peak—do
what I talk.’ He looked at the missionary, and what
did he see? ‘See Kanaka ’peak in a big
outch!’ he cried, with a strong ring of sarcasm. Yet
he endured the subversive spectacle, and might even have
continued to endure it, had not a fresh point arisen. He
looked again, to employ his own figure; and the Kanaka was no
longer speaking, he was doing worse—he was building a
copra-house. The king was touched in his chief interests;
revenue and prerogative were threatened. He considered
besides (and some think with him) that trade is incompatible with
the missionary claims. ‘Tuppoti mitonary think
“good man”: very good. Tuppoti he think
“cobra”: no good. I send him away
ship.’ Such was his abrupt history of the evangelist
in Apemama.</p>
<p>Similar deportations are common: ‘I send him away
ship’ is the epitaph of not a few, his majesty paying the
exile’s fare to the next place of call. For instance,
being passionately fond of European food, he has several times
added to his household a white cook, and one after another these
have been deported. They, on their side, swear they were
not paid their wages; he, on his, that they robbed and swindled
him beyond endurance: both perhaps justly. A more important
case was that of an agent, despatched (as I heard the story) by a
firm of merchants to worm his way into the king’s good
graces, become, if possible, premier, and handle the copra in the
interest of his employers. He obtained authority to land,
practised his fascinations, was patiently listened to by
Tembinok’, supposed himself on the highway to success; and
behold! when the next ship touched at Apemama, the would-be
premier was flung into a boat—had on board—his fare
paid, and so good-bye. But it is needless to multiply
examples; the proof of the pudding is in the eating. When
we came to Apemama, of so many white men who have scrambled for a
place in that rich market, one remained—a silent, sober,
solitary, niggardly recluse, of whom the king remarks, ‘I
think he good; he no ’peak.’</p>
<p>I was warned at the outset we might very well fail in our
design: yet never dreamed of what proved to be the fact, that we
should be left four-and-twenty hours in suspense and come within
an ace of ultimate rejection. Captain Reid had primed
himself; no sooner was the king on board, and the Hennetti
question amicably settled, than he proceeded to express my
request and give an abstract of my claims and virtues. The
gammon about Queen Victoria’s son might do for Butaritari;
it was out of the question here; and I now figured as ‘one
of the Old Men of England,’ a person of deep knowledge,
come expressly to visit Tembinok’s dominion, and eager to
report upon it to the no less eager Queen Victoria. The
king made no shadow of an answer, and presently began upon a
different subject. We might have thought that he had not
heard, or not understood; only that we found ourselves the
subject of a constant study. As we sat at meals, he took us
in series and fixed upon each, for near a minute at a time, the
same hard and thoughtful stare. As he thus looked he seemed
to forget himself, the subject and the company, and to become
absorbed in the process of his thought; the look was wholly
impersonal; I have seen the same in the eyes of
portrait-painters. The counts upon which whites have been
deported are mainly four: cheating Tembinok’, meddling
overmuch with copra, which is the source of his wealth, and one
of the sinews of his power, <i>’peaking</i>, and political
intrigue. I felt guiltless upon all; but how to show
it? I would not have taken copra in a gift: how to express
that quality by my dinner-table bearing? The rest of the
party shared my innocence and my embarrassment. They shared
also in my mortification when after two whole meal-times and the
odd moments of an afternoon devoted to this reconnoitring,
Tembinok’ took his leave in silence. Next morning,
the same undisguised study, the same silence, was resumed; and
the second day had come to its maturity before I was informed
abruptly that I had stood the ordeal. ‘I look your
eye. You good man. You no lie,’ said the king:
a doubtful compliment to a writer of romance. Later he
explained he did not quite judge by the eye only, but the mouth
as well. ‘Tuppoti I see man,’ he
explained. ‘I no tavvy good man, bad man. I
look eye, look mouth. Then I tavvy. Look <i>eye</i>,
look mouth,’ he repeated. And indeed in our case the
mouth had the most to do with it, and it was by our talk that we
gained admission to the island; the king promising himself (and I
believe really amassing) a vast amount of useful knowledge ere we
left.</p>
<p>The terms of our admission were as follows: We were to choose
a site, and the king should there build us a town. His
people should work for us, but the king only was to give them
orders. One of his cooks should come daily to help mine,
and to learn of him. In case our stores ran out, he would
supply us, and be repaid on the return of the
<i>Equator</i>. On the other hand, he was to come to meals
with us when so inclined; when he stayed at home, a dish was to
be sent him from our table; and I solemnly engaged to give his
subjects no liquor or money (both of which they are forbidden to
possess) and no tobacco, which they were to receive only from the
royal hand. I think I remember to have protested against
the stringency of this last article; at least, it was relaxed,
and when a man worked for me I was allowed to give him a pipe of
tobacco on the premises, but none to take away.</p>
<p>The site of Equator City—we named our city for the
schooner—was soon chosen. The immediate shores of the
lagoon are windy and blinding; Tembinok’ himself is glad to
grope blue-spectacled on his terrace; and we fled the
neighbourhood of the red <i>conjunctiva</i>, the suppurating
eyeball, and the beggar who pursues and beseeches the passing
foreigner for eye wash. Behind the town the country is
diversified; here open, sandy, uneven, and dotted with dwarfish
palms; here cut up with taro trenches, deep and shallow, and,
according to the growth of the plants, presenting now the
appearance of a sandy tannery, now of an alleyed and green
garden. A path leads towards the sea, mounting abruptly to
the main level of the island—twenty or even thirty feet,
although Findlay gives five; and just hard by the top of the
rise, where the coco-palms begin to be well grown, we found a
grove of pandanus, and a piece of soil pleasantly covered with
green underbush. A well was not far off under a rustic
well-house; nearer still, in a sandy cup of the land, a pond
where we might wash our clothes. The place was out of the
wind, out of the sun, and out of sight of the village. It
was shown to the king, and the town promised for the morrow.</p>
<p>The morrow came, Mr. Osbourne landed, found nothing done, and
carried his complaint to Tembinok’. He heard it,
rose, called for a Winchester, stepped without the royal
palisade, and fired two shots in the air. A shot in the air
is the first Apemama warning; it has the force of a proclamation
in more loquacious countries; and his majesty remarked agreeably
that it would make his labourers ‘mo’
bright.’ In less than thirty minutes, accordingly,
the men had mustered, the work was begun, and we were told that
we might bring our baggage when we pleased.</p>
<p>It was two in the afternoon ere the first boat was beached,
and the long procession of chests and crates and sacks began to
straggle through the sandy desert towards Equator Town. The
grove of pandanus was practically a thing of the past. Fire
surrounded and smoke rose in the green underbush. In a wide
circuit the axes were still crashing. Those very advantages
for which the place was chosen, it had been the king’s
first idea to abolish; and in the midst of this devastation there
stood already a good-sized maniap’ and a small closed
house. A mat was spread near by for Tembinok’; here
he sat superintending, in cardinal red, a pith helmet on his
head, a meerschaum pipe in his mouth, a wife stretched at his
back with custody of the matches and tobacco. Twenty or
thirty feet in front of him the bulk of the workers squatted on
the ground; some of the bush here survived and in this the
commons sat nearly to their shoulders, and presented only an arc
of brown faces, black heads, and attentive eyes fixed on his
majesty. Long pauses reigned, during which the subjects
stared and the king smoked. Then Tembinok’ would
raise his voice and speak shrilly and briefly. There was
never a response in words; but if the speech were jesting, there
came by way of answer discreet, obsequious laughter—such
laughter as we hear in schoolrooms; and if it were practical, the
sudden uprising and departure of the squad. Twice they so
disappeared, and returned with further elements of the city: a
second house and a second maniap’. It was singular to
spy, far off through the coco stems, the silent oncoming of the
maniap’, at first (it seemed) swimming spontaneously in the
air—but on a nearer view betraying under the eaves many
score of moving naked legs. In all the affair servile
obedience was no less remarkable than servile deliberation.
The gang had here mustered by the note of a deadly weapon; the
man who looked on was the unquestioned master of their lives; and
except for civility, they bestirred themselves like so many
American hotel clerks. The spectator was aware of an
unobtrusive yet invincible inertia, at which the skipper of a
trading dandy might have torn his hair.</p>
<p>Yet the work was accomplished. By dusk, when his majesty
withdrew, the town was founded and complete, a new and ruder
Amphion having called it from nothing with three cracks of a
rifle. And the next morning the same conjurer obliged us
with a further miracle: a mystic rampart fencing us, so that the
path which ran by our doors became suddenly impassable, the
inhabitants who had business across the isle must fetch a wide
circuit, and we sat in the midst in a transparent privacy,
seeing, seen, but unapproachable, like bees in a glass
hive. The outward and visible sign of this glamour was no
more than a few ragged coco-leaf garlands round the stems of the
outlying palms; but its significance reposed on the tremendous
sanction of the tapu and the guns of Tembinok’.</p>
<p>We made our first meal that night in the improvised city,
where we were to stay two months, and which—so soon as we
had done with it—was to vanish in a day as it appeared, its
elements returning whence they came, the tapu raised, the traffic
on the path resumed, the sun and the moon peering in vain between
the palm-trees for the bygone work, the wind blowing over an
empty site. Yet the place, which is now only an episode in
some memories, seemed to have been built, and to be destined to
endure, for years. It was a busy hamlet. One of the
maniap’s we made our dining-room, one the kitchen.
The houses we reserved for sleeping. They were on the
admirable Apemama plan: out and away the best house in the South
Seas; standing some three feet above the ground on posts; the
sides of woven flaps, which can be raised to admit light and air,
or lowered to shut out the wind and the rain: airy, healthy,
clean, and watertight. We had a hen of a remarkable kind:
almost unique in my experience, being a hen that occasionally
laid eggs. Not far off, Mrs. Stevenson tended a garden of
salad and shalots. The salad was devoured by the
hen—which was her bane. The shalots were served out a
leaf at a time, and welcomed and relished like peaches.
Toddy and green cocoa-nuts were brought us daily. We once
had a present of fish from the king, and once of a turtle.
