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diff --git a/old/62697-0.txt b/old/62697-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 7c513fd..0000000 --- a/old/62697-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,15387 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of Atolls of the Sun, by Frederick O'Brien - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world 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. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - -Title: Atolls of the Sun - -Author: Frederick O'Brien - -Release Date: July 19, 2020 [EBook #62697] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ATOLLS OF THE SUN *** - - - - -Produced by Chris Whitehead, Barry Abrahamsen, and the -Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net -(This file was produced from images generously made -available by The Internet Archive) - - - - - - - - - - ATOLLS OF THE SUN - - - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - -[Illustration: - - Photo from L. Gauthier - Nature’s mirror showed him why he could not leave -] - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - ATOLLS - OF THE SUN - - BY - FREDERICK O’BRIEN - - Author of “MYSTIC ISLES OF THE SOUTH SEAS,” “WHITE SHADOWS - IN THE SOUTH SEAS,” etc. - - WITH MANY - ILLUSTRATIONS - FROM - PAINTINGS, DRAWINGS AND PHOTOGRAPHS - - - - - - -[Illustration] - - - - - TORONTO - McCLELLAND & STEWART - 1922 - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - Copyright, 1922, by - THE CENTURY CO. - - - - - PRINTED IN U. S. A. - - - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - To G—— - - - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - FOREWORD - - -“Atolls of the Sun” is a book of experiences, impressions, and dreams in -the strange and lonely islands of the South Seas. It does not aim to be -literal, or sequential, though everything in it is the result of my -wanderings in the far and mysterious recesses of the Pacific Ocean. - -I am not a scientist or scholar, and can relate only what I saw and -heard, felt and imagined, in my dwelling with savage and singular races -among the wonderful lagoons of the coral atolls, and poignant valleys of -disregarded islands. - -If I can make my reader see and feel the sad and beautiful guises of -life in them, and the secrets of a few unusual souls, I shall be -satisfied. The thrills of adventure upon the sea and in the shadowy -glens, the odors of rare and sweet flowers, the memories of lovable -humans, are here written to keep them alive in my heart, and to share -them with my friends. - -Life is not real. It is an illusion, a screen upon which each one writes -the reactions upon himself of his sensory knowledge. The individual is -the moving camera, and what he calls life is his projection of the -panorama about him—not more actual than the figures and storms upon the -cinema screen. In this book I have put the film that passed through my -mind in wild places, and among natural people. - -It is useless to look to find in the South Seas what I have found. It is -there, glowing and true, and yet, as each beholder conjures a different -vision of the human spectacle about him, each can see the islands of -romance only by the lens life has fitted upon his soul. - -To seek a replica of experience or scenes is to spoil a possession. - -If this book has interest, one may read and laugh, be entertained or -repelled with thanks that one can sit at ease, and watch this picture -made on another’s mind in long journeys and in many days and nights of -hazard and delight. - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CONTENTS - - - CHAPTER I - - Leaving Tahiti—The sunset over 3 - Moorea—Bound for the Paumotu - Atolls—The Schooner _Marara, Flying - Fish_—Captain Jean Moet and others - aboard—Sighting and Landing on Niau - - CHAPTER II - - Meeting with Tommy Eustace, the 23 - trader—Strange soil of the atoll—A - bath in the lagoon—Momuni, the thirsty - bread baker—Off for Anaa - - CHAPTER III - - Perilous navigation—Curious green 40 - sky—Arrival at Anaa—Religion and the - movies—Character of Paumotuans - - CHAPTER IV - - The copra market—Dangerous passage to 58 - shore at Kaukura—Our boat overturns in - the pass—I narrowly escape - death—Josephite Missionaries—The - deadly nohu—The himene at night - - CHAPTER V - - Captain Moet tells of Mapuhi, the great 80 - Paumotuan—Kopcke tells about - women—Virginie’s jealousy—An - affrighting waterspout—The wrecked - ship—Landing at Takaroa - - CHAPTER VI - - Diffidence of Takaroans—Hiram Mervin’s 96 - description of the cyclone—Teamo’s - wonderful swim—Mormon missionaries - from America—I take a bath - - CHAPTER VII - - Breakfast with elders—The great Mapuhi 114 - enters—He tells of San Francisco—Of - prizefighters and Police gazettes—I - reside with Nohea—Robber-crabs—The - cats that warred and caught fish - - CHAPTER VIII - - I meet a Seventh Day Adventist 135 - missionary, and a descendant of a - mutineer of the Bounty—They tell me - the story of Pitcairn island—An epic - of isolation - - CHAPTER IX - - The fish in the lagoon and sea—Giant 157 - clams and fish that poison—Hunting the - devilfish—Catching bonito—Snarling - turtles—Trepang and sea cucumbers—The - mammoth manta - - CHAPTER X - - Traders and divers assembling for the 175 - diving—A story told by Llewellyn at - night—The mystery of Easter - Island—Strangest spot in the - world—Curious statues and - houses—Borrowed wives—Arrival of - English girl—Tragedy of the Meke Meke - festival - - CHAPTER XI - - Pearl hunting in the lagoon—Previous 211 - methods wasteful—Mapuhi shows me the - wonders of the lagoon—Marvelous - stories of sharks—Woman who lost her - arm—Shark of Samoa—Deacon who rode a - shark a half-hour—Eels are terrible - menace - - CHAPTER XII - - History of the pearl hunger—Noted jewels 230 - of past—I go with Nohea to the - diving—Beautiful floor of the - Lagoon—Nohea dives many times—Escapes - shark narrowly—Descends 148 feet—No - pearls reward us—Mandel tells of - culture pearls - - CHAPTER XIII - - Story of the wondrous pearls planted in 249 - the lagoon of Pukapuka—Tepeva a - Tepeva, the crippled diver, tells - it—How a European scientist improved - on nature—Tragedy of Patasy and - Mauraii—The robbed coral bank—Death - under the sea - - CHAPTER XIV - - The palace of the governor of the 271 - Marquesas in the vale of - Atuona—Monsieur L’Hermier des Plantes, - Ghost Girl, Miss Tail, and Song of the - Nightingale—_Tapus_ in the South - Seas—Strange conventions that regulate - life—A South Seas Pankhurst—How women - won their freedom - - CHAPTER XV - - The dismal abode of the 294 - Peyrals—Stark-white daughter of - Peyral—Only white maiden in the - Marquesas—I hunt wild bulls—Peyral’s - friendliness—I visit his house—He - strikes me and threatens to kill me—I - go armed—Explanation of the bizarre - tragic comedy - - CHAPTER XVI - - In the valley of Vaitahu—With Vanquished 319 - Often and Seventh Man He Is So Angry - He Wallows in the Mire—Worship of - beauty in the South Seas—Like the - ancient Greeks—Care of the - body—Preparations for a belle’s - début—Massage as a cure for ills - - CHAPTER XVII - - Skilled tattooers of Marquesas Islands a 336 - generation ago—Entire bodies covered - with intricate tattooed designs—The - foreigner who had himself tattooed to - win the favor of a Marquesan - beauty—The magic that removed the - markings when he was recalled to his - former life in England - - CHAPTER XVIII - - A fantastic but dying language—The 364 - Polynesian or Maori Tongue—Making of - the first lexicons—Words taken from - other languages—Decay of vocabularies - with decrease of population—Humors and - whimsicalities of the dictionary as - arranged by foreigners - - CHAPTER XIX - - Tragic Mademoiselle Narbonne—Whom shall 384 - she marry?—Dinner at the home of - Wilhelm Lutz—The _Taua_, the - sorcerer—Lemoal says Narbonne is a - leper—I visit the _Taua_—The prophecy - - CHAPTER XX - - Holy Week—How the rum was saved during 414 - the storm—An Easter Sunday - “Celebration”—The Governor, - Commissaire Bauda and I have a - discussion—Paul Vernier, the - Protestant Pastor, and his church—How - the girls of the Valley imperilled the - immortal souls of the first - missionaries—Jimmy Kekela, his - family—A watch from Abraham Lincoln - - CHAPTER XXI - - Paul Gauguin, the famous French-Peruvian 439 - Artist—A Rebel against the society - that rejected him while he lived, and - now cherishes his paintings - - CHAPTER XXII - - Monsieur l’Inspecteur des Etablissements 460 - Français de l’Océanie—How the school - house was inspected—I receive my - congé—The runaway pigs—Mademoiselle - Narbonne goes with Lutz to Papeete to - be married—Père Siméon, about whom - Robert Louis Stevenson wrote - - CHAPTER XXIII - - McHenry gets a caning—The fear of the 482 - dead—A visit to the grave of Mapuhi—En - voyage - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS - - - Nature’s mirror showed him why _Frontispiece_ - he could not leave - - PAGE - - Map 7 - - The atoll of Niau 16 - - The anchorage at Tahauku. Atuona lies 17 - just around the first headland to the - right - - A Paumotu atoll after a blow 32 - - A squall approaching Anaa 33 - - Picking up the atoll of Anaa from the 48 - deck of the schooner _Flying Fish_ - - Canoes and cutters at atoll of Anaa, 49 - Paumotu Islands - - The road from the beach 64 - - An American Josephite missionary and his 65 - wife, and their church - - Typical and primitive native hut, 80 - Paumotu Archipelago - - Copra drying 81 - - Atoll of Hikuera after the cyclone 96 - - The wrecked _County of Roxburgh_ 97 - - Mormon elders baptizing in the lagoon 112 - - Over the reef in a canoe 113 - - Robber-crab ascending tree at night. One 128 - of the few photographs taken of the - marauder in action - - Where the _Bounty_ was beached and 129 - burned - - The church on Pitcairn Island 144 - - The shores of Pitcairn Island 145 - - Spearing fish 160 - - A canoe on the lagoon 161 - - Ready for the fishing 161 - - Spearing fish in the lagoon 176 - - The Captain and two sailors of the _El 177 - Dorado_ - - Beach dancers at Tahiti 192 - - After the bath in the pool 193 - - Old cocoanut-trees 208 - - The dark valley of Taaoa 209 - - Launch towing canoes to diving grounds 224 - in lagoon - - Divers voyaging in Paumotu atolls 225 - - Ghost Girl 256 - - A double canoe 257 - - A young palm in Atuona 272 - - Atuona valley and the peak of Temetiu 273 - - Malicious Gossip, Le Brunnec, and his 304 - wife, At Peace - - Exploding Eggs and his chums packing 304 - copra - - Frederick O’Brien and Dr. Malcolm 305 - Douglas at home in Tahiti - - Some friends in my valley 320 - - Wash-day in the stream by my cabin 321 - - Te Ipu, an old Marquesan chief, showing 336 - tattooing - - The famous tattooed leg of Queen Vaikehu 337 - - Tattooing at the present day 352 - - Easter Islander in head-dress and with 353 - dancing-wand - - My tattooed Marquesan friend 353 - - The author with his friends at council 368 - - House of governor of Paumotu Islands. 369 - Atoll of Fakarava - - Nakohu, Exploding Eggs 384 - - Haabuani, the sole sculptor of Hiva-Oa 385 - - The coral road and the traders’ stores 416 - - Scene on beach a few miles west of 417 - Papeete - - Tahiatini, Many Daughters, the little 432 - leper lass - - François Grelet, the Swiss, of Oomoa 433 - - Brunneck, the boxer and diver 464 - - A village maid in Tahiti 465 - - A Samoan maiden of high caste 465 - - Throwing spears at a cocoanut on a stake 480 - - The raised-up atoll of Makatea 481 - - Paumotuans on a heap of brain coral 496 - - Did these two eat Chocolat? 496 - - The stonehenge men in the South Seas 497 - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - ATOLLS OF THE SUN - - - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - ATOLLS OF THE SUN - - - - - CHAPTER I - -Leaving Tahiti—The sunset over Moorea—Bound for the Paumotu Atolls—The - Schooner _Marara, Flying Fish_—Captain Jean Moet and others - aboard—Sighting and Landing on Niau. - -_“NOUS partons!_ We air off—off!” shouted _Capitaine_ Moet, gaily, as -the _Marara_, the schooner _Flying Fish_, slipped through the narrow, -treacherous pass of the barrier-reef of Papeete Harbor. “_Mon ami_, you -weel by ’n’ by say dam Moet for take you to ze _Iles Dangereuses_. You -air goin’ to ze worse climate in ze _sacré mundo_. Eet ees hot and ze -win’ blow many time like ’urricane. An’ you nevaire wash, because ze -wataire ees salt _como_ se o-c-ean.” - -We had waited for a wafting breeze all afternoon, the brown crew alert -to raise the anchor at every zephyr, but it was almost dark when we were -clear of the reef and, with all sails raised, fair on our voyage to the -mysterious atolls of the Paumotu Archipelago. Often I had planned that -pilgrimage in my long stay in Tahiti. At the Cercle Bougainville, the -business club, where the pearl and shell traders and the copra buyers -drank their rum and Doctor Funks, I had heard many stories of a nature -in these Paumotus strangely different of aspect from all other parts of -the world, of a native people who had amazing knowledge of the secrets -of the sea and its inhabitants, and of white dwellers altered by -residence there to a pattern very contrary from other whites. For scores -of years these traders and sailors or their forerunners had played all -the tricks of commerce on the Paumotuans, and they laughed reminiscently -over them; yet they hinted of demons there, of ghosts that soared and -whistled, and of dancers they had seen transfixed in the air. What was -true or untrue I had not known; nor had they, I believed. - -Llewellyn, the Welsh-Tahitian gentleman, after four or five glasses of -_Pernoud_, would ask, “Do you know why the Paumotus are unearthly?” and -would answer in the same liquorish breath, “Because they haven’t any -earth about them. They’re all white bones.” - -Woronick, the Parisian expert in pearls, referred often to the wonderful -jewel he had bought in Takaroa from a Paumotuan, and the fortune he had -made on it. - -“That pearl was made by God and fish and man, and how it was grown and -Tepeva a Tepeva got it, is a something to learn; unique. It is bizarre, -_effrayant_. I will not recite it here, for you must go to Takaroa to -hear it.” - -And Lying Bill and McHenry, in a score of vivid phrases, told of the -cyclones that had swept entire populations into the sea, felled the -trees of scores of years’ growth, and left the bare atoll as when first -it emerged from the depths. - -“I knew a Dane who rode over Anaa on a tree like a bloody ’orse on the -turf,” said Lying Bill to me, with a frightening bang of his tumbler on -the table. “’E was caught by the top of a big wave, an’ away ’e drove -from one side of the bleedin’ island to the other, and come right side -up. A bit ’urt in the ’ead, ’e was, but able to take ’is bloomin’ oath -on what ’appened.” - -I had not depended on these _raconteurs_ for a vicarious understanding -of the Paumotus; for I had read and noted all that I could find in books -and calendars about them, but yet I had felt that these unlettered -actors in the real dramas laid there gave me a valid picture. My hopes -were fixed in finding in spirit what they saw only materially. - -Moet stood by the wheel until we cleared the waters where the lofty bulk -of the island confused the winds, and I, when the actions of the sailors -in shifting the sails with his repeated orders had lost newness, looked -with some anguish at that sweet land I was leaving. It had meant so much -to me. - -A poetic mood only could paint the swiftly changing panorama as the -schooner on its seaward tacks moved slowly under the faint vesper -breeze; the mood of a diarist could tell how “the sun setting behind -Moorea in a brilliant saffron sky, splashed with small golden and -mauve-colored clouds, threw boldly forward in a clear-cut, opaque purple -mass that fantastically pinnacled island, near the summit of whose -highest peak there glittered, star-like, a speck of light—the sky seen -through a hole pierced in the mountain. How in the sea, smooth as a -mirror, within the reef, and here and there to seaward, blue ruffled by -a catspaw, away to the horizon was reflected the saffron hue from above; -how against purple Moorea a cocoa-crowned islet in the harbor appeared -olive-green—a gem set in the yellow water. How the sunlight left the -vivid green shore of palm-fringed Tahiti, and stole upward till only the -highest ridges and precipices were illuminated with strange pink and -violet tints springing straight from the mysterious depth of dark-blue -shadow. How from the loftiest crags there floated a long streamer -cloud—the cloud-banner of Tyndal. Then, as the sun sank lower and lower, -the saffron of the sky paled to the turquoise-blue of a brief tropical -twilight, the cloud-banner melted and vanished, and the whole color -deepened and went out in the sudden darkness of the night.” - -If one must say farewell to Tahiti, let it be in the evening, in the -tender hues of the sunset, the effacing shadows of the sinking orb in -sympathy with the day’s tasks done; the screen of night being drawn amid -flaming, dying lights across a workaday world, the dream pictures of the -Supreme Artist appearing and fainting in the purpling heavens. I was -leaving people and scenes that had taught me a new path in life, or, at -least, had hung lamps to guide my feet in an appreciation of values -before unknown to me. - -I came back to the deck of the schooner with Moet’s call for a -steersman, and his invitation to go below for food and drink. I refused -despite his “_Sapristi!_ Eef you no eat by ’n’ by you cannot drink!” and -when he disappeared down the companion-ladder I climbed to the roof of -the low cabin. The moon was now high—a plate of glowing gold in an -indigo ceiling. The swelling sea rocked the vessel and now and then -lifted her sharp prow out of the water and struck it a blow of -friendship as it rejoined it. I unrolled a straw mat, and, placing it -well aft so that the jibing boom would not touch me, lay upon my back, -and visioned the prodigious world I was seeking. The very names given by -discoverers were suggestive of extravagant adventure. The Half-drowned -Islands, the Low Archipelago, the Dangerous Isles, the Pernicious -Islands, were the titles of the early mariners. For three hundred years -the Paumotus had been dimly known on the charts as set in the most -perilous sea in all the round of the globe. I had read that they were -more hazardous than any other shores, as they were more singular in -form. They had excited the wonder of learned men and laymen by even the -scant depiction of their astounding appearance. For decades after the -eyes of a European glimpsed them they were thought by many bookish men -to be as fabulous as Atlantis or Micomicon; too chimerical to exist, -though witches then were a surety, and hell a burning reality. - -I fell asleep, and as during the night the wind shifted and with it the -schooner veered, I had but a precarious hold upon the mat and was -several times stood on my feet in the narrow passageway. The dream -_jinn_ seized these shiftings and twistings, the shouts of the mate in -charge, the chants of the sailors at work, the whistle of the wind -through the cordage, and wove them into fantasies,—ecstasies or -nightmares,—and thus warded off my waking. - -But the sun, roused from his slumber beneath the dip of the sphere, -could be put off with no fine frenzies. When even half above the dipping -horizon his beams opened my eyes as if a furnace door had been flung -wide, and I turned over to see my hard couch occupied by others. Beside -me was McHenry, next to him Moet, and furthest, the one white woman -aboard, the captain’s wife. We yawned in unison; and, with a quick, -accustomed movement, she dropped below. The day had begun on the -schooner. - -The _Marara_ was once a French gunboat of these seas when cannons were -needed to prevent dishonor to the tricolor by failure to obey French -discipline, while France was making good colonists or corpses of all -peoples hereabout. She was the very pattern of the rakish craft in which -the blackbirders and pirates sailed this ocean for generations—built for -speed, for entering threatening passes, for stealing silently away under -giant sweeps, and for handling by a small number of strong and fearless -men. The bitts on the poop were still marked by the gun emplacements, -and the rail about the stern was but two feet high. - -Now her owners were a company of Tahiti Europeans who, trusting largely -to the seamanship and business shrewdness of her master, despatched her -every few weeks or months on voyages about the French islands within a -thousand miles or so to sell the natives all they would buy, and to get -from them at the least cost the copra, shells, and pearls which were -virtually the sole products of these islands. - -[Illustration: - - TUAMOTU ARCHIPELAGO - (PACIFIC OCEAN) - click on map for a larger view -] - -The cabin was one room, stuffy and hot, and malodorous of decades of -cargo. A small table in the center for dining was alone free from -shelves and boxes holding merchandise, which was displayed as in a -country store. Besides all kinds of articles salable to a primitive -people, there were foods in barrels, boxes, tins, and glass, for whites -and for educated native palates. - -Jean Moet, the commander of the _Marara_, was of the type of French -sailor encountered in the Mediterranean, and especially about Marseilles -and Spanish ports. He had a slight person, with hair and moustache black -as the stones of Papenoo beach—nervous, excitable, moving incessantly, -gesturing with every word. Twenty-eight of his forty years had been -passed in ships. He had visited the _Ile du Diable_, and had seen -Dreyfus there; he chattered of New York, Senegal, Yokohama, Cayenne, was -full of French ocean oaths, breaking into English or Spanish to -enlighten me or press a point, singing a Parisian music-hall -_chansonette_, or a Spanish _cancioncita_. His language was a curious -hodge-podge bespeaking the wanderings of the man and his intensely -mercurial temperament. - -His wife, who sailed with him on all voyages since their marriage five -years before, was his opposite—large-boned and heavy, like a Millet -peasant, looking at her brilliant husband as a wistful cow at her -master, but not fearing to caution him against extravagance in stimulant -or money. Her life had begun in Tahiti, and she had always been there -until the dashing son of the _Midi_ had lifted her from the house of her -father—a petty official—to the deck of the _Flying Fish_. She was a -housekeeper and accountant. - -She paid especial attention to the shelves of pain-killers, cough cures, -perunas, bitters and medical discoveries from America, which, in islands -where all alcoholic liquors were forbidden to the aborigines, sold -readily to all who sickened for them. Moet was affectionate but stern -toward Virginie, the wife, and talked to her as does a kind but wise -master to a trained seal. - -For breakfast, the captain, Madame Moet, McHenry, and I had canned -sardines, canned hash from Chicago, California olives, canned pineapple -from Hawaii, and red wine from Bordeaux. - -Virginie explained in Tahitian French that Jean had forgotten to get -aboard stores of fresh food. He had been at the Cercle Bougainville -until we had gone aboard, she said caustically. Jean put his arm about -her fat waist. - -“_Mais_, dar-leeng,” he said, soothingly, “_tais-toi!_” And then to me, -“We are _camarades, ma femme y mi, compañeros buenos_. Ma wife she wash -ze _linge_. That good, eh? _Amerique_ ze woman got boss hand now. -_Diable! C’est_ rottan! _Hombre_, ze wife ees for ze _cuisine_, and ze -babee.” - -He pressed her middle, and advised her to clear up the table while we -went on deck for a smoke. - -He became confidential with me after a _pousse café_ or two. - -“We _faire_ ze _chose économique_, Virginie _y mi_,” he said. “Maybee -som’ day we weesh _avoir_ leetle farm _en France. En vérité, mon ami_, I -forget ze vegetable an’ ze meat because I beat McHenry at _écarté_ in ze -Cercle Bougainville, jus’ _avant_ we go ’way from Papeete. I nevaire -play ze _carte_ on ze schoonaire! _Jamais de la vie!_” - -The captain had aboard a brown pup, a mongrel he had found in the -Marquesas Islands. He had named him Chocolat, and passed hours each day -in teaching him tricks—to lie down and sit up at command, to stand and -to bark. The dog liked to run over the roof of the cabin and to crouch -upon the low rail at the stern. As any roll or pitch of the vessel might -toss him into the ocean, I feared for his longevity, but -Chocolat—pronounced by Moet “Shockolah”—was able to fall inboard -whenever the motion jeopardized his safety. - -“_Eh, petit chien_,” Jean Moet would cry, when Chocolat skated down the -inclined deck into the scuppers, or hung for a moment indecisively on -the rail, “you by ’n’ by goin’-a be eat by ze _requin_. Ze big shark -getta you, _perrillo_, an’ you forget all my teach you, _mi querido_!” - -He whipped Chocolat many times a day, when the puppy let down from -“attention” before told, or when he attacked his food before a certain -whistled note. - -“What will you do with him when his education is complete?” I asked -Moet. - -“When he ees educate, _hein_? He will be like ze saircuss animal. One -year old, maybe, he make turnover, fight ze _boxe_, drink wine, an’, -_puedeser_, he talk leetle. Zen I sell heem some tourist, some crazee -_Americain_ who zink he do for heem like me. I sharge five hunder -franc.” - -McHenry, who kicked Chocolat whenever he had an opportunity unseen, -ridiculed Moet’s dream of gain. - -“You will like hell!” said McHenry. “When you’ve got the dirty little -bastard sayin’, ‘Good mornin’, ‘nice an’ proper, he’ll sneak ashore in -some boat-load o’ truck, an’ some Paumotuan ’ll hotpot him. Wait till -he’s fat! You know what they’ll do for fresh meat.” - -“_Non, non!_” answered the captain, angrily. “I am not afraid of zat. I -teach heem I keel heem he go in boat, but maybe you take heem an’ sell -heem on ze quiet, McHenry.” - -The small, cold eyes of McHenry gleamed, and a queer smile twisted his -mouth. - -“Well, keep him from under my feet!” he warned, and laughed at some -thought now fully formed in his mind. I could see it squirming in his -small brain. - -McHenry was as rollicking a rascal as I knew in all the South Seas. He -was bitter and yet had a flavor of real humor at odd times. Without -schooling except that of a wharf-rat in Liverpool, New York, and San -Francisco, he had come into these latitudes twenty years before. Cunning -yet drunken, cruel but now and again doing a kindness out of sheer -animal spirits or a desire to show off, he had many enemies, and yet he -had a few friends. When the itching for money or the desire to feel -power over those about him urged him, as most of the time, he proved -himself the ripest and rottenest product of his early and present -environment. He had had desperate fights to keep from being a decaying -beachcomber, a parasite without the law; but a certain Scotch caution, a -love of making and amassing profits, and, as I learned later, a firm and -towering native wife, had kept him at least out of jail and in the -groove of trading. - -Boasting was his chief weakness. He would go far to find the chance to -ease his latent sense of inferiority to an audience that did not know -fully his poverty of character and attainment. After years of ups and -downs he had now quarreled with his recent employers, and was going to -pitch his trade tent on some Paumotu atoll where copra and pearl-shell -might be found. He thought that he might stay a while in Takaroa, one of -our ports, because the diving season was about to open there. He and I -being the only ones whose language was English, we were much together, -but I always half despised myself for not speaking my mind to him. -Still, those lonely places make a man compromise as much as do cities. -What one might fear most would be having no one to talk with. - -We lived on deck, all four of us, the Moets, McHenry, and I, along with -a half-caste mate, sleeping always on the roof of the cabin, and taking -our meals off it, except in rain. In that moist case we bundled on the -floor of the cabin. There was no ceremony. The cook brought the food -through the cabin, and we handed up and down the dishes through the -after scuttle, helping ourselves at will to the wine and rum which were -in clay bottles on the roof. McHenry and I were the only passengers, and -the crew of six Tahitians was ample for all tasks. They were Piri a -Tuahine, the boat-steerer; Peretia a Huitofa, Moe a Nahe, Roometua a -Terehe, Piha a Teina, and Huahine, with Tamataura, the cook. - -The whole forward deck of the schooner was crowded with native men, -women, and children, the families of church leaders who were returning -to their Paumotu homes after attending a religious festival in Tahiti. -They lay huddled at night, sleeping silently in the moonlight and under -the stars. All day, and until eight or nine o’clock, they conversed and -ate, and worked with their hands, plaiting hats of _pandanus_, -sugar-cane, bamboo, and other materials. White laborers massed in such -discomfort would have quarreled, squabbled for place, and eased their -annoyance in loud words, but the Polynesian, of all races, loves his -fellow and keeps his temper. - -These were the first Paumotuan people I had seen intimately, and I -listened to them and asked them questions. A deacon who at night removed -a black coat and slept in a white-flowered blue loin-cloth, the _pareu_ -of all the Polynesians, gazed at the heavens for hours. He knew many of -the stars. - -“Our old people,” he said, “believed that the gods were always making -new worlds in distant sky places beyond the Milky Way, the -_Maoroaheita_. When a new world was made by the strong hands of the -gods, the _Atua_, it went like a great bird to the place fixed for it. -That star, _Rehua_,”—he pointed toward Sirius “was first placed by the -_Atua_ near the _Tauha_, the Southern Cross, but afterwards they changed -it, and sent it to where it is now.” - -I looked at the glowing cross, and remembered the emotion its first -sight had stirred in me. I was tossing on the royal yard of a bark bound -for Brazil, up a hundred feet and more from deck, when, raising my head -from the sail I had made fast, there burst upon me the wonderful form -and brilliance of the constellation which five thousand years ago -entranced the Old World but which is hidden from it now. - -The deacon again raised his hand and indicated the spot where _Rehua_ -had shone before the divine mind had changed. It was the Coal-sack, the -black vacancy in the Magellan Clouds, so conspicuous below the cross -when all the rest of the sky is cloudless and clear. The Maori mind had -wisely settled upon that vast space in the stellar system in which not -even an atom of stellar dust sheds a single flicker of luminosity as the -point from which the gods had plucked _Rehua_. I had no such lucid -reason for this amazing, celestial void as the half-naked deacon on the -deck of the _Marara_. - -We had a poor wind for two days, and I looked long hours in the water, -so close to the deck, at the manifestations of organic and vegetable -vitality. All life of the ocean, I knew, depended ultimately on minute -plants. The great fish and mammals fed on plant forms which were -distributed throughout the seas. These grew in the waters themselves or -were cast into them along their shores or by the thousands of rivers -which eventually feed the ocean. The flora of all the earth, seeds, -nuts, beans, leaves, kernels, swam or sank in the majority element, and -aided in the nourishment of the creatures there. They had, also, taken -root on shores foreign to their birth, and had, from immigrants, become -esteemed natives of many lands. They had increased man’s knowledge, too, -as the sea-beans found on the shores of Scotland led to the discovery of -that puzzle of all currents, the Gulf Stream. After all was said, the -land was insignificant compared to the water—little more than a fourth -of the surface of the globe, and in mass as puny. The average elevation -of the land was less than a fifth of a mile, while the average depth of -the sea was two miles, or thirty times the mass of the land. If the -solid earth were smoothed down to a level, it would be entirely covered -a mile deep by the water. I felt very close to the sea, and fearful of -its might. I envied the natives their assurance, or, at least, -stolidity. - -The days were intensely hot. When the sails were furled or flapped idly, -and the _Marara_ lay almost still, listening for even a whisper of wind, -I suffered keenly. The second noon our common exasperation broke out in -the inflammable Moet. - -The captain shouted to Huahine, a sailor, to cover his head with a hat. -The man was a giant, weighing more than two hundred and fifty pounds, -but Moet addressed him as he would a child. - -“_Sapristi!_” he yelled, _“Taupoo! Maamaa!_ Your hat, you fool!” - -“_Diablo! amigo_,” he said, testily. “Zose nateev air babee. I have ze -men paralyze by ze sun in ze Marqueses. In ze _viento_, when ze win’ -blow, no dan-gair, but when no blow—_sacré!_ ze sun melts ze brain -off-off.” - -Captain Moet was dramatic. Whatever he said he acted with face, hands -and arms, feet, and even his whole body. He made a gesture that caused -me to touch my own hat, to consider its resistance to the sun, to feel -an anticipation of harm. Suddenly he took the arm of the sailor at the -wheel, Piha a Teina, a Tahitian, and, releasing the spokes from his -hands, himself began to steer. - -“Go there in the lee of the mainsail,” he said in Tahitian, “and tell -the American about your terrible adventure when you almost died of -thirst!” - -“Look at him!” said Moet to me. “He is old before his time. The sun did -that.” - -[Illustration: - - Photo from L. Gauthier - The atoll of Niau -] - -Piha a Teina stood beside me, shy, slow to begin his epic. He was -shriveled and withered, pitifully marked by some experience unusual even -to these Maori masters of this sea. I gave him a cigarette, and, -lighting it, he began; - -“I am Piha a Teina,” he said. “I was living in the island of Marutea in -the Paumotus when this thing happened. I set out one day in a cutter for -Manga Reva. That island was seven hundred miles away, and we were sent, -Pere Ani, my friend, and I, to bring back copra. The cutter was small, -not so large as a ship’s boat. We had food for eight or nine days, and -as the wind was as we wanted it, blowing steadily toward Manga Reva, we -felt sure we would arrive there in that time. But we lost the stars. -They would not show themselves, and soon we did not know which way to -steer. This schooner has a compass, but we could not tell the direction -by the sun as we had not the _aveia_. We became uneasy and then afraid. -Still we kept on by guess and hope, believing the wind could not have -changed its mind since we started. On the tenth day we ate the last bite -of our food. We had not stinted ourselves until the eighth day, and then -we felt sure the next day or the next would bring the land. - -[Illustration: - - The anchorage at Tahauku. Atuona lies just around the first headland - to the right -] - -“But on the eleventh day we saw nothing but the sea. I had a pearl hook -and with it we caught _bonito_. We ate them raw. They made us thirsty, -and we drank all our water. It did not rain for many days, and we drank -the salt water. When it rained we had nothing in which to catch and keep -the fresh water. We could only suck the wet sail which we had taken down -because we had become too weak to handle it if the gale had caught us -with it up. We drifted and drifted with the current. The sun beat upon -us and we were burned like the breadfruit in the oven. I could not touch -my breast in the daytime it was so hot. The time went on as slowly as -the cocoanut-tree grows from the nut we plant. We left in the month you -call October. Days and nights we floated without using the tiller except -to keep the cutter before the wind when it blew hard. We had been asleep -maybe a day or two when a storm came. We did not wake up, but it cast us -on the island of Rapa-iti. Pere Ani never woke up, but I am here. The -sun killed him.” - -“How long were you in the cutter?” I asked. - -Moet heard my question and replied: - -“_Mais_, zey lef’ Marutea in _octobre_, an’ ze Zelee, the Franche -war-sheep, fin’ zem on Rapa-iti in Januaire. Zey was—_yo no se_—more zan -seexty day in ze boat.” - -Piha a Teina expressed neither gladness nor sorrow that he had escaped -the fate of Pere Ani. He knew, as his race, that fate was inexorable, -and he contemplated life as the gift of a powerful force that could not -be argued with nor threatened by prayers, though, to be in the mode, he -might make such supplications. - -“If I had had such a _hohoa moana_, a chart of the sea, as we formerly -made of sticks,” he said, “I could have found Manga Reva without the -stars. We made them of straight and curved pieces of wood or bamboo, and -we marked islands on them with shells. They showed the currents from the -four quarters of the sea, and with them we made journeys of thousands of -miles to the Marquesas and to Hawaii and Samoa. But we have forgotten -how to make them, and I know nothing of the paper charts the white man -has, but I can read the _aveia_, the compass of the schooner. We did not -take our _hooa_ in our canoes, but studied them at home.” - -The captain whistled, caught my eye, touched his forehead to signify -Piha a Teina was wandering mentally, and summoned the sailor to take the -wheel. - -“He ees _maamaa_ evvair since zat leetle voyage,” he said, sagely. - -On the morning of the fourth day from Papeete the first of the eighty -Paumotu atolls raised a delicate green fringe of trees four or five -miles away. It lay so low that from the deck of the schooner it could -not be seen even on the clearest days at a greater distance. One heard -the surf before the island appeared. It was only a few feet above the -plane of the sea, flat, with no hill or eminence upon it, a leaf upon -the surface of a pond. I could hardly believe it part of the familiar -globe. It was more like the fairy-island of childhood, the coral strand -of youth, the lotus land of poesy. It was, in reality, the most -beautiful, fascinating, inconceivable sight upon the ocean. - -McHenry and I stood with Chocolat and watched the slow rise of the atoll -of Niau, as the _Marara_, under lessened sail and with Captain Moet at -the helm, cautiously approached the land. We crept up to it, as one -might to a trap in which one hoped to snare a hare but feared to find a -wolf. All hands stood by for orders. Though the sky was azure and the -sun broiling, one never knew in the Pernicious Islands when the -unforeseen might happen. - -Seven miles long and five wide, Niau was a matchless bracelet of ivory -and jade. Grieg Island, some Anglo-Saxon discoverer once named it, but -Grieg had fame abroad only. None spoke his name as we advanced warily -over the road, familiar to them all as the Sulu Sea to me. The cargo for -Niau came through the hatches, thrown up from the hold, sailor to -sailor, and was piled on deck until all was checked. Madame Moet was on -the poop by the after door of the cabin, hanging over each item and -marking it off upon her inventory, while Jean hummed the “Carmagnole,” -and swung the _Flying Fish_ about on short tacks for her goal. Between -the shifting of the canvas the long-boat was lowered, and the goods -heaped in it: boxes and barrels, bales and buckets, edibles and -clothing, matches and tobacco, gimcracks and patent medicines. - -As closer we went, I saw that Niau was a perfect oval, composed of a -number of separate islets or _motus_. These formed the land on which -were the trees and shrubs and the people, but this oval itself was -inclosed by a hidden reef, several hundred feet wide, on which the -breakers crashed and spilled in a flood of foaming billows. - -There was no enthusiasm over the beauty of Niau except in my heaving -breast, and I concealed it as I would free thinking in a monastery. To -McHenry and Jean and Virginia, a lovely atoll was but a speck upon the -ocean on which to cozen inferior creatures. - -“_Madre de Dios!_” vociferated the skipper, when, a mile from the -gleaming teeth of the reef, he brought the _Marara_ up into the wind and -halted her like a panting mare thrown upon her haunches. “Mc’onree et -M’sieu’ O’Breeon, eef you go ’shore, tomble een, _pronto_!” - -He released the wheel to the mate, and we three scrambled over the rail -and jumped upon the cargo as the boat rose on a wave, joining the four -Tahitians who were at the heavy oars, with Piri a Tuahine at the stern, -holding a long sweep for a rudder. It was attached by a bight of rope, -and by a longer rope kept from floating away in case of mishap. - -Now came as delicate a bit of action with sails as a yachtsman, with his -mother-in-law as a guest, might recklessly essay. Captain Moet sang out -from his perch on a barrel to the half-caste at the wheel to go ahead, -and the _Flying Fish_, which for a few minutes had been trembling in -leash, turned on her heel and headed directly for the streak of foam, -the roar of which drowned our voices at that distance. - -Eight hundred feet away, when it must have looked to a landsman on the -schooner that she was almost in the breakers, we cast off the line and -took to our oars. It was nice seamanship to save time by minimizing -rowing, but certainly not in Lloyd’s rules of safety. Those who reckon -dangers do not laugh in these parts. A merry rashness helps ease of -mind. - -In five minutes our boat was in the surf, rolling and tumbling, and I on -my merchandise peak clasped a bale fervently, though McHenry and Moet -appeared glued to barrels which they rode jauntily. It was now I saw the -art of the Polynesians, the ablest breaker boatmen in the world. - -All about seemed to me solid coral rock or distorted masses of limestone -covering and uncovering with the surging water, but suddenly there came -into my altering view, as the steersman headed toward it, a strange pit -in the unyielding strata. Into this maelstrom the water rushed -furiously, drawn in and sucked out with each roll of the ocean. The -Tahitians, at a word, stopped rowing, while Piri a Tuahine scrutinized -intently the onrushing waves. He judged the speed and force of each as -it neared him, and on his accuracy of eye and mind depended our lives. - -The oarsmen tugged with their blades to hold the boat against the -sweeping tide, and abruptly, with a wild shout, Piri a Tuahine set them -to pulling like mad, while he with his long oar both steered and -sculled. - -“_Tamau te paina!_” all yelled amid the boom of the surf. - -“Hold on to the wood!” and down into the pit we tore; down and in, the -boat raced through the vortex of the chute, the pilot avoiding narrowly -the coffin-like sides of the menacing depression, and the sailors, with -their oars aloft for the few dread seconds, awaiting with joyous shouts -the emergence into the shallows. All was in the strong hands and steady -nerves of Piri a Tuahine. A miscalculated swerve of his sturdy lever, -and we would have been smashed like egg-shells, boat and bodies, against -the massive sides. But spirit and wood were stedfast, and I rode as high -and dry from the imminent Scylla as if on a camel in the Sahara. - -In a few twinklings of an eye we were past the reef, and in the moat in -fast shoaling, quiet water, studded with hummocks and heaps of coral. -The sailors leaped into it shoulder-deep, and guided and forced the boat -as far shoreward as possible, to curtail the cargo-carrying distance. -Captain Moet, McHenry, and I went up to our waists, and reached the -beach. - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CHAPTER II - -Meeting with Tommy Eustace, the trader—Strange soil of the atoll—A bath - in the lagoon—Momuni, the thirsty bread baker—Off for Anaa. - -THE crusader who entered Jerusalem had no deeper feeling of realization -of a long-cherished hope than I when my foot imprinted its mold in the -glistening sand of the atoll of Niau. I stood in my track and scanned -it, as _Crusoe_ the first human mark other than his own he saw on his -lonely island. Not with his dismay, but yet with a slight panic, a -pleasant but alarmed perturbation, an awe at the wonder of the scene. -The moment had the tenseness of that when I saw my first cocoanut-palm; -it mingled a fear that I had passed one of the great climacterics of -visual emotion. - -Here was I in the arcanum of romance, the promised land of chimera, -after years of faint expectation. I was almost stunned by the reality, -and I felt sensibly the need of some one to share the pathos that -oppressed me. I did not forsake my love for Tahiti. That was fixed, but -this atoll was not the same. Tahiti was an adored mistress, this a light -o’ love, a dazzling, alien siren, with whom one could not rest in -safety; a fanciful abode for a brief period, as incomparable to Tahiti -as an ice-field to a garden. - -“What the bloody hell’s eatin’ on you?” exclaimed the irked McHenry, -questioningly as he glared at me. “Aren’t your feet mates? Let’s see -Tommy Eustace! He might have a bottle o’ beer buried in a cool place.” - -Moet was shaking the salt water from his long, inky hair. He had -stumbled and dipped his head in the brine. - -“_’Sus-Maria!_” he swore. “Virginie she say Jean been drink.” - -A shed-like building of rough boards, with unpainted corrugated iron -roof, was a hundred steps from the water, the store and warehouse of the -single trader, who supplied the wants and ambitions of the hundred -inhabitants of Niau and endeavored to monopolize a meager output of -copra and pearl-shell. It was on a rude road, which stretched along the -beach, edged by a dozen houses, small, wooden huts, or thatched straw -shanties, much more primitive and poor than in Tahiti. All the remainder -of Niau was coral, water, and cocoanut-trees, except a scanty -vegetation. - -Thomas Eustace, the trader, or Tomé, as the natives called him, was in -the doorway of his establishment, awaiting the sailors who had begun at -once to carry the _Marara’s_ freight from the boat through the moat. A -quarter of a century ago, a broth of a boy from Ireland, he had stepped -off a ship alongside the Papeete quay, and had never left the South Seas -since. - -“_Faix_, I had the divil’s own toime to shtay,” say Tomé, as we four sat -by an empty barrel head and drank the warmish beer he had offered us -with instant hospitality. - -“I waz that atthracted by the purty gir-ruls, the threes, and the -foine-shmellin’ flowers that the ould man of the ship nivir could dhraw -me back to the pots an’ pans iv the galley. I waz the flunky in the -kitchin iv a wind-jammin’ Sassenach bark, peelin’ praties, an’ waitin’ -on sailormin. The father iv a darlin’ hid me out be Fautaua falls, an’ -the _jondarmy_ hunted an’ hunted, wid nothin’ for their thrubble.” - -A stoutish, quizzical man was Tomé, with brown face and throat and -hands, a stubby, chewed mustache and sleepy, laughing eyes. By the -purling steam of Fautaua, where Loti had lived his idyl with Rarahu and -I had walked with a princess, Thomas Eustace became Tomé forever and -ever. He was well satisfied to be bashaw of an atoll, unused to greater -comfort as he was, and enamored of reef and palm, and the lazy, -unstandardized life of the South Seas. - -“Ye may picther me,” he went on, as he poured the beer, “jumpin’ out iv -the p’isonous galley iv that wind-jammin’ man-killer, an’ fallin’, be -the grace iv God, into a grove iv cocoanuts, wid roas’ pig, breadfruit, -and oranges fur breakfus, _deejunee_, an’ dinner, to whistle low about a -brown fairy that swung on the same branch wid me! The Emerald Isle the -divil! ‘Tis Tahiti’s the Tir-na’n-Og! This beats the bogs an’ the peat -an’ the stirabout, wid no peeler to move you on, an’ no _soggarth_ to -tell ye ye’re a sinner!” - -Tomé was ten years in Penrhyn, the noted pearl island belonging to New -Zealand, and known as Tongareva. Lying Bill, McHenry, and Eustace were -fellow-traders in that lonely spot. “Fellow” in such relations meant the -affectionate intercourse of wolves who united to chase the sheep and -quarrel over the carcass. McHenry and Tomé had greeted each other with -cold familiarity, each knowing the other through and through, wondering -how the other would beat him, and yet not averse to an exchange of trade -news and the gossip of Tahiti and the Group, as they called the -Paumotus. - -“How’s old Lovaina?” asked Tomé. - -“Chargin’ as much as ever for her cheap scoffin’s,” replied McHenry, who -had never eaten a better meal than that served at the Tiaré Hotel. -Eustace, I doubted not, was a square and genial man, but among his -business kind he had to fight bludgeon with bludgeon. He opened a fresh -cocoanut and diverted the mouth of an infant from its natural fount to -make it swallow a few drops. The mother, a handsome, young woman, proud -of her armful, gestured smilingly that Tomé was its father. - -“_Mavourneen dheelish!_” he called her, and the baby, “Molly.” - -Cocoanuts differ in kind and quality as much as apples, and Eustace gave -me a _kaipoa_, which at his direction I ate, husks and all, and found it -delicious. - -Leaving the two merchants to continue their armed banter, I stepped -outside the store and struck off the road toward the center of the -island, through fields of broken coral, mysterious in its oppositeness -from all other terrestrial formations. There was no earth that one could -see or feel, but a matted vegetation in spots showed that even in these -whited sepulchers of the coral animals outlandish plants had found the -substance of life. The flora, though desperate in its poverty, was -heartening in that it could survive at all. The lofty cocoanut-palm, -standing straight as a mast or curving in singular grace, grew -luxuriantly—the evergreen banner of this giant fleet of anchored ships -of stone. Through a few hundred yards of this weird desert-jungle, I -reached the lagoon which the inner marge of the great coral reef -inclosed. - -No lake that I have seen approached this mere in simple beauty, nor had -artist’s vision wrought a more startling, extravagant, yet perfect work -of color. The lagoon of Niau was small enough to encompass with a glance -from where I stood. I felt myself in an enchanted spot. Niau was not all -wooded. For long stretches only the white coral lined the shores, with -here and there the plumy palms refreshing the eyes—brilliant in contrast -with the bare sheen of the coral, and softly rustling in the breeze. - -The water of the lagoon was palest blue, verging to green, clear almost -as the pure air, and the beach shelved rapidly into depths. - -The beach was made up of tiny shells crumbling into sand, billions and -billions of them in the twenty miles about the lagoon. In each of the -legion coral isles this was repeated, so that the mind contemplating -them was confused at the incalculable prodigality of the life expended -to build them and the oddity of the problem arranged by the power -planning them. - -“Every single atom, from the least particle to the largest fragment of -rock, in this great pile,” said Darwin, “bears the stamp of having been -subjected to organized arrangement. We feel surprised when travelers -tell us of the vast dimensions of the Pyramids and other great ruins, -but how utterly insignificant are the greatest of these when compared to -these mountains of stone accumulated by the agency of various minute and -tender animals. This is a wonder which does not at first strike the eye -of the body, but, after reflection, the eye of reason.” - -I sat down under a dwarf cocoanut and let my eyes and mind dwell upon -the gorgeousness of the prospect and the insight into nature’s -reticences it afforded. Everywhere were the tombs or skeletons of the -myriad creatures who had labored and died to construct these footstools -of Might. Could man assume that these eons of years and countless -births, efforts, and deaths, were for any concern of his? But else, he -asked, why were they? To show the boundless power and caprice of the -Creator? Was not the world made for humanity? - -An atoll was to an island as a comet to a star—a freak or sport in the -garden of the sea-gods. It was as if the Designer had planned to set up, -in the thousand miles of ocean through which the Dangerous Islands -stretched, a whimsical cluster of shallower salt lakes, and so had -hidden trillions of tiny beings to inclose them. For, after all, an -atoll was but a lagoon surrounded by a reef of coral, or rather two -reefs, for in the plan of the Architect there was built a second reef -for every atoll, and this outer barrier was sunken, as the one through -which we had come, but yet took the brunt of the waves, and prevented -them from washing away and destroying the inner and habitable reef on -which I then sat. - -This hidden shoal belted the beach regularly, so that it made a moat -between the two; and yet in most atolls there was such an opening as -that through which we had come, often a mere depression, sometimes a -deep and wide mouth. One was forced to consider whether the Architect -had not taken man into his scheme, for without such an opening no people -could reach the shore and lagoon. But the grievous fact was that in some -atolls the minute workers had left no door and that man himself had torn -one open with tools and explosives. Even once within the moat, our boat -was in comparative safety only in the mildest weather, for the moat was -studded with lumps and boulders of coral, and the most crafty -guardianship was imperative to keep our craft whole. - -If there had been an entry through the inner shore into the peaceful -lagoon by which I lolled, then would anchorage and calm have been -assured. So, of course, nature had in some other atolls than Niau -attended to this detail, and these I was to find more inhabited and more -developed, for in some even schooners might seek the haven of the lake, -and a fleet lie there in security. The lagoons were thus, generally, -safe and unflurried, though sometimes terribly harried by cyclones, such -as Lying Bill described the Dane as riding from sea to sea across the -entire island of Anaa. - -Each of the Paumotus was made up of a number of _motus_, or islets, -parted by lower strata in which was the moat water. This string of -_motus_ assumed many dissimilar figures. One had fifty pieces in its -puzzle—a puzzle not fully solved by science, or, at least, still in -dispute. The _motus_ were all formed of coral rock of comparatively -recent origin geologically. Were these atolls the mountain-tops of a -lost Atlantis or thrust-up marine plateaus? The wise men differed. A -theory was that the atolls were coral formations upon volcanic islands -that had slowly sunk, each a monument marking an engulfed island or -mountain peak. - -Another, that volcanic activity, which mothered the high islands in -these seas, caused to rise from the bottom of the ocean a series of -submerged tablelands, leveled by the currents and waves, on which the -coral insects erected the reefs—reefs just peeping above the surface of -the water—and on which the storms threw great blocks of madrepores and -coral broken from the mass. When in this condition, mere rocky rings of -milky coral, over which each billow swept, without life or aught else -than the structures of the marvelous zoöphytes, floors cut and broken -here and there by the surging and pounding breakers, the hand of the -Master raised them up, as through Polynesia other islands had been -raised, and fixed these Paumotus as the fairest growths of Neptune’s -park. - -Lifted above the watery level, they were able to begin their task of -usefulness. Seeds carried by currents, borne by the winds, or brought by -those greatest of all pioneers and settlers of new countries, the -sea-birds, were flung on these ready, but yet barren, atolls, and -vegetation gave them an entrancing present. - -Volcano and insect combined to make these coral blossoms of the South -Seas so different from any other mundane formations that the man with -any dreaming in his soul stood awe-struck at the wonder and artistry of -nature. They were the most wonderful and simple of nature’s works. They -eluded portrayal by brush and camera. No canvas or film could grasp -their symmetry and grace, seize more than a fragment of their alluring -form or hint of their admirable colors. Ravishing scenes from the deck -of a ship, and marvels of construction and hue when upon them, they were -sad and disappointing to the dweller, like a lovely woman who has a bad -disposition. - -Circles, ovals, and horseshoes, regular and irregular, a few miles or a -hundred in circumference, the Paumotus were always essentially the -same—the lagoon and the fringe of reef and palm. These _Iles -Dangereuses_ were the supreme in creation in harmonious light and shade. -They were the very breath of imagination. My thoughts harked back to the -dawn of life, and the struggle between the land and water in which -continents and islands were drowned, and others rose to be the home of -beast and man, when God said, “Let the dry land appear.” - -These atolls had fought the ceaseless war which slowly, but eternally, -shifted our terrestrial foothold. Makatea, nearer Tahiti, lifted its -strange cliffs two hundred feet in the air. It had been raised by -subterranean force thirty-five fathoms from the sea-level, and its -coasts were vertical walls of that height. - -The young Darwin’s theory appealed even with these examples of -resurgence. It was improbable that an elevatory force would uplift -through an immense area great, rocky banks within twenty or thirty -fathoms of the surface of the sea, and not a single point above that -level. Where on the surface of the globe was a chain of mountains, even -a few hundred miles in length, with their many summits rising within a -few feet of a given level, and not one pinnacle above it? Yet that was -the condition in these atolls, for the coral animal could not live more -than thirty fathoms or so below the atmosphere, so that the basic -foundations of the atolls, on which the mites laid their offerings and -their bones, were fewer than two hundred feet under the surface. The -polyp gnome died from the pressure of water at greater depths. Just -outside the reefs or between the atolls, the depths were often greater -than a mile or two. - -The vague science I possessed stimulated the memories of my reading of -that oldest civilization in tradition, the immense continent of Pan, -which a score of millenniums ago, according to the poet archæologists, -flourished in this Pacific Ocean. Its cryptogram attended in many spots -the discovery of a new Rosetta stone. I myself had seen huge monoliths, -half-buried pyramids and High Places, hieroglyphs and carvings, -certainly the fashioning of no living races. Were these Paumotus, and -many other islands from Japan to Easter, the tops of the submerged -continent, Pan, which stretched its crippled body along the floor of the -Pacific for thousands of leagues? There were legends, myths, customs, -inexplicable absences of usages and knowledge on the part of present -peoples, all perhaps capable of interpretation by this fascinating -theory of a race lost to history before Sumer attained coherence or -Babylon made bricks. - -[Illustration: - - A Paumotu atoll after a blow -] - -Over this land bridge, mayhap, ventured a Caucasian people, the dominant -blood in Polynesia to-day, and when the connecting links in the chain to -their cradle fell from the sights of sun and stars, the survivors were -isolated for ages on the islands like Tahiti and the Marquesas. On the -mountain-tops, plateaus beneath the water, the coral insect built up -these atolls until they stood in their wondrous shapes splendid examples -of nature’s self-arrested labor, sculptures of unbelievable brilliancy. - -[Illustration: - - Photo by Dr. Theodore P. Cleveland - A squall approaching Anaa -] - -To them came first Caucasians who had been spared in the cataclysm, and -later the new sailors of giant canoes who followed from Asia the line of -islets and atolls, fighting with and conquering the Caucasians, and -merging into them in the course of generations. These first and -succeeding migrations must have been forced by devastating natural -phenomena, by terrible economic pressure, by wars and tribal feuds. It -was not probable that any people deliberately chose these atolls in -preference to the higher lands, but that they occupied them in lieu of -better on account of evil fortune. - -These eighty Paumotu islands averaged about forty miles apart, with only -two thousand people in all of them, which would allow, if equally -distributed, only twenty-five inhabitants to each. On more than half of -them no person lived, and all the others were scantily peopled. Three or -four hundred might occupy one atoll where shell and cocoanuts were -bountiful and fish plentiful and good, while two score and more atolls -were left for the frigate-bird to build its nest and for the robber-crab -to eat its full of nuts. - -The thud of a cocoanut beside me stirred me from my reverie. I was wet -with the wading ashore and the sweat of my walk, and so I removed my few -garments and plunged into the lagoon. Going down to test the declivity a -yard or so from the water’s edge I dropped twenty feet and touched no -bottom. The water was limpid, delicious, and I could see the giant coral -fans waving fifty feet below me. - -As I loitered on my back in the water, and looked down into the crystal -depths and at the cloudless sky, I had a moment’s phantasm of a great -city, its lofty trade battlements, its crowded streets, the pale, set -faces of its people, the splendor of the rich houses, the squalor of the -tenements, the police with clubs and guns, and the shrieking traffic. -Here was the sweetest contrast, where man had hardly touched the -primitive work of nature. It was long from Sumer, and far from Gotham. - -I was floating at ease when I heard a voice. It seemed to come out of -the water. It was soft and almost etheric. - -“_Maitai!_” it said, which meant, “You’re all right.” - -I turned on my side, and by my garments was a long, gaunt Niauan, with a -loose mouth, loafing there, with his eyes fawning upon me. He smiled -sweetly, and said, “Goodanighta!” - -As it was hardly seven o’clock in the morning, the sun a ball of fire, -and the glare of the reef like the shine of a boy’s mirror in one’s -eyes, I argued against his English education. But courtesy is not -correction. I said in kind, “Goodanighta!” He came into the water and -repaid me by shaking my hand, and with a movement toward the beach, -said, “Damafina!” - -“_Maitai!_” I corroborated his opinion, and then he beckoned to me to -leave the lagoon and follow him. I dressed, all moist as I was, and we -returned toward the village, I wondering what design on me he had. - -“She canna fik (fix) you show Niau,” my cicerone explained, as he waved -toward the island. - -“All right, good, number one,” I assented. - -He laughed with pleased vanity at his success in conversing with me in -my tongue and at the envious looks of the people on their tiny porches -as we passed them, and I saluted them. - -“_Momuni! Momuni!_” they called after him with scornful laughter, and -beckoned me to leave him and join them. - -“_Haere mai!_” they said, sweetly to me. Come to us! - -My guide did not like either the name they gave him or their efforts to -alienate us. He retorted with an impolite gesticulation, and cried, -“_Popay! Popay!_” _Momuni_, though, was plainly nervous, and afraid that -I might be won over by the opposition. He plucked me by my wet sleeve -and directed me to a shanty of old boards set upon a platform of coral -rocks four feet from the bed of the atoll. In its single room on a white -bedspread were a dozen loaves of bread, crisp and white, and smelling -appetizingly. He lifted one, squeezed it to show its sponginess, and put -it to my nose. He sniffed, and said, “She the greata coo-ooka.” - -I guessed that he referred to himself as the baker. He pointed out -toward the schooner and made me understand that this baking was a -present to me. I was embarrassed, and with many flourishes explained -that the Tahitian cook of the _Marara_ could not be compared with him as -a bread-maker, but that he was of a jealous disposition and might resent -bitterly the gift. My companion was cast down for a moment, but -brightened with another idea. Through a hundred yards more of coral -bones we plowed to his oven, a huge, coral stove like a lime-kiln, with -a roof, and bags of Victor flour from the Pacific Coast beside it. -Pridefully he made me note everything, as an artist might his studio. - -_Momuni_ then touched my arm, and said, “_Haere!_ We can do.” - -We walked along the beach of the lagoon and found a road that paralleled -the one we had come. It was lower than the other and the rain had -flooded it. The water was brown and stagnant, even red in pools, like -blood. Uncanny things shot past my feet or crawled upon them, and once -something that had not the feel of anything I knew of climbed the calf -of my leg, and when I turned and saw it dimly I leaped into the air and -kicked it off. I heard it plop into the dark water. - -Down this marsh we plodded and paddled, floundered and splashed for half -a mile. The cocoanut-palms arched across it, but there was not a person -nor a habitation in view. I wondered why “she the great cook” had led me -into this morass. _Momuni_ looked at me mysteriously several times, and -his lips moved as if he had been about to speak. - -He studied my countenance attentively, and several times he patted and -rubbed my back affectionately and said, “You damafina.” Then, slimy and -sloppy as I was, covered with the foul water up to my waist, when we -were in the darkest spot _Momuni_ halted and drew me under a palm. - -He would either seek to borrow money or to cut my throat, I thought -hastily. Again he scanned me closely, and I, to soften his heart and -avert the evil, tried to appear firm and unafraid. To my astonishment he -took from his pocket five five-franc notes, those ugly, red-inked bills -which are current in all the _Etablissements Français de l’Oceanie_, and -held them under my nose. He smiled and then made the motion of pulling a -cork, and of a bottle’s contents gurgling through his loose mouth and -down his long neck. - -I shuddered at my thoughts. Could it be that in this dry atoll, with -intoxicants forbidden, and prison the penalty of selling or giving them -to a native, this hospitable Niauan had offered me his bread and shown -me his oven, and the glories of the isle, and was displaying those five -red notes to seduce me into breaking the law, into smuggling ashore a -bottle of rum or wine? - -I was determined to know the worst. I drew from my drawers (I had worn -no trousers) an imaginary corkscrew, and from my undershirt an -unsubstantial bottle. I pulled a supposititious cork, and took a long -drink of the unreal elixir. _Momuni_ was transfixed. His jaws worked, -and his tongue extended. He squeezed my hand with happiness and hope, -and left in it the five scarlet tokens of the _Banque de l’Indo-Chine_. - -“Wina damafina; rumma damafina,” he confided. The man would be content -with anything, so it bit his throat and made him a king for an evil -hour. - -Tomé was dealing out tobacco when we reached his store. His wife and -baby, an Irish-Penrhyn baby, were now eating a can of salmon and Nabisco -wafers. - -“Who is this gentleman, Mr. Eustace?” I asked, pointing to _Momuni_. - -“He’s an _omadhaun_, a nuisance, that he is, sure,” said Tomé. “He’s a -Mormon deacon that peddles bread an’ buys his flour from some one else -because I won’t trust him. He’s the only Mormon in this blessed island. -Every last soul is a Roman Cat’lic, except me, and I’m a believer in the -_leprechawn_. Has that hooligan been thryin’ to work ye for a bottle of -rum? He’ll talk a day for a drink.” - -“What’s _Momuni_ and _Popay_?” - -“_Momuni_ is the way they say ‘Mormons.’ The other’s the pope wid the -accint on the last syllable. It’s the name for Cat’lics all over these -seas, because they worship the pope iv Rome. The Popays run this island, -but the Momunis have got Takaroa and some others by the tail.” - -I turned to look at my guide, the bread-maker. I had new admiration for -him. It took courage to be the one Mormon among a hundred Catholics, and -to try to sell them the staff of life. But he could not withstand the -withering glances of Tomé, and fled, with gestures to me which I could -only hazard to mean to meet him later in the fearsome swamp, with the -rum. - -“Does _Momuni_ owe you any money?” I asked the trader, who was lighting -his wife’s cigarette. - -“Does he? He owes me forty francs for flour, and I’ll nivir see the -shadow iv them. I’ll tell ye, though, he’s the best baker in the Group, -an’ they’re crazy about his bread.” - -Eustace had no cargo for us, and McHenry and I caught the last boat for -the _Marara_, Moet having stayed for one trip only. - -“Come an’ shtay wid us a month or two,” said Tomé in farewell. “We’ll -make ye happy and find ye a sweetheart! ’Tis here ye can shpend yer -valibil time doin’ nawthin’ at all, at all.” - -He laughed heartily at his joke on virtue, and as we dashed through the -surf to climb into the boat I turned to see him telling the assembling -villagers some story that might provoke a laugh and keep their copra a -monopoly for him. - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CHAPTER III - -Perilous navigation—Curious green sky—Arrival at Anaa—Religion and the - movies—Character of Paumotuans. - -A CURRENT set against us all night. Now I understood fully the alarms -and misgivings that had caused the first and following discoverers of -the “Pernicious Islands” to curse them by the titles they gave them. Our -current was of the mischievous sort that upset logarithms and dead -reckoning, and put ships ashore. - -“This group is a graveyard of vessels,” said McHenry, “and there’d be -ten times as many wrecked, if they come here. Wait till you see the -_County of Roxburgh_ at Takaroa! I’ve been cruisin’ round here more’n -twenty years, and I never saw the current the same. The Frog Government -at Papeete is always talkin’ about puttin’ lighthouses on a half dozen -of these atolls, but does nothin’. Maybe the chief or a trader hangs a -lantern on top of his house when he expects a cargo for him, but you -can’t trust those lights, and you can’t see them in time to keep from -hittin’ the reef. There’s no leeway to run from a wind past beating. -It’s lee shore in some bloody direction all the time. - -“There’s a foot or two between high and low, and it’s low in the lagoon -when the moon is full. It’s high when the moon rises and when it sets. -In atolls where there’s a pass into the lagoon, there’s a hell of a -current in the lagoon at the lowerin’ tide, and in the sea near the -lagoon when the tide is risin’. We’re goin’ to beat those tides with -engines. In five years every schooner in the group will have an -auxiliary. There’s only one now, the _Fetia Taiao_, and she’s brand new. -It used to be canoes, and then whale-boats, and then cutters here, and -purty soon it’ll be gasolene schooners.” - -Then will the cry arise that romance has perished of artificiality. But -the heart of man is always the same, and nothing kills romance but -sloth. - -We battled with the current and a fresh wind during the long, dark -hours, Jean Moet never leaving the deck, and I keeping him company. -Below on a settee Virginie said her beads or slept. I could see her by -the smudgy cabin lamp, and hear her call to her husband two or three -times, hours apart, “_Ça va bien?_” Jean would answer in Tahitian, as to -a sailor, “_Maitai_,” and invariably would follow his mechanical reply, -with “_Et toi, dors-tu?_” - -Ever light-hearted, currents nor squalls could burden his Gascon spirit. -He looked at the stars, and he looked at the water, he consulted with -the mate, and gave orders to the steersman. - -“_Eh b’en_,” he said to me, “_moi_, I am _comme monsieur_ ze -_gouverneur_ ov ze Paumotu who live een Favarava, over zere.” He pointed -into the darkness. “’E ’as a leetle schoonaire an’ ’e keep ze court and -ze calaboose, bot mos’ly ’e lis’en to ze _musique_ an’ make ze dance. -_La vie est triste; viva la bagatelle!_ Maybee we pick op Anaa in ze -morning. Eef not, _amigo mio_, Virginie she weel pray for _nous_ both.” - -Anaa, or Chain Island, as Captain Cook named it because of its eleven -_motus_ or islets, strung like emeralds and pearls in a rosary, was not -visible at daybreak, but as I studied the horizon the sky turned to a -brilliant green. I thought some dream of that Tir-na’n-Og spoken of by -Tomé in Niau obsessed me. I turned my back and waited for my eyes to -right themselves. One sees green in the rainbow and green in the sunset, -but never had I known a morning sky to be of such a hue. McHenry came on -deck in his pajamas, and looked about. - -“_Erin go bragh!_” he remarked. “Ireland is castin’ a shadow on the -bloody heaven. There,” he pointed, “is the sight o’ the bleedin’ world. -You’ve never seen it before an’ you won’t see it again, unless you come -to Anaa in the mornin’ or evenin’ of a purty clear day. It’s the shinin’ -of the lagoon of Anaa in the sky, an’ it’s nowhere else on the ball. -There’s many a Kanaka in ’is canoe outa sight o’ land has said a prayer -to his god when he seen that green. He knew he was near Anaa. You can -see that shine thirty or thirty-five miles away, hours before you raise -the atoll.” - -Some curious relation of the lagoon to the sky had painted this hazy -lawn on high. It was like a great field of luscious grass, at times -filmy, paling to the color of absinthe touched with water, and again a -true aquamarine, as I have seen the bay of Todos Santos, at Enseñada of -Lower California. Probably it is the shallowness of the waters, which in -this lagoon are strangely different from most of the inland basins of -the South Sea Isles. To these mariners, who moved their little boats -between them, the mirage was famed; and the natives had many a legend of -its origin and cause, and of their kind being saved from starvation or -thirst by its kindly glint. - -McHenry called down the companionway, “Hey, _monster_, you can see the -grass on Anaa. _Vite-vite!_” - -Moet, who was below, drinking a cup of coffee, leaped up the -companionway. He called out swift orders to go over on the other tack, -and headed straight for the mirage. The schooner heeled to the breeze, -now freshening as the sun became hotter, and we reeled off six or seven -knots with all canvas drawing. In an hour the celestial plot of green -had vanished, fading out slowly as we advanced, and we began to glimpse -the cocoanuts on the beach, though few trees showed on the sky-line, and -they were twisted as in travail. - -Anaa, as others of these islands and Tahiti, too, had suffered terribly -by a cyclone a few years ago. More than any other island of this group -Anaa had felt the devastating force of the _matai rorofai_, the “wind -that kills”—the wind that slew Lovaina’s son and made her cut her hair -in mourning. Hikueru lost more people, because there were many there; -but Anaa was mangled and torn as a picador’s horse by the horns of the -angry bull. A half-mile away we could plainly see the havoc of wind and -wave. The reef itself had been broken away in places, and coral rocks as -big as houses hurled upon the beach. - -“I was there just after the cyclone,” said McHenry. “It was a bloomin’ -garden before then, Anaa. It was the only island in the Paumotus in -which they grew most of the fruits as in Tahiti, the breadfruit, the -banana, the orange, lime, mango, and others. It may be an older island -than the others or more protected usually from the wind; but, anyhow, it -had the richest soil. The Anaa people were just like children, happy and -singin’ all the time. That damned storm knocked them galley-west. It -tore a hole in the island, as you can see, killed a hundred people, and -ended their prosperity. There was a Catholic church of coral, old and -bloody fine, and when I got here a week after the cyclone I couldn’t -find the spot where the foundations had been. I came with the vessels -the Government sent to help the people. You never seen such a sight. The -most of the dead were blown into the lagoon or lay under big hunks of -coral. People with crushed heads and broken legs and arms and ribs were -strewn all around. The bare reef is where the village was, and the -people who went into the church to be safe were swept out to sea with -it.” - -As at Niau, the schooner lay off the shore, and the long-boat was -lowered. In it were placed the cargo, and with Moet, McHenry, and me, -men, women, and children passengers, four oarsmen and the boat-steerer, -it was completely filled, we sitting again on the boxes. - -Once more the _Flying Fish_ towed the boat very near to the beach, and -at the cry of “Let go!” flung away the rope’s end and left us to the -oars. The passage through the reef of Anaa was not like that of Niau. -There was no pit, but a mere depression in the rocks, and it took the -nicest manœuvering to send the boat in the exact spot. As we approached, -the huge boulders lowered upon us, threatening to smash us to pieces, -and we backed water and waited for the psychological moment. The surf -was strong, rolling seven or eight feet high, and crashing on the stone -with a menacing roar, but the boat-steerer wore a smile as he shouted, -“_Tamau te paina!_” - -The oars lurched forward in the water, the boat rose on the wave, and -onward we surged; over the reef, scraping a little, avoiding the great -rocks by inches almost, and into milder water. The sailors leaped out, -and with the next wave pulled the boat against the smoother strand; but -it was all coral, all rough and all dangerous, and I considered well the -situation before leaving the boat. I got out in two feet of water and -raced the next breaker to the higher beach, my camera tied on my head. - -There was no beach, as we know the word—only a jumbled mass of coral -humps, millions of shells, some whole, most of them broken into bits, -and the rest mere coarse sand. On this were scattered enormous masses of -coral, these pieces of the primitive foundation upheaved and divided by -the breakers when the cyclone blew. The hand of a Titan had crushed them -into shapeless heaps and thrown them hundreds of feet toward the -interior, the waves washing away the soil, destroying all vegetation, -and laying bare the crude floor of the island. From the water’s edge I -walked over this waste, gleaming white or milky, for a hundred yards -before I reached the copra shed of Lacour, a French trader, and sat down -to rest. The sailors bore the women and children on their shoulders to -safety, and then commenced the landing of the merchandise for Lacour. -Flour and soap, sugar, biscuit, canned goods, lamps, piece goods; gauds -and gewgaws, cheap jewelry, beads, straw for making hats, perfumes and -shawls. - -Lacour, pale beneath his deep tan, black-haired and slender, greeted us -at the shed with the dead-and-alive manner of many of these island -exiles, born of torrid heat, long silences, and weariness of the driven -flesh. A cluster of women lounged under a _tohonu_ tree, the only shade -near-by, and they smiled at me and said, “_Ia ora na oe!_” - -I strolled inland. It was an isle of desolation, ravaged years ago, but -prostrated still, swept as by a gigantic flail. Everywhere I beheld the -results of the cataclysm. - -Picking up shells and bits of coral at haphazard, I came upon the bone -of a child, the forearm, bleached by wind and rain. Few of the bodies of -the drowned had been interred with prayer, but found a last -resting-place under the coral débris or in the maws of the sharks that -rode upon the cyclone’s back in search of prey. - -It was very hot. These low atolls were always excessively warm, but not -humid. It was a dry heat. The reflection of the sunlight on the blocks -of coral and the white sand made a glare that was painful to whites, and -made colored glasses necessary to shield their eyes. Temporary blindness -was common among new-comers, thus unprotected. - -I walked miles and never lost the evidence of violence and loss. There -was an old man by a coral pen, in which were three thin, measly pigs, a -grayish yellow in color. He showed me to a small, wooden church. - -“There are four Catholic churches in Anaa,” he said, “with one priest, -and there are three hundred souls all told in this island. The priest -goes about to the different churches, but money is scarce. This New Year -the contribution was so trifling, the priest, who knew the bishop in -Papeete would demand an accounting, sent word to know why—and what do -you think he got back? That Lacour, the trader, with his accursed -cinematograph, had taken all the money. He charged twenty-five cocoanuts -to see the views in his copra shed, and they are wonderful; but the -churches are empty. We are all _Katorika_.” - -“_Katorika?_” I queried. “That is Popay?” - -The old man frowned. - -“Popay! That is what the _Porotetani_ [Protestants] call the Katorika. I -am the priest’s right hand. But we are poor, and Lacour, with his store -and now with his machine that sets the people wild over cowaboyas, and -shows them the Farani [French] and the Amariti [Americans] in their own -islands—there is no money for the church.” - -I interrupted the jeremiad of the ancient acolyte. - -“Was there nothing left of the old church?” I asked. - -The hater of cinematographs took me into the humble wooden structure, -and there were a bronze crucifix and silver candlesticks that had been -in the coral edifice. - -“I saved them,” he said proudly. “When I saw the wind was too great, -when the church began to rock, I took them and buried them in a hole I -dug. I did this before I climbed the tree which saved me from the big -wave. Ah, that was a real cathedral. The people of Anna are changed. The -best died in the storm. They want now to know what is going on in -Papeete, the great world.” - -A hundred years ago the people of Anaa erected three temples to the god -of the Christians. For a century they have had the Jewish and Christian -scriptures. - -Anaa had witnessed a bitter struggle between contending churches to win -adherents. When France took hold, France was Catholic, and the priests -had every opportunity and assistance to do their pious work. The schools -were taught by Catholic nuns. Their governmental subsidy made it -difficult for the English Protestants to proselytize, and with grief -they saw their flocks going to Rome. Only the most zealous Protestant -missionaries were unshaken by the change. When the anti-clerical feeling -in France triumphed, the Concordat was broken, and the schools laicized, -the priests and nuns in these colonies were ousted from the schools; the -Catholic church was not only not favored, but, in many instances, was -hindered by officials who were of anti-clerical feelings. The Protestant -sects took heart again, and made great headway. The Mormons returned, -the Seventh Day Adventists became active, and many nominal Catholics -fell away. The fact was that it was not easy to keep Polynesians at any -heat of religion. They wanted entertainment and amusement, and if a -performance of a religious rite, a sermon, revival, conference, or other -solace or diversion was not offered, they inclined to seek relaxation -and even pleasure where it might be had. Monotony was the substance of -their days, and relief welcomed in the most trifling incident or change. - -[Illustration: - - Photo from Underwood and Underwood - Picking up the atoll of Anaa from the deck of the schooner _Flying - Fish_ -] - -Lacour’s wife, granddaughter of a Welshman but all native in appearance, -sat with the other women under the _tohonu_ tree when I returned. I had -seen thousands of fallen cocoanut-trees rotting in the swamps, and had -climbed over the coral fields for several miles. There was no earth, -only coral and shells and white shell-sand. Chickens evidently picked up -something to eat, for I saw a dozen of them. In the lagoon, fish darted -to and fro. - -[Illustration: - - Photo from L. Gauthier - Canoes and cutters at atoll of Anaa, Paumotu Islands -] - -Lacour’s wife had a yellowish baby in her lap, and she wore earrings, a -wedding-ring, and a necklace and bracelets. - -The boat was plying from the schooner to the shore, and I watched its -progress. Piri a Tuahine held the steering oar, laughing, calling to his -fellows to pull or not to pull, as I could see through a glass. A -current affected the surf, increasing or decreasing its force at -intervals, and it was now at its height. The boat entered the passage on -a crest, but a following wave struck it hard, turned it broadside, and -all but over. A flood entered the boat, but the men leaped out and, -though up to their shoulders in the water, held it firm, and finally -drew it close to the beach. The flour and the boxes and beds of native -passengers were wetted, but they ran to the boat and carried their -belongings near to the copra shed, and spread them to dry. Lacour cursed -the boat and the sailors. - -Near Lacour’s store was a house, in which lived Captain Nimau, owner of -a small schooner. Nimau invited me to sleep there and see the moving -pictures. We had brought Lacour a reel or so, and in anticipation, the -people of Anaa had been gathering cocoanuts for a week. The films were -old ones that Tahiti had wearied of, and Lacour got them for a trifle. -The theater was his copra house, and there were no seats nor need of -them. - -He set the hour of seven for the show, and I alone stayed ashore for it. -By six o’clock the residents began flocking to the shed with their -entrance-fees. Each bore upon his back twenty-five cocoanuts, some in -bags and others with the nuts tied on a pole by their husk. Fathers -carried double or even triple quantities for their little ones, and -each, as he arrived at Lacour’s, counted the nuts before the trader. - -The women brought their own admission tickets. The acolyte, who had -inveighed against the cinematograph, was second in line, and secured the -best squatting space. His own cocoanuts were in Lacour’s bin. - -When the screen was erected and the first picture flashed upon it, few -of the people of Anaa were absent, and Lacour’s copra heap was piled -high. There were a hundred and sixty people present, and four thousand -nuts in the box-office. - -The first film was concerned with the doings of _Nick Winter_, an -English detective in France, a burlesque of _Sherlock Holmes_, and other -criminal literatures. The spectators could not make a head nor tail of -it, but they enjoyed the scenes hugely and were intensely mystified by -many pictures. An automobile, which, by the trickery of the camera, was -made to appear to climb the face of a sky-scraper, raised cries of -astonishment and assertions of _diablerie_. The devil was a very real -power to South Sea Islanders, whether they were Christians or not, and -they had fashioned a composite devil of our horned and cloven-hoofed -chap and their own demons, who was made responsible for most trouble and -disaster that came to them, and whose machinations explained sleight of -hand, and even the vagaries of moving pictures. - -What pleased them most were cow-boy pictures, the melodramatic life of -the Wild West of America, with bucking bronchos, flying lassos, painted -Indians whom they thought tattooed, and dashes of _vaqueros_, border -sheriffs, and maidens who rode cayuses like Comanches. Tahiti was daft -over cow-boys, and had adopted that word into the language, and these -Anaans were vastly taken by the same life. Lacour explained the pictures -as they unrolled, shouting any meanings he thought might pass; and I -doubted if he himself knew much about them, for later he asked me if all -cow-boys were not Spaniards. - -This was the first moving picture machine in these islands. Lacour had -only had it a few weeks. He purposed taking it through the Group on a -cutter that would transport the cocoanut receipts. Lacour, Nimau, and I -sat up late. These Frenchmen save for a few exceptions were as courteous -as at home. Peasants or sailors in France, they brought and improved -with their position that striking cosmopolitan spirit which -distinguishes the Gaul, be he ever so uneducated. The English and -American trader was suspicious, sullen or blatant, vulgar and often -brutal in manner. The Frenchman had _bonhomie_, politeness. England and -America in the South Seas considered this a weakness, and aimed at the -contrary. Manners, of course, originated in France. - -“This island is on the French map as _La Chaîne_,” said Captain Nimau, -“but we who traverse these seas always use the native names. Those old -admirals who took word to their king that they had discovered new -islands always said, too, that they had named them after the king or -some saint. A Spaniard selected a nice name like the Blessed Sacrament -or the Holy Mother of God, or some Spanish saint, while a Frenchman -chose something to show the shape or color of the land. The Englishman -usually named his find after some place at home, like New England, New -Britain, and so on. But we don’t give a _sacré_ for those names. How -could we? All those fellows claimed to have been here first, and so all -islands have two or three European names. We who have to pick them up in -the night, or escape from them in a storm, want the native name as we -need the native knowledge of them. The landmarks, the clouds, the -smells, the currents, the passes, the depths—those are the items that -save or lose us our lives and vessels. Let those _vieux capitaines_ -fight it out below for the honor of their nomenclature and precedence of -discovery!” - -What recriminations in Hades between Columbus and Vespucci! - -“Take this whole archipelago!” continued Nimau. “The Tahitians named it -the Poumotu or pillar islands, because to them the atolls seemed to rise -like white trees from the sea. But the name sounded to the people here -like Paumotu, which means conquered or destroyed islands, and so, after -a few petitions or requests by proud chiefs, the French in 1852 -officially named them Tuamotu, distant, out of view, or below the -horizon. That was more than a half century ago, but we still call them -the Paumotu. There’s nothing harder to change than the old names of -places. You can change a man’s or a whole island’s religion much -easier.” - -Near the little hut in which we were, Nimau’s house, a bevy of girls -smoked cigarettes and talked about me. They had learned that I was not a -sailor, not one of the crew of the _Marara_, and not a trader. What -could I be, then, but a missionary, as I was not an official, because -not French? But I was not a Catholic missionary, for they wore black -gowns; and I could not be Mormoni nor Konito, because there in public I -was with the Frenchmen, drinking beer. Two, who were handsome, brown, -with teeth as brilliant as the heart of the nacre, and eyes and hair -like the husks of the ripe cocoanut, came into the house and questioned -Lacour. - -“They want to know what you are doing here,” interpreted Lacour. - -“I am not here to make money nor to preach the Gospel,” I replied. - -The younger came to me and put her arms about me, and said: “_Ei aha e -reva a noho io nei!_” And that meant, “Stay here always and rest with -me!” - -After a while the acolyte joined us, and I put them all many questions. - -The Paumotuans were a quiet people, dour, or at least serious and -contemplative. They were not like the Tahitians, laugh-loving, -light-hearted, frenzied dancers, orators, music worshipers, feasters. -The Tahitians had the joy of living, though with the melancholy strain -that permeated all Polynesia. The folk of the Dangerous Archipelago were -silent, brooding, and religious. The perils they faced in their general -vocation of diving, and from cyclones, which annihilated entire -populations of atolls, had made them intensely susceptible to fears of -hell-fire and to hopes of heaven. The rather Moslem paradise of -Mormonism made strong appeal, but was offset by the tortures of the -damned, limned by other earnest clerics who preached the old -Wesley-Spurgeon everlasting suffering for all not of their sect. - -Had religion never affected the Paumotuans, their food would have made -them a distinct and a restrained people. We all are creatures of our -nourishment. The Tahitians had a plentitude of varied and delicious -food, a green and sympathetic landscape, a hundred waterfalls and gentle -rills. The inhabitants of these low isles had cocoanut and fish as -staples, and often their only sustenance for years. No streams meander -these stony beds, but rain-water must be caught, or dependence placed on -the brackish pools and shallow wells in the porous rocks or compressed -sand, which ebbed and flowed with the tides. - -To a Tahitian his brooks were his club, where often he sat or lay in the -laughing water, his head crowned with flowers, dreaming of a life of -serene idleness. Once or twice a day he must bathe thoroughly. He was -clean; his skin was aglow with the effect of air and water. No European -could teach him hygiene. He was a perfect animal, untainted and -unsoiled, accustomed to laving and massage, to steam, fresh, and salt -baths, when Europeans, kings, courts, and commoners went unwashed from -autumn to summer; when in the “_Lois de la Galanterie_,” written for -beaux and dandies in 1640, it was enjoined that “every day one should -take pains to wash one’s hands, and one should wash one’s face almost as -often.” - -Environment, purling rivulets under embowering trees, the most -enchanting climate between pole and pole, a simple diet but little -clothing, made the Tahitian and Marquesan the handsomest and cleanest -races in the world. Clothes and cold are an iron barrier to cleanliness, -except where wealth affords comfort and privacy. Michelangelo wore a -pair of socks many years without removing them. Our grandfathers counted -a habit of frequent bathing a sign of weakness. In old New England many -baths were thought conducive to immorality, by some line of logic akin -to that of my austere aunt, who warned me that oysters led to dancing. - -The Paumotuan, before the white man made him a mere machine for -gathering copra and pearl-shell and pearls, had a very distinct culture, -savage though it was. He was the fabric of his food and the actions -induced in him by necessity. Ellis, the interesting missionary diarist -of Tahiti and Hawaii, recorded that in 1817, when at Afareaitu, on -Moorea, he was printing for the first time the Bible in Tahitian “among -the various parties in Afareaitu ... were a number of natives of the -Paumotu, or Pearl Islands, which lie to the northwest of Tahiti and -constitute what is called the Dangerous Archipelago. These numerous -islands, like those of Tetuaroa to the north, are of coralline -formation, and the most elevated parts of them are seldom more than two -or three feet above high-water mark. The principal, and almost only, -edible vegetable they produce is the fruit of the cocoanut. On these, -with the numerous kinds of fishes resorting to their shores or among the -coral reefs, the inhabitants entirely subsist. They appear a hardy and -industrious race, capable of enduring great privations. The Tahitians -believe them to be cannibals.... They are in general firm and muscular, -but of a more spare habit of body than the Tahitians. Their limbs are -well formed, their stature generally tall. The expression of their -countenance, and the outline of their features, greatly resemble those -of the Society Islanders; their manners are, however, more rude and -uncourteous. The greater part of the body is tattooed, sometimes in -broad stripes, at others in large masses of black, and always without -any of the taste and elegance frequently exhibited in the figures marked -on the persons of the Tahitians.” - -One who traveled much in the isolated parts of the world was often -struck by the unfitness of certain populated places to support in any -comfort and safety the people who generation after generation persisted -in living in them. For thousands of years the slopes of Vesuvius have -been cultivated despite the imminent horror of the volcano above. The -burning Paumotu atolls are as undesirable for residences as the desert -of Sahara. Yet the hot sands are peopled, and have been for ages, and in -the recesses of the frozen North the processes of birth and death, of -love and greed, are as absorbing as in the Edens of the earth. Hateful -as a lengthy enforced stay in the Paumotus might be to any of us, I have -seen two Paumotuan youths dwelling abroad for the first time in their -lives, eating delicious food and hardly working at all, weep hours upon -hours from homesickness, a continuous longing for their atoll of -Puka-ruhu, where they had half starved since birth, and where the -equatorial typhoon had raped time and again. Nature, in her insistence -that mankind shall continue, implanted that instinct of home in us as -one of the most powerful agents of survival of the species. Enduring -terrible privation, even, we learned to love the scenes of our -sufferings. Never was that better exemplified than in these melancholy -and maddening-atolls of the half-browned Archipelago. - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CHAPTER IV - -The copra market—Dangerous passage to shore at Kaukura—Our boat - overturns in the pass—I narrowly escape death—Josephite - Missionaries—The deadly nohu—The himene at night. - -WORD we got at Anaa of a few tons of copra at Kaukura sent us hurrying -there. The wind was against us, and we drew long sides of a triangle -before we reached that atoll, which was, as our starting-point, at the -base of the isosceles. Kaukura was a divergence from our intended -course, but these schooners were like birds of the air, which must take -their sustenance as fortune wills. Copra was scarce, and competition in -buying, fierce. The natives received about four cents a pound, but as -payment was usually in goods, the Tahiti traders, who shipped copra to -America and Europe, profited heavily. There were grades in copra, owing -to the carelessness of the natives in drying it. Green or poorly-dried -nuts shrank, and the nuts parched in kilns developed more undesirable -creosote than sun-dried. All copra was sold by weight and quality, and -it continually lessened in weight by evaporation of oil. Time was the -essence of a good bargain. The sooner to the presses of the mainland, -the greater the return. Crude mills in the Paumotus or Tahiti crushed -out the oil formerly, and it was sealed in bamboo lengths, and these -exported. These tubes, air-tight, were common mediums of exchange, as -wampum among Indians, or gold-dust in Alaska. Modern processes extracted -double the oil of the old presses, and the eight-foot sections of the -long grass were almost obsolete for cocoanut-oil, and used mostly for -sauces sold in the Papeete market-place. - -“Trade ain’t what it was,” said McHenry. “There’s more traders than -natives, almost. I remember when they were so crazy to exchange our -stuff for their produce, we’d have the trade-room crowded all day, an’ -had to keep guns handy to chase the mob away, to add up the bloody -figures. Now every atoll has its store, and the trader has to pat his -copra-makers an’ divers on the back, instead o’ kickin’ them the way we -used to. The damn Frogs treat these Kanakas like they were white people, -an’ have spoiled our game. We can’t trade in the Paumotus unless the -schooner has a French registry and a French captain,—Lyin’ Bill is a -Frog citizen for not stealin’ a vessel he had a chance to,—an’ when you -leave the Papeete you’ve got to register every last drop o’ booze you’ve -got aboard. It’s supposed to be only for us on the schooner, and for the -whites in the Paumotus, or a few chieves who have permits, for bein’ -Froggy. But it’s the rotten missionaries who hurt us, really. We could -smuggle it in, but they tell on us.” - -We had not caught a fish from the schooner, despite having a tackle -rigged most of the days. I had fixed a bamboo rod, about eighteen feet -long and very strong, on the rail of the waist of the vessel, and from -it let trail a hundred feet or so of tough line. The hook was the most -perfect for the purpose ever made by man. It was cut out of the -mother-of-pearl lining of the Paumotuan pearl-oyster shell. It was about -six inches long, and three quarters wide, shaped rudely like a -flying-fish, and attached to it on the concave side was a barb of bone -about an inch and a half in length, fastened with _purau_ fiber, and a -few hog’s bristles inserted. The line was roved through the hole where -the barb was fastened, and, being braided along the inner side of the -pearl shank, was tied again at the top, forming a chord to the arch. -Unbaited, the hook, by the pull of the schooner, skipped along the -surface of the sea like a flying-fish. I had made a telltale of a piece -of stick, and while McHenry and I talked and Jean Moet slept it snapped -before my eyes. To seize the rod and hold on was the act of a second. I -let out the entire five hundred feet of line, before the fish tired, and -then it took four of us to drag him to the deck. He was a _roroa_, a -kind of barracuda, about ten feet long, and weighing a couple of hundred -pounds. - -The fish made a welcome change in our diet and was enough for all, -including a number of Paumotuans who were returning to Takaroa for the -opening of the diving season. Chocolat nibbled a head, but preferred the -remnants of a can of beef. He improved daily in his tricks and in his -agility in avoiding being hurtled into the water by the roll or pitch of -the schooner. He had an almost incredible instinct or acquired knowledge -of the motion of the _Marara_, and when I felt sure we had lost him—that -he would fall overboard in another instant—he would leap to the deck and -frolic about the wheel. The spokes of it were another constant threat to -his health, for one blow when they spun fast might kill him; but he was -reserved for a more horrid fate. - -Kaukura rose from the sea at dawn, after a night of wearing and tacking. -It was an atoll, irregularly annular in shape, twenty-six miles long and -ten wide, wooded in patches, and with vast stretches where only the -dazzling coral shone. It, too, had been spoiled in prosperity by an -inimical wind and tide, and the cocoa-palms had been annihilated that -had once grown upon all its many component islets. The cocoanut-tree -lives more than eighty years, and does not fruit until seven years old, -so that the loss of thousands of these life-giving palms was a fearful -blow. Each tree bore a hundred nuts annually, and that crop was worth to -the owner for copra nearly a dollar, besides being much of his food. - -Landmarks we gradually discerned; a village, two churches, and a row of -houses, and then the French tricolor on a pole. The surf broke with a -fierce roaring on the reef, and when McHenry and I left the schooner, -Moet stayed aboard, as the wind was ominous. There was no pass into the -lagoon at this village, and even the pit in the barrier-reef had been -made by French engineers. They had blown up the madrepore rock, and made -a gateway for small boats. - -The schooner did not take our painter, for the breeze was too stiff for -the venture, and so we had a half-mile to row. When we neared the reef -and entered the pit, I felt that it was touch-and-go, for we rose and -tottered on the huge swells, and dived into their hollows, with a -prophetic certainty of capsizing. I could hardly keep on the box under -me, and swayed forebodingly. Then suddenly the steering oar caught under -a bank of coral. I barely heard the cry of Piri a Tuahine, “_E era!_ -There she goes!” when the boat rose on its stern with a twisting motion, -as if a whale had struck it with its fluke, and turned turtle. I was -slighted into the water at its topmost teeter, falling yards away from -it, and in the air I seemed to see the Tahitians leaping for safety from -its crushing thwarts and the cargo. - -McHenry’s “What the bloody——!” as we both somersaulted, was in my ears -as I was plunged beneath the surface. - -With the fear of encountering the boat, the dark bulk of which I saw -dimly above me, I swam hard under the water a dozen strokes, and rose to -find myself beneath the reef, which grew in broken ledges. When my head -in stunning contact with the rock knelled a warning to my brain, I -opened my eyes. There was only blackness. I dived again, a strange -terror chilling me, but when I came up, I was still penned from air in -abysmal darkness. - -Now fear struck me weak. I realized my extraordinary peril, a peril -glimpsed in nightmares. I had penetrated fifteen or twenty feet under -the ledge, and I had no sense of direction of the edge of the coral. My -distance from it was considerable; I knew by the invisible gloom. With a -fleeting recollection of camera films in my shirt pocket, came the -choking dread of suffocation, and death in this labyrinth. - -I supposed I invoked God and his Son to save me. Probably in my agony I -promised big things to them and humanity if I survived. I kept my eyes -open and struck out. After swimming a few yards I felt the coral -shelving inwardly. I realized that I had gone farther from my only goal -of life. I felt the end was close, but still in desperation moved my -limbs vigorously. - -Then I felt the water lashing about me. Something seized my arm. Shark -stories leaped from my memory’s cold storage to my very soul. My blood -was an icy stream from head to toes. Singular to relate, I was aware of -a profound regret for my murders of many sharks—who, after all, I -reasoned with an atavistic impulse of propitiation, were but working out -the wise plan of the Creator. But the animal that grasped my arm did not -bite. It held me firmly, and dragged me out from that murky hell, until -in a few seconds the light, God’s eldest and loveliest daughter, -appeared faintly, and then, bright as lightning, and all of a sudden, I -was in the center of the sun, my mouth open at last, my chest heaving, -my heart pumping madly, and my head bursting with pain. I was in the -arms of Piri a Tuahine, who, as all the other Tahitians, had swum under -the reef in search of me. - -In the two or three minutes—or that half-hour—during which I had been -breathless, the sailors had recaptured the boat and were righting it, -the oars still fastened to the gunwales. I was glad to be hauled into -the empty boat, along with McHenry, who was sputtering and cursing. - -“Gorbli-me!” he said, as he spat out salt water, “you made a bloody fool -o’ yerself doin’ that! Why didn’t ye look how I handled meself? But I -lost a half-pound of tobacco by that christenin’.” - -I was laid down on the cargoless seats, and the men rowed through the -moat, smiling at me with a worthy sense of superiority, while McHenry -dug the soaked tobacco out of his trousers pocket. - -“Ye can always trust the Kanaka to get ye out o’ the water if ye -capsize,” said he, artfully. “We’ve taught him to think o’ the white man -first. He damn well knows where he’d get off, otherwise.” - -A hundred feet farther, we came to a spit of rocks, which stopped -progress. A swarm of naked children were playing about it. Assisted by -the Tahitians I was lifted to my feet, and, with McHenry, continued to -the sand. - -There I took stock of my physical self. I was battered and bruised, but -no bones were broken. My shins were scraped and my entire body bleeding -as if a sharp steel comb had raked me. My head was bloody, but my skull -without a hole in it, or even marked depression, except my usual one -where phrenologists locate the bump of reverence. I was sick at my -stomach, and my legs bent under me. I knew that I would be as well as -ever soon, unless poisoned, but would bear the marks of the coral. All -these white men who journeyed about the Paumotus bore indelible scars of -coral wound. - -[Illustration: - - The road from the beach -] - -[Illustration: - - An American Josephite missionary and his wife, and their church -] - -My friend, the poet, Rupert Brooke, had been made very ill by coral -poisoning. He wrote from the Tiare Hotel in Papeete: “I’ve got some -beastly coral-poisoning into my legs, and a local microbe on top of -that, and made the places worse by neglecting them, and sea-bathing all -day, which turns out to be the worst possible thing. I was in the -country, at Mataiea, when it came on bad, and tried native remedies, -which took all the skin off, and produced such a ghastly appearance that -I hurried into town. I’ve got over it now and feel spry.” His nickname, -_Pupure_, meant leprous, as well as fair, and was a joking _double -entendre_ by the natives. - -I was later, in the Marquesas, to see a man die of such poison received -in the Paumotus. But, in Kaukura, I had to make the best of it, and -after a short rest began to see the sights. There was a crowd of people -about, men and women, and still more children, all lighter than the -Paumotuans in complexion and stouter in body. They were dressed up. The -men were in denim trousers and shirts, and some with the stiff white -atrocities suffered by urbanites in America and Europe. The women wore -the conventional night-gowns that Christian propriety of the early -nineteenth century had pulled over their heads. They were not the -spacious _holokus_ of Hawaii. These single garments fitted the portly -women on the beach as the skin of a banana its pulpy body—and between me -and the sun hid nothing of their roly-poly forms. I recognized the _ahu -vahine_ of Tahiti. - -“_Ia ora na i te Atua!_” the people greeted me, with winning smiles. -“God be with you!” was its meaning, and their accent confirmed their -clothing. They were Tahitians. I spoke to them, and they commiserated my -sad appearance, and pointed out a tall young white man who came striding -down the beach, his mouth pursed in an anxious question as he saw me. - -“Got any medicine on that hay wagon?” he asked. “We’ve got a bunch of -dysentery here.” - -I knew at once by his voice issuing through his nostrils instead of his -mouth, and by the sharp cut of his jib, that he was my countryman, and -from the Middle West. He had the self-satisfied air of a Kansan. - -“The trade-room of the _Marara_ is full of medical discoveries, perunas, -Jamaica ginger, celery compounds, and other hot stuff,” I replied, “but -what they’ll cure I don’t know. We have divers patent poisons known to -prohibition.” - -“That’s all rotten booze. My people don’t use the devilish stuff,” he -commented, caustically. He continued on, wading to the boat, and, after -a parley, proceeding with it to the schooner. - -McHenry had half determined to plant himself, at least temporarily, in -Kaukura, and left me to spy on the store of a Chinese, who had brought a -stock of goods from Papeete. I walked toward an enormous thatched roof, -under which, on the coral strand, were nearly a thousand persons. The -pungent smoke from a hundred small fires of cocoanut husks gave an -agreeable tang to the air; the lumps of coral between which they were -kindled were red with the heat, the odors rose from bubbling pots. All -the small equipment of Tahitian travelers was strewn about. Upon -mattresses and mats in the shed, the sides of which were built up -several feet to prevent the intrusion of pigs and dogs, lay old people -and children, who had not finished their slumbers. Stands for the sale -of fruits, ice, confections, soda-water, sauces, and other ministrants -to hunger and habit bespoke the acquired tastes of the Tahitians; but -most of the people were of Kaukura and other atolls. - -Kaukura alone had nearly a thousand inhabitants. Its lagoons were the -richest in pearl of all the group. Being one of the nearest of the -Paumotus to Tahiti, it had been much affected by the proselytizing and -commercializing spirits of that island—spirits often at variance but now -and again joined, as on a greater scale trust magnates capitalize and -direct missions and religious institutions with the left hand, while -their right takes toll of life-killing mill and mine. - -The village was as attractive as a settlement could be in these -benighted islands, the houses stretching along one or two roads, some in -gala color. A small, sprightly white man was donning shirt and trousers -on the veranda of the best residence at the end of the street. He was -about forty years old, with a curiously keen face, a quick movement, and -an eye like an electric light through a keyhole. - -“Hello,” he said, briskly, “by golly, you’re not an American, are you? -I’m getting my pants on a little late. We were up all hours last night, -but I flatter myself God was glad of it. Kidd’s my name; Johnny Kidd, -they call me in Lamoni. I’m glad to meet you, Mr. ——?” - -“O’Brien, Frederick O’Brien, of almost anywhere, except Lamoni,” I -replied, laughingly, his good-natured enthusiasm being infectious. - -He looked at me, inquiringly. - -“Not in my line, are you?” he asked, with an appraising survey of me. - -My head bleeding and aching, my body quivering with the biting pain of -its abraded surface, I still surrendered to the irony of the question. I -guessed that he was a clergyman from his possessive attitude toward God, -but he was so simple and natural in manner, with so little of a clerical -tone or gesture, that I would have thought him a street-faker or -professional gambler had I had no clue to his identity. I remembered, -too, the oft-quoted: “In my Father’s house are many mansions.” - -“I’m merely a beachcomber,” I assured him. “I take a few notes now and -then.” - -“Oh, you’re not a sky-pilot,” he went on, in comic relief. “You never -can tell. Those four-flushing Mormons have been bringing a whole gang of -young elders from Utah to Tahiti to beat us out. I’m an elder myself of -the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. They -usually call us the Josephites. In these islands we are Konito or -Tonito. We’ve been having a grand annual meeting here. Over sixty from -Tahiti, and altogether a thousand and seventy members. They’ve been -gathering from most of the Paumotus for weeks, coming with the wind, but -we’re about over now.” - -“But I thought the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints was the -Mormons,” said I, puzzled. - -“Mormon!” There was such vigor in his explosive catching up of my query -that I may well be pardoned if I thought he placed the common name for -Sheol after that of the sect. But it stands to reason that he did not. -His whole training would stop such a word ere it escaped him. - -“Mormon! I should say not! Those grafters and polygamists are not our -kind. They stole our name. We were the same until Brigham Young split -off and led his crowd to Utah. Our headquarters is at Lamoni, Iowa, but -I. N. Imbel, who’s gone to the schooner, my partner, and I are the -missionaries in these islands. We’re properly authorized ministers who -make this our regular and whole business. My pal and I live in Papeete, -but run through the Paumotus when there’s anything doing.” - -The reverend fellow had no airs about him. - -“Sit down and take off your clothes and dry them, and I’ll rub your cuts -with some liniment,” he invited. “They’ll dry in the sun, and here’s a -_pareu_ to slip over you. I’d like to tell you more about our work, so’s -you won’t mix us up with those Mormons. They’re a tough bunch. My -father’s the head of our mission in England, and I’m in charge of these -islands. Every year we have a business meeting. That’s what this is; not -a revival. We don’t believe in that emotion game. We call it a -‘reasonable service.’ We take up a collection, of course. We invite the -natives to investigate our claims. We have the custom to get converts by -debating with the Mormons, but after we had accepted a challenge to meet -them in Papeete the French governor stopped the show, because a French -law forbade such meetings. They used to have riots in France, it seems. -The Mormons teach polygamy and other abominations. They’ll tell you they -don’t, but they do. You ask any Mormon native if he believes in plural -wives, and he’ll say yes, that the elders from America teach that it’s -right. Those Mormons ran away from here once, when the French government -scared them, and we got in and had most of the natives in the Paumotus -that the Catholics hadn’t kept. Then when the Mormons saw there was no -danger, they came back here from Salt Lake. Oh, they’re a bad outfit. -We’re regularly ordained ministers, not farmers off on a lark. This -temple here cost a thousand dollars, without the labor. That was all -voluntary. Wait a minute!” - -He dashed into a room, and returned with a pamphlet which purported to -be the findings of the Court of Lake County, Ohio, and he read from it a -decree that the Utah Mormons were a fragment and split off from the real -simon-pure religion established by Joseph Smith in New York. I wished -that Stevenson had been there to hear him, for I remembered his page of -bewilderment at the enigma of the “_Kanitu_” and _Mormoni_ in the -Paumotus, and how he made comparisons of the Holy Willies of Scotland, -and a New Guinea god named Kanitu. His uninquiring mind had not solved -the problem. - -“We beat those wolves in sheep’s clothing in this court,” said Elder -Kidd, animatedly. “We’re the real church, and the Brighamites are a -hollow sham.” - -Mr. Kidd engaged my interest, true or pseudo-disciple of Joseph Smith. -He was so human, so guileful, and had such an engaging smile and wink. -He seemed to feel that he was in a soul-saving business thoroughly -respectable, yet needing to be explained and defended to the Gentile. -His competitors’ incompetency he deemed worthy of emphasis. - -“Not long ago,” he said, “in certain of these Paumotus there had been a -good deal of backsliding from our church. Nobody had stirred them up, -and with these people you have got to keep their souls awake all the -time or they’ll go to sleep, or, worse, get into the control of those -Mormons. They’ll steal a convert like you’d peel a banana, and that’s -what I call the limit of a dirty trick. The Mormons thought they had a -puddin’ in these backsliders to pull them over to their side. I heard -about it, and without a word to any one I took a run through the group. -I went through that crowd of backsliders with a spiritual club, and I -not only redeemed the old Josephites, but I baptized seventy-five others -before you could run a launch from here to Anaa. It was like stealin’ -persimmons from a blind farmer whose dog is chained. I was talkin’ to -the head Mormon in Papeete shortly afterward, and he asked me what we -were doin’. I counted off the seventy-five new ones, and he had to -acknowledge his church hadn’t made a count in a long time. I offered to -bet him anything he was beat to a finish, but he quit cold.” - -The Reverend Mr. Kidd excused himself to go to the meeting-house and get -his breakfast with some of his deacons. McHenry had returned from his -tour of espionage. He was cast down at the poor chance for business. - -“There’s nothing doin’,” he said. “Twenty years ago I was here with a -schooner o’ booze to a Konito meetin’ like this. There was kegs o’ rum -with bloody tops knocked in right in the road. An’ wimmin’! You’d a-gone -nuts tryin’ to choose. This is what religi’n does to business. A couple -o’ bleedin’ chinks sellin’ a few bottles o’ smell water, an’ a lot o’ -Tahitians with fruit an’ picnic stuff. A thousand Kanakas in one bunch -an’ not one drunk. By cripes, the mishes have ruined the trade. The -American Government ought to interfere. You and me had better skin out -to west’ard where there ain’t so many bloody preachers, an’ you can -handle the Kanaka the way you want. To-night this mob’ll be in that -meetin’-house singin’ their heads off, instead o’ buyin’ rum and dancin’ -like they used to. Them two sky-pilots has got all the francs. Even the -Chinks hasn’t made a turn. Kopcke of Papeete is here an’ ain’t made a -sou. He’s goin’-a go to leeward.” - -“McHenry,” I interrogated, “do you never consider the other fellow? -Aren’t these poor people better off chanting hymns and praying than -getting drunk and dancing the hula, just to make you money.” - -He regarded me with contemptuous malice. - -“I knew after all you were a bloody missionary,” he said, acridly. “I -been on to you. You’ll be in that straw shed to-night singin’ ‘Come to -Jesus.’ You’d better look out after your cuts! You’ll be sore’n a boil -to-morrow when they get stiff. Let’s go back to the schooner and get -drunk!” - -I was tempted to return to the _Marara_ to ease my misery, and only the -promise of Elder Kidd to assuage it with liniment, and an ardent desire -to attend the Josephite services that night, detained me in the heat of -the atoll. McHenry persisting in his decision to cool his coppers in -rum, and I to see everything of Kaukura, I joined with a friendly native -for a stroll. The Josephite temple was a small coral edifice, washed -white with coral lime. An old and uncared-for Catholic church was -near-by. Most of the residences were thatched huts, or shacks made of -pieces of boxes and tin and corrugated iron, with a few formal wooden -cottages, painted red, white, and blue. They were very poor, these -Kaukurans, from our point of view, earning barely enough to sustain them -in strength, and with few comforts in their huts, except the universal -sewing-machine. Everywhere that was the first ambition of the -uncivilized woman roused to modern vanities, as of the poor woman in all -countries. - -Walking along the beach I narrowly escaped a more serious accident than -the disaster of the reef, for only the warning of my companion stayed me -from treading upon a _nohu_, the deadliest underfoot danger of the -Paumotus. It was a fish peculiarly hateful to humans, yet gifted by -nature with both defensive disguise and offensive weapons, a remnant of -the fierce struggle for survival in which so many forms of life had -disappeared or altered in changing environment. The _nohu_ lay on the -coral strand where the tide lapped it, looking the twin of a battered, -mossy rock, so deceiving that one must have the sight of the aborigine -to avoid stepping upon it, if in one’s way. Put a foot on it, and before -one could move, the _nohu_ raised the bony spines of its dorsal fin and -pierced one’s flesh as would a row of hatpins; not only pierced, but -simultaneously injected through its spines a virulent poison that lay at -the base of a malevolent gland. The _nohu_ possessed a protective -coloring and shape more deluding than any other noxious creature I know, -and kept its mouth shut except when it swallowed the prey for which it -lay in wait. Its mouth is very large, and a brilliant lemon-color -inside, so that if it parts its lips it betrays itself. Brother to the -_nohu_ in evil purpose is the _tataraihau_. But what a trickster is -nature! The _nohu_ is as ugly as a squid, and the _tataraihau_ beautiful -as a piece of the sunset, a brilliant red, with transverse bands of -chocolate, bordered with ebony. - -“If you can spit on the _nohu_ before he sticks his _taetae_ into you, -it will not poison you,” sagely said my savior, as he stabbed the wretch -with his knife. - -Pliny, as translated by Holland, said: - - All men carry about them that which is poyson to serpents: for - if it be true that is reported, they will no better abide the - touching with man’s spittle than scalding water cast upon them: - but if it happen to light within their chawes or mouth, - especially if it comes from a man that is fasting, it is present - death. - -Pliny in his day may have known of quick-witted people who, when -assailed by a snake, had presence of mind to expectorate in his chawes, -but the most hungry, salivary man could hardly avail himself of this -prophylactic unless he recognized the _nohu_ before treading upon him. -The Paumotuans employ the _mape_, the native chestnut, the _atae_, -_ape_, and _rea moeruru_. These are all “yarb” remedies, and the first, -the juice of the chestnut, squeezed on the head and neck, they swear by. -The French doctors advise morphine injection or laudanum externally, or -to suck the wound and cup it. Coagulating the poison _in situ_ by -alcohol, acids, or caustic alkali, or the use of turpentine, is also -recommended. If the venom is not speedily drawn out or nullified, the -feet of the victim turn black and coma ensues. The French called the -_nohu_, _La Mort_, The Death. - -My Paumotuan friend and Elder Kidd together gave me this information, -and when we brought the _nohu_ to the house in which he lived the -clergyman said we would eat it. The native heated an old iron pipe and, -after flaying the skin off the fish, boiled it. The flesh was remarkably -sweet and tender. - -I lay on a mat, and, after the American had laved me with the liniment, -the Paumotuan, a Konito elder, massaged me for an hour, during which -grievous process I fell asleep, and woke after dark when the “reasonable -service” was beginning. - -The people were ranged under the immense roof in orderly ranks, the -Tahitians being in one knot. Both the American elders were upon a -platform, surrounded by the native elders, who aided in the conduct of -the program, which was in Paumotuan. The Paumotuan language is a dialect -closely allied to the Maori, which includes the Tahitian, Hawaiian, -Marquesan, New Zealand, Samoan, and other island tongues. The Paumotuan -was crossed with a strange tongue, the origin of which was not fixed, -but which might be the remains of an Aino or negroid race found in the -Paumotus by the first Polynesian immigrants. Tahitians easily understood -the Paumotuans, though many words were different, and there were many -variations in pronunciation and usage. The Tahitians had been living -closely with Europeans for a hundred years, and their language had -become a mere shadow of its past form. The Paumotuan had remained more -primitive, for the Paumotuan was a savage when the Tahitians were the -most cultivated race of the South Seas; not with a culture of our kind, -but yet with elaborated ceremonials, religious and civil, ranks of -nobility, drama, oratory, and wit. - -It being the conclusion of the grand annual meeting of the Josephites, a -summing up of the business condition of the sect in these waters was the -principal item. Elders Kidd and Imbel stressed dependence of the -Almighty upon his apostles, prophets, evangelists, and pastors, and of -these called-of-God men upon the francs collected at such gatherings as -this. - -Both the divines spoke earnestly, and mentioned Jehovah and Joseph Smith -many times, with Aarona, Timoteo, Pauro, and other figures from the -Scriptures. They struck the pulpit when they spoke of the _Mormoni_, and -the faces of the congregation took on expressions of holy disdain. - -Somewhat like the modern preacher of the larger cities, the elders -strove to entertain as well as instruct, edify, and command their flock. -They proposed a charade or riddle, which they said was of very ancient -origin, and perhaps had been told in the time of the Master’s sojourn -among men. They spoke it very slowly and carefully and repeated it -several times, so that it was thoroughly understood by all: - - He walked on earth, - He talked on earth, - He reproved man for his sin; - He is not in earth, - He is not in heaven, - Nor can he enter therein. - -This mysterious person was written about in the Bible, said Elder Kidd. - -_Aue!_ That was a puzzler! Who could it be? Many scratched their heads. -Others shook theirs despairingly. A few older men, of the diaconate, -probably, smiled knowingly. Some began to eliminate likely biblical -characters on their fingers. Iesu-Kirito, Aberahama, Ioba, Petero, and -so on through a list of the more prominent notables of Scripture. But -after five minutes of guesses, which were pointed out by Mr. Kidd not to -comply with the specifications of the charade, the answer was announced -with impressive unction: - -“Asini Balaama.” - -Balaam’s ass. _Aue!_ Why, of course. I had named to myself every -_persona dramatis_ of the Book I could recall, but the talkative steed -had escaped me. We all laughed. Most of the congregation had never seen -an ass or even a horse, and the word itself was pulled into their -language by the ears. But they could conjure up a life-like picture of -the scene from their pastor’s description, and there were many -interchanges between neighbors about the wisdom of the beast, and his -kindness in saving Balaam from the angry angel who would have killed -him. - -But in time the prose part of the service came to an end, and the -singing began. I moved myself to the shadows outside the pale, and -stretching at full length on a mat on the sand, gave myself to the -rapture of their poetry, and the waking dreams it brought. - -_Himene_, all mass singing was called in these islands—the missionary -hymn Polynesianized. They had only chants when the whites came; proud -recitatives of valor in war, of the beginnings of creation, of the -wanderings of their heroes, challenges to the foe, and prayers to the -mysterious gods and demons of their supernal regions. They learned -awedly the hymns of Christianity, and struggled decades with the airs. -Confused with these were songs of the white sailors, the spirited -bowline and windlass chanteys of the British and American tars, the -trivial or obscene lays of beach-combers and soldiers, and later the -popular tunes of nations and governments. Out of all these the -Polynesians had evolved their _himenes_, singing as different from any -ever heard in Europe or America as the bagpipe from the violin, but -never to be forgotten when once heard to advantage, for its barbaric -call, its poignancy of utterance, and its marvelous harmony. - -In the great shed outside which I lay under the purple sky, the men and -women were divided, and the women led the _himene_. One began a wail, a -high note, almost a shriek, like the keening of a wake, and carrying but -a phrase. Others met her voice at an exact interval, and formed a -chorus, into which men and women entered, apparently at will, but each -with a perfect observance of time, so that the result was an -overwhelming symphony of vocal sounds which had in them the power of a -pipe-organ to evoke thought. I heard the cry of sea-birds, the crash of -the waves on the reef, the thrashing of the giant fronds of the -cocoa-palms, the groans of afflicted humans, and the pæans of victory of -embattled warriors. The effect was incredibly individual. Each white -heard the _himene_ differently, according to his own cosmos. - -There under the stars on Kaukura, cast down and conscious as I had been -of my trivial hurts, and of a certain loneliness of situation, I forgot -all in the thrill of emotion caused by the exquisite though unstudied -art of these simple Josephites, worshipers, whose voices pierced my -heart with the sorrows and aspirations of an occult world. The Reverends -Kidd and Imbel were forgotten, and all but the mysterious conflict of -man with his soul. I fell asleep as the _himene_ went on for hours, and -was awakened by Kopcke, the trader, who said that the _Marara_ was to -sail at midnight, and that he had been asked to bring me aboard. - -Chocolat barked a welcome from the taffrail as we boarded the schooner, -and with the offshore wind we welcomed I could hear a faint human noise -which I interpreted as the benediction of the Reverend Johnny Kidd. - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CHAPTER V - -Captain Moet tells of Mapuhi, the great Paumotuan—Kopcke tells about - women—Virginia’s jealousy—An affrighting waterspout—The wrecked - ship—Landing at Takaroa. - -_“Maintenant_”, said Captain Moet, as he gave orders for the course, “we -weel veesit ze king ov ze Paumotu. Monsieur O’Breeon, ’e got no nose, -bot ’e ees _magnifique_. ’E like out ov ze story-book. Ze bigges’ -tradaire, ze bes’ divaire, ze _bon père_ ov ze Paumotu. An’ ’e ees -reech, eef ’e don’ geeve ’way ev’rysing. Nevaire ’ave I know one -_hombre_ like ‘eem!” - -“He’s lost his grip since he got old,” McHenry interrupted, in his -contrary way. “They say he’s got a million francs out in bad accounts to -natives. He’s rotten easy, and spoils trade for a decent white man, by -cripes!” - -“_Nom d’une pipe!_” cried the Marseillais. “Mac, you nevaire see anysing -nice. ’E ees not easy; ’e ees not rotten. ’E ’as got old, an’ -_maintenant_, ’e ees ’fraid ov ze devil, ze _diablo malo_. Mac, eef you -waire so nice as Mapuhi, I geeve you wan hug an’ kees. ’E ees ’onnes’, -Mac, _vous savez_! Mapuhi say somesing, eet ees true. Zat bad for you, -eh?” - -[Illustration: - - Photo by Brown Bros. - Typical and primitive native hut, Paumotu Archipelago -] - -Mapuhi! In Tahiti, among the Paumotu traders at the Cercle Bougainville, -his name was every-day mention. He was the outstanding figure of the -Paumatuan race. Lying Bill had narrated a dozen stories about him over -our glasses, and Goeltz, Hallman, all the skippers and supercargos, had -spoken of him. - -[Illustration: - - Copra drying -] - -“Mapuhi’s som’mat for looks without ’is nose,” said Captain Pincher. -“I’ve known ’im thirty years, an’ ’e’s the biggest man in the group in -all that time. ’E’s got Mormonism stronger now, an’ ’e’s bloody well -afraid of ’ell, the ’ell those Mormon missionaries tell about; but ’e’s -the best navigator in these waters.” - -“He’s past eighty now, big-hearted but shrewd, and loving his own -people,” said Woronick, the Parisian, and cunningest of Tahiti pearl -merchants, except Levy. “He’s gone on Mormonism, but he’s smart with all -his religion. The trouble is he’s let charity run away with business -principles, and divers and others get into him for hundreds of thousands -of francs. I’d take his word for anything, and you know me! They didn’t -keep me out of the United States because I’m a dummy, _hein_?” - -“He’s a remarkable man, this Kanaka,” joined in Winnie Brander, master -of a sieve of a schooner, as he drank his Doctor Funk. “When he was a -boy he was a savage. His father ate his enemies. For fifty years Mapuhi -has been sailing schooners in the Paumotus. He’s the richest man there, -and the best skipper in these waters that ever weathered the New Year -gales. I’m captain of a schooner and I have sailed the Group since a -boy, but, matching my experience against his,—and I haven’t had a tenth -of his,—Mapuhi knows more by instinct of weather, of reefs, of passes, -and of seamanship than I have learned. He’s known from Samoa to Tahiti -as a wizard for sailing. He knows every one of the eighty Paumotus by -sight. Wake him up anywhere in the Group in sight of land, and he’ll -take a squint and tell where they are. God knows that’s the hardest bit -of spying there is, because these atolls are mostly all alike at a -distance—just a few specks of green, then a bunch of palms, and a line -of coral. It’s something uncanny the way this fellow can locate himself. -They say he can tell them at night by the smell.” - -“’E’s a bloody Rockefeller down ’ere,” Lying Bill took up the story. -“’E’s combed this ’ere ’ole ocean. I remember when ’e lost the _Tavaroa_ -’e ’ad built by Matthew Turner in California, and four other schooners, -in the cyclone of 1906. Many a boat ’e built ’imself. ’E was the devil -for women, with the pick of the group an’ ’im owin’ ’alf the families in -debt. Then the Mormons got a ’olt of ’im, an’ ’e began prayin’ an’ -preachin’, and stuck by ’is proper wife. You’ll see that big church, if -you go to Takaroa, ’e built, an’ where ’is ol’ woman is buried.” - -And now I was bound for the atoll of this mighty chief of his tribe, and -was to see him face to face. From Kaukura, the _Marara_ raced and lagged -by turn. The glass fell, and I spoke to McHenry about it, pointing to -the recording barometer. - -“There’s trouble comin’,” he said, testily. “I know that. I don’t need -any barometer. We South Sea men have got enough mercury in us to tell -the weather without any barometer.” - -The rain fell at intervals, but not hard enough for a bath on deck, the -prized weather incident of these parts. With no fresh water in Niau, -Anaa, or Kaukura, or not enough for bathing, and with only a dole on the -_Marara_ for hands and faces, I, with remembrance of Rupert Brooke’s -complaint about the effect of sea-water on coral wounds, was about -half-crazy for a torrential shower. But the rain passed, and the sunset -soothed my sorrow. Never had I known such skies. In this heaven’s prism -were hues not before seen by me. Manila, I had thought, was of all the -world apart for the beauty and brilliancy of its sunsets. Such bepainted -clouds as hung over the hill of Mariveles when I rode down the Malecon -in the days of the Empire! But Manila was here surpassed in startling -shape and blazing color. - -A great bank of ocher held the western sky—a perfect curtain for a stage -upon which gods might enact the fall of the angels. It depended in folds -and fringes over stripes of gold—a startling, magnificent design which -appeared too regular in form and color to be accident of clouds. One had -to remember the bits of glass in the kaleidoscope. - -The gold grew red, the stripes became a sheet of scarlet, and that -vermilion and maroon, swiftly changing as deeper dipped the sun into the -sea, until the entire sky was broken into mammoth fleecy white tiles, -the tesselated ceiling of Olympus. The canopy grew gray, and night -dropped abruptly. A wind came out of the darkness and caught the -_Marara_ under full canvas. It drove her through the fast-building waves -at eleven knots. The hull groaned in tune with the shrieking cordage. -The timbers that were long from the forest, and had fought a thousand -gales, lamented their age in moans and whines, in grindings and fierce -blows. The white water piled over the bows, deluged the deck, and foamed -on the barrier of the cabin rise. I stripped and went forward to meet -it. I could have danced in it for joy. Oh! the joy of sail! Steam and -motor made swift the path of the ship, but they had in them no -consonance with nature. They were blind and deaf to the wind and wave, -which were the very life of the schooner. They brought no sense of -participation in speed as did the white wings of the _Marara_, nor of -kinship with the main. They were alive, those swelling and careening -sheets of canvas, that swung to and fro with the mind of the breeze, and -cried and laughed in stress of labor. - -The rain blanketed the ocean, the vessel heeled over to starboard until -her rail was salty, the jibs pleaded for relief, but man was implacable. -For hours we held our course, driving fast in the obscure night toward -the home of the wondrous diver, the man without a nose, Mapuhi, the -uncrowned king of the Dangerous Isles. - -But when the moon lit the road to Takaroa, she lulled the wind. The -eleven knots fell to seven, and to five, and at midnight we drifted in a -zephyr. - -When I went below in a light squall, sure sign of near-by land, Kopcke, -the handsome trader, and a native girl were asleep on a mat in the -passageway beside and partly under my bunk. I had to step over them. Her -red tunic was drawn up over her limbs in her restless slumber, and a -sheet covered closely her head. He lay on his back, his eyes facing the -cabin lamp, his breathing that of a happy child after a day of hard -play. As a matter of fact he had drunk a half dozen tots of rum since he -had brought me aboard. - -Kopcke had failed at Kaukura, and like McHenry was bound for Takaroa, to -set up a store for the diving season. He was a ne’er-do-well who existed -without hard work merely because of familiarity with the people and -languages of the islands. After a few glasses on board he had spilled -his affairs to me, and especially his amorous adventures, in the -boasting way of his kind. “Mary pity women!” A quarter-Tahitian, his -father a European, and his mother French Tahitian, he was remarkably -good-looking, in the style of a cinema idol. He had first married the -half-caste daughter of Lying Bill, one of the many children of that -Bedouin of the Pacific, who, in more than three decades of roaming the -islands, had, according to his brag, scores of descendants. She had -died, and Kopcke had left their child to charity, and taken up with -another whom he had deserted after a year, leaving her their new-born -infant. - -“She would not obey me,” Kopcke explained to Virginie and me. “I was -good to her, but she was obstinate, and I had to send her to Takepoto. -She had a good thing but could not appreciate me. I then took this girl -here, whose father is an old diver in Takaroa, with a good deal of -money. He once picked up a single pearl worth a big fortune. She is -sixteen, and is easily managed. You’ve got to get them young, _mon ami_, -to learn your ways. That Takepoto girl feels sorry now. Women are queer, -all of them, _mon vieux, n’est-ce pas_?” - -Virginie was all Huguenot French blood though born in Tahiti, and Kopcke -went against her puritan grain. She thought him a bad example for her -Jean, who, though as devoted a husband as seaman, was dangerously -attractive to the native girls. Moet could _tutoyer_ them in their own -tongue, with a roughish but alluring manner toward them that, though it -crowded the trade-room of the _Marara_ with customers for finery and -cologne water, tortured Virginie. His endearing terms, his gentle slaps -on their hips, and momentary arm about their waists, rended Virginie -between jealousy and profits. - -“_Mais_,” Jean would exclaim, after an interchange of bitter words, in -which _cochon_ had been applied to him, “how zat _femme_ zink I do -bees’ness. Wiz kicks ‘an go-to-’ells? She count ze money wiz _plaisir_, -bot Jean Moet, ’er ’usbin’, ’e mos’ be like wan mutton. ’Sus-Maria! I -will make show ’oo ees boss!” - -Kopcke was rather more honest in his dealings with women than the white -men. His quarter-native strain made him less ruthless, and more -understanding of them. The ordinary European or American in the South -Seas had not his own home’s standards in such affairs. He released -himself with a prideful assertiveness from such restraints, and went to -an opposite ethic in his breaking of the chain. His usual attitude to -women here was that of the average man toward domesticated animals—to -pet and feed them, and to abuse them when disobedient or at whim. - -Of course, the white flotsam and jetsam of humanity in these islands, -who in their own countries had probably starved for caresses, and who -may never have known women other than the frowzy boughten ones of the -cabaret and brothel, were here giving back to the sex what it had -bestowed on them in more formalized circles. The soft, loving women of -Polynesia paid for the sex starvation enforced by economic conditions -among the superior whites. A feast brought the ingratitude of the -beggar. - -All day, with half a gale, we sailed past atolls and bare reefs, groves -of palms and rudest rocks, primal strata and beaches of softest and -whitest sand. The schooner went close to these islands, so that it -appeared I could throw my hat upon them; but distances here were -deceptive, and I suppose we were never less than a thousand feet away. -Yet we were near enough to hear the smash of the surf and to see the big -fish leap in the lagoon, to drink the intoxicating draft of oneness with -the lonely places, and to feel the secrets of their isolation. I was -happy that before I died I had again seen the Thing I had worshipped -since I began to read. - -I slipped off the coat of years and was a boy on a pirate schooner, my -hand on Long Tom, the brass gun, ready to fire if the cannibals pushed -nearer in their canoes. Again I had trained my hand and eye so that I -brought down the wild pigeon with my sling, and I outran the furious -turtle on the beach. I dived under the reef into the cave where the -freebooters had stored their ill-gotten treasure, and reveled in the -bags of pieces of eight, and the bars of virgin gold. I thought of -_Silver_, and sang: - - “Fifteen men on the Dead Man’s Chest— - Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!” - -“_Mais vous êtes gai_,” said Jean Moet. “_Qu’est cela?_ You not drink -wan bottle when I no look?” - -At three o’clock in the afternoon the gale had almost died away. The sun -was struggling to break through the lowering sky. McHenry and Kopcke -were engaged in their usual bombast of personal achievement with women -and drink, and I, to shut out their _blague_, was playing with Chocolat. -Suddenly Kopcke broke off in a sentence and shouted to Moet, who was in -the trade-room. - -“_Capitaine! Capitaine!_” he called loudly through the window of the -cabin. “There is a flood in air. _Puahiohio!_ On deck! On deck!” - -His voice vibrated with alarm, and Moet made three jumps and was at the -wheel. He looked ahead, and I, too, saw, directly on the course we were -steering, a convolute stem of water stretching from the sea to the sky. -Well I knew what it was. I whirled McHenry around. - -“Look!” I said, and pointed to the oncoming spectacle. - -“A bloody waterspout!” yelled McHenry. “By cripes—here’s where we pay -up!” - -I heard the native passengers and the sailors forward shouting -confusedly, and saw them throwing themselves flat on deck, where they -held on to the hatch lashings and other stable objects. Moet, with a -fierce oath, ordered the sailors to the halyards. - -“Off with every stitch!” he commanded, as he threw the wheel hard over. -“_Vave! Vave!_” - -“_Trombe!_” he warned his wife, who was in the cabin with Kopcke’s girl. -“Hold on, Virginie, hold on! Pray, and be quick about it!” - -McHenry, Kopcke, and I sprang to the main boom, and helped to take down -the canvas and make it fast. The jibs were still standing, when the -_Marara_ turned on her heel like a hare pursued by a hound. The -waterspout was yet miles distant, but rushing toward us, as we made slow -starboard progress from our previous wake. The daylight faded; the air -seemed full of water. The sailors were again prone, and we, at the calm -though sharp word of Moet, pulled over the companion cover. I shrank -behind the house, and McHenry tucked his head into the bend of my body, -while Kopcke, on his knees, held on to the traveler. - -“_Sacramento!_” said Moet, as if to himself. “Maybe she no can meet -zat!” - -With pounding heart, but every sense alert, I watched the mad drive of -the sable column. The _Marara_ was now in smooth water,—the glassy -circle of the _Puahiohio_,—and so near was the terrifying, twisting mass -of dark foam and spindrift that it seemed impossible we could avoid it. -Every inch the master, Moet alone stood up. Chocolat was huddled -whimpering between his feet. I saw the captain pull up the straps that -held the wheel when in light airs we drifted peacefully, and attach them -so that the helm was fixed. There was a dreadful roaring a short way off -and nearing every second. The spout was bigger than any of the great -trees I had seen in the California forests, and from its base a leaden -tower of hurrying water seemed to wind in a spiral stream to the clouds. - -“She’s going to drop,” said McHenry in my ear. “Now hold on, and we’ll -see who comes out of the bloody wash!” - -The roar was that of a blast-furnace, and so close, so fearful, I ceased -to breathe. Captain Moet crouched by the steadfast wheel, his hand on -the spokes. Forward, I saw two Tahitians with their palms upon their -ears. - -Suddenly the _Marara_ heeled over. The starboard rail was in the water, -and Kopcke, McHenry, and I, a tangled heap against the rail, as we -struggled to keep our heads above the foam. Farther and farther the -schooner listed. It was certain to me that we must meet death under it -in another instant. Moet’s feet were deep in the water, and now the -wheel held him up. We clutched madly at the stanchions of the rail, as -we choked with the salt flood. - -Came the supreme moment. The waterspout rose above us on the port bow -like a cliff, solid as stone. A million trumpets blew to me the call of -Judgment Day. Then the wall of water passed by a hundred feet to port. -In another breath the _Marara_ regained her poise and was on an even -keel. The peril was over. - -“_Mais, tonnère de Dieu!_” cried Moet, excitedly, “zat was a _cochon_ ov -a watairespouse! Zere air many in zese latitude. Some time I see seex, -seven, playin’ ‘round at wan time. I sink we make ze sail, and take wan -drink queeck. Eh, Virginie, _ici! Donne-moi un baiser_, little cabbage! -Deed you pray ’ard?” - -Over his _petit verre_, the captain said to me, confidentially, “_Moi_, -I was almos’ become a _bon catholique_ again.” - -Chocolat, who must have thought he had borne his part bravely in the -crisis, frisked wildly about the wheel, risking his own brown hide at -every leap, to testify his joy at his safety. - -McHenry and Kopcke, with the heartening rum in their stomachs, resumed -their palaver. - -“That spout didn’t come within fifty feet of us,” said McHenry. “I’ve -seen one in which a bird was bein’ carried up, whirlin’ round and round, -and not able to fly away. It was comin’ toward us like lightnin’ when I -jumped into the shrouds with a big tin tub, an’ banged it like bloody -hell. It scared the spout away, an’ it busted far enough from us not to -hurt us. Bill an’ Tommy Eustace can swear to that.” - -“_Diable!_” Kopcke broke in. “Mapuhi and his daughter were in a cutter -coming from Takepoto when they were attacked by a _trombe_. It did not -strike them but the force of it overturned their cutter, four miles from -shore, and knocked the girl insensible, so that Mapuhi had to swim to -shore with her.” - -They are fearsome spectacles at their best, these phenomena of the sea, -comparable only in awe-inspiring qualities to the dread composants of -St. Elmo’s Fire, those apparitions of flame which appear on mastheads -and booms on tempestuous nights, as if the spirits of hell had come to -welcome the sailor to Davy Jones’s locker. Waterspouts I had seen many -times. They were common in these waters,—more frequent, perhaps, than -anywhere else,—and to the native they were the most alarming -manifestation of nature. Many a canoe had been sunk by them. There were -legends of destruction by them, and of how the gods and devils used them -as weapons to destroy the war fleets of the enemies of the -legend-telling tribes. - -When I went to sleep at ten o’clock that night, we were ranging up and -down between Takepoto and Takaroa, steering no course but that of -prudence, and waiting for the dawn. - -I came on deck again at four. The moon was two thirds down the steep -slope of the west, a golden sphere vaster than ever before. The sea was -bright and quaking, and shoals of fish were waking and parting the -shining surface of the water. - -Suddenly from out of the gloom of the distance there loomed as strange a -vision as ever startled a wayfarer. - -A huge ship, under bare poles, solemn and lonely of aspect and almost -out of the water, lifted a black bulk as if bearing down upon us. Somber -and ominous, void of light or life, fancy peopled it with a ghostly -crew. I almost expected to read upon its quarter the name of -Vanderdecken’s specter-ship, and to hear the mournful voice of the -_Flying Dutchman’s_ skipper report that he had at last reached a haven. - -The weirdness of this unexpected sight was incredibly surprising. It -electrified me, dismayed me, as few phenomena have. - -Piri a Tuahine, at the wheel, called down to the captain. - -“_Paparai te pahi matai!_” he announced in the even tone of the Maori -sailor. “The ship wrecked in the cyclone!” - -Moet came on deck in pajamas, surveyed the spectacle of desolation, said -“_Bon jour!_” to me, gave an order to the sailor to “Keep her off,” and -returned to snatch another nap. I saw through the stripped masts of the -wrecked ship the fires of the bakers who mix their flour with -cocoanut-milk, and wrap their loaves in cocoanut-leaves to bake. They -were comforting as tokens of the living, contrasted with the sorrowful -skeleton of one-time glory in that isolated cradle of rocks. Kopcke -stuck his head through the companionway to observe our bearings, -squinted at the somber wraith through his heavy eyes,—he and McHenry had -played _écarté_ most of the night,—and replied to my query: - -“As you say, _mon garçon_, it is the _County of Roxburgh_, that English -ship. She lost her reckoning, and in a big hurricane crashed upon the -reef. Her crew put over a boat but it was smashed at once, and those who -reached the shore were badly bruised and broken by the coral. When the -people of Takaroa—my girl’s father was one of them—rushed to succor -them, they fought them off, because their books said the Paumotuans were -savages and cannibals. It wasn’t till they saw Takauha, the _gendarme_, -and he showed them his red stripe on the sleeve of his jacket, that they -realized they were not on a cannibal isle. Takauha brought Monsieur -George Fordham, an Englishman, to interpret for them, and they were -taken care of. They had broken arms and legs, and heads, too. Mapuhi -bought the ship from Lloyd’s for fifteen hundred francs. Think of that! -He took everything off he could, but the hull, masts, and yards stayed -on. He made thousands of dollars out of the ship, and in his store you -will find the doors and chests and the glass. She was built in -Scotland.” - -Her hull and decks of heavy metal, and her masts and yards, great iron -tubes, she had defied even that master wrecker, Mapuhi, to disrobe her -of more than her ornaments. Carried over the reef upon a gigantic wave, -and perched upon a bed of coral in which she now fitted as snugly as in -a dry-dock, she had withstood the storms and tides of years, and -doubtless must stay in that solitary spot until time should disintegrate -her metal and dissolve its atoms in the eternal sea. - -The palms on the atoll paraded in battalions, waving their dark heads -like shakos, and the surf shone in silver splashes, as I sat on the -cabin house and watched the dawn unfold. Slowly the moon withdrew. At -half-past five o’clock, the mother of life and her coldly brilliant -satellite were in concert, and the ocean was exquisitely divided by -sunbeams and moonbeams matching for favor in my admiring eyes. - -Kopcke reappeared with a cigarette. He had an unusual chance to find me -alone, and was hungry for information. - -“There is a passage in the reef at Takaroa,” he said, “but you can bet -the _Marara_ won’t go through it. It is plenty big enough to let her in, -but that takes seamanship. Now, I have seen Mapuhi sail his schooner -through this passage in half a gale of wind, and swing her about inside -in the space most chauffeurs in Tahiti need to turn their automobiles. -No one else would try it. He won’t go in; but Mapuhi would have his crew -stand by, and, with the wheel in his own hands, would tear through the -opening as if he had all the seven seas about him.” - -I was below washing my hands, when the roar of the breakers came to my -ears with the call of Moet that a boat was leaving. I rushed to the -waist of the schooner and, catching hold of a belayed rope’s end, -dropped on the dancing thwart. Chocolat made a bound and landed on his -master’s lap. Moet swore, but we were away. - -There was a high sea, and for a few seconds it was pitch and toss -whether we could keep right side up. However, we struck the gait of the -rollers, and, with Piri a Tuahine at the long steering oar, moved toward -the beach, urged on by rowers and breakers, but opposed by a strong -outsetting current. - -The dexterity of the steersman saved us a dozen times from capsizing. -Often we climbed waves that, but for an expert guidance, would have -crashed over us. Many and many a boat turns over in these “landings” and -spills its life freight to death or hurt. Nearing the passage, a white -and brawling two hundred feet between murderous rocks, the boat had to -be swung obliquely to enter, and we hung upon a comber’s peak for a -seeming age, the rowers sweating furiously at the oars, until Piri a -Tuahine gave a staccato signal. Oars inboard, we rushed down the shore -side of the breaker, and were at peace in a lovely lagoon. - -Of the many miles of circumference of Takaroa, a tiny _motu_ was -inhabited by the hundred and fifty people, and on it they had built a -stone quay for small boats. We made fast to it and sprang ashore. - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CHAPTER VI - -Diffidence of Takaroans—Hiram Mervin’s description of the - cyclone—Teamo’s wonderful swim—Mormon missionaries from America—I - take a bath. - -THERE was no stir on the quay of Takaroa. In these latitudes the -civilized stranger is shocked by the indifference to his arrival of the -half-naked native. It enrages a prideful white. He perhaps remembers the -pages of Cook and the other discoverers, who wrote of the overflowing -enthusiasm of the new-found aborigines for them; but he forgets the -pages of history since national, religious, and business rivalries -invaded the South Seas. These Paumotuans, and, indeed, most Polynesian -peoples, are kin to pet cats who madden mistresses by pretending not to -hear calls, and by finding views from windows interesting when asked to -show their accomplishments or fine coats. Though they may have seen no -outsider for months, these Paumotuans will appear as unconcerned at a -white visitor’s coming as if circuses dropped in their midst daily. Yet -every movement, every word of a newcomer is as alluring to their -imaginations, bored by the sameness of their days, as a clown’s antics -to a child. - -“It is a politeness and pride, not indifference,” had explained my -friend, that first gentleman of Tahiti, the Chevalier Tetuanui, of -Mataiea. “We simple islanders have been so often rebuffed by -uncultivated whites that we wait for advances. It is our etiquette.” - -The main thoroughfare of the village stretched up from the quay half a -mile, with one or two ramifying byways, along which straggled the humble -homes of the Takaroans. There were not the usual breakfast fires before -them, as in Tahiti, where breadfruit and _feis_ are to be cooked, nor -did the appetizing odor of coffee rise, as in Tahiti, for Mormonism -forbade coffee to its adherents as it did alcohol and tobacco. Beside -the quay were dozens of cutters, and a small launch. Canoes were being -relegated to lesser civilizations by the fast sailing cutters. Motor -power was new here; almost new in Tahiti. But a few years and it would -be common, for while the islander cared nothing for time, he was -attracted to labor-saving machines. - -Captain Moet set the sailors to unload the _Marara’s_ boat, and the -chief of Takaroa appeared. The French, whose island possessions in -Polynesia occupy sea room in spots from eight to twenty-seven degrees -below the equator, and from 136 to 155 west of Greenwich, have left -survive, in title at least, the chieftaincies, the form of government -they found upon seizure. “_Monsieur le Chef_,” they said of the native -officials here, as they did of a head cook in a restaurant. These -chiefs, though nominally the representatives of French sovereignty, -were, in pitiable reality, wretchedly-paid tax collectors, policemen, -and bailiffs. But they often were gentlemen—gentlemen of rich color. The -strapping fellow who had _viséd_ the documents of the _Marara_, though -wearing only denim overalls, lacked nothing in courtesy. A rent -disclosed that the “alls” were over his birth-suit. - -[Illustration: - - Atoll of Hikuera after the cyclone -] - -[Illustration: - - The wrecked _County of Roxburgh_ -] - -I was not arrayed very smartly, having left collar, cravat, and socks, -as well as shirt and undershirt, aboard. Pongee coat and trousers, with -flexible shoes, were in this tropic an ideal compromise with culture. -Open the coat, and the breeze had access to one’s _puris naturalibus_, -and, if one had to swim or wade, little clothing was wetted. The chief -surveyed me, saw that I took no interest in the cargo, and drew his own -conclusion. - -“_Ia ora na!_” he said gently, and led me toward the village. - -It was seven years earlier that the last great cyclone had devastated -these islands. Takaroa was mute witness of its ruin. The houses were -almost all mere shacks of corrugated iron—walls and roofs of hideous -gray metal. A few wooden buildings, including two stores, were the -exceptions. The people had neither courage nor money to rebuild -comfortable abodes. Lumber must be brought from Tahiti and carpenters -employed. No more unsuitable material than iron for a house in this -climate could be chosen, except glass, but it was comparatively cheap, -easily put together, and a novelty. It was as unharmonious a note among -the palms as rag-time music in a Greek theater, and in the next cyclone -each separate sheet would be a guillotine. Nothing more than a few feet -above the ground withstands these hurricanes, which fell cocoanuts as -fire eats prairie-grass. - -We had not walked a hundred yards before a powerful half-caste stopped -me with a soft “_Bon jour!_” A good-looking, clean-cut man of thirty -years, the white blood in him showed most in his efficient manner and -his excellent French. - -“You are American,” he said in that tongue in the wildest voice. - -“_Mais oui._” I replied. - -“I am Hiram Mervin, son of Captain Mervin, owner of the schooner -_France-Austral_. My father is American, and I am half American, though -I speak no English. You may have read of me. I repaired his boat, the -_Shark_, for that American author, Jack. His engine was broken down. He -wanted me to go to Australia as his mechanician, but my father said no, -and when an American says no, he means that, _n’est-ce pas, Monsieur?_” - -“Where were you,” I inquired, “when the last cyclone blew?” - -His fine brown face wrinkled. Hiram had a firm chin, a handsome black -mustache, and teeth as hard and white as the keys of a new piano. - -“Ah, you have heard of how we escaped? _Non? Alors, Monsieur_, I will -tell you. I am a diver, and here I keep a store. We were at Hikueru, my -father and I, when it began to storm. Father watched the barometer, and -the sea. The mercury lowered fast, and the waves rolled bigger every -hour. - -“‘The barometer is sinking fast. The ocean will drown the island,’ said -my father. ‘Noah built an ark, but we cannot float on one; we must get -above the water.’ - -“There were four cocoanut-trees, solid and thick-trunked, that grew a -few feet from one another. Bad planting, _oui_, but most useful. He set -me and some others, his close friends, to climbing these trees and -cutting off their heads, so that they stood like pillars of the temple. -It was a pity, I thought, for we ruined them. Then we took heavy planks -and lifted them to the tops of these trees and spiked and roped them in -a platform. - -“_Attendez, Monsieur!_ All this time the cyclone increased. My father -was not with us. It was the diving season on Hikueru, and people were -gathered from all over the atolls, and from Tahiti, hundreds of Maoris, -and many whites. My father was directing the efforts of the people to -save their property. We had not yet thought of our lives being in great -danger. We islanders could not live if we expected the worst. - -“A gale from the east, strong but not dangerous, had lashed the water of -the lagoon and made it like the ocean, and then, turning to the west, -had driven the ocean mad. Now the ocean was coming over the reef, the -waves very high and threatening. We knew that if ever the sea and the -lagoon met to fight, we would be the victims. Thus, Monsieur, the lagoon -surrounded by the island, and the usually calm waters inside the outer -reef, were both in a frightful state, and we began to fear what had been -in other atolls. My father was wise, but, being a Mormon and also an -American, he must not think of himself first. My father came to us and -tested the platform, and showed us where to strengthen it. - -“‘The island will be covered by the sea and the lagoon,’ he said. ‘Make -haste, in the name of God!’ - -“Some one, a woman, called to him for help, and he ran to her. A sheet -of iron from a roof came through the air, and wounded him. I thought his -head was almost cut off, from the quantity of blood. _Mais, Monsieur, -c’etait terrible!_ We caught hold of my father, and made a sling with -our ropes, and lifted him, unconscious, to the platform at the top of -the trees. He raised his head and looked around. - -“‘Go down again!’ he commanded. ‘Cut down those three trees. If they -fall they will strike us.’ - -“Monsieur, that was my father, the American, who spoke, though nearly -dead. He was wise. We did as he said, as quickly as we could, and -climbed back to the platform. The great breakers of the ocean were now -far up on our beach at each end of the tide. The whole width of the land -from the edge of the beach to the lagoon is but the length of four or -five cocoanut-trees. The water below the atoll was forced up through the -coral sand, Monsieur, until it was like the dough of the baker when he -first pours in the cocoanut juice. People still on the ground went up to -their arms in it. We feared the atoll would be taken back to the depths. -Our platform was nearer the lagoon than the moat—to be exact, two -hundred feet from the moat, and a hundred from the lagoon. My father had -us tie him to the platform and to the trees. We had brought plenty of -ropes for that. - -“_Mon Dieu!_ Below the poor people were tying themselves to the trunks -of the cocoanut-trees, and climbing them, if they could, and roosting in -the branches like the wild birds of the air. They were shrieking and -praying. There were many whites, too, because all the pearl-shell and -pearl buyers, and the keepers of stores like us, were there from -Papeete. The little children who could not climb were crying, and many -parents stayed with them to die. The sea was now like the reef, white as -the noon clouds with foam. We had bound my father’s wounds with my -shirt, but the blood dripped on the boards where he lay with his eyes -open and watching the cyclone.” - -The chief, who had accompanied me, became restless. He understood no -French. - -“_Monsieur l’Americain_, do I detain you?” Hiram Mervin asked me. - -I signed for him to continue. - -“Then came the darkness. There were only the sounds of the wind and -water, the crash of the cocoanut-trees as they fell with their human -fruit. We heard the houses being swept away; we thought we caught -glimpses of vessels riding on the breakers, and we imagined we caught -the shrieks of those being destroyed. But the wind itself sounded like -the voices of people. I heard many calling my name. - -“‘Hiram Mervin, pray for us! Save us!’ said the cyclone. - -“Ah, I cannot tell it! It was too dreadful. It was hours after darkness -that the sea reached its height. Those below were torn from hummocks of -coral, from the roofs of houses, and from trees. We knew that the sharks -and other devils of the sea were seizing them. The sea rushed over the -land into the lagoon and the lagoon returned to the sea. When they met -under us, they fought like the bulls of Bashan. Hikueru was being -swallowed as the whale swallowed _Iona_, the _perofeta_. We held on -though our trees bent like the mast of a schooner in a typhoon. We -called often to one another to be sure none was lost. When morning came, -after night on night of darkness, the waters receded, and we saw the -work of the demon. Almost every house had been cut down, and most of the -trees. The cemeteries were washed up, and the bodies, bones, and skulls -of our dead for decades were strewn about or in the ocean. The lagoon -was so full of corpses old and new that our people would not fish nor -dive for shells there for a long time. The spirits are still seen as -they fly through the air when there is a gale. But, Monsieur, our four -cocoanut-trees had stood as the pillars of the temple of Birigi’ama -Iunga. Not for nothing was my father born in America. _Mais, Monsieur_, -the chief is waiting. The _mitinare_ will be glad to see you. _Au -revoir._” - -Hiram took a step to return to the quay when he called back to me. “Ah, -there is Teamo, who is the Living Ghost,” and he pointed to a Paumotuan -woman who was coming up from the quay towards where we three stood. -Teamo had the balanced gait of one who sits or stands much in canoes, -and she strode like a man, her powerful figure showing under her red -Mother-Hubbard which clung close to her stoutish form. Short, she was -like most of the Paumotuans, of middle height, but with her head set -upon a pillar of a neck, and her bare chocolate arms, rounded, but -hinting of the powerful muscles beneath the skin. Her hair was piled -high on her head like a crown, and upon it was a basket in which were -two chickens. A live pig was under her arm. She was carrying this stock -from our boat. - -“There,” said Hiram, “there is Teamo, who is the greatest swimmer of all -these seas, and who went through the great cyclone as does a fish. -_Haere mai!_” he called, “This _monsieur_, who is an American, like my -father, wants to hear about your swimming of the seas in the _matai -rorofai_.” - -Teamo put down her pig and the chickens from her head, sat upon her -haunches, and drawing a diagram in the coral sand, she told her strange -tale in her own language. - -“The water is coming over the atoll, and the lagoon and the sea are -one,” said Teamo, “when my brother and sisters and I climbed the great -cocoanut-tree by our house, because it is death below. You know the -cocoanut-trees. You see they have no limbs. You know that it is hard to -hold on because the great trees shake in the wind, and there is no place -to sit. Only we could put our arms around the leaves and hold as best we -might. When it comes on dark we feel the wind roaring louder about us, -and we hear the cries of those who are in other trees. Then far out on -the reef we hear the pounding of the sea and the waves begin more and -more to come over the atoll until they cover it deeper and deeper, and -each succeeding wave climbs higher and higher toward where we cling. We -know that soon there will come a wave whose teeth will tear us from the -tree. - -“That wave came all of a sudden. It was like a cloud in the sky. It -lifted me out of the cocoanut-leaves as the diver tears the shell from -the bank at the bottom of the lagoon. It lifted me and took me over the -lagoon, over the tops of all trees, and when it went back to the ocean, -it carried me miles with it. I was on the top of its back, almost in the -sky, and it was as black as the spittle of the devilfish.” - -The chief was listening attentively, for she spoke in Paumotuan. Hiram -Mervin interposed: - -“Teamo went away from Hikueru on that wave and stayed three days,” said -he. “She was numbered with the dead when the count of the living was -made by my father.” - -Teamo squatted on the sand of the road. I was afraid she would weary in -her relation, as do her race. “_Parau vinivini!_” I said, and smoothed -her shoulders. - -“I kept upon its back,” she resumed. “All through that night I swam or -floated, fighting the waves, and fearing the sharks. I called on -Birigi’ama Iunga and on Ietu Kirito, and on God. Hours and hours I kept -up until the dawn. Then I saw a coral-reef, and swam for it. I was -nearly crushed time and time on the rocks, but at last I crawled up on -the sand above the water, and fell asleep. - -“When I awoke I was all naked. The waves had torn my dress from me, and -the sun was burning my body. I was bruised and wounded, but I prayed my -thanks to the God of the Mormons. I stood upon my feet, and I saw all -about me the _pohe roa_, the blackening and broken bodies of people of -Hikueru. They, too, had floated on the same wave, but they had perished. -They were all about me. I searched for cocoanuts, for I was drying up -with thirst and shaking with hunger. At last I found one under the body -of my cousin, and, breaking it with a rock, I drank the water in it, and -again fell asleep. - -“Now when I awoke I was stronger, and a distance away in the water I saw -a box floating. I broke it open, and found it had in it tins of salmon. -They were from some store in Hikueru, for I soon knew there was no -living human on that atoll but me. I could not open the tins of salmon -but pierced holes in them with a piece of coral and sucked out the fish. -God was even better to me, for I found a camphor-wood chest with a shirt -and _pareu_ in it, and I put them on. I then found a canoe thrown up on -the beach, and it was half full of rain-water. I made up my mind to -return to my home in the canoe. It was broken and there was no paddle. I -patched it, I found the outrigger, and tied it on with cocoanut-fiber -which I plaited. I made a paddle from the top of the salmon case, and -lashed it to the handle of a broom I found. I kept enough fresh water in -the canoe, and after two days of eating and resting I pushed out in the -canoe, with the remainder of the salmon. I could not see any other -atoll, but I trusted to God and prayed as I paddled. I pushed over the -reef at daybreak of the third day, and paddled until the next morning, -when I saw Hikueru, and reached the remnants of my village.” - -Teamo gathered up her burdens and, with a reminiscent smile, walked on. - -“_Monsieur l’Americain_,” said Hiram, “you may be sure that when she -returned to Hikueru from Tekokota—that atoll was fifteen miles away—they -were afraid of her, as the friends of Lataro when Ietu Kirito raised him -from the dead.” - -The chief’s restlessness increased, as if he must deliver me somewhere -quickly; but I thought of the man they called the king of the Paumotus. - -“The house of Mapuhi, is it—” - -“The chief is taking you there now,” said Hiram. “The elders are there. -My father was long-time the partner of Mapuhi. They sailed their -schooners together and had their divers.” - -“You and your father are Mormons?” - -“_Nous sommes bons Mormons_,” replied the half-caste, seriously. “Am I -not named for the king who built the temple of Solomon. It is a shame, -Monsieur, that those _Konito_ are permitted in these islands. They -corrupt the true religion.” - -The chief touched my arm, and we proceeded, after an exchange of bows -with the son of the American. We walked to the very end of the small -_motu_ or islet. The _motus_ are often long but always very narrow, -between three hundred and fifteen hundred feet. - -The people of Takaroa had chosen to pitch their huts on this spot of the -whole atoll because of the pass into the lagoon being there. That was -the determining factor just as the banks of rivers and bays were -selected by American pioneers. Where the salt water was on three -sides—the moat, the lagoon, and the channel between the next _motu_—was -the residence of our seeking. - -It was a neat domicile of dressed lumber, raised ten feet from the -ground on stilts. It was fenced about, and here and there a banana-plant -or fig-tree grew in a hole dug in the coral, surrounded by a little wall -of coral and with rotting tin cans heaped about. Driven in the trunks -were nails. I asked the chief the reason, and he replied vaguely that -the trees needed the iron of the cans and the nails. - -We were entering the grounds now, and I guessed it was Mapuhi’s house. - -“Mapuhi is here?” I inquired. - -“_’E_, he is at prayer, maybe.” - -The chief shrank back, as we were on the porch. - -“_Faaea oe; tehaeri nei au._ You stay; I go,” he said. - -On the side veranda, a girl of seventeen or so, in a black gown, lay on -a mattress and yawned as she scratched her knee with her toes—not of the -same leg. She was almost naked, slender and very brown. These Paumotuans -are darkened by the sun, their hair is not long and beautiful like the -Tahitians’. Beauty is a matter of food and fresh water. She lay on this -bare mattress, without sheets or pillows, evidently just awakening for -the day. She made quite a picture when she smiled. The daughter of the -king, doubtless. - -There was a noise in response to my knock, and the door opened. A -tousled pompadour of yellowish-red hair above hazel eyes peeped out, the -eyes snapped in amazement, and their owner, a strapping chap of -twenty-five, put out his hand. - -“Hello! Where are you from?” he said. - -“Off the _Marara_ just now, and from the United States not long ago.” - -“Well, gee cricketty, I’m glad to see you! My name’s Overton, T. E. -Overton of Logan, Utah. Come here, Martin! He’s Martin De Kalb of -Koosharem, Utah. We’re Mormon elders. Say, it’s good to talk United -States!” - -A body leaped out of bed in an inner room, and a pair of blue eyes under -brown hair, an earnest face, supported by an athletic figure in pajamas, -rushed out. The owner seized my hand. - -“I’ll be doggoned! I didn’t know anything was in sight. The _Marara_! -Any mail for me? Come in, and we’ll dress.” - -The king’s daughter had fled when the missionaries appeared. I entered -the living-room and found a chair, while the elders flooded me with -questions from their sleeping quarters, as they put on their clothes. -While I answered, I looked at the home of this foremost of the -Paumotuans, whose father and mother had eaten their kind. - -A dining-room table and half a dozen cheap chairs were all the -furniture. South Sea Islanders found sitting in chairs uncomfortable, -and these were plainly guest seats, for governors and pearl-buyers and -missionaries. - -The walls held prints curiously antagonistic. Brigham Young, founder of -the Utah Mormon colony, with a curly white beard, smooth upper lip, and -glorified countenance, sat in an arm-chair, holding a walking-stick of -size, with a gilded head. A splendiferous colored lithograph of the -temple at Salt Lake flanked the portrait. - -On the other wall was a double pink page from a New York gazette, -usually found in barber-shops and on boot-black stands, with pictures of -two prize-fighters, Jeffries and Johnson, one white and the other black, -glaring viciously at each other, and with threatening gloved fists. -Beneath this picture was in handwriting: - - _Teferite e Tihonitone - na - Taata Moto_ - -Emerging from their bedroom, the elders caught my eyes fastened on the -pink page, and they looked grieved, as housewives whose kitchen is found -in disorder. - -“They’re crazy about boxing,” said Overton. “That’s young Mapuhi who put -that up and wrote that. We reprove them for such ungodly interests, but -they are good Mormons, anyhow.” - -I led the conversation to their own work in this group. They became -enthusiastic. Sincere faces they had, simple and strong, of the pioneer -type. They were sons of healthy peasantry, and products of plain living -in the open. De Kalb had left a wife and child in Koosharem, and Overton -a sweetheart in Logan, to take their part in spreading their gospel -among these natives. They were voluntary missionaries, paying their own -expenses for the two or three years they were to give to proselytizing, -according to the rule of their church, they said. They were eager to -return to their women and their farms, and their service was soon to be -at an end. Each had spent a year or so in Papeete in the Mormon Mission -House, learning the Paumotuan language and the routine of their duties, -and now for a year and more they had journeyed from atoll to atoll where -they had churches, preaching and making converts, they said. They talked -with fervor of their success. - -“The Lord has been mighty good to us,” said De Kalb, who was in his -twenties. “We’ve got this island hog-tied. If it weren’t for the -Josephites and some of those Catholic priests, we’d have every last one. -Those Josephites are sorest, because they are deserters from Mormonism. -Why are they? Why, their so-called prophet was Joseph. I forget his -other name. Oh, no, he was not our martyr, Joseph Smith. They split off -from the real church. They don’t amount to a hill of beans, but when the -Mormons left these islands, because the French were hostyle, these -Josephites sneaked in and got quite a hold by lying about us, before we -got on to their game and came back here. They’re out for the stuff. The -real name of our church here is, _Te Etaretia a Jesu Metia e te feia -mo’a i te Mau Mahana Hopea Nei_.” - -“Gosh, I’d like to get my hair cut and roached,” said Elder Overton. “It -was fine, when I left Papeete. I just have to let it go,” and he stirred -his golden shock with the air of a man who has abandoned comfort for an -ideal. - -“Do the Paumotuans cling to their heathen customs?” I asked. - -Overton looked at the floor, but De Kalb, the older, spoke up. - -“They will circumcise,” he said hesitatingly. “We try to stop it, but -they say it is right; that it makes them a separate people. They often -wait until thirteen years of age before prompted to perform the rite. -The kids don’t appreciate it.” - -“And tithes? Your church members give a tenth of their incomes?” - -Again De Kalb replied: - -“They should,” he said. “These Takaroans are just beginning to see the -beauty of that divine law. It is hard to make them exact. Perhaps they -give a twentieth. It’s cocoanuts, you know, and it’s hard to keep -account.” - -“Of course, polygamy is—” I was about to say “forbidden,” when I felt -that I had broached a delicate topic. I was stupid. Here in a lagoon -surrounded by a narrow fringe of coral, to bang the eternal polyangle of -one man and many women! The elders looked pained. I was about to -withdraw the remark with an apology, but Westover made the most of his -twenty-four years and waived aside my amends. - -“It must be met,” he said. “We obey the laws of the land. The American -law forbids plural marriages, and our church expressly forbids them. We -are loyal Americans. We say to these people that polygamy is not to be -practised. That’s true, no matter what the Josephites say.” - -Elder De Kalb, who was watching me, interposed: - -“I suppose you’re not a Mormon, but, as a matter of fact, isn’t -polygamy, with wives and children to the extent of a man’s purse, all -avowed and cherished, better than adultery?” - -Overton got upon his feet. “You bet it is,” he declared, with intense -feeling. “It’s nature’s law. There are more women than men by millions. -Men are polygamous by instinct. And, by heavens! look at all those old -maids at home and in England!” - -[Illustration: - - Photo from Underwood and Underwood - Mormon elders baptizing in the lagoon -] - -Considering the sorrows of old maids, I felt my standards being -endangered, but was saved from downright perversion by accepting the -royal favor of a tub of fresh water from a cistern that caught the -rain-water from the roof. I was seeking to immerse myself in the -inadequate bath when I saw the daughter of the king gazing at me -interestedly, and I hope that I blushed. But the princess distinctly -winked in the direction of my hosts as I attempted to sink into oblivion -in the ten-gallon pail. - -[Illustration: - - Over the reef in a canoe -] - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CHAPTER VII - -Breakfast with elders—The great Mapuhi enters—He tells of San - Francisco—Of prizefighters and Police gazettes—I reside with - Nohea—Robber crabs—The cats that warred and caught fish. - -TIMES in my life a bath had been a guerdon after days of denial in -desert and at sea, but seldom so grateful as that in the stony garden of -Mapuhi under the tropical sun. My wounds were healing, but the new skin -forming in a score of places bound me like patches of plaster. Not many -houses in the Paumotus were constructed to impound rain, even for -drinking purposes. The cocoanut furnished the liquid for quenching -thirst, or the brackish rain-water retained in holes dug five or six -feet in the coral was drunk by the natives. The Europeans of any -permanent residence gathered the rain in barrels or cisterns, and -sometimes made ample reservoirs, while in a few atolls were little fresh -lakes fed by rains, the bottoms of which were formed by a coral -limestone impervious to water. Such lakes were very precious. - -When I went up the steps to the house, I found the Mormon elders fully -dressed and preparing breakfast for three. A can of California peaches, -a small broiled fish, and pilot biscuits were all the meal, but the -grace was worthy of a feast. They bowed their heads, closed their eyes, -and implored God to bless their fare, to make it strengthen them for the -affairs of this world only as they conduced to His greater honor and -glory. And they put in a word for me, “Our brother who has come among us -all unannounced, but doubtless for some good purpose known to Him who -directs the sparrow’s fall, and the sphere’s movements.” - -“We have to economize dreadfully,” said De Kalb, apologetically. “We are -spending our savings. Canned goods are dear. But we are saving souls -right along. There is to be a service in the temple in half an hour, and -we would like you to attend. We are going to pray for a successful -_rahui_, the diving season, and for the safety of the divers. You know -they never know when they’re going to come up dying or dead from the -bottom of the lagoon.” - -As he spoke there was framed in the doorway a native whom I knew -instinctively to be the monarch of this cluster of atolls. He wore only -a dark-blue _pareu_ stamped with white flowers, but some men have an air -which makes you know at first sight that they are masters of those about -them. So was this Mapuhi, who, of all Paumotuans in a hundred years, had -become distinguished among whites. Mapuhi was a giant in stature, a man -solidly planted on spreading bare feet of which each toe was articulated -as the fingers of a master pianist’s hand. His legs were rounded -columns, the muscles hidden under the pad of flesh, his chest a great -barrel, and below it a mighty belly, the abdomen of a Japanese or -Chinese god of plenty. He was almost black from a life upon and in the -salt water. - -His head was huge, a mass of grizzled hair low upon his forehead. His -eyes, very large and luminous, gentle but piercing, gave an impression -of absolute fearlessness, of breadth of mind, and of devotion to his -idea, be it ideal or indulgence. His chin was round and powerful, but -not prognathous. His mouth was well-formed, big and sensual under the -short gray mustache, and not lacking in humor or a trace of irony. His -nose was all but missing, for once when building a schooner an adz had -slipped and cut it off. His face was thus flattened, with a slight -suggestion of a fragment of a Greek gladiator’s head; but it was not so -disfigured as one might think, and preserved a mien of dignity and -reserve force, of moral grandeur and superiority which one might call -kingly were kings as of old. But it was in his eyes I read the reasons -for his rise from the ruck of his race to lordship over it, and to the -admiration of the white traders and mariners whom he bested in all their -own ways—navigation, ship-building, and even trade. - -When Mapuhi saw me, he looked inquiringly at the elders, and then -smiled. I saw two rows of teeth, large as my thumb nail, and as -brilliant as the pearl-shell from which he had wrung his vast fortune. -He stood upright, straight as a mast, solid as a tree, and commanding in -every sense. More than seventy years of wrestling with the devils of the -sea and lagoon, and the outcasts of Europe and America, had failed to -bow him an inch or to take from him apparently a single attribute of his -vigorous manhood except that across his broad face ran a score of -wrinkles, which criss-crossed his forehead into diamond panes, and made -one know he had learned the secrets of man and wind and water by fearful -experience. - -Thus was Mapuhi who had made the winds and currents his sport, who in -the dark of night ran the foaming passes that the white mariner shunned -even in daylight, and who had made the trees and lagoons of his isles -pay him princely toll. This was the man who alone had outwitted the -white trader who came to take much and give little. - -“Good morning,” said Mapuhi, in English, of which he knew only a few -words. He gave me a probing glance, and retired, to appear in a few -minutes in black calico trousers, a pink undershirt, and a belt of red -silk. His eyes asked me if I was a trader come to compete with him. He -sat down in a great chair that vaguely resembled a throne, wrought of -bamboo, and carved, and trussed to bear the exceeding weight of the man, -for Mapuhi was over three hundred pounds. As he sat he inquired of the -elders the reason for my being there. He did it with his foot. He -twisted his toes into the most expressive interrogation, which was a -plain question to the elders. They said in Paumotuan that I was an -American, an important man, but precisely what were my affairs they did -not know. I was interested in Mormonism, in Takaroa, and in the career -of Mapuhi. Assured that I was not another Tahiti trader, Mapuhi put out -his great hands and took into them one of mine, and pressed it, as he -said in Paumotuan, “My island is yours.” - -I was loath to talk my poor Paumotuan, because I wanted to get as -closely as possible to the mind of this noblest of his tribe; and so I -conversed in French, except when I appealed to the elders for more exact -meanings in Paumotuan. - -“Mapuhi,” I began, “even in San Francisco sailors know your skill in -these dangerous waters.” - -“Ah, San Francisco!” said Mapuhi, regretfully. “I was there. I had a -ship built there, and I sailed it to Takaroa. I lived there a week in -your great house into which one drives with horses.” - -I conjured a picture of Mapuhi coming in a hack from the dock in San -Francisco to the Palace Hotel, and of the striking contrast between this -mighty man of these isles and the little men of finance and of commerce -who must have dined about him. Kalakaua, king of the Hawaiian Islands, -had lived there, and had died there. But charming as was that prince of -_bons vivants_, he was nevertheless the victim of the white man’s vices, -and as years passed, his appearance became that of an overfed, -over-ginned head porter. Even the patrons of the Palace must have had -some vision of this man Mapuhi on the deck of his schooner, his vast -chest and arms bare, his hair blown by the wind. Or, emerging from the -waters of the lagoon, arising from the plunge to the coral cave where -the lethal shark looks for prey. This was what he spoke in face and form -to me. - -“I had seven nights,” said Mapuhi, “in your great house, and seven days -in your streets. The people were like the fish in the lagoon of -Pukapuka, where no man seeks them, and where they crowd each other until -they kill. I went in a room from the ground to where I slept, a room -that moved on a cord; and I rode in other rooms that moved about the -roads on iron bands in which people sat who never said a word to one -another, and who never spoke to me. As I walked in the roads they were -dark as in the cocoanut-groves, for your houses make caves of the roads, -as under the barrier-reef.” - -“But, Mapuhi,” I said, “we are happy in our way.” - -“You do not laugh much,” returned the chief. “Only I heard the laughter -from the houses in which you sold rum. I am a good Mormon. I do not now -drink your mad waters, but in your city only the mad waters made men -happy. I was a gentile myself many years and did not know the truth. I, -too, drank the mad waters.” - -Mapuhi’s eyes sought the picture of Brigham Young which was on the wall, -but mine went to the figures of the prize-fighters, Jeffries and -Johnson. Mapuhi intercepted my glance and immediately became alert. - -“Was it possible that I had ever seen _Teferite_ or _Tihonitone_?” - -This question was put to Elder Overton, who hesitated to interpret. The -subject was a scandal throughout the Paumotus. I read that in the -preacher’s face, but, comprehending the import of the words, I said that -I knew _Teferite_; that he lived very near me, and that I saw him often -in his store. Once or twice I had bought goods of him. He was getting -very fat since _Tihonitone_ had whipped him, and most of his time he -hunted fish and wild animals. _Tihonitone_, the _neega_, as the -Paumotuans call Afro-Americans, I had seen more than once, I said. - -“That _neega_ knocked down the white _Teferite_ and took the hundreds of -thousands of francs given the winner,” said Mapuhi, with spirit. “They -are both great men, but the _neega_ is the greatest. Next to the chiefs -of the Mormon church, they are the greatest Americans.” - -“Have you never heard of Roosevelt, Teddy Roosevelt?” I demanded. - -He did not know the man. An acquaintance in Tahiti sent him now and then -the pink paper which contained the pictures of fighting men, of fighting -dogs, and of women whose bosoms and legs were bare. America must now be -full of these fights, and of beautiful women almost naked, he said. - -“Your two most famous men, _Teferite and Tihonitone_, sell rum. The -goods you bought of _Teferite_ was rum, for he keeps a rum store in Los -Angelese, and the _neega_, in Keekago.” - -Each sentence tore the elders’ hearts, but Mapuhi salved their wounds. - -“These men are gentiles, I know,” he concluded. “The elders have -informed me. Mormons sell no rum. But tell me, is _Tihonitone_ master of -his white wife? I have her picture. She is beautiful.” - -Overton frowned. - -“Mapuhi,” he said, gently, “you make too much of those ‘Police Gazette’ -pictures. The godly in America never see them. They are for the -rum-drinkers, and are found only in the resorts of the wicked. Strength -is admirable, but the fighting men of our country are the Philistines -whom Jehovah chastised.” - -To me, in English, the Utahan said: “That coon’s licking the white man -has cost the whole white race dear. A preacher in India told me England -could better have afforded to give Johnson five million dollars, for -what it has cost in troops. The same in Africa. The evil of -prize-fighting, was never better exemplified. Jeffries’ beating has hurt -religion seriously.” - -Mapuhi and the elders left the room, and returned in a few minutes in -black broadcloth coats and high white collars, in which they sweated -woefully. We all walked to the temple. It was close beside the beach, -built of coral blocks, smeared with cement, white as the ocean foam. Its -iron roof, painted crimson, was the only spot of color on the _motu_, -except the nodding palms. - -“It is like the blood of the martyrs,” exclaimed Overton, piously. “The -temple was begun over twenty years ago. Nine years it took to build it, -because the converts were few and poor, and labor scarce. Twice cyclones -leveled it. Ten years ago the Takaroans began it again, and for two -years it has been completed. I know of no more sublime monument to the -true religion than this little temple. Every block of coral is a -redeemed soul. If only the gentiles in America knew the work we were -doing!” - -We entered the temple reverently, the congregation, already seated, -nearly filling it. On its rude coral floor were rough benches -accommodating five or six persons each. A pulpit of gingerbread -scrollwork, the only other furniture, was apologized for by De Kalb. - -“It was the plainest we could get. It was made for the Catholics. They -like ’em fancy, like their religion.” - -Elder Overton preached the sermon. De Kalb read from the Bible and the -“Book of Mormon.” The people who filled the edifice paid all attention. -Serious always in their demeanor, except when affected by alcohol, they -were positively melancholy in religion. All who could afford it wore -black, and the oldsters had long frock coats of funereal hue, and -collars like the Americans. - -After the services, I broached to the elders my necessity of a -habitation. With the diving season opening in a few weeks, divers and -traders would be at Takaroa from all about, and the 140 people of the -atoll would be multiplied three or four times. Most of these divers -would crowd in the houses of the natives, and the majority of the -traders would live on their schooners. Mapuhi regretted that all his -accommodations were bespoken. - -The elders took me to the house of Nohea, a small, neat cottage, at the -end of the avenue leading from the mole, an avenue all shining white -with coral sand. It reminded me of the shell roads of my native State, -Maryland, in my childhood. It was lined with the shanties and huts of -the inhabitants. - -Nohea greeted me quietly. He was a dark man, six feet four inches in -height, big all over, his muscles well insulated by deep fat, and with -the placid giantism of a Yeddo wrestler. He was taciturn, reserved, and -melancholy. Most of these natives became spiritually strained when, as -commonly, late in life, they gave up the wicked pleasures of the -flesh—alcohol, tobacco, and philandering. They lost toleration for -unrighteousness, and the joy that in their unregenerate state had oozed -from their wicked pores turned to acid. - -A friend and sometime partner of Mapuhi, and as devout a Mormon, Nohea -was, next to Mapuhi, the foremost figure in the archipelago. He was not -a trader, except that he sold his pearls, shell, and copra for money and -merchandise; but he had dignity, strength, and personality—not quite as -had Mapuhi, but more than any other Takaroan. Among Paumotuans few men -showed distinctive character. Nohea possessed that, and also physical -strength and skill for the diving, for the handling of boats, and for -the making of copra. When there was no white missionary at Takaroa, he -was the hierophant of the Mormon church. He conducted the services and -advised the faithful, collected the tithes, and admonished the sinners. -He did not fail in zeal for that task. Nohea painted a hell darker than -a shark’s jaws, a pit of horror, lit by black flames which burned the -non-Mormons, and a heaven on earth where baked pig was a free dish at -all hours. The Mormon heaven is nearer the Mussulman’s than the -Christian’s. Food and rills of fresh water, many beautiful and -passionate wives, song and feasting, were promised the Paumotuan. Golden -harps and streets of pearl would hardly have brought their tithes to the -church treasury. - -The very day I joined him I began to see things through his eyes. I was -bathing at dusk in the clear waters of the lagoon near our home. The -severe heat of the equatorial day had passed, and the still salt lake -was as refreshing to my sun-stricken and coral-scratched body as the -spring of the oasis to the parched traveler. The night was riding fast -after the sunken sun, and driving the last gleam of color from the sky. - -As I floated at ease upon the quiet surface of the pale-green lagoon, -the sounds of the murmurous twilight—the rustling of the trees and the -splash of the surf on the outer shore—were made discordant by a peculiar -scraping noise near-by. I turned lazily over on my face and raised my -head from the water. - -On the coral in the deceptive half-light of the crepuscule was a -hideous, shell-backed monster, which had emerged from an unseen lair, -and moved slowly and lumberingly toward the cocoanut-trees. Its motions -and appearance, in the semi-obscurity, took on the quality of a -dream-beast, affrighting in its amazing novelty. It was like a great -paper-mâché animal in a pantomine. - -I was beset by apprehension that it might advance to the lagoon and -approach me in an element in which it would be my master. I swam swiftly -to shore and called, “Nohea!” - -My companion came from near our hut, where on the red-hot coral stones, -which had been made to glow by a fire of cocoanut-husks, he cooked the -fish he had caught that afternoon. - -He looked at me inquiringly, and I pointed to the alarming creature now -disappearing in the palm-grove. - -“_Aue!