Sometimes we shot so-called plover along on the shore, sometimes
wild chicken in the bush. The rest of our diet was from
tins.</p>
<p>Our occupations were very various. While some of the
party would be away sketching, Mr. Osbourne and I hammered away
at a novel. We read Gibbon and Carlyle aloud; we blew on
flageolets, we strummed on guitars; we took photographs by the
light of the sun, the moon, and flash-powder; sometimes we played
cards. Pot-hunting engaged a part of our leisure. I
have myself passed afternoons in the exciting but innocuous
pursuit of winged animals with a revolver; and it was fortunate
there were better shots of the party, and fortunate the king
could lend us a more suitable weapon, in the form of an excellent
fowling-piece, or our spare diet had been sparer still.</p>
<p>Night was the time to see our city, after the moon was up,
after the lamps were lighted, and so long as the fire sparkled in
the cook-house. We suffered from a plague of flies and
mosquitoes, comparable to that of Egypt; our dinner-table (lent,
like all our furniture, by the king) must be enclosed in a tent
of netting, our citadel and refuge; and this became all luminous,
and bulged and beaconed under the eaves, like the globe of some
monstrous lamp under the margin of its shade. Our cabins,
the sides being propped at a variety of inclinations, spelled out
strange, angular patterns of brightness. In his roofed and
open kitchen, Ah Fu was to be seen by lamp and firelight,
dabbling among pots. Over all, there fell in the season an
extraordinary splendour of mellow moonshine. The sand
sparkled as with the dust of diamonds; the stars had
vanished. At intervals, a dusky night-bird, slow and low
flying, passed in the colonnade of the tree stems and uttered a
hoarse croaking cry.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER III—THE KING OF APEMAMA: THE PALACE OF MANY
WOMEN</h3>
<p>The palace, or rather the ground which it includes, is several
acres in extent. A terrace encloses it toward the lagoon;
on the side of the land, a palisade with several gates.
These are scarce intended for defence; a man, if he were strong,
might easily pluck down the palisade; he need not be specially
active to leap from the beach upon the terrace. There is no
parade of guards, soldiers, or weapons; the armoury is under lock
and key; and the only sentinels are certain inconspicuous old
women lurking day and night before the gates. By day, these
crones were often engaged in boiling syrup or the like household
occupation; by night, they lay ambushed in the shadow or crouched
along the palisade, filling the office of eunuchs to this harem,
sole guards upon a tyrant life.</p>
<p>Female wardens made a fit outpost for this palace of many
women. Of the number of the king’s wives I have no
guess; and but a loose idea of their function. He himself
displayed embarrassment when they were referred to as his wives,
called them himself ‘my pamily,’ and explained they
were his ‘cutcheons’—cousins. We
distinguished four of the crowd: the king’s mother; his
sister, a grave, trenchant woman, with much of her
brother’s intelligence; the queen proper, to whom (and to
whom alone) my wife was formally presented; and the favourite of
the hour, a pretty, graceful girl, who sat with the king daily,
and once (when he shed tears) consoled him with caresses. I
am assured that even with her his relations are platonic.
In the background figured a multitude of ladies, the lean, the
plump, and the elephantine, some in sacque frocks, some in the
hairbreadth <i>ridi</i>; high-born and low, slave and mistress;
from the queen to the scullion, from the favourite to the scraggy
sentries at the palisade. Not all of these of course are of
‘my pamily,’—many are mere attendants; yet a
surprising number shared the responsibility of the king’s
trust. These were key-bearers, treasurers, wardens of the
armoury, the napery, and the stores. Each knew and did her
part to admiration. Should anything be required—a
particular gun, perhaps, or a particular bolt of stuff,—the
right queen was summoned; she came bringing the right chest,
opened it in the king’s presence, and displayed her charge
in perfect preservation—the gun cleaned and oiled, the
goods duly folded. Without delay or haste, and with the
minimum of speech, the whole great establishment turned on wheels
like a machine. Nowhere have I seen order more complete and
pervasive. And yet I was always reminded of Norse tales of
trolls and ogres who kept their hearts buried in the ground for
the mere safety, and must confide the secret to their
wives. For these weapons are the life of
Tembinok’. He does not aim at popularity; but drives
and braves his subjects, with a simplicity of domination which it
is impossible not to admire, hard not to sympathise with.
Should one out of so many prove faithless, should the armoury be
secretly unlocked, should the crones have dozed by the palisade
and the weapons find their way unseen into the village,
revolution would be nearly certain, death the most probable
result, and the spirit of the tyrant of Apemama flit to rejoin
his predecessors of Mariki and Tapituea. Yet those whom he
so trusts are all women, and all rivals.</p>
<p>There is indeed a ministry and staff of males: cook, steward,
carpenter, and supercargoes: the hierarchy of a schooner.
The spies, ‘his majesty’s daily papers,’ as we
called them, come every morning to report, and go again.
The cook and steward are concerned with the table only. The
supercargoes, whose business it is to keep tally of the copra at
three pounds a month and a percentage, are rarely in the palace;
and two at least are in the other islands. The carpenter,
indeed, shrewd and jolly old Rubam—query,
Reuben?—promoted on my last visit to the greater dignity of
governor, is daily present, altering, extending, embellishing,
pursuing the endless series of the king’s inventions; and
his majesty will sometimes pass an afternoon watching and talking
with Rubam at his work. But the males are still outsiders;
none seems to be armed, none is entrusted with a key; by dusk
they are all usually departed from the palace; and the weight of
the monarchy and of the monarch’s life reposes unshared on
the women.</p>
<p>Here is a household unlike, indeed, to one of ours; more
unlike still to the Oriental harem: that of an elderly childless
man, his days menaced, dwelling alone amid a bevy of women of all
ages, ranks, and relationships,—the mother, the sister, the
cousin, the legitimate wife, the concubine, the favourite, the
eldest born, and she of yesterday; he, in their midst, the only
master, the only male, the sole dispenser of honours, clothes,
and luxuries, the sole mark of multitudinous ambitions and
desires. I doubt if you could find a man in Europe so bold
as to attempt this piece of tact and government. And
seemingly Tembinok’ himself had trouble in the
beginning. I hear of him shooting at a wife for some levity
on board a schooner. Another, on some more serious offence,
he slew outright; he exposed her body in an open box, and (to
make the warning more memorable) suffered it to putrefy before
the palace gate. Doubtless his growing years have come to
his assistance; for upon so large a scale it is more easy to play
the father than the husband. And to-day, at least to the
eye of a stranger, all seems to go smoothly, and the wives to be
proud of their trust, proud of their rank, and proud of their
cunning lord.</p>
<p>I conceived they made rather a hero of the man. A
popular master in a girls’ school might, perhaps, offer a
figure of his preponderating station. But then the master
does not eat, sleep, live, and wash his dirty linen in the midst
of his admirers; he escapes, he has a room of his own, he leads a
private life; if he had nothing else, he has the holidays, and
the more unhappy Tembinok’ is always on the stage and on
the stretch.</p>
<p>In all my coming and going, I never heard him speak harshly or
express the least displeasure. An extreme, rather heavy,
benignity—the benignity of one sure to be
obeyed—marked his demeanour; so that I was at times
reminded of Samual Richardson in his circle of admiring
women. The wives spoke up and seemed to volunteer opinions,
like our wives at home—or, say, like doting but respectable
aunts. Altogether, I conclude that he rules his seraglio
much more by art than terror; and those who give a different
account (and who have none of them enjoyed my opportunities of
observation) perhaps failed to distinguish between degrees of
rank, between ‘my pamily’ and the hangers-on,
laundresses, and prostitutes.</p>
<p>A notable feature is the evening game of cards when lamps are
set forth upon the terrace, and ‘I and my pamily’
play for tobacco by the hour. It is highly characteristic
of Tembinok’ that he must invent a game for himself; highly
characteristic of his worshipping household that they should
swear by the absurd invention. It is founded on poker,
played with the honours out of many packs, and inconceivably
dreary. But I have a passion for all games, studied it, and
am supposed to be the only white who ever fairly grasped its
principle: a fact for which the wives (with whom I was not
otherwise popular) admired me with acclamation. It was
impossible to be deceived; this was a genuine feeling: they were
proud of their private game, had been cut to the quick by the
want of interest shown in it by others, and expanded under the
flattery of my attention. Tembinok’ puts up a double
stake, and receives in return two hands to choose from: a shallow
artifice which the wives (in all these years) have not yet
fathomed. He himself, when talking with me privately, made
not the least secret that he was secure of winning; and it was
thus he explained his recent liberality on board the
<i>Equator</i>. He let the wives buy their own tobacco,
which pleased them at the moment. He won it back at cards,
which made him once more, and without fresh expense, that which
he ought to be,—the sole fount of all indulgences.
And he summed the matter up in that phrase with which he almost
always concludes any account of his policy: ‘Mo’
betta.’</p>
<p>The palace compound is laid with broken coral, excruciating to
the eyes and the bare feet, but exquisitely raked and
weeded. A score or more of buildings lie in a sort of
street along the palisade and scattered on the margin of the
terrace; dwelling-houses for the wives and the attendants,
storehouses for the king’s curios and treasures, spacious
maniap’s for feast or council, some on pillars of wood,
some on piers of masonry. One was still in hand, a new
invention, the king’s latest born: a European frame-house
built for coolness inside a lofty maniap’: its roof planked
like a ship’s deck to be a raised, shady, and yet private
promenade. It was here the king spent hours with Rubam;
here I would sometimes join them; the place had a most singular
appearance; and I must say I was greatly taken with the fancy,
and joined with relish in the counsels of the architects.</p>
<p>Suppose we had business with his majesty by day: we strolled
over the sand and by the dwarfish palms, exchanged a
‘<i>Kõnamaori</i>’ with the crone on duty, and
entered the compound. The wide sheet of coral glared before
us deserted; all having stowed themselves in dark canvas from the
excess of room. I have gone to and fro in that labyrinth of
a place, seeking the king; and the only breathing creature I
could find was when I peered under the eaves of a maniap’,
and saw the brawny body of one of the wives stretched on the
floor, a naked Amazon plunged in noiseless slumber. If it
were still the hour of the ‘morning papers’ the quest
would be more easy, the half-dozen obsequious, sly dogs squatting
on the ground outside a house, crammed as far as possible in its
narrow shadow, and turning to the king a row of leering
faces. Tembinok’ would be within, the flaps of the
cabin raised, the trade blowing through, hearing their
report. Like journalists nearer home, when the day’s
news were scanty, these would make the more of it in words; and I
have known one to fill up a barren morning with an imaginary
conversation of two dogs. Sometimes the king deigns to
laugh, sometimes to question or jest with them, his voice
sounding shrilly from the cabin. By his side he may have
the heir-apparent, Paul, his nephew and adopted son, six years
old, stark naked, and a model of young human beauty. And
there will always be the favourite and perhaps two other wives
awake; four more lying supine under mats and whelmed in
slumber. Or perhaps we came later, fell on a more private
hour, and found Tembinok’ retired in the house with the
favourite, an earthenware spittoon, a leaden inkpot, and a
commercial ledger. In the last, lying on his belly, he
writes from day to day the uneventful history of his reign; and
when thus employed he betrayed a touch of fretfulness on
interruption with which I was well able to sympathise. The
royal annalist once read me a page or so, translating as he went;
but the passage being genealogical, and the author boggling
extremely in his version, I own I have been sometimes better
entertained. Nor does he confine himself to prose, but
touches the lyre, too, in his leisure moments, and passes for the
chief bard of his kingdom, as he is its sole public character,
leading architect, and only merchant.</p>
<p>His competence, however, does not reach to music; and his
verses, when they are ready, are taught to a professional
musician, who sets them and instructs the chorus. Asked
what his songs were about, Tembinok’ replied,
‘Sweethearts and trees and the sea. Not all the same
true, all the same lie.’ For a condensed view of
lyrical poetry (except that he seems to have forgot the stars and
flowers) this would be hard to mend. These multifarious
occupations bespeak (in a native and an absolute prince) unusual
activity of mind.</p>
<p>The palace court at noon is a spot to be remembered with awe,
the visitor scrambling there, on the loose stones, through a
splendid nightmare of light and heat; but the sweep of the wind
delivers it from flies and mosquitoes; and with the set of sun it
became heavenly. I remember it best on moonless
nights. The air was like a bath of milk. Countless
shining stars were overhead, the lagoon paved with them.
Herds of wives squatted by companies on the gravel, softly
chatting. Tembinok’ would doff his jacket, and sit
bare and silent, perhaps meditating songs; the favourite usually
by him, silent also. Meanwhile in the midst of the court,
the palace lanterns were being lit and marshalled in rank upon
the ground—six or eight square yards of them; a sight that
gave one strange ideas of the number of ‘my pamily’:
such a sight as may be seen about dusk in a corner of some great
terminus at home. Presently these fared off into all
corners of the precinct, lighting the last labours of the day,
lighting one after another to their rest that prodigious company
of women. A few lingered in the middle of the court for the
card-party, and saw the honours shuffled and dealt, and
Tembinok’ deliberating between his two; hands, and the
queens losing their tobacco. Then these also were scattered
and extinguished; and their place was taken by a great bonfire,
the night-light of the palace. When this was no more,
smaller fires burned likewise at the gates. These were
tended by the crones, unseen, unsleeping—not always
unheard. Should any approach in the dark hours, a guarded
alert made the circuit of the palisade; each sentry signalled her
neighbour with a stone; the rattle of falling pebbles passed and
died away; and the wardens of Tembinok’ crouched in their
places silent as before.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER IV—THE KING OF APEMAMA: EQUATOR TOWN AND THE
PALACE</h3>
<p>Five persons were detailed to wait upon us. Uncle
Parker, who brought us toddy and green nuts, was an elderly,
almost an old man, with the spirits, the industry, and the morals
of a boy of ten. His face was ancient, droll, and
diabolical, the skin stretched over taut sinews, like a sail on
the guide-rope; and he smiled with every muscle of his
head. His nuts must be counted every day, or he would
deceive us in the tale; they must be daily examined, or some
would prove to be unhusked; nothing but the king’s name,
and scarcely that, would hold him to his duty. After his
toils were over he was given a pipe, matches, and tobacco, and
sat on the floor in the maniap’ to smoke. He would
not seem to move from his position, and yet every day, when the
things fell to be returned the plug had disappeared; he had found
the means to conceal it in the roof, whence he could radiantly
produce it on the morrow. Although this piece of
legerdemain was performed regularly before three or four pairs of
eyes, we could never catch him in the fact; although we searched
after he was gone, we could never find the tobacco. Such
were the diversions of Uncle Parker, a man nearing sixty.
But he was punished according unto his deeds: Mrs. Stevenson took
a fancy to paint him, and the sufferings of the sitter were
beyond description.</p>
<p>Three lasses came from the palace to do our washing and racket
with Ah Fu. They were of the lowest class, hangers-on kept
for the convenience of merchant skippers, probably low-born,
perhaps out-islanders, with little refinement whether of manner
or appearance, but likely and jolly enough wenches in their
way. We called one <i>Guttersnipe</i>, for you may find her
image in the slums of any city; the same lean, dark-eyed, eager,
vulgar face, the same sudden, hoarse guffaws, the same forward
and yet anxious manner, as with a tail of an eye on the
policeman: only the policeman here was a live king, and his
truncheon a rifle. I doubt if you could find anywhere out
of the islands, or often there, the parallel of <i>Fatty</i>, a
mountain of a girl, who must have weighed near as many stones as
she counted summers, could have given a good account of a
life-guardsman, had the face of a baby, and applied her vast
mechanical forces almost exclusively to play. But they were
all three of the same merry spirit. Our washing was
conducted in a game of romps; and they fled and pursued, and
splashed, and pelted, and rolled each other in the sand, and kept
up a continuous noise of cries and laughter like holiday
children. Indeed, and however strange their own function in
that austere establishment, were they not escaped for the day
from the largest and strictest Ladies’ School in the South
Seas?</p>
<p>Our fifth attendant was no less a person than the royal
cook. He was strikingly handsome both in face and body,
lazy as a slave, and insolent as a butcher’s boy. He
slept and smoked on our premises in various graceful attitudes;
but so far from helping Ah Fu, he was not at the pains to watch
him. It may be said of him that he came to learn, and
remained to teach; and his lessons were at times difficult to
stomach. For example, he was sent to fill a bucket from the
well. About half-way he found my wife watering her onions,
changed buckets with her, and leaving her the empty, returned to
the kitchen with the full. On another occasion he was given
a dish of dumplings for the king, was told they must be eaten
hot, and that he should carry them as fast as possible. The
wretch set off at the rate of about a mile in the hour, head in
air, toes turned out. My patience, after a month of trial,
failed me at the sight. I pursued, caught him by his two
big shoulders, and thrusting him before me, ran with him down the
hill, over the sands, and through the applauding village, to the
Speak House, where the king was then holding a pow-wow. He
had the impudence to pretend he was internally injured by my
violence, and to profess serious apprehensions for his life.</p>
<p>All this we endured; for the ways of Tembinok’ are
summary, and I was not yet ripe to take a hand in the man’s
death. But in the meanwhile, here was my unfortunate China
boy slaving for the pair, and presently he fell sick. I was
now in the position of Cimondain Lantenac, and indeed all the
characters in <i>Quatre-Vingt-Treize</i>: to continue to spare
the guilty, I must sacrifice the innocent. I took the usual
course and tried to save both, with the usual consequence of
failure. Well rehearsed, I went down to the palace, found
the king alone, and obliged him with a vast amount of
rigmarole. The cook was too old to learn: I feared he was
not making progress; how if we had a boy instead?—boys were
more teachable. It was all in vain; the king pierced
through my disguises to the root of the fact; saw that the cook
had desperately misbehaved; and sat a while glooming.
‘I think he tavvy too much,’ he said at last, with
grim concision; and immediately turned the talk to other
subjects. The same day another high officer, the steward,
appeared in the cook’s place, and, I am bound to say,
proved civil and industrious.</p>
<p>As soon as I left, it seems the king called for a Winchester
and strolled outside the palisade, awaiting the defaulter.
That day Tembinok’ wore the woman’s frock; as like as
not, his make-up was completed by a pith helmet and blue
spectacles. Conceive the glaring stretch of sandhills, the
dwarf palms with their noon-day shadows, the line of the
palisade, the crone sentries (each by a small clear fire) cooking
syrup on their posts—and this chimæra waiting with
his deadly engine. To him, enter at last the cook,
strolling down the sandhill from Equator Town, listless, vain and
graceful; with no thought of alarm. As soon as he was well
within range, the travestied monarch fired the six shots over his
head, at his feet, and on either hand of him: the second Apemama
warning, startling in itself, fatal in significance, for the next
time his majesty will aim to hit. I am told the king is a
crack shot; that when he aims to kill, the grave may be got
ready; and when he aims to miss, misses by so near a margin that
the culprit tastes six times the bitterness of death. The
effect upon the cook I had an opportunity of seeing for
myself. My wife and I were returning from the sea-side of
the island, when we spied one coming to meet us at a very quick,
disordered pace, between a walk and a run. As we drew
nearer we saw it was the cook, beside himself with some emotion,
his usual warm, mulatto colour declined into a bluish
pallor. He passed us without word or gesture, staring on us
with the face of a Satan, and plunged on across the wood for the
unpeopled quarter of the island and the long, desert beach, where
he might rage to and fro unseen, and froth out the vials of his
wrath, fear, and humiliation. Doubtless in the curses that
he there uttered to the bursting surf and the tropic birds, the
name of the Kaupoi—the rich man—was frequently
repeated. I had made him the laughing-stock of the village
in the affair of the king’s dumplings; I had brought him by
my machinations into disgrace and the immediate jeopardy of his
days; last, and perhaps bitterest, he had found me there by the
way to spy upon him in the hour of his disorder.</p>
<p>Time passed, and we saw no more of him. The season of
the full moon came round, when a man thinks shame to lie
sleeping; and I continued until late—perhaps till twelve or
one in the morning—to walk on the bright sand and in the
tossing shadow of the palms. I played, as I wandered, on a
flageolet, which occupied much of my attention; the fans overhead
rattled in the wind with a metallic chatter; and a bare foot
falls at any rate almost noiseless on that shifting soil.
Yet when I got back to Equator Town, where all the lights were
out, and my wife (who was still awake, and had been looking
forth) asked me who it was that followed me, I thought she spoke
in jest. ‘Not at all,’ she said. ‘I
saw him twice as you passed, walking close at your heels.
He only left you at the corner of the maniap’; he must be
still behind the cook-house.’ Thither I
ran—like a fool, without any weapon—and came face to
face with the cook. He was within my tapu-line, which was
death in itself; he could have no business there at such an hour
but either to steal or to kill; guilt made him timorous; and he
turned and fled before me in the night in silence. As he
went I kicked him in that place where honour lies, and he gave
tongue faintly like an injured mouse. At the moment I
daresay he supposed it was a deadly instrument that touched
him.</p>
<p>What had the man been after? I have found my music
better qualified to scatter than to collect an audience.