_” he cried irascibly, and sprang after the nightmare. When I -overtook him, he was standing at the foot of a lofty cocoanut-tree and -shaking his fist at the object of his pursuit, which was climbing with -unbelievable speed up the slippery gray trunk. - -“_I teienei!_ It is the _kaveu_, that devil of the night who robs us of -our cocoanuts while we sleep. But wait! I made a vow to destroy the next -one I found thieving!” - -Nohea went a hundred yards to where a banana plant was growing in earth -brought from Tahiti. He gathered clay and leaves, and with painstaking -effort fashioned a wreath of the mixture six inches wide and several -feet in length. I stood in wonderment, guessing that he was making a -charm to bring about the death of the despoiler of the groves. - -Nohea took a length of _coir_, the rope the Paumotuans make of -cocoanut-fiber,—from the tree which feeds them, clothes them, and houses -them,—and, tying it into a girdle but little larger than the girth of -the palm, put it about his wrists. The cocoanut-tree had, at regular -intervals upon its trunk, projecting bands of its tough bark, and about -the first of these above his head Nohea slipped the rope. He pulled -himself up by it, and, clasping the tree with his legs, seized a higher -holding-place. Thus he proceeded with ease until he had reached a point -half-way of the lofty column. There he halted, and, taking from his -shoulders his matted band, he plastered it firmly around the trunk. - -He then slipped to the ground. I was as puzzled as a boy who was told at -sailing that the ship was weighing its anchor, and saw no scale. - -“That will do for him,” said Nohea, “as the reef shatters the canoe when -the steersman fails to find the pass.” - -He returned to the fire, and soon we were absorbed in the pleasant -processes of supper. We lived simply, becoming near-to-nature folk, but -we had plenty. First, we ate _popo_, tiny fish we had snared in our -traps, and which we swallowed raw, after a soaking in the juice of -limes. With our _bonito_ steak we had broiled cocoanut-meat, and for -drink we opened the wondrous chalices of the green nuts and enjoyed the -cool wine. There was no breadfruit, for these islands of stone afforded -no nourishment to such delicate and rich plants. But we had ship’s -biscuit from the schooner, and for desert a pot of loganberry jam. -Nohea, his stomach full, sat contemplatively on his haunches. Now and -then he cocked his ear toward the cocoanut-grove, but he said nothing. -The crown of the tree in which the giant crustacean had vanished was -lost in the gloom of night. A slight breeze sprang up from the distance -toward the Land of the War Fleet, and _pandanus_ and _mikimiki_ bushes -nodded and gave forth little noises as their leaves and branches rubbed -together. - -Over all was the atmosphere of mystic aloofness which the white feels so -keenly in these far-away dots—the utter difference of scene and incident -from the accustomed one of the home land. I mused about my own future in -these little known tropics— - -Nohea cautiously raised himself to his feet, and, motioning me to be -silent, directed my attention to the tree up which had gone the ugly -marauder an hour before. We heard plainly a grating, incisive noise, and -in a moment a huge cocoanut fell from among the swaying leaves to the -earth. - -A smothered exclamation of fury broke from the Paumotuan, but he made no -step and continued pointing at the palm. Then I heard a scratching, and -peering through the darkness with the aid of my electric torch, I saw -the colossal crab coming down the trunk. He held on to the slippery bark -by the sharp points of his walking legs, and backwardly descended with -extreme care. - -Nohea watched intently as the animal neared the girdle of clay and -leaves. I noted his excitement, but still could not resolve his plan. It -flashed upon me as its success was established in an instant of action. - -The robber-crab, touching the clay, moved less carefully, and suddenly, -to my astonishment, let go his hold, and with claws wildly beating the -air, whirled downward from the height of forty feet, crashing on the -rocks at the foot of the tree. In a second Nohea was upon him with a -club of purau wood. But there was no need for further punishment. The -drop had caused instant death. The immense shell was smashed and the -monster lay inert upon the coral stones. - -The diver sprang in the air and clapped his hands rapidly, as might a -winning better at a prize-fight. - -“The fool!” he said. “He has no _koekoe_—no bowels of wisdom. He thought -the clay was the bottom, and that he was already with the nut he had -robbed me of, and which he could open and eat. Many I have killed like -that one, but it takes time. I have had such a thief steal my _pareu_ -for his house, and a bottle of kerosene for mere mischief. We will eat -the flesh of this one’s legs, and I will melt his fat against the -_rahui_ when I might have rheumatism.” - -Nohea showed me a great mass of blue fat under the _kaveu’s_ tail, and -from this he boiled down a quart of the finest oil. It was not only a -specific for rheumatism but the best possible lubricant for -sewing-machines and clocks, he said. He put some of the oil in the sun, -and when thickened it made butter, though not with a milky taste. - -This thievish crab seemed marked by his star—doubtless of the Cancer -constellation—to play a deceptive part in the crustacean world, for not -only had he practically abandoned the water as his element, learned to -climb trees, and to eat food utterly foreign to his natural appetite, -but he had a habit of hiding his tail when the rest of his body was in -full view. He would stick it in any convenient hole, under a log, or -even in the cocoanut-shell he had emptied. He was over-conscious and -seemingly ashamed of it, like an awkward man of his hands at a wedding. - -The _kaveu’s_ descent from the hermit-crab family might explain his -tail-concealment custom, for the hermit concealed his entire body in a -borrowed shell, and so, perhaps, the robber-baron was but showing an -atavistic remnant of the disguise instinct. The whole crab tribe seemed -tainted with this fear of being merely themselves. Many of them picked -up a piece of seaweed and stuck in on their projecting curved bristles, -and let it grow as a kind of permanent bonnet. Others took pieces of -live sponge, and fastened them to hooks on their backs. One clever chap -stitched seaweed threads together to form a tube, and then crawled into -it. And one masonic crab mixed a sandy cement and plastered its back -with it until it looked like the floor of its pond. - -These specious masqueraders selected colors, too, to suit their -background, and the seaweed or sponge must match the environment or be -rejected. Older and hardened backsliders invited oysters and other -mollusks and worms that live in limestone pipes to dwell on their -shells, and move about with them. I was convinced that these -low-down-in-the-scale beings knew more about their environment, and -practised “safety first” more assiduously, than did man himself. The -biggest robber-crab in the Takaroa groves could not have got a humble -hermit brother to volunteer to go to war against a crab colony, or risk -his life to glorify the crab state. - -[Illustration: - - Photo by Dr. Theodore P. Cleveland - Robber-crab ascending tree at night. One of the few photographs taken - of - the marauder in action -] - -In carrying a cocoanut, the robber crab held it under some of its -walking legs, and retired, raised high on the tips of its other members -a foot from the ground. Its body measured two feet long by eighteen -inches wide. It did not use its claws in ascending the tree, but clung -with the sharp points of its legs; and I saw it go up steep rocks upon -these. The remarkable strength of this mollusk was proved when one was -placed in an ordinary tin cracker-box, which it could not take hold of, -and a few hours later had twisted off the lid. Nohea said that they were -not easy to trap, and that more than once a Paumotuan, who had climbed a -tree in the night to procure nuts, to his great horror had had his hair -seized by a crab. He said that usually they bit off from six to ten nuts -upon each ascent of a palm. - -[Illustration: - - Photo from Dr. Theodore P. Cleveland - Where the _Bounty_ was beached and burned -] - -“The _kaveu_ likes to eat the young turtles when they are hatched and -making their first journey to the water,” Nohea informed me. “The crab, -knowing where the eggs are buried, watches them as they mature in the -sand.” - -I told Nohea of the crabs I had seen in Japanese waters, some stretching -seven or eight feet, and another which bore a human face upon its back. -To see one of the latter crawling upon the sand was to see what -apparently was a human mask moving across the beach. The Japanese said -that these crabs were never known until after a fleet of pirates had -been destroyed, and the leading villains beheaded upon the sea-shore. - -Against the rat, which was perhaps a worse enemy of the beneficent -cocoanut than the crab, my friend Nohea had no safeguard. He could not -afford to encircle his trees with bands of tin, as did corporate owners -of plantations in Tahiti, but he told me, with great appreciation, the -story of Willi, the clever American dentist, and his atoll of Tetiaroa, -near Tahiti. Once it was the resort of the kings and aristocracy of -Tahiti, the sanatorium to which they went when jaded, or wounded in war -or sport, and to which the belles retired to whiten their complexion by -wearing off the sunburn in the shade of the banyans and cocoanuts. It -was famed in the annals of the _Arioi_, the ancient minstrels of Tahiti, -as a scene of orgiastic dances. - -“The atoll of Tetiaroa,” said Nohea, “had always many cocoanut-trees. -The lagoon is as rich in fish as is Takaroa. Never had many people lived -there, for it was _tabu_, and only for the _Arii_, the nobles, and the -_Arioi_. But now it belongs to the man who takes away teeth from the -head, and who hammers gold upon those that remain.” - -The master diver spun his tale vividly but slowly. Often he repeated the -same statement, for the Paumotuan speech, like that of all Polynesia, is -a picture language, and iteration and harping is the soul of it, as of -the ancient Hebrew chronicles. - -Upon my mat and gazing into the expressive eyes of the diver, I recalled -what I myself had been told by the owner of Tetiaroa, and, with Nohea’s -story, pieced together the facts. - -Dr. Walter Johnstone Williams, the dentist of Tahiti for twenty years, -had, as related Nohea, taken away the teeth of the South Sea Islanders -or gilded those which remained. They love those shiny, precious-metal -teeth, these children of the tropics, and would give almost anything to -gain the golden smile they admired. So when the royal family of Tahiti -fell in debt to Dr. Williams, they bartered, in exchange for fillings -and pullings, facings and bridges, and for other good and sufficient -consideration, the wondrous atoll of Tetiaroa. Upon it the shrewd and -skillful dentist found tens of thousands of cocoanut-palms which had -grown as volunteers in the generous way of tropic verdure, and he -himself planted tens of thousands more in order to increase the copra -crop. He found a plague of rats, and, being unwilling to expend the -large sum that would be needed for the metal bands which would frustrate -the rats, he longed for a Pied Piper to lead the pests into the sea. But -he bethought himself of the proverbial appetite of the domestic cat for -the rat, and, lacking a magic whistler, he advertised for cats, offering -to pay a franc for each one brought to his house by the Papeete quay. He -had copies of his advertisement struck off on the press and posted upon -the trees in and about Papeete, as was the custom. - -The result was a flood, a deluge, a typhoon of cats. The Tahitian boy -was as eager as his American brother to earn a few coins to spend on -luxuries; and so the cats, much like our own in appearance except for -their tails, which were curved like a question-mark, came in bags, in -boxes, and in nets, while others were personally conducted, yowling, in -the arms of the Tahitian youth. - -Dentist Williams had not expected so many, and had much trouble in -finding places for them to reside until he could remove them to -Tetiaroa. - -There were cats in his office, cats on the landings, cats in every room, -and his garden was a boarding-place of felines. When more than a -thousand had been collected, he posted a notice to ward off any further -sellers, and, chartering a schooner, hastened with his live cargo to the -atoll. There was no necessity of putting down a gangway from the vessel -to the little wharf at Tetiaroa, for once she was made fast it needed -but the loosening of their bonds to cause the thousand cats to reach the -shore in one bound from the deck. - -Of course, the cats set immediately about their pleasant business of -catching and eating the rodents. There were tens of thousands of them, -perhaps hundreds of thousands, because the island had been little -inhabited for many years and the rats had been multiplying unmolested. -But with a thousand South Sea Island cats to prey upon them, the easy -supply of rats was soon exhausted. Then the cats chased them up and down -the trees, in and out of caves and from every refuge, so that there came -a day when the last rat was in the maw of a cat. - -Meanwhile, with such rich meat diet the cats increased mightily. When -the rats were all gone, they were confronted with the problem of -existence for uncounted thousands of cats. They might have learned to -eat cocoanuts, but they had become such confirmed meat-eaters that they -would not abandon their carnal appetites. They did what greed does the -world over—what the Russians did recently—they began to eat one another. -And they followed the example of industrialism which takes the young in -factories. - -First toms and tabbies lay in wait for the children of other cats, and -soon there was not a kitten left alive, nor could the parents prevent -the devouring of their children because of the avid hunger of the -adults. - -With the kittens gone, began a struggle, with the death of all as the -apparent end in view. Swifter and stronger cats slew weaker cats, and -the cats which allied themselves in bands, attacked distant strongholds -of cats. Slowly and surely went on this internecine warfare, with the -seeming certainty that, if not halted, one day the last two cats on -Tetiaroa would face each other in the final contest of prowess. Then one -lone cat might remain doomed to certain death from starvation, because -there would be no meat left. - -Once on a leviathan Atlantic liner, when the usual exterminating process -of hydrocyanic gas could not be used, all food was removed, and the rats -were left to starve, with a dozen cats to hasten the end. But the rats -ate the cats, and then the leather cushions, and finally their weaker -brethren, until the last rat died of starvation. - -But on Tetiaroa when there were but a few dozen of the quickest, -cleverest, and strongest cats remaining, the process suddenly stopped. -Atavism, heredity, or the stern battle for life, developed in the -survivors unusual intelligence, or they had a return of plain cat-sense. -Perhaps they held a powwow, or meowmeow, or whatever a council of cats -should be called, and decided upon the one course that would preserve -their species. In any event, they saved themselves by ending the -warfare. They reverted to the habits of their forefathers, and went -fishing. It is as natural for a cat to fish as for a dog to hunt a -rabbit. Falconer marked the ferocious jaguars of South America lying in -wait upon the shores of the river Plata to seize the fish that passed by -the roots of the trees. My goldfish ponds in California were raided by -cats many times. - -“I myself,” said Nohea, “have seen the fisher-cats of Tetiaroa stretched -at length on the shores of the lagoon, awaiting their prey. I have seen -a mother cat, with her kittens stringing in a cue behind her, snaring in -silence, and with paws fierce to strike, the small fish which come in -the eddies of the shallow pools. I have seen the good parent pass a -small fish back to her child and smile under her bristling whiskers at -her cleverness in providing such fare for her little ones.” - -The diver ceased speaking, and unrolled his mat. He knelt a moment and -prayed, and then he laid him down, and in a moment his deep breathing -was informing of his serene slumber. - -I lay there a few minutes thinking of his story, of the robber-crabs and -the fisher-cats, and above me the vast fronds of the cocoas inclined to -and fro, while, doubtless, other industrious crabs, unwarned by their -kindred’s fate, were climbing for nuts. - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CHAPTER VIII - -I meet a Seventh Day Adventist missionary, and a descendant of a - mutineer of the Bounty—They tell me the story of Pitcairn island—An - epic of isolation. - -MAPUHI, though a zealous Mormon, was not illiberal in his posture toward -other faiths. In his long years he had entertained a number of them as -ways to salvation before the apostles of Salt Lake sent their -evangelists to Takaroa. A day or two after landing he brought to Nohea’s -hut two aliens, whom, he said, I should know, because their language was -my own. He introduced them as Jabez Leek, _mahana maa mitinare_, a -“Saturday missionary,” and Mayhew December Christian, his assistant. -They had come to the atoll to dive in living waters for souls. A few -words and they were revealed as exceptional men, from far-away places. -The Reverend Jabez Leek was my countryman, as were the opposing elders I -had met here and at Kaukura. He said, with our half-defiant local pride, -that he came from the home of “postum and grape nuts.” A divine of the -Seventh Day Adventist persuasion, he cheerfully associated diet and -religion, as do most sects, the Jews with kosher foods and no pork; the -Catholics with abstinence from meat on certain days, and Mormons from -alcohol, coffee, and tea; and Protestants with the partaking of the -Lord’s Supper. - -“I am hoping to win for the true Christ a few souls for saving from the -lake of fire in that final day,” said the Reverend Mr. Leek, with the -accent of sincerity. There are few hypocrites among missionaries. They -believe in their remedies. - -Mapuhi, when Mr. Leek’s declaration was interpreted to him by Mayhew -December Christian, was stirred. He said so, and the most interesting -subject in the world to elderly people the world over—the state of man -after death—was discussed eagerly, though with the reserve of -proselytizing disputants. They agreed that in Mormonism and Seventh Day -Adventism they had in common the personal reign of Christ on earth and -prophecy. Joseph Smith, the Mormon prophet, the pastor from Battle -Creek, Michigan, compared with the God-inspired Ellen G. White, who, he -said, had led humanity back to the infallibility and perfection of the -Bible as the sole rule of life and faith. They both believed in a -Supreme God, and that only in the last century, two thousand years after -his son had been here in person, God had raised up men and women to -conduct sinners to paradise. It had been a revolutionary century in -revealed religion. The Battle Creek preacher began to tell of the -apocalyptic Mrs. White and her prophetic announcements, and Mapuhi was -beginning to prick up his big brown ears when he was called away. The -Mormon elders needed him in a conference. The slow, interpreted speech -of the minister flowed into rapid English as he directed his words to me -and Mr. Christian. The latter was evidently of mixed blood, with -Anglo-Saxon features, light-brown hair, dark-blue eyes, but a dark skin -and the voluptuous mouth of these seas. His voice, too, had a unique -timbre, and his English was slightly confused by Polynesian arrangement -of sentences. - -“God has set his seal upon rebellion for his own purposes,” continued -Leek. “The conflict with Satan is fiercer every year, but the Lord -listens to those who supplicate him. He is proof of his mercy.” - -He put his hand on the shoulder of Mayhew December Christian. - -“The first white settlers in the South Seas were rebels. They were -traitors to their king, murderers, and revolters against religion, -morals, and society. They were in the hands of Satan, and some of them -must perish in the lake of fire after the final judgment. But Christian -here is a true sample of the strange way God works out his plans. He is -a great-grandson of Fletcher Christian, who led the mutiny of the -British ship _Bounty_, and he is a Seventh Day Adventist and a -missionary of our denomination.” - -The mutiny of the _Bounty_! A phrase projects a hazy page of history or -raises the curtain upon an almost-forgotten episode. Fletcher Christian! -There was a name. They frightened children with it while he was still -alive, and it became a synonym for insubordination at sea. A thousand -sailors in two generations were spread-eagled or hailed to the mast and -given the cat while the offended officer shouted, “You’d be a damned -Christian, would you? I’ll take the Christian out o’ you!” He and his -desperate gang had committed the most romantically infamous crime of -their time, and their story had been for a hundred years singular in the -manifold annals of violent deeds in the tropics. Their rebellion and its -outcome was written scarlet in the records of admiralty, and for long -was a mysterious study for psychologists, a dreadful illustration to the -godly of sin’s certain punishment, and the most fascinating of -temptations to seamen and adventurers. - -The _Bounty_ had gone to Tahiti from England to transport -breadfruit-trees to the West Indies. George III was on the throne of -maritime England, and between the equator and the polar circle his flag -flew almost undisputed. Captain Cook had carried home knowledge of the -marvelous fruit in Tahiti, “about the size and shape of a child’s head, -and with a taste between the crumb of wheaten bread and Jerusalem -artichoke.” The West Indies had only the scarcely wholesome roots of the -manioc and cassava as the main food of the African slaves, and their -owners believed that if the breadfruit were plentiful there, the negroes -would be able to work harder. Lieutenant Bligh, Cook’s sailing-master, -was despatched with forty-four men in the two-hundred-ton _Bounty_ to -secure the trees in the Society Islands, and fetch them to St. Vincent -and Jamaica. When they at last reached maturity there, the slaves -refused to eat them, and another dream of perfection went by the board. - -Bligh was a hell-roarer of the quarter-deck, of the stripe less common -to-day than then, only because of such mutinies as it prompted. Crowded -in a leaky ship, with moldy and scanty provisions, half around Cape -Horn, and all around Cape of Good Hope, after twenty-seven thousand -miles of sailing, and a year and two months of harsh discipline and -depressing lack of decent food or sufficient water, the green and lovely -shores of Tahiti were a haven to the weary tars. They were greeted as -heaven-sent, and for six months they ate the fruits of the Isle of -Venus, swam in its clear streams, and were made love to by its -passionate and free-giving women in its groves. When, with a thousand -breadfruit shoots aboard, Bligh ordered up-anchor and away, the contrast -between the sweets of the present and the prospect of another year of -Bligh’s tyranny, with a certainty of poverty in England or hardship at -sea, turned the scale against the commander. An attempt to wreck the -ship by cutting its cable failed, but the second night of the homeward -voyage Fletcher Christian, master’s mate, who had made three voyages -under Bligh, being in charge of the deck, led a mutiny. Bligh was seized -in his bunk, bound, and, with eighteen of the crew who were not in the -plot, and a small amount of food and water, set adrift in a small boat. -Bligh’s party reached Malaysia after overcoming overwhelming dangers and -sufferings, and most of them went from there in a merchant’s ship to -London, where Bligh’s account of the mutiny, and his and his loyal men’s -wanderings, “filled all England with the deepest sympathy, as well as -horror of the crime by which they had been plunged into so dreadful a -situation.” The frigate _Pandora_, with twenty-four guns and 166 -fighting men, blessed by bishops, and with a special word from the king, -but just temporarily recovered from his recurrent insanity, sailed -speedily to “apprehend the mutineers.” - -Those hearties had meanwhile arranged their own fates. The _Bounty_ was -now a democracy with Christian as president, and the vote, after an -experiment in another islet, was to go back to the fair ones in the -groves of Tahiti. There sixteen of the twenty-five aboard, determined to -become landsmen, and, with the joyous shouts and hula harmonies of their -native friends, transferred their share of the plunder on the ship to -the shore, and went to dancing among the breadfruits. Christian was -shrewder. He knew well the long arm of the British monarchy, and warned -his shipmates their haven would be but for a little while. They were -capering to the pipes of Pan and would not listen, and so with nine -Englishmen, six Tahitian men, ten Tahitian belles, and a girl of -fifteen, the _Bounty_ weighed and steered a course unknown to those who -stayed. - -These latter weltered in an Elysium of freedom from humiliations, -discipline, work, and unrequited cravings for mates, and in a perfection -of warmth, delicious viands, exaltation of rank, and amorous damsels. -Chiefs adopted them, maidens caressed them, the tender zephyrs healed -their vapors, and they were happy; until the _Pandora_ arrived, snared -them, and took them in chains to England, where they were tried and -three hanged in chains at Spithead. The _Pandora_ reported that no trace -could be found of the _Bounty_, and the most that could be done was to -anathematize Christian and the mutineers, and to make the path of the -ordinary seaman more thorny, as a deterrent to others. - -For twenty-four years England heard nothing of the further movements of -the pirates. The new generation forgot them, but Christian’s name -lingered as a threat and a curse. The ship and crew disappeared as -completely as though at the bottom of the sea; and when their refuge -finally was disclosed, horrifying and also wonderfully poignant chapters -were added to the log of the _Bounty_, and one of the most curious and -affecting conditions of humanity brought to light. The bare outline of -all this is in every Pacific chronography, but one must have heard its -obscure intricacies from a scion of a participant to appreciate fully -their lights and shadows. Mayhew December Christian told me these, and -the Reverend Jabez Leek commented and pointed the moral. - -“My great grandfatheh want go farthes’ from Engalan’,” said Mayhew, “and -he look on chart of _Bounty_ an’ fin’ small islan’ not printed but jus’ -point of pencil made by cap’in where English ship some years before -find. It was call’ Pitcairn for midshipman who firs’ see it from mas.’ -He steer there an’ in twenty-three day _Bounty_ arrive. That where I was -born.” - -Not by any spelling or clipping of letters could I convey the speech and -accent of the islander, English, Tahitian, and American,—Middle -Western,—combined into a peculiar _patois_, soft at times, and strident -at others, with admixture of Tahitian words. He went on to tell how his -ancestor and his companions looked with hope at the land which must give -them safety or death. They reached the shore through a rocky inlet and -rough breakers, and, on finding stone images, hatchets, and traces of -heathen temples, were cast down by fear of savages. But as days passed, -and they gradually wandered over the entire island without trace of any -present inhabitants, they felt secure. Its smallness in that vast and -then trackless waste of waters below the line reassured them of its -insignificance to mariners or rulers, it being only five miles long by -two wide, and with no harbor or protected bay. Rugged in outline, and -uninviting from the deck, with peaks and precipices sheer and -sterile-looking, the mutineers were gladdened to walk through forests of -beautiful and useful trees, with fruit and grasses for making native -clothes; and about its borders to be able to catch an abundance of fish -and crustaceans. - -They drove and warped the ship into the inlet against the cliff, and -fastened it by a cable to a mighty tree, and in a few weeks removed -everything useful to the upland where they pitched their first camp. -Christian, with the determination and foresight that saved his group -from the ignominious end of those who would not abjure the ease of -Tahiti, insisted on burning the _Bounty_, to remove all indication of -their origin to visitors, and, doubtless, to make impossible belated -efforts to desert their sanctuary. They lived in tents made of the -canvas until they built houses from the ship’s planks, and these among -the spreading trees so that they were completely unseen from the sea. -They had ample provisions from the stores until they could raise a crop -of vegetables, and the plants they brought might supplement those -indigenous. The island was covered with luxurious growths, there was -water, and they extracted salt from pools among the rocks. They parceled -out all the land among the Englishmen, and each with his Tahitian wife -set up his own home. The Tahitian men helped different ones in their -building and cultivation, and in peace and comparative plenty they began -one of the most startling experiments of mankind. - -Nine Englishmen, mostly rude sailors, with ten Tahitian women and a -girl, and six Tahitian men,—unevenly divided as to sex, whites and -Polynesians unable to converse except meagerly, with totally different -inheritance and habits,—were there as the experimenters, with no -restraint upon passions or covetings except the feeble check of mutual -interests. A hamlet in the ripest civilization has difficulty to govern -by these. Compromise through a supposed expression of the will of the -majority in elections has become an accepted solvent, but in reality the -determined and organized minority wins usually. On Pitcairn, as in Eden, -a woman caused the failure. After two years of associated achievement, -the wife of Williams, a mutineer, having fallen to death from a cliff -while gathering sea-birds’ eggs, that subject of King George demanded -and was awarded the wife of a Tahitian comrade. The committee of the -whole, Anglo-Saxon whole, in contemplation of their own naked souls, -could not deny Williams. The woman left the hut of her husband and -shared the couch of the victor in the award. There was no appeal, for -the supreme court, as in America, was final, no matter what the congress -of the people wished. The lady was complacent, but the cuckolded -Tahitian got together his color majority and protested. He was told to -nurse his wrath in hell, and the court administered summary sentences to -all who disputed its power or equity. Timiti had murmured, but, as mere -treason was too sublimated a charge, they brought another against him, -and the tribunal was assembled, with the entire citizenry as witnesses -and auditors. Christian walked up and down in the house as evidence was -offered, and once, as he turned, Timiti, sure of the court’s finding, -flew out of the door. He escaped to the other shore of the island, but -after weeks was decoyed by false promises and murdered as his deceivers -combed his tangled hair, a sign of friendship. - -[Illustration: - - Photo from Dr. Theodore P. Cleveland - The church on Pitcairn Island -] - -The remaining Tahitian males formed a committee of vigilance, and voted -to rid the island of the entire supreme court. Its members were saved -from immediate assassination by their wives, who, in the way of women on -continent and islet, loved them because they were the fathers of their -children. Moreover, since Cook claimed as paramour in Hawaii the -Princess Lelemahoalani, dark women have been fired by ambition for -social and environmental climbing on a white family tree. The wives of -the English in Pitcairn were able to inform their husbands through the -gossip of the wives of the Tahitians, who also sided with the whites. -One carried her adherence far enough to murder her spouse while he -slept. Life was made fearful for these wives, and once they constructed -a raft and were beyond the breakers to sail to Tahiti or oblivion, when -the Englishmen’s women’s wailing and pleading induced them to return. -For months more it was touch and go as to survival. Murder stalked -hourly, and the oppression of the whites became that of masters towards -slaves. Then the Tahitians crept into their huts and secured the -firearms, and with these hunted down the Europeans. They killed first -John Williams, the successful litigant, and then Fletcher Christian, the -chief justice, and, quickly, John Mills, Isaac Martin, and William -Brown. William McCoy, John Quintal, and John Adams were fleet enough to -reach the woods, and Edward Young, midshipman of the _Bounty_, beloved -of all the women, was secreted by them. John Adams when hunger-pressed -showed himself, and was shot and badly wounded. He ran to the bluff -above the sea, and was about to hurl himself to destruction when induced -to refrain by his pursuers, whose hearts failed them. Adams, Young, -McCoy, and Quintal, but a quartet of the nine mutineers, remained, and -five of the six Tahitian men. The latter had cut down the four to a -minority of the male populace, and were delighted to swear eternal -amity. Adams recovered, and, at a midnight session, the whites released -themselves from their oaths and decreed the wiping out of every male but -themselves. They swore as allies the widows of the other sailors, and, -as fast as dark opportunity offered, the decree was executed. They were, -shortly, the only men. - -[Illustration: - - Photo from Dr. Theodore P. Cleveland - The shores of Pitcairn Island -] - -Now was a second chance for peace and success. The experiment of putting -together without higher authority a band of white men with women and -slaves as spoils had miscarried. The inferior tribesmen were finished, -but there were four of the higher race, and eleven native women, still -subjects for further probation. One would say for certain that on that -lonely speck of land, having glutted any blood lust, and with twelve of -their number already dead, these four men of the same race, religion, -and profession would get along somehow. It was not to be. - -“McCoy,” said Mayhew December Christian, “liked to drink liquor. Before -he was a seaman he worked in a distillery in England, and on Pitcairn he -distilled _ti_ leaves in his tea-kettle. They all had drunk his alcohol, -and it had been a factor in the quarrels. He got worse as he became -older, and he and Quintal kept up a continuous spree until the devil -gripped McCoy for his own, and McCoy tied a rock around his waist and -leaped into the sea. Three whites were left, and Quintal had learned -nothing from the past. He drank the _ti_ liquor, and when his wife came -from fishing with too few fish he bit off her ear. When she fell from -the cliff and was drowned, Quintal, with all the other women to choose -from, demanded the wife of one of his two shipmates. He made terrible -threats against both of them, and they knew he meant what he said.” - -In the first case since its institution the court of Pitcairn divided. -Adams and Young, taunted by the continuing insults of Quintal to their -matrimonial integrity, and faced with the probability of extinction -unless they acted vigorously, seceded from the minority. They deluded -Quintal into a momentary incautiousness when the recurrent insistence of -his demand was being quarreled over in the presence of the entire -community, and butchered him with a hatchet. - -“I heard the daughter of John Mills, an old woman, relate the incident,” -said Mayhew. “They were gathered together, children and all, in Adams’s -house, when he and Young jumped upon Quintal and chopped him to pieces. -The blood was everywhere, she said, and we grew up with a song about it. -My mother used to croon it to me on her lap.” - -Young, midshipman, of gentle breeding, and a serious man at his -lightest, faded away, and in his last, melancholy days, uttered the name -of God. Convinced that Adams would not strike him down, he gave way to a -conviction of sin, the remembrance of his childhood at home. He died -begging for mercy, which Adams assured him would be granted to a -contrite heart. They laid him in a grave upon the land he had -cultivated, and over him was said the first word of funeral sermon -pronounced in Pitcairn. John Adams, the preacher, of the fifteen males -who had sailed in the _Bounty_ from Tahiti, was sole survivor. Fourteen -had perished, thirteen violently, in the search for happiness and -freedom from restraint. Man had almost annihilated his brother. - -John Adams had a dream in which it was pointed out to him that upon his -head was not merely the blood of the many who had been murdered, but -that the bodies and souls of the innocents remaining were in his care. - -“Thou art thy brother’s keeper,” said the scroll in his vision. He -counted his human kind. The feud had swallowed fourteen strong and -wilful men, but nature, as it had allowed their crops to grow and their -trees to become fruitful, had preserved eight of the women, and their -fertility had given twenty-three children to the mutineers. Christian -had fathered three, McCoy three, Quintal the bold, five, Young six, -Mills two, and Adams four. Adams drew about him these thirty-one beings, -and commenced a new regimen. He forswore the democracy of Pitcairn, and -in the sweat of his soul dedicated the island to the God of the Bible -and prayer-book that had molded on a shelf until then. In tears and with -vows he gathered his flock about him and daily and nightly expounded to -them verses and read them prayers. He did not lose sight of the material -needs in his flinging himself on the compassion of heaven, but gave -every one a task and saw that it was done. He taught the children -English from these, the only books saved, and it was not the least of -his accomplishments that he was able to make his language theirs, for -their mothers knew nothing of it. The thirty-two became one family, the -eight widows looking upon him as their father, as did the little ones. -Morning and evening, and all Sunday, a stream of prayers for their -welfare and salvation was directed by him toward the seat of the -Almighty, and the theocracy of Pitcairn waxed fat and sweet. With one -head, and many hands, yearly increasing as the children grew, they -perfected their fields and bowers, their fewer houses and their gear, -and, born into the environment, the adolescents became marvelously -adapted to its necessities. When the scene was unveiled to the outer -world, it would have needed a Rousseau to describe its felicity. - -Captain Mayhew Folger, a sealer from Boston, commanding the _Topaz_, -lifted the curtain twenty years after the mutiny and ten years after -Adams had become its sole survivor. He sailed to Pitcairn to look for -seals, and offshore was hailed in English by three youths in a boat who -offered him cocoanuts, and told him an Englishman was there. He landed, -and was received with warm hospitality. He put down Adams’s statement in -the _Topaz’s_ log, with the comment that whatever his crimes in the -past, he was now “a worthy man, and might be useful to navigators who -traverse this immense ocean.” He also recorded that Adams gave him hogs, -cocoanuts, and plantains. - -England did not gain a clue to the “mystery of the _Bounty_” through the -_Topaz_ log. Captain Folger tarried a day at Pitcairn, and his ship was -confiscated at Valparaiso shortly afterwards by the Spanish governor of -Chile. Young America and England were not close friends, and their -navies and merchant marines were at odds. Six years elapsed before even -the British admiralty knew the facts. They were gained on an expedition -of immense interest to Americans. Captain Porter, of the Yankee navy, -had been not long before in the Marquesas Islands, to which he had taken -prize ships captured in the war between Great Britain and the United -States, and where he had flown the American flag in token of possession, -and killed many helpless natives to indicate his power. The British -captured Porter in the _Essex_, undid at Nuku-Hiva what he had done, and -did it over in the name of King George. Bound from the Marquesas to -Chile, Captain Staines of the _Briton_ unexpectedly sighted Pitcairn and -was confounded at the signs of human life in huts and laid-out fields, -but more so when Thursday October Christian and George Young shouted -from a small boat to “throw them a rope.” Invited aboard the _Briton_ -and put at table, they asked a blessing in English, and said they had -been taught by John Adams of the _Bounty_ to reverence God in every act. -The _Briton_ commander, amazed at this apparition of civilization from -the ghostly past, put ashore a party, and investigated the colony of -forty-eight. The stupified Pitcairn folk were afraid that Adams would be -taken prisoner, and he doubtless would have been except for the -pleadings of the young, and especially of Adams’s “beautiful grown -daughter.” The captain stayed a few hours and reported to the admiralty -in England the answer to the _Bounty_ riddle, and that never in his -lifetime had he seen such a model settlement or such virtuous and happy -people. England was at war with Napoleon, and left Adams to time. Ten -years later came a British whaler, and Adams confessed himself old to -its captain. He begged for a helper in governing his commonwealth, and -especially in teaching them. The captain assembled the crew and asked -for a volunteer. John Buffet, twenty-six, cabinet-maker, twice -shipwrecked, and a lover of his fellow, stepped out and was accepted. He -knew that it meant years of isolation from Europe, but that was what he -had craved in his rovings. When his ship was ready to sail, Johnny -Evans, nineteen, Buffett’s chum, was missing. He had hidden in a hollow -stump. The community was obliged to receive him. And so two white men, -fresh from Europe, became members of a family of several score -half-breeds who, in an idyllic simplicity and a gentle savagery, had -lived for years undisturbed by a foreign or dissentient element, and who -in their common affection and openness of heart were remindful of the -Christians of the catacombs. The second period of Pitcairn was ended. - -It continued as a secluded handful of people, but new theocracies began -to govern them. God had been always their dependence and lord paramount, -but his vicegerents had guided them in tortuous paths toward his throne. - -The Reverend Jabez Leek, who had often supplied links in the chain which -had led the relation of Mayhew December Christian from the mutiny to the -coming of Buffett and Evans, said this: - -“I was induced to go to Pitcairn by the devotion of one of its sons to -the place of his birth,” he explained. “I met him in California. He was -a young man, and one of the few Pitcairners who had ever been to -America. He had voyaged to England as a sailor on a ship that had -touched at Pitcairn, and was trying to return home. That seemed -impossible. Twice he had shipped on vessels bound for Australia, with -promises to land him if the wind permitted, and once had sighted his -island, but his ships were driven past both times, and he had been -forced to go half-way round the world on them. He told me that he had -left home in order to earn money to start married life better. He had -engaged himself to a Pitcairn girl, and, as is the custom there, the -marriage day was put three years away. It was already two years and a -half since he had departed. He had not the means to charter a ship,—that -would have cost thousands,—and his health was fast going. Just -homesickness. It was nothing else. The doctors said there was nothing -the matter with his body, but he got weaker. There was no ship offering, -and I doubt if he could have passed muster, but daily he examined the -shipping lists, and often went to the docks and offices to get a chance. -It was he who told me about Pitcairn and its God-fearing people, and he -first introduced me to the true religion of Christ. He was a sincere -Seventh Day Adventist, and confident of the coming of Christ on earth -and of his own salvation. It was pitiful to see him fail. We lodged in -the same house, and I talked to him daily. He said that when he saw -Pitcairn receding in the distance after seven months on the -_Silverhorn_, he could not leave the rail of the ship, and remained -there when night came peering into the darkness until at dawn he had to -take up his duties. His only hope was in God, but he was destined to -wait until the first resurrection, unknowing time or space, until he -comes before the judgment of God. As the day set for his marriage came -nearer, he abandoned desire to live past it, and the only sorrow he had -was that his sweetheart could not know his inability to keep his troth. -He died the day before the three years expired, and in his last moments -advised me that God had made him the channel through which the truth of -religion might be made known to me. His death opened my eyes, and I -accepted the gospel. - -“I studied for our ministry, and, with service in other fields, I was -fortunate enough to be chosen to go to Pitcairn after expressing my -earnest desire to see God’s will and power shown in such manifest ways. -Our denomination had its own missionary vessel, the _Pitcairn_, doing -the Master’s work in these seas, and I went on it. On the thirty-third -day we came to Bounty Bay and anchored, and in the boat that put off to -greet us, besides two of our own elders, was this young man, -great-grandson of the Fletcher Christian who had, we fear, died without -knowing God’s mercy. I remained on Pitcairn a long time, a fruitful, -peaceful span, for all there were devout members of our church, and God -had blessed them greatly in faith and works. They had not been without -religious trials, though, and it was only in 1886 that they received the -gift of the truth. Buffett, the young Englishman upon whom Adams put the -teaching, married Midshipman Young’s daughter, Dorothy; and Evans, John -Adams’s girl, Rachel. They were there a half dozen years when George Hun -Nobbs arrived with an American named Bunker. They came from Chile in a -yawl. Nobbs had heard there the _Bounty_ story, and was so excited over -it that he induced Bunker to start out with him for Pitcairn in a small -boat. Nobbs said he was the son of a Marquis, and soon claimed the hand -of Sarah Christian, the mutineer’s granddaughter. Bunker tried for her -sister, Peggy, and when she refused, threw himself from a cliff, as -McCoy had done long before. Nobbs built a house out of the lumber of his -boat, and, because he was the best educated man, took Buffett’s place as -schoolmaster. Buffett was angry, but the people chose Nobbs because -Buffett had fallen once into a very terrible sin. Everybody knew it, and -though he had repented bitterly, it was remembered. Then John Adams died -after forty years on Pitcairn, and thirty of contrition, and Nobbs -became pastor, too. - -“A tremendous change came about then. Tahiti was controlled by the -London Protestant missionaries; and they made an arrangement with the -Pitcairners to give them land, and transportation to Tahiti. Every one -was moved to Tahiti, and Pitcairn left uninhabited. In Papeete they saw -for the first time in their lives, money, immorality, saloons, vile -dances, gambling, and scarlet women. Buffett and his family returned -within a few weeks, and after fourteen had died of fever, a schooner was -chartered to take all back. It was paid for by the copper stripped from -the _Bounty_, which had been carried to Tahiti. Back in their old homes, -all was not as before. Adams had never broken the still used by McCoy -and Quintal, and it began to be more active. Nobbs and Buffett, though -good men, liked a drop of the _ti_ juice, and there was a let-down in -strict morality. Things were at a pass when Joshua Hill arrived. In -England he had learned about Pitcairn, and through Hawaii and Tahiti had -come a roundabout route. Hill pretended to have been deputized by the -British Government, and declared he was the governor and pastor, both. -He fired out Nobbs from the church and school, and made no bones of what -he thought of Buffett and Evans, the other Englishmen. Hill was past -seventy, but he had his way. Nobbs, Buffet, and Evans were supported by -Charles Christian, Fletcher’s son, but Hill ruled with an iron hand. He -had Buffett beaten with a cat-o’-nine-tails in public, and announced -that he was going to reform Pitcairn if he had to flog every person. He -quoted Jesus’s action in the temple, and when he heard that several of -the women had been talking about his own dereliction, he called -everybody in prayer to judge them. His own prayer was: - -“‘O Lord, if these women die the common death of all men, thou hast not -sent me.’” - -“This was going too far, and there were no amens, which made Hill -furious. I have heard this from one who was present. When he learned -about Buffett’s sin, and that it had been concealed from him, he made up -his mind to give Buffett an unforgettable lesson with a whip. Then he -put the three whites on the first vessel touching Pitcairn, and exiled -them. This was the straw that broke Hill’s rule. A schooner captain -brought back the trio, and they and others opposed Hill. An elder’s -daughter took some yams that did not belong to her, and at her trial -Hill said she should be executed for her crime. The father indignantly -opposed any severe sentence. Hill, who had felt his authority lessening, -rushed into his room and returned with a sword, and shouted out for the -father to confess his sins as he intended to kill him immediately. A -grandson of Quintal, who had bitten his wife’s ear off, leaped over a -table, and though he threw Hill down, he could not prevent Hill from -stabbing him many times. Others came to his rescue, and Hill was -disarmed. He was soon deported, as the Englishmen had written to the -British admirality in Chile about his madness, and a war vessel came to -quiet things. Nobbs took hold again, and when our missionary came, they -were ready for the real word of God. Within two weeks they all had given -up Sunday as the Sabbath and were keeping Saturday, the Seventh Day, the -Sabbath instituted at the end of creation, and the day Christ and his -apostles rigidly observed. I loved the Pitcairn brethren. When my time -came to go into other fields, I brought with me Mayhew December -Christian, who had been selected for his understanding of our beliefs -and his spiritual growth.” - -The Reverend Mr. Leek stopped, and Nohea, who had awakened with a start -from a fitful slumber, said loudly, “_Amene!_” - -“You should read the account of Pitcairn by Buffett’s granddaughter,” -said the minister. “Mayhew, we will sing before we go to sleep our hymn -of Pitcairn, fifth and last verses!” - -The descendant of the arch-mutineer led in a mellow baritone, which Mr. -Leek supported in a firm bass: - - - “We own the depths of sin and shame, - Of guilt and crime from which we came; - Thy hand upheld us from despair, - Else we had sunk in darkness there. - - “Thou know’st the depths from whence we sprung; - Inspire each heart, unloose each tongue, - That all our powers may join to bless - The Lord, our strength and righteousness.” - -When they had said good night, I felt as sinful as Mary Magdalene; and -Nohea, though the words were Greek to him, sensed their meaning, and -before taking to his mat knelt and groaned deeply. - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CHAPTER IX - -The fish in the lagoon and sea—Giant clams and fish that poison—Hunting - the devilfish—Catching bonito—Snarling turtles—Trepang and sea - cucumbers—The mammoth manta. - -THE schooner _Marara_ unloaded her cargo of supplies after several days -of riding on and off the lee of the island, and went on her voyage to -other atolls. McHenry and Kopcke joined interests for the nonce, and -tried to draw me into the net they said they were spreading for the -natives. I was convinced that I was as edible fish for them as the -Paumotuans, and, besides, I was determined to avail myself of the -leisure of the wise Nohea before the _rahui_, to learn all about the -fish in the lagoon and sea. An ignorant amateur of the life of the -ocean, I was devoured with curiosity to peer into it under his guidance, -and I was resolute to spend my days in such sport instead of in sleep -after roistering of nights with the traders. - -“Nohea,” I said, “will you show me what the Creator has put in the -water? In my country I know the fish, but not here. Soon you will go to -the _rahui_, but we have a few weeks yet, and you are skilled in these -matters.” - -The diver replied, “_E_, I will show you”; and he kept his word, with a -prideful exactitude. Days and nights I returned dog-weary, from the sea -and the lagoon, but never once threw myself on my mat and counted my -pains for naught, as scores of times I had on the brooks, bays, and -oceans of America. With our variety of edibles in islands and continents -where there are real soil and domestic animals of many kinds, we can -hardly appreciate the desperate necessity of the Paumotuans to comb the -waters of their bare atolls for food. - -The pig, the only domestic mammifer before the whites came a century -ago, ate only cocoanuts, and, like fowls, was generally small and thin, -as well as too expensive for other meals than feasts. Few were the birds -in these white islands. In many only the sandpiper, the frigate, the -curlew, and the tern were found, but in uninhabited atolls others -abounded. I saw many pigeons, black with rusty spots which lived in the -_tohonu_ tree and ate its seeds and also those of the _nono_. Green -pigeons or doves, called _oo_, were sometimes seen. None of these -constituted any part of the diet. - -Except for cocoanuts, the atoll yielded few growths of value. The most -characteristic was a small tree or bush with white flowers, the -_mikimiki_, the wood of which was very dense. It grew even in the most -solid coral blocks, and was formerly much used for the great -shark-hooks, for harpoons, and handles for their shovels of shells. The -_huhu_, another little tree, with yellow blossoms and the general -appearance of the _mikimiki_, was useless for timber, but the _kahia_, -with deliciously-perfumed flowers, made an excellent fuel. The _geogeo_ -furnished boat-knees, the _tou_ was fit for canoes, and the _pandanus_, -the screw-pine, filled almost as many needs as the cocoanut-palm. Its -fruit was eaten by poor islanders, its wood and leaves formed their -houses, its leaves also made mats and hats and the sails of the _pahi_, -the sailing canoes, and, as throughout Polynesia, the wrappers of -cigarettes. All the clothing was formerly made of this prince of trees -for native wants. The _tamanu_ was scarce, and _purau_; but there were -some herbaceous plants, the _cassytha filiformis_, which climbed on the -_huhu_ and the _mikimiki_; a little _lepturus repens_; a heliotrope; a -cruciferous plant, and a purslane that afforded a poor salad, and was -also boiled. I also saw the _nono_, not here the arrow of Cupid as in -Tahiti, but a sour fruit, eaten only when hunger compelled. - -In Takaroa, particularly favored by absence of cyclones, by safety of -harbor, breadth and depth of pass into the lagoon, and plentitude of -cocoa-palms and pearl-shell, herculean efforts had been made by bringing -whole schooner cargoes of soil to grow some of the food plants and trees -of Tahiti, but all such growths were a trivial item in the daily demand -for sustenance. - -When Polynesians in their legends spoke of a rich island, they described -it as abounding in fish, as the Jews, pastoral tribes, sang of milk and -honey, the red Indian of happy hunting-grounds, and Christians of -streets of gold, and harps and hymns. - -Shell-fish, mollusks and crustaceans, played as important a part in -their aliment as ordinary fish, and _ia_ or _ika_ meant both. In some -islands the people were forced to subsist largely on _taclobo_, the -furbelowed clam or giant _tridacna_ called _pahua_ here and _benitier_ -in Europe, where the shells were used for holy water fonts. The flesh of -the _pahua_ was sold in the Papeete market but was not a delicacy. The -clam itself weighed up to fifty pounds or more, and the pair of shells -from a dozen to eight hundred pounds according to the age of the living -clams. The shells were so hard that they furnished the blades of the -shovels with which the native had anciently dug wells to hold the -brackish water. - -“The _pahua_ is also a devil,” said Nohea. “In the lagoon he lies with -his shells open to catch his prey. Many a shark has torn off his tail in -trying to get free when the _pahua_ has closed on him, or has died in -the trap. When a young man, I put my hand into a shell not bigger than -your face, and it shut upon it. I was feeling for pearl-shell under -fifty feet of water. I could not reach the threads that anchor the clam -to the rock because it was in a crevice. If I could have cut them I -could have freed myself, but I was able after a minute to force my knife -beside my hand and stab the _pahua_ so that it let me go. Paumotuans -have often lost their lives in the _pahua’s_ shells, and one cut off his -fingers and left them to the fish. I always drive my knife into him, and -then cut the cord that ties him to the rock. They are hard to lift,—the -big _pahua_,—and often we must leave them. Sometimes they have pearls in -them that are very fine—not like oyster-pearls, but just like the white -inside of the clam-shell itself, which is like the marble of the -tombstone of Mapuhi’s wife.” - -[Illustration: - - Photo by Brown Bros. - Spearing fish -] - -[Illustration: - - Photo by Dr. Theodore P. Cleveland - A canoe on the lagoon -] - -[Illustration: - - Photo by Dr. Theodore P. Cleveland - Ready for the fishing -] - -Nohea rubbed me every day with the oil from the robber-crab’s tail, and -my wounds healed quickly, although the scars remained. He said that -Paumotuans died of coral poisoning, but usually recovered, unless their -blood was tainted by _tona_, the syphilis brought originally by the -white, and which the Paumotuan cured with native remedies. He pointed to -a species of corals which stung one if touched. The stony branches or -plates when fresh from the water had a harsh feeling and a bad smell, -but were not slimy. They pricked me when pressed against my arm, and the -sting lasted from a few minutes to half an hour, with different -specimens. The sensation was as painful as from nettles or the -_Physalia_, the Portuguese man-of-war. One coral, sulphurous or dark in -color, Nohea warned me not to touch, saying it would cause my hand and -arm to swell for days. There was a jellyfish, he said, the _keakea_, -that in certain months, January, February, and March, almost filled the -lagoon, and they stung so fiercely, especially about the eyes, that -diving ceased as soon as they appeared. - -There were fish, too, that were deadly to eat, some at one time and some -at another, as fish venomous in one lagoon were innocuous in another. -Some isles were blessed by having no poisonous fish, as Hao, Amanu, -Negonego, Marokau, Hikueru, Vahitahi, Fakahina, and Pukapuka. Marutea of -the north, Raraka, Kauehi, Katiu, Makemo, Takume, Moruroa, and Marutea -of the south, were cursed by the opposite condition. In Rangira only the -_haamea_ of the pass was hurtful. The _meko_ was the most feared fish at -Marutea of the south, occasioning a terrible dysentery with cramps, -which ended in vertigo and extreme weakness. Mullets, also, were often -harmful in certain lagoons, and the _muraena_ killed. - -What made these fish poisonous? Science guessed that the larvæ of the -coral animals were the cause. These fish ate the coral, and it was -noticed that in December, January, and February, at the time the corals -expelled their larvæ,—were in blossom, as the expression went,—the -toxicity of the fish was highest. Other fish were made poisonous by -eating the sea-centipede, curious creatures which looked like yards of -black string and wound themselves around the corals. They had thousands -of minute legs. - -While all land-crabs were safe to eat, certain sea-crabs were injurious, -one in particular, a stark-white species, which was death to swallow, -and which despairing Paumotuans had bolted as a suicide potion. Even -certain starfish must be avoided, one, a lovely cone-shaped kind, being -deadly, their barbs injecting a virulent poison which speedily dilated -the arm and then the body hugely, and made the heart stop beating. To -the native such illnesses were awesome mysteries, yet he had learned -ages ago to distinguish the baneful fishes by the empire path of pain -and death which all races have trod toward safety from the enemies of -mankind. His more open foes, whom he hunted for food, the native met -fearlessly, and fought with adroitness. - -The devilfish, or octopus, frequented mostly the outside of the reef and -preyed on mollusks and crustaceans, being naturally timid and -inoffensive, though capable of affrighting attack when molested. They -commonly took up their abode in some cavern or crevice, and lay safely -ensconced in the shadow, simulating the color of their surroundings so -artfully that their victims hardly ever saw them until grasped by the -suckers of the many long, muscular arms. - -“In Samoa,” said Nohea, when we went to a certain spot to seek out the -devilfish, “is the _Fale o le Fe’e_, the House of the Octopus. It is -very large, with black basalt walls, and has a pillar in the center. It -was built to guard against the tribe of giants who once traded with -Samoa.” - -The devilfish was, as I said, at most times shy and harmless but, when -roused, the most dangerous of antagonists. We met one at close quarters -the third time we paddled to the caves or recesses in the coral rock. It -was near sunset, and there were already black shadows about the ledge, -which at low tide disclosed the niches wrought in it by the action of -the water. In one of these I saw two fiery eyes with white rims as big -as dinner-plates, and Nohea said to beware, that they belonged to an -enormous _fe’e_. Nohea had a mighty spear or grain with three points of -solid iron, and a heavy, long shaft, on a rope attached to the prow of -the canoe. Better still I carried a rifle with bullets that would kill a -wild bull. Nohea steered the canoe up to the nook and thrust out a long, -light stick toward the glittering eyes. The cuttlefish threw out one -tentacle upon it. Nohea teased him as one might tease a cat, and another -tentacle took hold. Again the stick was manipulated, and finally, after -half an hour, ten arms were fastened tightly upon the rod. Nohea gently -drew the rod toward him, and the _fe’e_ emerged from his den, so that, -though the light was growing dim, I was able for a minute to survey him -in the fullest detail, as I sat with my rifle to my shoulder. - -His body, bigger than a barrel, was like a dirty gray bag, with one end -three-cornered for use as a steering-fin, or rudder. His mouth was like -an opening in a sack, with a thick, circular lip and a great parrot-like -beak, which was almost hidden at the moment. His tentacles were in a -circle around the mouth, and were large at the trunk and tapering to the -ends. Two main arms with which he supported himself against the rock -were twice as long as the others, and differently formed. The fiery eyes -were serpent-like, and set back of the arms. - -“If he were not so strong I would jump on him now that I have his -tentacles engaged, and would bite the back of his neck till he died,” -said Nohea, with anger. “I have slain many that way. But this one would -destroy me in a moment. Once we hooked one by mistake when we were -fishing for barracuda from a canoe. My companion hauled him to the side -of the canoe, when the octopus threw his arms about him and pulled him -into the sea. I sprang after him, and put my thumbs in the eyes of the -beast. He moaned and cried, and covered us with his black fluid; but he -let go, and fled, blinded.” - -The octopus was regarding us with apparent calm. The rod he held was -twenty-five feet in length, so that our canoe was more than twenty feet -from his eyes. Nohea now agitated the rod, and the _fe’e_ retained his -grasp, but began to change from a slaty gray to red, with black -mottlings. - -“He is enraged,” said Nohea, warningly. “Prepare to shoot if the -_tavero_ fails!” - -He stood up in the canoe, and, resting the bamboo rod on the gunwale, -poised his spear. The devilfish felt the menace of his attitude, and his -two longest tentacles began to writhe in the air, as he measured our -distance. Then Nohea, with a step back, launched the grain, and with so -true an aim that it penetrated the eye of the grisly creature and half -unbalanced him. Instantly the air was filled with the cloud of sepia he -ejected,—a confession of defeat,—and the terrible arms with their -twisting, coiling tips were thrust at us in lightning movements. But -Nohea had seized a paddle, and parted us by thirty feet. The _fe’e_ was -pulled into the water, but was not yet dead. He struggled as if -drowning, the great arms rising and falling upon the surface, and a -direful groaning issuing with the bubbles that covered the surface. I -fired twice at his bulk seen clearly in the water, and after ten minutes -it relaxed utterly. A musky, delicious odor filled the air. - -With immense difficulty we brought his abhorrent corpse partly upon the -ledge to measure it, and to cut off some of the tentacles for broiling. -Nohea said it weighed a thousand pounds, but that he had seen one that -weighed two tons, and whose arms stretched seventy feet. The two longest -limbs of our octopus were rounded from the body to within two feet of -their tips, when they flattened out like blades. Along the edges were -rows of suckers, each with a movable membrane across it. When these -suckers fastened on an object, the membrane reacted and made a vacuum -under each sucker. Nohea explained that wherever the suckers touched -one’s flesh it puckered and blistered, and two months would elapse -before it healed. He showed me scars upon his own skin. Our octopus had -two thousand and more suckers on its tentacles. - -“In Japan,” I told Nohea, “I have seen the men at night sink in the sea -earthenware jars, very tall and stout, and in the morning find them -occupied each by a devilfish, who must have thought them suitable to its -condition in life.” - -We had other methods of catching the _fe’e_. One was to tie many pieces -of shell on a large stick with the pointed ends up, and from our canoe -to strike the water with this. The resulting noise or vibration -attracted the octopi, who thought the bait alive, and, eager to examine, -threw themselves upon it and were killed and hoisted aboard. Nohea would -strike the canoe sometimes with his paddle in a rhythmical manner, and -draw them to hear the concert, when he would spear them. - -At the rookeries of the hair seals on Puget Sound, bounty hunters lure -these destroyers of salmon nets and traps, by the wailing of a fiddle -string, the wheeze of an accordian, a hymn upon a mouth organ, or almost -any musical note. The hair seal rises to the surface to listen to the -entrancing notes, and is shot by the hunter from his boat. - -The smaller devilfish Nohea eviscerated and ate, or gave to his friends. -I could not look at them as food. The sepia still contained in their -sacs he dried for bait for small-mouthed fish, and we used also the -bellies of hermit-crabs, the tentacles of squid, and the tails of -various kinds of fish. For the larger, scaled fish, Nohea preferred -hooks of _mikimiki_, which he carved from the bushes, or of turtle-shell -or whalebone, though the stores had the modern ones of steel. For -_bonito_ we used only the pearl-hook without barb, and, of course, -unbaited. The advantage of the barbless hook—that is, lacking the -backward-projecting point which makes extraction difficult—could, -perhaps, be appreciated only by seeing our way of fishing. - -When we came into a school of _bonito_ pursuing flying-fish, I took the -paddle, and Nohea, with a fifteen-foot _purau_ rod, and a line as long, -trailed the _pa_, the pearly hook, on the surface, so that it skipped -and leaped as does the _marara_. When a _bonito_ took the lure, Nohea -with a dexterous jerk raised the fish out of the water, and brought it -full against his chest. He hugged it to him a second and, without -touching the hook, threw it hard into the bottom of the canoe where I -could strike it sharply over the head with the edge of my paddle. The -whole manœuver was a continuous motion on Nohea’s part. The fish seized -the hook, the rod shot up straight, the _bonito_ came quickly to his -bosom, he embraced it, and, with no barb to release, it slipped off the -bone into his powerful grip, and was hurled upon the hard wood. Thus no -time was lost, and the hook was in the water in another instant. Once or -twice when I failed in my part the _bonito_ raised itself on the end of -its tail, and shot through the air to its element. That Nohea was not -hurt by the fish when they were brought bang against his chest, can be -explained only by his dexterity, which doubtless avoided the full impact -of the heavy blow. The _bonito_ weighed from thirty to a hundred pounds. - -The turtle-shell for the hooks Nohea got from the turtles which he -caught. They were a prime dish in the Paumotus, especially the great -green turtle. The very word for turtle, _honu_, meant also to be gorged, -associating the reptile itself with feasting. The thought of turtle -caused Nohea, a fairly abstemious man, to water at the mouth and to rub -his stomach in concentric circles, as if aiding in its digestion. The -_honu_ was in the days of heathenry sacred to high livers, the priests -and chiefs, and was eaten with pomp and circumstance; to make sure of -their husbanding, they were, in the careful way of the old Maoris, taboo -to women and children under pain of death. An old cannibal chief was -called the Turtle Pond because he had a record of more than a hundred -humans eaten by him. Turtles were of two hundred species, and were found -six feet long and weighing eight hundred pounds, but more ordinarily in -the Paumotus from a hundred to four hundred. After a feast the pieces of -turtle meat were put into cocoanut-shells, with the liquid fat poured -over them, and sealed with a heated leaf, for a reserve, as we put up -mince-meat. - -The best season for turtles was when the Matariki, the Pleiades, rose in -the east, and the time of egg-laying arrived. Then the turtles came from -long journeys by sea, and looked for a place to deposit their eggs far -from the haunts of humans. They came two by two, like proper married -folk, and, leaving the husband on the barrier-reef, the wife, alone, dug -a hole from one to two feet in depth in the coral sand, above the -high-water mark, and in it scooped a deeper and smaller pipe, to lay -five or six score eggs, white and rough, like enlarged golf-balls. The -moon was usually full when this most important deed of the turtle’s -career was done with intense secrecy. The sand was painstakingly -replaced and smoothed, and the wife swam back to the reef and at high -tide touched flippers again with her patient spouse. The operation -occupied less than an hour. - -McHenry, whom I met every day when I walked to the village, said that it -was the Southern Cross and not the Pleiades that governed the dropping -of the eggs, and that the _honu_ did not approach the beach until the -four stars forming the cross had reached a position exactly -perpendicular to the horizon. - -“Those turtles are better astronomers than Lyin’ Bill,” said McHenry. -“They savvy the Southern Cross like Bill does a Doc Funk.” - -The turtle returned to her eggs on the ninth night, but if she saw -evidences of enemies about, she left immediately, and waited another -novendial period and, if again scared, came back on the twenty-seventh -evening. But when that fatal night had passed she surrendered to the -inevitable. Nohea knew the habits of the _honu_ as well as she did -herself. He knew the broad tracks she made, which she tried in vain to -obliterate, and he often removed the eggs to eat raw, or freshly cooked. -Nohea could swim to the beach where the mother turtle was, and land so -quietly that she would not have notice of his coming, and so could not -escape to the lagoon or the moat; or he could swim noiselessly to the -reef, and forelay the uxorious male napping until the arrival of his -consort from her oviposition. To rush upon either male or female and -turn it over on its back was the act of a moment, if strength permitted, -but Paumotuans seldom hunted alone for turtles, the fencing them from -the water being better achieved by two or more. Even when we saw one at -sea, Nohea would spring from the canoe and fasten a hook about the neck -and front flipper which rendered the _honu_ as helpless as if a human -were bound neck and leg. Once fast, the turtle was turned, and then -pulled to the beach. Nohea could attach such a device to a turtle, and -without a canoe swim with him to the beach or to a schooner. The turtle -was put under a roof of cocoanut-leaves, until desire for his meat -brought death to him. - -Nohea often picked up _rori_ to make soup. They were to me the most -repulsive offering of the South Seas, long, round, thin echinoderms, -shaped like cucumbers or giant slugs, and appalling in their -hideousness. The Malays called them trepang, the Portuguese -_bicho-do-mar_, or sea-slug, and the scientists holothurian. Slimy, -disgusting, crawling beings, they were like sausage-skins or starved -snakes six inches or six feet long, and stretchable to double that -length. One end had a set of waving tentacles by which they drew in the -sand and coral animalculæ. They crept along the bottom or swam slowly. - -There was a small trade in these dried trepang, or _bêche de mer_, which -were shipped to Tahiti and thence to San Francisco, for transshipment to -China, for purchase by Chinese gourmets. The Chinese usually put them in -their gelatinous soups. I had eaten them at feasts in Canton and Chifu. -They were considered a powerful aphrodisiac, as swallows’-nests and -ginseng. - -No race so eagerly sought such love philters as the Chinese. They had a -belief that certain parts and organs of animals strengthened the similar -parts or organs in humans. Our own medical men often verged on the same -theory, making elixirs, as the Chinese had for countless centuries. At a -Chinese feast where the heart of a tiger was the _pièce de résistance_, -I had been assured that a slice of it would make me brave. There may -have been something in it, for after eating I felt I was brave to have -done so. - -The fishing for _rori_ was sometimes on a considerable scale. McHenry -had often taken a score of Paumotuan men and women on his schooner to -one of the unpopulated atolls. They built huts ashore for themselves, -and others for curing the trepang. They searched for them with long -grains or forks, going in calm weather to the outer edge of the reef -where they found the red rori, which ranked second in the grading by the -Chinese, but the black they had to dive for in the lagoon to great -depths. Some trepang had spicules, or prickles, on their skin, and some -were smooth, while others had teats or ambulacral feet, in rows; and -these, known to the trade as teat-fish, and to the Chinese as -_Se-ok-sum_, were _bonnes bouches_ to a Pekinese gourmand. Next in order -were the red, the black, and the lolly. These latter we found in great -quantities on the reef at low tide in shallow places. They exuded, when -stepped on, a horrid red liquid, like blood, from all the surface of -their body. - -Against mankind these _rori_ had no defense when stabbed with the fork -or grain, but to touch one of the elongated _Blutwursts_ with any part -of one’s body was to rue one’s temerity. They were like skins filled -with a poisonous fluid, and this they ejected with force, so that if -contacted with a scratch or sore, or one’s eye, it set up immediate -inflammation, and caused hours of agony. Many Paumotuans had thus -suffered serious injury to their eyes. The leopard trepang, olive-green -with orange spots, disgorged sticky threads when molested, and these -clung fast to the human skin and raised painful blisters. Nature had -armed them for protection. The native never gathered the _rori_ in -baskets or sacks, but made a box to drag about on land or float on the -water, into which he put them. - -The pawky Paumotuan gave no thought to the aphrodisiacal qualities of -the _rori_, as did the Chinese. The filling of his belly or his purse -was his sole idea. The trepang must be cooked as quickly as possible -after removal from the water because it quickly dissolved, like a salted -slug, into a jellied mass. If the native had no caldron in which to boil -the _rori_, he threw them on red-hot stones, covered them with leaves, -and left them to steam. In an hour they were shriveled and rid of their -poisonous power. They were slit with a sharp knife and boiled for -several hours in salt water until the outer skin was removed. Taken from -the pot, they were placed on screens made of the spinal columns of the -cocoanut-palm leaves, and underneath the screens was built a fire of -cocoanut-husks. When thoroughly dried and smoked, the trepang was put in -sacks, with great precaution against dampness. If not shipped at once -they were from time to time dried in the sun, because the presence of -any moisture prejudiced them to the palates of the Chinese epicures. In -China they sold for a high price, having the place in their _cuisine_ -that rare caviar might have in ours. - -Nohea and I essayed every kind of fishing afforded by the atoll. We -often went out at midnight, according to the moon, and speared swordfish -by the light of torches, and I also caught these warriors of the sea on -hook and line. We hooked sharks and many sorts of fish, and had many -strange and stirring adventures. - -For rousing hatred and fear, neither the devilfish, with his frightful -tentacles and demoniacal body and eyes, nor the swordfish, which could -hurl his hundred or thousand pounds against the body or craft of the -fishermen, were peers of the _manta birostris_, the gigantic ray, called -the “winged devil of the deep passes,” which was seen only in the depths -between the atolls, and which was never fished for because worthless to -commerce or as food. - -Nohea, Kopcke, and I were out one day in a cutter. This was a sailing -craft of about ten tons, which was used to pick up copra at points away -from villages and to bring it to the village or to the waiting schooner. -It was about noon. We had hooked a dozen _bonito_, and were having -luncheon when a sailor shouted to us to look at a sight near-by. We saw -a number of the largest _mantas_ any of us had ever seen. A dozen of -these mammoth rays were swimming round and round, in circles not more -than a hundred feet in diameter. They were about twenty-five feet -across, and twenty feet from head to tip of tail, and each one raised a -tip of an outer fin two feet or so above the water. The fin toward the -center of the circle was correspondingly depressed, and they appeared -like a flock of incredible bats. Every few minutes one threw itself into -the air and turned completely over, displaying a dazzlingly white belly. -Their long, whip-like tails were armed with dagger spines, double-edged -with saw-teeth. Their mouths were large enough to swallow a man, and -their teeth, as they gleamed, flat as jagged stones. - -Nohea said they used these fins to wave their prey, fish and -crustaceans, into their maws. He expressed intense terror of them and -urged Kopcke to steer away from them. - -The _manta_ had lifted the anchor of a vessel in harbor by pushing -against the chain, and had towed the vessel a considerable distance. -When harpooned, he had dragged as many as fourteen catamarans or boats -without apparent weariness. Well might the Paumotuan in his frail -fishing-canoe dread the sea-devil! He had known him rise beneath his -pirogue, and with a blow of his fearful fins shatter fisherman and -craft. Not vicious in pursuit of man as the shark, or lithe and able to -impale his victims as the swordfish, yet more terrible when aroused by -the impotent Paumotuan, the “winged devil of the deep passes” stood for -all that was perilous and awesome among the beasts of the ocean. When -harpooned from a schooner large enough not to be in danger from the -_manta’s_ strength, the Paumotuan or Tahitian sailor loved to vent his -hate upon the giant ray, and he had names for him then that he would not -dare to call him from a smaller boat. - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CHAPTER X - -Traders and divers assembling for the diving—A story told by Llewellyn - at night—The mystery of Easter Island—Strangest spot in the - world—Curious statues and houses—Borrowed wives—Arrival of English - girl—Tragedy of the Meke Meke festival. - -THE scene at Takaroa was now remindful in a diminutive way of the bustle -and turmoil before the opening of a camp-meeting in the United States. -The traders and pearl-buyers of Tahiti began to assemble, and divers and -their families of other islands to arrive. Soon the huddle had the mild -disorder and excitement of an old-fashioned southern revival. Chinese, -the cunning Cantonese, two generations in Tahiti, set up stands for -selling sweetmeats and titbits, and the merchants spread out samples of -their goods in competition with Mapuhi’s and Hiram Mervin’s stores. The -whites developed artful schemes for circumventing one another in -securing the best divers. These, until contracts were signed, were -importuned and made much of as desirable members are solicited by -college clubs. The narrow strand of the atoll crowded up with new-comers -who every few days alighted from schooner, cutter, and canoe. All day -the moat and sea were alive with boats unloading the belongings and -merchandise of the visitors. The housing problem was settled by each -family’s or group’s erecting for itself flimsy abodes of the scant -building material growing on the isle, pieced out with boards or bits of -flattened tin cans or canvas, while others contented themselves with -lean-tos or leafy kennels. All was good nature, anticipation of profits, -and hope of miraculous drafts from the lagoon. - -In the evenings on the verandas or about the bivouacs, there was an -incessant chatter. The bargaining, the reuniting of former friends or -acquaintances, the efforts of deacons and missionaries, the sly actions -of the traders, the commencements of courtships, and love-making of the -free-and-easy foreigners filled the balmy night air with laughter, -whisperings, and conversation. A hundred stories were told—jokes, -adventures, slanders, and curious happenings. Religion, business, mirth, -and obscenity vied for interest. - -Llewellyn, the Welsh Tahitian vanilla-planter, with Lying Bill, McHenry, -Kopcke, Aaron Mandel, and others, formed a nightly circle. Sitting on -boxes or reclining on mats under the cocoanut-trees, with a lantern or -two above them and pipes aglow, these pilgrims of the deep recited -moving tales of phenomena and accident, of wanderings and hardships, and -small villainies. - -[Illustration: - - Photo from Dr. Theodore P. Cleveland - Spearing fish in the lagoon -] - -“Sailors are damn fools,” said Captain Nimau, whom I had met in Lacour’s -shed on Anaa. “There was a ship’s boat passed here some time ago. It was -from the wrecked American schooner _El Dorado_, and the three men in it -with eight others of the crew had spent months on a lonely island and -were beating up for Tahiti. They did not reach Papeete for days after I -sighted them from Lacour’s, yet they wouldn’t spare the time to touch at -Anaa where they might have gotten plenty of food and water, and rested a -day or two. I wondered who they were until O’Brien here told me. I saw -them only through my glass.” - -[Illustration: - - The Captain and two sailors of the _El Dorado_ -] - -“The skipper of the _El Dorado_ who was in the boat wouldn’t let it -stop,” said McHenry. “He was hurryin’ to Tahiti to find a steamer for -America to report to his owners an’ to get a new billet. I saw him in -Papeete, hustlin’ his bleedin’ boat and dunnage on the steamer for -‘Frisco after three weeks’ wait. The sailors weren’t in no rush for they -know’d they be cheated outa their rights, anyway. The squarehead capt’in -had the goods on the owners of the _El Dorado_ because they couldn’t -collect insurance for her without his say. He scooted away from Easter -Island in that small boat after four months there, leavin’ all but those -two bloody fools who came with him.” - -“He mentioned to me that he was buying a house on the instalment plan, -and would lose everything if he didn’t get back to make his payment,” I -said. “So he ventured 3,600 miles in a small boat to save his home.” - -“Any one would have enough of that lonely island in four months,” said -Llewellyn, reminiscently. His deep, melancholy voice came from the -shadows where he sat on a mat. “I lived years there. It is a place to go -mad in. It isn’t so much that it is the last bit of land between here -and South America, and is bare and dry, without trees or streams, and -filled with beetles that gnaw you in your sleep, but there’s something -terrible about it. It has an air of mystery, of murder. I have never -gotten over my life there. I wish I had never seen it, but I still dream -about it.” - -Llewellyn was a university man. He had drunk as deeply of the lore of -books and charts as he had of the products of the stills of Scotland and -the winepresses of France. In his library in Tahiti, his birthplace, -were many rare brochures, manuscripts, and private maps of untracked -parts of the Pacific, and keys to Polynesian mazes impenetrable by the -uninstructed. Seventy years before, his father had come here, and -Llewellyn as child and man had roamed wide in his vessels in search of -secret places that might yield gold or power. He had worn bare the -emotions of his heart, and frayed his nerves in the hunt for pleasure -and excitement. Now in his fifties he felt himself cheated by fate of -what he might have been intellectually. - -“I suppose I’m the only man here who has ever been on Rapa Nui,” he went -on. “It’s like Pitcairn, far off steam and sailing routes, and with no -cargoes to sell or buy. Only a ship a year from Chile now, they say, or -a boat from a shipwreck like the _El Dorado’s_. But the scientific men -will always go there. They think Easter, or Rapa Nui, as the natives -call it now, has the solution of the riddle of the Pacific, of the lost -continent. You know it had the only written language in the South Seas, -a language the Easter Islanders, the first whites found there, knew -apparently little of.” - -McHenry interrupted Llewellyn, to set in movement about the group a -bottle of rum and a cocoanut-shell, first himself quaffing a gill of the -scorching molasses liquor. Llewellyn downed his portion hastily, as if -putting aside such an appetite while engaged on an abstruse subject. He -knew that rum made all equal; and he was an aristocrat, and now beyond -the others in thought. - -“_Allez!_” said Captain Nimau. “I am curious. _Dites!_ What did you find -out?” - -Llewellyn’s eyes smoldering in somber-thatched cells lit a moment as he -returned to his enigmatic theme. - -“I was a young man not long from a German university and travel in -Europe when I was sent to Easter Island,” he said, with dignity. “A -commercial firm in Tahiti, a Frenchman and a Scotchman, had control of -the island, which was not under the flag of any country, and was -employed by them to look after their interests. The firm had a schooner -that sailed there now and then, and with me went a young American. He -was a graduate of some Yankee college, and had drifted into the South -Seas a few months before. For some reason we did not know about, he was -eager to go to Easter Island. He could speak none of the lingos -hereabouts, and the firm at first refused him, but on his insistence, -and willingness to agree to stay two years and to work for a trifle, -they sent him with me. - -“He was about twenty-four, handsome and gay, but a student. I liked him -from the start. Ralph Waldo Willis was his name, and I was glad that I -had such a companion for there was nobody else but natives to talk to, -except Timi Linder, a half-Tahitian who was older than us and who was -our boss. Our cockroach schooner was a month in getting there. It’s more -than a thousand miles as the tropic bird goes, but for us it was sailing -the wrong way many days, making half-circles or beating dead against the -wind. We were about ready to turn round and sail back when we caught a -breeze and made sight of land. I hated it at first view. It was nothing -like our South Sea islands, with black, frowning cliffs worn into a -thousand caves and recesses. The ocean broke angrily against the stern -basalt, or entered these huge pits and sprang out of them in welling -masses of foam and spray. An iron-bound coast that defied the heart, or -any sentiment but wonder and fear. Boulders as big as ships were half -attached to the precipices or lay near-by to attest the continuous -devouring of the land by the sea. Coming from Tahiti, with its beautiful -reefs and beaches, and the clouds like wreaths of _reva-reva_, with -cocoanut-palms and breadfruit-trees and bananas covering all the land, -this Easter Island seemed terribly bare and forbidding. There wasn’t a -flower on it.” - -Llewellyn halted and lit his pipe. In the glow of the match his eyes had -the inversion of the relator who is remote from his audience. - -McHenry, who had been quiet a few minutes, must call attention to -himself. - -“Is there any fightin’ or women in this yarn?” he burst out, with a -guffaw. - -Llewellyn came back to the present in a dark fume. - -“I’ll chuck it,” he said irritably. “You want only stories that stink!” - -Nimau, the Frenchman, took McHenry’s arm. - -“_Nom d’une pipe!