Amateur as I was, I could not suppose him interested in my
reading of the <i>Carnival of Venice</i>, or that he would deny
himself his natural rest to follow my variations on <i>The
Ploughboy</i>. And whatever his design, it was impossible I
should suffer him to prowl by night among the houses. A
word to the king, and the man were not, his case being far beyond
pardon. But it is one thing to kill a man yourself; quite
another to bear tales behind his back and have him shot by a
third party; and I determined to deal with the fellow in some
method of my own. I told Ah Fu the story, and bade him
fetch me the cook whenever he should find him. I had
supposed this would be a matter of difficulty; and far from that,
he came of his own accord: an act really of desperation, since
his life hung by my silence, and the best he could hope was to be
forgotten. Yet he came with an assured countenance,
volunteered no apology or explanation, complained of injuries
received, and pretended he was unable to sit down. I
suppose I am the weakest man God made; I had kicked him in the
least vulnerable part of his big carcase; my foot was bare, and I
had not even hurt my foot. Ah Fu could not control his
merriment. On my side, knowing what must be the nature of
his apprehensions, I found in so much impudence a kind of
gallantry, and secretly admired the man. I told him I
should say nothing of his night’s adventure to the king;
that I should still allow him, when he had an errand, to come
within my tapu-line by day; but if ever I found him there after
the set of the sun I would shoot him on the spot; and to the
proof showed him a revolver. He must have been incredibly
relieved; but he showed no sign of it, took himself off with his
usual dandy nonchalance, and was scarce seen by us again.</p>
<p>These five, then, with the substitution of the steward for the
cook, came and went, and were our only visitors. The circle
of the tapu held at arm’s-length the inhabitants of the
village. As for ‘my pamily,’ they dwelt like
nuns in their enclosure; only once have I met one of them abroad,
and she was the king’s sister, and the place in which I
found her (the island infirmary) was very likely
privileged. There remains only the king to be accounted
for. He would come strolling over, always alone, a little
before a meal-time, take a chair, and talk and eat with us like
an old family friend. Gilbertine etiquette appears
defective on the point of leave-taking. It may be
remembered we had trouble in the matter with Karaiti; and there
was something childish and disconcerting in Tembinok’s
abrupt ‘I want go home now,’ accompanied by a kind of
ducking rise, and followed by an unadorned retreat. It was
the only blot upon his manners, which were otherwise plain,
decent, sensible, and dignified. He never stayed long nor
drank much, and copied our behaviour where he perceived it to
differ from his own. Very early in the day, for instance,
he ceased eating with his knife. It was plain he was
determined in all things to wring profit from our visit, and
chiefly upon etiquette. The quality of his white visitors
puzzled and concerned him; he would bring up name after name, and
ask if its bearer were a ‘big chiep,’ or even a
‘chiep’ at all—which, as some were my excellent
good friends, and none were actually born in the purple, became
at times embarrassing. He was struck to learn that our
classes were distinguishable by their speech, and that certain
words (for instance) were tapu on the quarter-deck of a
man-of-war; and he begged in consequence that we should watch and
correct him on the point. We were able to assure him that
he was beyond correction. His vocabulary is apt and ample
to an extraordinary degree. God knows where he collected
it, but by some instinct or some accident he has avoided all
profane or gross expressions. ‘Obliged,’
‘stabbed,’ ‘gnaw,’ ‘lodge,’
‘power,’ ‘company,’
‘slender,’ ‘smooth,’ and
‘wonderful,’ are a few of the unexpected words that
enrich his dialect. Perhaps what pleased him most was to
hear about saluting the quarter-deck of a man-of-war. In
his gratitude for this hint he became fulsome.
‘Schooner cap’n no tell me,’ he cried; ‘I
think no tavvy! You tavvy too much; tavvy
’teama’, tavvy man-a-wa’. I think you
tavvy everything.’ Yet he gravelled me often enough with
his perpetual questions; and the false Mr. Barlow stood
frequently exposed before the royal Sandford. I remember
once in particular. We were showing the magic-lantern; a
slide of Windsor Castle was put in, and I told him there was the
‘outch’ of Victoreea. ‘How many pathom he
high?’ he asked, and I was dumb before him. It was
the builder, the indefatigable architect of palaces, that spoke;
collector though he was, he did not collect useless information;
and all his questions had a purpose. After etiquette,
government, law, the police, money, and medicine were his chief
interests—things vitally important to himself as a king and
the father of his people. It was my part not only to supply
new information, but to correct the old. ‘My patha he
tell me,’ or ‘White man he tell me,’ would be
his constant beginning; ‘You think he lie?’
Sometimes I thought he did. Tembinok’ once brought me
a difficulty of this kind, which I was long of
comprehending. A schooner captain had told him of Captain
Cook; the king was much interested in the story; and turned for
more information—not to Mr. Stephen’s Dictionary, not
to the <i>Britannica</i>, but to the Bible in the Gilbert Island
version (which consists chiefly of the New Testament and the
Psalms). Here he sought long and earnestly; Paul he found,
and Festus and Alexander the coppersmith: no word of Cook.
The inference was obvious: the explorer was a myth. So hard
it is, even for a man of great natural parts like
Tembinok’, to grasp the ideas of a new society and
culture.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER V—KING AND COMMONS</h3>
<p>We saw but little of the commons of the isle. At first
we met them at the well, where they washed their linen and we
drew water for the table. The combination was distasteful;
and, having a tyrant at command, we applied to the king and had
the place enclosed in our tapu. It was one of the few
favours which Tembinok’ visibly boggled about granting, and
it may be conceived how little popular it made the
strangers. Many villagers passed us daily going afield; but
they fetched a wide circuit round our tapu, and seemed to avert
their looks. At times we went ourselves into the
village—a strange place. Dutch by its canals,
Oriental by the height and steepness of the roofs, which looked
at dusk like temples; but we were rarely called into a house: no
welcome, no friendship, was offered us; and of home life we had
but the one view: the waking of a corpse, a frigid, painful
scene: the widow holding on her lap the cold, bluish body of her
husband, and now partaking of the refreshments which made the
round of the company, now weeping and kissing the pale
mouth. (‘I fear you feel this affliction
deeply,’ said the Scottish minister. ‘Eh, sir,
and that I do!’ replied the widow. ‘I’ve
been greetin’ a’ nicht; an’ noo I’m just
gaun to sup this bit parritch, and then I’ll begin
an’ greet again.’) In our walks abroad I have
always supposed the islanders avoided us, perhaps from distaste,
perhaps by order; and those whom we met we took generally by
surprise. The surface of the isle is diversified with palm
groves, thickets, and romantic dingles four feet deep, relics of
old taro plantation; and it is thus possible to stumble unawares
on folk resting or hiding from their work. About
pistol-shot from our township there lay a pond in the bottom of a
jungle; here the maids of the isle came to bathe, and were
several times alarmed by our intrusion. Not for them are
the bright cold rivers of Tahiti or Upolu, not for them to splash
and laugh in the hour of the dusk with a villageful of gay
companions; but to steal here solitary, to crouch in a place like
a cow-wallow, and wash (if that can be called washing) in
lukewarm mud, brown as their own skins. Other, but still
rare, encounters occur to my memory. I was several times
arrested by a tender sound in the bush of voices talking, soft as
flutes and with quiet intonations. Hope told a flattering
tale; I put aside the leaves; and behold! in place of the
expected dryads, a pair of all too solid ladies squatting over a
clay pipe in the ungraceful <i>ridi</i>. The beauty of the
voice and the eye was all that remained to those vast dames; but
that of the voice was indeed exquisite. It is strange I
should have never heard a more winning sound of speech, yet the
dialect should be one remarkable for violent, ugly, and
outlandish vocables; so that Tembinok’ himself declared it
made him weary, and professed to find repose in talking
English.</p>
<p>The state of this folk, of whom I saw so little, I can merely
guess at. The king himself explains the situation with some
art. ‘No; I no pay them,’ he once said.
‘I give them tobacco. They work for me <i>all the
same brothers</i>.’ It is true there was a brother
once in Arden! But we prefer the shorter word. They
bear every servile mark,—levity like a child’s,
incurable idleness, incurious content. The insolence of the
cook was a trait of his own; not so his levity, which he shared
with the innocent Uncle Parker. With equal unconcern both
gambolled under the shadow of the gallows, and took liberties
with death that might have surprised a careless student of
man’s nature. I wrote of Parker that he behaved like
a boy of ten: what was he else, being a slave of sixty? He
had passed all his years in school, fed, clad, thought for,
commanded; and had grown familiar and coquetted with the fear of
punishment. By terror you may drive men long, but not
far. Here, in Apemama, they work at the constant and the
instant peril of their lives; and are plunged in a kind of
lethargy of laziness. It is common to see one go afield in
his stiff mat ungirt, so that he walks elbows-in like a trussed
fowl; and whatsoever his right hand findeth to do, the other must
be off duty holding on his clothes. It is common to see two
men carrying between them on a pole a single bucket of
water. To make two bites of a cherry is good enough: to
make two burthens of a soldier’s kit, for a distance of
perhaps half a furlong, passes measure. Woman, being the
less childish animal, is less relaxed by servile
conditions. Even in the king’s absence, even when
they were alone, I have seen Apemama women work with
constancy. But the outside to be hoped for in a man is that
he may attack his task in little languid fits, and lounge
between-whiles. So I have seen a painter, with his pipe
going, and a friend by the studio fireside. You might
suppose the race to lack civility, even vitality, until you saw
them in the dance. Night after night, and sometimes day
after day, they rolled out their choruses in the great Speak
House—solemn andantes and adagios, led by the clapped hand,
and delivered with an energy that shook the roof. The time
was not so slow, though it was slow for the islands; but I have
chosen rather to indicate the effect upon the hearer. Their
music had a church-like character from near at hand, and seemed
to European ears more regular than the run of island music.
Twice I have heard a discord regularly solved. From farther
off, heard at Equator Town for instance, the measures rose and
fell and crepitated like the barking of hounds in a distant
kennel.</p>
<p>The slaves are certainly not overworked—children of ten
do more without fatigue—and the Apemama labourers have
holidays, when the singing begins early in the afternoon.
The diet is hard; copra and a sweetmeat of pounded pandanus are
the only dishes I observed outside the palace; but there seems no
defect in quantity, and the king shares with them his
turtles. Three came in a boat from Kuria during our stay;
one was kept for the palace, one sent to us, one presented to the
village. It is the habit of the islanders to cook the
turtle in its carapace; we had been promised the shells, and we
asked a tapu on this foolish practice. The face of
Tembinok’ darkened and he answered nothing.
Hesitation in the question of the well I could understand, for
water is scarce on a low island; that he should refuse to
interfere upon a point of cookery was more than I had dreamed of;
and I gathered (rightly or wrongly) that he was scrupulous of
touching in the least degree the private life and habits of his
slaves. So that even here, in full despotism, public
opinion has weight; even here, in the midst of slavery, freedom
has a corner.</p>
<p>Orderly, sober, and innocent, life flows in the isle from day
to day as in a model plantation under a model planter. It
is impossible to doubt the beneficence of that stern rule.
A curious politeness, a soft and gracious manner, something
effeminate and courtly, distinguishes the islanders of Apemama;
it is talked of by all the traders, it was felt even by residents
so little beloved as ourselves, and noticeable even in the cook,
and even in that scoundrel’s hours of insolence. The
king, with his manly and plain bearing, stood out alone; you
might say he was the only Gilbert Islander in Apemama.