_” he rapped out. “Take that bottle, McHenry, and throw -it and yourself into the lagoon. Monsieur Llewellyn, please go on! The -night is just begun. That _Ile de Pâcques_ is a very curious place.” - -McHenry, offended, jumped up. “Go to hell, all of you!” he blurted. -“I’ll go and stir up the Mormons. If they smell my breath, it’ll make -’em jealous.” - -Llewellyn took up his narration. - -“It’s a cursed place,” he assented. “There’s been nothing but death -since the white man found out there was anything to steal there. They -were the healthiest people in the world, but we whites knew how to -destroy them. Our schooner came into the roadstead of Hanga Roa at -daybreak. I could see the huge, dead volcano, Rana Roraku, from the -masthead. Other extinct volcanos were all over the rolling land. _Te -Pito te Henua_, the old islanders called it; the Navel and the Womb. -That monster crater, Rano Raraku, must have given it the latter name, -for out of it came all those wonderful images of stone. The Navel was -one of many rounded, shallower craters all about. When we landed at -sunrise and the slanting rays shone on them they were for all the world -like the navels of giants. I fancied each of them belonging to a -colossus who had turned to stone. At first, the island was just a gray -bulk, the surface in several sweeping curves dotted with mole-hills. As -we climbed upon the cliffs and the details of the land grew in the -sunlight, the impression was of a totally different part of the globe, -of a cut-off place where scenes and people were of an ancient sort, of a -mystery that stunned as thoughts crowded in on one. That impression -never left me. I can feel it now after these years. The American, -Willis, was fair overcome. He turned pale and put his hand to his -stomach as if sick. - -“‘What’s the matter?’ I asked, though I really knew. - -“‘I feel like when I was a little boy and saw the wax-works in New -York,’ he said. ‘All the spirits of the dead and great seem to be -around. But I’ve waited years to come here.’ - -“As we walked from point to point that first day, the spectacle was -incredible, absolutely bewildering. The whole island was a charnel-house -and a relic shrine. It seemed to have been furnished by a race whose -mind was fixed on death instead of life, and who worked for remembrance -instead of happiness. Oblivion was their most desperate fear, or, at -least, they must have thought that the preservation of their bones and -the building of images of the dead were the chief duties of the living. -At intervals all around the coast were immense platforms or High Places -of slabs of stone, gigantic stages for tremendous statues. These bases -were called _ahu_, and were some three or four hundred feet long, and on -them at regular intervals had been mammoth sculptures. Scores of these -lay half buried in the scrub, and some were covered over entirely by the -growth of the grass. Some were fifty or even seventy feet high and -others three or four feet, as if the makers sized them by the power or -fame of the dead men they represented. They were like gray ghosts of the -departed. - -“I can’t quite tell you the sensation we had at our first stroll about. -Our house was at the base of the volcano, and Timi Linder, who came off -to the schooner in a boat to meet us, took us to it. He was a cousin of -mine—some of you remember him—and a fine fellow. He didn’t make anything -of all those images or the tombs. Sheep were his gods, and we had twenty -thousand of them to take care of, besides hundreds of horses and cattle. -Our house, Willis’s and mine, was at Mataveri, at the base of the crater -Rana Kao, and Timi’s was five miles away at Vaihu. It used to be a -Catholic mission. We were soon settled down to a regular routine. - -“We were on horseback all day. Some of the going was so bad it meant -hours of barely walking the horses. The lower part of the island was all -broken sheets of lava, grown over or about with tough grass, and it was -worth your neck to travel fast in it. On the slopes of the hills it was -smoother, the ash from the volcanos having been leveled more in the -thousands of years since the last eruption. Another horrible thing about -living there was that we had to get all our water like in these Paumotus -by catching rain on our iron roof into tanks. God! How I used to long -for a drink out of a Tahiti brook! When we were out in the scrub and -noon came it was salvation to find a piece of shade. It was not so -terribly hot, because Easter is out of the tropics, and, as I say, the -climate is perfectly healthful, but the sun came down like lightning on -that lava and the hard grass, and the glare and the heat combined, with -the fatigue of the riding, would lay us out. The nights were cool, with -heavy dews which supplied the sheep with enough moisture. - -“Timi left us much to ourselves and said that he wanted us to go about -without any duties and to learn the lay of the land. So we did that. The -island was about thirty-four miles around, but it took us many weeks to -make the circuit, because we followed the indentations of most of the -inlets or bays, determined to see everything of the marvels before we -got down to work. Those were the days we suffered from thirst. Except -for the lakes in the craters which I’ll tell you about, the so-called -_puna_ or springs were far apart, and then only shoal excavations among -the boulders into which surface water ran and had been protected by -rocky roofs from the sun and animals. Just a few bucketsful in each at a -time, and rank it was. The queer thing was the natives drank but little -water. They would be surprised every day at our thirst. - -“We ascended the crater Rana Kao near our home. It was a quarter of a -mile high, and nearly a mile across, a perfect, unbroken circle at its -edge except where the lava had cut through and run down to the sea. The -inside was magnificent, like a vast colosseum, and, at the bottom, a -lake unlike any I had ever seen. Six hundred feet below the rim it was, -and more than three hundred feet deep by our soundings, and the sides of -the volcano were like a regular cone. We saw many cattle feeding or -drinking in the midst of lush vegetation, and on getting close to the -lake itself we found that they were standing or walking on a floating -garden. So dense and profound was this matting or raft of green and -brown, in which were bushes and even small trees, that the cattle moved -on it without fear. Yet in places we saw the water rippled by the wind, -and at times the cows or bulls drew back from their paths as if they -sensed danger. The water was foul with vegetable and animal matter, but -probably once this lake had been cared for, and its waters had quenched -the thirst of many thousands of people.” - -“Ah!” said I, “Llewellyn, I was going to ask you. So far you have been -on an uninhabited island. What about the people you found there. I am -more interested in them even than in the wonderful images and tombs.” - -“’E won’t say too bloody much about them,” said Lying Bill, caustically. -“‘Is family killed off most of ’em.” - -Again it seemed that we would hear Llewellyn to no conclusion. He got on -his feet, and shook out his pipe. - -“A gentleman has no place in the Paumotus,” he said, bitterly. “Mr. -O’Brien, you must not judge South Sea traders by McHenry or Pincher.” - -“Judge and be bloomin’ well damned!” interrupted Lying Bill. “I’ll go -an’ see where McHenry is. Maybe the bottle’ll ’ave a drink in it, an’ -you can stay an’ spin your yarn your own way. I know the bleedin’ -truth.” - -Captain Pincher retreated, muttering, in the darkness toward the sound -of the surf on the reef. The gentle breeze agitated the cocoanuts above -our heads, and Kopcke, a child in mentality though a man, begged -Llewellyn to keep on. - -“Pay no attention, please, to those bums!” said Kopcke in his politest -French. “Now, me, I want to learn everything.” - -Nimau and I apologized for humanity, and insisted that the scholar -proceed. Mollified, and with his pipe refilled, the quarter-caste -graduate of Leipsic resumed his account. - -“I was going to tell about the people, and I’ll begin at the beginning,” -he said, thoughtfully. “A Dutch ship discovered Easter Island two -hundred years ago, and shot some of the natives. Every succeeding -discoverer did the same. Peruvian blackbirders killed hundreds and -carried off five thousand of them to die in the guano deposits of the -Chincha Islands and the mines of Peru. Almost every leading man, the -king and every chief, was killed or captured. The prisoners nearly all -died in slavery, and only Pakomeo came back. He lived near us, and told -me all about it. Timi Martin believed there were twenty thousand people -on the island near the time of the Peruvian raid. - -“From then on, with all the livest men gone, the people paid no -attention to any authority. There had been a hereditary monarchy for -ages, and while the clans might go to battle for any reason, no one ever -touched the king or his family. But with Maurata, the king, kidnapped, -and most of the head men, there was no boss. Then _Frère_ Eugène, a -Belgian priest of Chile, brought back three youths who had been taken by -the Peruvians. One was Tepito, the heir of King Maurata, and the priest -thought maybe he could use him to convert the islanders. He had a hard -time, but he did it. You must say for those old missionaries that they -stuck to their jobs though hell popped. He had fifty narrow escapes from -being assassinated by natives who thought him much like the Peruvians, -and just when he was baptizing the last of the Rapa Nuiis, and complete -peace had settled down, trouble began again. A Frenchman who was looking -about for a fortune arrived there and took up his residence. He saw -there was plenty of land not used for growing yams, the only crop, and -so he went into partnership with a Scotchman in Tahiti to grow sheep, -cattle, and horses. He gave a few yards of calico for a mile of land, -and started his ranch with the Scotchman’s animals. - -“The Frenchman took up with a common woman who had been the wife of a -chief but who was not of the chief caste, and he had her made queen. -Queen Korato was her name, and she was a caution—like a society woman -and a Jezebel, mixed. She bossed everything but her husband. She started -a row between him and _Frère_ Eugène, who claimed authority through the -church. There being no regular government, the priest said that, through -God and the pope, he was the ruler. He was a strong man, and I must say -from all accounts kind to the natives. They started to work and built -again, but the feud between the church and the queen became fiercer and -fiercer, and finally after personal combats between leaders, and a few -deaths, _Frère_ Eugène gathered all his adherents and, securing a vessel -through his bishop, transported them to the Gambier Islands. - -“Now the struggle commenced of getting the land away from the natives. -Without any government, and the land of each district owned in community -by each clan, the queen and the Frenchman had to get title by cunning -and force. They did not succeed in that without blood. Booze and guns -and meat did it. The remaining head men gave away the land for sheep to -eat, for gin and rum to drink, and for guns to shoot those who objected -to having their land taken. Of course, it was really a community, with -no private property inside the clans, but the chiefs signed papers they -couldn’t read, and the firm claimed everything soon. It was legal as -things go, as legal as England taking New Zealand or Australia, or -France taking my Tahiti. The people divided into factions, headed by -self-appointed chiefs, and went to fighting. Some were driven into -craters, and some hid in caves. The crowd that had the upper hand chased -the other groups. They all began to steal the sheep for food, and the -Frenchman hired a band to stop the marauding and end the war. Then the -real massacres began. Natives were so pressed they took up cannibalism -again, and without fire they ate their meat raw. Ure Vaeiko told me how -he warmed a slice of a man’s body in his armpit to make it better -eating. - -“In the end a kind of peace was made by the terrible misery of all. But -the Frenchman who had gotten the land did not live long to enjoy his -bargain. They caught him unawares when he was on a ladder helping to -repair the very house we lived in, and which he built. They struck him -down with a club, and buried him near-by. Other whites all but lost -their lives later when they tried to prevent the islanders from stealing -sheep when hungry. They were besieged in our house, but finally were -saved by the arrival of a vessel. Now, with their potato plantations -destroyed, their houses burned, the natives were done for. They -consented to sign contracts to work in the hot sugar-fields of Tahiti. -Five hundred were removed there. I often saw them, poor devils. They -were homesick to death, and they never were brought back as promised. -They died in Tahiti, crying for their own land. - -“It was not long after that I went to Easter with the American, Willis. -Queen Korato had followed the Frenchman into the grave, and the -Scotchman had become the sole owner of the island. No one disputed him, -and when Willis and I took up our residence in the former royal -residence at Mataveri, Timi Linder was the virtual king. The entire -population either lived on small plantations which they had to wall in -to keep the cattle and sheep from eating their yams, or they worked for -us looking after the cattle and horses, and shearing the sheep. The -fighting was over, for the spirit of the wild islanders was extinct as -was almost all the twenty thousand Linder said were there a few years -before. The two or three hundred left lived in the ruins of the ancient -stone houses, cairns, and platforms, the tombs of the dead Rapa Nuiis -for ages. The living piled up more stones or roofed in the walls with -slabs and earth, and got along somehow. They had lost all reverence for -the past, and often brought us the skulls of their ancestors to trade -for a biscuit or two or a drink of rum. - -“Willis and I were young, and though both of us were intensely -interested in the mystery of the island, and the unknown throngs who had -built the gigantic sepulchers and carved the monoliths, we had many dull -hours. When it rained or at night we thought of the outside world. The -howling of the sheep-dogs, the moaning of the wind, and the frightful -pests of insects made the evenings damnable. The fleas were by the -millions, and the glistening brown cockroaches, two or three inches -long, flew at our lights and into our food, while mosquitoes and hordes -of flies preyed on us. We often sat with nets on our heads and denim -gloves on, and on our cots we stuffed our ears with paper to keep out -snapping beetles. Willis was wrapped up in trying to read the wooden -tablets Linder had collected, on which were rows and rows of picture -symbols. First, he had to learn the Rapa Nui language. There’s one way -to do that in these islands. We all know that, and it was easy there. -They had always had a custom by which a husband leased his wife to -another man for a consideration. Linder attended to that, and sent over -to us two girls to teach us the lingo. They were beautiful and merry, -being young, and looked after our household. Taaroa was assigned to -Willis and Tokouo to me. We got along famously until one day, after a -year or so, a schooner arrived to take away wool, and on it was a white -girl and her father. That changed everything for us.” - -In Llewellyn’s air and low, mournful voice there was confession. In his -words there had been anger at Captain Pincher’s accusation, but with -Lying Bill and McHenry, mockers at all decency, missing from the circle, -we others became impressed, I might say, almost oppressed, by impending -humiliation. In an assemblage, a public meeting, or a pentecostal -gathering, one withstands the self reproach and contrition of others, -or, perhaps, experiences keen pleasure in announced guilt and remorse, -but among a few, it hurts. One’s soul shrinks at its own secrets, and -there is not the support and excitement of the throng. We moved -uneasily, with a struggling urge to call it a night, but Llewellyn, -absorbed in his progress toward unveilment, went on without noticing our -disquiet. - -“My God! What a change for Willis and me! The schooner was in the offing -one morning when we got up. We calculated that the wind would not let -her anchor at Hanga Piko, and started out on horses for Rana Raraku to -photograph the largest image we had found on the island. You have been -in Egypt, O’Brien?” - -I nodded assent, and the lamp threw a spot of light on Llewellyn’s -gloomy face. - -“You remember the biggest obelisk in the world is still unfinished in -the quarry at Syene. This one, too, was still in the rough. It lay in an -excavation on the slope of the huge crater, not fully cut out of the -rocky bank, but incredibly big. We measured it as quite seventy feet -long. It was as all those images, a half-length figure, the long, -delicate hands almost meeting about the body, the belly indrawn—pinched, -and the face with no likeness to the Rapa Nui face, or to any of the -Polynesians, but harsh and archaic, perhaps showing an Inca or other -austere race, and also the wretchedness of their existence. Life must -have been dour for them by their looks and by their working only for the -dead. How they ever expected to move this mass we could not understand. -They had no wood, even, to make rollers, as the Egyptians had, because -their thickest tree was the _toromiro_, not three inches in diameter, -but they had to depend on slipping the monstrous stones down slopes and -dragging them up hills or on the level by ropes of native hemp and main -strength. Hundreds or thousands of sculptors and pullers must have been -required for the 555 monoliths we found carved or almost finished. But -they never were of the race the whites saw there. - -“Before we began the descent of Rana Rauraku we stopped a moment to -survey the scene. The sun was setting over La Perouse Bay, and the side -of the crater on which we were was deepening in shadow. As we went down -the hill the many images reared themselves as black figures of terror -and awe against the scarlet light. Willis was in a trance. He was a -queer fellow, and there was something inexplicable in his attachment to -those paradoxes of rock dolls. He thought he had discovered some clue to -the race of men or religious cult which he believed once went almost all -over the world and built monuments or stonehenges long before metal was -known as a tool. We rode across the swelling plain past the quarry in -the Teraai Hills where the hats for the images were carved of the red -sandstone, and we stayed a minute to see again a monster twelve feet -across and weighing many tons. It was a proper head-covering for the -sculpture in the quarry. What had caused the work to stop all of a -sudden? There were hundreds of tools, stone adzes and hammers, dropped -at a moment, statues near finished or hardly begun, some half-way to the -evident place of fixation, and others almost at them. What dreadful bell -had sounded to halt it all? - -[Illustration: - - Photo by International Newsreel - Beach dancers at Tahiti -] - -“Talking about all that, we came to where we could see the Hanga Piko -landing, and our company schooner anchored a little offshore. The -captain and some of the crew were engaged in bringing supplies ashore, -and it was not until we rode into the ground of Queen Korato’s palace, -our home, that we saw there were white strangers arrived. Imagine the -situation! When we called to Taaroa and Tokouo to get a man to care for -the horses, out came a beautiful English girl in a white frock, and -apologized for having entered the house in our absence. Her father -joined her, and we soon knew him, Professor Scotten Dorey, for the -greatest authority on Polynesian languages, myths, and migrations. There -he was, by the favor of the Tahiti owners, come to stay indefinitely and -to study the Rapa Nui language. His daughter was his scribe, she said, -and saved his eyes as much as possible by copying his notes. We were up -against it, as O’Brien would say. Our conveniences were scant,—the queen -had not been much for linen or dishes,—and you know how we fellows live -even in such nearer places like Takaroa. - -[Illustration: - - After the bath in the pool -] - -“Then there was the matter of Taaroa and Tokouo; borrowed wives, -recognized as the custom was. Willis took one look at Miss Dorey, and -went white as when he first saw the sweep of Easter Island. He was as -sensitive as a child about certain things. There we had been all alone, -I used to doing what I damn please, anyhow, and he without any old -_bavarde_ to chatter, or even to see. I won’t say, too, that we hadn’t -had some drinking bouts, nights when we had scared away even the -cockroaches and the ear-boring beetles with our songs, and the love -dances of Taaroa and Tokouo. For me, I’m a gentleman, and I was a -student under Nietzsche at Basel, but I hate being interfered with. I’ve -lived too long in the South Seas. But for the American, a young chap -just out of college, it was like being seen in some rottenness by a -member of his family. You fellows may laugh, but that’s the way he felt. -He used to talk about a younger sister to me on our voyage up. - -“We assured the daughter and father we would care for them. There was -room enough, four or five chambers in the place, and we could improvise -beds for them, rough as they might be, but the daily living, the meals -and the evenings, confronted us hatefully. I would mind nothing but the -being so close to probably very particular people, the lack of freedom -of undress, and the pretense about Tokouo, but Willis was in a funk. He -wanted to go to live with Timi Linder, but I knew that he could not -endure that. Linder was island-born and almost a native, insects were -nothing to him, and he made no pretense of regular meals like a white. -Besides he was boss, and wanted to live his own life. I told Willis -plainly he had to make the best of it for a few months. He finally said -he would break off his intimacy with Taaroa, and I said that that was -his lookout. - -“So we took the Doreys into our _ménage_. We gave them two rooms -together, and Willis and I doubled up. Taaroa and Tokouo had their mats -in the fourth, and the fifth was the living- and dining-room. The -cook-house was detached. We improvised a big table for the professor on -which he could spread his dictionaries and comparative lists of South -Seas languages, and there day after day he delved into the _Te Pito te -Henua_ mystery. Chief Ure Vaeiko and Pakomeo were interpreters of the -tablets and reciters of legends, but, as the professor had not yet -mastered the Rapa Nui tongue, a go-between in English was needed. For a -few days Timi Linder volunteered for this job, but soon it was the -American who was called upon. He had made good use of his year or so and -knew the dialect well. It is only a dialect of the Malayo-Polynesian -language, and the professor himself in three months knew more of it than -any of us because he spoke six or seven other branches of it from New -Zealand Maori to Tahitian. - -“The schooner, after a month of unloading supplies and taking on wool -and cattle, sailed for Tahiti, and Timi Linder went with her, as he had -been three years away from his relations. This left me in charge, and as -the principal settlement was at Vaihu, the former mission, I was ordered -by Linder to move there, and Willis to stay at Hanga Piko. You can see -easily how fate was shaping things for the American. I took Tokouo with -me, and, the year’s lease of Taaroa expiring, she was demanded back by -her husband. An elderly Tahitian couple replaced them as helpers in the -palace. As I was five miles away, with a poor road, and had to keep the -accounts of births and deaths of people and animals, look after the -warehouse, and be a kind of chief and doctor, I saw less and less of the -Doreys, and not much more of Willis. He had to run his gang, attend to -the cattle, the water-holes, and sheep that got in distress in the -craters or caves. Of course, now and then he came over to see me, or I -to see him and the English people,—I’m Welsh myself, three quarters,—and -I met him often in the scrub. - -“Everything seemed going along all right after a few months. The Doreys -came in the seventh month of the Rapa Nui year, _Koro_, which -corresponds to our January, Timi Linder left in _Tuaharo_, February, and -Taaroa returned to her husband the last of that month. The month is -divided in half, beginning with the new moon and the full moon. On the -first of the full moon in _Vaitu-nui_, May, we had a party to visit the -_ahu_ of Hananakou. The professor, his daughter, and Willis joined me at -Vaihu as it was on the trail, and in company with several islanders we -started. It so happened that Taaroa was at my house to visit Tokouo, and -when Willis rode into the inclosure she was the first person he saw. - -“‘_Kohomai!_’ he said, which is the usual greeting. It is like ‘Good -day’ or ‘How do you do,’ but it actually means ‘Come to me!’ You answer, -‘_Koe!_’ which is ‘Thou!’ A dozen times a day you might meet and say -this, pleasantly or automatically, but I heard Taaroa reply with -astonishing bitterness, ‘_Koe kovau aita paihenga!_’ ‘Thou! I am not a -dog!’ She turned her back on him as Miss Dorey followed in, and I saw on -his face a look of puzzlement and fear. I was struck for the first time -by the contrasting beauty of the two girls, Taaroa the finest type of -Polynesian, as fine as the best Marquesan, and the white girl the real -_tea-tea_, the blond English, the pink-white flesh, the violet eyes and -rich brown hair. I tell you I’d like to have been lover to them both. -Taaroa looked intently at Miss Dorey, who spoke to her negligently -though kindly, and the incident was over. Anyhow, for the time being. - -“The _ahu_ of Hananakou was a grim sight in the moonlight. About eighty -yards long, and but four wide, it loomed on the sea-cliff like the fort -at Gibraltar, black, broken, and remindful of the past. The front was of -huge blocks of fire-rocks, all squared as neatly as the pyramids, and -carved in curious faces and figures barely traceable in the brilliant -night. Among these was the swastika or fylfot. Human remains filled the -inner chambers, and bones were lying loose among the boulders. The -professor took my arm—he was in his sixties then—and led me to where a -fallen statue lay prone on the steep slope toward the sea. - -“‘Agassiz guessed it,’ he said quietly. ‘The Pacific continent once -extended due west from South America to here, pretty nearly from the -Galapagos to the Paumotus. The people who built these statues were the -same as the Incas of Peru. In my room now is a drawing made by my -daughter of the figures on the rocks at Orongo. I have its duplicate on -a piece of pottery I dug up in an Inca grave. There is the swastika as -in ancient Troy, India, and in Peru. The Maori legend known from Samoa -to New Zealand was correct. Probably it came from Rapa Nui people who -survived the cataclysm that lowered the continent under the ocean. - -“Instinctively I turned my head towards the great land of South America -now two thousand miles away, and in the moonbeams I saw Willis clasping -the English girl’s hand. Her face was close to his and her eyes had -happy tears in them. A jealous feeling came over me. As a matter of -fact, I never made love to a white woman since I left Europe. I’m -satisfied with the part-native who don’t ask too much time or money. -But, by God, I envied him that night, and when we returned to Queen -Korato’s palace I hated him for his luck. - -The mood of Llewellyn was growing more self-accusatory, and his voice -less audible. Perhaps Aaron Mandel, an old pearl-buyer, had heard him -tell the story before, because he interrupted him, and said: - -“What the devil’s the good of openin’ old graves, T’yonni?” - -He said it, indulgently, calling him by his familiar Tahitian name, but -Llewellyn was set to tell it all. I felt again and more certainly that -it was confession, and excused my impatient interest by the need of his -making it. - -“Let him finish!” - -Llewellyn’s gaze was that of a man relieved from imminent prison. - -“It’s not my grave, Mandel,” he said; “I could not foresee the future. -When I got back to Vaihu, Tokouo brought me some rum and water, and -Taaroa sat on the mat with us. She had questions in her black eyes, and -I had to answer something after what I had heard her say to Willis. - -“‘We went to Hananakou,’ I began. - -“‘He does not need me now,’ she broke in angrily. ‘He has gotten all my -words, and gives them to the _Via tea-tea_ (white woman). He is a -_toke-toke_, a thief!’ - -“Remember that Miss Dorey was undoubtedly the first white female Taaroa -had ever seen, and that jealousy among women or men in Rapa Nui was -unknown. They hated, like us, but jealousy they had no word for. And -because I was amazed at her emotion, I said: - -“‘I saw them _hohoi_ (embrace).’ - -“Taaroa showed then the heat of this new flame on Easter Island. She -gave a mocking laugh, repeated it, then choked, and burst into wailing. -You could have told me that moment I knew nothing of the Maori, and I -would not have denied it. I was struck dumb, and swallowed my drink. And -as I poured another, and sat there in the old mission-house where -_Frère_ Eugène had gathered his flock years before, Taaroa began the -love song of her race, written in the picture symbols on the wooden -tablet I have in my house in Tahiti now. It is the _Ate-a-renga-hokan -iti poheraa_. You know how it goes. I can hear Taaroa now: - - “Ka tagi, Renga-a-manu—hakaopa; - Ohiu runarme a ita metua. - Ka ketu te nairo hihi—O te hoa! - Eaha ton tiena—e te hoa—e! - - “Ta hi tiena ita have. - Horoa ita have. - Horoa moni e fahiti; - Ita ori miro; - Ana piri atu; - Ana piri atu; - Ana tagu atu.” - -Even a quarter of Maori blood with childhood spent in Polynesia lends a -plaintive quality to the voice of men and women, and gives them an -ability to sing their own songs in a powerfully affecting manner—the -outpouring of the sad, confused hearts of a destroyed people. Under the -cocoanut-trees of Takaroa, the lamps all but expiring by then, the man -who had sat under Nietzsche at Basel rendered the song of Takaroa, the -primitive love cry of the Rapa Nuiis, so that I was transported to the -Land of Womb and Navel, and saw as he did the lovely savage Taaroa in -her wretchedness. - -“_Auwe!_” Kopcke exclaimed. “She could love!” - -“_Eiaha e ru!_ You shall see!” murmured Llewellyn, forebodingly. “After -that I didn’t meet Taaroa for two months. She stopped visiting Tokouo, -and my girl said she was _heva_, which is wrong in the head. Tokouo -couldn’t even understand jealousy. But I did, and I envied the American -having two women, the finest on the island, in love with him. About a -month later I was at the palace to have supper with them. My word, Miss -Dorey had straightened out things. There were the best mats, those the -natives make of bulrushes, everywhere. The table was spread as fine as -wax, and we had a leg of mutton, tomatoes, and other fresh vegetables. -She said they owed the green things to Willis, who had hunted the -islands for them, and found some wild and some cultivated by natives who -had the seed from war-vessels that had come years before. The professor -had out my tablets after dinner, and his daughter read the translation -into English of the song Taaroa had sung. She had brought with her on -the schooner a tiny organ about as big as a trunk, and she had set the -_ute_ to music, as wild as the wind. The words went like this: - - “Who is sorrowing? It is Renga-a-manu-hakopa! - A red branch descended from her father. - Open thine eyelids, my true love. - Where is your brother, my love? - At the Feast in the Bay of Salutation - We will meet under the feathers of your clan. - She has long been yearning after you. - Send your brother as a mediator of love between us, - Your brother who is now at the house of my father. - Oh, where is the messenger of love between us? - When the feast of driftwood is commemorated - There we will meet in loving embrace. - -“She was dressed all in white, with a blue sash, and a blue ribbon in -her hair, and when she sang I could see her white bosom as it rose and -fell. She was making love to the American right before me. Her father, -with the tablet beside him, thought of nothing but the translation, and -she had forgotten me. I could see that this was one of many such -evenings. Willis stood and turned the leaves on which she had written -her words and air, and when she sang the word ‘love’ their bodies seemed -to draw each other. There was a girl I knew in Munich—but hell! After -the tablets were put away, we talked about the yearly festival of the -god Meke Meke, which was about the last of the ancient days still -celebrated. The schooner was due back, and would take away the visitors, -and they hoped that it would not go before thirty days yet, when it -would be _Maro_, the last month in the Rapa Nui year, our July. That was -the real winter month, and then the sea-birds came by the tens of -thousands to lay their eggs. Mostly they preferred the ledges and -hollows of the cliffs, but the first comers frequented two islets or -points of rock in the sea just below the crater Rano Kao. Both Chief Ure -Vaeiko and the old Pakomeo said that always there had been a ceremony to -the god Meke Meke at that time. We had witnessed the one the previous -year, and could tell the English pair about it. - -“All the strong men of the island, young and old, met at Orongo after -the birds were seen to have returned, and raced by land and water to the -rocks, Motu Iti and Motu Nui, to seize an egg. The one who came back to -the king and crowd at Orongo was highly honored. The great spirit of the -sea, Meke Meke, was supposed to have picked him out for regard, and all -the year he was well fed and looked after by those who wanted the favor -of the god. The women especially were drawn to him as a hero, and a -likely father of strong children. In times gone, said Ure Vaeiko, many -were killed or hurt in the scramble of thousands, and in the fights for -precedence that came in the struggle to break the eggs of competitors. -Now one or two might be drowned or injured, but, with the few left to -take part, often no harm was done anybody. - -“When I left that night Willis walked a little distance with me as I led -my horse. He was under stress and, after fencing about a bit, said that -he would like to go away on the schooner. His two years were not -complete, but he was anxious to get back to America. He had gathered -material for a thesis on the tablets and sculptures of Rapa Nui, with -which he believed he could win his doctor’s degree. That was really what -he had come for, he said. I was sore because I knew the truth. I didn’t -doubt about the thesis. That explained his being there at all, but his -wanting to go on that next vessel was too plain. I said to him that he -was not a prisoner or a slave, but that I hoped he would stay, unless -Timi Linder was aboard, when it would be all right, as only two white -men were needed, one at each station. We left it that way, though he did -not say yes or no. - -“Well, Linder was on the schooner, and she came into Hanga Piko Cove two -weeks before the Meke Meke feast, so that her sailing was set for the -day after, and Willis was told by Linder it was all right for him to go. -Linder had letters for everybody, and new photographic films for Willis. -I unloaded the vessel, and Willis rode over the island with Linder to -show him the changes, the increase of cattle and sheep, and pick out -certain cattle and horses the schooner was to carry to Tahiti. He made -dozens of pictures for his thesis. Meanwhile the natives had absolutely -quit all work and moved in a body from their little plantations to the -old settlement at Orongo to prepare for the race. Orongo was the -queerest place in the world. If Rapa Nui was strange, then Orongo was -the innermost secret of it. It was a village of stone houses in two -rough rows, built on the edge of the volcano Rana Kao, and facing the -sea. There were fifty houses, all pretty much alike. They were built -against the terraces and rocks of the crater slope, without design, but -according to the ground. The doorways to the houses were not two feet -wide or high, and the rooms, though from a dozen to forty feet long, -never more than five feet wide, and the roofs not more than that high. -They were built of slabs of stone, and the floors were the bare earth. -The doorposts were sculptured and the inside walls painted, and the -rocks all about marked with hieroglyphics and figures. There were -lizards, fishes, and turtles, and a half-human, mythical beast with -claws for legs and arms, but mostly the Meke Meke, the god which -Professor Dorey had discovered the likeness of in the Inca tombs in -Peru. The old people said that Orongo had never been occupied except at -the time of the feast of Meke Meke. - -“So there they were, all that were left of the once many thousands, -living again in those damp, squat tombs, and cooking in the ovens by the -doorways that were there before Judas hanged himself. All knew that -Orongo was more ancient than the platforms or the images, and those were -built by the same folk who put up the stonehenges in Britain and in the -Tonga Islands. Pakomeo, who had escaped from the slavery in Peru, was in -charge of the Meke Meke event, because Chief Ure Vaeiko was in his -eighties. We donated a number of sheep, and, with yams, bananas, and -sugar-cane,—we grew a little of these last two,—the show was mostly of -food. A few went to Orongo several days before the bird-eggs trial, but -all slept there the night before. The moon was at its biggest, and the -women danced on the terrace in front of the houses. Professor Dorey and -his daughter with Willis were there when Timi Linder and I arrived after -supper. They had waited for us, to begin, and the drums were sounding as -we rounded the curve of the crater. - -“The English girl was entranced by the beauty of the night, the weird -outlines of the Orongo camp, the over-reaching rise of the volcano, the -sea in the foreground, and the _kokore toru_, the moon that shone so -brightly on that lone speck of land thousands of miles from our homes. I -heard her singing intimately to him an old English air. The schooner was -to leave the next day, and her lover would go with her. - -“When we were seated on mats, Pakomeo struck his hands together, and -called out, ‘_Riva-riva maitai!_’ Two women danced, both so covered with -mat garments and wearing feather hats drooping over their heads that I -did not know them. The tom-tom players chanted about the Meke Meke, and -the women moved about the circle, spreading and closing their mats in -imitation perhaps of the Meke Meke’s actions in the sea or air. I was -bored after a few minutes, and watched Willis and Miss Dorey. They were -in the shadow sitting close to each other, their hands clasped, and from -his sweet words to her I learned her first name. The father always said -simply ‘daughter,’ but Willis called her Viola. It was a good name for -her, it seemed to me, for she was grave and pathetic like the viola’s -notes. The two women were succeeded by others, who put in pantomine the -past of their people, the building of the _ahu_ and the images, the -fishing and the wars, the heroic feats of the dead, and the vengeance of -the gods. Christianity had not touched them much. They still believed in -the _atua_, their name for both god and devil. - -“Now the heaps of small fuel brought days before by severe labor were -lit, and when the fires were blazing low a single dancer appeared. She -had on a white tapa cloak, flowing and graceful, and in her hair the -plumage of the _makohe_, the tropic bird, the long scarlet feathers so -prized by natives. As she came into the light I saw that she was Taaroa. -Her long black hair was in two plaits, and the _makohe_ feathers were -like a coronet. She had a dancing-wand in each hand, the _ao_, light and -with flattened ends carved with the heads of famous female dancers of -long ago. The three drums began a slow, monotonous thump, and Taaroa a -gentle, swaying movement, with timid gestures, and coquettish -glances—the wooing of a maiden yet unskilled in love. The drums beat -faster, and the simulated passion of the dancer became more ardent. Her -eyes, dark-brown, brilliant, and liquid, commenced to search for the -wooed one, and roved around the circle. They remained fixed an instant -on the American in startling appeal. I glanced and saw Miss Dorey look -at him surprisedly and inquiringly, and then resentfully at Taaroa. But -she was carrying on her pantomine, and she ended it with a burst of -passion, the _hula_ that we all know, though even more attractive than -Miri’s or Mamoe’s in Tahiti. - -“I suppose Miss Dorey had never in her life seen such an expression of -_amour_, and didn’t know that women told such things. Her face was like -the fire, and she moved slightly away from Willis. But now Taaroa was -dancing again, and altogether differently. She stood in one spot, and as -the drums beat softly, raised her arms as if imploring the moon, and -sang the mourning _ute_ of Easter Island: - - “‘Ka ihi uiga—te ki ati,— - Auwe te poki, e—’ - - “The sail of my daughter, - Never before broken by the force of foreign clans! - Ever victorious in all her fights, - She would not drink the poison waters in the cup of obsidian glass. - -“We all felt depressingly the sudden reversal of sentiment, and, when -Taaroa had finished, Miss Dorey said she would like to leave. She -shivered. The air was a little cold, but the Rapa Nuiis built up their -fires and prepared to dance through the night. We whites, with Timi -Linder, went home with a promise to meet at noon to-morrow for the egg -ceremony. As Timi and I rode to Vaihu, seven or eight miles it was, he -remarked that Taaroa had gotten much handsomer while he was away. He -asked if she was still friendly with Willis, and I explained things. -Timi didn’t make much of those troubles, but ‘Anyhow,’ he said, ‘they’ll -all sail away to-morrow, and her husband can lease her to me.’” - -Llewellyn hesitated. His story had been long. The lamps were out. - -“There isn’t much more,” he said, apologetically though pleadingly. -“When the race started at Orongo, we four, the English people, Willis, -and I, went to the sea where we could watch the swimming. Timi Linder -stayed with Ure Vaeiko and Pakomeo to award the prize. The runners came -swarming down the cliff, some taking paths around and others trying to -climb straight down. They wore loin-cloths only, and were mad as -fighters with the excitement. Some fell but got up, and away they went, -and some leaped into the sea from the bluff at forty or fifty feet high. -The rocks were about a hundred fathom off shore, and that is a short -swim for Kanakas. But it was the carrying the egg whole and getting up -the bluff again that tested skill and luck. Well, it was over in a -little while, and when we returned to Orongo, Matatoa, the husband of -Taaroa, had been made the choice of the god Meke Meke for the year. - -“As the passengers had their goods already stowed, but intended to go -aboard the schooner before nightfall to wait for a favoring wind, Willis -proposed that we all go back to the beach and have a last bath together. -Most of the Rapa Nuiis went with us, and the victor and Taaroa among -them. We all wore _pareus_ and I tell you those two young people made a -magnificent pair. That year and a half on Rapa Nui had done wonders for -Willis. He was like a wrestler, and Miss Dorey in her _pareu_ was a -picture. - -“Some one spoke of the spring under the sea, and proposed that we all -drink from it. It was like that one at Nâgone. The fresh water runs into -the ocean about ten feet under the ocean at the bottom of the cliff. -Willis shouted out that he had never had a drink under the sea, and -would try it first. Nobody, they said, had been down there for years, -but in war time it had been a prized spot. Willis was a good diver, and -down he went while we watched from the rocks twenty feet above on which -we climbed. Now, to stay down there long enough to drink, some one else -had to stand on your shoulders, and some one else on theirs. Willis -plunged in, and, of those sporting in the water, Taaroa was first to -follow him down. Her husband, the winner, was the second, and we, -laughing and joking about the American’s heavy burden, waited for him to -come up spluttering. - -“You know how long it seems. We had no watches, but after about a -minute, Matatoa suddenly tottered and then dived. The water was not very -clear there because of the issuance of the spring, and mud stirred up, -and we could not see beneath the surface. But we knew something -unexpected had happened, and Miss Dorey seized my arm. - -“‘For God’s sake, go down and help him,’ she shrieked. - -[Illustration: - - Old cocoanut trees -] - -[Illustration: - - From the painting by Oscar F. Schmidt - The dark valley of Taaoa -] - -“I hesitated. I didn’t think anything was wrong, but even then I had a -feeling of not risking anything to save him if it was. He had too much -already. Rotten! I know it. But that’s my nature. I couldn’t have done -any good. Matatoa came up and went down again and then a half dozen -dived to the place where Willis and Taaroa were out of sight. One came -up and yelled that he could not find them, and then we knew the worst. -They were gone by this time more than three minutes. Then I leaped in, -too, but there were so many of us we got tangled up with one another -under the water, and as Matatoa came near me I told every one else to -move aside, and that we two would make the search. - -“Well, we found that at the spring a frightful sponge of seaweed and -kelp had grown, and that Willis and Taaroa had become fastened in it. We -had to take down knives to cut them out, and we brought them up -together. She had him clasped in her arms so tightly we had to tear them -apart. They were like dead. His heart was not beating, but we carried -them up the rocky path and with as much speed as possible to the fires -which the natives still had for cooking. There Pakomeo and Ure Vaeiko -directed the holding of them in the smoke which, as you know, does -sometimes bring them back, but they were dead as Queen Korato. We put -the body of the American on a horse and took it to the palace. Taaroa -remained at Orongo, and her tribe began at once preparations to bury her -in one of the burrows. Miss Dorey was quiet. Except that one shriek I -did not hear her cry. I went to Vaihu that night and left Timi Linder -with them. I got drunk, and Timi said in the morning that the English -girl stayed alone all night with Willis in the living room.” - -I had sat so long listening to Llewellyn that when, with the tension -off, I tried to stand up, I reeled. He sat with his head bowed. Captain -Nimau grasped my arm to help himself up, and said, “_Mais, mon Dieu!_ -that was terrible. You buried the American there, and the Doreys left -soon.” - -“The next day, after the burial. I remained two years more, and, by the -great Atua of Rano Roraku, I wasn’t sober a week at a time.” - -Kopcke lit a cigarette, and, as we prepared to separate, said -sententiously: “_Mon vieux_, I know women and I know the Kanaka, and I -do not think Taaroa drowned the American for love. She didn’t know about -the sea-grass being there.” - -Llewellyn did not answer. He only said, vexedly, “Well, for heaven’s -sake, let’s get a few drinks before we go to sleep!” - -I left them to go to Nohea’s shack. On my mat I pitied Llewellyn. He had -a real or fancied contrition for his small part in the tragedy of Rapa -Nui. But my last thought was of the violet eyes of Miss Dorey. Those -months to England must have been over-long. - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CHAPTER XI - -Pearl hunting in the lagoon—Previous methods wasteful—Mapuhi shows me - the wonders of the lagoon—Marvelous stories of sharks—Woman who lost - her arm—Shark of Samoa—Deacon who rode a shark a half hour—Eels are - terrible menace. - -THE lagoon of Takaroa was to be the scene of intense activity and of -incredible romance for the period of the open season for hunting the -pearl-oyster. Eighty years or more of this fishing had been a profitable -industry in Takaroa, especially for the whites who owned or commanded -the vessels trading here. A handful of nails would at one time buy the -services of a Paumotuan diver for a day. Trifles, cheap muskets, axes, -and hammers, were exchanged for shells and pearls, often five dollars -for five hundred dollars’ worth. The Paumotuan was robbed unconscionably -by cheating him of his rights under contracts, by intimidation, assault, -and murder, by getting him drunk, and the usual villainous methods of -unregulated trade all over the world. The Sons of Belial were -hereabouts. They had to haul down the black flag under compulsion, but -they sighed for the good old days, and did not constitute themselves -honest guardians for the natives even now. - -The piratical traders of the early decades sailed from atoll to atoll, -bartering for pearls and shells, or engaging the Paumotuans to dive for -them, either by the month or season, at a wage or for a division of the -gains. For their part, the traders supplied firearms, salt meat, and -biscuit or flour, though rum or other alcoholic drink was their -principal merchandise. The average native would continue to sell his -soul for the godlike exaltation of the hours of drunkenness, and forget -the hell of the aftermath. He did sell his body, for often the diver -found himself in debt to the traders at the end of the year. If so, he -was lost, for he remained the virtual slave of the creditor, who gave -him still enough rum to make him quiescent, and to continue in debt till -he died from the accidents of his vocation, or from excesses. - -The lagoons were emptied of their shells in improvident manner, shells -of any size being taken, and no provision made for the future nor for -the growth and propagation of the oysters. The industry was the usual -fiercely competitive struggle that marks a new way of becoming rich -quickly. The disorder and wasteful methods of the early days of gold -digging in California, and later in Alaska, matched the reckless roguery -and foolish mishandling of these rich pearl-fisheries before the French -Government tardily ended the reign of lawlessness and prodigality. -Gambling became a fever, and the white man knew the cards better than -the brown. Driven by desire for rum and for more money to hazard, the -Paumotuan risked terrible depths and killed himself, or ruined his -health by too many descents in a day. Atoll and sea must soon have been -deprived of people and oysters. - -Thirty years ago, the secretary of the _Collège de France_, summoned to -Tahiti to find a remedy, reported that, if laws were not made and -enforced against the conditions he found, the industry would speedily -pass. Schooners of many nationalities frequented the atolls. Pearls were -not rare, and magnificent shells were found in many of the eighty -lagoons. Their size surpassed all found now. The continuous search had -impoverished the beds, which were the result of centuries, and had -robbed them of shells of age and more perfect growth, as war took the -strongest and bravest men of a nation, and left the race to be -perpetuated by cowards, weaklings, and the rich or politic who evaded -the front of battle. - -It took five years to grow a fine shell. The sixth year often doubled -the value in mother-of-pearl, and the seventh year doubled it again. The -Chinese, in a certain famous fishery off their coast, sought the shells -only every ten or fifteen years; but those yellow people had the last -word in conservation of soil and every other source of gain, forced to a -sublimated philosophy by the demands of hundreds of millions of hungry -bellies. - -Warned by the Parisian professor, the French Government made strict -regulations to prevent the extinction of the pearl-oyster, and, -incidentally, of the Paumotuan. For the oyster they instituted the -closed season or _rahui_, forbidding the taking of shells from certain -atolls except at times stated. Experts examined the lagoons, and upon -their recommendations a schedule of the _rahui_ was drawn out, so that -while diving might be permitted in one lagoon for successive seasons it -might be prohibited in another over a term of years. This had caused a -peripatetic school of divers, who went about the group from open lagoon -to open lagoon, as vagrants follow projects of railroad building. But -the lagoons would never be again what they had been in wealth. The -denuding had been too rapacious. However, the oysters were now given -time to breed, and their food was taken care of to a degree, though -France, the most scientific of nations, with the foremost physicists, -chemists, and physicians, did not send her genius to her colonies. - -To protect the divers and their families, alcohol was made contraband. -It was unlawful to let a Paumotuan have intoxicants. The scenes of -riotous debauchery once common and which always marked the diving -season, in the merciless pitting of pearl- and shell-buyers against one -another, were rare, but surreptitious sale and donation of drink were -still going on. - -Mormonism, Josephitism, and Seventh Day Adventism, strict sects as to -stimulants, had aided the law, and the Lying Bills and McHenrys, the -Mandels and the Kopckes, had a white god against them in their -devil-take-the-hindmost treatment of the natives. France also confined -the buying and selling in the Paumotus to French citizens, so that the -non-Gauls by blood had been driven to kiss the flag they contemned. But -business excused all subterfuges. - - * * * * * - -One day when the diving term was almost on, Mapuhi and I were talking on -his veranda about the ventures of his life, and especially of his -experiences under the sea. - -“Come!” he said, with an indulgent smile upon his flawed but noble face, -“American, you and I will go upon the lagoon, and I will show you what -may be strange to you.” - -Going to the end of his spit of land, we entered a canoe, and, with the -chief paddling swiftly, moved towards the other side of the lagoon, away -from the habitations of the Paumotuans. When a hundred yards or two -offshore, Mapuhi shipped his paddle and let the outrigger canoe lie idly -on the water. - -“Look!” he said, appraisingly, “See the wonders of God prepared for his -children!” - -I took the _titea mata_ he handed me, the four-sided wooden box with a -pane of ordinary glass fixed in it, about fifteen inches square, and -notched for the neck of the observer. Putting the glass below the -surface and gazing through it, I was in fairy-land. - -The floor of the lagoon was the superbest garden ever seen by the eye of -man. A thousand forms of life, fixed and moving, firm and waving, coral -and shells, fish of all the colors of the rainbow, of beauteous, of -weird, and of majestic shape and size, decorated and animated this -strange reserve man had invaded for food and profit. The giant -furbelowed clams, largest of all mollusks, white, or tinged with red and -saffron or brown-yellow, a corruscating glare of blue, violet, and -yellow from above, reposed like a bed of dream tulips upon the shining -parterre. - -The coral was of an infinitude of shape: emerald one moment and sapphire -the next, shot with colors from the sun and the living and growing -things beneath. Springing from the sea-floor were cabbages and roses, -cauliflower and lilies, ivory fans and scarlet vases, delicate fluted -columns, bushes of pale yellow coral, bouquets of red and green coral, -shells of pink and purple, masses of weeds, brown and black sponges. It -was a magic maze of submarine sculpture, fretwork, and flowers, and -through all the interstices of the coral weaved in and out the -brilliant-colored and often miraculously-molded fish and crustaceans. -There were great masses of dark or sulphur-hued coral into which at any -alarm these creatures darted and from which they peeped when danger -seemed past. Snakes, blue, gold, or green bars on a velvet black-brown, -glided in and out of the recesses, or coiled themselves about branches. - -Big and small were these denizens of the lagoon. The tiny hermit-crab in -a stolen mollusk-shell had on his movable house his much smaller -paramour, who, also in her appropriated former tenement of a dead enemy, -would spend the entire mating season thus waiting for his embrace. And -now and again as I looked through the crystal water I saw the giant -bulks of sharks, conger-eels, and other huge fish. These I pointed out -to Mapuhi. - -He peered through the _titea mata_. - -“_E!_” he exclaimed. “For fifty years I have fought those demons. They -will take one of us this _rahui_ as before. It may be God’s will, but I -think the devil fights on the side of the beasts below. I myself have -never been touched by them though I have killed many. When I think of -the many years I entered the water all over these seas, and in blackest -sin, I understand more and more what the elders say, that God is ever -watching over those He intends to use for His work. I have seen or known -men to lose parts of themselves to the sharks, but to escape death. They -prayed when in the very jaws of the _mao_, and were heard.” - -Mapuhi blew out his breath loudly, as if expelling an evil odor. - -“_Tavana_, tell me about some of the bad deeds of sharks,” I said. - -“_Aue!_ There are no good ones,” he replied. “In Raiatea, near Tahiti, -they were fishing at night for the _ava_, the fish something like the -salmon. They had a net five meters high, and, after the people of the -village had drawn the net round so that no fish could escape, a number -of men dived from their canoes. You know they try to catch the _ava_ by -the tail and make it swim for the air, pulling the fisherman with it. -That is an _arearea_ [game]. The torches held by the women and children -and the old people were lighting the water brightly when Tamaehu came up -with his fish. He was baptized Tamaehu, but his common name was Marae. -Just as he brought the _ava_, or the _ava_ brought Tamaehu, to his -canoe, and the occupants were about to lift the _ava_ into the canoe, a -shark caught Tamaehu by the right foot. He caught hold of the outrigger -and tried to shake it off. It was not a big shark, but it was hungry. He -shouted, and his companions leaned over and drove a harpoon into the -shark, which let go his foot, tore out the harpoon, and swam away. Poor -Tamaehu was hauled in, with his foot hanging loose, but in Raiatea the -French doctor sewed it on again. You can see him now limping about, but -he praises God for being alive.” - -“He well may; and there are many others to join with him?” I ventured, -inquisitively. - -“Do you know Piti, the woman of Raroia, in these Paumotu islands?” he -asked. “No? If you go there, look for her. You will know her, for she -has but one arm. Raroia has a large door to its lagoon. The bigger the -door the bigger the sharks inside. The lagoons to which only small boats -can enter have small sharks only. Piti was diving in the lagoon of -Raroia during the season. She was bringing up shell from fifty feet -below, and had several already in her canoe. She dived again, and, after -seizing one shell, started to come up. Suddenly she saw a shark dart out -of a coral bank. She became afraid. She did not pray. She forgot even to -swim up. A man like me would not have been afraid. It is the shark that -takes you when you do not see him that is to fear. Piti did nothing, and -the _mao_ took her left arm into his mouth. He closed his teeth and -dragged off the flesh down to the elbow where he bit her arm in two. You -know how when a shark bites, after he sinks his teeth into the meat, he -twists his mouth, so as to make his teeth cut. That is the way God made -him. This shark twisted and stripped off Piti’s flesh as he drew down -his teeth. When he bit off her lower arm he swam off to eat it, and she -rose to the top. She put her good arm over the outrigger, and those -other women paddled to her and pulled her into the canoe. The bone stuck -out six inches below the flesh the shark had left. There were no -doctors, but they put a healing plant over the arm. The wound would not -heal, and ate and ate inside for several years until the upper arm fell -off at the shoulder-joint. Then she got well.” - -“Is the shark himself never frightened? A human being must seem a very -queer fish to a shark. They do not always attack, do they?” I said. “I -have swum where they were, and Jack of the _Snark_, Monsieur London, -told that at Santa Ana in the Solomon Islands, when they were putting -dynamite in the water to get a supply of fish, the natives leaped into -the water and fought with the sharks for the fish. He said that the -sharks had learned to rush to the spot whenever they heard dynamite -exploded. The Solomon people had to grab the stunned fish away from the -sharks, and one man who started for the surface with a fish came to the -boat with only half of it, as a shark had taken away the head.” - -“_E!_” answered Mapuhi, “Sharks are devils, but the devils are not -without fear, and sometimes they become _neneva_, and do things perhaps -they did not think about. At Marutea Atoll, Tau, a strong man, caught a -shark about four feet long. They had a feast on the beach, and Tau, to -show how strong he was, picked up the shark and played with it after it -had been on the sand for some minutes. The mouth of the _mao_ was near -his arm, and it opened and closed, and took off the flesh of the upper -arm. He got well, but he never could use that arm. Right here in -Takaroa, in the _rahui_ of seven years ago, a man, diving for shell, met -a shark on the bottom. He was crawling along the bottom, looking for a -good shell, when the shark turned a corner and struck him square in the -mouth. The shark was a little one, not more than three feet long, but so -frightened was he that he bit the man’s two cheeks right off, the cheeks -and the lips, so that to-day you see all his teeth all the time. He has -become a good Mormon.” - -Mapuhi laughed. I looked at him, and his face was filled with mirth. He -was not deceived as to the heart of man. Devout he was, but he had dealt -too long with brown and white, and had been too many years a -sinner—indeed, one of the vilest, if rumor ran true—not to have drunk -from the well-springs of the passions. Mapuhi wore a blue loin-cloth and -a white shirt. The tails of the latter floated in the soft breeze, and -the bosom was open, displaying his Herculean chest. We could see his -house in the distance across the lagoon, and now and then he kept it in -his eyes for a minute. He had gone far for a man whose father had been a -savage and an eater of his enemies. The Mormon tenets permit a proper -pride of possession, like the Mohammedan philosophy. One can rejoice -that God has signaled one out for holding in trust the material assets -of life. The bankers of the world have long known this about their God. -Mapuhi had become thoughtful, and, as I was sure he had other and more -astonishing facts about the sharks not yet related, I suggested that -other archipelagos were also cursed by the presence and rapacity of the -_mao_. - -“In Samoa,” said Mapuhi, “the shark is not called _mao_ or _mako_ as in -Nuku-Hiva, but _mălie_. There are no lagoons in Samoa, for there are no -atolls, but high mountains and beaches. Now the _mălie_ is the shark -that swims around the islands, but the deep-sea shark, the one that -lives out of sight of land, is the mălietua. The Samoans are a wise -people in a rich country. They are not like us poor Paumotuans with only -cocoanuts and fish, but the Samoans have bananas, breadfruit, taro, -oranges, and cocoanuts and fish, too. They are a happy people. Of -course, I am a Paumotuan, and I would not live away from here. Once, a -woman I had—when I was not a Mormon—wanted me to take my money and go -and live in Tahiti, which is gay. I considered it, and even counted my -money. But when I thought of my home and my people, I thrust her out as -a bad woman. Now in Manua in Samoa was a half-caste, and his daughter -was the queen of Manua. The half-caste’s name was Alatua Iunga, and he -was one day fishing for _bonito_ in the way we do, with a pearl-shell -hook, when one of the four or five Samoans with him said, ‘There is a -small shark. Put on a piece of _bonito_, and we will catch the _mălie_.’ -They did so, and then they let their canoe float while they ate boiled -taro and dried squid. - -“Then one of the Samoans said, ‘I see a shark.’ Others looked, and they -said, also, ‘A shark is rising from the deep.’ Now a deep-water shark, -as I said, is a _mălietua_ and is not to be smiled at. Iunga said, ‘Get -the big hook and bait it!’ Then the shark rose, twenty feet of its body -out of the water, and its jaws opened. They closed on the outrigger of -the canoe, and bit one end clear off. Iunga said again, ‘Get the hook!’ -He thought the shark would take the baited hook, and then they could -throw the rope attached to the hook overboard, and the _mălietua_ would -be troubled with the rope at the end of his nose and would cease to -attack them. They could see the shark all this time. He was a blue shark -with a flat tail, and was forty feet long at least. Their canoe was just -half as long, and they thought of Iona [Jonah]. The _perofeta_ was -swallowed by a shark, because a whale can swallow only little fish. The -_mălietua_ would not take the hook, and, leaving the outrigger, rammed -the stern of the canoe. The shock almost threw them into the water. All -were paddling hard to escape, for they knew that this shark was a real -devil and sought to destroy them. Iunga, who was steering the _va aalo_, -rose up and struck the shark many times on his nose. This angered him, -but Iunga kept it up, as their one chance of safety. There is a saying -in Samoa, ‘_O le mălie ma le tu’tu’_, which is, ‘Each shark has its -pay.’ Iunga and all the Samoans were religious men, though not Mormons, -and they sang a hymn as they paddled hard. They made their peace with -the Creator, who heard them. For over two miles the race was run. The -_mălietua_ pursued the _va aalo_, and Iunga jabbed him with the big -paddle. At last they were nearly all dead from weariness, and so Iunga -sheered the canoe abruptly to the right, intending to smash on the reef -as a chance for their lives. But just as the _va aalo_ swerved, to -strike upon the coral rocks, they rested on their paddles, and they saw -that the shark had disappeared. If that shark had kept on for another -minute it would have killed itself on the reef.” - -“Mapuhi,” I verified, “I, too, have been to Manua, and heard the story -from the kin of Alatua Iunga, whom I knew as Arthur Young, the trader. -He became very pious after that, and was a great help to the -_mitinare_.” - -The republican king of the atolls may have thought he detected in my -voice or manner a raillery I did not mean to imply, for he inspected my -countenance seriously. He had long ago discovered that white men often -speak with a forked tongue. But I was sincere, because I had never known -a joyous, unfrightened person to become suddenly religious, while I had -witnessed a hundred conversions from fear of the devil, hunger, or the -future. However, Mapuhi, who was an admirable story-teller, with a -dramatic manner and a voice of poesy, had reserved his _chef d’œuvre_ -for the last. - -“American,” he said, “If I were a scoffer or unbeliever to-day and I met -Huri-Huri and he informed me of what God had done for him, and his -neighbors who had seen the thing itself brought their proof to his -words, I would believe in God’s goodness. Have you seen Huri-Huri at -Rangiora? He lives at the village of Avatoru. He has a long beard. Ah, -you have not seen him. Yes, very few Paumotuans have beards, but no -Paumotuan ever had the experience of Huri-Huri. He was living in his -village of Avatoru, and was forty years old. He was a good diver but -getting old for that work. It takes the young to go deep and stay down -long. As we grow older that weight of water hurts us. Huri-Huri was -lucky. He was getting many large shells, and he felt sure he would pick -up one with a valuable pearl in it. He drank the rum the white trader -poisons my people with, and he spent his money for tobacco, beef, and -cloth. He had a watch but it did not go, and he had some foolish things -the trader had sold him. But here he was forty years old, and so poor -that he had to go from atoll to atoll wherever there was a _rahui_ -because he wanted all these foreign goods. - -“This time he was diving in the lagoon of Rangiroa. He was all alone in -his canoe, and was in deep water. He had gone down several times, and -had in his canoe four or five pairs of shells. He looked again and saw -another pair, and plunged to the bottom. He had the shells in his sack -and was leaving the bank when he saw just above him a shark so big that, -as he said, it could have bitten him in half as a man eats a banana. The -shark thrust down its nose toward Huri-Huri, and he took out his shells -and held them against the beast. He kept its nose down for half a minute -but then was out of breath. He was about to die, he believed, unless he -could reach the air without the shark following him. He threw himself on -the shark’s back, and put his hands in the fish’s gills, and so stopped -or partly stopped the shark’s breathing. The shark did not know what to -make of that, and hurried upward, headed for the surface by the diver. -Huri-Huri was afraid to let go even there, because he knew the _mao_ -would turn on him and tear him to pieces. But he took several long -breaths in the way a diver understands, and still held on and tore the -shark’s breathing-places. - -[Illustration: - - Launch towing canoes to diving grounds in lagoon -] - -[Illustration: - - Divers voyaging in Paumotu atolls -] - -“Now the shark was angry and puzzled, and so rushed to the bottom again, -but with the man on his back. The shark had not been able to enjoy the -air at the top because he breathes water and not air. Huri-Huri closed -his gill openings, and piloted him, and so he came up again and again -descended. By pulling at the gills the shark’s head was brought up and -he had to rise. All this time Huri-Huri was thinking hard about God and -his own evil life. He knew that each second might be his last one in -life, and he prayed. He thought of Iona who was saved out of the shark’s -belly in the sea where Christ was born, and he asked Iona to aid him. -And all the while he jerked at the gills, which are the shark’s lungs. -He knew that the shark was dying all the time, but the question was how -long could the shark himself hold out, and which would weaken first. Up -and down they went for half an hour, the shark’s blood pouring out over -Huri-Huri’s hands as he minute after minute tore at the gills. Now he -could direct the shark any way, and often he guided him toward the beach -of the lagoon. The shark would swim toward it but when he felt the -shallow water would turn. But after many minutes the shark had to stay -on top altogether, because he was too far gone to dive, and finally -Huri-Huri steered him right upon the sand. Huri-Huri fell off the _mao_ -and crawled up further, out of reach of him. - -“When the people on shore who had watched the strange fight between the -_mao_ and the man came to them both, the fish could barely move his -tail, and Huri-Huri was like dead. Every bit of skin was rubbed off his -chest, legs, and arms, and he was bleeding from dozens of places. The -shark’s body is as rough as a file. When Huri-Huri opened his eyes on -his mat in his house, and looked about and heard his wife speak to him, -and heard his friends about say that he was the bravest and strongest -Paumotuan who ever lived, he said: ‘My brothers, praise God! I called on -Iona, and the prophet heard me, and taught me how to conquer the devil -that would have killed me in my sin!’ They listened and were astonished. -They thought the first thing Huri-Huri would say would be, ‘Give me a -drink of rum!’ American, that man is seventy years old now, and for -thirty years he has preached about God and sin. Iona was three days and -nights in the shark’s belly, but nobody could ride a shark for a -half-hour, and conquer him, except a Paumotuan and a diver.” - -Mapuhi was glad to be corroborated by Linnæus in his opinion that a -white shark and not a whale had been the divine instrument in teaching -the doubting Jonah to upbraid Nineveh even at the risk of his life. The -great Swedish naturalist says: - - Jonam Prophetum ut veteris Herculem trinoctem, in hujus - ventriculo, tridui spatro baesisse, verisimile est. - -Also, Mapuhi was deeply interested by my telling him that at Marseilles -a shark was caught in which was a man in complete armor. He had me -describe a suit of armor as I had seen it in the notable collection in -Madrid. He was struck by its resemblance to the modern diver’s suit. - -“In the Paumotus,” he said, “the French Government forbids the use of -the _scaphandre_ because it cheated the native of his birthright. The -merchants, the rich men of Tahiti, could buy and use such diving -machinery, but the Paumotuan could not. The natives asked the French -government to send away the _scaphandre_, and to permit the searching -for shells by the human being only. I had one of the machines. I could -go deeper in it than any diver in the world, so the merchants said. I -would go out in my cutter with my men and the _scaphandre_. I did not -put on the whole suit, but only the rubber jacket, on the brass collar -of which the helmet was screwed. I fixed this jacket tightly around my -waist so that no water could enter, and fastened it about my wrists. -Then, with my legs uncovered, I jumped into the lagoon. I had big pieces -of lead on my back and breast so as not to be overturned by the weight -of the helmet, and an air-hose from the helmet to the pump in the -cutter. I would work three hours at a time, but had to come up many -times for relief from the pressure. - -“One day I was in this suit at the bottom of the lagoon of Hikueru. I -had filled my net with shells, and had signaled for it to be hauled up. -I was examining a ledge of shells when I felt something touch my helmet. -It was a sea-snake about ten feet long and of bright color. It had a -long, thin neck, and it was poisonous. I snatched my knife from my belt, -and before the snake could bite me I drove the knife into it. It was -attacking the glass of my helmet, and not my legs, fortunately. That -snake has its enemy, too, for when it lies on the surface to enjoy the -sun the sea-eagle falls like a thunderbolt from the sky, seizes it by -the back of the head, and flies away with it. - -“Another time when I was in the suit, a _puhi_, a very big eel, wrapped -itself about me. I had a narrow escape but I killed it with my knife. In -the olden days in Hikueru I would have perished, for that _puhi_ eel, -the conger-eel, was taboo, sacred as a god, here and in many islands. To -eat that eel or harm him was to break the taboo. More than eighty people -of Fakaofa were driven from that island for eating the _puhi_, and they -drifted for weeks before they reached Samoa. The _vaaroa_, the -long-mouthed eel, is dangerous to the diver. It is eight feet long, and -Amaru, of Fakarava had the calf of his leg bitten off by one.” - -A week I could have listened to Mapuhi. I was back in my childhood with -Jules Verne, Ballantyne, and Oliver Optic. Actual and terrifying as were -the harrowing incidents of the diving related by the giant, they found -constant comparison in my mind with the deeds of my boyish heroes. After -all, these Paumotuans were children—simple, honest, happy children. The -fate that had denied them the necessaries of our environment, or even -the delicious foods and natural pleasures of the high islands, Tahiti -and the Marquesas, had endowed them with health, satisfaction with a -rigid fare, and an incomparable ability to meet the hardships of their -life and the blows of extraordinary circumstance with fortitude and -persistent optimism. They had no education and were happier for the lack -of it. The white man had impressed their instincts and habits but -shallowly. Even their very austerity of surroundings had kept them freer -than the Tahitians from the poisonous gifts and suicidal customs of the -foreigner. Their God was near and dear to them, and a mighty fortress in -time of trouble. - -While Mapuhi talked the canoe had returned with the currents nearer to -his house, from which we had embarked. It was conspicuous over all the -other homes on the _motu_, though it was a very ordinary wooden -structure of five or six rooms. It was not a fit frame for Mapuhi, I -thought. This son of the sea and lagoon was suited better to a canoe, a -cutter, or the deck of a schooner. He had a companionship with this warm -salt water, with the fish in it, and the winds that blew over it, -exceeding that of any other man. He drove the canoe on the sand, and we -stepped ashore. I lingered by the water as he walked on to his store. In -his white, fluttering shirt, and his blue _pareu_, bare legged and -bareheaded, there was a natural distinction and atmosphere of dignity -about him that was grandeur. Kingship must have originated in the force -and bearing of such men, shepherds or sea-rovers. - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CHAPTER XII - -History of the pearl hunger—Noted jewels of past—I go with Nohea to the - diving—Beautiful floor of the lagoon—Nohea dives many times—Escapes - shark narrowly—Descends 148 feet—No pearls reward us—Mandel tells of - culture pearls. - -MUCH of the mystery and myth of these burning atolls was concerned with -the quest of pearls. In all the world those gems had been a subject of -romance, and legend had draped their search with a myriad marvels. Poets -and fictionists in many tongues had embroidered their gossamer fabric -with these exquisite lures, the ornament of beauty, the treasures of -queen and odalisque, _mondaine_ and dancer, image and shrine, since -humans began to adorn themselves with more delicate things than the -skins and teeth of animals. A thousand crimes had their seed in greed -for the possession of these sensuous sarcophagi of dead worms. A million -men had labored, fought, and died to hang them about the velvet throats -of the mistresses of the powerful. Hundreds of thousands had perished to -fetch them from the depths of the sea. History and novel were filled -with the struggle of princes and Cyprians, merchants, adventurers, and -thieves for ropes of pearls or single specimens of rarity. Krishna -discovered pearls in the ocean and presented them to his goddess -daughter. The Ethiopians all but worshiped them, and the Persians -believed them rain-drops that had entered the shells while the oysters -sunned themselves on the beach. Two thousand years before our era, a -millennium before Rome was even mud, the records of the Middle Kingdom -enumerated pearls as proper payments for taxes. When Alexander the Great -was conquering, the Chinese inventoried them as products of their -country. The “Url-Ja,” a Chinese dictionary of that date, says “they are -very precious.” - -Solomon’s pearls came from the Persian Gulf, India, and Ceylon, and the -queen of Sheba’s too. Rivers of Britain gave the author of the -“Commentaries” pearls to dedicate to Venus Genetrix, and to present to -that lovely assassin who melted two, costing ten million sesterces, for -a love philter, and seduced two Cæsars. Who can forget the salad Philip -II of Spain, the uxorious inquisitor, set upon the royal table for his -wife, Elizabeth of Valois, the leaves of which were of emeralds, the -vinegar of rubies, the oil of topazes, and the salt of pearls? What more -appetizing dish for a royal bride? The Orientals make medicine of them -to-day, and I myself have seen a sultan burn pearls to make lime for -chewing with the betel-nut. - -The New World offered fresh preserves to pearl-hunters; primeval grounds -drew a horde of lusty blades to harry the red men’s treasure-house. -South and Central America fed the pearl hunger that grew with the more -even distribution of wealth through commerce, and the rise of stout -merchants on the Continent and the British Islands. The Spanish king who -gave his name to the Philippines got from Venezuela a pearl that -balanced an eighth of a pound. I saw it in Madrid. These Paumotus and -Australasia were the last to answer yes to man’s ceaseless demand that -the earth and the waters thereof yield him more than bread for the sweat -of his brow. On many maps these atolls are yet inscribed as the Pearl -Islands. About their glorious lagoons was a mist of obscurity and of -wonder for centuries. Besides dangers to vessels, the cannibalism of -savages, the lack of any food except cocoanuts and fish, and stories of -strange happenings, there were accounts of divers who sank deeper in the -sea than science said was possible, and of priceless pearls plundered or -bought for a drinking-song. - -Custom-houses and organized commerce had rung down the curtain on the -extravaganza of the past, but the romance of man wrestling with the -forces of nature in the element from which he originally came, now so -deadly to him, was yet a supreme attraction. The day of the opening of -the _rahui_ came none too soon for me. Nohea, my host, was to dive, and -we had arranged that I was to be in his canoe. I was assured by Mapuhi, -and by Captain Nimau and Kopcke, that despite the fact that his youth -was gone, Nohea was the best diver in Takaroa, and especially the -shrewdest judge of the worth of a piece of diving ground. - -All the village went to the scene of the diving in a fleet of cutters -and canoes, sailing or paddling according to the goal and craft. Nohea -and I had a largish canoe, which, though with a small sail woven of -pandanus straw, could easily be paddled by us. He had staked out a spot -upon the lagoon that had no recognizable bearings for me, but which he -had long ago selected as his arena of action. He identified it by its -distance from certain points, and its association with the sun’s -position at a fixed hour. - -We had risen before dawn to attend the Mormon church service initiating -the _rahui_. The rude coral temple was crowded when the young elders -from Utah began the service. Mapuhi, Nohea, and leaders of the village -sat on the forward benches. The prayer of elder Overton was for the -physical safety of the elected in the pursuit they were about to engage -in. - -“Thou knowest, O God,” he supplicated, “that in the midst of life we are -in death.” - -“_E! E! Parau mau!_” echoed the old divers, which is, “Yea, Verily!” - -“These, thy children, O God, are about to go under the sea, but not like -the Chosen People in Israel, for whom the waters divided and let them go -dry-shod. But grant, O God, who didst send an angel to Joseph Smith to -show him the path to Thee through the Book of Mormon, who didst lead thy -new Chosen People through the deserts and over the mountains, among wild -beasts and the savages who knew Thee not, to Thy capital on earth, Salt -Lake City, that thy loving worshipers here assembled shall come safely -through this day, and that Thy sustaining hand shall support them in -those dark places where other wild beasts lie in wait for them!” - -“_Parau mau!_” said all, and the eyes of some of the women were wet, for -they thought of sons and lovers, fathers and brothers, mothers and -sisters, who had gone out upon the lagoon, and who had died there among -the coral rocks, or of whom only pieces had been brought back. They sang -a song of parting, and of commending their bodies to the Master of the -universe, and then with many greetings and hearty laughter and a hundred -jests about expected good fortune, we parted to put the final touches on -the equipment for _la pêche des huitres nacrières_. Forgetting the -quarter of an hour of serious prayer and song in the temple, the natives -were now bubbling with eagerness for the hunt. Mapuhi himself was like a -child on the first day of vacation. These Paumotuans had an almost -perfect community spirit, for, while a man like Mapuhi became rich, -actually he made and conserved what the duller natives would have failed -to create from the resources about them, or to save from the clutches of -the acquisitive white, and he was ready to share with his fellows at any -time. He, as all other chiefs, was the choice of the men of the atoll at -a quadrennial election, and held office and power by their sufferance -and his own merits. None might go hungry or unhoused when others had -plenty. Civilization had not yet inflicted on them its worst -concomitants. They were too near to nature. - -After a light breakfast of bread and savory fried fish, to which I added -jam and coffee for myself, Nohea and I pushed off for our -wonder-fishing. In the canoe we had, besides paddles, two _titea mata_, -the glass-bottomed boxes for seeing under the surface of the water, a -long rope, an iron-hooped net, a smaller net or bag of _coir_, twenty -inches deep and a foot across, with three-inch meshes, a bucket, a pair -of plain-glass spectacles for under-water use, a jar of drinking-water, -and food for later in the day. - -The sun was already high in the unclouded sky when we lifted the mat -sail, and glided through the pale-blue pond, the shores of which were a -melting contrast of alabaster and viridescence. All about us were our -friends in their own craft, and the single motor-boat of the island, -Mapuhi’s, towed a score of cutters and canoes to their appointed places. -A slender breeze sufficed to set us, with a few tacks, at our exact -spot. We furled our sail, stowed it along the outrigger, and were ready -for the plunge. We did not anchor the canoe because of the profundity of -the water and because it is not the custom to do so. I sat with a paddle -in my hand for a few minutes but laid it down when Nohea picked up the -looking-glass. He put the unlidded box into the water and his head into -it and gazed intently for a few moments, moving the frame about to sweep -the bottom of the lagoon with his wise eyes. - -The water was as smooth as a mirror. I saw the bed of the inland sea as -plainly as one does the floor of an aquarium a few feet deep. No streams -poured débris into it, nor did any alluvium cloud its crystal purity. -Coral and gravel alone were the base of its floor and sides, and the -result was a surpassing transparency of the water not believable by -comparison with any other lake. - -“How far is that _toa aau_?” I asked, and pointed to a bank of coral. - -Nohea sized up the object, took his head from the _titea mata_, and -replied, “Sixty feet.” - -At that distance I could, unaided, see plainly a piece of coral as big -as my hand. The view was as variegated as the richest landscape—a -wilderness of vegetation, of magnificent marine verdure, sloping hills -and high towers with irregular windows, in which the sunshine streamed -in a rainbow of gorgeous colors; and the shells and bodies of scores of -zoöphytes dwelling upon the structures gleamed and glistened like jewels -in the flood of light. About these were patches of snow-white sand, -blinding in refracted brilliancy, and beside them green bushes or trees -of herbage-covered coral, all beautiful as a dream-garden of the Nereids -and as imaginary. Even when I withdrew my eyes from this fantastic -scene, the lagoon and shore were hardy less fabulous. The palms waved -along the beach as banners of seduction to a sense of sheer animism, of -investiture of their trunks and leaves with the spirits of the atoll. -Not seldom I had heard them call my name in the darkness, sometimes in -invitation to enchantment and again in warning against temptation. The -cutters or canoes of the village were like lily-pads upon the placid -water, far apart, white or brown, the voices of the people whispers in -the calm air. I wished I were a boy to know to the full the feeling of -adventure among such divine toys which had brought glad tears to my eyes -in my early wanderings. - -The canoe had drifted, and Nohea slipped over its side and again spied -with the glass. I, too, looked through mine and saw where he indicated a -ridge or bank of coral upon which were several oyster-shells. Nohea -immediately climbed into the canoe and, resting upon the side prayed a -few moments, bowing his head and nodding as if in the temple. Then he -began to breathe heavily. For several minutes he made a great noise, -drawing in the air and expelling it forcibly, so that he seemed to be -wasting energy. I was almost convinced that he exaggerated the value of -his emotions and explosive sounds, but his impassive face and -remembrance of his race’s freedom from our exhibition conceit, drove the -foolish thought away. His chest, very capacious normally, was bursting -with stored air, a storage beyond that of our best trained athletes; and -without a word he went over the side and allowed his body to descend -through the water. He made no splash at all but sank as quietly as a -stone. I fastened my head in the _titea mata_ and watched his every -movement. He had about his waist a _pareu_ of calico, blue with large -white flowers,—the design of William Morris,—and a sharp sailor’s -sheath-knife at the belt. Around his neck was a sack of cocoanut-fiber, -and on his right hand a glove of common denim. Almost all his robust -brown body was naked for his return to the sea-slime whence his first -ancestor had once crawled. - -Down he went through the pellucid liquid until at about ten feet the -resistance of the water stopped his course and, animated bubble as he -was, would have pushed him to the air again. But Nohea turned in a -flash, and with his feet uppermost struck out vigorously. He forced -himself down with astonishing speed and in twenty seconds was at his -goal. He caught hold of a gigantic goblet of coral and rested himself an -instant as he marked his object, the ledge of darker rocks on which grew -the shells. There were sharp-edged shapes and branching plant-like -forms, which, appearing soft as silk from above would wound him did he -graze them with his bare skin. He moved carefully about and finally -reached the shells. One he gripped with the gloved hand, for the shell, -too, had serrated edges, and, working it to and fro, he broke it loose -from its probable birthplace and thrust it into his sack. Immediately he -attacked the other, and as quickly detached it. He stooped down and -looked closely all about him. He then sprang up, put his arms over his -head, his palms pressed one on the other, and shot toward the surface. I -could see him coming toward me like a bolt from a catapult. I held a -paddle to move the canoe from his path if he should strike it, and to -meet him the trice he flashed into the ether. - -The diver put his right arm over the outrigger boom, and opening his -mouth gulped the air as does the _bonito_ when first hauled from the -ocean. I was as still as death. In a séance once I was cautioned not to -speak during the materializations, as the disturbance might kill the -medium. I recalled that unearthly silence, for the moment of emergence -was the most fatal to the diver. His senses after the terrible pressure -of such a weight upon his body were as abnormal and acute as a man’s -whose nerves have been stripped by flaying. The change in a few seconds -from being laden and hemmed in by many tons of water to the lightness of -the atmosphere was ravaging. Slowly the air was respired, and gradually -his system,—heart, glands, lungs, and blood,—resumed its ordinary -rhythm, and his organs functioned as before his descent. Several minutes -passed before he raised his head from the outrigger, opened his eyes, -which were suffused with blood, and said in a low tone of the deaf -person, “_E tau Atua e!_” He was thanking his God for the gift of life -and health. He had been tried with Meshach, Shadrach, and Abednego, -though not by fire. - -Nohea lifted himself into the canoe, and took the sack of _coir_ from -his neck. I removed the two pairs of shells with the reverence one might -assume in taking the new-born babe from its first cradle. They were Holy -Grails to me who had witnessed their wringing from the tie-ribs of -earth. They were shaped like a stemless palm-leaf fan, about eight -inches tall and ten wide, rough and black; and still adhering to their -base was a tangle of dark-green silky threads, the byssus or strong -filament which attaches them to their fulcrum, the ledge. It was the -byssus which Nohea had to wrench from the rock. I laid down the shells -and restored the sack to Nohea, who sat immobile, perhaps thoughtless. -Another brief space of time, and he smiled and clapped his hands. - -“That was ten fathoms,” he said. “Paddle toward that clump of trees” -(they were a mile away), “and we will seek deeper water.” - -A few score strokes and we were nearer the center of the lagoon. With my -bare eyes I could not make out the quality of the bottom but only its -general configuration. Nohea said the distance was twenty fathoms. The -looking-glass disclosed a long ledge with a flat shelf for a score of -feet, and he said he made out a number of large shells. It took the -acutest concentration on my part to find them, with his direction, for -his eyes were twice as keen as mine from a lifetime’s usage upon his -natural surroundings. We sacrificed our birthright of vivid senses to -artificial habits, lights, and the printed page. Nohea made ready to go -down, but changed slightly his method and equipment. He dropped the -iron-hooped net into the water by its line and allowed it to sink to the -ledge. Then he raised it a few feet so that it would swing clear of the -bottom. - -“It will hold my shells and indicate to me exactly where the canoe is,” -he explained. “At this depth, 120 feet, I want to rest immediately on -reaching the surface, and not to have to swim to the canoe. I have not -dived for many months, and I am no longer young.” - -He attached the line to the outrigger, and then, after a fervent prayer -to which I echoed a nervous amen, he began his breathing exercises. -Louder than before and more actively he expanded his lungs until they -held a maximum of stored oxygen, and then with a smile he slid through -the water until he reversed his body and swam. In his left hand now he -had a shell, a single side of a bivalve; and this he moved like an oar -or paddle, catching the water with greater force, and pulling himself -down with it and the stroke of the other arm, as well as a slight motion -of the feet. The entire movement was perfectly suited to his purpose, -and he made such rapid progress that he was beside the hoop-net in less -than a minute. He had a number of pairs of shells stripped from the -shelf and in the swinging net in a few seconds more, and then, drawn by -others he discerned further along the ledge, he swam, and dragged -himself by seizing the coral forms, and reached another bank. I paddled -the canoe gently behind him. I lost sight of him then completely. Either -he was hidden behind a huge stone obelisk or he had gone beyond my power -of sight. - -A gigantic black shape swam into view near the oscillating hoop, and a -horror swept over me. It disappeared, but Nohea was still missing. The -time beat in my veins like a pendulum. Every throb seemed a second, and -they began to count themselves in my brain. How long was it since Nohea -had left me? A minute and a half? Two minutes? That is an age without -breathing. Something must have injured him. Slowly the moments struck -against my heart. I could not look through the _titea mata_ any longer. -Another sixty seconds and despair had chilled me so I shook in the hot -sunshine as with ague. I was cold and weak. Suddenly I felt a pull at -the rope, the canoe moved slightly, and hope grew warm in me. I -perceived an agitation of the water gradually ascending, and in a few -instants the diver sprang out of the lagoon to his waist. He threw his -arm over the outrigger, and bent down in agony. His suffering was -written in the contortion of his face, the blood in his eyes, and a -writhing of his whole body. He gasped madly at his first emergence, and -then his bosom rose and fell in lessening spasms. The cramp which had -convulsed his form relaxed, and, as minute after minute elapsed, his -face lost its rigidity, his pulse slackened to normal, and he said -feebly, “_E tau Atua e!