Violence, so common in Butaritari, seems unknown. So are
theft and drunkenness. I am assured the experiment has been
made of leaving sovereigns on the beach before the village; they
lay there untouched. In all our time on the island I was
but once asked for drink. This was by a mighty plausible
fellow, wearing European clothes and speaking excellent
English—Tamaiti his name, or, as the whites have now
corrupted it, ‘Tom White’: one of the king’s
supercargoes at three pounds a month and a percentage, a medical
man besides, and in his private hours a wizard. He found me
one day in the outskirts of the village, in a secluded place, hot
and private, where the taro-pits are deep and the plants
high. Here he buttonholed me, and, looking about him like a
conspirator, inquired if I had gin.</p>
<p>I told him I had. He remarked that gin was forbidden,
lauded the prohibition a while, and then went on to explain that
he was a doctor, or ‘dogstar’ as he pronounced the
word, that gin was necessary to him for his medical infusions,
that he was quite out of it, and that he would be obliged to me
for some in a bottle. I told him I had passed the king my
word on landing; but since his case was so exceptional, I would
go down to the palace at once, and had no doubt that
Tembinok’ would set me free. Tom White was
immediately overwhelmed with embarrassment and terror, besought
me in the most moving terms not to betray him, and fled my
neighbourhood. He had none of the cook’s valour; it
was weeks before he dared to meet my eye; and then only by the
order of the king and on particular business.</p>
<p>The more I viewed and admired this triumph of firm rule, the
more I was haunted and troubled by a problem, the problem
(perhaps) of to-morrow for ourselves. Here was a people
protected from all serious misfortune, relieved of all serious
anxieties, and deprived of what we call our liberty. Did
they like it? and what was their sentiment toward the
ruler? The first question I could not of course ask, nor
perhaps the natives answer. Even the second was delicate;
yet at last, and under charming and strange circumstances, I
found my opportunity to put it and a man to reply. It was
near the full of the moon, with a delicious breeze; the isle was
bright as day—to sleep would have been sacrilege; and I
walked in the bush, playing my pipe. It must have been the
sound of what I am pleased to call my music that attracted in my
direction another wanderer of the night. This was a young
man attired in a fine mat, and with a garland on his hair, for he
was new come from dancing and singing in the public hall; and his
body, his face, and his eyes were all of an enchanting
beauty. Every here and there in the Gilberts youths are to
be found of this absurd perfection; I have seen five of us pass
half an hour in admiration of a boy at Mariki; and Te Kop (my
friend in the fine mat and garland) I had already several times
remarked, and long ago set down as the loveliest animal in
Apemama. The philtre of admiration must be very strong, or
these natives specially susceptible to its effects, for I have
scarce ever admired a person in the islands but what he has
sought my particular acquaintance. So it was with Te
Kop. He led me to the ocean side; and for an hour or two we
sat smoking and talking on the resplendent sand and under the
ineffable brightness of the moon. My friend showed himself
very sensible of the beauty and amenity of the hour.
‘Good night! Good wind!’ he kept exclaiming, and as
he said the words he seemed to hug myself. I had long
before invented such reiterated expressions of delight for a
character (Felipe, in the story of <i>Olalla</i>) intended to be
partly bestial. But there was nothing bestial in Te Kop;
only a childish pleasure in the moment. He was no less
pleased with his companion, or was good enough to say so;
honoured me, before he left, by calling me Te Kop; apostrophised
me as ‘My name!’ with an intonation exquisitely
tender, laying his hand at the same time swiftly on my knee; and
after we had risen, and our paths began to separate in the bush,
twice cried to me with a sort of gentle ecstasy, ‘I like
you too much!’ From the beginning he had made no
secret of his terror of the king; would not sit down nor speak
above a whisper till he had put the whole breadth of the isle
between himself and his monarch, then harmlessly asleep; and even
there, even within a stone-cast of the outer sea, our talk
covered by the sound of the surf and the rattle of the wind among
the palms, continued to speak guardedly, softening his silver
voice (which rang loud enough in the chorus) and looking about
him like a man in fear of spies. The strange thing is that
I should have beheld him no more. In any other island in
the whole South Seas, if I had advanced half as far with any
native, he would have been at my door next morning, bringing and
expecting gifts. But Te Kop vanished in the bush for
ever. My house, of course, was unapproachable; but he knew
where to find me on the ocean beach, where I went daily. I
was the <i>Kaupoi</i>, the rich man; my tobacco and trade were
known to be endless: he was sure of a present. I am at a
loss how to explain his behaviour, unless it be supposed that he
recalled with terror and regret a passage in our interview.
Here it is:</p>
<p>‘The king, he good man?’ I asked.</p>
<p>‘Suppose he like you, he good man,’ replied Te
Kop: ‘no like, no good.’</p>
<p>That is one way of putting it, of course. Te Kop himself
was probably no favourite, for he scarce appealed to my judgment
as a type of industry. And there must be many others whom
the king (to adhere to the formula) does not like. Do these
unfortunates like the king? Or is not rather the repulsion
mutual? and the conscientious Tembinok’, like the
conscientious Braxfield before him, and many other conscientious
rulers and judges before either, surrounded by a considerable
body of ‘grumbletonians’? Take the cook, for
instance, when he passed us by, blue with rage and terror.
He was very wroth with me; I think by all the old principles of
human nature he was not very well pleased with his
sovereign. It was the rich man he sought to waylay: I think
it must have been by the turn of a hair that it was not the king
he waylaid instead. And the king gives, or seems to give,
plenty of opportunities; day and night he goes abroad alone,
whether armed or not I can but guess; and the taro-patches, where
his business must so often carry him, seem designed for
assassination. The case of the cook was heavy indeed to my
conscience. I did not like to kill my enemy at second-hand;
but had I a right to conceal from the king, who had trusted me,
the dangerous secret character of his attendant? And
suppose the king should fall, what would be the fate of the
king’s friends? It was our opinion at the time that
we should pay dear for the closing of the well; that our breath
was in the king’s nostrils; that if the king should by any
chance be bludgeoned in a taro-patch, the philosophical and
musical inhabitants of Equator Town might lay aside their
pleasant instruments, and betake themselves to what defence they
had, with a very dim prospect of success. These
speculations were forced upon us by an incident which I am
ashamed to betray. The schooner <i>H. L. Haseltine</i>
(since capsized at sea, with the loss of eleven lives) put into
Apemama in a good hour for us, who had near exhausted our
supplies. The king, after his habit, spent day after day on
board; the gin proved unhappily to his taste; he brought a store
of it ashore with him; and for some time the sole tyrant of the
isle was half-seas-over. He was not drunk—the man is
not a drunkard, he has always stores of liquor at hand, which he
uses with moderation,—but he was muzzy, dull, and
confused. He came one day to lunch with us, and while the
cloth was being laid fell asleep in his chair. His
confusion, when he awoke and found he had been detected, was
equalled by our uneasiness. When he was gone we sat and
spoke of his peril, which we thought to be in some degree our
own; of how easily the man might be surprised in such a state by
<i>grumbletonians</i>; of the strange scenes that would
follow—the royal treasures and stores at the mercy of the
rabble, the palace overrun, the garrison of women turned
adrift. And as we talked we were startled by a gun-shot and
a sudden, barbaric outcry. I believe we all changed colour;
but it was only the king firing at a dog and the chorus striking
up in the Speak House. A day or two later I learned the
king was very sick; went down, diagnosed the case; and took at
once the highest medical degree by the exhibition of bicarbonate
of soda. Within the hour Richard was himself again; and I
found him at the unfinished house, enjoying the double pleasure
of directing Rubam and making a dinner of cocoa-nut dumplings,
and all eagerness to have the formula of this new sort of
<i>pain-killer</i>—for <i>pain-killer</i> in the islands is
the generic name of medicine. So ended the king’s
modest spree and our anxiety.</p>
<p>On the face of things, I ought to say, loyalty appeared
unshaken. When the schooner at last returned for us, after
much experience of baffling winds, she brought a rumour that
Tebureimoa had declared war on Apemama. Tembinok’
became a new man; his face radiant; his attitude, as I saw him
preside over a council of chiefs in one of the palace
maniap’s, eager as a boy’s; his voice sounding
abroad, shrill and jubilant, over half the compound. War is
what he wants, and here was his chance. The English
captain, when he flung his arms in the lagoon, had forbidden him
(except in one case) all military adventures in the future: here
was the case arrived. All morning the council sat; men were
drilled, arms were bought, the sound of firing disturbed the
afternoon; the king devised and communicated to me his plan of
campaign, which was highly elaborate and ingenious, but perhaps a
trifle fine-spun for the rough and random vicissitudes of
war. And in all this bustle the temper of the people
appeared excellent, an unwonted animation in every face, and even
Uncle Parker burning with military zeal.</p>
<p>Of course it was a false alarm. Tebureimoa had other
fish to fry. The ambassador who accompanied us on our
return to Butaritari found him retired to a small island on the
reef, in a huff with the Old Men, a tiff with the traders, and
more fear of insurrection at home than appetite for wars
abroad. The plenipotentiary had been placed under my
protection; and we solemnly saluted when we met. He proved
an excellent fisherman, and caught bonito over the ship’s
side. He pulled a good oar, and made himself useful for a
whole fiery afternoon, towing the becalmed <i>Equator</i> off
Mariki. He went to his post and did no good. He
returned home again, having done no harm. <i>O si sic
omnes</i>!</p>
<h3>CHAPTER VI—THE KING OF APEMAMA: DEVIL-WORK</h3>
<p>The ocean beach of Apemama was our daily resort. The
coast is broken by shallow bays. The reef is detached,
elevated, and includes a lagoon about knee-deep, the unrestful
spending-basin of the surf. The beach is now of fine sand,
now of broken coral. The trend of the coast being convex,
scarce a quarter of a mile of it is to be seen at once; the land
being so low, the horizon appears within a stone-cast; and the
narrow prospect enhances the sense of privacy. Man avoids
the place—even his footprints are uncommon; but a great
number of birds hover and pipe there fishing, and leave crooked
tracks upon the sand. Apart from these, the only sound (and
I was going to say the only society), is that of the breakers on
the reef.</p>
<p>On each projection of the coast, the bank of coral clinkers
immediately above the beach has been levelled, and a pillar
built, perhaps breast-high. These are not sepulchral; all
the dead being buried on the inhabited side of the island, close
to men’s houses, and (what is worse) to their wells.