_” With my assistance he hauled himself into the -canoe and lay half prone. - -“You saw no shark?” I asked. - -“I saw his shadow, but it was not he that detained me. I saw a bank -which might hold shells and I explored it. We will see what I have.” - -We pulled up the hoop-net, and in it were thirteen pairs of shells. -These were larger than the others, older, and, as he said, from a more -advantageous place for feeding, so that their residents, being better -nourished had made larger and finer houses for themselves. Some of the -thirteen were eighteen inches across. He said that he had roamed seventy -feet on the bottom, and he had been down two and a half minutes. He had -made observation of the ledges all about and intended going a little -deeper. I had but to look at the rope of the net to gage the distance -for it was marked with knots and bits of colored cotton to give the -lengths like the marks on a lead-line on shipboard. I wanted to demur to -his more dangerous venture, but I did not. This was his avocation and -adventure, his war with the elements, and he must follow it and conquer -or fail. - -Again he dived, and this time at 148 feet. This was almost the limit of -men in suits with air pumps or oxygen-tanks, and they were always let -down and brought up gradually, to accustom their blood to the altering -pressure. Half an hour or an hour was often consumed in hauling a diver -up from the depth from which Nohea sprang in a few seconds. His -transcendent courage and consummate skill were matched by his body’s -trained resistance to the effect of such extreme pressure of water and -the remaining without breathing for so long a time. I could appreciate -his achievements more than most people, for I had seen the divers of -many races at work in many waters. Ninety feet was the boundary of all -except the Paumotuans and those who used machines. But here was Nohea -exceeding that by sixty feet in my view, and I knew that greater depths -must be attained. Impelled by an instantaneous urge to contrast my own -capabilities with Nohea’s, I measured off thirty feet on the line, and, -putting it in his hands to hold, I breathed to my fullest and leaped -overboard. At three lengths of my figure, less than eighteen feet, I -experienced alarm and pain. I unloosed the hoop and it swayed down to -the end of the five fathoms of rope, while I kicked and pulled, and -after an interminable period I had barely touched it again before I -became convinced that if I did not breathe in another second I would -open my mouth. Nohea knew my plight, for he yanked at the rope, and with -his effort and my own frantic exertion I made the air, and humbly hugged -the outrigger until I was myself. Thirty feet! And Nohea had brought up -the shells from 148. - -He paid dearly. Several times of the score that he probed the deeper -retreats of the oysters, he was prostrated for minutes upon his egress -and in throes of severe pain during the readjustment of pressure; but he -continued to pursue his fascinating and near-fatal employment until by -afternoon a heap of heavy, darkish bivalves lay in the canoe. My -curiosity had been heated since I had lifted the first shell, and it was -with increasing impatience that I waited for the milder but not less -interesting phase of his labor, the scrutiny of the interior of the -shells for pearls. - - There are two moments in a divers life; - One, when, a beggar, he prepares to plunge; - Then, when, a prince, he rises with his pearl. - -The poet visioned Nohea’s emotions, perhaps, but he had schooled himself -to postpone his satisfaction until the days harvest was gathered. When -we had paddled the canoe into shallow waters, and the sun was slanting -fast down the western side of earth, Nohea surrendered himself to the -realization or dissipation of his dream. He knew that a thousand shells -contain no pearls, that the princely state came to few in decades. But -the diver had the yearning and credulous mind of the gold prospector, -and lived in expectation as did he. The glint of a pebble, the sheen of -yellow sand, set his pulse to beating more rapidly; and so with the -diver. He knew that pearls of great value had been found many times, and -that one such trove might make him rich for life, independent of daily -toil, and free of the traps and pangs of the plunge. - -Nohea thrust his knife between the blades of a bivalve and pried open -his resisting jaws. True pearls lie in the tissues of the oyster, -generally in the rear of the body and sealed in a pocket. Nohea laid -down the parted shell and seized the animal, and dissected his boneless -substance in a gesture of eager inquiry. I watched his actions with as -sharp response, and sighed as each oyster in turn was thrown into the -bucket, in which was sea-water. When all had been submitted to the test -and no pearl had flashed upon our hopeful eyes we examined the shells, -trusting that though the true pearls had escaped us we might find -blisters, those which, having a point of contact with the shell, are -thus not perfect in shape and skin, but have a flaw. These often have -large value, if they can be skinned to advantage; and the diver put his -smaller hopes upon them. - -With pearls, orient or blister, eliminated, the primary and actually -more important basis of the industry appealed to Nohea. He estimated the -weight and value of the shells, which would be transported to London for -manufacture in the French Department of the Oise into the black pearl -buttons that ornament women’s dresses. These Paumotuan shells were -celebrated for their black borders, _nacre á bord noir_, more valuable -than the gold-lipped product of the Philippines, but a third cheaper -than the silver-lipped shells of Australia. With at least the comfort of -a heavy catch of this less remunerative though hardly less beautiful -creation of the oyster, Nohea pointed out to me that the formation of -the mother-of-pearl or nacre on the shells was from left to right, as if -the oyster were right minded. - -“When the whorls of a shell are from right to left,” he said, “that -shell is valuable as a curiosity. The people of Asia, the Chinese, pay -well for it, and a Chinese shell-buyer now here told me that in Initia -[India] they weighed it with gold in old times. In China they keep such -shells in the temples to hold the sacred oil, and the priests administer -magic medicine in them.” - -Nohea completed the round of the day’s undertaking by macerating the -oysters and throwing them into the lagoon that their spawn might be -released for another generation. He cut off and threaded the adhesive -muscle of the oyster, the _tatari ioro_, to eat when dried. It was -something like the scallop or abalone abductor muscle sold in our -markets. The shells would be put into the sheds or warehouses to dry and -to be beaten and rubbed so as to reduce the bulk of their backs, which -have no value but weigh heavily. - -After we had supped, Nohea and the older divers gathered at Mapuhi’s for -a discussion of the day’s luck, and I went along to the coterie of -traders by Lying Bill’s firm’s store. A cocoanut-husk fire was burning, -and about it sat Bill, McHenry, Llewellyn, Nimau, Mandel, Kopcke, and -others. Mandel was the most notable pearl-buyer and expert here, with an -office in Paris and a warehouse in Papeete. He was huge and with gross -features, and was rated as the richest man in these South Seas. His own -schooner had dropped anchor off Takaroa a few days before with Mrs. -Mandel in command. He might make the bargain for pearls, but she would -do the paying and squeeze the most out of the price to the native. She -ruled with no soft hand, and in her long life had solved many difficult -problems in money-grubbing in this archipelago. Her husband was the head -of the Mandel tribe, but sons and daughter all knew the dancing boards -of the schooner and the intricacies of the pearl-market. Usually Mandel -stayed in Tahiti or visited Paris, but the _rahui_ in Takaroa was too -promising a prize for any of them to remain away, and all of the family -were diligent in intrigue and negotiation. Mandel had handled the finest -pearls of the Paumotus for many years. I had seen Mrs. Mandel come -ashore, in a sheeny yellow Mother-Hubbard or Tahitian _ahu vahine_ and a -cork helmet; but she made her home on her schooner, to which she invited -those from whom her good man had purchased shell or pearls. - -Pearls were, of course, the subject of the talk about the fire. Toae, a -Hikueru man, had found one, and Mandel had it already. He showed it to -me, a pea-shaped, dusky object, with no striking beauty. - -“I may be mistaken,” said Mandel, “but I believe this outside layer is -poorer than one inside. In Paris my employees will peel it and see. It -is taking a chance, but we have a second sight about it. You know a -pearl is like an onion, with successive skins, and we take off a number -sometimes. It reduces the size but may increase the luster. Also we are -using the ultra-violet ray to improve color. I saw a pearl that cost a -hundred thousand francs sold for three hundred thousand after the ray -was used on it. You know a pearl is produced only by a sick oyster. It -is a pathological product like gall-stones, and it is mostly caused by a -tapeworm getting into the oyster’s shell, though a grain of sand is -often the nucleus. The oyster feels the grating or irritating thing and -secretes nacre to cover it. The tapeworm is embalmed in this -mother-of-pearl, and the sand smoothed with it. The material, the nacre, -is the same as the interior of the shell, and the oyster seems not to -stop covering the intruder when the itching has stopped but keeps on out -of habit. And so forms small and big pearls. Now a blister is generally -over a bug or snail, though sometimes it is a stop-gap to keep out a -borer who is drilling through the shell from the outside. The blisters -are usually hollow, whereas a pearl has a yellow center with the -carbonate of lime in concentric prisms. An orient or true pearl is -formed in the muscles of the oyster and does not touch the shell; but -the blister, which generally is part of the shell, may have been started -in the oyster’s sac or folds, and have dropped out or been released to -hold between the oyster and the shell. With these we cut away the -outside down to the original pearl. A blister itself is only good for a -brooch or an ornament, but I have gotten five or ten thousand francs for -the best.” - -Captain Nimau, who was only less clever than Mandel in the lore of -pearls, said that, as the lagoons were often three hundred feet or -deeper in places, it was probable that larger pearls than ever yet -brought up were in these untouched caches. - -“The Paumotuan has descended 180 feet,” said Nimau. “I have plumbed his -dive. A diver with a suit cannot go any deeper, and so we never have -explored the possible beds ’way down. The whole face of the outer reef -may be a vast oyster-bed, but the surf prevents us from investigating. I -have seen in December and March of many years millions of baby oysters -floating into the lagoons with the rising tide, to remain there. They -never go out again but prefer the quiet life where they can grow up -strong and big. The singular thing about these pearl-oysters is that -they can move about. When you try to break them loose from the ledge -they prove to be very firmly attached by their byssus, but they travel -from one shelf to another when they need a change of food. It is not -sand they are most afraid of. They can spit their nacre on it if it gets -in their shells; but it is the little red crab that bothers them most. -You know how often you find the crab living happily in the pearl-shell -because when the oyster feeds he gets his share, and he is too active -for the oyster to kill as it does the worm, by spitting its nacre on him -and entombing him. Some day divers in improved suits will search for the -thousands of pearls that have fallen upon the bottom from dead oysters, -and maybe make millions. _Mais, après tout_, pearls may soon have little -value, for they say that the Japanese and other people are growing them -like mushrooms, and, though they have not yet perfected the orient or -true pearl, they may some day. One man, some kind of foreigner, who used -to be around here, discovered the secret, but it’s lost now.” - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CHAPTER XIII - -Story of the wondrous pearls planted in the lagoon of Pukapuka—Tepeva a - Tepeva, the crippled diver, tells it—How a European scientist - improved on nature—Tragedy of Patasy and Mauraii—The robbed coral - bank—Death under the sea. - -THE palace of the governor was within half a mile of my abode in the -vale of Atuona, on the island of Hiva-Oa, the capital of the Marquesan -Archipelago. It was a broad and deep valley, “the most beautiful, and by -far the most ominous and gloomy, spot on earth,” said Stevenson. -Umbrageous and silent, it was watered by a stream, which, born in the -distant hills, descended in falls and rills and finally a chattering -brook to the bay. Magnificent forests of many kinds of trees, a hundred -vines and flowers, with rarest orchids, and a tangled mass of grasses -and creepers, lined the banks of the little river, and filled the rising -confines of the dell, which, as it climbed, grew narrower and darker, -and more melancholy of aspect, the poignant melancholy of a sad -loveliness past telling or analyzing. A huge fortress of rocks rose -almost sheer above my cottage, lowering in shadow and terrible in storm, -the highest point in the Marquesas. In sunshine it was the brilliant -rampart of the world-god’s battlement, reflecting his flashing rays, and -throwing a sheen of luminosity upon the depths of the strath. This lofty -peak of Temetiu, nearly a mile in the sky, was the tower of a vast -structure of broken hills, gigantic columns, pinnacles, tilted and -vertical rocks, ruins of titanic battles of fire and water in ages gone. -I had but to lift my eyes and lower them to know that man here as in the -Paumotus had but triflingly affected his environment. From the -castellated summits to the beach where I had landed, the dwellings of -humans seemed lost in the dense foliage dominated by the lofty cocoanuts -and the spreading breadfruits. - -The palace of the young French administrator was in a garden in which -grew exotic flowers brought by predecessors who sought to assuage their -nostalgia by familiar charms. The palace had large verandas, and they -were most of it, as in all tropical countries where mosquitoes are not -too menacing. The reading and lounging, the eating and drinking, took -place there, and generally a delicious breeze cooled the humid air and -drove away any insects that might annoy. Almost daily I was the guest of -the governor at a meal, or in the evening after dinner, for a merry hour -or two. We might be alone, or with André Bauda, the tax collector, -postmaster, and chief of police, or not seldom with one or more of the -fairest of the Marquesan girls of the island of Hiva-Oa. For the -governor was host not only to the beauties of our valley of Atuona, but -sent Flag, the native _mutoi_, or policeman, of the capital, to other -villages over the mountains, to invite those whom Flag thought would -lessen his _ennui_. Far from his beloved Midi, the governor retained a -Gallic and gallant attitude toward young women, and never tired of their -prattle, their insatiable thirst for the beverages of France, and their -light laughter when lifted out of their habitual gravity by these. -Determined to learn their tongue as quickly as possible, being no longer -resident than I in the Marquesas, he kept about him a lively lexicon or -two to furnish him words and practice. Midnight often came with the rest -of the village already hours upon their sleeping-mats, but on the palace -porches a gabble of conversation, the lilt of a chant, or perhaps the -patter of a hula dance of bare feet upon the boards. The Protestant and -Catholic missionaries, though opposed to each other upon doctrinal and -disciplinary subjects, united in condemnation of the conduct of the high -representative of sovereignty. But, like the governor of the Paumotus, -he replied: “_La vie est triste; vive la bagatalle._” Life is sad; let -joy be unconfined. - -The governor’s _ménage_ had only one attendant, Song of the Nightingale, -and he served only because he was a prisoner, and preferred the domestic -duties to repairing trails or sitting all day in the calaboose by the -beach. There was no servant in the Marquesas. Whatever civilization had -done to them,—and it had undone them almost entirely,—it had not made -them menials. There was never a slave. Here death was preferable. In -Tahiti one might procure native domestics with extreme difficulty -through their momentary craving for gauds, or through affection, but one -bought no subservience. The silent, painstaking European or American or -Asiatic, the humble, sir-ring butler and footman, could not be matched -in the South Seas. If they liked one, these indolent people would work -for one now and then, but must be allowed to have their own way and say, -and, if reproved, it must be in the tone one used to a child or a -relative. The governor himself was compelled to endure Song of the -Nightingale’s lapses and familiarities, because he was the only -procurable cook in the islands. He could not buy or persuade one of his -lovely guests, clothed as they were but in a single garment, to wash a -plate or shake a mat. I, it was true, was assisted by Exploding Eggs, a -boy of fourteen years, but I made him an honored companion and neophyte -whom I initiated into the mysteries of coffee-making and sweeping, and -he, too, often wandered away for a day or two without warning. - -The table was spread on the veranda when at seven o’clock I opened the -garden gate of the palace. Flag had delivered to me an enveloped card -with studious ceremony, the governor sometimes observing the extreme -niceties of official hospitality, and again throwing them to the winds, -especially in very hot weather. Flag, barelegged and barefooted as -always, wore the red-striped jacket of the _mutoi_ and a loin-cloth, and -carried a capacious leather pouch from which he had extracted the -made-in-Paris _carte d’invitation_. To him it was a mysterious summons -to a Lucullan feast which he might not even look upon. The governor was -dressing when I mounted the porch, and I was received by Song of the -Nightingale. He was a middle-aged desperado, with a leering face, given -a Mephistophelian cast by a black whisker extending from ear to ear, and -by heavy lines of blue tattooing upon his forehead. He had white blood -in him, I felt sure, for he had a cunning wickedness of aspect that -lacked the simplicity of the Marquesan. He had been a prisoner many -years for various offenses, but mostly for theft or moonshining, at -which he was adept, and he was the one Marquesan I would not trust; he -had been too much with whites. One wondered at times whether one’s life -was not the pawn of a mood of such a villain, but the French had -hammered their dominion upon these sons of man-eaters with lead and -steel in the early days, though they were easy and negligent rulers over -the feeble remnant. - -The handsome governor came from his boudoir as Vehine-hae and Tahia-veo -said “_Kaoha!_” Vehine-hae and Tahia-veo were their names in Marquesan, -which translated exactly Ghost Girl and Miss Tail. The latter was a -_petite_, engaging girl of seventeen, a brunette in color, and modest -and sweet in disposition. Ghost Girl was the enigma of her sex there, -nineteen or twenty, living alone in a detached hut, and singularly -beautiful. She was as dark as a Nubian, with a voluptuous figure, small -hands and feet, and baggage eyes of melting sepia that promised devotion -unutterable. Her nose was straight and perfect, and her sensual mouth -filled with shining teeth. Of all the Marquesan girls she wore a -travesty of European dress. They in public wore a tight-fitting -_peignoir_ or tunic, and in private a _pareu_, but Ghost Girl had on a -silk bodice open to disclose her ripe symmetry, and a lace petticoat -about which she wore a silk kerchief. In her ebon heap of hair she wore -the phosphorescent flowers of the Rat’s Ear. Her mind was that of a -child of ten, inquisitive and acquisitive, exhibitive and demanding. - -The governor seated us, the ladies opposite each other, and the dinner -began with appetizers of vermouth. The aromatic wine, highly fortified -as it was, burned the throat of Miss Tail, but Ghost Girl drank hers -with zest, and said, “_Motaki!_ That’s fine!” Neither of the girls spoke -more than a few sentences of French, though they had both been in the -nuns’ school, but we were able with our knowledge of Marquesan and -Song’s fragmentary French to carry on a lively interchange of words, if -not of thought. - -The governor had shot a few brace of _kuku_, the green doves of the -forest, and Song had spitted them over a _purau_ wood fire. With the -haunch of a wild goat from the hills we had excellent fare, with claret -and white wine from Sauterne. We two palefaces wielded forks, but as no -Polynesians use such very modern inventions the ladies lifted their meat -to their months without artificial aid. Ghost Girl, as befitting her -European attire, tried to use a fork, but shrieked with pain when she -succeeded in putting only the tines into her tongue. We hardly realize -the pains our mothers were at to teach us table-manners, nor that -gentlemen of Europe ate with their fingers at a period when chop-sticks -were in common use in China and Japan, except in time of mourning. - -Song of the Nightingale, who, doubtless, had indulged his convict -hankering for alcohol in the secret recesses of the kitchen, laughed -loudly at Ghost Girl’s pain, and when he placed a platter of the _kuku_ -on the cloth, and she refused to accept one of the grilled birds his -snigger became derisive. He took up the carving-fork and stuck it deep -into a _kuku’s_ breast and put it on her plate. She shuddered and -started back, with her hands covering her long-lashed eyes. The governor -demanded in a slightly angry tone to know what Song had done to frighten -her. The cook explained that Ghost Girl was of Hanavave, on the island -of Fatuhiva, a day’s journey distant, and that the _bon dieu_ or god—he -said _pony-too_—of Fatuhiva was the _kuku_. She had been appalled at his -suggestion that she should eat the symbolic tenement of her mother’s -deity, though she herself ate the transubstantiated host at communion in -the Catholic church at Atuona. Not content with his insult to her -ancestral god, and, taking his cue from the governor’s roar of laughter -at his French or his explanation, the cruel Song said a bitter thing to -Ghost Girl. - -“Eat the _kuku_!” he said. “It will taste better than your grandmother -did.” - -“_Tuitui!_ Shut your mouth!” retorted Vehine-hae. “There were no thieves -in our tribe.” - -That was a hot shot at Song’s crimes and penal record, and so animated -became their repartee that the governor had to call a halt and demand -mutual apologies. The _chef_ informed him that his father in a foray -upon Hanavave had taken as a prize of war the grandmother of Ghost Girl, -and had eaten her, or at least, whatever tidbit he had liked. It was -history that she had been eaten in Taaoa, Song’s home, in the next -valley to Atuona. No more vindictive remark than this, nor more hateful -action than his offering the _kuku_ to Ghost Girl, could be imagined in -the rigid etiquette of Marquesas society. The tears were in the soft -eyes of Vehine-hae, and the alarmed governor dismissed Song from further -service that evening and took the weeping Fatuhivan in his arms to -console her. - -“_Tapu!_ _Tapu!_” sobbed Ghost Girl. The _kuku_ was _tapu_ to her teeth, -as the American flag would be to the feet of a patriot. Song was without -other belief than in the delight of drink, but Ghost Girl was a woman, -the support of every new cult and the prop of every old one. -Superstition the world over will die last in the breast of the female. -She survives subjugated races, and conserves the past, because her -instincts are stronger and her faculties less active than man’s, and her -need of worship overwhelming. - -That word _tapu_ was still one to conjure with in the Marquesas. Flag, -the policeman, and sole deputy of _Commissaire_ Bauda on the island of -Hiva-Oa, had invoked it a few days before, after an untoward incident. -Bauda and I had returned on horseback from a journey to the other side -of the island, and, at the post-tax-police office near the beach where -Bauda lived, encountered Flag, drunk. Son of a famous dead chief, and -himself an amiable, bright man of thirty, he had not resisted the -temptation of Bauda’s being gone for a day, to abstract a bottle of -absinthe from a closet and consume the quart. Bauda upbraided him and -ordered him to his house, but Flag seized a loaded rifle and sounded an -ancient battle-cry. It had the blood-curdling quality of an Indian -whoop. - -Neither Bauda nor I was armed, and I was for shelter behind a -cocoanut-tree. That would not do for Bauda, nor for discipline. - -“Me with six campaigns in Africa! _Moi qui parle!_” exclaimed the former -officer of the Foreign Legion, as he tapped his breast and voiced his -astonishment at Flag’s temerity. He strode toward the staggering -_mutoi_, and, with utter disregard of the rifle, reached his side. He -wrenched the weapon from him, and with a series of kicks drove him into -the calaboose and locked the door on him. - -[Illustration: - - Photo from L. Gauthier - Ghost girl -] - -[Illustration: - - A double canoe -] - -“That means ten years in Noumea for him,” said the _commissaire_, -savagely. But after dinner, which I got, when he had meditated upon -Flag’s willingness as a cook and his ability to collect taxes, he -lessened the sentence to a year at hard labor. I was not surprised to -meet Flag at noon the next day with his accustomed white jacket with its -red stripe upon the arm. Man cannot live without cooks, and perhaps I -had aided leniency by burning a bird. - -Flag explained to me, though sheepishly, that, overcome by the _litre_ -of absinthe as he was, he would not have injured a hair of Bauda’s head. - -“Bauda is _tapu_. I would meet an evil fate did I touch him,” said Flag, -when sober and sorry. - -I stumbled on _tapus_ daily. Vai Etienne, my neighbor, gave me a feast -one day, and half a dozen of us, all men, sat at table. Vai Etienne, -having lived several years in Tahiti had Frenchified ways. His mother, -the magnificent Titihuti, who was splendidly tattooed from toe to waist, -and who was my adopted mother, waited upon us. Offering her a glass of -wine, and begging her to sit with us, I discovered that the glass her -son drank from and the chair a man sat in were _tapu_ to her. She took -her wine from a shell, but would not sit at table with us. Of course, -she never sat in chairs, anyhow, nor did Vai Etienne, but he had -provided these for the whites. - -The subject of the _tapus_ of the South Seas was endless. The custom, -_tabu_ or _kapu_ in Hawaiian, and _tambu_ in Fijian, was ill expressed -in our “taboo,” which means the pressure of public sentiment, or family -or group feeling. _Tapus_ here were the conventions of primitive people -made awe-inspiring for enforcement because of the very willfulness of -these primitives. The custom here and throughout society dated from the -beginning of legend. Laws began with the rules laid down by the old man -of the family and made dread in the tribe or sept by the hocus-pocus of -the medicine man. _Tapus_ may have been the foundation of all penal laws -and etiquette. The Jews had a hundred niceties of religious, sanitary, -and social _tapus_. Warriors were _tapu_ in Homer’s day, and land and -fish were _tapu_ to Grecian warriors, according to Plato. Confucius in -the “Li Ki,” ordained men and women not to sit on the same mat, nor have -the same clothes-rack, towel, or comb, nor to let their hands touch in -giving and receiving, nor to do a score of other trivial things. The old -Irish had many _tapus_ and totems, and many legends of harm wrought by -their breaking, a famous one being “The Destruction of Da Derga’s -Hostel.” - -In the Marquesas _tapus_ were the most important part of life, as -ceremony was at the court of the kings of France. They governed almost -every action of the people, as the rules of a prison do convicts, or the -precepts of a monastery monks. Death followed the disobedience of many, -and others preserved one from the hands of enemies. There being no -organized government in Polynesia, _tapus_ took the place of laws and -edicts. They were, in fact, spiritual laws, superstition being the force -instead of a penal code. They imposed honesty, for if a man had any dear -possession, he had the priest _tapu_ it and felt secure. _Tapus_ -protected betrothed girls and married women from rakes. - -A young woman who worked at the convent in Atuona, near me, was made -_tapu_ against all work. She was never allowed to touch food until it -had been prepared for her. If she broke the _tapu_ the food was thrown -away. From infancy, when a _taua_ had laid the prohibition upon her, she -lived in disagreeable idleness, afraid to break the law of the priest. -Only in recent years did the nuns laugh away her fears, and set her to -helping in their kitchen. She told me that she could not explain the -reason for her having been _tapu_ from effort, as the _taua_ had died -who chained her, without informing her. - -If a child crawled under a house in the building, the house was burned. -If I were building a boat, and, for dislike of me, some one named aloud -the boat after my father, I destroyed the boat. Blue was _tapu_ to women -in Nuku-Hiva, and red, too. They could not eat bonito, _squid_, _popii_, -and _koehi_. They might not eat bananas, cocoanuts, fresh breadfruit, -pigs of brown color, goats, fowls and other edibles. - -Females were forbidden to climb upon the sacred _paepaes_, to enter the -men’s club-houses (this _tapu_ was enforced in America until the last -few years), to eat with men, to smoke inside the house, to carry mats on -their heads, and, saddest of all, to weep. Children might not carry one -another pickaback. The _kuavena_ fish was _tapu_ to fishermen, as also -_peata_, a kind of shark. - -To throw human hair upon the ground was strictly prohibited. It might be -trodden on, and bring mischief upon the former wearer. So the chiefs -would never walk under anything that might be trodden on, and aboard -ships never went below deck, for that reason. Perhaps our superstition -as to walking under ladders is derived from such a _tapu_. To stretch -one’s hand or an object over the head of any one was _tapu_. There were -a hundred things _tapu_ to one sex. Men had the advantage in these -rules, for they were made by men. - -The earthly punishments for breaking _tapus_ ran from a small fine to -death, and from spoliation to ostracism and banishment. Though there -were many arbitrary _tapus_, the whims and fantasies of chiefs, or the -wiles of priests, the majority of them had their beginning in some real -or fancied necessity or desirability. Doubtless they were distorted, -but, like circumcision and the Mosaic barring of pork to the Jews, here -was health or safety of soul or body concerned. One might cite the Ten -Commandments as very old _tapus_. - -The utter disregard for the _tapus_ of the Marquesans shown by the -whites eventually had caused them to fall into general disrepute. They -degenerated as manners decayed under the influx of barbarians into Rome, -as Greek art fell before the corruption of the people. The Catholic, who -bowed his head and struck his breast at the exaltation of the host, -could understand the veneration the Marquesans had for their chief -_tapus_, and their horror at the conduct of the rude sailors and -soldiers who contemned them. But when they saw that no gods revenged -themselves upon the whites, that no devil devoured their vitals when -they ate _tapu_ breadfruit or fish or kicked the high priest from the -temple, the gentle savages made up their minds that the magic had lost -its potency. So, gradually, though to some people _tapus_ were yet very -sacred, the fabric built up by thousands of years of an increasingly -elaborate system of laws and rites, melted away under the breath of -scorn. The god of the white man was evidently greater than theirs. -Titihuti, a constant attendent of the Catholic church, yet treasured a -score of _tapus_, and associated with them these others, the dipping of -holy water from the _bénitier_, the crossing herself, the kneeling and -standing at mass, the telling of her beads, and the kissing of the -cross. - -The abandonment of _tapus_ under the ridicule and profanation of the -whites relaxed the whole intricate but sustaining Marquesan economy. -Combined with the ending of the power of chiefs of hereditary caste, the -doing away with _tapus_ as laws set the natives hopelessly adrift on an -uncharted sea. Right and wrong were no longer right or wrong. - -This fetish system was very aptly called a plague of sacredness. - -“Whoever was sacred infested everything he touched with consecration to -the gods, and whatever had thus the microbe of divinity communicated to -it could communicate it to other things and persons, and render them -incapable of common use or approach. Not till the priest had removed the -divine element by ceremonies and incantations could the thing or person -become common or fit for human use or approach again.” - -The Marquesan priests strove with might and main to extend the _tapus_, -for they meant power and gain. Wise and strong chiefs generally had -private conferences with the priests and looked to it that _tapus_ did -not injure them. - -Allied with _tapuism_ was what is called in Hawaii _kahunaism_, that is -the witchcraft of the priests, the old wizards, who combined with the -imposing and lifting of the bans, the curing or killing of people by -enchantment. Sorcery or spells were at the basis of most primitive -medicine. At its best it was hypnotism, mesmerism, or mind power. After -coming through thousands of years of groping in physic and surgery, we -are adopting to a considerable degree the methods of the ancient -priests, the theurgy, laying on of hands, or invoking the force of mind -over matter, or stated Christly methods of curing the sick. In Africa -witchcraft or voodooism attains more powers than ever here, but even in -Polynesia the test of a priest’s powers was his ability to kill by -willing it. In the New Zealand witchcraft schools no man was graduated -until he could make some one die who was pointed out as his subject. A -belief in this murderous magic is shared by many whites who have lived -long in Polynesia or New Zealand. It was still practised here, and held -many in deadly fear. The victims died under it as if their strength ran -out like water. - -The most resented exclusion against women in the Marquesas, and one of -the last to be broken, was from canoes. Lying Bill, as the first seaman -who sailed their ships here, had met shoals of women swimming out miles -to the vessel as it made for port. In his youth they did not dare enter -a canoe in Hiva-Oa. They tied their _pareus_ on their heads and swam -out, clambered aboard the ships miles from land with the _pareus_ still -dry. - -“They’d jump up on the bulwarks,” said Lying Bill, “an’ make their -twilight before touchin’ the deck. The men would come out in canoes an’ -find the women had all the bloomin’ plunder.” - -This _tapu_, most important to the men, was maintained until a Pankhurst -sprang from the ranks of complaining but inactive women. There being -many more men, women had always had a singular sex liberty, but, as I -have said, the artful men had invoked rigid _tapus_ to keep them from -all water-craft. The females might have three or four husbands, might -outshine an Aspasia in spell of pulchritude and collected tribute, and -the portioned men must submit for passion’s sake, but when economics had -concern, the pagan priests brought orders directly from deity. - -The dread gods of the High Place, the demons of the _Paepae Tapu_, had -centuries before sealed canoes against women. In canoes women might -wander; they might visit other bays and valleys, even other islands, and -learn of the men of other tribes. They might go about and fall victims -to the enemies of the race. They might assume to enter the Fae Enata, -the House of Council, which was on a detached islet. - -And they certainly would catch other fish than those they now snared -from rocks or hooked, as both swam in the sea. Fish are much the diet of -the Marquesans, and were propitiations to maid and wife—the current coin -of the food market. To withhold fish was to cause hunger. The men alone -assumed the hazard of the tossing canoe, the storms, the hot eye of the -vertical sun, and the devils of the deep who grappled with the fisher; -and theirs was the reward, and theirs the weapons of control. - -But there were always women who grumbled, women who even laughed at such -sacred things, and women who persisted. Finally the very altar of the -Forbidden Height was shaken by their madness. How and what came of it -were told me by an old priest or sorcerer, as we sat in the shade of the -great banyan on the beach and waited for canoes to come from the -fishing. - -The sorcerer and I passed the ceremonial pipe, and his words were slow, -as becoming age and a severe outlook on life. - -“There were willful women who would destroy the _tapu_ against entering -canoes?” I asked, to urge his speech. - -“_E_, it was so!” he said. - -“_Me imui?_ What happened?” I queried further. - -“A long time this went on. My grandfather told me of a woman who talked -against that _tapu_ when he was a boy.” - -“And she—?” - -“She enraged the gods. She corrupted even men. A council was held of the -wise old men, and the words went forth from it. She was made to keep -within her house, and a _tapu_ against her made it forbidden to listen -to her wildness. In each period another woman arose to do the same, and -more were corrupted. Some women stole canoes and were drowned. The -sharks even hated them for their wickedness. We pointed out what fate -had befallen them, but other women returned boasting. We slew some of -these. But still it went on. You know, foreigner, how the _pokoko_ -enters a valley. One coughs and then another, and from the sea to the -peak of Temetiu, many are made sick by the evil. It was so with us, and -that revolt against religion.” - -He sighed and rubbed his stomach. - -“Is it not time they came?” he asked. - -“_Epo_, by and by,” I answered. “Why did you men not yield? After all, -what did it really matter?” - -“_O te Etua e!_ The gods of the High Place forbade, for the women’s own -sake!” he said indignantly, and muttered further. - -To break down every sacred relation of centuries! To shatter the -tradition of ages! To unsex their beloved mothers, wives, and sisters by -the license of canoe riding! The dangers and the hardships of the carven -tree were to be spared the consolers of men’s labor and perils. - -“Did the gods speak out plainly and severely?” - -The _taua_ looked at me quizzically. Foreigners mock holy things of -nature. The bishop here had kicked the graven image of the deity of the -cocoanut-tree. - -“_Ea!_ Po, the god of night, who rules the hereafter, spoke. The priest, -the high priest, received the message. You know that grove by the Dark -Cave. He heard the voice from the black recesses. _Tapu haa_, it said. A -double _tapu_ against any woman even lifting a paddle, or putting one -toe, or her heel, or her shadow within a canoe. All the women were not -wicked. Many believed their place was in the _huaa_, the home. These -refused to join the brazen hussies, the deserters of the _popoi_ pit. -But the dance was dull, and there was strife. The _huona_, the artists, -the women who rejoice men when they are merry, the women with three or -more husbands, they all seemed to have the madness. They gained some of -the younger men to their side, and they built that long house by those -breadfruit-trees. They held their palaver there, and they refused to lie -under their own _faa_, their roofs of pandanus. They would not dance by -the light of the blazing candlenuts the mad _hura-hura_, nor let those -bravers of the sea share their mats on the _paepae_ of the valley. Many -husbands fought one another when their wife did not return. The tribe -grew apart.” - -He sighed and took a shark’s tooth from his loin-cloth, with which he -scraped our pipe. - -I went and lay where the curling sea caressed my naked feet. I was -within easy distance of the _taua’s_ voice. One must not hurry even in -speech in these Isles of Leisure. The old man blew through the bowl and -then the stem, and, taking pieces of tobacco from his _pareu_, he packed -the pipe and lit it. He drew a long whiff first, as one pours wine first -in one’s own glass, and handed it to me. - -He responded when I put the pipe again between his trembling fingers. - -“The gods grew weary. Messages but few came from them. Priests’ wives -even ceased to cook the breadfruit on the hot stones, and went to live -in that accursed _haa ite_.” - -“We esteem such a long house, and call it a club,” I interposed in -subconscious defense of my own habits. - -“_Oti_! Maybe. Your island forgot wisdom early. You even cook your fish. -We will make the fire now.” - -I rose and shook off the warm salt water from my body. My _pareu_ of -blue with white stars was on a descending branch of the banyan. I put it -about my thighs and folded it for holding. Then arm in arm we walked to -our own house on the raised _paepae_ of great basalt stones. - -I heaped the dried cocoanut fiber in a hollow of a rock, and about it -set the polished coral of our kitchen. A spark from the pipe set it -afire, and, heaped with more fiber and wood of the hibiscus, before long -the stones blushed with the heat, and, growing redder yet, were ready -for their service. - -The priest of old had withdrawn to make a sauce of limes and sea-water, -which he brought out within the half-hour from the penthouse in which we -stored our simple goods. It was in a _tanoa_ formerly used for _kava_, a -trencher of the false ebony, black in life, but turned by the years of -decoction of the mysterious narcotic to a marvelous green. It was like -an ancient bronze in the open. Here we were both ready for our delayed -food, I, beside the glowing coral stones, the bones of once living -organisms, and the old man, with his bowl of sauce. But the food -tarried. - -He fluttered about the _paepae_ and chewed a bit of the hibiscus wood to -stay his hunger. In the breadfruit-grove the _komako_, the Marquesan -nightingale, deceived by a lowering cloud or perhaps impelled by a -sudden passion, was early pouring his soul into the shadowy air. I -tended my fire and wondered at man’s small relation to most of creation. - -“Go, my son,” said the _taua_ impatiently, “to the opening of the -forest, and see if they do not come over the waves!” - -I strolled to where the beach met the jungle. An outrigger canoe was -coming through the surf. A faint shout from it reached me. I ran back to -him where he still chewed an inedible splinter. - -“_Epo_,” I said, and made the fire fiercer. He stirred his _mitiaroa_, -the sauce, and watered his lips. - -“How was the _tapu_ broken finally?” I asked, casually. - -“They are long away,” he observed with his eyes on the break in the -trees. - -“They are just now beaching the canoe,” I said soothingly. “We will eat -in a moment. But _taua_, you leave me hungry for that last word. - -“The women of Oomoa tried to break down your _tapu_ of time immemorial -against their entering canoes, and there was trouble. The gods were -against them, and yet to-day—” - -“The gods got tired,” he interrupted me. “The chiefs became afraid of -the continuous _hakapahi i te faufau_, the excitement and turmoil. You -know the chiefs and priests decided all things. Now the women cried out -for a _vavaotina_, for each one of the tribe to lay a candlenut in one -of two _popoi_ troughs. One was assent to the _tapu_, and the other -against it.” - -There was argument first, said the _taua_. After the priests had called -down the curse of Po and other gods of might on all who would invoke a -popular judgment of a sacred and time-webbed commandment, the chiefs -pictured the dangers to women and to canoes, to the tribe and the -valley, if women broke loose from the centuried bonds that forbade -canoeing. Older women and some younger beauties, the latter fearing hurt -to their prestige by less luxurious belles, urged the inviolability of -the _tapu_. - -The women of the Long House, the rebels, merely demanded instant casting -of the _ama_ nuts into the _hoana_. He himself, the _taua_ said, then -made the great error of his life. He swiftly counted in his mind those -for and against, and, convinced that he had a huge majority for the -prevailing law and order, shouted out that the _vavaotina_, though long -disused, was just and truly Marquesan. - -The troughs were brought from a near-by house to the beach, and the -trial was staged. - -“At that moment,” said the old priest, “a canoe which had been cunningly -making its way to the shore, as if by a prearranged signal, suddenly -took the breakers and came careening upon the sand. Out of it stepped -Taipi, a woman of that red-headed tribe of Tahuata, arranged her kilt of -_tapa_, and advanced. She was like an apparition, but fatal to my count. -She was a _moi kanahau_, beautiful and strong, and the first woman who -had ever come except as a prisoner from that fierce island. But she was -stronger in her desires than any man. She was unbelieving and unafraid -of sacred things. A hundred men sprang forward to greet Taipi. American, -she was as the red jasmine, as the fire of the oven, odorous and lovely, -but hot to the touch and scorching to know. That woman laughed at the -men, and, as if word had been sent her, took her place among the women. -She seized a candlenut and threw it exactly into the unholy _hoana_. - -“‘O men of Oomoa,’ she cried, ‘so you fear that women may paddle faster -and better than you! _Haametau hae!_ You are cowards. Look, I have come -a night and a day alone, and no shark god has injured me and I am not -weary.’ - -“There followed a shower of candlenuts into the demon trough, as the -stones from the slings in battle. We were beaten, as youth ever defeats -age when new gods are powerful. Our day and the power of all _tapus_ -waned and ended soon. Once in the canoes those women made us release the -_tapu_ against their eating bananas and, later, pig. In a thousand years -no Marquesan woman had tasted a banana or eaten pig. They were for the -men and there were good reasons known to the gods. But let woman leave -ever so little way the narrow path of obedience and of doing without -things that are evil for her, and she knows no limits. She is without -the _koekoe_, the spirit that is in man. The race has fallen on sorrow.” - -He sat down on his powerful haunches and chanted an improvisation about -the lost splendor. Low and mournful, the psalm of a Jeremiah, his deep -voice rumbled as he fixed his dark eyes on the great globes of the -breadfruit hanging by the plaited roof of the hut. - -And through an opening of the forest came the two women of his -household, Very White and Eyes of the Great Stars, heavily laden with -their morning’s catch of fish. They came tripping over the green carpet -of the forest, laughing at some incident of their fishing, and threw -down beside him the strung circles of shining _ika_, large and brilliant -_bonito_, the mackerel of brilliancy, and the _maoo_, the gay and gaudy -flying-fish. - -“Oh, ho! sorcerer,” said I. “Did ever men match with the cunning of -these scaly ones with greater luck? The stones are ready for their -broiling.” - -The _taua_ made a wry face and stirred his sauce. He dipped a _popo_ -into it and ate it greedily, bones and all. - -“_E, e!_” he said and spat out the words. “_Piau!_ The women catch their -own fish now.” - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CHAPTER XIV - -The palace of the governor of the Marquesas in the vale of - Atuona—Monsieur L’Hermier des Plantes, Ghost Girl, Miss Tail, and - Song of the Nightingale—_Tapus_ in the South Seas—Strange - conventions that regulate life—A South Seas Pankhurst—How women won - their freedom. - -IN Mapuhi’s store, on the counter, taken from the cabin of the _County -of Roxburgh_, lay twenty-five pearls. They were of different values, two -or three magnificent in size, in shape, and in luster, the fruit of -Mapuhi’s tribe’s harvest in Takaroa Lagoon. He displayed them to me and -others the night before I was to sail with Lying Bill for the Marquesas -Islands. Aaron Mandel was about to buy them, and as the Parisian dealer -and Mapuhi discussed their worth, Bill, McHenry, Kopcke, Nimau, and -others added their opinions. - -“If you paid for these pearls what they cost in suffering, and in -proportion to the earnings of a diver in his lifetime, you would offer -me ten times what you do,” said Mapuhi. “The white women who wear these -_poe_ can never know the dangers or the pain endured by our people. Two -have _aninia_, vertigo, and one has been made permanently deaf this -_rahui_.” - -“I agree with you,” replied Mandel, “that nothing of money can balance -what you Paumotuans go through to gather shells, but in many parts of -the world divers of other races are doing the same. They don’t go as -deep as you do, because their waters are shallower, but they fix the -price for pearls. I have seen them from Ceylon to Australia, and I have -to meet their competition when I take these pearls to Paris where the -market is. Also, Mapuhi, the culture pearl is every year hurting our -trade more and more, and some day may make pearls so cheap that you will -get a third of what you do now. You remember the Taote of _Pukapuka!_” - -“That was the devil’s magic, and it will not be again,” said Mapuhi. -“Man who loves and serves the true God will never interfere with his -secrets, but will accept what he offers for man’s struggles and -torments. The Taote was tempted by Satan, and his sin was terribly -punished.” - -Mandel smiled. - -[Illustration: - - From the painting by Oscar F. Schmidt - A young palm in Atuona -] - -[Illustration: - - From the painting by Oscar F. Schmidt - Atuona valley and the peak of Temetiu -] - -“Yes the Taote got a rough deal,” he admitted. “But his pearls made -another man’s fortune, and astonished all who saw them in Paris. Let me -tell you! Last year I visited three culture fields, and they are doing -wonderful things. The Japanese for many years only copied the methods of -the Chinese. They forced the fresh water mussel and the abalone to coat -with nacre substances they inserted within their folds, but they got no -pearls of the best size, shape, or luster. Now, Kokichi Mikimoto has -gone much further than anybody. I spent a week with him at his pearl -farm in the bay of Ago in the Inland Sea of Japan. The bay is a dozen -miles long and five wide, with an average depth of sixty feet, but it is -remarkably free from currents and severe storms. Mikimoto is a scientist -as was the _Taote_. He opens a three-year-old shell and lays a head of -nacre on the outer, shell-secreting skin of the oyster. This skin is -then dissected off the oyster and fitted about the bead like a sac. This -sac is then transplanted into the tissues of another oyster in its -shell, an astringent is sprinkled on the wound, and the second oyster is -planted in the prepared bed at anywhere from twenty-five to eighty feet. -It stays there from three to seven years, and then his girl diver brings -it up. Mind you, he has laid down suitable rocks in certain shallow -places, and when they are covered with oyster spat they are removed to -deeper beds and set out in order. It is these which are dissected at -three years of age, and the nuclei inserted in them. These beads are of -all colors, mother-of-pearl or pink or blue coral, and the pearls are of -the color, white or pink or blue, of the beads. The oysters often spit -them out, the starfish and octopus ravage the beds, and the red current -sometimes spoils everything for a year. They have similar farms in other -parts of Japan, and in Australia and Ceylon, but Mikimoto has done most. -He sells millions of pearls every year. Of course they are blisters and -so not orient or perfect, because the bead has touched the shell while -growing, and has not remained in the folds of the oyster. But I am -afraid, for I was told a few months ago that Mikimoto and others were -making perfect pearls. If they do they will ruin the market.” - -“You can tell the difference between natural and culture pearls in any -case?” I asked. - -“_Mais oui!_ If you cut open the grafted pearl you find the center a -bead or bit of coral, but in the true pearl the center is a grain of -sand, or a hollow formerly occupied by the tapeworm or parasite. Well, -you won’t make any money cutting pearls open, so we use the ultra-violet -ray. Most of Mikimoto’s pearls are about as big as French peas, and, as -I say, lack sphericity because of attachment to the inner shells. But, -mind you, his oysters are merely the avicule or wing-shelled kind, and -small. Here are these Paumotu shells from six to eighteen inches across -and the oysters in proportion. Think of what they might do, if they were -put to work by science and—” - -“They were once,” broke in Kopcke. “My girl’s father knows all about -it.” - -“I know much about it, too,” said Mandel; “and I have never known just -what to believe. I only know that some one sold a string of pearls in -Paris finer than any in the world, and they are now in New York. - -“The Empress Eugénie’s necklace came from here, and so did Queen -Victoria’s five-thousand-pound pearl, but these were said to be finer.” - -“For heaven’s sake!” I exclaimed. “Tell me what you do know of this -mysterious _Taote_ and his tragedy. Mapuhi has put the devil to work in -it. I have been hearing talk about it since I landed in Tahiti.” - -“Come down to my shack,” said Kopcke, “and I will get old Tepeva a -Tepeva to tell you his part of it.” - -“I will finish with Mapuhi,” Mandel said, “and will be along in ten -minutes.” - -That the fixing of a price for the twenty-five pearls was not to be -concluded in public was evident, and so Kopcke, Lying Bill, and we -others sauntered to Kopcke’s hut. Nowhere do whites despise one another -as feelingly as in the South Seas. Their competition in business and in -love is so intimate and so acute that there are no distances nor -withholdings of emotion. The finesse and impersonal euchering of rivals -practised on mainlands is not copied in this hotter and more primitive -mart where adversaries are of ruder breed, and courtesy is considered -weakness. As we strolled under the palms to Kopcke’s house, McHenry said -to me, “This _Taote_, this doctor or magician they gab about, I knew -better than anybody else, an’ he was a bloomin’ queer ’un. I kept a -store at Penrhyn for years, and this fellow was around there studyin’ -the lagoon. Everybody called him Doc, but whether he was a M.D. I don’t -know. He had a tool-chest, though, like a bloody sawbones, and could fix -a cut or saw off an arm fine. He had michaelscropes and all sorts o’ -professor junk, an’ he was good-hearted, and had money enough, too.” - -“I remember the fellow well,” Lying Bill interposed. “’E was a han’some -man, big as Landers, and dark as Llewellyn. ’E ’ad gold ’air, but never -wore a ’at, blow ’igh, blow low, an’ so ’is ’air was so bleedin’ -sunburned, it was all colors. ’E was a furriner, an’ ’ad studied in -Germany,—if ’e wasn’t a German,—though ’e was a reg’ler pollyglut and -parlayed every lingo. ’E ’ad a ’ole chemist shop with ’im on Penrhyn. I -used to see ’im treatin’ the lepers and studyin’ oysters night an’ day. -At first, I thought he might be a buyer, an’ watched ’im, but he ’ad no -time for tradin’. In the divin’ season ’e was always around the lagoons, -an’ ’e’d look at every pearl and the shell it come out of. ’E was a -myst’ry, ’e was, an’ made no friends with anybody. The natives called -’im _Itataupoo Taote_, ’Atless Doctor. ’E played a deep game, ’e did.” - -At Kopcke’s shack he made us welcome. Lamps were lighted, and cigarettes -and a black bottle of rum set on the counter. - -“I’ll go and hunt up the old man to spin you the yarn,” said Kopcke, and -disappeared in the darkness of the outside. Mandel came before he -returned, and as the talk was still on the _Taote_ he gathered up his -thread of it. - -“This magician’s name was Horace Sassoon, and he was of a rich and fine -family in England,” said Mandel. “I knew much about him because I cashed -his drafts more than once. He was a medical doctor, educated in Germany, -France, and England, and he had been seven or eight years in India. -While in Ceylon or the Arabian Gulf he investigated the pearl fisheries -and got interested in the processes of mother-of-pearl secretion by -oysters. I think he was a real savant, and that he had a strong interest -in the treatment of lepers by the chaulmoogra oil and the X-ray. He told -me that he wanted to endow a great institution in India, but that he was -unable to raise the funds. Me, I am credulous, but I believe the -institution was a beautiful woman who spent much money. He had an income -sent from Paris to Tahiti, and the drafts, not large, came through my -house. I would meet him, as you men did, in Papeete or in these atolls, -or Penrhyn, wherever there was diving, but I never suspected his game, -though three or four times he said to me, ‘I will have all the money I -need some day if I am right in my theories.’ I lost track of him, and -did not associate with him the big pearls that came to Paris until I saw -the pearl Woronick bought, and heard Tepeva a Tepeva’s account. I won’t -spoil it by repeating it, and anyhow, here he is himself!” - -Kopcke entered with his girl and her father. The latter was a very big -man, the wreck of a giant. He was sadly afflicted; he would take a step, -and stop, and then his head would roll over on his shoulder. Each time -he started to move, he went through convulsive tremors as if winding -himself up for the next step—and I recognized the paralysis which seizes -the diver who has dived too often and too deep. - -“_Maite rii, Tamahine!_ Go slow, daughter!” he was saying, as he seized -a post and let himself down to the floor, where he squatted. - -“He was about the best diver in the group, but the bends have got him,” -said Kopcke. - -“’E’s a Mormon,” Lying Bill blurted, “an’ ’e won’t touch the rum.” Bill -helped himself, stood the bottle before him, and began to doze. - -“My father,” said Kopcke, “here is a _Marite_ from far across the sea, -who wants to know of your adventure with the _Taote_ who gave you the -pearl.” - -Tepeva a Tepeva shaded his eyes with his hand and peered at me. “_Oia -ia!_ It is well!” he stuttered. His eyes fell upon the bottle, and -remained fastened upon it. - -“Would not Tepeva a Tepeva wish to refresh himself?” I said quietly, and -passed the bottle to the cripple. He took it, weighed it, removed the -cork, smelt the contents, and poured out a shellful,—a third of a -pint,—tossed it off, smacked his lips as if it were cocoanut-milk, and -began to speak more freely. - -“_Ea_, that _ramu_ is good. I do not drink it as a Mormon but because I -am weak. It is _makivi_, this thing I tell you. It is stranger than the -stick of Moses turning into a sea-snake. It costs me dear, as you see, -though it paid me well. I am as I am, a cracked canoe, because of it. -But I have my house, and all the debts of my family are paid, and I owe -Mapuhi a Mapuhi not a _sou_. It is good to be free. I was a diver at -Penrhyn for the British when I met the foreigner. He was a _Taote_. He -said that he was trying to cure the lepers. He had a wonderful medicine. -He did not let them drink it, but put it into their arms through a pipe. -But also he watched the diving. Doc, they called him, and he never -covered his head. But no man said _Itataupoo_ to him. He was no man to -laugh at. He spat his words and was done, but he would mend a broken -bone, or cure a coral cut or the wound of a swordfish. He looked through -a tube with a glass in it at blood from the lepers, and at pearls and -oysters. He had lamps that made a light like the blue sky. Through his -tube the water from our wells was as a fish-pond. Hours and hours he -watched the shells being opened, and every pearl he must see, and the -shell from which it came. I thought he searched for a pearl to charm the -leprosy. All through the _rahui_ he stayed in Penrhyn. He went to Tahiti -on the _Pani_. I was on the _Pani_, and much we talked about oysters and -the different lagoons. - -“I came to Takaroa, my home. Months afterward the _Taote_ arrived here -in a ten-ton cutter. He had but one sailor, a Tahitian, Terii. They -lived in that house over there. I would not go into that house now for -ten tons of shell. It is _ihoiho_. When the moon is dark a spirit dances -there, the spirit of Mauraii. He was my cousin, and the _Taote_ hired -him to help the other man. One day the _Taote_ began to buy provisions, -a great quantity which were stored in the cutter with other big boxes, -as if for a long voyage. They sailed away, Terii and Mauraii, too. -‘Nuku-Hiva will see me next,’ said the _Taote_ to us all. That was a -lie, but I did not know it then. They went to Pukapuka. It is a little -atoll, toward the Marquesas, and far from any other island. Mauraii had -dived there, and the _Taote_ knew that. Five moons later the cutter -sailed into this lagoon. Mauraii was with the _Taote_, but Terii was -not. The _Taote_ paid Mauraii, and left in the cutter with another -sailor. For two years Mauraii lived without labor. For two years his -jaws remained tight as the jaws of the _pahua_. He spoke well of the -_Taote_, but he was afraid. When I asked him more about Terii, he would -not talk. Terii had eaten poisonous fish, he said once. He had trodden -on the _nohu_, he said another time. I knew Mauraii had not been to the -Marquesas. He was a Mormon, Mauraii, and he prayed like a man with a -secret. - -“We forget soon, and it was four years when Patasy came in the _Potii -Taaha_, his own cutter. He was of Irélani, and drank much _ramu_. The -cutter was leaky, and Mauraii worked to calk the seams. Patasy gave him -hardly any money, but food, and night rum. Mauraii, with rum in him, -would now make many words to Patasy, and to me. He spoke of a secret -that lay between him and the _Taote_. He spoke of an oath he had sworn -on the book of Mormon and the picture of Birigahama Younga. He spoke of -something at Pukapuka that was growing bigger and bigger. The _Taote_ -was in his native land, and would return soon, and they would both be -very rich. Mauraii’s talk was like a cloudy day that does not let one -see far. Sometimes I would ask him about Terii, who had gone with -Mauraii, and who had not come back. That would still his big -word-making. He would shake a little then, all over. He would say: ‘I -must not talk, Tepeva a Tepeva; I must not talk.’ But with more rum he -would talk. He was worried, though. He stopped going to the temple; he -lived on Patasy’s cutter. Often I saw him lying on the deck, full of -drink. - -“One night he came to my house late. His heart was very heavy. He had -been drinking with Patasy, and he had done something wrong. He cursed -Patasy. He said that Patasy had forced him to do evil—that he, Mauraii, -had taken an oath, and that now, this night, he had broken it. It would -bring him harm. The _Taote_ was coming back soon. Mauraii shook when he -said that, shook just as he did when I would ask him what had become of -the companion who had gone with him to Pukapuka and had never come back. - -“_E mea au!_ I am not the man to search the heart of a brother for what -should be hidden. But having broken his oath and told his secret to -Patasy, I thought it right he should tell it to me. But he would say no -more. And he sailed away alone with Patasy. - -“For many weeks we heard nothing more of Mauraii. Then from sailors who -came from Tahiti we heard that he and Patasy had returned to Papeete in -a month. Then we heard that Patasy had sold his cutter and had taken -steamship away to his own country. He never came back. - -“Mauraii stayed in Papeete. Every little while we heard about him. He -had much money, and he was drinking all day in the Paris rum store, and -dancing the nights with the Tahiti Magadalenas in the Cocoanut House. - -“When Mauraii had spent all his money the French Government brought him -back to Takaroa, and he was mad. Something had broken in his belly, -where the thinking-parts are. He would sit all day, looking at the -lagoon and saying nothing. Never did he say anything. Sometimes he would -shake all over. And all the time his back was bent as if some one was -coming from behind to strike him. - -“It was a long time after this that the _Taote_ returned, on the -_Moana_. He came first to my house. He asked me where Mauraii was, and I -told him Mauraii was here, but was _maamaa_, that he was possessed of -the demon. He asked me if it was a talking demon, if it made Mauraii say -everything there was in his head. I told him it was the other way. The -poor man said nothing, but sat by the lagoon all day, and was fed and -cared for by the women. - -“‘Let us go to see Mauraii!’ he said. He was angry, and I was afraid, -and I went with him. I knew where Mauraii would be, and I pointed him -out. He was sitting in the shade of a _purau_ tree, looking at the -lagoon. The _Taote_ went to him and spoke to him. Mauraii fell flat, and -then he crawled about the sand, and shouted to me not to let the _Taote_ -kill him, _too_. This made him more angry, and he said that Mauraii was -really _maamaa_, and that nothing could be done for him. Mauraii ran to -his house when he had turned his back. After the _Moana_ had gone on her -way to Nuku-Hiva, the _Taote_ asked me if I could go with him to another -island. I did not want to go. If I had not gone, I would not be as I am, -but then I would not have my house, and all the debts paid of my family. - -“I said that I had work here. But he said he would be gone but a couple -of weeks, and that he would give me ten _taras_ a day, and that I would -have no hard work. Mapuhi and Nohea were absent. No white elders were -here to advise me. Finally I said I would go, though when I looked at -Mauraii and saw what he was, I was afraid. He said we must take Mauraii -with us. We had hard work to get Mauraii on the cutter. When we did, -which was at night, we put him in the hold and closed the hatch and -sailed out of the pass. It was my own cutter, but the _Taote_ had -provided food, and his big boxes were in the hold with Mauraii. - -“Once outside the reef, the _Taote_ said he would go almost due east, -and that Pukapuka was our island. I said that Pukapuka had no people on -it, and he said that was true. I said that Pukapuka was closed to the -diving, and he said that was true. But we went on toward Pukapuka. When -we slid the cover off the hatch to the hold, Mauraii came up, and when -he saw we were at sea and that the _Taote_ was so near him, he shivered -like a diver who has had a struggle with a shark. I thought he would -leap into the water, and often he looked at it with longing. But the -_Taote_ talked to him strongly, and put medicine in his arm. - -“We steered and trimmed sail by turn. The wind was fair, and we reached -Pukapuka in five days. We had a hard time to get the boxes ashore. There -is no pass, and you cannot reach the lagoon from the sea. We had brought -a small boat lashed on the deck, and this we carried to the lagoon. It -took us a day to move it, and we made Mauraii help. The man had changed -since we landed on Pukapuka. He was not wild, but _taata ravea paari_. -He was cunning. He smiled to himself sometimes in an evil way. We were -no sooner on the lagoon than the _Taote_ ordered me and that madman to -build a hut and to rest ourselves for a day. - -“Pukapuka had not a man upon it. It is like a cocoanut-shell, round all -about, and the lagoon deep, and full of yellow shell with yellow pearls. -There are no poison fish in the water, as in some other islands. I -thought of that, and of the man who had been here with Mauraii and had -never come back. I was afraid. The _Taote_ could make Mauraii sleep and -sleep with one touch of a silver pipe on his arm. I was afraid. - -“The island is loved by the birds; it was their time for nesting, and -the air was filled with them. That was the only sound. The _Taote_ wore -no hat, though the sun upon the coral was as stones heated to cook fish. -When we had rested a day, the _Taote_, who had been most of the hours -upon the lagoon, spoke to me of our mission, and we three rowed a little -distance until I judged we were in water of seventeen fathoms. - -“‘It is long,’ said the _Taote_. ‘It is five years since I was here, but -I am sure of the spot. There was a cocoanut-tree that hid the village if -I rowed from that rock we put there on shore, due west, five _umi_. -There is the cocoanut, and it hides the huts the divers live in when the -lagoon is open.’ - -“You see how quiet this lagoon is? Well, that lagoon of Pukapuka was ten -times more still. It made me shake as had Mauraii. But now he did not -shake. He was all brightness, and his eyes were shining, though he said -not a word. - -“The _Taote_ took the _titea mata_ and looked into the water. He could -see little; his eyes were not strong. I went into the water, took the -_titea mata_, stuck my head into it and gazed down into the sea. - -“‘Do you see shell, large shell?’ he asked quickly, like a man who knows -what is in a place. - -“‘I see shell,’ I said. - -“‘Then dive and bring it up,’ he commanded. - -“I said the prayer to Adam and to Birigahama Younga. I breathed long, -and I went down. There was in my heart a fear of something strange. The -bottom was at seventeen fathoms, a jungle of coral as big as the trees -in Tahiti, with black caves and large flowers and sponges, and also many -of the _pahua_, the great shell which closes like a trap and can drown a -man. Dropping straightaway, I swam upon a ledge raised above the floor -of the lagoon. There was a pair of shells, very large. But where there -had been many, only this single pair remained. I moved along the ledge, -and found that scores had been ripped from the same bed. A diver sees -easily where shells have been. - -“‘Robbed!’ I said to myself. ‘There has been a thief here.’ Pukapuka had -been closed to diving for six years, and it was forbidden to remove a -shell. I swam over the face of the ledge, and was sure I had the sole -remaining pair of this bed. I rose to the surface with them.” - -The _Taote_ was hanging over the boat with his head in the _titea mata_, -watching me as I came up. As I hung on the boat to breathe, I saw -Mauraii regarding him with a hateful eye, and I shook my fist at the -fool. The foreigner took the shell quickly, and opened it, pulled the -oyster out into a bowl, and searched it. Then with a little cry he held -up a pearl, a _poe matauiui_, big and like a ball, as shiny as an eye. -Bigger it was than any pearl I have ever seen. It was perfect in shape, -and with a skin like the gleam of the sun on the lagoon. What Mauraii -had said of the _Taote_ growing things to make him rich came to my mind, -as I saw this wonder-pearl shining in the _Taote’s_ hand. The foreigner -for a moment was as mad as Mauraii, and, taking hold of that man’s hand, -shook it and shook it. - -“‘Ah, Mauraii,’ he shouted, ‘now we are paid for those weeks of hell -here! You shall have enough to eat and drink always.’ - -“He laughed and clapped Mauraii on the shoulder, and the _maamaa_ -laughed foolishly, and began to dance in the boat. We had to pull him -down, or he would have overturned it. - -“‘There are more than a hundred pearls like that,’ said the _Taote_. ‘I -am richer than King Mapuhi, ten times as rich, and I can make all I -want. I made it. I worked and worked to find out, and Mauraii put the -things in the shell. I am a _te Tumu_!’ - -“I did not like that. _Te Tumu_ is the creator. It is wrong to boast -like that. And where was Terii, who had gone with Mauraii from Takaroa -to Pukapuka? He would share in no wealth. And the madman beside me—what -happiness left for him? - -“‘_I teienei_,’ said the _Taote_, as he rubbed the pearl. ‘Go down and -bring up as many as you can. When we did the sowing, I worked in a -diver’s dress. I have that machine in those boxes on the cutter. Maybe -we should get it, for we will want more seed.’ - -“‘There are no more shells in that bed,’ I said. ‘This was the only one -there.’ - -“‘No more shells there!’ he screamed. ‘You are mad like this fellow. We -found a hundred and seven there, and we planted seed in each one. Each -of them has a pearl as fine as this.’ - -“He tried to be gentle again, though he sweated. He tried to explain. He -had discovered the secret of the pearl; he had planted something in each -shell as one might a cocoanut-sprout in the earth. There was much I did -not understand, for no man had ever tried such blasphemy. The God that -made these lagoons had wrapped them in the unknown, and had made pearls -the dispensation of His will. - -“‘Whatever was done here by you,’ I said, ‘there are no more shells in -that _tiamaha_. I searched it all about.’ - -“He tried to laugh, but failed, and he looked at Mauraii. - -“‘A hundred and seven shells! It took us weeks,’ he said. ‘That was the -number, Mauraii?’ - -“The man possessed of the devil nodded his head and really laughed. It -was an evil laugh. - -“‘A hundred and seven, and one—this one—makes a hundred and six,’ said -he. He smiled, and I went cold. I knew that before he went mad, Mauraii -did not know how to count. The devil was in him. - -“The _Taote_ breathed hard. ‘Tepeva a Tepeva,’ he said, ‘go down again. -It is possible that this is not the bed. We placed a small anchor beside -it. Look for that. I worked seventeen years for this day.’ - -“Again I went into the water, and to the bottom. I found the place where -I had pried off the oyster with the great pearl. Digging in the sand and -ooze, I found the anchor. I saw plainly the empty cups of the oysters -that had been, and I counted them roughly and made them about a hundred. -I stayed a full minute and a half, and I hated to go up. I did not like -to meet that wise man looking at me in a terrible way when he should see -me empty-handed. But I had to go. I was exhausted when I reached the -sunlight, and until I had gained my breath and my blood was quiet, I did -not turn to the _Taote_. - -“‘No more shell?’ he said quietly. ‘You are lying! You are lying! You -are trying to cheat me. Look out! Look out! Ask Mauraii what I did -to—but the shell are there. I can see them with the glass. Come, we will -get the diving-machine.’ - -“He cursed me, and said I was trying to steal his wealth. What he saw -through the _titea mata_ was the gleam of the _pahua_, the great shell -the priests use for holy water. I said no more, and with Mauraii went to -the beach. It was night when we had brought the machine to the boat, and -we returned to the cutter for food. I shall not forget that night. The -foreigner could not sleep, and he talked to me. He talked as if he had a -fever. He said he had tried for years to find out what made pearls in -oysters, and to do the work of God. While others had made small ones -that clung to the shell, he alone had found the way to put in the shells -large beginnings for the oysters to cover. He had chosen Pukapuka -because it had a lagoon without a pass, and so free from currents, and -because it was closed to diving and no one lived there. No one knew of -it, he said—no one but himself and Mauraii. - -“I thought of Patasy, of the _Potii Taaha_. Of what Mauraii had told me -when in rum. Of his going away with Patasy and coming back to Tahiti, -there to drink and dance in the Cocoanut House. - -“But I said nothing, for I was afraid. Mauraii had slept ashore. In the -morning we found him praying and singing by the lagoon. We went out in -the boat, and set up the diving-machine, and the _Taote_ told me to put -on the dress. - -“‘I and Mauraii will work the pump,’ he said. ‘You stay down ten minutes -at least, and search the bottom all about there. Maybe we were mistaken -in the exact spot.’ He spoke like a good friend, now. - -“I had said nothing about the anchor, because I was afraid. I sank down -to the bottom, and first looked that the air came freely and that I was -not entangled. Then I walked about and saw that a diver had been there. -The whole bank had been gathered. The one shell had escaped merely -because the thief had so willed it. I sat down and waited for the ten -minutes to go, and I wished I was in Takaroa. Pukapuka Lagoon had many -sharks. In the years that had passed since the last diving season they -had grown big. When I was still, they came by me, and through the -glasses I saw their ugly faces staring at me. I frightened them away -with the air from my wrist, or I clapped my hands in a diver’s way. I -had my back to the rock bank. At last a signal came on the rope, and I -had to let them pull me up.” - -Tepeva a Tepeva’s voice was weak. He poured himself the last drink of -rum. Kopcke had gone to attend to the loading and Lying Bill was snoring -on the floor. - -“Slowly they lifted me, but it seemed to me like a second. - -“What look the _Taote_ had, I do not know. I did not turn to him until -my helmet was unscrewed, and I had taken off the coat. Without meeting -his eyes, I said, ‘No shells.’ - -“‘No shells! My God!’ he said. ‘Are you blind? Did you not the first -time bring up this? Mauraii knows well there are a hundred and six more. -Is not that true, Mauraii?’ he said, coaxingly. - -“The madman laughed. ‘A hundred and six more,’ he replied; ‘and to hell -with Patasy.’ - -“This moment the eyes of the _Taote_ met me. He was shivering, as -Mauraii had shivered when he left Takaroa. - -“‘Give me the helmet!’ he ordered. ‘Help me put it on. I will know. I -will know!’ - -“He put the pearl in a purse, and the purse in a pocket of the -diving-coat. A knife was in his belt. I fastened the coat and the belt -and tied the strings at the wrist. I put the lead weights on his breast -and back, and lowered him into the water. Before I screwed the helmet -tight, I said to him: ‘Go slowly! Walk carefully! Don’t bend too low!’ - -“Mauraii fed the pump as I let out the line, and when I felt the weight -of the line, I took the pump myself. Now, a man like me, who has dived -with the machine for years, knows every motion of the line. - -The _Taote_ was not moving slowly and cautiously. He stopped, and for -five minutes there was little motion. - -“_Aueo!_” I thought. He has found the robbed bank, and the anchor. He -knows the truth. He will come up now. What will I do? He will be -terrible. - -“Suddenly I felt a drag at the rope, swift and hard; not the steady pull -of walking. - -“He has fallen, tripped and fallen, and cannot get up! That was my -thought. - -“‘Mauraii,’ I said, ‘you man the pump alone. Go smoothly! If you fail, I -will kill you!’ - -“I leaped in, and swam straight down. The foreigner was on the bottom, -lying on his face. I raised his body, light as a shell in that depth. -There was a great rip in the front of the coat. The air rushed from it, -but there was no motion of his body. The knife in his hand had been used -to destroy himself. He had seen the work of the thief and had cut open -the coat. The devil of despair had done that with him. - -“A diver thinks quickly. I could not bring him to the top unless Mauraii -aided. I signaled by the rope. There was no reply. The air was not being -pumped. It had stopped as I lifted him. Mauraii had left his duty. I had -one chance. I might unscrew the heavy helmet, and cut the leads and -carry him, with the aid of the line, to the surface. He might not be -dead yet. I seized the helmet, cut the hose, and began to turn the metal -helmet. As I did so, I saw a shadow over my head, and laid hold of my -knife. It was not a shark. It was Mauraii. He was dancing and smiling, -dancing and smiling, as in the Cocoanut House in Papeete. He slowly -settled down in the water. He took hold of me as I twisted at the -helmet, and he smiled at me, and danced on a ledge of coral. Below this, -I saw one of those giant _pahua_. _Aue! Marite!_ This pair was as long -as I am, and as deep as my legs. The great animal in it had opened his -doors to eat, and as Mauraii leaped about in his mad dancing from rock -to rock, he stepped into the jaws of the _pahua_. _Aue!_ They closed as -the jaws of the turtle upon the fish, and held the fool as if he was -buried. He was fast to the knees, and fell over upon me as I worked at -the helmet, his head hanging down by my feet. - -“My lungs were bursting, my heart beating my breast. I had been more -than three minutes a hundred feet below the air. I had been using my -strength. I pushed the fool away. Suddenly I felt my leg seized, and the -grip of teeth upon my flesh. I sprang up, pulling at the rope to give me -force, and calling on Adam for help. - -“Minutes it was before I could crawl into the boat. I lay there many -minutes before I could stand up. The blood was upon my leg, and the -marks of teeth. They were not the teeth of a fish, but of a man. I -prayed for guidance. The _Taote_ was dead, and Mauraii, too. What could -I do for them? Nothing! Yet I heard a whisper in my ear to go down. I -slipped into the water and swam to the bottom. I never touched the sand. -I saw the bodies of the _Taote_ and Mauraii fought over by a dozen -sharks. I had prayed, and I had a knife in my hand. Even a shark fears a -bold man. I struck at them right and left and reached the ledge where -the _Taote_ lay. I slashed at the coat and cut away the pocket. The -water was red with blood about me, but I shot up past the sharks with -the purse, and reached the boat. I took the oars and rowed as fast as I -could to shore. There I knelt and thanked Adam and Ietu Kirito for my -life. - -“I ran across the reef and swam to the cutter. I cut away the anchor and -raised the sail and left the abode of the demon. Fakaina I reached in -two days; and, with a Takaroa man who was there, I put the cutter about -and sailed for home. - -“What does the Book say? In the midst of life we are in death. I had -stayed under too long in the lagoon of Pukapuka. Like a thunderbolt came -on me the diver’s sickness—and I am as I am.” - -Lying Bill had been awake for several minutes. - -“You did mighty well,” he commented. “You saved the pearl and the Doc’s -money for yourself. There’s three men et up by sharks. You sold the -pearl to Woronick for twenty-five thousand francs.... And by the bloody -star of Mars, you’ve drunk all the rum while I’ve been asleep! Come on, -O’Brien! Let’s get the bloomin’ ’ell out of ’ere to the schooner! We’ve -got to sail at sun-up for the Marquesas.” - -Tepeva a Tepeva, the man stricken by the bends, was still squatting on -the floor immersed in his pregnant memories when I shook his hand, and -went to bid good-by to my friends of the atolls where life is harder but -simpler and sweeter than elsewhere in the world. Mapuhi and Nohea rubbed -my back, and commended me to God. The wind was fluttering wildly the -fronds of the cocoanut-trees, and the surf was heavy as we rowed through -the passage and moat and struck the breakers on the outer reef. From the -sea for a few minutes the lanterns in the houses were like fireflies in -the cane, but soon the darkness hid them, and I saw only the black -shadow of the _motus_, and the gleam of the foaming crests of the waves -in the faint starlight. I lay down on a mat by the steering-wheel of the -_Fetia Taiao_, and dreamed of the _Taote_ and the dancing Mauraii in the -trap of the giant _pahua_. - -I awoke with the cries of the sailors raising the mainsail, and the -motion of the vessel through the water. We were off with a fair wind for -the Land of the War Fleet. - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CHAPTER XV - -The dismal abode of the Peyrals—Stark-white daughter of Peyral—Only - white maiden in the Marquesas—I hunt wild bulls—Peyral’s - friendliness—I visit his house—He strikes me and threatens to kill - me—I go armed—Explanation of the bizarre tragic comedy. - -AS I walked up from the beach of Atuona, where I had touched the shore -of the Marquesas for the first time, I had remarked a European dwelling, -squalid, forbidding and peculiarly desolate. Painted black originally, -the heat and storms of years had worn and defaced it, the sun had shrunk -the boards from one another, and posts and beams had gone awry. It was -set in a cocoanut-grove, the trees so close together that their huge -fronds joined and roofed out sky and light. The narrow road along the -grove had been raised later, and formed a dike so that with the heavy -rains of the season the land all about was a gloomy marsh to which the -sun seldom penetrated. The dingy gallery of the house fronting the road -had a broken rail and dilapidated stairs, and in the shallow swamp and -about the entrance were cast-off articles of household and plantation. A -dismaying mingling of decayed European inventions with native bareness -framed a dismal and foreboding scene, contrasting with the brilliancy of -nature in the open. - -I had felt a sudden fear of the possibilities of degradation, as if the -dreary house were a symbol of the white man’s deterioration in these -wild places. A sense of physical and spiritual abandonment to alien -environment, without fitness of soul or habit, depressed me. - -As we passed, I saw on the veranda a girl of sixteen or seventeen, with -a white face and light blue eyes. Her long yellow hair was slightly -confined by a piece of ribbon, but hung down loose on her rounded -shoulders. She wore a blue cotton gown, becoming and not in keeping with -her soiled and frayed surroundings. She seemed not to notice us until we -were opposite her, when she raised her head and glanced at us a moment. -Those off the schooner she must have known, for she fixed her eyes on me -the fleeting instant of her gaze. They had the innocence and appeal of a -fawn and the melancholy and detachment of a cloistered nun. There was no -curiosity in them, though we were the only white visitors in months, and -had come with the new governor, who had landed but the day before. A -second or two her eyes met mine and conveyed an unconscious message of -youth and sorrow, of budding womanhood that had had no guidance or -companionship, and only sad dreams. - -From the room opening on the gallery a man came and shouted to us “_Bon -jour!_” in a raven-like croak. He was in soiled overalls, barefooted, -and reeling drunk. His brown hair and beard had not been cut for months -or years, and rudely margined his bloated, grievous face, of rugged -strength, in which grim despair contended with fierce pride. - -“That is Peyral,” said Ducat, the second mate of the _Fetia Taiao_. He -is always half-seas over, except when he sews. He is the village tailor, -and makes the priest’s gowns and clothes for any one who will buy them. -That daughter of his is the only white girl in the Marquesas. She is all -white, and he keeps her chained in that dark house as if he was afraid -some one would eat her.” - -“You know bloody well why ’e keeps ’er there,” said Lying Bill. “’E -knows you an’ me and ’Allman and ’earty bucks like us is not to be -trusted; ’at’s why! I knew ’er mother and ’er grandparents. ’E was a -British calvary officer ’oo ’ad served in Injia, an’ come ’ere with ’is -wife, an Irish lady, to take charge of the store an’ plantation now -owned by the Germans at Tahaaku. They ’ad one daughter. Peyral was a -non-com. on a French war-ship that come ’ere to shoot up the natives, -an’ ’e was purty good to look at then. ’E could do anything, an’ when ’e -got ’is papers from the French navy ’e went to work for the plantation, -courted the girl, an’, when ’er parents weren’t lookin’, married ’er. -They died, an’ ’e set up a proper ’ouse ’ere, an’ was bloomin’ -prosp’rous till ’is wife died o’ the _pokoko_, this gallopin’ -consumption that takes off the natives. Then he give in, and went to -’ell. ’E ’as three girls, two little ones, an’ ‘ow they live I don’t -know. When ’is wife died ’e painted that ’ouse black, an’ ’e ain’t -touched it since. ’E gathers ’is copra, an’ makes a few clo’s now an’ -’en, an’ spends all the money on absinthe. The girl looks after ’er -sisters, but ’e guards ’er like a bleedin’ dragon. She never goes off -the veranda there now except to church on Sundays and ’olidays. I don’t -know what’ll ’e do with ’er, but ’e’ll kill any one that goes too near -’er like Ducat ’ere or meself.” - -When I was settled in the House of the Golden Bed, as the Marquesans -called the cabin I had rented from Apporo, the wife of Great Fern, in -exchange for my brass bed at my departure, I went almost every day with -Exploding Eggs to the beach to fish or swim or to ride the surf on a -board. The road wended from my house past the garden of the palace and -thence to the sea. Between the governor’s and the beach was only -Peyral’s noisome residence, and twice a day I passed it within a few -feet. Sometimes he was at his sewing-machine on the veranda, or -gathering the cocoanuts that had fallen and drying them in the sun, but -generally the shaggy Breton was in a stupor or murmurously intoxicated, -sitting on a bench or lying on the ground, and talking to himself in the -way of morose, unsocial men when inebriated. His daughter was usually on -the veranda sewing by hand, or apparently wrapt in thoughts which -obscured her consciousness and painted despondence on her countenance. I -tried not to stare at her, but when I made sure that she was oblivious -of me, or intentionally not seeing, I observed her narrowly. - -How could she have preserved that miraculous blondness in these islands? -It was amazing. Her skin was like the inside of a cocoanut, smooth as -satin. The years in that shadowy house had bleached her white flesh -until it was pearl-like in transparency, the blue veins as in fine -marble. Though hardly seventeen her figure was the luxuriant one of -these latitudes, rounded as the breadfruit, curving in opulency under -her single garment, a diaphanous tunic. Her hair that I had judged -yellow at first sight was silver-gold, almost as white as her flesh, but -with glints of topaz and amber. Silky, glistening, as fine as the -filament of a web, it did not hide her shapely ears and fell in -profusion almost to her waist. I never saw her smile. Her azure eyes had -wept until their fountains were dried. She was numb, mute, never having -seen aught in sleep but ghosts. She was, in this voluptuous atmosphere, -herself voluptuous in contour and color, but frozen. A thousand brutal -words from Peyral must have made her so. In drunkenness he was harsh, -and in less violent hours sullen and suspicious. The children feared him -as _Nancy_ had _Bill Sykes_, but there was a powerful attachment between -them. He must have described to her horrible things that he guarded her -against, and have threatened unspeakable punishments if she disobeyed -him. - -Daughter of Europeans, granddaughter of Celt and Anglo-Saxon, this girl -did not know her father’s or mother’s language but feebly, and had no -more knowledge of or contact with the world of her forefathers than if -she were all Marquesan. I fancied her spirit infinitely confused by her -blood and her surroundings, vague aspirations perhaps stirring her to -desire for other things than the savage and stupid ones about her. In -the church she must have had some respite. I watched her there a number -of times, bowed over her Marquesan book of the ritual, reciting the -prayers, and beating her sweet breast at the _mea culpa_ as might the -most repentant sinner or worst hypocrite. - -No one called on Peyral save a very occasional buyer of copra or an -infrequent customer for clothes. These, prevalently, met him on the -trail or at church, and dealt with him there. Either his jealous -solitude was respected, or disagreeable experiences had caused the -villagers to shun his dwelling. He himself infrequently dropped in at -the store of Le Brunnec, or the German’s establishment at Tahaaku where -he had wooed the daughter of the English officer and the Irish exile. At -the Catholic church only was he a regular attendant, sitting in the rear -by the _pahua_ shell holy-water font, and mumbling the responses. The -children were in the pews, the sexes separated, and I, the few times I -was there, at the door where the breeze was freshest and I might go out -unseen. One Sunday he spoke to me. I was as astonished as if Father -David had begun a _hula_ at the altar. - -“You are American,” he said in French, his voice hoarse and broken. - -I said I was and that I had come to the islands to stay an uncertain -length of time. We exchanged the day’s greetings after that, and when -Painter Le Moine and I were examining the remains of the studio of Paul -Gauguin, who had died here ten years before, it was Peyral who showed us -how everything had been and who told me of his daily intercourse with -the famous symbolist. Thus we struck up a real acquaintance, if not -friendship, and he would tarry a quarter of an hour on my _paepae_ to -drink a shell of rum and to talk about copra and the coming and going of -schooners. He drew me out about my plans, whether I was going to settle -in the Marquesas or return to my own country, and evinced a flattering -interest in my future. And I was flattered, as I am easily by the -friendliness of unfriendly people, and did not question his genuine -liking for me. - -Ah Suey, the Chinese baker and storekeeper, who had been tried for the -murder of an American, and who spoke English he had learned at Los -Angeles and at sea, might have enlightened me, but that I was beyond -doubt. I was at Ah Suey’s to dance a jig and to sing “The Good Old -Summertime” to amuse him. The saturnine Chinese, after a drink of rum, -said: - -“Peylalee all time come you housee takee dlinkee. He no good. More -better you tell him _poponihoó_ go hellee! Makee tlubble for you his -daughtah.” - -Ah Suey puzzled me, but I do not like advice or warning, and I shunted -the subject. - -Peyral was a hunter. He would wander, always alone, in the upper -valleys, to shoot _kuku_, or along the beach for salt-water birds, -walking slowly and not alertly; but he was a crack shot and hardly ever -failed to bring back a bag of game. He had learned marksmanship at sea, -or perhaps in his native Brittany, and his cartridges went far. He was -not contented with birds, but also tramped to the mountains to kill -goats or even the wild bulls that were growing scarce there under a -promiscuous use of firearms. Le Brunnec, the trader, an amiable and -intelligent Breton, and I met him there, fortunately, at a critical -moment for me. We had, Le Brunnec and I, climbed on horses in the late -afternoon to a plateau high up in the hills and camped there the night. -In that altitude it was cool after the sun had set, and we sat about a -fire of twigs and branches until we were sleepy. We were considerably -past the line of cocoanut-palms, and in a rich and varied flora. -Magnificent chestnut, ironwood, rose-apple, and other tropical trees -formed dark groups about us, and masses of _huetu_ or mountain plantains -lined the slopes. We had washed down our dinner with a bottle of -Moselle, and had a mellow and philosophical hour before sleep. - -Far above us we could see a pair of ducks, a kind of non-migratory -mallard. They lived only in the lonely valleys or woods, and nested on -the tops of distant ridges where they laid a half dozen eggs. The -ducklings must be carried by their parents to the feeding grounds -hundreds of feet below. - -We talked about the decimation of the Marquesans—Le Brunnec in ten years -had seen them depopulated almost 50 per cent. - -“They are unhappy and soul-sick,” he said. “They are animals, and, when -they had freedom under their own rule, prospered enormously. Now there -are a couple of thousand instead of the hundred thousand the whites -found. They are in the cage of civilization and cannot stand the bars. -We are adaptable because we are an admixture of many races, and have had -to exist in changing environments or die. Millions must have died from -the same thing that destroys the Marquesans, but there were enough to -keep on and build up again. The quality of adaptability, of making the -best of it, is wonderful. One time in Tahiti I was at the Annexe -lodging-house of Lovaina when a Frenchman arrived by steamer from -Martinique. He had with him his four children. The mother, a native of -that island, was dead, and the oldest child was a girl of thirteen, a -child-woman, naive but clever, and very charming. For four years she had -been mother to the other three, since she was nine, and they were as -neat as a gunboat. She was tiny and undeveloped physically, but -necessity had adapted her perfectly to her task. The father was looking -for work, and, not finding it in Tahiti, was off to Dacca, in Africa, -leaving the babies in her care. _Mon Dieu!_ It was brave to see her -bathing them, brushing their hair, reproving them, and feeding them. If -she had been five years older I would have tried to marry her, and the -whole flock. Now, you see, she could keep on because she was continuing -the white race customs and ideals, and understood them, hard as it was; -but these poor people have been told to do something they don’t -understand, and that is not their ideal. Now take that girl of old -Peyral! Her mother spoke English, and her father is French, and she went -to the nuns’ school here for four or five years. Yet she can hardly -speak anything but Marquesan, and in that tongue she replies to her -father, and talks to her sisters. She is almost a Marquesan, and as they -are unhappy in their prison so is she. She is the only white woman here, -and she has no companions, and her father won’t let her be a native. -_Pauvre enfant!_ Now, her I wouldn’t marry for all the cocoanuts on this -island. There is one other, Mademoiselle Narbonne, who is the richest -person in the Marquesas, for she, too, is fit neither for native life -nor for white. The nuns have spoiled her, as her mother spoiled the -Peyral girl.” - -And so to bed on the grass with a blanket about us. - -In the morning we were up at daybreak, and, after coffee and hardtack, -we rode toward the sea. There was a faint trail, but Le Brunnec was a -skilled tracker and picked up the spoor in a few minutes. After half an -hour we saw fresher traces of our prey, and began to make plans for the -attack. We felt sure we were the only ones on the plateau, and so were -safe, for Marquesans are reckless with guns, and when we heard a horse -coming toward us we halted and waited. It was Peyral. We could see his -frowsy head a quarter of a mile away as it bobbed in the trot. - -“_Eh bien!_” said Le Brunnec, philosophically. “He is not so bad here. -It is curious that when Peyral has been drunk for a month, and reforms -so as not to die, he goes to the mountains for a week and shoots an -animal.” - -We said _bon jour_, and he joined us. Le Brunnec proposed that we try to -kill two bulls, share the labor of carrying the meat to Atuona, and -divide it there. Peyral gruffly assented, and, as he was the more -skillful _chasseur_, gave us our stations. We were to start up one or -more _taureaux sauvages_ and to endeavor to refrain from firing at them -until they were as near as possible to the cliff. We were successful and -had felled one, when another appeared. - -“_Prennez garde!_” shouted Le Brunnec. “That _hakiuka_ has blood in his -eye.” - -“Go around to the left and drive him toward me,” commanded Peyral. - -I was riding fast about his flank when my horse put his foot in a rat’s -hole. I had my rifle on my right arm and I must have used it as a -vaulting-pole unwittingly, for I struck the earth about ten feet from my -mount. I was struggling to my feet when I became aware that the -_hakiuka_ was approaching with malice in his snortings. My horse had got -up but too late to bear me to security, and my rifle was choked with -mud. I rushed for a tree but could see none with low branches. I had a -big knife in my belt, a kind of Bowie, and, as I felt the hot breath of -the animal on me and saw his horns magnified to elephant’s tusks, I drew -the weapon. The beast was within five feet of me when he dropped. Peyral -had put a Winchester bullet in his heart. His head was at my feet as he -gave it a mighty toss, and laid it on the sward of maidenhair ferns in -submission to man’s invention. - -When I had made sure of the poor _hakiuka’s_ being absolutely dead, and -had shaken myself together, finding no injuries, I thanked Peyral, whom -Le Brunnec was already extolling for marksmanship and quickness of -thought. - -“_Rien!_ It is nothing!” replied the shaggy man. “I like to kill.” - -We put ropes over the horns of the victims, and forced our horses to -drag them to a certain spot at the edge of the cliff. Below was a wide -shelf of rocks at water-level. We pushed the stiffening bodies over the -edge and let them fall. Then we rode back to Atuona, and in a big canoe -with three Marquesans, Great Fern, Mouth of God, and Exploding Eggs, -went for the carcasses. To retrieve them into the craft was a difficult -task. - -[Illustration: - - Malicious Gossip, Le Brunnec, and his wife, at peace -] - -[Illustration: - - Photo by Dr. Malcolm Douglas - Exploding Eggs and his chums packing copra -] - -[Illustration: - - Frederick O’Brien and Dr. Malcolm Douglas at home in Tahiti -] - -The sea surged against the rocks so that we could not tie up close to -them, but several of us jumped on them while others remained in the -canoe, with a line ashore and a kedge-anchor aft. The Marquesans cut up -the bulls into quarters, and each we tied to a rope and dragged through -the water into the canoe. Over our heads a cloud of heron and sea-gulls -shrieked for their share, and when we had left the rocks these birds -screamed and fought for the entrails. They had been attracted when the -bulls were killed, and for hours had peeked vainly at the carcasses. The -dragging them over the land and hurling them to the ledge, and their -hours of lying there, had drawn an immense concourse of the sea-birds. -There were many thousands before we got away, and so rapacious were they -that they circled over our heads and snatched at the bloody meat in the -canoe. We had to wave our shirts at them to frighten them away. Sharks -smelling the blood swam about the canoe, and we were not a little -afraid. We had brought no guns in the canoe, and we were forced to -strike at them with paddles, and shout imprecations at them. They did -not enter the breakers, which we ran to the sand. At the beach near -_Commissaire_ Bauda’s residence and offices, we turned over to Peyral -his third, and, taking the remainder into the village, Great Fern with -saw and knife provided every household, including the Catholic and -Protestant clergy and the nuns, with ample for a meal or two. Peyral -threw his part over his horse’s back and left us, muttering that he -would salt it down for the uncertain future. - -Peyral became increasingly friendly, and a number of times stopped me on -my way to and from the shore to invite me to drink with him. Le Brunnec -said that this was something new for Peyral, and that he must be “going -crazy.” But, like Ah Suey, Le Brunnec hid his real thought from me when -I defended Peyral and said that he was sinned against overmuch. Peyral’s -daughter—I hardly ever caught sight of the younger two—would desert the -veranda if I came upon it, but once he called her, and when she did not -respond immediately added a “_sacré_” to his order for her to come and -be presented to me. - -“She is a fine girl, but shy,” he said, and patted her clumsily. - -Mademoiselle Peyral trembled under his heavy caress, and with merely a -slight, awkward bow to me hurried into the sombre chamber. - -“She is shy,” he repeated as he drank his absinthe with mouthing and -grimacing. “She needs a man to train her right, a husband, eh, a -gentleman, _mon garçon_. Is not that right?” - -Peyral’s voice was almost gentle, but his mood changed in a breath. He -struck the board hard with his shell, and yelled, “Do you understand, -American, I said a gentleman. Her mother was aristocrat. Do you get that -into your noddle?” - -Exploding Eggs, who had waited for me on the road with my towels, -laughed as we ran toward the surf. - -“Peyral _paeá_,” he said. “Too much drink, too much fight.” - -I did not stop after that when he bade me have a _goutte_ with him, for -I was sensible of a deep pity for the girl and an ardent desire to save -her embarrassment, the deadly unreasoning shame or perplexity that -overwhelmed her at her father’s gross attitude and my presence. After a -few weeks, Peyral did not sing out to me any more, and I was conscious -of a coldness, of a return of his first relation to me, and then of fits -and starts of friendship. I felt oppressed by his changing tempers, and -attributed them to his varying degrees of inebriety. - -I split my rain-coat one day, and, after making a bad job of repairing -it, thought of Peyral and his skill as a tailor. With the coat on my arm -I climbed the stairs to his porch, and, finding no one there, called out -Peyral’s name. My voice echoed through the house, and, with the -intention of scribbling a note and leaving the coat, I entered the -nearest room. Mademoiselle Peyral was sitting near the machine but was -not sewing. She trembled as I approached her, and looked frightened. I -am timid with women, and her nervousness communicated itself to me. I -wished I was not there. She was half uncovered, having on only a -chemise, and her dishabille added to my confusion, though that very -morning I had bathed in the river nude with Titihuti and others. - -“Please give your father this coat, and ask him to repair it,” I said, -and put it down. Her downcast eyes and heaving bosom, her evident -extreme timidity, and her pitiable situation overcame me. She was of my -own race, and she was so white and so fair. Before I could restrain -myself, I said in English, “Don’t be afraid of me! I am very sorry for -you,” and I patted her shoulder as I might have a child’s. - -She shrank from me in apparent horror, and ran from the room into a -farther one, screaming in Marquesan. I started to follow her to explain -or to appease her, but reconsidered. - -Though I was conscious of no wrong, the familiar incidents in newspapers -and gossip of misinterpreted gestures and of false allegations rose to -my mind as her cries resounded through the black and tristful house. I -moved toward the porch to leave, and deliberated, and awaited some one’s -coming. Better to tell the fact and make a stand there and then, said -common sense. But no one answered her alarm, and after a few minutes I -left, with the coat, and returned to my own cabin. For half an hour my -mind was actively going over the affair to find out what might be at the -bottom of it, and, of course, to make certain of my clearance of the -least onus of guilt. - -Perhaps I was the first man other than her father who had put his hand -on her, and I had done that, no matter how innocently! The nuns had -overbalanced her standard of modesty, and her father’s brutal -admonitions had made her hysterical! I tried myself and, having found -myself not guilty of even forwardness or discourtesy, I cooked my -dinner, poured myself a shell of Munich beer that had been cooled in the -river, and dismissed the trifle. - -The next afternoon as I passed the governor’s garden on the road to the -beach, I saw Peyral on the veranda with the official. I thought of the -rent in my rain-coat, and entered the grounds to speak to him about it. -As I approached the steps I heard the tailor speaking loudly and -vehemently to Monsieur l’Hermier, and spilling the absinthe in the glass -in his hand. - -“_Kaoha!_” I said, and Peyral turned and saw me. His face purpled, and -he shouted in French something I did not understand, and appealed to the -governor for corroboration. A twinge of privity with his emotion swept -over me, and I am sure I flushed and looked the culprit. I hadn’t much -time for analysis, for Peyral stood up and flung his glass at my head. -It went wide. I took a step toward him and asked: - -“What’s the matter with him, _Monsieur l’Administrateur_? Is he drunker -than usual?” - -“_Je ne sais pas_,” replied the governor, with a shrug of his shoulder. -“He has come here to lodge a complaint against you of maltreating his -daughter. He wants you tried and sent to prison, and he wants to -institute a suit against you for damages. I have told him to return when -he is sober. He is bitter, Monsieur, and he is, after all, a Frenchman.” - -Peyral got up from his chair, unsteadily. The governor discreetly left -the veranda and entered his study. I sat down in sheer weariness, when -suddenly the frenzied drunkard confronted me. - -“_Sacré Americain!_” he yelled. “You will insult the daughter of a -French patriot. _Cochon!_ I will show you what I do to such people as -you!” - -He flung himself upon me and struck me in the face. Peyral was fifty -pounds heavier than I, but he was very drunk. I drove my fist into his -chin, and, following the blow with another, sent him sprawling. I -regretted my violence as I saw the poor devil staggering to his feet -unsteadily, but when, with the most blasphemous profanity and the basest -epithets in the dialect of Brest, he lurched at me again with his two -hundred pounds of rank bulk, charity fled from my panting heart, and I -realized that I must fight or retreat. Years of addiction to alcohol had -not made my assailant anything but tough and strong physically, and I -was no match for him if he was not reeling. He plunged toward me as a -drunken elephant might go to combat. I decided not to run, because I -wanted to continue to live in Atuona underided, and so I sprang to meet -him, and hitting him full tilt in the chin and chest, carried him hard -down to the boards, where we grappled and exchanged powerless blows. - -We had knocked over table, bottle, glasses, and chairs, and the uproar -was immense. Song of the Nightingale, Exploding Eggs, Ghost Girl and -Many Daughters, the little leper lass, had come scurrying from the -kitchen. Maybe the governor had a plan, or his dignity was offended, -for, without appearing, he gave an order to Song, and the quartet of -natives threw themselves on us, and disentangled us. Song, who later -confessed to me that he had a grudge against the tailor, took the -opportunity in the hurly-burly to deal him vicious blows, and then drove -the cursing, struggling Breton through the garden and out the gateway. -Peyral’s last words were a threat to kill me the next time we met. The -village had gathered, and Apporo, my landlady, Mouth of God, Malicious -Gossip, his wife, and a dozen others were running toward the palace. -Song dismissed them with a grandiloquent gesture, and his obscene -badinage dissolved their curiosity in gales of laughter. - -With the disturbance abated, the governor joined me, his ordinary merry -self again, and we drank a libation to Mars. My clothes were torn, my -jaw ached, and my body was bruised from the clutches of the tailor. - -“Do not molest yourself!” said the executive. “I do not entertain any -evil of you. When the allegation is formally made, I, as magistrate, -will hear the evidence. According to his own statement, no one was there -but his daughter and you. I believe you a man of honor. And women? _Mon -vieux_, I have known and loved many of them. I am a doctor, and a -student of life. They are incomprehensible. But we must take -precautions. He has said he will kill you, so you must be on guard. You -have no pistol? _Eh bien!_ I will lend you my Browning automatic I had -in Senegal. It is loaded. Defend yourself, but do not step on his -property. _Nous verrons!_” - -The governor was dramatic, not to say melodramatic, and, to my nervous -conception, he took too lightly the crime upon my person. I was the one -to bring a charge, not Peyral. Assaulted in the palace, at the throne of -justice, in the presence of the judge, I was handed a deadly firearm by -the arbiter, and told to protect myself. It was like the Wild West, or a -stage farce. But I had come a thousand miles with him on a small vessel, -and knew his delight in the least diversion that would relieve his -_ennui_ in a monotonous period of service. This was but a scherzo in a -slow program. However, I thanked him and, with the heavy pistol, went to -the House of the Golden Bed. The girl was uppermost in my unstable -reflections. - -What had possessed her to lie so? She must have distorted my ingenuous -action damnably to cause her father to beset me before the governor, and -to swear to kill me! I pictured her as I had last seen her, and try as I -would I could not hate her. I lay down with the Browning beside me, and -dreamed that she was testifying against me at the seat of judgment, and -that an austere God pointed downward. Exploding Eggs was cooking a -rasher of bacon on my improvised stove on the _paepae_ the next morning, -when Flag, the _mutoi_, brought a note, he acting as general messenger -of the island. It was in a strange hand and on dirty paper. I could not -make out the language except a few French words, and the signature not -at all, and so after breakfast I took it to Le Brunnec at his store. - -Le Brunnec glanced over it and looked puzzled. Then he spoke low, in -French, so that the natives in the room might not glean a word. - -“_Mais_,” he said, “it is from Peyral, and it is written in Breton and -absinthe. I translate it for you into your English: - -“‘Monsieur: You cannot _éviter_’—what you say?—‘escape—from your insult -to _ma fille_. You have insulted and struck me, too. I will not seek the -tribunal to make your apology. The governor has told me you are -Irishman, and so you are of the same blood like the grandparent of my -child. In France what you have done must be paid for in blood or by -marriage. Even if you make intention to return to your own country no -matter. You must marry my daughter or you will be buried in _Calvaire -cimetière_—what you say—graveyard?—It is necessary that you send me word -by to-morrow or I will make justice on you.’ He says he is yours -respectful. Well, by gar, it is a situation, my friend, but I say to you -one thing: do not be afraid. He slip back already. You have a revolver? -Yes? Keep it in the hand or the pants.” - -The merchant took up his sugar scoop to begin business. My wholeness or -health seemed not to interest him seriously. I sauntered up the path in -meditation. My feet took me into the mission churchyard, and I sat on -the roots of a gigantic banian-tree near the colossal crucifix brought -from France by the priests for the jubilee of 1900. The mad note of -Peyral had stunned me, and, instead of thinking hard and clearly upon my -situation, I fell into fatuous reverie. - -A gentle and lovely savage she was, and unspoiled by civilization. What -a singular and perhaps entrancing task to teach her only the best in it, -to unfold through English or French the music and literature of the -world, to take her perhaps to the great cities? Or if I myself was done -with civilization, as I sometimes persuaded myself I was, what more -delightful companion than this simple virgin of Atuona? To fish, to -swim, to roam the plateaus; to have a library and to get the reviews and -the new books by the schooners, to create a living idyll! Love would -undoubtedly be the response of kindness, of sympathy, of tenderness, of -love itself. But could I love her? There would be children. And they -would grow up here. I remembered her own white feet in the mud of this -village. Their mother! And with Peyral’s blood in them! Peyral! Damn -him! What had I done to make him attack me, to say he would kill me? To -spoil my peace? I would wear the Browning about my waist, and if he -winked an eyelash I would shoot first. He had brought it on himself. She -had lied to him. I had no liking to be in Calvary with Gauguin. My grave -would be forgotten like his. A man here was a bubble in the breeze. It -burst and was nothing. - -All these ideas rushed through my head as I returned to my house. I had -concluded not to pass Peyral’s house unarmed, so I tied a string about -my middle over my _pareu_ and fastened the revolver to it. With one pull -the knot undid and the gun came loose into my hand. I wore a light linen -coat over my bare body, and no one was the wiser. - -Thus ready for my would-be murderer or father-in-law, I whistled to -Exploding Eggs the next forenoon, and, he with towels in hand, we walked -toward the sands. There was no one on the veranda of the palace. Except -for the residence of the lepers by the cemetery there was no other house -toward the beach but that of my enemy. - -Obscure under the heavy-leaved palms, I could not be sure that Peyral -was not ensconced on his gallery with a bottle of absinthe and a -shot-gun or rifle waiting to pot-shot me. He knew my habit of bathing -every day, and maybe was chuckling over scaring me from the spot. I -walked boldly and briskly past his house. There was no figure on the -porch but that of a girl. I glimpsed her only, for an emotion of -shame—inexplicable shame—directed my eyes away from her. I continued on -to the water, and, hiding my revolver in the trailing _pahue_ with its -morning-glory blossoms, I took up my surfboard and forgot Peyral in that -most exhilarating of sports. - -Exploding Eggs dragged his tiny canoe from the bushes, and we launched -it and pushed it through the surf. With rare dexterity he paddled it -seaward, I with my board on my knees, a calm admirer of his marvelous -control of the little craft: he and it the first Marquesan and the first -canoe I had seen in this archipelago. When we were out half a mile or so -we lay still for the right breaker. He watched and after a few minutes -began to paddle with intense energy until the wave caught him. We swung -to its crest and clung there as we dashed in at a fast pace without -motion on our part. But, when half-way, Exploding Eggs took my board -from me, and, handing me the paddle, he suddenly plunged with it from -the canoe and, extended full on the board in rhythm with the billow I -rode, accompanied me to shore. - -The sun was dropping down the western sky when we dressed to leave the -beach, Exploding Eggs in his loin-cloth and I in mine, with my coat over -the Browning. The hours in the salt water with the exercise and the -laughter had cleared the cobwebs of blame from my brain. My innocent -blood would be on the guilty head of Peyral did he kill me. That was -comforting. However, I made sure that the knot slipped easily, and with -my valet beside me I made the start. - -I had gained half-way when I saw Peyral coming toward me, a thousand -feet away, with a shot-gun over his shoulder. He was silhouetted against -the setting sun and could not be mistaken. His burly form, his beard, -his general shagginess made him unmistakable, as was also the outline of -the weapon. - -There was no stopping. The swamp was on either side of the ten-foot -road, the beach behind me. Fleeing was out of the question. I might have -taken a side road had there been one, but just such conditions as -presented themselves then must be met daily. I kept on, and, as we came -nearer, our eyes joined and remained steadily fixed. I do not know how -Peyral felt, but I was as fascinated as the proverbial bird by the -snake. I moved as if by magnetic power toward my probable slayer, and he -toward me. Neither of us made a movement except that of our legs and -stiff bodies. - -There came a second when we were about four feet apart, each hugging the -edge of the road. Our eyes were held straight ahead, and mine remained -so. We appeared to hesitate as if we might whirl and seize each other or -draw our weapons. The shot-gun was on his shoulder but in the flash of -an eye might be brought down to the level of my vitals. But the eye did -not flash. The gun swayed only with his footfalls, and we continued our -mechanical advance away from each other. - -Prudence whispered to me to turn and protect myself from a rear attack, -but the message did not affect my legs. I winced momentarily for the -expected load of shot in my back, but I walked stiffly as if a great ray -of light were penetrating my cerebellum. Exploding Eggs, who knew only -about our fight upon the palace balcony and nothing of my having the -Browning, was chanting about the god of night, Po, and paid no attention -to Peyral, except to say quite audibly, “_Peyralé aoe metai!_ Peyral is -no good!” That did not add to my surety, and the imagined missile or -missiles from behind did not become less vivid until I was beyond -shooting distance. Just as I calculated with incredible relief that the -crisis was past, Peyral’s gun roared out. - -My muscles squirmed, my heart leaped, my knees bent, and my chin touched -my bosom. Exploding Eggs laughed. - -“_Peyralé puhi kuku_,” he said regretfully; “Peyral has shot a -_kuku_”—as if I should have shot it. I laughed heartily with him. The -joke was on me, but I enjoyed it to the echo. I recalled that often of -an evening my enemy replenished his larder with an expenditure of Number -Four shot. It was funny, and when I reached the palace I was trembling -with the reverberations of the absurd climax to my fears. - -L’Hermier des Plantes was dancing opposite Many Daughters a _hura-hura_, -and Song of the Nightingale was fetching cold water from the brook to -water the wine, in the temperate French way. - -“_Hola!_” called out the governor. “Come in, _mon ami_! Sit down and -have a _goutte de Pernod_. You are jolly. What? You met Peyral, and he -shot not you but a _kuku_? _O lalala!_ You give me back the Browning? -All right. You could not have done much harm with it. See, the -cartridges are blanks for firing a salute on the Fall of the Bastille -_fête_. _O sapristi!_ It is droll! I will die!” - -He held his stomach while he laughed and laughed. I grinned with fury. - -“What the devil is the _drôlerie_?” I questioned, earnestly. - -The governor wiped his eyes, and emptied his glass. - -“_Attendez!_” he answered. You were not in any great danger or I would -have come to your rescue. You know I have here a _dossier_ of every one -in these islands who has been complained against, or has complained. The -first week I was here Peyral declared that _Commissaire_ Bauda had -insulted his daughter, and that he must marry her or he would kill him. -Bauda denied the charge, and Peyral did nothing. Then I opened his -_dossier_, and in two years he had made three such charges, one against -a professor who was here a month, and one against Le Brunnec. _C’est -curieux._ The man is mad with alcohol, but more so with a determination -to marry that stark daughter of his to a white man who might take her -away. Others have been eliminated after such foolishness as this. See, -there was no one but you. Lutz is after higher game, and besides he is a -German, and Peyral hates him. _Voilà, mon garçon._ You were the _parti_ -inevitable. It is strange the way he goes about getting a son-in-law. -One might expect a _dot_, or a little hospitality, but no, he runs true -to type, and he is not a _chic_ type. But, _c’est fini_. He has tried -and failed. You have met him, and knocked him down, and now you know his -gun is for _kuku_. Well, we will drink to the health of the _pauvre -diable_, and a good husband for the girl. But not you, eh?” - -I drank with as much grace as I could, but when I walked in the upper -valley at dusk, and was alone by the _paepae tapu_, the shattered and -grown-over temple of the old Marquesan gods, I could have cried for pity -for that girl. - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CHAPTER XVI - -In the valley of Vaitahu—With Vanquished Often and Seventh Man He Is So - Angry He wallows in the Mire—Worship of beauty in the South - Seas—Like the ancient Greeks—Care of the body—Preparations for a - belle’s début—Massage as a cure for ills. - -ACROSS the Bordelaise Channel from Atuona, many hours of sailing in an -outrigger canoe, lay the island of Tahuata. Its principal settlement was -Vaitahu, and there I went with Exploding Eggs, my adopted brother of -fourteen, to stay awhile in the house of the chief, Seventh Man Who Is -So Angry He Wallows in the Mire, as Neo Efitu, his short name, meant. -Atuona personified the brooding spirit of melancholy that possessed the -race, the shadow of the white upon the Marquesan spirit, but Vaihatu had -as _genus loci_ a blithe and domestic sprite, which had kept the tiny -village—formerly of thousands—in the habits and moods of the old ways. -Waited on as an honored guest by the chief, his wife, and his niece, -Vanquished Often, the friend and playmate of the few score inhabitants, -I had happy weeks of simple pleasures, and of intense interest in -searching into the past of the Marquesans, and especially into their -customs and manners in relation to esthetics. - -The only foreigner in the valley, by my earnest wish and laughable -example, life resumed for a time much of the old Marquesan method and -appearance. The mission church, the first Christian edifice within a -thousand miles, was rejoining the wilderness. Without clergy or -adherent, its walls were fast falling into decay, and its -precisely-planned garden was jungle. The artist-schoolmaster, Le Moine, -who had taught Vaitahu’s children to say, “_La France est le plus bon -pays du monde_,” was gone to seek other models for painting as ravishing -as Vanquished Often, or men as majestic as Kahuiti, the cannibal of -Taaoa. Existence, almost as devoid of invention and artificiality as -before the white came, I was able to rebuild in my mind the structure of -Marquesan taste, and to view in imagination the attractive aspect of -Vaitahu in its idyllic days of old. We brought out of the chests the -native garments of _tapa_, and we lived as much as possible—like -children playing Indians—a perspective of the past. - -I looked from my mat upon the _paepae_ of Seventh Man Who Wallows to see -Vanquished Often by the _Vai Puna_, the spring of Vaitahu. She had taken -off her _ahu_ or tunic of pink muslin and bent over to receive the full -stream of cool water from the hills which flowed through the bamboo -pipes. Her beautiful body, the blood mantling under her silken skin, -perfect in development at thirteen years, glowed in the dazzling light -and under the silvery cascade, and her long, unconfined hair shone -red-gold in the sunbeams. My mind reverted to the descriptions of the -women, the men, and the scenes described by these who voyaged here -decades ago. - -[Illustration: - - Photo by Dr. Theodore P. Cleveland - Some friends in my valley -] - -[Illustration: - - Wash-day in the stream by my cabin -] - -Not any people in all the world, ancient or modern, ranked human beauty -higher in the list of life’s gifts than did the people of these islands. -In the star-scattered archipelagos of the Pacific tropics a dozen tawny -races or breeds of superb physical endowment made their bodies wondrous -temples for their free souls. The loveliness and grace of women, the -symmetry and strength of men, were, before the white came to destroy -them, the fascinating labor of their days, their vivid religion, and the -expression of their joy of living. - -They brought the culture of beauty and the rhythm of motion to an -unequaled perfection, and in the adornment of their bodies and -development of their natural attractions reached a pitch of splendor and -artistry which, though seeming savage to us of this period, struck -beholders, even of our kind, as entrancing and marvelous. - -While all over Polynesia these conditions obtained when the first -Anglo-Saxons threw down the anchors of their ships in the enchanting -harbors of these tropics, they remained longest in the Marquesas -Archipelago. - -In their simple dress, their practice of manipulation in the development -of their bodies, their use of scents, unguents, and lotions, their -wearing of flowers and ornaments, their singular and astounding art of -the story-teller, the dance and the pantomime, and the exquisite -tattooing of their persons, they showed a delicacy of feeling and an -understanding of elegance unsurpassed in the records of the nations of -the earth. - -As I sat under the _pandanus_ thatch of Seventh Man Who Is So Angry He -Wallows in the Mire, I recalled what that eminent moralizer, Lecky, had -said: - - The intense esthetic enthusiasm that prevailed was eminently - fitted to raise the most beautiful to honor. In a land and - beneath a sky where natural beauty developed to the highest - point, supreme physical perfection was crowned by an assembled - people. In no other period of the world’s history was the - admiration of beauty in all its forms so passionate or so - universal. It colored the whole moral teaching of the time, and - led the chief moralists to regard virtue simply as the highest - kind of supersensual beauty. It led the wife to pray, before all - other prayers, for the beauty of her children. The courtesan was - often the queen of beauty. - -Lecky wrote that of ancient Greece to contrast it with the morals of the -Europe of his day, but I considered the striking likeness between the -condition he described and the attitude of the ancient Marquesans. Here -in these tiny islands, separated by ten thousand miles of billow from -the land of Pericles and Aspasia, a people whose origin was only guessed -at by science, erected the same goal of attainment, and like standards -of harmony of form and movement. Doubtless at that very day these Greeks -of the tropics, considering their environment, most distant from the -birthplace of humanity and from the example of other peoples, were -comparable in brilliancy of person and ease of motion to the Homeric -figures. - -The American sea-fighter, Captain David Porter, who ran up the Stars and -Stripes in the breadfruit groves of these islands, said: - - The men of the Marquesas are remarkably handsome, of large - stature and well-proportioned; they possess every variety of - countenance and feature, and a great difference is observable in - the color of the skin, which for the most part is of a copper - color. But some are as fair as the generality of working people - much exposed to the sun of a warm climate. - - The young girls were handsome and well-formed; their skins were - remarkably soft and smooth and their complexions no darker than - many brunettes in America, celebrated for their beauty. Their - modesty was more evident than that of the women of any place we - had visited since leaving our own country; and if they suffered - themselves (though with apparent timidity and reluctance) to be - presented naked to strangers, may it not be in compliance with a - custom which taught them to sacrifice to hospitality all that is - most estimable? - -Why, and how had this strange race, so far from others’ strivings, -attained so singular a state of natural beauty that discoverer after -discoverer and diarist after diarist, from the bloody Spaniard, Mendaña, -to the gentle Louis Stevenson, set it down as the “handsomest on earth?” - -One must guess at the beginnings of the Marquesans. Scientists make -explorations to find the route of the Caucasian people who thousands of -years ago—maybe, before the Hebrews deserted Jehovah for -Baal-Peor—migrated through the unknown and fearsome wastes of ocean -toward these misty islands of the far south. What equipment of body and -soul they brought with them we do not know, but they were or became the -masters of their seas, and in their frail canoes dared even the long -voyage to New Zealand and to Hawaii, when Europeans and Asiatics in -keeled ships crept carefully about their own coasts, or crossed the -Mediterranean Sea only within the threatening Pillars of Hercules. - -During the thousands of years the Marquesans were separated from Europe -they developed a policy of government, a paternalistic democracy, or -communism, which was perfectly adapted to their nature and surroundings. -A very large part of it was concerned with beauty, manners, and -entertainment, with personal decoration, carving of stone and wood, -building of temples and houses, oratory, dances, and chants. All of -these were carefully regulated by cults, gilds, and _tapus_. They must -have been an extremely prolonged growth, for they had come to a fixed -standard of detail and exactness, and an acme of art, bizarre and exotic -as it was, that could have been but the minute accretion of many -centuries. When the first explorers came into the uncharted spaces of -these warm seas, they found a culture totally beyond the understanding -of most of them, and abhorrent to state and church, but which a few fine -souls glimpsed as an astonishing revelation of the natural development -of the human, and, by foil, of the decadence of civilization. They found -health and high spirits abounding to a degree utterly strange to them, -the hardiest and most adventurous of Europeans and Americans, and they -were provoked by the innocence, radiance, and naturalness of the women. - -This Edenic condition astounded the Yankee Porter, who went to sea at -sixteen, and who slew scores of Marquesans, for he put in his log: - - The Hawaiians, Tahitians, and New Zealanders had by residence - among whites become corrupt; they had fallen into their vices - and ate the same food. They were no longer in a state of nature; - they had, like us, become corrupt, and while the honest, - guileless faces of the Marquesans shone with benevolence, good - nature and intelligence, the downcast eye and sullen look of the - others marked their inferiority and degeneracy. Guilt, of which - by intercourse with us they had become sensible, had already - marked their countenances. Every emanation of their souls could - not be perceived upon their countenances as with those of the - naked Marquesans. - -War, murder, mutiny, desertion, and horrible orgies marked the reaction -of these forecastle denizens, scourings of slums and dull villages, to -the spontaneity, ease, and liberty they found here, in contrast with -their ugly and restricted lives aboard ship or in the hard climes and -rough grooves of their homes. The sight of such intense individual -happiness, glowing vitality, and exquisite bodies, of a coöperative -existence without kings or commoners, business or money, palaces or -hovels, disease or dirt, prudery or prostitutes, shocked them by the -abrupt differences from their own countries. They wrote the Marquesans -down as barbarians, as the Greeks did the Romans; and church, -government, and trade made haste to hack down their achievement, and to -make over the pieces as the wretched patchwork of their own hands. They -hated it, subconsciously, for its giving the lie to their own boasted -institutions. They ended it that it might not mock the degradation and -futility of their own conduct and the opposition between their decalogue -and their deeds. The merchant condemned and altered it to make a market -for what it did not then need or desire. - -The first approach to change after subjugation and conversion was -through clothing, because the most obvious difference between the whites -and the browns was that the latter largely exposed their bodies. The -missionary paved the way for the dealer who had cottons to sell by -saying that God abhorred nakedness. Livingston himself acted likewise. -The Marquesans, in truth, had a small variety of clothing. Much of the -time both sexes wore only the single garment, the _pareu_ or loin-cloth. -Their clothes of _Tapa_ or bark were, except mattings, the only stuffs -made by the Marquesans. They were of a remarkable texture and coloring, -considering the materials available. The inner barks of the banian, -breadfruit, and particularly the mulberry trees were used. The outer -rind was scraped off with a shell, and the inner slightly beaten and -allowed to ferment. It was then beaten over wooden forms with clubs of -ironwood about eighteen inches long, grooved coarsely on one side and -finely on the reverse, a process that united so closely the fibers that -in the finished cloth one could not guess the processes of its making. -Bleached in the sun on the beaches to a dazzling white, this fabric was -either dyed black or brown, yellow or red, or fashioned as it was into -the few varieties of garments they affected. All wore the _pareu_ about -the loins; a strip two yards or more in length, and a yard wide, which -is passed twice about the waist and tucked in for holding, as the sarong -of the Malay. It hangs above the knees, and like the _fundoshi_ of -Japan, worn by royalty and beggar, is capable, for strenuous movements, -such as swimming, of being gathered up to form a diaper or breech-cloth. - -The _cahu_ or _ahu_, a long and flowing piece of _tapa_, was worn by the -females, hanging from the shoulders, knotted about or covering one or -both breasts at the whim of the wearer. For the coloring of this and the -_pareu_, rich and alluring dyes were found in the plants and trees and -even the sea-animals of the beaches. The outlines of the hibiscus -flowers and carven objects were imprinted upon these tapas, and -astronomical, mystic, or tribal signs or records drawn upon them in -fantastic but artistic design. - -The method of wearing the _cahu_ for hiding or disclosing the charms of -the female was as varied as the _toilettes_ of Parisian fashion. The -conceit of the girl or woman, the occasion, and the weather decided its -being draped in any one of a score of manners. A belle might think it -ungenerous to cover too much, and an old or homely woman find the entire -surface too scant. When human nature has freest fling, prudery is the -fig-leaf of ugliness, here, as in the salon of Mayfair, or behind the -footlights of Broadway. - -For the men, while the _pareu_, always as now, was the common apparel, -they had a hundred ornaments, in a diversity more numerable than those -of the females. Whenever man has not sacrificed his masculine craving -for adornment to religious or economic pressure, he is the gaudier of -the sexes. From the fiddler-crab with his rampant claw to the mandrill -with his crimson and lilac callosities, nature has so ordained it, and -man rejoiced in his privilege. Not until European man felt the iron hand -of the machine age, when the rifle displaced the bow and the pistol the -sword, the factory the home loom, and the foundry the smithy; not until -money became the chief pursuit of all ranks, and puritanism a general -blight upon brilliancy of costume, did the white man relinquish his -gewgaws to the parasitic woman. Then he made it a vicarious pride by -decorating her with his riches and making her the vehicle of his pomp in -ornature, and the advertisement of his prosperity. - -The Marquesans, struck by the glitter of brass buttons and gold braid, -of broadcloth and fur, unfamiliar with metal, and admiring everything -foreign, fell facile victims to vestures, and when the new-fangled -religions that followed hot upon the discoverers, enforced covering by -dogma and even by punishment, they clothed themselves and sweated in -fashion and sanctity. But clothes irk the Marquesans as they do all -people living close to a kindly nature. Our own babes resent even the -swaddles which bind them in the cradle. The first years of childhood are -a continuing struggle against garments, until, having lost plasticity -and the instant response of muscle to mind that distinguishes the -Marquesans, the result is rationalized by adolescents into modesty and -convention. After youth, clothing is welcomed by us to enhance imperfect -charms and to hide defects, to screen our unhandsome and puny bodies. -The lean shanks, protuberant abdomens, and anatomical grotesqueries in a -public bath bear witness to our sacrifice. Marriage is often a -disclosure of unguessed flaws. - -“The gods are naked and in the open,” said Seneca. - -Pigalle sculptured the frail old Voltaire in the nude, yet attained -dignity. Even Broadway smiles at frocked heroes in bronze, and must have -its ideals in marble or bronze undraped. - -How often, when I lived at the spacious home of my friend, Ariioehau -Ameroearao, the chief at Mataiea in Tahiti, I have seen him, chevalier -of the Legion of Honor, come in from the highway in stiff white linen or -in religious black, and in a twinkling reduce his garb to a loin-cloth! - -His walls were hung with portraits of princes and distinguished -travelers, guests of his in the past score of years, and none was more -distinguished, though in brilliant uniform and gorgeously decorated, -than the old chief in his strip of cotton print. - -“Three kings naked have I seen, and never a sign of royalty,” said the -cynical Bismarck. - -Plato understood very well the spirit in which the Polynesians were -clothed by the whites, the crass prurience that pointed out to them the -wickedness of nudity, that hid their beautiful bodies under tunics and -pantaloons, that laughed at their simplicity. - -In the “Republic” he says: - - Not long since it was thought discreditable and ridiculous among - the Greeks, as it is now among most barbarian nations, for men - to be seen naked. And when the Cretans first, and after them the - Lacedæmonians, began the practice of gymnastic exercises, the - wits of the time had it in their power to make sport of those - novelties. But when experience has shown that it was better to - strip than to cover up the body and when the ridiculous effect - that this plan had to the eye had given way before the arguments - establishing its superiority, it was at the same time, as I - imagine, demonstrated that he is a fool who thinks anything - ridiculous but that which is evil, and who attempts to raise a - laugh by assuming any object to be ridiculous but that which is - unwise and evil. - -The Marquesans, perfect animals, had their senses extraordinarily -attuned to the faintest vibrations of value to their survival or -delight. They heard sounds plainly that I, with rather better than -ordinary civilized hearing, did not catch. I was with Vanquished Often -when she spoke to Exploding Eggs two hundred feet away in a -conversational tone. I tested them, and found they could talk with each -other intelligibly when I heard but an indistinct whisper from the -farthest. So with smell. Ghost Girl and Mouth of God, my neighbor at -Atuona, could detect any intimates by their odor in pitch darkness at -twenty feet, though Marquesans, because they have little bodily hair and -are the cleanest people I know, have less personal odor than we. They -enjoyed life through scent infinitely more than do we. They had no -kisses but rubbed noses and smelled each other with indrawings of their -breath. Odoriferous herbs, flowers, and seeds were continually about -their necks, both men and women, tucked behind their ears, or in their -hair, and their bodies after bathings were anointed with the -_hinano_-scented cocoanut-oil. Their noses were sources of sensuous -enjoyment to them beyond my capability. They inhaled emanations from -flowers too subtle to touch my olfactory nerves. - -The Marquesan woman has ever been an arch-coquette, paying infinite -attention to her appearance, and enduring pain and _ennui_ to improve -her beauty. Her complexion was as much a pride as with a fashionable -American woman to-day. The beauty parlors of our cities were matched by -the steam baths, the use of saffron, of oils, and of massage, and by -weeks or even months of preparation before some great festival. To burst -upon the assembled clan, white as the sea-foam, with skin as smooth as a -polished calabash, hair oiled and wreathed, and body rounded from -dancing practice and much sleep, and to set beating wildly the pulses of -the young men, so that, strive as they might to remain mute, they would -be forced to yield mad plaudits, was a result worth months of effort. To -be the belle of the ball was a distinction a woman remembered a -lifetime. It was an honor comparable to the warrior’s wounds, or -possession of the heads of the enemies. Parents felt keenly the success -of their daughters. Titihuti and others have told me of their triumphs, -as Bernhardt or Patti might recite of packed houses and a score of -encores. - -A curious secrecy or modesty was attached to the making of the toilet -and the enhancement of the natural charms. No Marquesan or Tahitian or -Hawaiian would ever have looked at herself in a portable mirror—if she -had one—as do many of our females, and the whitening and reddening of -cheeks and lips in public places would have caused a blush of shame for -her sex to suffuse the face of a Marquesan, to whom such intimate -gestures were for the privacy of her home or the bank of the limpid -stream in a grove dedicated to the Marquesan Venus. - -Near Tahiti was the atoll of Tetuaroa where for hundreds of years the -belles of Tahiti resorted to lose their sunburn in the bowered groves -and to spend a season in beautification by banting, special foods, -dancing, swimming, massage, baths, oils, and lotions. - -Here in the Marquesas, as in all Polynesia, a period of voluntary -seclusion preceded the début of the maiden, or the preparation for a -special _pas seul_ by a noted beauty. - -Seclusion of the girl was practiced at the time of puberty. It has a -curious analogy in such far separated places as Torres Straits and -British Columbia, one Australasia and the other North America. The girls -of a tribe in Torres Straits are hidden for three months behind a circle -of bushes in their parent’s house at the first signs of womanhood. No -sun must reach them, and no man, even though he be the father, enter the -house, nor must they feed themselves. The Nootkas of British Columbia -also conceal their nubile virgins, and insist that they touch their own -bodies for a period only with a comb or a bone, never laying their hands -upon it. - -It would seem that all this mystery had the same purpose, that of adding -to the attractiveness of the girls and heightening the romance of their -new condition. Our coming-out parties parallel the goal of these strange -peoples, announcements, formal introductions, as brilliant as possible, -being considered desirable both among savages and ourselves to give -notice of a marriageable state. Our débuts have not departed far from -aboriginal ideas. - -The Junoesque wife of Seventh Man Who Wallows had just come from the -_via puna_ in her accustomed bathing attire, and, still dripping, seated -herself in the sun near me to dry. She had added a jasmine blossom to -the heavy gold hoops in her ears and had lit her pipe, and her handsome, -large face was twisted between smiles and frowns as she tried to put in -understandable words and gestures her recital of these customs: - -“Our girls, daughters of chiefs, such as I am, were kept hidden for -months before we appeared for the first time in public in the tribal -dance. The _tapu_ was strict. We were secret in our mother’s house and -inclosure, without supposedly even being seen by any one but our -relatives and their retainers. It was death to gaze upon us. We were -_tapu tapu_. If we had cause to go out, our official guardian blew a -conch-shell to warn all from the neighborhood. Not until the day of the -dance or marriage ceremony, not until the feast was spread and the -accepted suitor present to claim us, or the drums booming for the dance, -were we shown to the multitude; we had had months of _omi omi_, and -would be in perfect condition and most beautiful.” - -It was this _omi omi_, or massage, that many of the earlier chroniclers -of the South Seas believed to be the cause of the chiefs and headmen of -all these islands being much bigger and handsomer than the common -people. The _hakaiki_, or chiefs, men and women, throughout Polynesia -astonished the voyagers and missionaries by their huge size. Often they -were from four to six inches above six feet tall, and framed in -proportion. Hardly a writing sailor or visitor to Hawaii, Tahiti, Samoa, -or the Marquesas but remarks this striking fact. Many thought these -headmen a different race than the others, but scientists know that -family, food, and the curious effect of the strenuous massage from -infancy account for the differences. The _omi omi_ of these islands, the -_tarumi_ of Tahiti, and the _lomi lomi_ of the Hawaiians all have a -relation to the _momi-ryoji_, practiced by the tens of thousands of -whistling blind itinerants throughout Japan. - -I had a remarkable illustration of the curative merits of _omi omi_ -when, having bruised my back by awkwardness in sliding down a rocky -waterfall into a once tabooed pool with Vanquished Often and Exploding -Eggs, I submitted myself to the ministrations of Juno and Vanquished -Often. They would have me in the glare of the early morning sun on -Seventh Man’s _paepae_, and there were gales of laughter as they shouted -out my physical differences from the Marquesans, my excellences, and my -blemishes. On one side and on the other, both squatted, they handled me -as if they understood the locations of each muscle and nerve. They -pinched and pulled, pressed and hammered, and otherwise took hold of and -struck me, but all with a most remarkable skill and seeming exact -knowledge of their method and its results. I was in agony over their -treatment of me, but after a day as well as ever. - -Before I was given the _omi omi_, I was bathed by the two ladies with a -care and nicety not to be bought at our best hammams. A tiny penthouse -was made quickly of cocoanut-leaves, and in this was placed a great -wooden trencher of water in which white hot stones were dropped. On a -tiny stool I sat in the resulting steam, the delicious odor of _kakaa_ -leaves thrown into the boiling water aiding the vapor in effect on skin -and nerves. Quite ten minutes I was compelled to remain in the -penthouse, my fair jailers remaining obdurate outside despite my -imploring cries to be released, my protestations that I was being -dissolved and would emerge a thing of shreds and patches. When I could -not have stood it another second, my lungs bursting with restraint, and -my body hot enough to hurt my nervously caressing hands, I was suddenly -let out and hurried to the beach, where Vanquished Often rushed with me -into the beating surf. - -The sea seemed cold as an Adirondack lake, and I was for swimming beyond -the breakers in fullest enjoyment of the relief, but my doctors would -not allow me another minute and hand in hand rushed me to the chief’s -_paepae_, now my own, for my lenitive kneading. The bruises I had got in -my awkward essay to emulate the agility of Exploding Eggs and Vanquished -Often were deep and painful, but after half an hour of their pounding I -fell asleep and remained unconscious six hours. I was to myself a -celestial musical instrument, a human xylophone, from which houris -struck notes that made the stars whirl, and to the music of which -Vanquished Often danced in the purple moonlight upon a milky cloud. -Their cessation of the _omi omi_ woke me. It was past noon when I joined -them and the whole merry populace of Vaitahu in the warm ocean waves. I -was without pain or stiffness, and reborn to a childhood I had -forgotten. - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CHAPTER XVII - -Skilled tattooers of Marquesas Islands a generation ago—Entire bodies - covered with intricate tattooed designs—The foreigner who had - himself tattooed to win the favor of a Marquesan beauty—The magic - that removed the markings when he was recalled to his former life in - England. - -TATTOOING, the marking of designs on the human skin in life, is an art -so old that its beginnings are lost to records. It was practised when -the Neolithic brute went out to club his fellows and drag in his body to -the fire his mate kept ever burning. Its origin, perhaps, was -contemporaneous with vanity, and that was in the heart of man before he -branched from the missing limb of evolution. It perhaps followed in the -procession of art the rude scratchings on bone and daubing on rock. In -the caves of Europe with these childish distortions are found the -implements with which the savage whites who lived in the recesses of the -rocks tattooed their bodies. The Jews were forbidden by Moses to tattoo -themselves, and the Arabs, with whom they had much converse, yet -practise it. In 1066 William of Malmesbury said that the English -“adorned their skins with punctured designs.” Kingsley, with regard for -accuracy, makes _Hereward the Wake_, son of the _Lady Godiva_, have blue -tattooing marks on wrists, throat, and knee; a cross on his throat and a -bear on the back of his hand. The Romans found the Britons stained with -woad. The taste for such marks existing to-day is evidenced by the pain -and price paid by sailors and aristocrats of all white nations for them. -Tattooing has faded under clothing which covers it and a less personal -civilization which condemns it. In the Marquesas Islands it reached its -highest development, and here was the most beautiful form of art known -to the most perfect physical people on earth. - -[Illustration: - - From an old drawing - Te Ipu, an old Marquesan chief, showing tattooing -] - -[Illustration: - - The famous tattooed leg of Queen Vaikehu -] - -Until the overthrow of Marquesan culture, the island of Fatuhiva was the -Florence of the South Seas. The most skillful workers at tattooing as -well as carving lived in its valleys of Oomoa and Hanavave. During the -weeks I have resided in them I delved into the history and curiosities -of this most intimate of fine arts, now expiring if not dead. Nataro, -the most learned Marquesan alive, took me into its intricacies and made -me know it for the proud, realistic performance it was, a dry-point -etching on a growing plate from which no prints were to be made. -Nataro’s wife had one hand that is as famous and as admired in Fatuhiva -as “Mona Lisa’s” portrait in Paris. A famous _tuhuka_ wrought its -design, a man equal in graphic genius, relatively, to Dürer or -Rembrandt. Age and work had faded and wrinkled the picture, but I can -believe her husband that, as a young woman, when the art was not cried -down, people came from far valleys to view it. I recalled the right leg -of the late Queen Vaekehu, the most notable piece of art in all the -Marquesas until it went with its possessor into the grave at Taiohae. In -late years the former queen of cannibals and last monarch of the -Marquesas would not show her limb—a modest attitude for a recluse who -lived with nuns and thought only of death. Stevenson confessed he never -saw it above the ankle, though the queen dined with him on the Casco. He -had a poet’s delicacy, an absolute lack of curiosity, and Mrs. Stevenson -was with him. But he expressed a real sympathy for the iconoclastic -ignorance that was destroying tattooing here. - -The queen, who had been the prize of bloody feuds and had danced at the -feast of “long pig,” had gone to her reward after years of beseechment -of the Christian God for mercy, but I could almost see her once glorious -leg in the life because of the two of my Atuona mother, Titihuti, which -for months have passed my hut daily. They are replicas of the Queen’s, -said Nataro, with the difference that Titihuti’s, beginning at her toe -nails, reached a gorgeous cincture at her waist, while Vaekehu’s did not -reach her hip, being, indeed, a permanent stocking. Some of the Easter -Island women had an imitation of drawers delineated upon them, giving -weight to the theory that these perpetuated the idea of clothing they -wore in a colder clime, but of which they had preserved not even a -legend. - -Women were seldom tattooed above the waist, except their hands, and fine -lines about the mouth and upon the insides of the lips. This -lip-coloring was, doubtless, the efforts of invaders to make the red -lips of the Caucasian women, the first Polynesian immigrants, conform to -the invaders’ inherited standards, as the Manchus put the queue on the -Chinese. The Marquesan men like dark men. The last conquerors here were -probably a darker race than the conquered, and they preserved their -ideals of color, but, having come without women and seized the women -they found, they let them preserve their own standards, except for red -lips, which they tattooed blue. These latest comers thought much pigment -meant strong bones, and after a battle they searched the field for the -darkest bodies to furnish fishhooks and tools for canoe-making and -carving. They thought the whites who first arrived were gods, and when -they found they were men, with their same passions, they thought they -were ill. That is the first impression one who lives long with -Polynesians has when he meets a group of whites. They look sickly, -sharp-faced, and worried. They pay dear for factories and wheeled -vehicles. - -Very probably the beginning of tattooing was the wish to frighten one’s -enemy, as masks were worn by many tribes, and as the American painted -his face with ocher. That state was followed by the natural desire of -the warrior, as evident yet as in Hector’s day, to look manly and -individualistic before the maidens of his tribe. And finally, as -heraldry became complicated, tattooing grew, at least in Polynesia, into -a record of sept and individual accomplishments and distinguishing -marks. Here it had, as an art, freed itself from the bonds of religion, -so that the artist had liberty to draw the Thing as he saw it, and had -not to conform to priest-craft, a rule which probably hurt Egyptian art -greatly. - -In New Zealand, where the Polynesians went from Samoa, a sometime -rigorous climate demanded clothing, and the head became the _pièce de -résistance_ of the tattooer. There was a considerable trade among whites -in the preserved heads of New Zealanders until the supply ran out. White -dealers procured the raiding of villages to sell their victim’s visages. -Museums and collectors of such curios paid well for these tattooed -faces, but the demand exhausted the best efforts of the whites. After -the rarest examples were dead and smoked, there was no stimulating the -supply. The goods refused to be manufactured. The Solomon Islands now -supply smoked human heads, but they have no adornment. - -Birds, fish, temples, trees, and plants—all the cosmos of the -Marquesan—was a model for the _tuhuka_. He often drew his designs in -charcoal on the skin, but sometimes proceeded with his inking _sans_ -pattern. He never copied, but drew from memory, though the same lines -and tableaux might be repeated a thousand times; and always he bore in -mind the caste, tribe, and sex of the subject. Thus at a glance one -could tell the valley and rank of any one, much as in Japan the station, -age, moral standing, and other artificial qualities of women are -indicated by their coiffure and _obi_, or sash. - -The craft did not require any elaborate tools. The _ama_ or candlenut -soot with water, a graduated set of bone-needles, of human and pig -origin, and a mallet were all the requirements. The paint or ink was of -but one color, black or brown, which on a dark skin looked bluish and on -a fair skin black. The marking of the parts most delicate and sensitive -to pain, as the eyelids, was a parcel of the endeavor to promote -stoicism and to show the foe the mettle of his opponent. Man did not -consent for thousands of years to share his ornamentation with women, -and then insisted that the _motif_ be beauty or the accentuation of sex. - -The tattooers, in order to learn from one another, to have art chats, to -discuss prices and perhaps dead beats or slow payers, had societies or -unions, in which were degrees and offices, the most favored in ability -and by patronage being given the highest rank, though now and again a -white man, by his superior magic and force, though no _tuhuka_ at all, -held the supreme position. - -A shark upon the forehead was the card of membership in the tattooers’ -lodge, to which were admitted occasionally enthusiastic and discerning -patrons of art. - -At festival times, when _tapus_ were to some degree suspended and the -intertribal enmities forgotten for the nonce, thousands of men, women, -and children gathered to eat, drink, and be merry, and to be tattooed, -as one at country fairs buys new dresses and trinkets. It was to these -_fêtes_ that the pot-boilers, fakers, and beginners among the talent -came; men who would make a sitter a scrawl for a heap of _pipi_, shells -and gewgaws, a few squealing pigs, a roll of tapa, or, most precious of -all, a whale’s tooth. Like our second- and third-class painters, our -wretched daubers who turn out canvases by the foot (though -hand-painted), these tramps, who, by a dispensation of the priests and a -mocking providence, were _tapu_, not to be attacked in any valley, -strolled from tribe to tribe, promising much and giving little. Some -worked largely on repair jobs, doing over spots where the skin had been -abraded by injuries in battles, or by rocks or fire. The man who was -well dressed in a suit of tattoo, or the lady who was clothed from toes -to waist in a washable _peau de femme_, kept these garments in as good -condition as possible, but when accident or the fortune of war injured -the _ensemble_ they hastened to have it touched up. - -An artist of the first rank, one who in a Marquesan salon would have a -medal of honor, disdained such commissions, but dauber and South Sea Da -Vinci alike often had their work hung upon the line, when they were -taken by the enemy and suspended at the High Place before being dropped -into the pit for the banquets of the cannibal victors. - -It was always of interest to me to wonder how men learned tattooing. -Painters, carvers, etchers, and sculptors have material ever available -for their lessons. They can waste an infinity of canvas, wood, copper, -or marble if they have the money to spend, but how about the apprentice -or student who must have live mediums even for practice? - -Well, just as there are Chinese who, for a consideration, take the place -of persons condemned to death (though they do not, as alleged, make a -living out of it), and others who, though it exhaust and finally kill -them, enter deadly trades or hire out for war, there were Marquesans who -offered themselves as kit-cats for these students and sold their surface -at so much an inch for any vile design or miserable execution. I can see -these fellows, well covered with _tapa_, hiding whenever possible the -caricatures and travesties that made them a laughing show. These -Hessians had no pride in complexion. Their skins they wanted full of -food, nor cared at all for their outside if the inside man was replete. - -There were others who, too poor to pay even the itinerant wall-painters, -let the students wreak their worst upon them, merely to be tattooed, -good or bad, and many of these, like our millionaire picture buyers, -were luckily denied any appreciation of art and did not know the -imperfections of the _skin_ pictures put upon them. - -“Tattooing in these islands,” said Nataro, “was usually begun upon those -able to pay for it at the age of puberty; but there were many exceptions -of tattooing commenced upon boys soon after their infancy or deferred -until mature manhood. Illness, poverty, or other obstacle might prevent, -and the desire of parents might cause early tattooing. The father or -other relative or protector of the youth or girl paid the _tuhuka_ but -at the festivals even the very poor orphans were given opportunities to -be tattooed by a general contribution, or the chief of the valley paid -the fee. Years were occupied at intervals in the covering of the entire -body of men, which was the aim; but many had to be content with having a -part pictured, and often elaborate designs were never finished. You see -many bare places, meant to be covered when the _tuhuka_ began his work. -Queen Vaekehu was converted to Christianity with but one leg done and -forewent further beautification to serve her new God. Though begun in -boyhood, the full adornment of a man could hardly be terminated before -his thirtieth year. During his lifetime of sixty years he might have it -renewed twice, and as each pore could not be duplicated exactly the -third coat would make him a solid mass of color, the goal of manly -beauty. - -“Though men usually sought to look terrible so that when they faced -their enemies they would inspire fear, with women the sex _motif_ was -dominant,” said Nataro. “Girls with beautiful bodies and legs are much -more attractive when tattooed, and we selected the best formed for the -most elaborate designs. These were drawn so that, as the girls danced -naked, the whole patterns were obvious, and those who were the most -symmetrical won high honors in the great public exhibitions. If in the -wide circle that chanted a _utanui_, while the old folks watched, a -woman by exposing her beauty in a dance caused the voices of the young -men to falter, or some one of them to become so entranced as to leap -into the ring and seize her, she won a prize of acclamation for her -parents which no other equaled. The dance stopped and all united in -cheering the dancer. These beauties danced with their legs close -together, so as to keep the design intact, lifting the heels backward -and showing the shapeliness of figure and the fineness of tattooing.” - -To analyze thoroughly the meanings of the different designs upon the -bodies of the Maoris, or upon the canoes, paddles, and bowls, was -impossible now. It might be compared to the study of heraldry. Tattooing -in the South Seas was a combination of art and heraldry, racial and -individual pride’s sole written or graven record. - -In the Marquesas, the art reached its zenith. It was the Marquesans’ -national expression, their art, their proof of Spartan courage, the -badge of the warrior, and the glory of sex. In the man it marked -ambition to meet the enemy and to win the most beautiful women. In the -weaker vessel it was a coquetry, highly developed among daughters of -chiefs and women of personal force; and it afforded those who had -submitted to the efforts of the best craftsmen opportunities to display -their charms in public to the most striking advantage. - -Nataro said that when the law against tattooing was enforced here a few -years ago a number went to prison rather than obey it, but that when it -was abrogated the art was already dead. It is kept alive now, except in -a few cases, only by the placing of names upon the arms of the girls. -Many _tuhukas_ were still living, but there was little call for their -work. - -“They were our highest class, next to the chiefs,” said Nataro. “We -looked up to them as you do to your great. They were fêted and made much -of, and their schools were our art centers, teaching besides tattooing, -the carving of wood, bowls, canoes, clubs, and paddles. Now we buy tin -cans and china plates. Von den Steinen, the German philologist, -connected with the Berlin museum, who was here ten years ago, copied -every tattoo pattern he saw, and in many he found a relation to Indian -or Asiatic and perhaps other hieroglyphics and figures of thousands of -years ago.” - -With the ridiculing of it by the missionaries, who associated it with -heathenry, and the making of it a crime by the missionary-directed -chiefs of Tahiti, tattooing vanished there almost a hundred years ago, -but here the law against it was very recent. The law written by the -English Protestant missionaries in Tahiti was as follows: - - No person shall mark with tatau, it shall be entirely - discontinued. It belongs to ancient evil customs. The man or - woman that shall mark with tatau, if it be clearly proved, shall - be tried and punished. The punishment shall be this—he shall - make a piece of road ten fathoms long for the first marking, - twenty for the second; or stone work four fathoms long and two - wide; if not this, he shall do some work for the king. This - shall be the woman’s punishment—she shall make two large mats, - one for the king and one for the governor; or four small mats, - for the king two, and for the governor two. If not this, native - cloth twenty fathoms long and two wide; ten fathoms for the king - and ten for the governor. The man and woman that persist in - tatauing themselves successively four or five times, the figures - marked shall be destroyed by blacking them over, and the - individuals shall be punished as above written. - -To achieve a fairly complete picture upon one’s body meant many months -of intense suffering, the expenditure of wealth, and a decade of years -of very gradual progress toward the goal after manhood was attained; but -for a man in the former days to lack the Stripes of Terror upon his -face, to have a bare countenance, or one not yet marked by the initial -strokes of the hammer of the tattooer was to be a poltroon and despised -of his tribe. - -Such a one must expect to have no apple of love thrown at him, to awaken -no passion in womankind, nor ever to find a wife to bear him children. -He was as the giaour among the Turks. He had no honor in life or death, -no foothold in the ranks of the warriors, or place among the shades of -Po. - -So when white men were cast by shipwreck in those isles, or fled from -duty on whalers or warships, and sought to stay among the Marquesans, -they acceded to the honored customs of their hosts, and adopted their -facial adornment and often in the course of years their whole bizarre -garb. The courage that did not shrink from dwelling among cannibals -could not wilt at the blow of the _hama_. - -The explorer in the far North, who lets his face become covered with a -great growth of hair, when he intends to return to civilization can with -a few strokes of a razor be again as before. But once the curious ink of -the tattooer has bitten into the skin, it is there forever. It is like -the pits of smallpox; it can never be erased. Through all his life, and -into the grave itself, the human canvas must bear the pictures painted -by the artist of the needles. It was a chain as strong as steel, riveted -on him, that fastened him to these lotus isles. So men of America or -Europe did not return to their native land from the Marquesas, but died -here. The whorls and lines in the _ama_ dye wrote exile forever from the -loved ones at home. - -Is that wholly true? Had not science or sorcery nepenthe for the -afflicted by such a horror—horror if unwanted? Is there not one who has -escaped such a fate when life had become fearful under it? - -I asked that question of all, and in the valley of Hanavave was -answered. I had rowed to Hanavave in the whaleboat of Grelet, and, when -he returned to Oomoa, stayed on a month for the fishing with Red Chicken -and discussions with _Père_ Olivier. - -“There is a sorcerer in the hills near here,” said the old French -priest, thirty-five years there without leaving, “who was said to be the -best tattooer on Fatuhiva. He is still a pagan, and has a wonderful -memory. Take some tobacco and a pipe, and go to visit him. He may be in -league with the devil, but he is worthy an hour’s journey.” - -Puhi Enata was still vigorous, though very old. The designs upon his -face and body were a strange green, the verde antique which the _ama_ -ink becomes on the flesh of the confirmed _kava_ drinker. I greeted him -with “Kaoha!” and soon, with the chunk of tobacco beside him and the new -pipe lit, I led him to the subject. The story is not mine but his, and -it has all the weird flavor of these exotic gardens of mystery. It is -true without question, and I have often thought since of the American -concerned in it, and wondered at his after fate. - -We were seated, Puhi Enata and I, upon the _paepae_ of his home, the -platform of huge stones on which all houses in the Land of the War Fleet -are built. - -In the humid air of that tropic parallel he made pass before me a -panorama of fantastic tragedy as real as the life about me, but as -astounding and as vivid in its facts and its narration as the recital of -a drama of ancient Athens by a master of histrionics. I laughed or -shuddered with the incidents of the story. He spoke in his native -tongue, and I have given his words as they filtered through the screen -of my alien mind, not always exactly, but in consonance with the cast of -thought of that far-away and unknown land. - -“We had no whites here when he came, this man of your islands. Other -valleys had them, but Hanavave, no. Few ships have come to this bay. -Taiohae, a day and a night and more distant, they sought for food and -water and now for copra, but Hanavave was, as always, lived in by us -only. Yet we ever welcomed the _haoe_, the stranger, for he had ways of -interest, and often magic greater than ours. - -“He came one day on a ship from far, this white man I tell about, and of -whom even now I often meditate. He was not of the sea, but on the ship -as one who pays to move about over the waters, looking for something of -interest. That thing he found here. He brought ashore his guns and -powder, his other possessions of wonder, and let the ship go away -without him. He had seen Titihuti, and his _koekoe_, his spirit, was set -aflame.” - -I needed no description by the _tuhuka_ to bring before me Titihuti, to -see that maddening, matchless child-woman, nor to know the desperate -plight of a white who fell in love with her. She must have been the -Helen of these Pacific Greeks, for men came from other islands to woo -her, fought over her, and embroiled tribes in bloody warfare at her -whim. Her affairs had been the history of her valley for a brief period, -and were immortalized in chants and in legends though she still lived. -Many had related to me stories of her beauty, her spell over men, and -her wicked pleasure in deceiving them. - -She was the daughter of a chief, of a long line of _hakaiki_, of noble -mothers and of warriors, and an adept in the marvelous cult of beauty, -of sex expression, which to the Marquesan woman was the field of her -dearest ambition, the professional stage and the salon of society. - -“The day he came to this beach,” said the sorcerer, “was the day she -first danced in the Grove of the Mei, at the annual gathering of the -tribe. All the people of the ship were invited, and not least he who had -no duties but his desires, and who brought from the vessel a barrel of -rum as his gift to the people. It was as rich as the full moon, as -strong as the surf in storm, and in every drop a dream of fortune. It -made that foreigner of note at once, and he was given a seat at the -_Hurahura_, the Dance of Passion, in which Titihuti for the first time -took her place as a woman and an equal of others. She was then thirteen -years old, a _moi kanahau_, her form as the bud of the _pahue_ flower, -her hair red-gold, like the fish of the lagoon, and her skin as the -fresh-opened breadfruit. The Grove of the Mei you have been in, but you -cannot imagine that scene. A hundred torches of candlenuts, strung on -the spine of the palm-leaf, lit the dancing mead. The grass had been cut -to a smoothness, and all the valley was there. As is usual in these -annual débuts of our girls, at the height of the breadfruit season, a -dozen were allowed to show their beauty and skill. These danced to the -music of drums and of hand-clapping and chanting before the entire tribe -seated on the grass.” - -The old man lit the pipe, which had gone out, and puffed out the blue -clouds of smoke as if they were recollections of the past. - -“Finally, as the custom is, the plaudits of the crowd narrowed the -contest to three. Each as she danced appealed for approval, and each had -followers. By the judgment of the throng all had retired but three after -a first effort. These began the formal _titii e te epo_. This is the -dance of love, the dance we Marquesans have ever made the test of the -female’s fascination. - -“Before the first of the three danced, the rum was passed. It was drunk -from cups of leaves, and each in turn drew from the cask. It ran through -our veins like fire through the _pandanus_. The great drum then sounded -the call. - -“Tahiatini came from the shadow of the trees. She wore a dress of -_tapa_, made from the pith of the mulberry-tree, and as the dance became -faster she tossed it off until she moved about quite nude. For this, of -course, is part of the test. A hundred men, mostly young, stood and -watched her, and watching them were the judges, the elders of the race, -men and women. For, Menike, in the expression, the heat, or the coolness -of those standing men was counted the success or failure of the dancer. -And they were taught by pride and by the rules of the event to conceal -every feeling, as did the warrior who faced the launched spear. They -were to be as the stones of the _paepae_. - -“Tahiatini passed back into the trees, and Moeo succeeded her. She -seemed to feel that Tahiatini had not scored heavily. She danced -marvelously for one who had never before been in the Grove of Mei, and -the shrewd judges reckoned more than one of the silent hundred who could -not restrain from some mark of approval. There was, when she fell back, -a shout of praise from the crowd, and the judges conferred while the rum -was handed about for the second time. - -“Then Titihuti was thrust out from the darkness, and from her first step -we realized that a new enchantress had come to torment the warriors. I -have lived long, and many of those dances in the Grove of Mei I have -seen. Never before or since that night have I known a girl to do what -she did. Her _kahu_ of _tapa_ was as red as the sun when the sea -swallows it, and hung over one shoulder, so that her bosom, as white as -the ripe cocoanut, gleamed in the light of the burning _ama_. - -“Her hair was in two plaits of flame, and the glittering ghost flowers -were over her ears. You know she had for months been out of the day and -under the hands of those who prepare the dancers. Her body was as -rounded as the silken bamboo, and her skin shone with the gloss of -ceaseless care. - -“She advanced before the silent hundred, moving as the slow waters of -the brook, and as she passed each one she looked into his eyes and -challenged him, as the fighting man his enemy. Only she looked love and -not hatred. Then she bounded into the center of the line and, casting -off her _kahu_, she stood before them, and for the first time bared her -beautiful body in the _titii e te epo_, the Dance of the Naked. She -fluttered as a bird a few moments, the bird that seeks a mate, the -_kuku_ of the valley. On her little saffroned feet she ran about, and -the light left her now in brilliancy and now in shadow. She was -searching for the way from childhood to womanhood. - -“Then the great _pahu_, the war-drum of human skin, was struck by O -Nuku, the sea-shells blew loudly, and the _Hurahura_ was proclaimed. You -know that. Few are the men who resist. Titihuti was as one aided by -Veinehae, the Woman Demon. She flung herself into that dance with -madness. All her life she and her mother had awaited that moment. If she -could tear the hearts of those warriors so that their breasts heaved, -their limbs twitched, and their eyes fell before her, her honor was as -the winner of a battle. It was the supreme hour of a woman’s existence. - -[Illustration: - - Photo from Brown Bros. - Tattooing at the present day -] - -[Illustration: - - Photo from Dr. Theodore P. Cleveland - Easter Islander in head-dress and with dancing-wand -] - -[Illustration: - - Photo from Dr. Theodore P. Cleveland - My tattooed Marquesan friend -] - -“The judges seized the flambeaux and scrutinized closely the faces of -the men. First one yielded and then another. Try as they might to be as -the rocks of the High Place, they felt the heat and melted. A dozen were -told off in the first few minutes of Titihuti’s dance, though Tahiatini -and Moeo had won but two or three. Faster grew the music, and faster -spun about her hips the torso of Titihuti. The judges caught the rhythm. -They themselves were convulsed by the spell of the girl. The whole line -of the silent hundred was breaking when, as the breadfruit falls from -the tree, suddenly sprang upon the mead the foreigner who had come but -that day. Though others of the ship tried to hold him, he broke from -them, and, clasping Titihuti in his arms, declared that she was his, and -that he would defend his capture. The drums were quieted, the judges -rushed to the pair, and, for the time of a wave’s lapping the beach, -spears were seized. - -“But the ritual of the rum began, and in the crush about the cask the -judges awarded Titihuti the Orchid of the Bird, the reward of the First -Dancer. She stood in the light of the now dying torches, and when the -foreigner would embrace her and lead her away she turned her laughing -eyes toward him and called out so that many heard: - -“‘You are without ornament, O Haoe. Cover your face as do Marquesan -lovers, or get you back to your island!’ - -“Then she hurried away to receive the praise and to taste the glory of -her achievement among her own family.” - -The _Taua_ took his long knife and with repeated blows hacked off the -upper half of a cocoanut to make ready another drink. I had a very vivid -idea of the situation he had described. That handsome young man of -Europe, belike of wealth, seeking to surrender to his vagrant fancies in -this contrasting environment, and finding that among these savages he -had position only as his rum bought it with the men, and was without it -at all among the women. One could fancy him all afire after that dance -of abandon, ready on the instant to yield to the deepest of all -instincts, and surprised, astounded, almost unbelieving at his repulse. -He might have learned that such repulse was not even in the manner of -the Marquesans, but solely the whim of Titihuti, the beginning of that -career of whimsical passion and _insouciance_ which carried her fame -from island to island and fetched other proud whites from afar to know -her favor. He himself had come a long way to be the unwitting victim of -the most prankish girl and woman who ever danced a tribe to death and -destruction, but who withal was worth more than she who launched the -thousand ships to batter Ilium’s towers. - -“And did he cover his face?” I demanded, hurrying to follow the windings -of fate. - -“_E!_” said the sorcerer. “He gained the friendship of chiefs. He let -his ship sail away with but a paper with words to his tribe, and he -stayed on. He hunted, he swam, and he drank, but he could not touch his -nose to the nose of Titihuti, for his nose was naked. Weeks passed, but -not his passion. He hovered about her as the great moth seeks the -fireflies, but ever she was busied with her pomades and her massage, the -_ena_ unguent and the baths, the _omi omi_ and the combing of her -red-gold tresses. She had set him aflame, but had no alleviation for -him. - -“And then when the moon was at its height she danced again, this time -alone, as the undisputed _vehine haka_ of Fatuhiva. The foreigner sat -and gazed, and when Titihuti glided to where he was and, planting her -feet a _metero_ away, addressed herself to him, he shook with longing. -She was perfumed with the jasmine, and about her breasts were rings of -those pink orchids of the mountains. The foreigner felt the warmth of -her presence as she posed in the attitudes of love. He bounded to his -feet and, clasping her for the second time to him, he shouted that he -would be tattooed, he would be a man among men in the Marquesas. - -“There was no delay; I myself tattooed him. As always the custom, I took -him into the mountains and built the _patiki_, the house for the rite. -That is as it should be, for tattooing is of our gods and of our -religion before the whites destroyed it. I was and am the master of our -arts. I did not sketch out my design upon his skin with burned bamboo, -as do some, but struck home the _ama_ ink directly. My needles were the -bones of one whom I had slain, an enemy of the Oi tribe. I myself -gathered the candlenuts and, burning them to powder, mixed that with -water and made my color. My mallet, or _hama_, was the shin of another -whom I had eaten.” - -Such a man as Leonardo, who painted “Mona Lisa” and designed a hundred -other beautiful things, or Cellini of the book and a vast creation of -intricate marvels, would have understood the exactness of that art of -tattooing in the Marquesas. Suppose “Mona Lisa” herself, an expanse of -her fair back, and not mere linen, bore her picture. What infinite -pains! Not more than took the _taua_ in such a task. In his mind his -plan, he dipped his needle in the _ama_ soot, and, placing the point -upon a pore of the flesh, he lightly tapped the other extremity of the -bone with his _hama_ of shin and impressed the sepia into the living -skin, for each point of flesh making a stroke. - -Followed fever after several hours of frightful anguish. The dentist is -the ministrant of caresses, his the loved hand of pleasure, compared -with the suffering caused to the quivering body by the blows of those -needles. A séance of tattooing followed, and several days of sickness. -He had not the strength of the natives in the pain, and often he cried -out, but yet he signed that the tattooing should go on. - -“Across his eyes upon the lids, and from ear to ear, I made a line as -wide as two of your teeth, and I crossed lines as wide from the corners -of his forehead to the corners of his chin. As he was to be admitted to -the Lodge of Tattooers, I put upon his brow the sacred shark as big as -Titihuti’s hand. I was four moons in all that, and all the time he must -lie within his hut, never leaving it or speaking. I handed him food and -nursed him between my work. Upon our darker skin the black candlenut ink -is, as you know, as blue as the deep waters of the sea, but on him it -was black as night, for his flesh was white. - -“He was handsome as ever god of war in the High Place, that foreigner, -and terrible to behold. His eyes of blue in their black frames were as -threatening as the thunders of the ocean, and above the black shark -glistened his hair, as yellow as the sands of the shore. A breadfruit -season had passed when we descended the mountain, and he was received -into the tribe of Hanavave. We called him Tohiki for his splendor, -though his name was Villee, as we could say it.” - -There is a curious quibble in the recital of the Polynesian. He arrives -at a crisis of his tale, and avoids it for a piece of wit or an idle -remark. Perhaps it is to pique the listener’s interest, to deepen his -attention, or it is but the etiquette of the bard. - -“Titihuti?” I interposed. - -“_Tuitui!_” he ejaculated. “You put weeds in my mouth. That girl, that -Titihuti, had left her _paepae_ and vanished. Some said she dwelt with a -lover in another valley. Others that she had been captured at night by -the men of Oi Valley. It was always our effort to seize the women of -other tribes. They made the race stronger. But Titihuti was not in Oi or -with a lover. Her love was her beauty, and soon we learned that she was -gone into the hills herself to be tattooed. You, American, have seen her -legs, and know the full year she gave to those. They are even to-day the -_hana metai oko_, the loveliest and most perfect of all living things.” - -“And Willie, the splendid Tokihi, what said he?” - -“_Aue!_ He dashed up and down the valleys seeking her. He offered gifts -for her return. He cried and he drank. But the tattooing is _tabu_, and -it would have been death to have entered the hut where she was against -the wish of the artist. Then he turned on me and cursed me, and often he -sat and looked at himself in the pool in the brook by his own _paepae_. -That foreigner lost his good heart. No longer was he kind and gentle. It -was he who led us against the valley of Oomoa, and with his gun wrought -great harm to those people. It was he who was ready to fight at but the -drop of a cocoanut upon his roof. He took no women, and he became the -fiercest man of Hanavave. When the year had gone, and Titihuti came -back, he would not see her in the dance, though in it she showed her -decorative legs for the first time. He cursed her, too, and said she was -a sister of the _feki_, the devilfish. He dwelt among us for several -years as one who leads the tribe, but is not of it. Often he but missed -death by the breadth of a grain of sand, for he flung himself on the -spears, he fought the sea when it was angered, and he drank each night -of the _namu_, the wine of the cocoanut flower grown old, until he -reeled to his mat as a canoe tossing at the fishing. - -“Then one day came a canoe from Taiohae, with words on paper for him -from his own people. A ship from his island was there and had sent on -the paper. That was a day to remember. There were with the paper _tiki_, -those faces of people you make on paper. Villee seized those things, -and, running to his _paepae_, he sat him down and began to look them -over. He eyed the words, and he put the _tiki_ to his lips. Then he lay -down upon his mat and wept. For much time he was like a child. He rolled -about as if he had been struck in the body by a war-club, and at last he -called me. I went to him with a shell of _namu_. - -“‘Drink!’ I said. ‘It will lift you up.’ - -“He knocked the shell from my hand. - -“‘I will drink no more,’ he cried. ‘My father is dead, and my brother. I -am the chief of my tribe. I have land and houses and everything good in -my own island, but, alas! I have this!’ - -“He pointed to the black shark upon his forehead, and then he shouted -out harsh words in his own language. I left him, for he was like one -from whom the spirit has gone, but who still lives. I thought of the -strangeness of tribes. In ours he was a noble and honored man for that -shark, and yet in his own as hateful as the barefaced man here. Man is, -as the wind cloud, but a shifting vapor. - -“Often, a hundred times, I saw him sitting by the pool and gazing into -it as though to wash out by his glances the marks on his countenance. He -was as deep in the mire of despair as the victim awaiting the oven. -Nature’s mirror showed him why he could not leave for his land and his -chieftaincy. And, American, for a woman, too. I saw him many times look -at that _tiki_ and read the words. Maybe he had fled from her in anger. -Now he was great among his people, and she called him. Maybe. My own -heart was heavy for him when he fixed his eyes on that still water. - -“After weeks of melancholy he summoned me one day. - -“‘_Taua_,’ he said, ‘is there no magic, no other ink, no bones, that -will quit me of this?’ - -“He swept his hand over his face. - -“‘I will give you my gun, my canoe, my coats, and I will send you by the -ship barrels of rum and many things of wonder.’ - -“He took my hand, and the tears followed the lines of the tattooing down -his cheeks. - -“‘Tokihi,’ I replied, ‘no man in the Marquesas has ever wanted to take -from his skin that which made him great to his race, yet there is a -legend that wanders through my stomach. I will consult the lodge. It -would be magic, and it may be _tapu_.’ - -“The next day I found him lying on his _paepae_, his face down. He was a -leaf that slowly withers. - -“‘Villee,’ I said, and rubbed his back, ‘there is for you perhaps -happiness yet. I have talked with the wise old men of the lodge.’ - -“He raised himself, and fixed his dull eyes on me. - -“‘One Kihiputona says that the milk of a woman will work the magic. I -can not say, for it is with the gods.’ - -“The foreigner sprang to his feet. - -“‘Come, let us lose no time!’ he cried. ‘It is that or the _eva_.’ - -“Marquesans, when tired of life, eat the _eva_ fruit. I made all ready, -and, taking my daughter and her babe, with food, and the things of the -tattooing, we again went to the hut in the mountains. Together we built -it over, and made all ready for the trial. - -“‘Remember, foreigner,’ I said, ‘this is all before the _Etuá_, the -rulers of each one’s good and evil. I have never done this, nor even the -wisest of us has ought but a faint memory of a memory that once a white -man thus was freed to go back to his kin.’ - -“‘_E aha a_—no matter,’ he said. ‘There is no choice. Begin!’ - -“I warned him not to utter a word until I released the _tapu_. I made -all ready. Then I had him lie down, his head fixed in a bamboo section, -and I began the long task.” - -The sorcerer sighed, and spat through his fingers. - -“Two moons he was there, silent. I worked faster than before, because I -had no designs to make. I only traced those of the years before. But the -suffering was even greater, and when I struck the bone-needles upon his -eyelids he groaned through his closed mouth. Every day I worked as long -as he could endure. Sometimes he all but died away, but the _omi omi_, -the rubbing, made him again aware, and as I went on I gained hope -myself. His own skin was by nature as that of the white orchid, and the -weeks in the _patiki_ out of the sunlight, with the oil and the saffron, -made it as when he was child. The milk was driven into a thousand little -holes in the flesh, and by magic it changed the black of _ama_ to white. -I think some wonder made it do so, but you should know such things. I -left the shark until the last, but long before I came to it the gods had -spoken. Faded slowly the candlenut soot, and crept out, as the -silver-fish in the caves of Hana Hevane, the bright color of that -foreigner. - -“Many times his eyes, when I let loose the lids, lifted to mine in -inquiry, but I was without answer. Yet nearer I felt the day when I -would possess that gun and canoe and the barrels of rum. - -“It came. A week had gone since I had touched with the needles his face, -and most of it he had slept. Now he was round with sleep and food, and -one morning when he awoke, I seized him by the hand and said, ‘_Kaoha!_’ -The _tapu_ was ended; the task was done.” - -“And he?” I said greedily. - -“He was as a man who wakes from a dream of horror. He said not a word, -but went with me and with my daughter and the babe down the trail to -this village. Here he stole silently to his pool, and, lying down, he -looked long into it. Then he made a wild cry as if he had come to a -precipice in the dark and been kept from falling to death by the mere -gleam of fungus on a tree. He fell back, and for a little while was -without mind. Awake again, he rushed about the village clasping each one -he met in his arms, rubbing noses with the girls, and singing queer -songs—_himenes to e aave_—of his island. His laughter rang in the -groves. Now he was as when he had come to us, gay, kind, and without -deep thought. - -“The gods had for that moon made him theirs, for soon came a canoe with -news that a ship of his country was at Taiohae. Never did a man act more -quickly. He made a feast, and to it he invited the village. A day it -took to prepare it, the pigs in the earth, the _popoi_, the fish cooked -on the coral stones, the fruits, and the nuts. To it he gave all his -rum, and he handed me his gun, the paddles of his canoe, and his coats. - -“But Po, the devil of night, crouched for him. The canoe to take him to -Taiohae was in the water, waiting but the end of the _koina kai_. -Plentifully all drank the rich rum, but Tokihi most. Titihuti even he -had greeted, and she sat beside him. She was now loath to have him go; -you know woman. She leaned against him, and her eyes promised him aught -that he would. She was more beautiful than on that night when she had -spurned him, and she struck from him a spark of her own willful fancy. -He took her a moment to his bosom, held her as the wave holds the rock -before it recedes, and then, as the madness she ever made crept upon -him, he drew back from her, held her again a fierce moment, and, dashing -his cup to the earth, he turned upon her in fury. - -“It was the evil noon. The eye of the sun was straight upon him, and as -he cursed her, and shouted that now he was free from her, the blood -rushed into his face, and painted there scarlet as the hibiscus the -marks of the tattooing. The black _ama_ the magic had erased now shone -red. The stripes across his eyes and face were like the scars a burning -brand leaves, and the shark of the lodge was a leper’s sign upon his -brow. - -“‘_Mutu!_’ I cried, for I saw death in the air if he knew, and all the -gifts lost to me. ‘Silence!’ And the tribe heeded. No quiver, no glance -showed the foreigner that one had seen what he himself had not. Titihuti -fastened her gaze on him a fleeting second, and then began the dance of -leave-taking. - -“We raised the chant: - - ‘_Apae! - Kaoha! te Haoe. - Mau oti oe anao nei._’ - -“To the canoe we bore him, and thrusting it into the breakers, we called -the last words, ‘_E avei atu!_’ - -“He was gone forever from Fatuhiva. And thus I got this latter name I -have, Puhi Enata, the Man with the Gun.” - -The old sorcerer rolled a leaf of _pandanus_ about a few grains of -tobacco. - -“And you never had word of him?” - -“_Aoe_, no,” he said meditatively. “He went upon that ship at Taiohae. -But, American, I think often that when that man who was Tokihi came to -dance in his own island, to sit at his own tribe’s feasts, or when the -ardor of love would seize him, always he tried to be calm.” - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CHAPTER XVIII - -A fantastic but dying language—The Polynesian or Maori Tongue—Making of - the first lexicons—Words taken from other languages—Decay of - vocabularies with decrease of population—Humors and whimsicalities - of the dictionary as arranged by foreigners. - -MALICIOUS Gossip and Le Brunnec taught me Marquesan in the “man-eating -isle of Hiva-Oa,” as Stevenson termed my home. After supper or dinner I -had a lesson in my _paepae_; often in a mixed group, for the beginnings -of democracy are in the needs of company. Here were the governor, the -highest official, an army officer and surgeon; Le Brunnec, a small -trader; Kekela, a Hawaiian; Puhe, the hunchback servant of Bapp, the -trader; Exploding Eggs, Ghost Girl, and Malicious Gossip and her -husband, Mouth of God. The governor spoke French and a very little -English, Le Brunnec those and Marquesan, Mouth of God and his wife -Marquesan and a trifle of French, Kekela Marquesan and English, and the -hunchback Marquesan only. Ghost Girl, of course, knew only that, but she -never spoke at all except to beg for rum or tobacco. Lonesomeness made -us intimate despite our difference of origin, status and language. We -talked about the Marquesan language, and we two comparative new-comers -strove to enlarge our vocabulary. - -The derivation of words is an absorbing pursuit. Enwrapped in it are -history and romance, the advance from the primitive, the gradual march -of civilization, and, besides, many a good laugh; for man made merry as -he came up, and the chatterings of the missing links are often heard in -the chase through the buried centuries for the beginnings of language. -The Aryan, English’s ancestor, was originally made up of a single -consonant between two vowels, and I fancied I was speaking my ancestral -words in this aboriginal tongue. - -“There is nothing more fascinating than etymologies. To the uninitiated -the victim seems to have eaten of ‘insane roots that take the reason -prisoner’; while the illuminate too often looks upon the stems and -flowers of language, the highest achievements of thought and poesy, as -mere handles by which to pull up the grim tubers that lie at the base of -articulate expression, sacred knobs of speech, sacred to him as the -potato to the Irishman.” James Russell Lowell had himself eaten of that -maddening weed. These Marquesan verbal radicals engaged me both by their -interest and their humor. - -The erudite philologist may harken back to the Chaldaic or another dead -language of Asia or Africa and make ponderous tomes upon his research, -but the amateur can dig as he plays only by being actually with a -simple, semi-savage people, as I was, and finding among them, still -active, the base and slight growth of human thought and emotion in -speech. The most alluring tongue in sound and origin is the Maori, and -Marquesan is Maori. It is spoken from Hawaii to New Zealand, and is -termed the “grand Polynesian” language. The people of those two groups -of islands, as well as those of the Marquesan, Society, Friendly, -Paumotuan, Samoan, Tongan, and some other small archipelagos, have it as -their vernacular, though its variations are so great as to prevent -converse except limitedly between the different islands. The Maori -tongue is as full of melancholy as are those passing races. Soon it will -be lost to use, like the ancient Greek or the mellifluous idiom of the -cultivated Incas. It is decaying so fast now that a few years mark a -decided loss of words, and lessen the adherence to any standard. Yet it -is the most charming of all present expressions of thought or emotion, -and it is a great pity that it perishes. One sighs for a South Seas Sinn -Fein to revivify it. - -The Polynesians, as scientists call them, know themselves, and therefore -their tongue as Maori. And just as “British” to an Englishman is a word -of pride, and “American” to our patriotic schoolboys and orators the -greatest word ever coined, so “Maori” actually means first-class, -excellent, fine. The Maoris were hundred per centers before the Chosen -People. - -I have lived much with Maori folk in many archipelagos and listened for -years to their soft and simple, sweet and short words. Their speech is -like the rippling of gentle waters, the breezes through the -breadfruit-trees. It has color and rhythm and a euphonism unequalled. -Language begins as poetry and ends as algebra, but here the algebraic -stage was not reached, and there remained something of the unconscious -uprush of its beginning, and the subliminal laws of mind which shaped -its construction. For the Maori is a very old language, older than Greek -or Latin, and was cut off from other languages at the outset of culture, -before the mud of the Tigris was made into pots. The Marquesan indigene -was never so complex, as in acute civilization, that his language could -not tell what he thought and felt, though he, too, had art to supplement -words, as his tattooing, carving, houses, and temples prove. - -The Maori has one inflexible rule, that no word shall end in a -consonant, that no two consonants shall be together, and that all -letters in a word be sounded. - -There are only fifteen letters, or sounds, in the pure alphabet, b, c, -d, j, h, l, q, s, w, x, and y being unknown. In some dialects other -letters have been introduced in the adaptation of foreign words. They -are not, however, properly Polynesian. Words are usually unchangeable, -but pronouns and the auxiliary verb “to be” and many adjectives and -verbs have curious doubling quality, like _ino iino; horo, hohoro, -horohoro; haere, hahaere_. _Ii_ in Marquesan means “anger”; _iiii_ means -“red in the face from anger.” The adjective follows the noun, as in _moa -iti_, little chicken, _iti_ is the adjective. The subject comes after -the verb “to be,” expressed or understood, or after the verb that -denotes the action of the subject. - -The Maoris knew no genders except those for beings by nature male or -female, and these they indicate by following words. In Tahitian, _tane_ -means “man,” and _vahine_ “woman,” or “male and female.” Thus I was -called often O’Brien _tane_, and, where the same proper names are -applied to men and women, the word _tane_ or _vahine_ indicates the sex: -The sign of a well-known merchant in Papeete, the capital of Tahiti and -the entrepôt of the South Seas reads, “Tane Meuel,” the Tane being the -name his proud parents gave him when born to show their delight at his -being a boy. - -While there is a dispute over the origin of the Maori, my friend, -McMillan Brown of New Zealand, a supreme authority, believes it -separated from the primeval Aryan a millennium or two ago, in the stone -age, and came into the Pacific with the migration that first brought -women into these waters. Some scholars say the language is to be classed -with the modern European tongues, and especially with English. They cite -the reduction of inflection to a minimum, the expression of the -grammatical relationship of words by their order in the sentence, the -use of auxiliaries and participles, the power of interchanging the -significant parts of speech as occasion requires; the indication of the -number of nouns by articles or other definitives, cases by prepositions, -gender by the addition of the word for male or female, the degree of -adjectives by a separate word, and the mood and tense of verbs by a -participle. - -As English spoken in isolated mountain regions—among the poor whites of -the Middle West and South of the United States—becomes attenuated and -broken, so in many of these islands and archipelagos the Maori language -became differentiated by climate and environment, and shriveled by the -limitations of its use. The Marquesan has been weakened by phonetic -decay, the l and r almost disappearing, and in some places, too, the k -being hardly ever heard. - -[Illustration: - - The author with his friends at council -] - -As a nation perishes, so does its language. As its numbers decrease, the -vocabulary of the survivors shrinks. It does not merely cease to grow; -it lessens. Cornwall proved that and Wales; Ireland and Scotland -exemplify it now. A language waxes with the mass and activities of its -speakers. Scholars may preserve a grammar, as the school Latin, or as -the Sinn Fein is doing in Ireland, but the body and blood of the vulgate -speech waste and ebb without the pulse of growth. Speech fattens with -usage. The largest number of words in any language is found in that -language which most people speak. The most enterprising race spreads its -language farthest by religion, commerce, and conquest. - -[Illustration: - - Photo from L. Gauthier - House of governor of Paumotu Islands. Atoll of Fakarava -] - -All these Polynesian tongues are dying with the people. Corrupted first -by the admixture of European words, their glossaries written by men -unborn to the land, the racial interests that fed them killed by the -destruction of customs and ambitions, these languages are moribund, and -as unlike those spoken before the white came as is the bison to the -family cow. - -The French observer Bovis said seventy years ago that only a few -Tahitians understood and spoke pure Tahitian. No one does now. Yet, -obsolescent and garbled as are these spiritual victims of pale-face -domination, the South Sea folk cling to them affectionately. I attended -the first sessions of the Hawaiian legislature under American -territorial government. All proceedings were in both English and -Hawaiian, many of the legislators not understanding English after eighty -years of intimate relations with England and America. They, like the -other Maoris, had not learned other tongues, but had let their own lapse -into a bastard _patois_. - -The Hawaiian is akin to the Marquesan. The variations consist in not -using in one dialect words in use in another, in the sense attached to -the same words, in the changing of vowels and of consonants in the same -words, and also by the replacement of consonants by a click of the -tongue. Almost all dialects have these unuttered consonants expressed by -the guttural accentuation of the vowel following. - -I must know French to approach Marquesan, because these islands are -French for eighty years, and I know of no practical grammar except that -of Monseigneur Dordillon, written in 1857, and of no procurable -dictionary but his. Both are in French. - -A tragedy originating in petty discipline or episcopal jealousy saddened -the last days of the writer, Bishop Dordillon. He had created out of the -mouths of his neophytes the written Marquesan tongue, and he made his -dictionary his life-work. They would not let him publish it. -Ecclesiastical authorities, presumably of Chile,—for all Catholic -missionaries here were under that see in early days,—forbade it. After -forty years of labor upon the book, he was allowed to put it to print, -but not to affix his name as author. Against this prohibition the sturdy -prelate set his face. - -“Not for himself,” said the vicar, _Père_ David, to me, “but for the -church and our order, he would not be robbed of the honor. He died very -old, and confided his manuscript to a fellow-priest. For fifty years -each missionary to these islands copied it for his personal use. Ten -thousand nights have thus passed because of the jealousy of some prelate -in Valparaiso or in Paris. Pierre Chaulet, of our order, the _Sacré -Cœur_, revised the book after forty-five years’ residence here.” - -The Tahitian was the first Maori language reduced to writing. No -Polynesian race had a written literature nor an alphabet. Writing was -not invented nor thought of when they left their European home, nor did -they acquire it in Malaysia. The Polynesians marked certain epochs and -events by monuments, and consecrated them with ceremonies. These events -also marked their language, which was peculiarly susceptible to change -and addition. It was abundant, and all the details of their material -life and history were impressed upon the language in shades of meanings -and words. In Tahiti the finer meanings disappeared ninety years ago, -and the adverbs and degrees of comparison were lost. In the Marquesas, -because of the lesser infiltration of whites, the language in its purity -lasted longer. One of the mutineers of the _Bounty_, Midshipman Peter -Heywood, who chose to remain in Tahiti rather than sail with Christian, -wrote the first vocabulary of Tahitian in prison at Execution Dock in -England. Bligh had determined to hang Heywood, and, awaiting his -seemingly assured death, the young officer in his death cell set down -the words he had learned in the happy days in the Isle of Venus, with -their connotation in English. One may imagine it was a sad yet consoling -task to live again the scenes of his joyous exile, and that each word of -Tahitian he wrote conjured for him a picture of the scene in which he -had learned it, and perhaps of the soft lips that had often repeated it -to him. It is pleasant to know that the youthful lexicographer did not -mount the gallows, and that his vocabulary was eagerly studied by the -first missionaries leaving England for the South Seas on the _Duff_. The -first word the clerics heard when the Tahitians boarded the _Duff_ was -_taio_, friend, and the reverends wrote to England that as the “heathen -danced on the deck in sign of hospitality and friendship, we sang them, -‘O’er the gloomy hills of darkness.’” With Heywood’s list as a -preparation, they established an alphabet for Tahiti which fitted the -dulcet sounds as they registered on their untuned ears. The general rule -was to give the vowels their Italian value and to sound the consonants -as in English. Their fonts of type were limited, and they had to use -makeshifts of other letters when they ran out of the proper ones. They -made monumental errors in their monumental toil, errors unavoidably due -to their not being philologists, nor even well educated—errors -perpetuated and incorporated in the language as finally written. This -Tahitian dictionary and grammar formed the basis of all similar books in -the Marquesan, Hawaiian, and other dialects. What store of ancient -tongues the missionaries had, they put into linguafacturing religious -words for the Tahitians. In fact, they were so busy inventing words for -ordinary use, and for their prayers, sermons, and the translation of the -Bible, they did not record many native words. They bowdlerized the whole -Polynesian language, and emasculated an age-old tongue from which we -might have gathered in its strength something of the spirit of our Aryan -forefathers. - -A chief difficulty of the makers of the written Polynesian languages was -the adjectives. Primitive peoples have not the wealth of these that -civilized nations possess, and fine shadings here are often expressed by -intonation, grimace, or gesture. - -There is no available Tahitian-English lexicon. The London Missionary -Society published one before the French seized Tahiti in the forties. It -is out of print, and as obsolete as to present-day Tahitian as Dr. -Johnson’s once-famous tome is as to English. The only copies are in the -hands of the Mormon, Josephite and other English-speaking missionaries -in Tahiti, and in the libraries of collectors. It cannot be bought in -Tahiti. Monseigneur Tepano Jaussen wrote one in French. I have it, dated -at Paris, 1898; but so fast is the Tahitian tongue degrading into a -bloodless wretched jumble that it, too, is almost archaic. - -“A Vocabulary of the Nukahiwa Language; including a Nukahiwa-English -Vocabulary and an English-Nukahiwa Vocabulary” was printed in Boston in -1848. No living Nukahiwan, or Marquesan, would understand much of it, as -there has been such radical change and degeneracy in the dialect in the -seventy years since it was written, and so few Marquesans survive. - -The language shows that at one time they did not count beyond four, and -the higher numbers were expressed by multiples of four. Afterward they -came to five, which they made _lima_ or the fingers of one hand. When -the ten or denary system was adopted, the word _umi_, or whiskers, was -chosen to mean ten, or a multitude. - -The cardinal numbers are sometimes tiresome. For instance, thirty-one is -_E tahi tekau me te onohuu me te mea ke e tahi_. I once remarked to a -Marquesan chief that the Marquesan people said many words to mean a -trifle and took a long time to eat their food. - -“What else have we to do?” he asked me. - -Strangely, the larger numbers are shorter. Twenty thousand is _tini_. - -Should I wish to say “once,” meaning at one time, I say, _mamua mamua -mamua_; more anciently _kakiu kakiu kakiu kakiu_; “a very long time -ago,” _tini tini tini tini_; “quite a long time ago,” _tini hahaa tini -hahaa tini hahaa tini hahaa_; but “always” is _anatu_ and “soon” _epo_. -This last word is a custom as well as a word, for it is like the Spanish -_mañana_ and the Hawaiian _mahope_, the Tahitian _ariana_, or our own -dilatory “by and by.” - -The variations between the dialects in the different groups is great, -and even in the same group, or on the same island, meanings are not the -same. In the Marquesas, the northwestern islands have a distinct dialect -from the southeastern. Valleys close together have different words for -the same object. These changes consist of dropping or substituting -consonants, t for k, l for r, etc., but to the beginner they are -baffling. Naturally, the letters, as written, have the Latin value. -Thus, Tahiatini is pronounced Tah-heea-teenee, and Puhei, Poo-hay-ee. - - For me words have color, form, character: They have faces, - ports, manners, gesticulations;—they have moods, humours, - eccentricities:—they have tints, tones, personalities. - -Lafcadio Hearn might have written that about the Maori tongue. - -The Marquesan language is sonorous, beautiful, and picturesque, lending -itself to oratory, of which the Polynesians are past masters. Without a -written tongue until the last century, they perfected themselves in -speaking. It was a treat to hear a Marquesan in the full flood of -address, recalling the days of old and the glories departed, or a -preacher telling the love of God or the tortures reserved for the -damned. They were graceful and extremely witty. They kept their audience -laughing for minutes or moved them quickly to tears. Their fault was -that shared by most European and American orators, long-windedness. The -Marquesans have many onomatopes, or words imitating natural sounds, and -they are most pleasing and expressive. The written words hardly convey -the close relation they bear to the reality when spoken. The _kivi_, a -bird, says, “_Kivi! kivi! kivi!_” The cock says, “_Kokoao! va tani te -moa! Kokoao!_” The god that entered the spirit of the priestess made a -noise in doing so that was like this: “_A u u u u u u u u u a! A u u u u -u a!_” - -When the pig eats, the sound he makes is thus: “_Afu! afu! afu! afu! -afu! afu! afu! apu! apu! apu! apu! apu! apu! apu!_” In repeating these -sounds the native abates no jot of the whole. The pig’s _afus_ are just -so many; no more, no fewer. - -When the cocoanut falls to the ground the sound is “_tu!_” The drinker -who takes a long draft makes the noise, “_Aku! aku! aku! aku! aku! -aku!_” - -_Moemoe_ is “the cry one makes of joy after killing any one.” - -It is notable that in English the names for edible animals when alive -are usually the foundational Saxon, but when dead and ready for food -they are Norman. Ox, steer, bull, and cow are Saxon. Beef and viand are -Norman. Calf is Saxon, but veal is Norman; sheep is Saxon, mutton -Norman. Probably the caretaker of these animals, the Saxon villain who -tended them, made his names for them stick in the composite language, -while the sitters at table, the Normans and those who aped their tongue, -applied the names of the prepared meat as they plied their knives. Pig -and hog, the latter meaning a gilded pig, are English, but pork is -Norman. - -So in the study of Marquesan one finds that the common objects have -older names than those less usual. The missionaries had a hard time -suiting a word to the devil. With their vision of him, horns, hoof and -tail, they had to be content with _kuhane anera maaa_. _Kuhane_ means -soul or spirit, _anera_ means heavenly spirit, and _maaa_ means wicked, -and also a firebrand or incendiary. So Great Fern, my Presbyterian -neighbor, gave me his idea that the devil—Tatana, as Satan is -pronounced—was a kind of cross between a man and a wild boar running -along with a bunch of lighted candlenuts, setting fire to the houses of -the wicked. - -It is not easy to learn well the Marquesan language, but it is not hard -to acquire a smattering of the Lingua Franca spoken by natives to whites -and whites to natives. The language itself has been so corrupted by this -intercourse that few speak it purely. - -Amusing are the English words adapted or melted into the native tongue, -and it is interesting to trace their derivation. They call any tin or -metal box _tipoti_ (pronounced “teepotee”). The first metal receptacles -they saw aboard the first ships were the teapots of the sailors, and -they took the word as applicable to all pots and boxes of metal. The -dictionary says “_Tipoti—petite boite en fer-blanc_.” - -Beef is _Pifa_ (peefa). _Poteto_—pronounced potato—means ship’s biscuits -or American crackers or cakes. The early whalesmen held out their -hardtack to the natives and offered to exchange it for potatoes or yams. -The natives took it that the biscuits were potatoes, and call them so -to-day. - -A curious and mixed meaning is that of _fishuka_, which one might think -meant a fish-hook. It means a safety-pin, and is a sought-for article by -the women. The Marquesans had fishhooks always, and a name for them, and -so gave the English name to safety-pins, which appear like unto them. - -_Metau_ is a fish-hook, and a pin is _piné_ (pee-nay). There are -hundreds of queer and distorted words like these. Bread is faraoa, -pronounced frowwa, which is flower, with an r instead of an l, as they -have no l in their alphabet. In Tahiti, _taofe_ is coffee. K and t and l -and r are interchangeable in many Polynesian languages, and fashion has -at times banned one or the other or exchanged them. Whims or even -decrees by the pagan priests have expelled letters and words from their -vocabularies, and some have been taboo to certain classes or to all. -Papeete was once upon a time Vaiete, which means the same, a basket of -water, the site conserving the streams of the hills. Vaiete was -smothered under a clerical bull and forgotten along with other words -thought not up-to-date. - -I have heard an aged and educated American woman born in Honolulu call -it Honoruru, and Waikiki, Waititi, as she had learned when a girl. - -Coffee here is _kahe_, not unlike the Japanese _kohi_. - -Area is the same word in Latin and Maori, and virtually in English. It -means space, in all. _Ruma_, a house, is much like room, and _poaka_ or -_puaka_, a pig, is akin to the Latin _porcus_, and the Spanish _puerca_. - -When the missionaries here sought to translate a beloved phrase, “The -sacred heart of Jesus,” familiar in Catholic liturgy, they were puzzled. -The Polynesian believes with some of the Old Testament writers that the -seat of sentiment is in the bowels. “My very bowels yearned” is a -favorite expression of Oriental authors. - -_Koekoe_ is the Marquesan word for entrails. It means also intelligence, -character, and conscience. A man of good heart is in Marquesan a man of -good bowels. The good fathers were sore put to it to write their -invocation to the “bleeding heart of the Savior,” and one finds a -warning in Bishop Dordillon’s dictionary: - - Les Canaques mettent dans les entrailles (_koekoe_) les - sentiments que nous mettons dans le cœur (_houpo_). - - Quelquefois il convient de traduire ad sensum pluto que ad - verbum et vice versa; Le cœur de Jesus—te houpo a Ietu. - -Extreme unction, the sacrament, is _eteremaotio_, pronounced, -“aytairaymahoteeo.” - -The daily usage of common English words fixed certain ideas in the minds -of the islanders for all time. - -_Oli mani_, a corruption of old man, is used for anything old; hence a -blunt, broken knife or a ragged pair of trousers is _oli mani_. - -A clergyman is _mitinané_, pronounced mitt-in-ahny, an effort at -missionary. In Tahiti the word is _mitinare_ or _mikonare_, and is one -of ribald humor. It is also a bitter epithet against one who is -sanctimonious. The white traders, beachcombers, and officials have given -the word this significance by their ridicule of religion and its -professors. - -What more picturesque record of the introduction of cattle into Samoa -than _bullamacow_? It is the generic name in those islands for beef, -canned beef, and virtually all kinds of canned meats. A child could -trace it to the male and female bovine ruminants first put ashore there, -and nominated by the whites “bull and a cow.” - -The good Bishop Dordillon notes that a cook is _enata tunu kai_, but -that the common word is _kuki_, and for kitchen _fae kuki_. That _kuki_ -is our own cook, as the Marquesans heard the sailors call him—cooky. -_Fae_ is house. - -A pipe is _paifa_ (pyfa), and tobacco _paké_ (pahkay), rough -pronunciations of the English words. - -All through Polynesia the generic name among foreigners for a native is -Kanaka, which is the Hawaiian word for man, or the human race. The -Marquesan man is _kenana_ or _enata_ or _enana_, and woman _vehine_. The -Tahitians and Hawaiians say _taata_ or _tane_ for man, and _vahine_ or -_wahine_ for woman. The French word for Kanaka is _canaque_. This word -is opprobrious or not according to the degree of civilization. The -Marquesans often call themselves _canaques_, as a negro calls himself a -negro; but I have seen a Tahitian of mixed blood weep bitterly when -termed a Kanaka. Perhaps it is as in the Southern part of the United -States, where the colored people refer to one another commonly as -niggers, but resent the word from a white. - -Pig in Marquesan is _puaa_ or _puaka_. - -Piggishness in English means greediness; but _cochonnerie_, the French -verbal equivalent, means filth or obscenity, and in Marquesan has its -counterpart in _haa puaa_, to be indecent; _hee haa puaa_, to go naked, -and _kaukau haa puaa_, to bathe naked, words doubtless originating under -missionary tutelage, as when the Catholic priests were all-powerful, -they made laws forbidding nudity in public. In fact, a noted English -writer who spent some time here was arrested and fined for sleeping upon -his veranda one hot noon in the garb of Adam before the apple episode. -The Catholic missionaries here never bathed in the rivers or sea, and -had no bath arrangements in their house. Godliness has no relation to -cleanliness. Celibate man the world over had the odor of sanctity. - -Shark is _mako_, and, curiously, _tumu mako_ is a gross eater, or “pig” -in our adopted sense, while _vehine mako_ is a prostitute. _E haa mako_ -is to deliver over to prostitution. Probably this last phrase has been -coined by the clergy for lack of a more opposite one. _Hateté_ in -Tahitian is chastity, for which the natives had no word nor idea. - -When card-playing was introduced by the whites, its nomenclature was -adapted. _Peré_ or _pepa_ are cards. _Pere_ is play, pronounced p’ray, -and _pepa_ is paper. _Taimanu_, _heata_, _tarapu_, and _pereda_ are -diamonds, hearts, clubs, and spades; _teata_ is the knave; _te hai_—the -high—is the ace; and _furu_ is a full. _Faráoa_ is flour or bread and -_faráoa peré_—flour play, flour or bread-like playing-cards—are biscuits -or crackers. _Afa miniti_ is a half-minute, or a little while. Others of -the hundreds of bastard words now in the language and dictionary are: -_Niru_, needle; _pia_, beer; _poti_, boat; _purumu_, broom; _putete_, -potato; _punu_, spoon; _Roretona_, London; _tara_, dollar; _tavana_, -governor or chief; _tohita_, sugar; _uaina_, wine; _tihu, dix sous_, or -half a franc; _fira_, fiddle; _puka_, book. I must not omit the -delightful _verkuti_ for very good, or all right, or the stiff -_eelemosina_, for alms, for which also, the Polynesians had no word, as -no one was a beggar. - -As did the American Indians, the Polynesians learned English and other -European tongues through religion. The discoverers, who were officials, -traders, or adventurers gained a smattering of the native language, but -hardly ever had the perseverance, if the education, to gather a thorough -knowledge. Almost all the first modern dictionaries and grammars were -written by clerics. The prime reason for their endeavors was to -translate the sacred Scriptures into their neophytes’ language and to be -able to preach them. The Bible has been the first book of all outlandish -living languages to be reduced to writing for hundreds of years. - -Consequently, its diction, its mode of speech, and its thoughts have -molded the island tongues. Words lacking to translate biblical ideas had -to be invented, and the missionaries became the inventors. Some with -Hebrew and Greek and Latin at their service used bits of them to create -new words, and others drew on their imaginations, as do infants in -naming people and things about them. In writing their dictionaries, they -limited the European vocabulary to necessary, nice, or religious words, -and the vernacular to all they could find, with a strict omission of -those conveying immodest ideas. As the Polynesians had no morals from -the Christian point of view, a great number of their commonest words -were lost. - -The Bible was done into Marquesan in the forties by English Protestants, -and the old Hawaiian missionaries in the Marquesas made much of it in -their teachings. It is not popular in French, and few copies survive. -The Catholics do not recommend it to the laity. Protestantism is -apathetic; yet I have seen a leper alone on his _paepae_ deep in the -Scriptures, and when I asked him if he got comfort from them, I was -answered, “They are strong words for a weak man, and better than pig.” - -The same corruptions that have destroyed the original purity of the -Hawaiian and Tahitian tongues has marred that of these islands. The -French officials had hardly ever remained long enough to encompass the -language here, and seldom had they been of the scholarly type. - -Rulers over colonies make feeble effort to speak well their subjects’ -tongues. Perhaps two of the dozen governors, military and civil, the -Philippines have had under American ownership could talk Spanish fairly -well, and none spoke the aboriginal tongues which are the key to native -thought. They knew the governed through interpreters, and therefore knew -nothing really of them. As our boys laugh at foreigners’ ignorance, so -do foreign colonists laugh at ours. I saw a famous American governor -stand aghast when, asking his Filipino host, as he thought, for “a night -lamp then and there,” the astounded _presidente_ of a village brought -before the assembled company a something never paraded in polite -society. - -The missionary dictionaries of the Polynesian dialects, preserving only -a very limited number of the words once existing, and hardly any of the -light and shade, the idioms and picture phrases, of these close -observers of nature, remind one of Shakespeare’s criticism, “They have -been at a great feast of languages, and stolen the scraps.” - -The English missionaries put the Marquesan sounds into English letters, -but when their day was done in Tahiti, and the French came to power -because of French Catholic missionaries being expelled at the -instigation of Protestant clerics, the poor Marquesans had to unlearn -their English and take up French. - -In Marquesan there never was an English dictionary circulated that I -know of, and so the natives’ first European language was French as far -back as books and schools were concerned; but the commerce has been -mostly in English, the whalers and the traders talk English, and all -Polynesia is stamped by the heel of the Saxon. - -A German army officer who traveled with me lamented that in German Samoa -the language used is English when not Samoan, even the German officials -being forced to use it. - -On the schooners all commands are in English, though the captains are -French and the crews Tahitian, whose English is confined to these words -alone. At the German traders’ in Taha-Uku the accounts are in English or -American. It is the effect of the long dominance of the English on the -sea and in commerce. - -A chief difficulty of the makers of the written Polynesian languages was -the adjectives. Primitive peoples have not the wealth of these that -civilized nations possess, and fine shadings here are often expressed by -intonation, grimace, or gesture. - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CHAPTER XIX - -Tragic Mademoiselle Narbonne—Whom shall she marry?—Dinner at the home of - Wilhelm Lutz—The _Taua_, the Sorcerer—Lemoal says Narbonne is a - Leper—I visit the _Taua_—The prophecy. - -AS long as I live, I shall have, as my avatar of tragedy, Mademoiselle -Narbonne. Fate had marked her for desolation. The grim drama of the -half-caste whose spirit is riven by heredity and environment, fighting -for supremacy of the soul, was enacted here in scenes of rare intensity -and mournful fitness. While I did not await its final dénouement I saw -enough to stamp its pitiable acts upon my memory, and later I learned of -the last blows of an inevitable destiny. - -Not even the pitiful plight of the bone-white daughter of the drunkard, -Peyral, appealed to me as did the conspiracy of life and ungenerous men -against the happiness of this singular creature, Mademoiselle Narbonne. - -[Illustration: - - From the painting by Oscar F. Schmidt - Nakohu, Exploding Eggs -] - -[Illustration: - - From the painting by Oscar F. Schmidt - Haabuani, the sole sculptor of Hiva-Oa -] - -I recall the impression the first sight of her made upon me. I was by -the door of the Catholic Church, the service half over, when she came -in, and knelt at a _prie-dieu_ especially placed for her. Wealth had its -privilege in the house of God here as in the temple of Solomon. But -Mademoiselle Narbonne had another claim to distinction though it did not -win favor with the church. She was exotically beautiful, a distracting -and fascinating contrast with the almost savage girls who knelt in the -pews in their cotton tunics of red or white or pink. She had the grace -of a hothouse flower among these blossoms of half-savage nature. She was -an orchid among wild roses. - -Peyral was then in process of winning me into his family, and both -communicative and monitory. - -“She is old Narbonne’s daughter,” he croaked. “The richest person in the -Marquesas, now that her father is dead, but I wouldn’t be her with all -her money. Me, I value my skin!” - -My whole attention was upon her, and the possible sinister meaning of -his comment escaped me. Whites blackguarded other whites so commonly in -the South Seas that one discounted or denied every judgment. I was to -understand his implication later. Mademoiselle Narbonne had no part in -the life of our valley of Atuona, nor did she come to it other times -than when she attended the services at the Catholic church or visited -the nuns with whom she had been from childhood until the death of her -father a few months before. Upon inheriting his vast cocoanut-groves and -considerable money she had said good-bye to her ascetic guardians and -left the convent walls to take possession of her dead parent’s house and -estate. These were in the adjoining valley of Taaoa, and with her in the -ugly European home built by him lived the stepmother she had known, and -the mother whom he had driven away with blows, years before, when he -caught her in a tryst with Song of the Nightingale. - -I met her towards sunset a week later. During that time, I had often -wondered what her temperament might be, and what the future would spin -for her. Many Daughters, Ghost Girl, and other all Marquesan girls were -striking in their aboriginal, hatched-carved beauty, but seemed at -opposite poles to Mademoiselle Narbonne in sophistication and elegance. -And yet at times I caught in her a glimpse of savagery, of wilful -passion and abandonment to her senses beyond that upon the faces of -these daughters of cannibals. The key to that occasional shift into -barbarity I found in her home. Her father had been a driving, sober, and -fierce Frenchman, a native of Cayenne, in Guiana, where the French in -three hundred years have achieved only a devil’s island for convicts -with cruelty and foulness festering under the tricolor. Narbonne in the -Marquesas had risen from a discharged corporal of marines to manager of -the Catholic mission properties, and, by hook and crook, owner of -countless cocoanut-trees. This child of his thirty years of banishment -from his own deadly natal land was the one treasure he had cherished -besides property. He had endured dangers in his early career here, -fought and subdued swaggering chief and tropical nature, to erect a -massive tomb of concrete, and to leave this daughter. She was already -apathetic to his memory, and disregardful of the advice he had given -always with mingled caresses and cuffs. - -Her mother, Climber of Trees Who Was Killed and Eaten, who had been -banished from his house for her unfaithfulness, had returned after his -death to share it with Daughter of a Piece of Tattooing, who had -replaced her. Between the two women was no jealousy, both enjoying the -ease their hard years of serving the _Cayennais_ had earned them. In -Climber of Trees I traced the source of those pagan moods which now and -then swept from the face of Barbe Narbonne the least vestige of the mask -the nuns had taught her to wear, and let be read the undammed passion -and wind-free will of the real Marquesan woman. - -“I will not be a _sœur_,” she said to me. “The nuns are dear to me, and -they want me to come into the convent, or to go to France for training -to return here. I am waiting to know life. I am not satisfied with the -love of the saints and of the Blessed Virgin.” - -“You are able to go where you please,” I answered. “You do not have to -go to France as a Religious. Paris would welcome you. Board the next -schooner for Tahiti, and you are on the way to the wide world.” - -Mademoiselle Narbonne made a gesture of fear. Few Marquesans had ever -gone abroad; there were terrors in the thought. It had been _tapu_ to -leave their island home, and, though, as far as Christianity might work -the miracle, she had in the convent been purged of most of her mother’s -superstitions, she had not rid herself of this one. - -“I would not care to go that great distance,” she said, dreamingly, “but -I would like to go to Tahiti, to see the cinema, and perhaps the -celebration of the fourteenth of July. I have for years sent to Paris -for my clothes. I have read many novels despite the sisters forbid it. I -have one here that I wish you might talk to me about. Many nights I have -sat up to read it.” - -She handed me a yellow paper-covered book, “Jean et Louise,” by Antonin -Dusserre, a story of pastoral and village life in Auvergne, and the -unfortunate loves of a simple peasant youth and maid. Its atmosphere was -of the clean earth, the herds, and the harvests in a lost corner of -France. Its action did not cover ten miles, yet the hate and injustice, -the desires and defeats of its little world were drawn with such skill -that they became universal. The author, himself a man in _sabots_, had -breathed into his model of common clay the life of all humanity. I had -read the book, and I was eager to hear her opinion of it; of an -existence, artless as it was, still as alien to her knowledge as ancient -Greece. - -“What do you think about it?” I asked. She spoke French vividly, though -with many Marquesan insets. - -“Jean and Louise loved each other,” she replied, “and, because she was -poor and had no money to give a husband, his father separated them; and -Jean allowed it. Already, Monsieur Frederick, the girl had shown her -true love for him by spending the night with him in the hills with their -sheep, and everybody knew she would have a child. That Jean was an -assassin and a coward. Me, I would kill such a man if I loved him, but I -could not love that kind.” - -Barbe Narbonne’s black eyes flashed with her feeling. - -“I am frank with you, Monsieur, because you are a stranger. You are not -French nor Marquesan. I am both, and I hate and love both. I hate the -French for what they have done to my mother’s race, and I hate the -Marquesans for not preferring to die than to be conquered. I have not -had a lover. I cannot find one here that can satisfy me. If I did, he -might have all my money and land. I would want a man who could read -books, who was honest and strong, but who knew and liked this island of -Hiva-Oa, who could ride and fight. He must love me as”—she paused to -weigh her comparison—“as nuns love Christ, for whom they leave their -homes in France.” - -Father David, seeing me with Mademoiselle Narbonne one day, spoke of her -to me. - -“We have hoped all along that Jean Narbonne’s daughter would remain with -us,” he said, inquisitively. “But the sacred heart of Jesus does not -call every one. The church leaves all free to choose a vocation of -service to God or not. We know she can find happiness only with the -nuns, for there is only wickedness outside the convent. Barbe is now a -woman, and unfortunately too much like her mother, who was a Magdalen. -She cannot marry a native because she cannot live in the brush. What -white can she select. There is the governor and Bauda and Le Brunnec, -all bad Catholics, and who else?” - -“There is Lutz, the big trader at Tahauku,” I said. - -“Lutz? No, no! He is a German, an enemy of France, and he is a -Protestant, and, besides, he has had his own woman fourteen years. He is -not married to her, but God knows even the devil could not excuse -putting away such an old companion. What would he want of her but her -money?” - -“He has some property himself.” - -“No, no! It would be impossible. He is a German, a heretic, and I tell -you he has that Tahitian woman ever since he has been here. Some day he -will return to Germany, the Germany of Martin Luther, and leave behind -any woman here. These Europeans who come here, except the Fathers, have -no consciences. When they have made a little fortune, unless they are -like Guillitoue, or Hemeury François, who are more _Canaque_ than the -_Canaques_, they go back to marry innocent and unsuspecting women.” - -I cannot imagine why I mentioned Lutz. I had never seen him with -Mademoiselle Narbonne, and she had not sounded his name. Of course, he -was the only possibly eligible man other than the whites already -enumerated. However, such thoughts did not come by chance, for the -apostolic vicar’s solicitude against him was matched by the boisterous -roarings of _Commissaire_ Bauda, the reincarnated musketeer. Over a -Doctor Funk at his beach house, my repeating of what Father David had -said brought from him an oath and a spluttering: - -“_Sacré cochon!_ That Lutz will go too far on French territory. He has -the best lands, most of the trade, and is the only one who can sell -liquor. Do we not all pay tribute to him? Now, me, I have not thought of -marrying, but if that daughter of a French corporal should look for a -suitable mate, who but Bauda? I am a soldier, a veteran of wars in -Africa, I have the medal General Devinne pinned here,”—he slapped his -chest,—“and I am a Frenchman. I could not agree to live here, but why -not for her a house in Marseilles where there are so many dark people of -our colonies? I could be there, say half the year, and the rest of it in -Paris. I would defend her against the world, and in turn, would take my -pleasure in the capital. I do not seek it, but rather than the robber, -Lutz, should take the money to Germany, as I know he wants to do, it -might, perhaps, be arranged. And, _pire alors!_ I would soon send to the -devil all those notions the church has put in her little head. A drop of -absinthe, _mon vieux_? Bauda has his eyes on Lutz.” - -I had met Herr Lutz each time that I had gone to his store at Tahauku, -but our social relations began when he sent me, by his cook, a Tongan, a -formal invitation to dinner. Like the young governor, this European -merchant, as often as the small voice of his civilization spoke to him, -cultivated the customs of his _bourgeois_ class in order to reassure -himself of his retaining them. I have the letter before me: - - Tahauka, le 11 avril. - - Dear Mr. O. Brien, - - In case that you having nothing else to do, I shall be glad to - see you at Tahauku to-night. Do not bother please about - dressing, the roads are too bad. If it suits you, I invite you - to stay here over night. - - With kindest regards, - - Yours - - WILHELM LUTZ - -Certainly I had nothing else to do, except to explain to Exploding Eggs -that I would not need his services to gather cocoanut husks for my -dinner fire, and at five o’clock to start for Tahauku. Lutz’s kindly -sentence about not dressing was to me a joke, for I had to cross both -the Atuona and the Tahauku rivers, and a storm, the day before, had made -the trails—there were no roads—merely muddy indications of the -direction. The Atuona stream I was able to wade with my trousers rolled -and canvas shoes in my hands, and when I reached the Tahauku River, I -found it waist-deep, and the footing uncertain. A Chinese was gathering -the coarse grass by the river’s bank for Lutz’s horse. It is a rare man -who does not make a slave of his inferior who by conquest or necessity -is forced to do his will. A man’s a man for a’ that only when fighting -equality or mass strength makes him so. I myself, who abhor inequality, -proved a sinner there. Averse to getting my clothes wet, I tried to make -the Chinese understand my wish that he take me on his back across the -stream. Stupidity or a dislike to play horse caused him to assume a -vacant look, the Oriental blankness which is maddening to Occidentals. I -took him by the shoulder, mounted him, and drove him through the hundred -feet of rushing water. On the other side, I thanked him, but his slit -eyes gleamed balefully as he turned away. - -The sky was racked with clouds, and they hung on the mountain like smoky -draperies. The evening air was humid and depressing. Tahauku was a -lonely, beautiful place, typical of the Marquesas, isolated, gloomy, but -splendid. There were no craft in the bay except two small cutters moored -near the foot of the stone stairs. A group of wooden buildings in an -extensive clearing lined the road that led along the cliffs, and about -it were thousands and thousands of palms, the finest cocoanut-grove that -I had ever seen in the South Seas or Asia or India. They were planted -regularly, not crowded, but with space for roots and for air. They had -been set out two generations ago by the grandfather of the stark -daughter of Peyral, the Irish cavalry officer, who was buried among -them. Then a thousand Marquesans had led there the life of their -ancestors; a score remained. - -In the commodious house erected by the latter, Lutz lived in a -determined though inadequate effort to preserve his German birthright. -In the sitting-room in which he welcomed me stiffly, though courteously, -were the hangings and cheap ornaments of a Prussian lower middle-class -family, tidies, mottos, and books, including a large brass-bound Bible -and the kaiser’s portrait in colors. A bitters was drunk before the -meal. Lutz sat at the head of a longish table, and his two white -employees, a Hamburg apprentice just out, and Jensen, a Dane, joined us. -The talk was in English, and it was curious, in this far-away island -ruled by the French for seventy years, to find my tongue, as in almost -every corner of the world, the powerful solvent of our mixed thoughts. -Lutz talked about America, through which he had come from Germany on his -way to Tahiti and the Marquesas. He praised our strength in trade, and -derided the French and English, predicting that the Germans would divide -the South Seas commerce with us, to the exclusion of others. - -I liked Lutz, and, after the Hamburg apprentice and the Dane had gone to -play chess, he and I passed some hours in chatting about music, books, -and history. He had the solid foundation of the German schools below the -universities, and he had read constantly his German reviews. Stolid, -ambitious, swift to take a business advantage, he lived in this -aloofness from the things he liked, in order to save enough to raise his -social status on his return to his fatherland. Just before he showed me -to my room for the night, he said: - -“My old woman is going back to Tahiti. She is tired of it here after so -many years. When Captain Pincher comes in with the _Morning Star_, I’m -sending her back with him. She’s getting lonesome for her kin. You know -how those Tahitians are.” - -I had seen but a glimpse of the “old woman” that evening. She had not -appeared openly, perhaps because of the rigid rule of Lutz, or perhaps -from pique. On the road, though, I had said good day to her, a huge sack -of a middle-aged creature, long past comeliness, but with an engaging -and strong personality. The words of _Père_ David and of Bauda recurred -to me before I slept. The “old woman” had been here fourteen years, and -her sudden repatriation coincided with Mademoiselle Narbonne’s coming -into her fortune, and her restlessness for a white husband. - -I sensed a conflict. Tahitian women, as well as all these Polynesians, -were seldom afflicted by sexual jealousy, the soul-ravaging curse of -culture, yet they had a pride, an overwhelming dignity of personal -relations, which often brought the same dire results. The rejected one -many times had eaten the _eva_, the poisonous fruit, or leaped to death -from a cliff, though she would have shared the house mats with her rival -as a friend. That was because they ranked mere physical alliance as but -a part of friendship between men and women, often an unimportant -beginning, in the natural way of propertyless races. - -“Lutz will not get rid of Maná so easily.” François Grelet, the shrewd -Swiss, of Oomoa, on the island of Fatuhiva, whom I had visited following -my evening with Lutz, had remarked to me: “She has as much strength of -will as he has. Her father was the chief of Papenoo, in Tahiti, and Lutz -had to steal her away to bring her here. I remember her then because the -schooner, on which they were, made port in Oomoa for a few days. Lutz -was in his twenties, with a year in Tahiti to learn the business before -his firm sent him to the Marquesas. Now, you know, for Maná to leave her -folks and her island meant a very unusual courage and will, and she has -stuck with Lutz all this time. He is heavy-handed, too, when vexed over -waste. I don’t think it will be a matter of settling with her as to -support; they all have a living at home. Also, the Tahitians do not love -the Marquesans. You will see!” - -I had returned from my visit to Grelet, when, arriving at night in a -canoe to the stone steps at the Tahauku landing, Tetuahunahuna, the -steersman, pointed out to me the dark bulk of a schooner swinging at -anchor. - -“_Fetia Taiao_,” he said. It was the schooner on which Lutz’s old woman -was to depart from her long-time abode. - -In the weeks that had elapsed during my stay with Grelet, the affair of -Mademoiselle Narbonne and Herr Lutz had actually become the gossip of -Atuona. The church, the French nation, the masculinity of all the other -whites, were concerned. The suitor was said to pay almost daily visits -to the Narbonne house in Taaoa, and I saw him galloping past my house in -the afternoons, and heard sometimes in the night, his shod horse’s hoofs -on the pebbly road. - -“It is terrible,” Sister Serapoline said to me, when I took her a catch -of _popo_ to the convent. “That German is a heathen, and has been living -in sin with a good woman for years. Now he will drag down to hell the -soul of our dear Barbe. We are offering a novena to Joan of Arc to bring -her to us. She has not been in the church or convent for a month. She -would make a wonderful sister, for she has a good heart and a true -devotion to Joan of Arc. And, to tell the truth, her money would be put -to a divine purpose instead of going into his business here or being -wasted in Germany.” - -“What about Maná?” I asked. “Is she satisfied to go away?” - -“That I doubt, but Maná, too, has not been inside the church for a long -time. Monsieur, I have heard that she has fallen from the true religion, -and is dealing with sorcery. The devil is astir in Atuona now.” - -Song of the Nightingale was of Taaoa, the valley of Mademoiselle -Narbonne, and, as I said, had once been the lover of her mother. Through -serving a term of imprisonment for making intoxicants of oranges and of -the juice of the flower of the cocoanut-tree, his servitude spent as -cook for the Governor allowed him leisure for a few stolen hours with -his tribe. Song was a very evil man; of that perverse disposition which -afflicts great murderers like Gilles de Raiz or the Marquis de Sade, and -also cowardly ones who do in mean words and accursed inuendoes what the -arch villains do in deeds. He hated because he was thwarted. Before the -white régime he would have set valley against valley, and island against -island for mad spleen. I had seen his vileness in a ludicrous light when -he had put Ghost Girl’s god, the _kuku_, before her as food, and had -reviled her grandmother eaten by his clan. He often made fun of the -governor to me, and of me, doubtless, to many. - -Song stopped at my house one night late. He was returning from Taaoa, -and had drunk deeply of the illicit _namu enata_, the cocoanut brandy. -He begged me for a drink of rum, and I could ill refuse him as he had -filled my glass so frequently at the palace. He tossed off a shell of -the ardent liquor, and filled his pipe from my tin. Then he began to -talk loosely and boastfully as was his habit. He ridiculed the churches, -and their teachings, and spoke of Gauguin, and his carven caricature of -the bishop. Gauguin was a “_chick tippee_,” he said again, and not any -more afraid of the sacrament than was he. - -“They cannot hurt you if you are _tapu_ as I am,” he went on. “The -priest talks of Satan and his red-hot fork, and calls the _taua_, our -one remaining priest, a child of Satan. I have been to see that _taua_. -He is of my family, and, though he is very old, he does not believe in -the Christian magic, but in our own. He can do anything he wants to a -Marquesan. He can make them sick or well.” - -“How about a white?” I asked, negligently. - -“I don’t say that. The _taua_ might work his sorcery with some, but he -does not try. Do you know whom I saw in his hut to-night? Maná, the -woman of Lutz, the _Heremani_. What did she there? Why do you go to the -mission? To get the _bon Dieu_ to help you. Maná went to Taaoa to ask -the Marquesan Po, the god of night, to help her. The _Taua_ did not -inform me, but Maná said to me that if she sailed on the _Fetia Taiao_ -to Tahiti, Ma’m’selle would never marry Lutz. The _taua_ would make her -_tapu_ to the _Heremani_, who would be afraid to take her to his bed.” - -Song of the Nightingale poured himself another drink, and, muttering an -incantation in his own language, slunk out toward the palace to hoodwink -the governor. My heart misgave me, for I had a sincere admiration for -Mademoiselle Narbonne, and I could not help a kindly feeling for the -_Heremani_, Lutz, who had heaped favors on me. When my money had run -out, he had trusted me for months, though he had my bare word that I -expected a draft from America. My sympathies were divided odiously. Lutz -seemed to be mercenary in his pursuit of Narbonne’s daughter, and yet -might not love move him? He had been faithful to Maná for fourteen -years, according to everybody, which was a marvel for a white man. Maná -was to be pitied, and her endeavor to circumvent her competitor not to -be despised. I could not sneer at the sorcery of the _taua_. In Hawaii, -I had seen a charming half-English girl, educated and living in a -cultured home, yield to a belief in the necromancy of a Hawaiian -_kahuna_, and die. Her strength “ran out like water.” With everything to -live for, she faded into the grave at twenty. - -How was _taua_ to aid _Maná_ to keep the affections of Lutz? The philter -that Julia sought on the slopes of Vesuvius to win the love of Glaucus -came to mind, but the _tauas_, I remembered, used no physical means to -work their spells. They depended entirely on the mind. They studied its -every intricacy, and the power of suggestion was, I reasoned, their -weapon and medicine as it was with Charcot, Freud, or Coué, the modern -_tauas_ of Europe. In my travels and residence of a dozen years in Asia -and the South Seas, I had been confronted often with phenomena -inexplicable except through control of others’ minds by the -thaumaturgist. Nevertheless, I had so frequently had such an opinion -shattered by a more artful and cunning material explanation that at each -instance I wavered as to the method of the mage. - -The schooner _Morning Star_, the _Fetia Taiao_, swung about the -Marquesan group, from Tahauku to Taiohae, Oomoa, and Vaitahu, and after -a month dropped anchor again near the stone steps of Lutz’s _magazin_. -Lying Bill I met at the governor’s, and heard him say that he had as -passenger for Papeete the “old woman of the Dutchman.” - -“I’ll sail with the first ‘an’ful o’ wind after we load our copra,” he -said. “That’ll be in three days. Maná is bloomin’ well angry at Lutz. -I’m wonderin’ if she won’t go over to Taaoa and ’ook out those purty -eyes o’ Ma’m’selle. ’E oughta ’ave Mc’Enry’s woman to deal with. She’d -take a war-club to im.” - -Lutz had me to dinner again the night before the schooner left, and at -table were, besides Jensen and the Hamburg apprentice, Captain Pincher -and Ducat, his mate. I did not get a glimpse of Maná, though Lutz -appeared uneasy, and occasionally went out into the kitchen and once -into the garden. The good Patzenhofer beer was plentifully served by the -Tongan, and, un-iced as it was, we drank several cases of it with -“_Hochs!_” from Lutz and the Hamburger, “_Skoals!_” from Jensen, and -“‘Ere’s yer bloody ’ealths!” from Lying Bill. - -McHenry, I learned, was keeping a store on the atoll of Takaroa. The -_rahui_ at Takaroa was finished, and the divers dispersed. No great -pearl had been brought up, though Mapuhi and his tribe had had a -bountiful season. Our party broke up about midnight, and, after the -seafarers had gone down the basalt stairs to their boat, and his clerks -were in bed, Lutz and I sat a few minutes. He, perhaps, wanted to avow -his intentions regarding Barbe Narbonne, to justify himself about Maná, -and to gain from me the comfort of my concurrence in his ethics and -ambitions, but his stiff Prussian bringing-up forbade him. Instead, he -spoke of his childhood at Frankfort, his education, and his failure to -go to a University on account of poverty. At seventeen, he had been put -to work in an exporting house in Hamburg, and had passed seven years as -an underling with small pay. His chance had come when debts due the -company in Tahiti called for an experienced man in goods and finance to -go to Papeete and wring a settlement from the debtor. He had been able -to please his firm, and to buy out the failing concern by Hamburg -backing. In the fourteen years since, he had been exiled in Tahauku, and -despite his grinding efforts and many voluntary privations, had not -amassed much. His mother and father in Germany were dependent on him, -and he had not been able once to visit them because of the expense. - -Maybe the Patzenhofer had mellowed my sympathies, for I agreed with him -that he was a dutiful son and a worthy merchant, and that life had not -been quite fair to him. There was a moment when I feared he was about to -divulge his secret, but a noise outside made him start, and after he had -listened with frowning brow a minute he said good night. He did not wish -to be alone, it was evident, for he said he would sleep on a straw couch -in my room. I heard him tossing as I fell asleep. - -From the hill of Calvary the next afternoon I saw the _Morning Star_ as -she glided past the opposite cliffs of Tahauku. At least the main -barrier to Lutz’s plans had gone from the Marquesas. As Mademoiselle -Narbonne no longer came to Atuona, I had not seen her for many Sundays, -and, although I still saw Lutz on his peregrinations, and from my Golden -Bed hearkened to the iron of his horse’s heels, I had no direct nor even -fairly certain knowledge that he had won her hand. Gradually a desire to -see her, to make sure of her intentions, grew in me, and I had fixed the -following Sunday as a date for my journey to Taaoa, when a stupefying -incident disarranged my scheme. - -Le Brunnec, the trader, my companion of the wild cattle hunting, was -ever on the outlook for information or entertainment for me. Speaking a -little English, and by nature friendly, he now and again sent to my -cabin a stranger, with a sealed note explaining the bearer’s particular -interest to me. One day, there appeared an American citizen, Lemoal, a -twisted, haggard native of Paimpol, who had been an adventurer and -vagabond all about the world. After a shell of rum, he had boasted a -while, and then when I had given him another drop with a gesture of -farewell, he had said with a leer and a curse, that he had seen me with -Mademoiselle Narbonne, and that “I would better beware.” - -“She is a leper, that rich girl,” he had said; “everybody here knows it -but you. Let the accursed German of Tahauku get it, not you!” - -He ambled down the trail like an old kobold, a spirit of evil and filth, -wagging his long beard, and sucking at his pipe. I threw away the shell -from which he had drunk. But in my horror at what he had said, I could -not forget that Mademoiselle Narbonne had asked me a strange question, -at first meeting—whether it was true that the Government was segregating -the lepers in Tahiti, and immuring them in a leprosarium. I had answered -in the affirmative, and thought curiosity dictated the query. Now, with -Lemoal gone, his statement and her question rose together. Le Brunnec’s -note said that Lemoal was not to be believed always. He might have told -Le Brunnec about Barbe. It could not be true! Yet, the missionary’s -daughter a half a mile away from me was a leper, and Tahiatini, Many -Daughters, was suspect. The Chinese imported by the American, Hart, had -brought the terrible disease from Canton, and many had died from it in -the Marquesas. Those who had it were free to live as they pleased, for -there was no care of them by the authorities. But in Tahiti, for the -first time, they had taken them from their families, and were keeping -them in a separate estate. It was easy, with the abominable assertion of -Lemoal agitating me, to exaggerate or misinterpret the meaning of -Mademoiselle Narbonne’s interrogation. - -Did the visit of Maná to the _taua_ have anything to do with Lemoal’s -wretched slander or gossip? - -I should be a fool, I reckoned, to believe Lemoal. Even the vicar -apostolic had intimated that the Protestant pastor was a rake, and I -knew him to be a virtuous man. Gauguin had written in his journal that -the bishop was a “goat,” and I believed him a vow-observing celibate. -Much, then, I was to credit this lifetime villain, Lemoal! Men who -stayed too long in the South Seas became natural, simple children of the -sweet soil, or decayed and rejected, rotten fruit of civilization when -unsuited to assimilation. - -A week after Lemoal had poisoned my mind with his intimation, I met -Mademoiselle Narbonne at Otupotu, the divide between the valleys of -Atuona and Taaoa, where Kahuiti, the magnificent cannibal of Taaoa, had -trapped the Mouth of God’s grandfather and eaten him. It was a precipice -facing the valleys of the island of Hiva-Oa, as it curved eastward. The -brilliant stretch of sea contrasted with dark glens in the torn, -convulsed panorama—gloomy gullies, suggestive of the old pagan days when -the Marquesans were free and strong. Above the shadowy caverns, the -mountains caught the light of the dying sun and shone green or black -under the cloudless sky. To sit there as the day declined and to view -the tragic marvel of the advent of night was to me a rapturous -experience made sorrowful by the final sinking of the sun. No long -twilight, no romantic gloaming followed the plunge of terror. I have -always peopled it with afrits and leprechawns, mischievous if not -malicious. - -It was an hour before dusk when I arrived, and soon I heard, far down -the glade of Taaoa, the slow approach of a horse. As the rider came in -view, I waved my hand, and the daughter of the _Cayennais_ called to me, -with a trifle of surprise in her soft voice. She dismounted and sat -beside me. She had changed. In what exactly I could not define. She was -less self-centered, silent, melancholy. The savage had fled from her -face, and animation with it. - -“I am half French, but all Marquesan,” she had said to me once. - -She was all white this evening. The rich color had deserted her cheeks, -and in her pallor was tenderness and longing. I was drawn to her as -never before. Her delicate hand crept into mine, and we remained hushed -a few minutes. Curiously, the words of Lemoal did not recur. She was so -perfect, so beautiful, the nightfall so embracing, other thoughts were -banished. We were in a wild expanse, in a bed of ferns, and landward a -prodigal glory of palm and plant, vine and orchid. Nature had spent its -richest colors and scents, its rarest shapes and oddest forms, for bird -and insect, star and sun, to look upon and rejoice in, and with no count -of man. In her grandest or most subtle manifestations, nature had no -thought to suit herself to man, and only as he adapted himself to her -thousand smiles and frowns, could he remain alive upon an -inconsequential planet which was nothing with the blazing star now going -down in the west. A shudder, and man died by myriads; a breath, and he -perished. But ever nature swelled the seeds of her unthinking creations -and ornamented her body with fresh fruitage. - -Sunset and death, the heat of the day and of life, and then the lapsing -years in the descent toward the cold grave, often stumbling and -trembling, and without the cadence and the color of the passing day; and -both ending in murk and fear. These tropical islands were for youth, -when every sense was a well of enjoyment. Age must only regret not -having known them sooner. - -The slim hand of Barbe Narbonne, folded in mine, excited no pleasanter -thoughts than these as we sat at Otupoto. I felt that I must have drawn -them from her, for I was happy, and the tide of life running strong in -my veins. - -She broke the quiet. - -“What do you think of Monsieur Lutz?” she said suddenly. - -“What do I think of Monsieur Lutz?” I parried. “I like him. Why do you -ask me that?” - -“Because, Monsieur, he has asked me to marry him; and I am thinking.” - -She took away her hand and smoothed her brow as if she swept away -cobwebs. - -The crisis had come in which her future was at pitch and toss. The years -of childhood make most of us what we are. The white surrounded by -Polynesians in the early years of life, learning their language first, -and having them as playmates, willy-nilly becomes more than half -Polynesian. Their tastes, dreads, superstitions, pleasures, and ideals -become his. Barbe Narbonne had the savage blood of her mother to -accentuate her environment. The exigency that now confronted her had -kindled in her divided soul for the first time the conflict between the -white and the brown. From infancy she had been in the convent, and now -she had had a few months of unrestraint in the society of her two -mothers, and recently of release even from the rigors of the -confessional and the nuns’ admonitions. She had been slipping back fast -into the ways of the Marquesans; the palm-groves had claimed her, and -the jungle was closing in upon her. The courtship of the European, Lutz, -was a challenge to her white strain, but it was confusing, for it added -a third element. Her mothers’ semi-savagery, and the convent strictness -of rule were in strife now with this offer of relief from both by the -most important white in the Marquesas except the governor. - -“Do you love him?” I asked her, and looked into her eyes. - -She cast them down a moment in confusion or meditation. No longer she -wore black. That had been in imitation of the sisters’ dull dress, and -she had put it aside with the mass and the confession. Her tunic, the -simple flowing garment of the valley, was of pale blue. Her hair was -parted on her low, delicate forehead. Her legs were stockingless, her -feet thrust into small, brown shoes. - -She raised her eyes, and replied slowly, seeking the answer herself, -maybe, at the moment. - -“Monsieur Lutz is a gentleman. He says he loves me. I must marry a white -man. Who else is there? If I stay in Taaoa, I shall become a Marquesan -pure. It is so easy.” - -Her manner was naïve and confiding, and affected me deeply. Where lay -her chance for happiness? - -Abruptly, the accusation of Lemoal rung in my ears; and I could hardly -refrain from voicing it, in a wish to hear her fierce denial. Never had -she been more attractive, more the pattern of the most wholesome and -fairest of her mingled parentage. I could not resist saying: - -“You know Lemoal?” - -“That _canaille_! He worked for my father for long and cheated him. Ah, -he is a bad one! Only the last few weeks he has been hanging about my -house to wheedle food and drink from me without return. He is of no -account. Why do you ask?” - -“He says that you are ill.” - -“Ill! I?” - -Her eyes closed, and her body became limp an instant. A flush spread -over her face. - -“Lemoal said that!” she cried. “It is a lie! What ill have I? -Tuberculosis? Do I cough? Am I thin? The _miserable!_ It is strange. -Kahuiti and two others have asked me in the past few days if I were ill. -Monsieur Frederick, you are my friend. Look at me! Am I not well?” - -She leaped to her feet. An instant she entertained the suggestion of -stripping her tunic from her, and revealing her entire body for -judgment. She bared her girlish bosom, and her hands tore at the gown, -and then the convent inhibitions conquered, and she hastily covered -herself. - -She blushed darkly, and turned from me. The mortal sin of immodesty had -been the daily preachment of the nuns. - -“I must go home before the night,” she said weakly. “I will not go on to -the convent. Good-by, my friend. Pray for me!” - -The dusk was already thick as she mounted her horse, and I made out the -trail to Atuona with difficulty. Dimly, I discerned the workings of an -unholy spell, or my sympathy for her and my hatred for Lemoal conjured -up a web of witchcraft that would affright her suitor, and bind her to -the scene of her birth. How far this web had been spun I could only -guess. I put the matter flatly to Le Brunnec. Yes, he had had the same -story from Lemoal, and so had many others. As to Lutz’s hearing it, he -did not know, but Lemoal was despised by Lutz, who had quarreled with -him long ago. He would not dare to carry his tale to Tahauku, nor would -any one. The Prussian trader in his dealings had inculcated respect and -a decent fear of himself. - -That evening I sent Exploding Eggs to tell Song of the Nightingale I -wanted to see him at my house. When he came, I referred, after the -customary drink of rum, to the _taua_, and declared my eager wish to -meet him. I knew Kahuiti, of the valley of Taaoa, who was still a -cannibal, and I must know the last of the pagan priests there. The cook -was well pleased, and we agreed that the first evening the governor took -his dinner at the house of Bauda he would come for me. Le Brunnec smiled -when I let him know my plan. - -“Go ahead!” he said. “I am no believer in anything but a reasonable -profit, and a merry time. You can do nothing if you are trying to help -Mademoiselle Narbonne. I have seen too often the meddling white fail -with these Marquesans. They know more about many important things than -we do, even if they don’t wear shoes or eat with a fork. That old _taua_ -may be a fool, but they don’t think so, and there’s the secret.” - -Song of the Nightingale appeared at six, a few evenings later, and we -started on the five miles’ ride to Taaoa. I had borrowed a horse of -Mouth of God, and the prisoner-cook had no difficulty in finding one. -Too many people dreaded his bitter tongue and violent disposition to -refuse him. As we went through the pass at Otupotu and descended the -winding trail to the adjoining valley, the sun was below the far tops of -the green hills and was tinting all the sky in shades of softest red. -Clouds, edged with brilliant gold, were like lilies in a garden of -roses. The air was still and heavy when we rode by the sulphurous -springs where Mouth of God’s grandfather was slain by Kahuiti’s spear. -My guide avoided the village of Taaoa, and took a path which led by a -graveyard. - -On an obelisk had been inscribed half a century before: - -_Inei Teavi o te mata einana o Taaoa._ - -“Here lie the bodies of the people of Taaoa.” An all-inclusive -tombstone, for there was no other, but, instead, banana-plants, -_badamiers_, _vi_-apples, and chile peppers, the fiery-red pods of the -latter bright against the green and black. Behind the burial-place were -two great _aoa_ trees, giant banyans that must have been there when the -first adventurous white cast anchor in these waters. In the lessening -light, they had a mysterious air of life in death; they were moribund -with age, twisted and gnarled like those century-old Mission Indians of -California who sit outside their adobe hovels and show a thousand -wrinkles on their naked bodies. Yet these banyans were filled with life, -for a hundred new shoots were thrusting from above into the rich mold of -the earth, and presaging renewal of the dead limbs and greater growth of -the whole. - -The trees covered acres, overpowering in their immensity, with columns -of regular and solemn symmetry. Their ponderous buttresses were like -towers, but divided into many separate chambers where the branches had -descended from heights to become roots, and later other columns. These -trees were individuals, shattered and worn by existence, broken by -storms, the boughs arching a hundred feet from the ground to let down -grotesque and curving branches that blindly groped for a grasp upon the -soil. They were tragedies in wood, and stirred in me memories of old -French tales of darksome wolds, of the shadowy, dripping spinneys where -the _loup garou_ lay in wait for the bodies and souls of his victims. - -Into one of the cells of the banyan, Song of the Nightingale led me. As -large as an average room, it was divided by a _tapa_ hanging, and from -behind this came, at his call, the _taua_. He had a snow-white beard and -long hair, and was very old. His body was quite covered with tattooing, -the most elaborate designs I had seen. The candlenut ink, originally -blackish-brown upon his dark skin, had, as the result of decades of kava -drinking, turned to a verde-antique, like the patina upon an ancient -bronze. - -“_Moa taputoho_,” said Song, with extreme seriousness. “A sacred -hermit.” One who had forsaken all the common things of existence to -commune with the gods. - -The sorcerer’s surrounding were druidic, remindful of the Norns, who -dwelt beneath the world-tree Ygdrasil, Urd and Verdande and Skuld, and -decided the fate of men. - -He gazed at me intently, raised his hand in a grave manner, and said -something to my companion which I did not understand. - -“He asks if you want anything of him,” explained the convict. - -“Yes, I do,” I replied. “Ask him if the daughter of Liha-liha is a -leper?” - -My interpreter did not put the question direct, but I comprehended his -many sentences to state my meaning. - -The _taua_ pursed his lips and withdrew behind the curtain. From his -hidden fane issued the deep rumbling of his voice in a chant. - -“He is asking the _tiki_, the image of the god,” said Song, fearfully. - -I confess I was aware of a depression approaching fear. It was dark in -the banyan cell, and a torch of candlenuts threw a fitful glimmer on the -_tapa_ and the scabrous walls. - -Soon above the indistinct voice of the _taua_ was the sound of something -in the branches of the banyan, of a flapping of wings, and a knocking. - -“It is a bat,” I whispered to Song. - -“It is the god coming to answer,” said he, cowering with real horror. - -A dreadful thing it is not to believe in the supernatural when in -ordinary surroundings, and yet to be subject to horrible misgivings when -circumstances conjure up visions of terror. - -The uncanny noises in the tree increased, and then the mammoth banyan -shook as though an earthquake vibrated it. Song and I were now flat on -the ground, and I repeated an invocation of my childhood: - -“From the powers of Lucifer, O, Mary, deliver us!” - -I said it over and over again, and it numbed my senses during the few -minutes that the pandemonium continued. - -When the _taua_ emerged, Song turned his back upon him, and, taking my -hand, reversed me, too. - -“_Tapu!_” he said, nervously. - -“_Tuitui!_” began the _moa taputoho_. “Be silent!” and in a staccato -manner pronounced his divination. His tone was orotund and dignified, -and impressive of sincerity. The words were symbolic, and of other -generations, and Song waited until he had finished to translate them. -Before he could do this, the _taua_ said, “_Apae!_” a word of dismissal, -and retired. Song seized me by the hand as I went toward the curtain, -and pulled me away; but, for a second, I had a glimpse of a rude, basalt -altar built against the trunk of the tree, and on it a stone image -before which was a heap of fruit. I was directed speedily away from the -banyan, and not until we had mounted our horses and galloped a hundred -feet did the convict answer my question. - -“The _moa taputoho_ said that this girl will offend the god if she -marries a _haoe_, a foreigner, and that she knows already how the god -will punish her if she leaves her own valley of Taaoa.” - -And flinging out the words as we pounded up the hill, it was as if the -maker of moonshine was more prophetical than the _taua_ himself, or was -a most interested mouthpiece, for he put into them a malevolence missing -from the aged hermit’s voice. That had been majestic though forboding, -while the intonation of Song of the Nightingale was personal and harsh. -Maybe he hated Lutz as did Lemoal. Le Brunnec corroborated my suspicion. - -“Lutz found him stealing a demijohn of rum, and had him sent to prison -for several months,” said the Breton. “But, granted that every one hates -the German,” he continued, “you are wasting your sympathy and time. I -predict that Lutz will get Mademoiselle Narbonne, but that the _taua_ -and his magic will snare her finally. These people are born to be -unhappy and to die under our Christian dispensation.” - -So, from day to day, the rumor of her dismaying condition spread, until -it was known to almost everyone of the few thousand Marquesans in all -the islands, and to all others except Lutz. His wooing had not ceased, -and when the day’s work was done at Tahauku, and his evening meal -despatched, as for months, he thought nothing of the ten slippery miles -in the pitchy blackness to and from the home of his Golden Maid. His -hoof-beats entered into my dreams, and after midnight I often awoke as -they resounded on the little bridge across the stream by the Catholic -Church, Poor devil! He was to pay dear for his brief dream. - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CHAPTER XX - -Holy Week—How the rum was saved during the storm—An Easter Sunday - “Celebration”—The Governor, Commissaire Bauda and I have a - discussion—Paul Vernier, the Protestant pastor, and his Church—How - the girls of the valley imperilled the immortal souls of the first - missionaries—Jimmy Kekela, his family—A watch from Abraham Lincoln. - -HOLY Week passed in a riot of uncommon amusement. Its religious -significance—the most sacred period of the year both for Catholics and -Protestants—was emphasized by priest and preacher with every observance -of the church, but the lay white harked back to the mood of the ancient -feast of spring and drew the natives with them. Permits to buy rum and -wine were much sought for by the Marquesans, to whom drink was -forbidden. The governor was of an easy disposition, and few who had the -price of a _dame-jeanne_ of rum or wine failed to secure it. As Lutz, -the German trader at Tahauku, the adjoining valley, was the only -importer of intoxicants, the canoes were active between our beach of -Atuona and the stone steps at Tahauku, while others rode a-horse or -walked. On Holy Thursday an uninformed new-comer might have pronounced -the Marquesans a bustling race with a liquid diet. - -Cloudbursts had swollen the streams, and made the trails troughs of mud, -so that when Exploding Eggs and Mouth of God and I arrived at Atuona -beach with our empties we were glad to place the receptacles in the -canoe of a fisherman for transport to Lutz’s. A gesture of my cupped -hand to my mouth made him eager to oblige me. We walked up the hill and -past the Scallamera leper-house. My friends’ bare feet and skill made it -hard for me to keep up with them. Shoes are clumsy shifts for naked -soles. After a glass of Munich beer and a pretzel with Lutz, Exploding -Eggs finding his own little canoe at the stone steps, we loaded the -demi-johns in it and the fisherman’s. I went with the latter, and Mouth -of God with my valet. The canoes were narrow and they sank to the -gunwales with the weight. The tide of the swollen river tore through the -bay, and soon Mouth of God cried out that we must take Exploding Eggs in -our craft. The boy transferred himself deftly, and Mouth of God’s canoe -shot ahead. It became necessary for us to bail, for the water poured in -over the unprotected sides, and the boy and I used our hats actively. -Suddenly the fisherman in agonizing voice announced that we could not -stay afloat. He gave no thought to our bodily plight, the racing -current, and the rapacious sharks, but laid stress on our freight. - -“_Aue!_ The rum will be lost!” he shouted, as the canoe weltered deeper, -and then, without ado, both he and Exploding Eggs leaped into the brine. -The canoe staggered and rose, and, after freeing it from water, I -paddled it to shore, while the pair swam alongside, watching the -precious burden. - -All night the torrent roared near my home. The big boulders rolled down -the rocky bed, groaning in travail. The solid shot of cocoanut and -breadfruit, sped by the gale, fell on my iron roof while the furious -rain was like cannister. The trees made noises as a sailing ship in a -storm, singing wildly, whistling as does the cordage, and the crash of -their fall sounding as the freed canvas banging on the yards. Sleep was -not for me, but I smoked and wrote, and listened to the chorus of -angered nature until daybreak. - -In the first light I saw Father David, in _soutane_ and surplice, -attended by two barelegged acolytes, fording the breast-high river. He -held aloft the golden box containing the sacred bread, and one of the -acolytes carried a bell of warning. Paro had the black leprosy, and in -his hut far up the valley, on his mat of suffering, waited for the -comfort of communion. All day three priests moved up and down urging the -people to confess and “make their Easter.” - -Titihuti, the magnificently tattooed matron, went with me to the -ceremony of _Honi Peka_, the Kissing of the Crucifix. Honi really meant -to rub noses or smell each other’s faces, for the Marquesans had no -labial kiss. The Catholic church was well filled, and each native in -turn approached the railing of the channel, and rubbed his nose over the -desolate figure of the Savior. It was a wonderful magic to them. The -next day, Good Friday or _Venini Tapu_, I asked Great Fern what event -that day commemorated. - -“Ietu Kirito was killed by his enemies, the tribe of Iuda,” he replied, -as he might relate a tribal feud in these islands. - -[Illustration: - - Photo from Underwood and Underwood - The Coral road and the traders’ stores -] - -Holy Saturday was a joyous holiday, and on Easter Sunday the climax of -the feasting and merriment came. The communion-rail was crowded, many -complying with the church compulsion of taking the sacrament once a year -under pain of mortal sin. There was compensation for celibacy and exile -in Father David’s expression of delight as he put into each -communicant’s mouth the host. He was the leading actor in a divine -drama, the conversion by his few words of consecration of a flour wafer -into the actual body and blood of Jesus Christ. The histrionic was mixed -with and a moving part of his exaltation. - -[Illustration: - - Photo by Brown Bros. - Scene on beach a few miles west of Papeete -] - -He gave to all, including Peyral and me, the only white attendants, a -little loaf of bread he had blessed; _faraoa benetitio_ in Marquesan, or -flour _benedicto_. Ah Suey took communion, and after mass hurried to me. -The reputed murderer of Wagner, the American, was prideful because he -was the baker of the _faraoa benetitio_. - -“How you likee that bleadee?” he asked me. “My bake him bleadee, pliest -make him holee. Bimeby me ketchee heaven,” he said in all seriousness. - -Titihuti, my neighbor, joined me to walk to our homes, and, knowing her -to miss no masses on Sundays, I asked her why she had not received the -sacrament. She said she had never partaken of it, that she had yet to -make her first communion of the Lord’s supper. - -“But, Titihuti,” I remonstrated, “you know that you are in danger of -hell-fire. You believe in the Catholic doctrine, you say, and despite -that you disregard its strict order.” - -Titihuti I realized was a heathen, still full of animist superstitions, -and I was not unprepared to hear her answer: - -“If I took the host into my mouth I would die. The _manakao_ would seize -me. I will wait until I am about to die, and then Père David will give -me the _viaticum_, and I will go straight to _aki_.” - -The _manakao_ is a demon, and _aki_ is paradise. Titihuti was intending -to take the chance that kings and others took in the early days of -Christianity, when, being taught that baptism wiped out all sins, they -kept an alert clergyman always near them to sprinkle them and speed them -to heaven, and meanwhile they sinned as they pleased. - -By noon the entire village was chanting and dancing. The unusual removal -of the restriction against beverages made Easter a pagan rout. The -natives became uninhibited, if not natural, for a few hours. Several -times the governor had had groups at his palace to give exhibitions of -their aboriginal dances, but this feast-day he extended a general -invitation to a levee. Fifty or sixty men or women enjoyed the utmost -hospitality. The young ruler was bent on seeing their fullest expression -of mirth, without any restraint of sobriety. The noise of their songs -echoed to the mission, where the nuns prayed that some brand might be -spared from the holocaust. Swaggering chiefs and beauteous damsels -abandoned themselves to the spirit of the day. The dances were without -order. Whenever a man or woman felt the urge they sprang to their feet -and began the _tapiriata_. Under the palms, upon the verandas, in the -_salle à manger_, in every corner of the palace and its grounds, the -people, astonished at such unwonted freedom and such lavish bounty, -showed their appreciation in movements of their bodies and legs. The -fairest girls surrounded the host, and with sinuous circlings and a -thousand blandishments entertained and thanked him. The chants by the -elders were of his greatness. The young sang of passion. - -From the hill near the cemetery where Guillitoue, the anarchist, dwelt, -sounded the drums. I was the especial guest there in the afternoon, and -those who were not too deep in the pool of pleasure at the palace -climbed the mountain. The orator had built a shelter of bamboo and -cocoanut leaves, graceful and clean, and upon its carpet of leaves we -sat. Guillitoue in a loin-cloth and black frock-coat moved about among -the three score with a _dame-jeanne_ in each hand, and poured rum or -wine at request. Occasionally he broke into a wild _hula_, grotesque as -he whirled about with the wickered bottles at arms-length. From other -valleys whites and natives had come to the _koina_. Thirty horses were -tied to the cemetery railing. Amiable gaiety and ludicrous baboonery -passed the afternoon. - -Frederick Tissot, a storekeeper at Puamau, a Swiss in his fifties, ten -years in the Foreign Legion of Algiers, a worker upon the Chicago -Exposition buildings in the early nineties, and seventeen years here, -spoke of the “good time” when he worked at Zinkand’s restaurant in San -Francisco. - -“I drank thirty quarts of beer a day. I was cook, and the bartenders -stood in with me for _bonnes bouches_. I never tasted solid food. I had -soup and booze. I nearly died in a year, and had to leave.” - -He sighed at the memory of those golden days. Later I saw him falling -off his horse, and laid upon a mat in a native house. - -James Nichols, son of a Chicagoan, dignified, tall and thin, almost -white, with side-whiskers, a black cutaway, overalls, and bare feet, a -shoeless butler for all the world, had a tale for me of his father’s -marrying in Tahiti a member of the royal family of Pomaré, and of -himself being born on Christmas Island. - -“A wild island that,” said the quasi-butler in English. “Captain Cook -discovered it when he was steering north from Borabora on Christmas day. -He stayed there a few weeks and saw an eclipse of the sun. He took away -three hundred turtles. When I lived there they melted cocoanuts into -oil, and my father was the cooper. Cook had planted cocoanuts there. It -is an atoll, a lonely place, and I was glad to leave. I learned English -from my father, and married a Paumotu lady. I was in Tahiti until eight -years ago, when the cyclone wiped me out. Here I work for the mission, -making copra, and I am the tinker and tinsmith. Here’s looking at you!” - -Jensen, the young and engaging Dane, who will never return to -civilization, trod a measure with a charming girl from Hanamenu. - -“The clan of the Puna has left its bare _paepaes_ all over her valley,” -he said. “She is the last.” - -At dark the cavalcade reeled down the hill, leaving Pierre Guillitoue -sleeping beside the drum. Despite his late fifties and his, to say the -least, irregular way of living, Pierre is strong and healthy. - -Captain Cook marveled in his diary that “since the arrival of the ship -in Batavia [Java] every person belonging to her has been ill, except the -sailmaker, who was more than seventy years old; yet this man got drunk -every day while we remained there.” - -A white man lured away the consort of Ahi, an agreeable young man much -in love. I found the lorn husband screaming in grief. - -“Tahiatauani, my wife, my wife!” he cried out. The Marquesan weeps with -facility. Hour after hour this stalwart fellow let fall tears, lying on -the ground in agony. Then he rose and said no more about it. - -Easter Sunday went out in a blaze of riotous glory. I saw Ah Suey after -nightfall inquiring anxiously and angrily for his daughter. The nuns had -reported to him that she had failed to appear for vespers. That night in -the breadfruit-grove by the High Place they enacted the old orgies of -pre-Christian days. Thirty men and women, mostly young, sang the ancient -songs and danced by the lights of lanterns, of candlenuts and fagots, -and to the sound of the booming drums. - -I sat at wine the next day with Father David in the mission-house. It -was bare and ugly as all convents, having the scant, ascetic, -uncomfortable atmosphere that monks and nuns dwell in all over the -world—no ornaments, no good pictures, no ease. Stark walls, stiff -chairs, and the staring, rude crucifix over the door. The apostolic -vicar censured the Government severely. He plucked his long, black beard -nervously, and spoke his feelings in the imperious manner of a mortal -who holds the keys of the kingdom of heaven, castigating fools who -wouldn’t even learn there was a door. There was no trace of personal -pride. - -“The government here and in France is unjust to the church. We suffer -from the impiety and wickedness of French officials. The people of -France are right at heart, but the politicians are Antichrists. The -Protestants are bad enough, but the French are Catholics, or should be. -This young governor here is a veritable heathen, and has shown the -people the road to hell again, when they had hardly trod the _via trita, -via tuta_. He and Bauda are godless men. Monsieur, rum is forbidden to -be given to a Marquesan, yet the valley floats in rum. I know that to -get copra made one must stretch the strict rod of the law a trifle, but -not to drunkenness, nor to dances of the devil, dances, that, frowned -upon, might be forgotten.” - -The governor, _Commissaire_ Bauda, and I dined that night on the palace -veranda, and afterward we had an animated discussion. I wrote it down -verbatim: - -GOVERNOR. What was it _Père_ David said to you, _mon ami_? - -I. He said that the Catholic church was badly treated by the officials -here. - -GOVERNOR. Yes, he wants another great slice of land. Oh, that church is -insatiable! One of my predecessors, Grosfillez, fought them. Here is his -report in the archives: He says that, contrary to their claims that they -have caused the republic to be loved here, that they have taught the -Franch language, and have raised the natives from savagery, from -immorality and evil manners, the facts are that they have not changed a -particle the morals of the Marquesans, that they taught in their schools -a trifling smattering of French, and that they did not make France loved -and respected, but sought the domination of their order, the Picpus -Congregation, at the expense of the Government. This domination they -forced in the early days at the point of the bayonet, to the sacrifice -of the lives of French officers and soldiers. - -BAUDA. That is true here and everywhere we French have gone. We have -died to spread the power of the church. _Nom d’un chien!