I was told they were to protect the isle against inroads from the
sea—divine or diabolical martellos, probably sacred to
Taburik, God of Thunder.</p>
<p>The bay immediately opposite Equator Town, which we called Fu
Bay, in honour of our cook, was thus fortified on either
horn. It was well sheltered by the reef, the enclosed water
clear and tranquil, the enclosing beach curved like a horseshoe,
and both steep and broad. The path debouched about the
midst of the re-entrant angle, the woods stopping some distance
inland. In front, between the fringe of the wood and the
crown of the beach, there had been designed a regular figure,
like the court for some new variety of tennis, with borders of
round stones imbedded, and pointed at the angles with low posts,
likewise of stone. This was the king’s Pray
Place. When he prayed, what he prayed for, and to whom he
addressed his supplications I could never learn. The ground
was tapu.</p>
<p>In the angle, by the mouth of the path, stood a deserted
maniap’. Near by there had been a house before our
coming, which was now transported and figured for the moment in
Equator Town. It had been, and it would be again when we
departed, the residence of the guardian and wizard of the
spot—Tamaiti. Here, in this lone place, within sound
of the sea, he had his dwelling and uncanny duties. I
cannot call to mind another case of a man living on the ocean
side of any open atoll; and Tamaiti must have had strong nerves,
the greater confidence in his own spells, or, what I believe to
be the truth, an enviable scepticism. Whether Tamaiti had
any guardianship of the Pray Place I never heard. But his
own particular chapel stood farther back in the fringe of the
wood. It was a tree of respectable growth. Around it
there was drawn a circle of stones like those that enclosed the
Pray Place; in front, facing towards the sea, a stone of a much
greater size, and somewhat hollowed, like a piscina, stood close
against the trunk; in front of that again a conical pile of
gravel. In the hollow of what I have called the piscina
(though it proved to be a magic seat) lay an offering of green
cocoa-nuts; and when you looked up you found the boughs of the
tree to be laden with strange fruit: palm-branches elaborately
plaited, and beautiful models of canoes, finished and rigged to
the least detail. The whole had the appearance of a
mid-summer and sylvan Christmas-tree <i>al fresco</i>. Yet
we were already well enough acquainted in the Gilberts to
recognise it, at the first sight, for a piece of wizardry, or, as
they say in the group, of Devil-work.</p>
<p>The plaited palms were what we recognised. We had seen
them before on Apaiang, the most christianised of all these
islands; where excellent Mr. Bingham lived and laboured and has
left golden memories; whence all the education in the northern
Gilberts traces its descent; and where we were boarded by little
native Sunday-school misses in clean frocks, with demure faces,
and singing hymns as to the manner born.</p>
<p>Our experience of Devil-work at Apaiang had been as
follows:—It chanced we were benighted at the house of
Captain Tierney. My wife and I lodged with a Chinaman some
half a mile away; and thither Captain Reid and a native boy
escorted us by torch-light. On the way the torch went out,
and we took shelter in a small and lonely Christian chapel to
rekindle it. Stuck in the rafters of the chapel was a
branch of knotted palm. ‘What is that?’ I
asked. ‘O, that’s Devil-work,’ said the
Captain. ‘And what is Devil-work?’ I
inquired. ‘If you like, I’ll show you some when
we get to Johnnie’s,’ he replied.
‘Johnnie’s’ was a quaint little house upon the
crest of the beach, raised some three feet on posts, approached
by stairs; part walled, part trellised. Trophies of
advertisement-photographs were hung up within for
decoration. There was a table and a recess-bed, in which
Mrs. Stevenson slept; while I camped on the matted floor with
Johnnie, Mrs. Johnnie, her sister, and the devil’s own
regiment of cockroaches. Hither was summoned an old witch,
who looked the part to horror. The lamp was set on the
floor; the crone squatted on the threshold, a green palm-branch
in her hand, the light striking full on her aged features and
picking out behind her, from the black night, timorous faces of
spectators. Our sorceress began with a chanted incantation;
it was in the old tongue, for which I had no interpreter; but
ever and again there ran among the crowd outside that laugh which
every traveller in the islands learns so soon to
recognise,—the laugh of terror. Doubtless these
half-Christian folk were shocked, these half-heathen folk
alarmed. Chench or Taburik thus invoked, we put our
questions; the witch knotted the leaves, here a leaf and there a
leaf, plainly on some arithmetical system; studied the result
with great apparent contention of mind; and gave the
answers. Sidney Colvin was in robust health and gone a
journey; and we should have a fair wind upon the morrow: that was
the result of our consultation, for which we paid a dollar.
The next day dawned cloudless and breathless; but I think Captain
Reid placed a secret reliance on the sibyl, for the schooner was
got ready for sea. By eight the lagoon was flawed with long
cat’s-paws, and the palms tossed and rustled; before ten we
were clear of the passage and skimming under all plain sail, with
bubbling scuppers. So we had the breeze, which was well
worth a dollar in itself; but the bulletin about my friend in
England proved, some six months later, when I got my mail, to
have been groundless. Perhaps London lies beyond the
horizon of the island gods.</p>
<p>Tembinok’, in his first dealings, showed himself sternly
averse from superstition: and had not the <i>Equator</i> delayed,
we might have left the island and still supposed him an
agnostic. It chanced one day, however, that he came to our
maniap’, and found Mrs. Stevenson in the midst of a game of
patience. She explained the game as well as she was able,
and wound up jocularly by telling him this was her devil-work,
and if she won, the <i>Equator</i> would arrive next day.
Tembinok’ must have drawn a long breath; we were not so
high-and-dry after all; he need no longer dissemble, and he
plunged at once into confessions. He made devil-work every
day, he told us, to know if ships were coming in; and thereafter
brought us regular reports of the results. It was
surprising how regularly he was wrong; but he always had an
explanation ready. There had been some schooner in the
offing out of view; but either she was not bound for Apemama, or
had changed her course, or lay becalmed. I used to regard
the king with veneration as he thus publicly deceived
himself. I saw behind him all the fathers of the Church,
all the philosophers and men of science of the past; before him,
all those that are to come; himself in the midst; the whole
visionary series bowed over the same task of welding
incongruities. To the end Tembinok’ spoke reluctantly
of the island gods and their worship, and I learned but
little. Taburik is the god of thunder, and deals in wind
and weather. A while since there were wizards who could
call him down in the form of lightning. ‘My patha he
tell me he see: you think he lie?’
Tienti—pronounced something like ‘Chench,’ and
identified by his majesty with the devil—sends and removes
bodily sickness. He is whistled for in the Paumotuan
manner, and is said to appear; but the king has never seen
him. The doctors treat disease by the aid of Chench:
eclectic Tembinok’ at the same time administering
‘pain-killer’ from his medicine-chest, so as to give
the sufferer both chances. ‘I think mo’
betta,’ observed his majesty, with more than his usual
self-approval. Apparently the gods are not jealous, and
placidly enjoy both shrine and priest in common. On
Tamaiti’s medicine-tree, for instance, the model canoes are
hung up <i>ex voto</i> for a prosperous voyage, and must
therefore be dedicated to Taburik, god of the weather; but the
stone in front is the place of sick folk come to pacify
Chench.</p>
<p>It chanced, by great good luck, that even as we spoke of these
affairs, I found myself threatened with a cold. I do not
suppose I was ever glad of a cold before, or shall ever be again;
but the opportunity to see the sorcerers at work was priceless,
and I called in the faculty of Apemama. They came in a
body, all in their Sunday’s best and hung with wreaths and
shells, the insignia of the devil-worker. Tamaiti I knew
already: Terutak’ I saw for the first time—a tall,
lank, raw-boned, serious North-Sea fisherman turned brown; and
there was a third in their company whose name I never heard, and
who played to Tamaiti the part of <i>famulus</i>. Tamaiti
took me in hand first, and led me, conversing agreeably, to the
shores of Fu Bay. The <i>famulus</i> climbed a tree for
some green cocoa-nuts. Tamaiti himself disappeared a while
in the bush and returned with coco tinder, dry leaves, and a
spray of waxberry. I was placed on the stone, with my back
to the tree and my face to windward; between me and the
gravel-heap one of the green nuts was set; and then Tamaiti
(having previously bared his feet, for he had come in canvas
shoes, which tortured him) joined me within the magic circle,
hollowed out the top of the gravel-heap, built his fire in the
bottom, and applied a match: it was one of Bryant and
May’s. The flame was slow to catch, and the
irreverent sorcerer filled in the time with talk of foreign
places—of London, and ‘companies,’ and how much
money they had; of San Francisco, and the nefarious fogs,
‘all the same smoke,’ which had been so nearly the
occasion of his death. I tried vainly to lead him to the
matter in hand. ‘Everybody make medicine,’ he
said lightly. And when I asked him if he were himself a
good practitioner—‘No savvy,’ he replied, more
lightly still. At length the leaves burst in a flame, which
he continued to feed; a thick, light smoke blew in my face, and
the flames streamed against and scorched my clothes. He in
the meanwhile addressed, or affected to address, the evil spirit,
his lips moving fast, but without sound; at the same time he
waved in the air and twice struck me on the breast with his green
spray. So soon as the leaves were consumed the ashes were
buried, the green spray was imbedded in the gravel, and the
ceremony was at an end.</p>
<p>A reader of the <i>Arabian Nights</i> felt quite at
home. Here was the suffumigation; here was the muttering
wizard; here was the desert place to which Aladdin was decoyed by
the false uncle. But they manage these things better in
fiction. The effect was marred by the levity of the
magician, entertaining his patient with small talk like an
affable dentist, and by the incongruous presence of Mr. Osbourne
with a camera. As for my cold, it was neither better nor
worse.</p>
<p>I was now handed over to Terutak’, the leading
practitioner or medical baronet of Apemama. His place is on
the lagoon side of the island, hard by the palace. A rail
of light wood, some two feet high, encloses an oblong piece of
gravel like the king’s Pray Place; in the midst is a green
tree; below, a stone table bears a pair of boxes covered with a
fine mat; and in front of these an offering of food, a cocoa-nut,
a piece of taro or a fish, is placed daily. On two sides
the enclosure is lined with maniap’s; and one of our party,
who had been there to sketch, had remarked a daily concourse of
people and an extraordinary number of sick children; for this is
in fact the infirmary of Apemama. The doctor and myself
entered the sacred place alone; the boxes and the mat were
displaced; and I was enthroned in their stead upon the stone,
facing once more to the east. For a while the sorcerer
remained unseen behind me, making passes in the air with a branch
of palm. Then he struck lightly on the brim of my straw
hat; and this blow he continued to repeat at intervals, sometimes
brushing instead my arm and shoulder. I have had people try
to mesmerise me a dozen times, and never with the least
result. But at the first tap—on a quarter no more
vital than my hat-brim, and from nothing more virtuous than a
switch of palm wielded by a man I could not even see—sleep
rushed upon me like an armed man. My sinews fainted, my
eyes closed, my brain hummed, with drowsiness. I resisted,
at first instinctively, then with a certain flurry of despair, in
the end successfully; if that were indeed success which enabled
me to scramble to my feet, to stumble home somnambulous, to cast
myself at once upon my bed, and sink at once into a dreamless
stupor. When I awoke my cold was gone. So I leave a
matter that I do not understand.</p>
<p>Meanwhile my appetite for curiosities (not usually very keen)
had been strangely whetted by the sacred boxes. They were
of pandanus wood, oblong in shape, with an effect of pillaring
along the sides like straw work, lightly fringed with hair or
fibre and standing on four legs. The outside was neat as a
toy; the inside a mystery I was resolved to penetrate. But
there was a lion in the path. I might not approach
Terutak’, since I had promised to buy nothing in the
island; I dared not have recourse to the king, for I had already
received from him more gifts than I knew how to repay. In
this dilemma (the schooner being at last returned) we hit on a
device. Captain Reid came forward in my stead, professed an
unbridled passion for the boxes, and asked and obtained leave to
bargain for them with the wizard. That same afternoon the
captain and I made haste to the infirmary, entered the enclosure,
raised the mat, and had begun to examine the boxes at our
leisure, when Terutak’s wife bounced out of one of the nigh
houses, fell upon us, swept up the treasures, and was gone.
There was never a more absolute surprise. She came, she
took, she vanished, we had not a guess whither; and we remained,
with foolish looks and laughter on the empty field. Such
was the fit prologue of our memorable bargaining.</p>
<p>Presently Terutak’ came, bringing Tamaiti along with
him, both smiling; and we four squatted without the rail.
In the three maniap’s of the infirmary a certain audience
was gathered: the family of a sick child under treatment, the
king’s sister playing cards, a pretty girl, who swore I was
the image of her father; in all perhaps a score.
Terutak’s wife had returned (even as she had vanished)
unseen, and now sat, breathless and watchful, by her
husband’s side. Perhaps some rumour of our quest had
gone abroad, or perhaps we had given the alert by our unseemly
freedom: certain, at least, that in the faces of all present,
expectation and alarm were mingled.</p>
<p>Captain Reid announced, without preface or disguise, that I
was come to purchase; Terutak’, with sudden gravity,
refused to sell. He was pressed; he persisted. It was
explained we only wanted one: no matter, two were necessary for
the healing of the sick. He was rallied, he was reasoned
with: in vain. He sat there, serious and still, and
refused. All this was only a preliminary skirmish; hitherto
no sum of money had been mentioned; but now the captain brought
his great guns to bear. He named a pound, then two, then
three. Out of the maniap’s one person after another
came to join the group, some with mere excitement, others with
consternation in their faces. The pretty girl crept to my
side; it was then that—surely with the most artless
flattery—she informed me of my likeness to her
father. Tamaiti the infidel sat with hanging head and every
mark of dejection. Terutak’ streamed with sweat, his
eye was glazed, his face wore a painful rictus, his chest heaved
like that of one spent with running. The man must have been
by nature covetous; and I doubt if ever I saw moral agony more
tragically displayed. His wife by his side passionately
encouraged his resistance.</p>
<p>And now came the charge of the old guard. The captain,
making a skip, named the surprising figure of five pounds.
At the word the maniap’s were emptied. The
king’s sister flung down her cards and came to the front to
listen, a cloud on her brow. The pretty girl beat her
breast and cried with wearisome iteration that if the box were
hers I should have it. Terutak’s wife was beside
herself with pious fear, her face discomposed, her voice (which
scarce ceased from warning and encouragement) shrill as a
whistle. Even Terutak’ lost that image-like
immobility which he had hitherto maintained. He rocked on
his mat, threw up his closed knees alternately, and struck
himself on the breast after the manner of dancers. But he
came gold out of the furnace; and with what voice was left him
continued to reject the bribe.</p>
<p>And now came a timely interjection. ‘Money will
not heal the sick,’ observed the king’s sister
sententiously; and as soon as I heard the remark translated my
eyes were unsealed, and I began to blush for my employment.
Here was a sick child, and I sought, in the view of its parents,
to remove the medicine-box. Here was the priest of a
religion, and I (a heathen millionaire) was corrupting him to
sacrilege. Here was a greedy man, torn in twain betwixt
greed and conscience; and I sat by and relished, and lustfully
renewed his torments. <i>Ave</i>, <i>Cæsar</i>!
Smothered in a corner, dormant but not dead, we have all the one
touch of nature: an infant passion for the sand and blood of the
arena. So I brought to an end my first and last experience
of the joys of the millionaire, and departed amid silent
awe. Nowhere else can I expect to stir the depths of human
nature by an offer of five pounds; nowhere else, even at the
expense of millions, could I hope to see the evil of riches stand
so legibly exposed. Of all the bystanders, none but the
king’s sister retained any memory of the gravity and danger
of the thing in hand. Their eyes glowed, the girl beat her
breast, in senseless animal excitement. Nothing was offered
them; they stood neither to gain nor to lose; at the mere name
and wind of these great sums Satan possessed them.</p>
<p>From this singular interview I went straight to the palace;
found the king; confessed what I had been doing; begged him, in
my name, to compliment Terutak’ on his virtue, and to have
a similar box made for me against the return of the
schooner. Tembinok’, Rubam, and one of the Daily
Papers—him we used to call ‘the Facetiæ
Column’—laboured for a while of some idea, which was
at last intelligibly delivered. They feared I thought the
box would cure me; whereas, without the wizard, it was useless;
and when I was threatened with another cold I should do better to
rely on pain-killer. I explained I merely wished to keep it
in my ‘outch’ as a thing made in Apemama and these
honest men were much relieved.</p>
<p>Late the same evening, my wife, crossing the isle to windward,
was aware of singing in the bush. Nothing is more common in
that hour and place than the jubilant carol of the toddy-cutter,
swinging high overhead, beholding below him the narrow ribbon of
the isle, the surrounding field of ocean, and the fires of the
sunset. But this was of a graver character, and seemed to
proceed from the ground-level. Advancing a little in the
thicket, Mrs. Stevenson saw a clear space, a fine mat spread in
the midst, and on the mat a wreath of white flowers and one of
the devil-work boxes. A woman—whom we guess to have
been Mrs. Terutak’—sat in front, now drooping over
the box like a mother over a cradle, now lifting her face and
directing her song to heaven. A passing toddy-cutter told
my wife that she was praying. Probably she did not so much
pray as deprecate; and perhaps even the ceremony was one of
disenchantment. For the box was already doomed; it was to
pass from its green medicine-tree, reverend precinct, and devout
attendants; to be handled by the profane; to cross three seas; to
come to land under the foolscap of St. Paul’s; to be
domesticated within the hail of Lillie Bridge; there to be dusted
by the British housemaid, and to take perhaps the roar of London
for the voice of the outer sea along the reef. Before even
we had finished dinner Chench had begun his journey, and one of
the newspapers had already placed the box upon my table as the
gift of Tembinok’.</p>
<p>I made haste to the palace, thanked the king, but offered to
restore the box, for I could not bear that the sick of the island
should be made to suffer. I was amazed by his reply.
Terutak’, it appeared, had still three or four in reserve
against an accident; and his reluctance, and the dread painted at
first on every face, was not in the least occasioned by the
prospect of medical destitution, but by the immediate divinity of
Chench. How much more did I respect the king’s
command, which had been able to extort in a moment and for
nothing a sacrilegious favour that I had in vain solicited with
millions! But now I had a difficult task in front of me; it
was not in my view that Terutak’ should suffer by his
virtue; and I must persuade the king to share my opinion, to let
me enrich one of his subjects, and (what was yet more delicate)
to pay for my present. Nothing shows the king in a more
becoming light than the fact that I succeeded. He demurred
at the principle; he exclaimed, when he heard it, at the
sum. ‘Plenty money!’ cried he, with
contemptuous displeasure. But his resistance was never
serious; and when he had blown off his
ill-humour—‘A’ right,’ said he.
‘You give him. Mo’ betta.’</p>
<p>Armed with this permission, I made straight for the
infirmary. The night was now come, cool, dark, and
starry. On a mat hard by a clear fire of wood and coco
shell, Terutak’ lay beside his wife. Both were
smiling; the agony was over, the king’s command had
reconciled (I must suppose) their agitating scruples; and I was
bidden to sit by them and share the circulating pipe. I was
a little moved myself when I placed five gold sovereigns in the
wizard’s hand; but there was no sign of emotion in
Terutak’ as he returned them, pointed to the palace, and
named Tembinok’. It was a changed scene when I had
managed to explain. Terutak’, long, dour Scots
fisherman as he was, expressed his satisfaction within bounds;
but the wife beamed; and there was an old gentleman
present—her father, I suppose—who seemed nigh
translated. His eyes stood out of his head;
‘<i>Kaupoi</i>, <i>Kaupoi</i>—rich, rich!’ ran
on his lips like a refrain; and he could not meet my eye but what
he gurgled into foolish laughter.</p>
<p>I might now go home, leaving that fire-lit family party
gloating over their new millions, and consider my strange
day. I had tried and rewarded the virtue of
Terutak’. I had played the millionaire, had behaved
abominably, and then in some degree repaired my
thoughtlessness. And now I had my box, and could open it
and look within. It contained a miniature sleeping-mat and
a white shell. Tamaiti, interrogated next day as to the
shell, explained it was not exactly Chench, but a cell, or body,
which he would at times inhabit. Asked why there was a
sleeping-mat, he retorted indignantly, ‘Why have you
mats?’ And this was the sceptical Tamaiti! But
island scepticism is never deeper than the lips.</p>
<h3>CHAPTER VII—THE KING OF APEMAMA</h3>
<p>Thus all things on the island, even the priests of the gods,
obey the word of Tembinok’. He can give and take, and
slay, and allay the scruples of the conscientious, and do all
things (apparently) but interfere in the cookery of a
turtle. ‘I got power’ is his favourite word; it
interlards his conversation; the thought haunts him and is ever
fresh; and when be has asked and meditates of foreign countries,
he looks up with a smile and reminds you, ‘<i>I</i> got
<i>Power</i>.’ Nor is his delight only in the
possession, but in the exercise. He rejoices in the crooked
and violent paths of kingship like a strong man to run a race, or
like an artist in his art. To feel, to use his power, to
embellish his island and the picture of the island life after a
private ideal, to milk the island vigorously, to extend his
singular museum—these employ delightfully the sum of his
abilities. I never saw a man more patently in the right
trade.</p>
<p>It would be natural to suppose this monarchy inherited intact
through generations. And so far from that, it is a thing of
yesterday. I was already a boy at school while Apemama was
yet republican, ruled by a noisy council of Old Men, and torn
with incurable feuds. And Tembinok’ is no Bourbon;
rather the son of a Napoleon. Of course he is
well-born. No man need aspire high in the isles of the
Pacific unless his pedigree be long and in the upper regions
mythical. And our king counts cousinship with most of the
high families in the archipelago, and traces his descent to a
shark and a heroic woman. Directed by an oracle, she swam
beyond sight of land to meet her revolting paramour, and received
at sea the seed of a predestined family. ‘I think
lie,’ is the king’s emphatic commentary; yet he is
proud of the legend. From this illustrious beginning the
fortunes of the race must have declined; and Teñkoruti,
the grandfather of Tembinok’, was the chief of a village at
the north end of the island. Kuria and Aranuka were yet
independent; Apemama itself the arena of devastating feuds.
Through this perturbed period of history the figure of
Teñkoruti stalks memorable. In war he was swift and
bloody; several towns fell to his spear, and the inhabitants were
butchered to a man. In civil life this arrogance was
unheard of. When the council of Old Men was summoned, he
went to the Speak House, delivered his mind, and left without
waiting to be answered. Wisdom had spoken: let others opine
according to their folly. He was feared and hated, and this
was his pleasure. He was no poet; he cared not for arts or
knowledge. ‘My gran’patha one thing savvy,
savvy pight,’ observed the king. In some lull of
their own disputes the Old Men of Apemama adventured on the
conquest of Apemama; and this unlicked Caius Marcius was elected
general of the united troops. Success attended him; the
islands were reduced, and Teñkoruti returned to his own
government, glorious and detested. He died about 1860, in
the seventieth year of his age and the full odour of
unpopularity. He was tall and lean, says his grandson,
looked extremely old, and ‘walked all the same young
man.’ The same observer gave me a significant
detail. The survivors of that rough epoch were all defaced
with spearmarks; there was none on the body of this skilful
fighter. ‘I see old man, no got a spear,’ said
the king.</p>
<p>Teñkoruti left two sons, Tembaitake and
Tembinatake. Tembaitake, our king’s father, was
short, middling stout, a poet, a good genealogist, and something
of a fighter; it seems he took himself seriously, and was perhaps
scarce conscious that he was in all things the creature and
nursling of his brother. There was no shadow of dispute
between the pair: the greater man filled with alacrity and
content the second place; held the breach in war, and all the
portfolios in the time of peace; and, when his brother rated him,
listened in silence, looking on the ground. Like
Teñkoruti, he was tall and lean and a swift talker—a
rare trait in the islands. He possessed every
accomplishment. He knew sorcery, he was the best
genealogist of his day, he was a poet, he could dance and make
canoes and armour; and the famous mast of Apemama, which ran one
joint higher than the mainmast of a full-rigged ship, was of his
conception and design. But these were avocations, and the
man’s trade was war. ‘When my uncle go make
wa’, he laugh,’ said Tembinok’. He
forbade the use of field fortification, that protractor of native
hostilities; his men must fight in the open, and win or be beaten
out of hand; his own activity inspired his followers; and the
swiftness of his blows beat down, in one lifetime, the resistance
of three islands. He made his brother sovereign, he left
his nephew absolute. ‘My uncle make all
smooth,’ said Tembinok’. ‘I mo’
king than my patha: I got power,’ he said, with formidable
relish.</p>
<p>Such is the portrait of the uncle drawn by the nephew. I
can set beside it another by a different artist, who has
often—I may say always—delighted me with his romantic
taste in narrative, but not always—and I may say not
often—persuaded me of his exactitude. I have already
denied myself the use of so much excellent matter from the same
source, that I begin to think it time to reward good resolution;
and his account of Tembinatake agrees so well with the
king’s, that it may very well be (what I hope it is) the
record of a fact, and not (what I suspect) the pleasing exercise
of an imagination more than sailorly. A., for so I had
perhaps better call him, was walking up the island after dusk,
when he came on a lighted village of some size, was directed to
the chief’s house, and asked leave to rest and smoke a
pipe. ‘You will sit down, and smoke a pipe, and wash,
and eat, and sleep,’ replied the chief, ‘and
to-morrow you will go again.’ Food was brought,
prayers were held (for this was in the brief day of
Christianity), and the chief himself prayed with eloquence and
seeming sincerity. All evening A. sat and admired the man
by the firelight. He was six feet high, lean, with the
appearance of many years, and an extraordinary air of breeding
and command. ‘He looked like a man who would kill you
laughing,’ said A., in singular echo of one of the
king’s expressions. And again: ‘I had been
reading the Musketeer books, and he reminded me of
Aramis.’ Such is the portrait of Tembinatake, drawn
by an expert romancer.</p>
<p>We had heard many tales of ‘my patha’; never a
word of my uncle till two days before we left. As the time
approached for our departure Tembinok’ became greatly
changed; a softer, a more melancholy, and, in particular, a more
confidential man appeared in his stead. To my wife he
contrived laboriously to explain that though he knew he must lose
his father in the course of nature, he had not minded nor
realised it till the moment came; and that now he was to lose us
he repeated the experience. We showed fireworks one evening
on the terrace. It was a heavy business; the sense of
separation was in all our minds, and the talk languished.
The king was specially affected, sat disconsolate on his mat, and
often sighed. Of a sudden one of the wives stepped forth
from a cluster, came and kissed him in silence, and silently went
again. It was just such a caress as we might give to a
disconsolate child, and the king received it with a child’s
simplicity. Presently after we said good-night and
withdrew; but Tembinok’ detained Mr. Osbourne, patting the
mat by his side and saying: ‘Sit down. I feel bad, I
like talk.’ Osbourne sat down by him.
‘You like some beer?’ said he; and one of the wives
produced a bottle. The king did not partake, but sat
sighing and smoking a meerschaum pipe. ‘I very sorry
you go,’ he said at last. ‘Miss Stlevens he
good man, woman he good man, boy he good man; all good man.
Woman he smart all the same man. My woman’ (glancing
towards his wives) ‘he good woman, no very smart. I
think Miss Stlevens he is chiep all the same cap’n
man-o-wa’. I think Miss Stlevens he rich man all the
same me. All go schoona. I very sorry. My patha
he go, my uncle he go, my cutcheons he go, Miss Stlevens he go:
all go. You no see king cry before. King all the same
man: feel bad, he cry. I very sorry.’</p>
<p>In the morning it was the common topic in the village that the
king had wept. To me he said: ‘Last night I no can
’peak: too much here,’ laying his hand upon his
bosom. ‘Now you go away all the same my pamily.
My brothers, my uncle go away. All the same.’
This was said with a dejection almost passionate. And it
was the first time I had heard him name his uncle, or indeed
employ the word. The same day he sent me a present of two
corselets, made in the island fashion of plaited fibre, heavy and
strong. One had been worn by Teñkoruti, one by
Tembaitake; and the gift being gratefully received, he sent me,
on the return of his messengers, a third—that of
Tembinatake. My curiosity was roused; I begged for
information as to the three wearers; and the king entered with
gusto into the details already given. Here was a strange
thing, that he should have talked so much of his family, and not
once mentioned that relative of whom he was plainly the most
proud. Nay, more: he had hitherto boasted of his father;
thenceforth he had little to say of him; and the qualities for
which he had praised him in the past were now attributed where
they were due,—to the uncle. A confusion might be
natural enough among islanders, who call all the sons of their
grandfather by the common name of father. But this was not
the case with Tembinok’. Now the ice was broken the
word uncle was perpetually in his mouth; he who had been so ready
to confound was now careful to distinguish; and the father sank
gradually into a self-complacent ordinary man, while the uncle
rose to his true stature as the hero and founder of the race.</p>
<p>The more I heard and the more I considered, the more this
mystery of Tembinok’s behaviour puzzled and attracted
me. And the explanation, when it came, was one to strike
the imagination of a dramatist. Tembinok’ had two
brothers. One, detected in private trading, was banished,
then forgiven, lives to this day in the island, and is the father
of the heir-apparent, Paul. The other fell beyond
forgiveness. I have heard it was a love-affair with one of
the king’s wives, and the thing is highly possible in that
romantic archipelago. War was attempted to be levied; but
Tembinok’ was too swift for the rebels, and the guilty
brother escaped in a canoe. He did not go alone.
Tembinatake had a hand in the rebellion, and the man who had
gained a kingdom for a weakling brother was banished by that
brother’s son. The fugitives came to shore in other
islands, but Tembinok’ remains to this day ignorant of
their fate.</p>
<p>So far history. And now a moment for conjecture.
Tembinok’ confused habitually, not only the attributes and
merits of his father and his uncle, but their diverse personal
appearance. Before he had even spoken, or thought to speak,
of Tembinatake, he had told me often of a tall, lean father,
skilled in war, and his own schoolmaster in genealogy and island
arts. How if both were fathers, one natural, one
adoptive? How if the heir of Tembaitake, like the heir of
Tembinok’ himself, were not a son, but an adopted
nephew? How if the founder of the monarchy, while he worked
for his brother, worked at the same time for the child of his
loins? How if on the
death of Tembaitake, the two stronger natures, father and son,
king and kingmaker, clashed, and Tembinok’, when he drove
out his uncle, drove out the author of his days? Here is at
least a tragedy four-square.</p>
<p>The king took us on board in his own gig, dressed for the
occasion in the naval uniform. He had little to say, he
refused refreshments, shook us briefly by the hand, and went
ashore again. That night the palm-tops of Apemama had
dipped behind the sea, and the schooner sailed solitary under the
stars.</p>
<div class="gapspace"> </div>
<p style="text-align: center">THE END.</p>
<div class="gapmediumline"> </div>
<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">BILLING AND
SONS, LTD., PRINTERS, GUILDFORD</span></p>
<div class="gapspace"> </div>
<h2>FOOTNOTES</h2>
<p><a name="footnote12"></a><a href="#citation12"
class="footnote">[12]</a> Where that word is used as a
salutation I give that form.</p>
<p><a name="footnote29"></a><a href="#citation29"
class="footnote">[29]</a> In English usually written
‘taboo’: ‘tapu’ is the correct Tahitian
form.—[<span class="smcap">Ed.</span>]</p>
<p><a name="footnote86"></a><a href="#citation86"
class="footnote">[86]</a> The reference is to Maka, the
Gawaiian missionary, at Butaritari in the Gilberts.</p>
<p><a name="footnote122"></a><a href="#citation122"
class="footnote">[122]</a> Elephantiasis.</p>
<p><a name="footnote156"></a><a href="#citation156"
class="footnote">[156]</a> Arorai is in the Gilberts,
Funafuti in the Ellice Islands.—<span
class="smcap">Ed.</span></p>
<p><a name="footnote231"></a><a href="#citation231"
class="footnote">[231]</a> Gin and brandy.</p>
<p><a name="footnote275"></a><a href="#citation275"
class="footnote">[275]</a> In the Gilbert group.</p>
<p><a name="footnote279a"></a><a href="#citation279a"
class="footnote">[279a]</a> Copra: the dried kernel of the
cocoa-nut, the chief article of commerce throughout the Pacific
Islands.</p>
<p><a name="footnote279b"></a><a href="#citation279b"
class="footnote">[279b]</a> Houses.</p>
<p><a name="footnote283"></a><a href="#citation283"
class="footnote">[283]</a> Suppose.</p>
<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK IN THE SOUTH SEAS***</p>
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