_ Six campaigns -in Africa, me! _Et pire alors!_ Did not General La Grande pin this -decoration on me? - -GOVERNOR. Here is the very letter of Grosfillez to the authorities. He -says that he visited the school at Taiohae, and that when he spoke to -the pupils, many of them three or four years in the school, the good -sister asked permission to translate his simple words into _canaque_ so -they could understand. _Sapristi!_ Is that teaching French? Is not the -calendar of the church here filled with foolishness, and almost all in -_canaque_? _Hein_? Read this: - -The governor thrust into my hands the almanac written by Father Simeon -Delmas, of Taiohae, and published by the mission. It was in hektograph, -neatly and beautifully written, and contained the religious calendar of -the year, and sermons, admonitions, and anecdotes, in Marquesan, with a -small minority in French; a photograph of Monseigneur Etienne Rouchouze, -former vicar apostolic to Oceanica, with praise for his career; an -anecdote of Bernadette of Lourdes, the famous peasant girl to whom the -Virgin Mary appeared, together with a list of the apparitions of the -Virgin in France, beginning in 1830, the other dates being ’46, ’58, -’71, and ’76; a prayer to Joan of Arc, with an attack on Protestantism -(_Porotetane_) for burning her, and something about the Duke of Guise; a -stirring article on Nero’s persecution of the Christians; an account of -the Fall of the Bastille; a comparison between Clovis, king of France, -and Napoleon; a tale of Charles V; and a table showing that the Catholic -church had established missions in all the inhabited islands of this -group since 1858, and giving the number of children in the schools when -they were closed by the government as clerical. - -“The mountain groaned and brought forth a mouse, a soldier,” said the -almanac. - -“That is treason,” said the governor, looking over my shoulder, “and -what has all that foolishness to do with a dying race that does not know -what it means? The church has done nothing for these people. They are -not changed except for the worse. What has the church done for their -health? Nothing. My predecessor wanted to stop the eating of _popoi_. He -knew that it is dirty, not healthful, and the promiscuous way of eating -it spreads disease. The church fought him and said _popoi_ was all -right. France! Have we not suffered enough by that church since the -Edict of Nantes? Since time immemorial? The church is a corporation, -selfish, scheming, always against any government it does not control. It -has been the evil genius of France. Only Napoleon harnessed the beast -and made it do his work, but it saw his humbling. The priests tell the -_canaques_ the Government is against the church, and that the church is -in the right; that it is the duty of every Catholic to love the church -first, because the church is Christ. They do not preach disaffection. -_Peut-être, non._ But they do not preach affection. - -I. But you must admit that these priests lead lives of self-sacrifice; -that personally they gain nothing. A meager fare and hard work. They -visit the sick—— - -GOVERNOR. Visit the sick? They do that, and they bury the dead. But they -do nothing to better conditions. We teach sanitation. The priests are -themselves either ignorant or neglectful of sanitation. Their calendars, -their tracts, their preaching, say not a word about health, cleanliness; -nothing about the body, but all about the soul, about duties to the -church. I am here primarily to study and aid the lepers, the -consumptives and the other sick. To try and halt the disease which has -killed thousands of unborn children, and the tuberculosis which takes -most of the Marquesans in youth. I am a soldier, experienced in Africa, -used to leprosy, and the care of natives. In Africa the church gives -nothing to the people but its ritual. What has the church done here -after seventy years? - -I. Ah, governor, that is the very question _Père_ David asked me as to -the Government. He says they looked after the lepers when they had a -free hand here. - -GOVERNOR. Looked after them. They were not physicians. Those men are -peasants crammed with a pitiful theology. They shall have nothing from -me but the law. - -He attacked the intermezzo of “Cavalleria Rusticana” on his flute, as -Many Daughters arrived. Over her ear was a sprig of fern, and about her -neck a string of fragrant nuts. Her very large eyes were singularly -brilliant. - -“_C’est toi qui pousse le pu me metai._” she complimented and tutoyed. -“_C’est toi qui n’a pas la pake?_ It is thou who playest the flute -wonderfully. It is thou who has not any tobacco?” - -“Ah, _ma fille_, you are well? You will have a drop of absinthe?” said -the governor. - -“With pleasure; I am as dry as the inside of an old skull.” - -“But, my friend,” I remonstrated with the executive, aside. “She is a -leper. Her sister is, too. Are you not afraid? She drinks from our -glasses.” - -“Me? I am a soldier, and a student of leprosy. It is my hobby. It is -mysterious, that disease. I watch her closely.” - -If the apostolic vicar felt keenly his inability to manage the affairs -of the village and the islands to suit his ideas of morality and -religion, so did the Protestant pastor. My house was very near the -mission, and it was some days after I had arrived before I went to the -dissenting church, half a mile across the valley. Monsieur Paul Vernier, -the Protestant pastor, had been many years in the Marquesas. He was -respected by the ungodly. Guillitoue hailed him as a brother, anarchist -and infidel though he was himself. Vernier alternated between hunting -souls to save and bulls to shoot, for he was a very son of Cush, and his -quest of the wild cattle of the mountains had put him upon their horns -more than once. Salvation he held first, and he was canny in copra, but -many nights he lay upon the tops of the great hills when pursuit of game -had led him far. - -Vernier had a background, for, though born in Tahiti, his father had -been a man of culture and his mother a charming Frenchwoman, whose home -in Tahiti was memorable to visitors. Vernier had devoted his life to the -Marquesans, and lived in this simple atmosphere without regret for -Tahiti. The apostolic vicar said that Vernier was Antichrist made -manifest in the flesh, but that was on account of the _odium -theologicum_, which here was as bitter as in Worms or Geneva of old. The -spirit of _Père_ David was pierced by the occasional defections from his -flock caused by the proselytizing of Vernier. Before I met him I had -gone to his church with Great Fern and Apporo. It was a box-like, -redwood building, its interior lacking the imagery and coloring of the -Roman congregation. The fat angels of Brother Michel, the cherubim and -seraphim in plaster on the _façade_ of Father David’s structure were -typical of the genius of that faith, round, smiling, and breathing good -will to the faithful. Protestantism was not in accord with the palms, -the flowers, and the brilliancy of the sunlight. Thirty made up the -congregation, of whom fourteen were men, twelve women, and four -children, though the benches would seat a hundred. The women, as in the -Catholic church, wore hats, but I was the only person shod. - -Men and women sat apart. During the service, except when they sang, no -man paid any attention to the preacher, nor did but three or four of the -men. They seemed to have no piety. The women with children walked in and -out, and four dogs coursed up and down the aisle. No one stirred a hand -or tongue at them. - -Fariura, a Tahitian preacher, who replaced Vernier, was a devout figure -in blackest alpaca suit and silk tie, but barefooted. As he stood on a -platform by a deal table and read the Bible, I saw his toes were well -spread, which in this country was like the horny hand of the laborer, -proof of industry. Climbing the cocoanut-trees made one’s toes ape one’s -fingers in radiation. - -Tevao Kekela led the singing in a high-pitched coppery voice, and those -who sang with her had much the same intonation and manner. Often the -sound was like that of a Tyrolean yodel, and the lingering on the last -note was fantastic. They sang without animation, rapidly, and as if -repeating a lesson. In the Catholic church the natives were assisted by -the nuns. These words were, of course, Marquesan, and I copied down a -stanza or two: - - Haere noara ta matorae - Va nia i te ea tiare, - Eare te pure tei rave, - Hiamai, na roto i te, - Taehae ote merie? - O te momona rahi - O te paraue otou, ta mata noaraoe? - Momona rahi roa - O te reira eiti to te merie? - Parau mai nei Ietue - Etimona Peteroe tia mai nioe, - Haa noara vau i tei nei po - Areva tuai aue. - -Fariura prayed melodiously and pleadingly for ten minutes, during which -Tevao Kekela’s father never raised his head but remained bowed in -meditation. A tattooed man in front of me bent double and groaned -constantly during the invocation. The others were occupied with their -thoughts. - -Then said Fariura, “_Ma teinoa o Ietu Kirito, Metia_ _kaoha nui ia_, in -the name of Jesus Christ, a good day to all the world.” - -He began his hour’s sermon. The discourse was about Rukifero and his -fall from Aki, and I discovered that Rukifero was Lucifer and Aki was -paradise. He described the fight preceding the drop as much like one of -the old Marquesan battles, with bitter recriminations, spears, clubs, -and slings as weapons, and Jehovah narrowly escaping Goliath’s fate. In -fact, the preacher said He had to dodge a particularly well-aimed stone. -Fariura, Kekela, Terii, the catechist, and his wife, Toua, received -communion, with fervent faces, while the others departed, lighting -cigarettes on the steps, some mounting horses, and the women fording the -river with their gowns rolled about their foreheads. - -The preacher shook hands with me, the only white. He was in a lather -from the heat and his unusual clothes, and the rills of sweat coursed -down his body. His pantomime of the heavenly faction fight had been -energetic. I took him to my house for a swig of rum, and we had a long -chat on the activities of the demon, and ways of circumventing his -wiles. - -Men like Vernier were not deceived by dry ecclesiasticism. They knew how -little the natives were changed from paganism, and how cold the once hot -blast of evangelism had grown. Religion was for long the strongest tide -in the affairs of the South Seas both under the heathen and the -Christian revelation. Government was not important under Marquesan -communism, for government is mostly concerned with enforcing opportunity -for acquisitive and ambitious men to gain and hold wealth and power. In -the days of the _tapus_ gods and devils made sacred laws and religious -rites. The first missionaries in the Marquesas, who sailed from Tahiti, -were young Englishmen, earnest and confident, but they met a severe -rebuff. They relate that a swarm of women and girls swam out to their -vessel and boarded it. - -“They had nothing on,” says the chronicle, “but girdles of green ferns, -which they generously fed to the goats we had on board, who seemed to -them very strange beings. The goats, deprived for long of fresh food, -completely devastated the garments of the savage females, and when we -had provided all the cloth we had to cover them, we had to drive the -others off the ship for the sake of decency.” - -Harris, one of the English missionaries, ventured ashore, and the next -morning returned in terror, declaring that nothing would induce him to -remain in the Marquesas. He feared for his soul. He said that despite -his protestations and prayers the girls of the valley had insisted on -examining him throughout the night hours to see if he was like other -humans, and that he had to submit to excruciating intimacies of a -“diabolical inspiration.” Crooks, Harris’s partner, dared these and -other dangers and remained a year. Crooks said that in Vaitahu, the -valley in which Vanquished Often and Seventh Man Who Wallows in the Mire -lived, there were deified men, called _atuas_, who, still in life, -wielded supernatural power over death, disease, the elements, and the -harvests, and who demanded human sacrifices to appease their wrath. -Crooks believed in the supremacy of Jehovah, but, like all his cloth -then, did not doubt diabolism and the power of its professors. - -For half a century American and English centers of evangelism despatched -missionaries to the Marquesas, but all failed. The _tapus_ were too much -feared by the natives, and the sorcerers and chiefs held this power -until the sailors and traders gradually broke it. They sold guns to the -chiefs, and bought or stole the stone and wooden gods to sell to museums -and collectors. They ridiculed the temples and the _tapus_, consorted -with the women, and induced them for love or trinkets to sin against -their code, and they corrupted the sorcerers with rum and gauds. They -prepared the ground for the Christian plow, but it was not until -Hawaiian missionaries took the field that the harvest was reaped. Then -it was because of a man of great and loving soul, a man I had known, and -whose descendants I met here. - -I was picking my way along the bank of a stream when a deep and ample -pool lured me to bathe in it. I threw off my _pareu_ and was splashing -in the deliciously cool water when I heard a song I had last heard in a -vaudeville theater in America. It was about a newly-wedded pair, and the -refrain declared that “all night long he called her Snookyookums.” The -voice was masculine, soft, and with the familiar intonation of the -Hawaiian educated in American English. I swam further and saw a big -brown youth, in face and figure the counterpart of Kamehameha I, the -first king of Hawaii, whose gold and bronze statue stands in Honolulu. -He was washing a shirt, and singing in fair tune. - -“Where’s your Snookyookums?” I asked by way of introduction. - -He was not surprised. Probably he heard and saw me before I did him. - -“Back on Alakea Street in Honolulu,” he replied, smilingly, “where I -wish I was. You’re the _perofeta_ [prophet] they talk about. I been -makin’ copra or I’d been see you before. My name is Jimmy Kekela, and I -was born here in that house up on the bank, but I was sent to school in -Honolulu, and I played on the Kamehameha High scrub team. The only -foot-ball I play now is with a cocoanut. I had a job as chauffeur for -Bob Shingle, who married a sister of the Princess Kawananakoa, but my -father wrote me to come back here. I’ll wring out this shirt, and we’ll -go up and see my folks.” - -The Kekela home was a large, bare house of pine planks from California -raised a dozen feet on a stone _paepae_. Unsightly and unsuitable, it -was characteristic of the architecture the white had given the Marquesan -for his own graceful and beautiful houses of hard wood, bamboo, and -thatch, of which few were left. I wrung out my _pareu_, replaced it, and -scrambled up the bank with him. The house was in a cocoanut forest, the -trees huge and lofty, some growing at an amazing angle owing to the wind -shaping them when young. They twisted like snakes, and some so -approached parallelism that a barefooted native could walk up them -without using his hands, by the mere prehensility of his toes and his -accustomed skill. In front of the steps to the veranda of the home were -mats for the drying of the copra, and a middle-aged man, very brown and -stout, was turning over the halves of the cocoanut meat to sun them all -over. - -[Illustration: - - Tahiatini, Many Daughters, the little leper lass -] - -[Illustration: - - François Grelet, the Swiss, of Oomoa -] - -“My father,” said Jimmy to me, and “_Perofeta_” to him. He shook hands -gingerly in the way all people do who are unaccustomed to that greeting, -and said, “_Kaoha!_” My answer, “_Aloha nui oe!_” surprised him, for it -was the Hawaiian salute. On the veranda I was presented to the entire -Kekela family, four generations. By ones and twos they drifted from the -room or the grounds. Hannah, the widow of Habuku, was very old, but was -eager to talk. - -“I am a Hawaiian,” she said in that language, “and I have been in -Atuona, on this piece of land, sixty years. My husband brought me here, -and he was pastor in that church till he died. _Auwe!_ What things went -on here then! I have seen many men being carried by toward the _Pekia_, -the High Place of Atuona, for roasting and eating. That was in war time, -when they fought with the people of Taaoa, or other valley. Kekela and -my husband with the help of God stopped that evil thing. Matanui, a -chief, came to Hawaii in a whale-ship, and asked for people to teach his -people the word of the true God. Four Hawaiians listened to Matanui, and -returned with him to Hanavave, where the French priest Father Olivier, -is now. A week later a French ship arrived with a Catholic priest. -_Auwe!_ He was angry to find the Protestants and tried to drive them -out. They stayed with the help of the Lord, though they had a hard time. -Then Kekela and we came, and we have seen many changes. He was a -warrior, and not afraid of anything, even the devil. There are his sons, -Iami and Tamueli, and his grandsons and granddaughters and their -children. We are Hawaiian. We have no drop of Marquesan blood in us. Did -you know Aberahama Linoconi?” - -Hannah lifted herself from the mat on the floor, and brought from the -house a large gold watch, very heavy and ornate, of the sort successful -men bought fifty years ago. It was inscribed to James Kekela from -Abraham Lincoln in token of his bravery and kindness in saving the life -of an American seaman, and the date was 1864. - -“That watch,” she said, “was given to Kekela by the big chief of -America. When he died he gave it to his son, Tamueli. Tell the prophet -why Aberahama Linoconi gave it to your grandfather, Iami!” - -Jimmy, the former chauffeur, tried to persuade his uncle, Samuel, a -missionary on another island, to tell the story, but finally himself -narrated it in English. - -“Grandfather Kekela was at Puamau, across this island, when he got this -watch. He had been at Puamau some years and teachin’ people stop -fightin’ an’ go church, when a whale-ship come in from Peru, an’ shot up -the town. The Peru men killed a lot of Marquesans, and stole plenty of -them to work in the mines like slave. They had guns an’ the poor Puamau -native only spear and club, so that got away with it good an’ strong. -Well, nex’ year come American whale-ship, an’ the mate come up the -valley to ketch girl. He saw girl he love an’ chase her up the valley. -The Puamau people let him go, an’ ask him go further. Then they tie him -up and beat him like the Peru people beat them, and then they got the -oven ready to cook him. The chief of Puamau come tell my grandfather -what they goin’ do, an’ he was some sore. He put on his Sunday clothes -he bring from Hawaii, an’ high collar an’ white necktie, an’ he go start -something. He was young and not afraid of all hell. The mate was tied in -a straw house, an’ everybody ‘roun’ was getting paralyzed with _namu -enata_—you know that cocoanut booze that is rougher than sandpaper gin -in Hawaii. - -“They were scarin’ the mate almost to death when grandfather come along. -The mate could see the _umu_ heatin’ up, and the stones bein’ turned -over on which he was goin’ to be cooked. Grandfather went in the hut. -The mate was lyin’ on his back with his hands an’ feet tied with a -_purau_ rope, an’ his face was as white as a shirt. I remember -grandfather used to say how white his face was. Kekela knelt down an’ -prayed for the mate, an’ he prayed that the chief would give him his -life. He prayed an’ prayed, and the chief listen an’ say nothin’. ‘Long -toward mornin’ the chief couldn’t hold out no longer, an’ said if -grandfather would give him the whale-boat he brought from Hawaii, his -gun, an’ his black coat, he would let him go. Grandfather handed them -all over, an’ took the mate to our house, and cured his wounds, and -finally got him on a boat an’ away. It was no cinch, for the American -ship had sailed away, and he had to keep the mate till another ship -came. Many time the young men of Puamau tried to get the mate, to eat -him, an’ when another ship arrived, an’ Kekela put the mate on board, -they followed in their canoes to grab him. They pretty near were killin’ -grandfather for what he did. - -“The mate must have told the Pres’ent of United States about his trouble -here, for grandfather got a bag of money, this watch, a new whaleboat, -an’ a fine black coat brought him by an American ship with a letter from -Mr. Lincoln. Father wrote back to Pres’ent Lincoln in Hawaiian, an’ -thank him proper.” - -“He must have lived to be a very old man,” I said, “because I was in -_Kawaiahao_ Church in Honolulu when he preached. He was asking for money -for this church, and he took out the watch Lincoln gave him, and banged -it on the pulpit so that we thought he would break it. He was greatly -excited. I wrote a piece about his sermon in the Honolulu paper and it -was printed in the _Nupepa Kukoa_, the Hawaiian edition of the _Honolulu -Advertiser_.” - -Samuel Kekela leaped to his feet and rushed into the house, from which -he came with a yellowed copy of the _Nupepa Kukoa_, containing the -article, with Kekela’s picture. To my own astonishment I read that the -fourteen Hawaiians of the Kekela families who had accompanied the aged -pioneer to Honolulu had journeyed in a schooner captained by my own -shipmate, Lying Bill. I had seen the schooner in Honolulu Harbor. - -Here was a remarkable group, a separate and alien sept, which, though -living since before Lincoln’s Presidency in this wild archipelago, had -preserved their Hawaiian inheritances and customs almost intact. This -had been due to the initial impetus given them by their ancestor, and it -had now ceased to animate them, so that they were declining into -commonplace and dull copra makers, with but a tiny spark of the flame of -piety that had lighted the soul of their progenitor. - -“I am not the man my father was,” said John, the father of Jimmy. “I am -an American because I am a Hawaiian citizen. My father had us all sent -to Hawaii to be educated and to marry.” - -The old Kekela had been a patriarch in Israel. Not alone had he lessened -cannibalism and the rigidity of the _tapu_ in the “great, cannibal isle -of Hiva-Oa,” but he had instructed them in foreign ways. He had acquired -lands, and now this family was the richest in the Marquesas. Only the -Catholic mission owned more acres. They were proud, and convinced that -they were anointed of the Lord, though Jimmy, being young, had no -interest at all in religion. If Kekela the first had not been a -missionary he would have been a chief or a capitalist. Hannah showed me -the photographs of the kings and queen of Hawaii since Kamehameha IV -with their signatures and affectionate words for Kekela. Now they were -disintegrating, and another generation would find them as undone as the -Marquesans. The contempt of government, trader, and casual white for all -religion had affected them, who for two generations had been Christian -aristocrats and leaders among a mass of commoners and admiring -followers. The ten commandments were as dead as the _tapus_, and the -church had become here what it is in America, a social and entertainment -focus for people bored by life. The German philosopher has said that the -apparent problem of all religions was to combat a certain weariness -produced by various causes which are epidemic. Christianity for -civilized people may be “a great storehouse of ingenuous sedatives, with -which deep depression, leaden languor, and sullen sadness of the -physiologically depressed might be relieved,” but for the Marquesans it -had been a narcotic, perhaps easing them into the grave dug by the new -dispensation brought by civilized outsiders. The gentle Jesus had been -betrayed by the culture that had developed in his name, but which had no -relation to his teaching or example. These good-willed Kekelas were as -feeble to arrest the decay of soul and body of their charges as was the -excellent Pastor Vernier or the self-sacrificing Father David. In the -dance at the governor’s the flocks, at least, had an expression, -corrupted as it was, of their desire for pleasure and forgetfulness of -the stupid present. - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CHAPTER XXI - -Paul Gauguin, the famous French-Peruvian artist—a rebel against the - society that rejected him while he lived, and now cherishes his - paintings. - -ABOVE the village of Atuona was the hill of Calvary, as the French named -the Catholic cemetery. Often in the late afternoon I went there to watch -the sun go down behind the peak of Temetiu, and to muse over what might -come into my mind. My first visit had been with Charles Le Moine, the -school teacher of Vaitahu, and the only painter living in the Marquesas. -We had gone to search for the grave of Paul Gauguin, the famous -French-Peruvian artist, and had found no trace of it. - -“That woman who swore to keep it right has buried another lover since,” -said Le Moine, cynically. - -A small man, with a long French nose, a red, pointed beard and mustache, -twinkling blue eyes, and dressed in faded denim, Le Moine, though many -years in these archipelagos, was out of the Latin Quarter. Two front -teeth missing, he had a childish air; one thought his whiskers might be -a boy’s joke. He was a _blageur_ about life, but he was very serious -about painting, and utterly without thought of else. - -“I work at anything the Government will give me to earn leisure and a -bare living so as to paint here,” he said. - -Alas! Le Moine was not a great artist. His pictures were so-so. -Doubtless the example and fame of Gauguin inspired him to achieve. We -had often talked of him. - -“When he died,” said Le Moine, “I was here, and I attended the night -services in the church over his remains. The chief _gendarme_ or _agent -special_, like Bauda now, took charge of his house and effects. You may -imagine the care he took when I tell you that Gauguin was under sentence -to prison for reviling the _gendarme_ and the law. He auctioned off -everything with a jest, and made fun of the dead man and his work. He -said to us: ‘Gauguin is dead. He leaves many debts, and nothing here to -pay for them, but a few paintings without value. He was a decadent -painter.’ Gauguin would have expected that. I had only a few _sous_, but -was able to buy what I needed most, his brushes and palette. Peyral got -‘Niagara Falls,’ as the _gendarme_ shouted its name. It was Gauguin’s -last picture; a Brittany village in winter, snow everywhere, a few -houses and trees, and the dusk in blue and red and violet tones. He made -that, _mon ami_, when he was dying. It was his reaching back to his old -painting ground in his last thoughts. I think Peyral sold it to -Polonsky, the Tahitian banker, who was here looking to buy anything of -Gauguin. Lutz got his cane, carved by Gauguin, and the other things went -for a trifle, including the house, which was torn down for the lumber, -because nobody here wanted a studio. I admired Gauguin, but he had -nothing to do with me because I was white and of the Government. He was -absorbed with the Marquesans, and to them he was all kindness and -generosity. He was the simplest educated white man in his needs I have -ever known, and I myself, as you know, have few demands. Gauguin wanted -drink, paint and canvas. He always kept a bottle of absinthe in a little -pool by his house.” - -Lying Bill had said that Gauguin was a seaman. - -“’Is ’ands was as tough an’ rough as mine,” said Captain Pincher. “’E’d -been to sea on merchant ships an’ in the French navy. Gauguin was no -bloomin’ pimp like most artists. ’E knew every rope in the schooner, an’ -could reef an’ steer. ’E looked like a Spaniard, an’ ’e could drink like -a Yarmouth bloater. Many a time I brought ’im absinthe to Atuona on my -ship. But ’e was a ’ard worker. I used to sit with ’im sometimes when -’e’d play ’is organ. ’E wasn’t bad at it, either. Women didn’t care much -for ’im. ’E never made much of them, but ’e ’ad plenty. A bleedin’ queer -frog, ’e was.” - -“He was a _chic type_.” said Song of the Nightingale, the prisoner-cook -of the palace. Song said _chick tippee_, but he meant that Gauguin was a -good man to know. “When there was a big storm here, and all the land of -the man next to him was washed away by the river, Gauguin gave him a -piece. _Ea!_ He gave him, too, a paper which made the land his. The -family has it to-day, and they are my relatives.” - -Pastor Vernier, Father David, Peyral, Flag, Song of the Nightingale, and -others had spoken of Gauguin, but his name never came to their lips -spontaneously. Being dead ten years, he was as never having been, to the -Marquesans. To Vernier his note was of small interest and to the vicar -apostolic an annoyance. In these seas when a man was dead he was -forgotten unless he had left an estate, or his ghost walked. The -Marquesan and the Paumotuan held the dead in great fear at times, but -not in reverence. The spirit of the artist had remained with his body, -and that was lost in the matted earth of the graveyard on the height. -His dust had long ago united with the cocoanut-palms that rose from his -burial-place on that lonely hill. The purple blossoms of the _pahue_ -vine, which crawled over his unmarked grave and sent its shoots to -search the heart of the unhappiest of men, were the only tribute ever -laid there. The woman who had vowed to keep its formal outline unbroken -and to bedew it with her tears smiled at my recalling it. Gauguin here -was a name’s faint echo, but in America and Europe they bartered for -Gauguin’s pictures as if they were of gold, schools of imitators and -emulators were active, and novelists and critics seized upon his -utterances and deeds, his savage ways and maddening canvases, to fit -fictional characters to them, or to tell over and over again the -mystifying story of his career and his work. Here, among the fascinating -scenes nature fashions for those who love its extravagances, he died in -poverty. More is paid to-day for one of his pictures than he earned in a -lifetime. - -The man Gauguin persisted as a legend wherever painting or Polynesia was -much discussed. There was in him a seed of anarchism, a harking back to -the absolute freedom of the individual, a fierce hatred of the -overlordship of money and fixed decency, of _comme il faut_, which -lightened the eye of many conforming people, as a glimpse of light -through a distant door in a dark tunnel. In this stark, brooding, -wounded _insurrecto_, this child of France and the ardent tropic of -South America, each of us who had suffered, and rebelled, if only in our -hearts, gained a vicarious expression, and an outlet for our atavistic -and fearful desires. Time that had led man from the anthropoid to the -artist had betrayed Gauguin. He had yielded to the impulse we all feel -at times, and had tried to escape from the cage formed by heredity, -habits, and the thoughts of his countrymen. Space he had conquered, and -in these wilds was hidden from the eyes of civilization, but time he -could not blot out, for he was of his age, and even its leader in the -evolution of painting. The savage in man he let take control of himself, -or willed it to be, and was spoiled by the inexorable grasp upon him of -his forebears and his decades of Europe. He was saturated with the ennui -of the West. He wanted to be primitive, and had to use morphine, -absinthe, and organ music to remain in the East. He asserted that he -wanted to be “wise and a barbarian.” He was a great artist but no -barbarian. - -He wrote: “Civilization is falling from me little by little. Under the -continual contact with pebbles my feet have become hardened and used to -the ground. My body, almost constantly nude, no longer suffers from the -sun. I am beginning to think simply, to feel very little hatred for my -neighbor—rather, to love him. All the joys, animal and human, are mine. -I have escaped everything that is artificial, conventional, customary. I -am entering into the truth, into nature. In the certitude of a -succession of days like this present one, equally free and beautiful, -peace descends on me.” - -He never knew peace. His was a tortured soul and body, torn by -conflicting desires, and absence of the fame and slight fortune he -craved. He had courage and stoicism. In scores of letters to his friend -Montfried he complained of his fate, of his desperate poverty, his lack -of painting materials, the _bourgeois_ whites about him, and his lack of -recognition in Europe. He wanted to return there, and Montfried had to -tell him in plain terms that he would destroy by his presence in Paris -any sale there was for his pictures. Gauguin realized that, for it -carried out his own motto, one that he had put over his door: “Be -mysterious and you will be happy!” - -Gauguin was like all cultivated whites who go to the South Seas after -manhood, like me, unfitted by the poisons of civilization to survive in -a simple, semi-savage environment. We demand the toxins of our machine -bringing-up and racial ideals, as the addict his drug. Gauguin was -already forty-three when he stepped ashore at Tahiti, and fifty-three -when he came to the Marquesas, but at least he had put into a proper -_milieu_ his portrait of himself made when he said to his opponents, in -Paris: “I am a savage. Every human work is a revelation of the -individual. All I have learned from others has been an impediment to me. -I know little, but what I do know is my own.” - -Paul Gauguin was dead at fifty-five. An ancestor was a centenarian. The -family was famed in its environment for its vitality, but Paul wasted -his energy in bitter blows against the steel shield of society, and -spoiled his body with the vices of both savage and civilized. - -“He was smiling when I saw him dead,” said Mouth of God, who had served -him for the love of him. - -That smile was his ever-brave defiance of life, but, too, a thought for -France—for the France he adored, and which he dreamed of so often though -it had rejected him. That last picture, painted in these humid Marquesas -in his house set in a grove of cocoanut-palms and breadfruit-trees, was -of Brittany and was a snow scene. He did not defeat his enemy, but sank -into his last sleep content to go because the struggle had become too -anguishing. He knew he was beaten, but he flew no flag of surrender. He -passed alone, with only the smile as a token of his final moment of -consciousness, and the emotion that stirred his soul. - -As was said best by his friend and biographer, Charles Morice, Gauguin -was one of the most necessary artists of the nineteenth century. His -name now signified a distinctive conception of the nature of art, a -certain spirit of creation and mastery of strange technique, and a -revolt against established standards and methods which constituted an -opposition to the accepted thoughts and morals of art—if not a school, -at least a distinct class of graphic achievement. As the French say, it -was a _catégorie_. For the conservatives, the regular painters and -critics, he had created _un frisson nouveau_, a new shudder in art, as -Hugo said Baudelaire had in literature. - -Gauguin was not a distinguished writer. “Noa Noa” was written by his -friend, Morice, in Paris, from letters to him. The painter commented -upon the book that it was “not the result of an ordinary collaboration, -that is, of two authors working in common, but that I had the idea, -speaking for non-civilized people, to contrast their characters with -ours, and I had enough originality to write it simply, just like a -savage, and to ask Morice, for his part, to put it in civilized words.” -His “Intimate Journals” are actually revelatory of the man, but “Noa -Noa” is a tropical dish seasoned with sophistries, though beautiful, -and, to a large degree, true. It is a poetical interpretation by Morice, -a Parisian, of Gauguin’s adventures in Tahiti. - -Gauguin spent little time in writing. Every fiber of his weakening body -and every lucubration of his mind were bent on expressing himself in -painting, or in clay or wood, but he thought clearly and -individualistically, and wrote forcefully and with wit. He was not a -poet, nor had he felicity of language. - -I revived Gauguin’s memory in the South Seas. Having known about him in -Tahiti, I was interested to find out all I could of his brief life and -sorrowful death here. Lovaina, the best known woman in the South Seas, -at whose Hotel Tiaré I lived in Tahiti, spoke of Gauguin one day. She -had heard a whisper between Temanu and Taata-Mata, two of her handmaids, -that I might leave the Tiaré, her impossible _auberge_ in Papeete, to -lodge with Madame Charbonnier or Madame Fanny. - -Lovaina, three quarters American by blood, but all Tahitian in looks, -language, and heart, was not assured that her impossible hotel was the -only possible one within thousands of miles, as it was really, and she -said: - -“Berina, I think more better you go see that damn house before you make -one bargain. You know what Gauguin say. He have room with Madame -Charbonnier, and eve’y day, some time night, she come make peep his -place. He had glass door between that room for him and for other man, -and he say one day to me (I drink one Pernod with him): - -“‘That _sacré_ French women she make peep me. I beelong myself. I make -one damn pictu’e stop that.’ - -“You go look for yourse’f to-day. You see that door. Gauguin say he make -ugly so nobody make look.” - -“That Gauguin was a very happy man in my _maison_,” said Madame -Charbonnier in French to me. “He and I had but one disagreement. One day -a native woman accompanied him here. I knew he must have models, but I -want no hussies in my house. I am a respectable citizeness of France. I -looked through the glass door, and I warned him, though he had paid in -advance, I must preserve my reputation. _O, la la la!_ He painted that -_mauvaise_ picture of that very Tahitian girl on my door to spite me. -_La voila!_ Is it not affrighting?” - -It was a double-panelled door, and a separate painting covered each; to -the left a seated girl wearing a _pareu_ and to the right a girl playing -the _vivo_, the Tahitian flute, a female figure standing, and the white -rabbit Gauguin introduced afterward into many paintings. I might have -bought the door of Madame Charbonnier or somewhat similar windows and -doors in another house occupied by Gauguin for a hundred francs or -perhaps two or three times that much. At any rate, for an inconsiderable -sum, because they had no value as examples of the painter’s ability nor -were they intrinsically beautiful or attractive. Stephen Haweis, a -talented English artist, who was there with me, bought the door, and W. -Somerset Maugham a window, which I saw afterward in a New York gallery -for sale at some thousands of dollars. - -I was mentioning Gauguin’s name at Mataiea, in Tahiti, at the house of -the chief of that district, Tetuanui, a gentleman of charming manners -and great knowledge of things Tahitian. Rupert Brooke and I had walked -to the ancient _marai_, or temple, and the poet and I had tried to -rebuild the ruin in our imagination. I had seen _marais_ better -preserved, and I had talked with many who had studied their formation -and history. - -This one, very famous in the annals of Tahiti, was not far from -Tetuanui’s home, and on it had been enacted strange and bloody -sacrifices in the days of heathenry. It was on the sea-shore, and, -indeed, much of it had fallen into the water, or the surf had encroached -upon the land. We had spent some hours about it, and had wondered about -the people who had made it their cathedral a few score years ago. Here -we were living with their grandchildren. The father of the chief’s -father might have participated in the ceremonies there, might have seen -the king accept and eat the eye of a victim, or feign to do so, for -cannibalism had long passed in Tahiti even a century ago. - -Walking back to Mataiea, we met the chief returning from his day’s labor -directing the repair of roads, for, though a chevalier of the Legion of -Honor, a former warrior for the French against tribes of other islands, -Tetuanui had small means, and was forced to be a civil servant of the -conquerers. - -“We have been to see the _marai_,” said Brooke. - -“_Oia mau anei teie?_” replied Tetuanui. “Is that so? I have not been -there for a long time. The last time was with that white painter -Gauguin. He lived near here, and one day I spoke of the _marai_, and he -asked me to show it to him. We walked down there together, but he was -disappointed that it was so broken down.” - -Once again the chevalier gave me a glimpse of the barbarian. He and his -amiable wife took occasional boarders, and there were two San Francisco -salesgirls there for a week. They were shocked at our bathing nude in -the lagoon in front of the house, although we wore loin-cloths to walk -to the beach and back. They complained to the chief, who was astonished, -for Brooke was strikingly handsome, and the Tahitian girls were open in -their praise of his beauty. - -“They should have seen that Gauguin,” said Tetuanui, as he begged our -pardon for telling their indignation. “He was always semi-nude and often -nude. He became as brown as a Tahitian in a few months. He liked to lie -in the sun, and I have seen him at the hottest part of the day sitting -at his easel. You know, he had a wife here in the way that the whites -take our women, and one day he and she were in swimming, and came out on -the road before putting on _pareus_. A good missionary complained of -them—it was not quite proper, truly, and the _gendarme_ warned both of -them. Gauguin was furious, for he hated the _gendarmes_ before that.” - -Ten years were gone since Gauguin, having fled from Tahiti and a fate -that he could not escape, had expired here in Atuona in a singular -though anguished resignation. His _atelier_ and dwelling had been just -below Peyral’s on the opposite side of the road I trod so often to and -from the beach, and Peyral had known him as well as such a man can know -a master. Mouth of God, the husband of Malicious Gossip, saw Gauguin -dead in his house, and it was he who told me that Kahuiti, the recent -cannibal chief, had a _tiki_ made by Gauguin. I went to Taaoa, past the -Stinking Springs and the house of Mademoiselle Narbonne, to see it. - -I remembered that James Huneker said, “In the huts of the natives where -cataloguing ceases, many pictures may be found.” - -Kahuiti had one, and dear to the heart of that remarkable -anthropophagus. It was a striking figure of an old god, and a couple of -feet square, and in the painter’s most characteristic style. - -When I asked him to sell it to me, he opened wide those large brown eyes -which had looked a hundred times at the advancing spear, and had watched -the cooking of his slain enemy. He said nothing but the words, “_Tiki -hoa pii!_ An image by my dear friend!” - -I smoked a pipe with him, and went back to Atuona thoughtful. - -Gauguin made many enemies, but he kept his friends even in death. - -“_Toujours tout a vous de cœur_,” he had signed his letters to his one -or two friends, with rare sincerity. - -Gauguin had deserted Tahiti because of his frequent quarrels with the -representatives of the Government there, and with the church. He -precipitated a similar situation in Atuona almost immediately. In his -“Intimate Journals,” he tells of it: - - The first news that reached me on my arrival at Atuona was that - there was no land to be bought or sold, except at the - mission.... Even so, as the bishop was away, I should have to - wait a month. My trunks and a shipment of building lumber waited - on the beach. During this month, as you can well imagine, I went - to mass every Sunday, forced as I was to play the rôle of a good - Catholic and a railer against the Protestants. My reputation was - made, and His reverence, without suspecting my hypocrisy, was - quite willing (since it was I) to sell me a small plot of ground - filled with pebbles and underbrush for 650 francs. I set to work - courageously, and, thanks once more to some men recommended by - the bishop, I was soon settled. - - Hypocrisy has its good points. When my hut was finished, I no - longer thought of making war on the Protestant pastor, who was a - well-brought-up young man with a liberal mind besides; nor did I - think any longer of going to church. A chicken had come along, - and war had begun again. When I say a chicken I am modest, for - all the chickens had arrived, and without any invitation. His - Reverence is a regular goat, while I am a tough old cock and - fairly well-seasoned. If I said the goat began it, I should be - telling the truth. To want to condemn me to a vow of chastity! - That’s a little too much; nothing like that, Lizette! - - To cut two superb pieces of rose-wood and carve them after - the Marquesan fashion was child’s play for me. One of them - represented a horned devil (the bishop), the other a - charming woman with flowers in her hair. It was enough to - name her Thérèse for every one without exception, even the - school-children, to see in it an allusion to this celebrated - love affair. Even if this is all a myth, still it was not I - who started it. - -Pastor Vernier told me of his acquaintance with Gauguin and of his last -days. Vernier acknowledged that he had never been his friend. I would -have known that, for to Gauguin, professors of theology were as absurd -and abhorrent as he to them. - -Gauguin’s residence was a half-mile away from Vernier’s. Two years he -had lived there after ten in Tahiti. Always disappointment, always -bodily suffering, and the reaction from alcohol and drugs; an invalid a -dozen years. - -“He was a savage, but a charming man,” said Pastor Vernier to me. “I -could have nothing to say to him, ordinarily, and he did not seek me -out. He had no respect for the law and less for the _bon Dieu_. The -Catholics especially he quarreled with, for he made a caricature of the -Bishop, and of a native woman, about whom there was a current scandal. -It was common talk, and the natives laughed uproariously, which angered -the bishop greatly. It was unfit to be seen by a savage. You can imagine -it! - -“I had not seen him for some time when I had a note from Gauguin, -scrawled on a piece of wrapping-paper. It said: - - “Will it be asking too much for you to come to see me? My sight - is all of a sudden leaving me. I am very ill, and cannot move.” - -“I went down the trail to his house, and found Mouth of God with him, as -also the old Tioka. His legs were terribly ulcerated. He had on a red -loin-cloth and a green tam-o’-shanter cap. His skin was as red as fire -from the eczema he had long been afflicted with, and the pain must have -been very severe. He shut his lips tight at moments, but he did not -groan. He talked of art for an hour or two, passionately advocating his -ideas, and without reference to his approaching end. I think he sent for -me for conversation and no more. It was then he presented me with books -and his portrait of Mallarmé. - -“We chatted long and I was filled with admiration for the courage of -Gauguin and his prepossession with painting, at the expense of his -_doleur_. About a fortnight later I went back when Tioka summoned me, -and found him worse, but still forgetful of everything else but his art. -It was the eighth of May Tioka came again. Gauguin now was in agony. He -had had periods of unconsciousness. He must have known his danger, but -he talked fitfully of Flaubert and of Poe, of ‘Salammbô’ and of -‘Nevermore.’ When I said adieu he was praising Poe as the greatest poet -in English. - -“A few hours afterward I heard the shouts of the natives that Gauguin -was dead. - -“‘_Haoe mate!_’ they called to me. ‘The white is dead.’ - -“I found Gauguin on his cot, one leg hanging down to the floor. Tioka -was urging him in Marquesan to speak, and was rubbing his chest. I took -his arms and tried to cause respiration, but in vain. He was already -beginning to grow cold. Do you know, _Monsieur Americain_, that the -vicar went down there at night before I was aware of it, and, though -Gauguin despised him and his superstitions, forced an entrance and, had -the body carried to the Catholic Cemetery, with mass, candles, and other -mummeries.” - -The good Vicar, _Père_ David, had another tale. He told it over our wine -at the mission. My House of the Golden Bed was but the toss of a mango -away, and we often discussed the fathers, especially Anthony, Jerome, -and Francis of Assisi. - -“It is not true,” he said, plucking his long, black beard nervously, as -was his wont. “Gauguin was born in the church. Did he not tell me he was -the descendant of a Borgia? He was at the Jesuits’ school. The devil got -hold of him early. Ah, that France is punished for its breaking of the -Concordat. Napoleon knew what was needed. Gauguin did make much trouble -here. I do not care what he did to the Government. That Government is -usually atheist. But he made an obscene image of the bishop. He never -entered our mission, after he had secured his land from us, and labor to -build his house. He derided the sacred things of religion, and when he -came to die he sent for the Protestant. I had hoped always that he would -recant his atheism and change his ways. He was immoral, but then so is -nearly everybody here except the fathers, and the nuns. That very -pastor—Non! I guard my secret. _Mais_, it is not a secret, for all the -world knows. N’importe! I close my lips.” - -He was determined to be charitable, but, as for me, I knew the charge -well, and had disproved it by personal research. John Kekela, the -Hawaiian, had sworn on the Bible given his father by Kalakaua, the last -Hawaiian king, that it was a lie, and Kekela would know for sure, and -would not kiss the book falsely for fear of death or, at least, the -dreaded _fefe_, which makes one’s legs as big as those of an elephant. - -“But despite the antagonism of Gauguin to the church and his immorality, -you took charge of his body and gave him a Catholic funeral,” I said. - -“Who am I to judge the soul of a man?” replied the vicar, deprecatingly, -his right hand lifted in appeal. “He was alone in his last moments. -Doubtless the Holy Virgin or perhaps even the patron of the Marquesas, -the watchful Joan of Arc, aided him. Each one has his guardian angel who -never deserts him. When the shadows of death darken the room, then does -that angel fight with the demons for the soul of his charge. I learned -that Gauguin was dead from the catechist. Daniel Vaimai. It was then -evening of the day he had died, and I had been ministering to a sick -woman in Hanamate, an hour’s ride away. I met Daniel Vaimai at the -cross-roads and he informed me of Gauguin’s death. I felt deeply sorry -that he had not had the holy oils in his extremity, and had not received -absolution after confession, but the devil is like a roaring lion of -Afrique, seeking what he may devour.” - -“He is especially active here,” I ventured, interested as I am in all -such vital matters. The vicar, who had been talking animatedly and -gazing at an invisible congregation, fixed his eyes on me. - -“Here in the Marquesas and wherever whites are,” he replied acridly. -“But to return to Gauguin! I immediately arranged for the interment of -the dead man the next morning. In this climate decay follows death fast. -As a matter of fact, some of us, including two of the _Frères de la -doctrine chrètienne_, had hastened to Gauguin’s house when his death was -announced the day before. They had planned his funeral for two o’clock -the next morning, but we made it a trifle earlier, and removed him to -the church of Atuona shortly after one. There we had mass for the dead, -and did the poor _cadavre_ all honor, or, rather, we thought of the soul -that had fled to its punishment or reward. We carried the body to -Calvary and put it in the earth.” - -“I find no stone nor any mark at all of his grave,” I said. - -“_Peut-être_, that may well be,” said the vicar calmly. “I do not know -if one was placed. He had no kin here nor intimates other than natives.” - -“But Pastor Vernier says Gauguin had asked long ago to be buried with -civil rites only, and that he had wanted to assist in them. He says that -you deceived him as to the hour of removal to the church, and that when -he arrived at two o’clock Gauguin was already in the mission which he -could not enter.” - -The vicar shrugged his shoulders. - -“I cannot enter into a controversy as to what Vernier says. Gauguin was -of Catholic parentage. Have I not said he claimed to be a descendant of -a Borgia, and Borgias were popes? What more or less could the church -have done? Stern as that Mother may be to wayward children in life, she -spares no effort even in death to comfort those remaining, and to help -by prayer and ceremony the spirit that wrestles with purgatory. We ever -give the benefit of the doubt. A second before he succumbed to that -heart stroke, or the laudanum, Gauguin may have asked for forgiveness. -Only God knows that, and in His infinite mercy He may have bestowed on -him that final penitence. You will not forget the thief on Calvary.” - -That villainous Song of the Nightingale might have given success to my -quest for the grave of Gauguin. I cannot remember now that I ever -mentioned to him my looking for it. He pointed it out to a recent -governor of the Marquesas Islands, Dr. L. Sasportas, who, in a letter to -Count Charles du Parc, now of San Francisco, tells of it: - - Gauguin, of whom you wrote, had not departed from the tradition - of adopting native customs; and unfortunately, his influence - among the Marquesans was rather bad than good. I have gathered - some details about him, which may interest those who know that - sad end of this talented painter who came to the Marquesas, to - escape the civilized world, its taxes, ugliness and evils. He - found here the government, police, the tax collector, etc. If - these islands enjoy an eternal summer, disease is not lacking in - them. - - Gauguin, morphinomaniac, lived close to a bottle of absinthe - that he kept fresh in his well. He was condemned to serve in - jail for three months, and one morning he was found dead near-by - a phial of laudanum. He committed suicide. Nothing remains of - him. His house has been demolished, and his land is a field of - potatoes. His last paintings have been carried away, not by - admirers, but by merchants who did not ignore the value of his - work. - - My wife and I went once to a little French cemetery which lies - on top of the hill and among a hundred Christian tombs we looked - for Gauguin’s. About three quarters of the crosses, worm-eaten, - had fallen. One after the other we threw them over to find the - name of Gauguin. It was in vain. After we had come down, we - inquired of our cook, prisoner and drunkard, who lived here at - the time of Gauguin. We learned that the tomb was for a long - time abandoned. We finally found it, and we had a wreath of - natural flowers that he loved so much, rose-laurel, hibiscus, - gardenia and others, placed upon the spot. They are decayed now, - alas, as is Gauguin. - -That again was Gauguin. Fleeing from Europe, from civilization, from the -_redingote_, and even there, in that most distant isle, thousands of -miles from any mainland, being pursued by the _gendarme_! Had he not -abandoned Tahiti after a decade for a wilder spot, yet a thousand miles -farther, hidden in a bywater of the vast ocean, and in the “great -cannibal isle of Hiva-Oa” been harassed by the law and the church? - -He saw there was no escape, and that, after all, the fault was in him. -He demanded the impossible from a world corrupted to its horizon. He, -too, could say of himself, as he wrote of the Tahitians, and then of the -Marquesans: - - The gods are dead and I am dead of their death. - -“He had verses on that god he made for his garden,” said Le Moine. “They -began: - - ‘Les dieux sont mort et Atuona meurt de leur mort.’ - -That was it. Gauguin was like the Marquesans of his, of my, village of -Atuona. Their old gods were dead, and they perished of the lack of -spiritual substance. - -Le Moine was to go mad, and to die, as I would have if I had not fled. -The air was one of death. - - “Le soleil autrefois qui l’enflammait l’endort - D’un sommeil désolé d’affreux sursauts de rêve, - Et l’effroi du futur remplit les yeux de l’Eve. - Dorée: elle soupire en regardant son sein, - Or, stérile scellé par les divins desseins.” - -When I returned to America and wrote of Gauguin, I received a letter -from his son: - - ... novel couldn’t hurt Gauguin as an artist. We men aren’t - insulted when apes yelp at us; but we are sometimes obliged to - live amongst them, so when you defend Gauguin against the - quadrumanes, you make it easier for his son to move in their - midst. - - I therefore thank you and beg you to believe me your most - grateful friend and admirer, - - EMILE GAUGUIN. - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CHAPTER XXII - -Monsieur l’Inspecteur des Etablissements Français de l’Océanie—How the - School House was Inspected—I Receive My Congé—The Runaway - Pigs—Mademoiselle Narbonne goes with Lutz to Papeete to be - Married—Père Siméon, about whom Robert Louis Stevenson wrote. - -ONE must admit that the processes of government in my islands were -simple. Since only a couple of thousand Marquesans, of an original -myriad, were alive, after three score years of colonialism, officialdom -had lessened according to the mortuary statistics. Sovereignty was -evidenced by the tricolor that Song of the Nightingale occasionally -raised in the palace garden, while _Commissaire_ Bauda and two -_gendarmes_ aided the merry governor in exercising a lazy authority. -There was no hospital, nor school to distract the people from copra -making, and, excepting for the court sessions of Saturdays, to hear -moonshine cases, or a claim against Chinese rapacity, we might have -thought ourselves living in an ideal state of anarchy. - -One morning we awoke to the reality of empire and the solicitude of -Paris. Flag, the _mutoi_, peered through the windowless aperture of my -cabin, shortly after dawn, and announced, with the pompousness of a -bumbailiff, that the French gunboat _Zélée_ was at Tahauku, and would -shortly land _Monsieur l’Inspecteur des Etablissements Français de -l’Océanie_. Flag called the visitor _’Sieu Ranisepatu_, and in pantomime -indicated his rank and power. The Zélée sent him ashore at the stone -steps of Lutz’s store, and departed for Vaitahu, ostensibly for a fresh -water-supply, but, as Painter Le Moine said with an oath, the commander -had gone to Le Moine’s adopted village, Vaitahu, to make love to -Vanquished Often, the artist’s model. - -The inspector of colonies occupied the spare room at the palace and our -pleasant parties were suspended. He was a gross, corpulent man, in a -colonel’s gilded uniform. One could not see his collar, front or back, -for the rolls of his fat neck and his spacious beard. The _tapis_ was -full of troublesome affairs. The governor and Bauda had fallen out. Rum -was responsible. The governor had given Taiao Koe, Flatulent Fish, one -of my tattooed neighbors, a permit to buy a gallon of rum for Lutz. -Flatulent Fish lightened his jug too much. _Commissaire_ Bauda met him -wobbling from port to starboard on his horse, and took the jug. That for -Bauda, censor of morals! But the same day, during the difficult work of -repairing Bauda’s arm-chair, Bauda cheered the natives with rum, and -two, made utterly reckless, invaded the palace garden in search of more. -The inspector was stupefied, and the governor drove them away with -threats of prison and indignant exclamations that such a thing had never -happened before. Of course, Bauda had to let the inspector know of his -action in saving Flatulent Fish from a more wobbly state, and he did so -in ignorance of his chair-repairers having betrayed to the inspector his -own liberality. The governor did not fancy Flatulent Fish’s permit for -rum being brought before the inspector’s notice. So the great man had to -decide whether the Governor or the _Commissaire_ was supreme in rum -matters, rum, of course, being absolutely forbidden to the natives. - -After two days, this matter was settled. The inspector became restless. -Every day he said, “I must see the schoolhouse. It is necessary that I -see that important building.” - -He meant a tumbledown, unoccupied cabin up the valley, a dirty, cheap, -wooden building, bare planks and an iron roof. - -Rain did not permit the inspector to go at once, for he did not stir out -of the Governor’s house while it was wet; but after three days of fair -weather he said very firmly, “I will visit the schoolhouse. It is my -duty and I wish to report on that.” - -So, with the governor, he advanced up the broken road to the river, -which must be crossed to go up the valley. The river was two feet deep. -There were crossing-stones placed for him, but he was stout and they -were three feet apart. One must jump from one stone to the other. The -governor, in boots, plunged into the purling rill. The inspector cried -to the governor, “_Mais, mon brave, prenez garde aux accidents!_” - -“It is not dangerous,” said the governor, who in five strides had -reached the other bank. - -“But I may get my shoes wet,” said the inspector. - -“It is better to take them off,” advised the governor. - -“Yes, that is true. Naturally one removes one’s shoes when one crosses a -river on foot. And, in such a case as this, one must take chances. It is -imperative that I inspect the schoolhouse. _Mais, nom d’un chien!_ Where -shall I sit to take off my shoes?” - -The governor suggested a certain boulder, but it was too low; another -was too high. But, after inspecting many boulders, one was found that -suited the _embonpoint_ of the big man. He bent over, then looked at the -river, and sat up straight. - -“It is a wooden schoolhouse?” he queried. - -“Yes, plain wood,” said the executive. - -“And, _par conséquence_, it has a roof and a floor and sides, and maybe -some wooden desks for the scholars. Steps to enter, _n’est-ce pas?_ And -a _tableau noir_, to write the alphabet on. As a matter of fact, there -is little difference between schoolhouses. You have seen that -schoolhouse, _mon ami_? - -“_Oui, Monsieur l’Inspecteur_, I have seen it. It is exactly as you -describe it. _Très simple_, and the blackboard is there, but a trifle -disfigured.” - -“Ah, the blackboard is in bad condition! _Bien_, we must remedy that. I -am well satisfied. I will return to your house. These stones are very -hot.” - -The _bon homme_ marched back, puffing, combing his fan-like whiskers -with his fingers, with that quietly exultant air of one who has done his -duty despite all risks. - -The _Zélée_ returning, and this being the total of his inspection, he -ordered it to speed forthwith to Tahiti, where, doubtless, as in Paris, -he recited the dangers and difficulties of life in the cannibal islands. -He forgot to have the blackboard repaired. I learned by letter from -Malicious Gossip, two years after his notation, of its deplorable state. -The ingratitude of colonies toward their foster-mothers is proverbial. -Our own fat men, secretaries of war, senators, and congressmen, make as -cursory examinations of our American vassals in the Pacific and -Atlantic, and with as little help to them. - -[Illustration: - - Brunneck, the boxer and diver -] - -[Illustration: - - Photo from L. Gauthier - A village maid in Tahiti -] - -[Illustration: - - A Samoan maiden of high caste -] - -The inspector’s _congé_ was almost synchronous with mine. The _Saint -François_ of Bordeaux, the first merchant steamship in the Marquesas, -arrived from Tahiti, to swing about the ports of my archipelago and -return to Papeete. My heart ached at leaving; the tendrils of the -purple-blossomed _pahue_-vine were about it. How could I forsake forever -my loved friends of Atuona and Vaitahu, Malicious Gossip, Mouth of God, -Vanquished Often, Seventh Man Who Is So Angry, Great Fern, Ghost Girl, -and the little leper lass, Many Daughters? I must make my choice, and -swiftly. If I stayed much longer, I would never live again in America; -the jungle would creep over me and I should lie, some day, on Calvary’s -hill near the lost remains of Paul Gauguin. There was Le Brunnec, the -best of the whites, but he was a Breton peasant, born to the sun and -simplicity and nature’s riches; I was of the shade and artificiality, of -pavements and libraries. Nor could I show an unabraded surface to these -savage tropics as did Lutz. His Prussianism, his Lutheranism, preserved -him cold, and ready to escape at fortune’s opening. My Irish forebears -and American generations gave me no such buckler, nor ambition. - -The one passenger of the _Saint François_ who came ashore on our beach -weighted the balance for America. He was Brunneck, an American swimmer, -diver, and boxer, whom I had seen Sarah Bernhardt kiss when at Catalina -Island he rose through the clear waters of Avalon Bay to her -glass-bottomed boat and presented her with an abalone shell. I traded -him my coffee-pot and utensils for the memory of Sarah’s moment of -abandon, and Brunneck tipped the scales for me toward the America he had -deserted. He was an atavist in a grass skirt and a crown of ferns, -hatless, purseless, a set of boxing-gloves his only impedimenta. I could -not equal his serenity, that of a civilized being again in harmony with -the earth. I hurried aboard the steamship in Tahauku roadstead to decide -my vacillation. - -By dark, the Tahauku River, into which some weary cloud had emptied, -sent a menacing current down the roadstead. The steamship rolled and -swung wildly. As madder grew the fresh torrent, the anchors dragged, and -the vessel drifted broadside toward the rocky cliff. Steam was down and -the engines would not turn. The captain yelling from the bridge, the -Breton sailors in noisy _sabots_, prancing alarmedly about the decks, a -search-light playing upon the rocks, and lighting the groups of natives -watching from the headlands, the shouting and swearing in French and -Breton with a word or two for my benefit in English, all made a dramatic -incident with a spice of danger. - -The _Saint François_ swung until the rail on which I stood was four feet -from the jagged wall. A wild chant rose from the Marquesans on shore in -the moment of most peril. I made ready to leap, but soon heard the hum -of the screw as it began fighting the current. We gained little by -little, and, once clear of the rocks, pointed the prow for the -Bordelaise Channel and comparative safety. The cargo boats had not been -hoisted aboard, and they banged to pieces as, urged by the rushing -river, we drove through the door of the bay and out to sea. - -I lay down on a bench, and when I awoke at dawn we were heading back for -Tahauku to finish loading. Exploding Eggs was beside me. I had not known -he was aboard. The adventures of the night, the fires, the engines, the -electric lights, and the danger had delighted him. - -“_Sacré!_” muttered the red-faced captain at breakfast. “These Marquesas -are as bad as the Paumotus.” - -No lighthouses, charts inaccurate, shore-guides lacking, treacherous -tides, winds, currents, reefs, and passages. Lying Bill said it took -“bloody near a gen’us to escape with his life after thirty years of -navigation in these waters.” - -The Polynesians believed that souls animate flowers and plants, that -these are organized beings. For pigs, they had a special heaven, -_Ofetuna_. Each pig had a distinct and arbitrary name, which was never -changed, though men changed their names often. - -On the deck of the _Saint François_ were half a dozen slender pigs that -had once played about my _paepae_ and were now engaged in resisting the -monopolistic tendencies of Alphonse, a ram bought from the trader. By -uniting, they made his habitat painful, and his outcries brought the -steward, who attempted to correct the ram, but was butted into profanity -and flight. - -“You’re no lam’ o’ goodness! You’ll be chops mighty soon!” the negro -shouted, and threw a pan at him. The ram bolted, knocked open a swinging -port, and, followed by the pork, dived into the bay. He may have sensed -the threat of the steward. - -“_A la chasse!_ _A la chasse!_” ordered the captain from the bridge. -“_Tonnerre de Dieu!_ Our meat is going ashore.” - -If a boat coming to the _Saint François_ had not intercepted the bold -deserters, they would have succeeded in their break for liberty, and -probably have taken to the wilds. The recovering them was no easy task, -but, diverted from the rocks, they were run down, after half an hour of -fierce commands through a megaphone from the captain. They were fast -swimmers, being encumbered by no fat. Their adventure dispelled for me -the myth that pigs cannot swim. The story ran that in swimming pigs cut -their throats with their hoofs. - -I had recognized in the English-African accent of the steward the lingo -of the West-India negro, and oddly, I remembered having seen the man -himself at Kowloon, in China, where he had been bartender at the Kowloon -Hotel. With no word of French, and ten days aboard from Tahiti, the -black man was bursting with conversation. Serving me with a bottle of -Bordeaux beer, he spoke of his hardships, and of familiar figures of his -happier days at Kowloon: - -“Yes, sir, men can stand more than animiles,” he said. “They can, sir, -work or play. You remember that goriller that Osborne had in the Kowloon -Hotel grounds? He perished, sir, from his drinking habits. He took his -reg’lar with the soldiers and tourists, and his favoryte tonoc was gin -and whiskey mixed, but after he was started, he would ‘bibe near -anything ’toxicating. You remember how big he was? Big as Sikh, that -goriller was. He was a African ape like the white perfesser says he is -descended from. - -“Week before Chrismus, that infantry regiment in barricks, in Kowloon, -kept him late every night, and I seen him climb to his house in that -tree hardly able to hold onto the limbs. Chrismus eve he let nothing -slip his paws. He began with the punch—you remember, sir, the punch I -used to make? and he overdone it, though he had a stummick like a India -major’s. He drank with the officers and he drank with the Tommies. When -I opened the bar, Chrismus morning, he was dead on the ground. He hadn’t -never been able to reach his home. Osborne gave him a Christian berrial -under the comquat trees, but as sure as you’re born every officer and -soldier turned up for more drink that night. Men can stand more than -animiles, sir.” - -All morning I sat on the deck and took my fill of the scenes on either -shore, while copra was hoisted aboard from canoes and boats. Exploding -Eggs was examining minutely the wonders of the steamship, reporting to -me occasionally some astounding discovery. Until then I had refused to -consider taking him away from his people, but, in a moment of -selfishness, I drew a plat of America, to attract his thirteen -years,—the lofty buildings, motor-cars, telephones, ice and ice-cream, -snow and sleighs, roller-skates and moving pictures. He had seen none of -these, nor read of them, but, nevertheless, the fear of homesickness -caused him, after a few minutes to say: - -“_Aoe metai, Nakohu mata!_” which meant, “No good; Exploding Eggs would -die!” - -Characteristic of all primitive peoples was this nostalgia, and, far -from being sentiment easily smothered, it was more often than physical -ailment the predisposing, or even actual, cause of death when they were -separated from their homes. The Pitcairn youth who died in California -and the Easter Islanders who could not endure even their exile in Tahiti -were examples. The Maori Napoleon, Te Rauparaha, gazed upon his old -home, Kawhia, and wept in farewell. His legendary song says: - - O my own home! Ah me! I bid farewell to you, - And still, at distance, bid farewell. - -Before noon, I was overcome by a longing to see Atuona again. The voices -of the friends who had chanted their grief were in my ears. I landed at -Tahauku in one of the copra boats which were coming and going, and -walked along the cliffs until I came within sight of the beach where, so -often, I had ridden the surf. I went at a fast pace down the hill, -hoping for a familiar face. At a point overlooking the cove, that very -spot Stevenson thought the most beautiful on earth, I heard shouts and -merry laughter. - -I moved to where I could survey the spot. There was a group of natives, -half the village, at least, and in the center of the chattering crowd -was Brunneck, naked to the waist, boxing with Jimmy Kekela, the -Hawaiian. The yellow hair of the American gleamed against his sun-burnt -skin, as he toyed with the amateur. Ghost girl, an absorbed spectator, -held the wreath of the American. Mouth of God, Haabuani, and Great Fern -were dancing about the circle in glee. Exploding Eggs, who had -accompanied me, left me without a word, and ran to the ring. I stood -fifty feet away, unnoticed. A new god had been thrown up by the sea. I -returned to the _Saint François_ more content to leave. - -When I awoke from a siesta, in the late afternoon, I found preparations -for immediate departure. The anchors were being hauled short, the -hatches battened down, and the cargo booms uphoisted. We waited only the -final accounts from Lutz. He brought them himself in the last boat, in -which were also Mademoiselle Narbonne and two nuns. She was again in -black, and greeted me in a distraught manner with “_Kaoha!_” the native -salutation, as if in her hour of departure from her own island she clung -to its language. She went below to the cabins with the sisters, and only -after the screw had revolved and we turned head for the sea did the -three come on deck. - -Tears suffused her eyes as we passed the opening of Atuona Bay. When -Exploding Eggs and others, including Song of the Nightingale, shouted -“_Kaoha_” to us from their canoes, she put her head upon the breast of -Sister Serapoline and wept passionately. The night drew on as, after -many bursts of her sad emotion, she leaned exhausted on the bosom so -long her shelter. In the flooding moonlight, she slept, while the nun -placidly counted her rosary. - -The _Saint François_, steering in a smooth sea for Taiohae, on the -island of Nuku-hiva, the captain, Lutz, and I gathered about the table -for supper and wine. The vessel had narrowly escaped shipwreck in the -Paumotus, and had lain for six days on a reef while the barrels of -cement, intended for some improvement at Atuona, were thrown overboard -to lighten her. - -Lutz did not seek any moment of intimacy with me, and said nothing to -explain Mademoiselle Narbonne’s presence aboard. Conforming to strict -native etiquette, he paid no attention to her, and a stranger would have -thought he hardly knew her. Lutz said that he had business affairs in -Tahiti and had jumped at the chance of a quick passage in the steamship. - -At dawn, we were off the island of Nuku-hiva; high up on a green -mountain-side, we saw a silver thread which we knew to be the waterfall -of Typee Valley, the valley in which Hermann Melville had lived in -captivity and happiness. We rounded Cape Martens, and, as the sun lit -the rocky forelands guarding the bay of Taiohae, the morning breeze -brought from Typee the delicious odor of the wild flowers, the _hinano_, -the _tiare_, and the _frangipani_. This beach of Taiohae, months before, -I had visited in a whale-boat from Atuona. I hoped to see again my -friend, the good priest, Père Siméon Delmas, who had held the citadel of -God here for half a century. - -In the first boat ashore went the captain and Lutz, and, when after -breakfast I asked the mate to be put on land, Mademoiselle Narbonne, -seeing me descending the ladder, joined me. - -“Where do you go?” she asked, when we set foot on the sand. - -“I have a message for Prince Stanislao from Le Brunnec,” I answered. - -“I must be back before the nuns miss me, but I will go with you,” she -said. - -Leaving the settlement, we were soon on a trail with which I was -familiar and reached a little wood. She took me by the sleeve. - -“_Attendez_,” she half whispered. “I am going to be married to Monsieur -Lutz in Papeete. He is a foreigner, and the priest could not marry us. -At Papeete the judge can do it. The nuns are going with me to make sure. -They oppose, but I am determined. It is my one chance. Tell me, -American, do I make a mistake?” - -“Do you love him?” - -“Love him?” she said hesitatingly. “I do not know what love is. The nuns -have not taught me. Always it has been Joan of Arc, or the Sacred Heart -of Jesus. I want love and freedom, but I am afraid of staying there at -Taaoa alone with those two old women. They are true _Canaques_, and -would make me like them, and I am afraid of the convent. _Mon dieu!_ I -am puzzled by life!” - -“Come!” I said, “you will have an hour of light-heartedness with -Stanislao. I am puzzled, too.” - -Hardly more than a youth, Stanislao was the last of the blood royal of -the family that had ruled the Marquesas. Temoana had been the only king. -The Marquesans were communists, with chiefs, and had not the corroding -egocentrism of nationality until the French crowned Temoana. He had been -one of the few travelers from here. Kidnapped, a dime-museum man in -foreign seaports, he returned on a whaler to find favor with the bishop -and to be set on a Catholic throne. Prince Stanislao was not even chief -of Taiohae, for a half-Hawaiian, of the Kekela tribe, had that office, -and did the French policeman’s chores. - -We entered the house of Stanislao and met, besides him, Antoinette, an -odalisque, most beautiful of dancers, who, like Ghost Girl, flitted from -island to island by the grace of her charms. I had known her in the -Cocoanut House in Papeete and her sister, Caroline. Neither she nor -Stanislao accepted the gospel of Christianity. Her warm blood had in it -an admixture of French and Italian, giving an archness and spice to her -manner and a coquetry to her eyes—black and dancing—that maddened many. -In the days about the fourteenth of July, when the French at Tahiti -celebrated the Fall of the Bastille, she was a prize exhibit, for then -governors and bankers, deacons and acolytes, lost the grace of God. - -These three, Barbe, Antoinette, and Stanislao, were extraordinary in -their unity with the teeming vivid life here, the ferns and orchids and -flowers on the sward, the palms and breadfruit in the grove. By the -alchemy of the brilliant morning and the company of this pair of -youthful lovers, Barbe’s mood was suddenly transmuted into joyousness. I -took an accordion off a shelf, and played the _upaupahura_ of Tahiti. -Without a moment’s hesitation, and with no sense of consciousness, the -three danced on the grass. - -Carlyle praises that countryman who, matching the boast of a doctor that -“his system was in high order,” answered that, for his part, “he had no -system.” - - Few mortals, it is to be feared, are permanently blessed with - that felicity of “having no system”; nevertheless, most of us, - looking backward on young years, may remember seasons of a light - aerial translucency and elasticity and perfect freedom; the body - had not yet become the prison-house of the soul, but was its - vehicle and implement, like a creature of the thought, and - altogether pliant to its bidding. We knew not that we had limbs, - we only lifted, hurled and leapt; through eye and ear and all - avenues of sense came clear, unimpeded tidings from without, and - from within issued clear victorious forces. We stood as in the - center of Nature, giving and receiving in harmony with it all; - unlike Virgil’s husbandman, “too happy because we did not know - our blessedness.” - -Stanislao seized the instrument and I danced. We four were the spirits -of a rare and vital esthetic, a harmony with being that denied all -knowledge but that of our acute and delicately-poised senses of warmth, -delicious odors, fresh colors of the plants, and mutual attraction. The -ship, Lutz, the nuns, heaven and hell, the _Taua_ and the _Tapus_ were -forgotten by me and by Barbe in the glowing hour of dance and play. - -Tired we threw ourselves on the grass and drank from the cocoanuts which -Stanislao climbed a tree to bring us. The prince told us, with solemnity -in which Marquesans speak of olden things, an incident related to him by -his uncle: - -“A French governor here forbade the girls to go to the war-ships in the -bay. They ruined discipline, he said. Nevertheless, three daughters of a -powerful chief swam out to a war vessel. The commander, discovering them -in the morning, sent them ashore to the governor, who put them in prison -for three days. - -“Their father’s rage was terrible. It had ever been the custom for the -young women to visit the ships, he said, and that his daughters should -be the victims of a governor’s whim, abetted by French sailors -themselves, was a deadly insult. - -“He sent a message to the governor: ‘I am a chief who has eaten my -enemies all my life. I will wash the hands of my daughters in French -blood.’ - -“The sailors were forbidden by their officers to leave the beach. They -had been going up the river to bathe in shady spots, but they were -warned of danger and a line was drawn beyond which they were not to go. -A guard was stationed a little higher up the stream, and for weeks the -barrier was not crossed. But sailors know no authority when woman -beckons,”—it has been so since Jason sought the Golden Fleece,—“and, -when, through the glade, they saw the alluring forms of the three -sisters, the governor’s orders were damned as tyranny. They outwitted -the guard and climbed the trail to the paepae of their inamoratas. The -chief and his warriors trapped six of them after a struggle. One sailor, -a man famed for strength, killed several with his hands. They were -outnumbered and were brought, some wounded and some dead, to an altar up -the valley, and there the daughters, at the command of their father, -bathed their hands in the men’s blood, as he had sworn. Parts of the -bodies were eaten and the remains fed to the pigs. - -“The governor had troops brought ashore to pursue the chief. For a year -he evaded them, but then Vaekehu, the widow of Temoana, sent him word to -come to Taiohae and be shot. He obeyed, of course, and met death near -the hill of the fort. - -“That was the palace of Queen Vaekehu,” said the prince, pointing up the -hill. It was by a pool, under a gigantic banyan, a lonely site, a -palisade of cocoanuts and tamarinds not availing to soften the gloomy -impression. Long before she died the queen forsook her royal residence -for the shelter of the convent, where all day she told her beads, or sat -in silent contemplation. - -Bishop Dordillon who had written my dictionary, had given the queen a -Trinity, a Mother of God, and a band of saints to dwell upon, and more, -a bottomless pit of fire, with writhing sufferers and devils from it -ever at her ear to whisper distraction and temptation. - -Mademoiselle Narbonne, hearing a warning whistle of the _Saint -François_, bethought her of her strange position, of the sisters and of -Lutz. She trembled, turned pale, and begged to be excused as she started -running to the beach to catch a boat about to shove off. I also bade -good-by to the two, with a sigh for their fleeting felicity, and -strolled to the Catholic mission. - -_Père_ Siméon was seated at a table under an umbrageous _hao_ tree, -writing. He was in a frayed and soiled cassock of black. His hair was -white, and his beard grizzled, both long and uncut and flowing over his -religious gown. His face was broad and rubicund, and his remarkable -eyes—a deep, shining brown, eyes of childish faith—proclaimed him poet -and artist. Aged, he had yet the strength and heartiness of middle age, -and when I greeted him he rose and kissed me with warmth. - -“Ah,” he exclaimed, “Monsieur O’Brien, you have returned to hear more of -Jeanne d’Arc, is not that so? You have been too long in Atuona. You -should stay in Taiohae, and see what we have here. We go along well. -Joan of Arc looks after us.” - -We entered the sitting-room of the mission, and were soon with a bottle -of wine, and cigarettes, in a discussion of affairs. - -I asked to see any recent poems he had written, and, blushingly, he -handed me the paper over which he had been bending. - -“There has been an excess of drinking recently,” he said ruefully, as he -took a sip of his mild claret. I read his stanzas aloud: - - “Comment peut-on pour un moment d’ivresse, - Par le démon se laisser entrainer? - Que de regrets suivraient cette faiblesse! - Je n’ai qu’une âme et je veux la sauver. - - “Oh! que je crains la perte de mon âme! - Pour la sauver je saurai tout braver, - J’ai mon refrain pour quiconque me blâme, - Je n’ai qu’une âme et je veux la sauver.” - -Now I have no skill in rime, but, inspired by his ready gift, I took his -paper and wrote what might be called a free translation. I read it to -him as follows: - - Oh, how can a man for a moment’s bibacity - Let the demon take hold of his soul? - Remorse is the fruit of such wicked vivacity; - Hell follows the flowing bowl. - - “Oh, how I fear that I weakly may lose it, - And, to guard it, will everything brave! - I’ll tell the world that would tempt me to bruise it; - I have but one soul to save. - -“_Hélas_!” commented the priest, “I cannot understand one word of it. -Doubtless it surpasses my poor lines in excellence. “I will multiply -copies of this poem on my hectograph,” said _Père_ Siméon, “and I will -distribute them where they will do most good.” - -“Captain Capriata will receive one?” I ventured, recalling that in the -procession in honor of Joan of Arc’s anniversary the old Corsican -skipper had fallen with the banner of the Maid of Orleans. - -_Père_ Siméon’s face glowed with zeal. - -“I will name no names,” he said, “but Capriata is a good man and comes -often to church now.” - -For months, I had desired to ask a question of _Père_ Siméon, since Lutz -had told me that Robert Louis Stevenson had written about him. The -trader had shown me his copy of “In the South Seas,” and had pointed out -the error of the printer, who had made Stevenson’s “Father Simeon -Delmas” “Father Simeon Delwar.” - -“_Père_ Siméon,” I said, “a writer about the islands mentions you in his -book. He was here a long time ago in a little yacht, the _Casco_, and he -says that he went with you from Hatiheu, to a native High Place, and -that you named the trees and plants for him. You had a portfolio, he -said, from which you read.” - -The missionary stopped a moment, and plucked his beard, inquiringly. - -“There have been many come here, in fifty years,” he said slowly, -“yachtsmen and students. I do not recall the name Stevenson.” - -Something pricked his recollection, and he took me into the rectory and -produced his portfolio. - -“Here is the list; I must have read that author,” he said. - -“You gave an abstract of the virtues of the trees and plants, Stevenson -says in his volume.” - -“_Le voilà_” replied the priest. “Stevenson? Do you mean perhaps Louis, -who was a consumptive?” - -He made a rapid movement of the hand to his face, and drew upon the air -a mustache and imperial, a slender figure with a slight stoop—in a word, -the very shadow of the master of romance. - -“He was much with Stanislao, the king’s son. He was _très distingué_. He -was here but a little time. However, I remember him well, because he was -very _sympathique_, and a gentleman. - -“I will tell you why he impressed me particularly. He was not French, -but he spoke it as I do, and he was curious about the cannibalism which -was then practically eradicated. There was another priest with me who -was then very ill. He died in my arms. I remember the evening he told -Stevenson of how he had saved the life of a foolish French governor. -There had been rumors of a cannibal feast at Hatiheu, and the governor -was incensed. He feared that the incident might be reported to Paris and -injure his prestige. He blamed the chief, and sent him word that if it -were proved he would personally blow out his brains. - -“Soon word came that the Hatiheu people—I was pastor there for a quarter -of a century—had killed several of their enemies, and were eating them -and drinking _namu enata_. The governor started off in haste from -Taiohae, for Hatiheu and the priest went with him, as also several -_gendarmes_. - -“Hundreds of natives were grouped in the public place, chanting, -dancing, and drinking. - -“‘Where is the chief?’ demanded the governor. - -“‘I am here,’ said a voice, stern and menacing, and the chief broke from -the throng and advanced toward the governor. - -“The latter drew his revolver. ‘You have permitted this breaking of the -law, after I sent you word that I would kill you if you ate human -flesh?’ - -“‘_E!_’ replied the chief in a high voice. ‘I am the master in Hatiheu. -Do you wish to be eaten?’ - -“The war-drums sounded and the grim warriors began to surround the -party. My friend, who was, for safety, an adopted son of the chief, and -thus taboo, seized the governor and led him to the boat. They got away -by sheer courage on the priest’s part. He described this to Louis, who -wrote it down. I recall it clearly, because the poor martyr died the -next week. Did Louis write of the Marquesas much?” - -I said that he had. I should have liked to stay and gain from _Père_ -Siméon all I could of his memories of the poet, but a boy came running -up the road to say that the _Saint François_ was to leave very soon. - -I embraced _Père_ Siméon. He kissed me on both cheeks, and gave me his -blessing. It had been worth a voyage to know him. - -Jerome Capriata, the eater of cats, was outside his house. He invited me -in to meet his wife, a barefooted Frenchwoman who sat in a -scantily-furnished room, musing over a bottle of absinthe. I could stay -only a minute, as the _Saint François_ whistled insistently. His wife -set out the bottle and glasses before us, and we drank the farewell -_goutte_. - -[Illustration: - - Photo from Underwood and Underwood - Throwing spears at a cocoanut on a stake -] - -[Illustration: - - The raised-up atoll of Makatea -] - -On the way to the beach I met Mrs. Fisher, whom Bishop Dordillon, my -dictionary writer, had as adopted mother, when he was old enough to be -her grandfather. That was because Queen Vaekehu had adopted him as a -grandson, and Mrs. Fisher as a daughter, and the bishop had observed the -pseudo-relationship strictly. - -“Mrs. Stevenson gave me a shawl,” said Mrs. Fisher. “I have shown that -to many people. Madame Jack London wore it when she was here with her -husband on the _Snark_. They lived with Lutz, the German, who was then -here. _Pauvre Stevenson!_ He had to die young, and here I am, after all -these years!” - -I waded through the surf to the boat, and reached the _Saint François_ -to find all the others aboard. We shipped the buoy and were away in a -trice. The last sight I had of the shore was of the promontory where -Captain Porter raised the American flag a hundred years before. I was -never to see the Marquesas Islands again. The fresh breath of nature was -too foul with the worst of civilization. - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CHAPTER XXIII - -McHenry gets a caning—The fear of the dead—A visit to the grave of - Mapuhi—En voyage. - -IMAGINE my delight when the captain of the _Saint François_ set our -course for Takaroa, the atoll of Mapuhi, Nohea, and the crippled diver -who had possessed the great pearl of Pukapuka! The Marquesas Islands are -only eight hundred miles from the Society Islands, of which Tahiti is -one, and between the Marquesas and the Society Islands lie the strewn -eighty atolls of the _Iles Dangereuses_ or Paumotu group. With steam we -ran the half-thousand miles or so from Taiohae in two nights and two -days, and at daybreak of the second day were due to see the familiar, -lonely figure of the wrecked _County of Roxburgh_ on an uninhabited -_motu_ of Takaroa. It was this startling sight that informed the Londons -in the _Snark_ that they were out of their course and in danger, and it -was Takaroa the Stevensons in the _Casco_ looked for, only to fetch up -at Tikei, thirty miles to windward. I had no confidence in our Breton -captain, to whom these waters were as unknown as the Indies to Columbus. -I breathed a sigh of relief when the lofty iron masts of the dismantled -vessel loomed on the horizon. - -After so many months in the frowning islands of the war fleet, with -their thunderous headlands, gleaming streams, and green and black -valleys, the spectacle of the slender ring of white sand and coral, the -verdant banners of this first of the Low Islands lying flat upon the -jeweled waters, aroused in me again sensations of wonder at the -ineffable variety of creation; the myriad-mindedness of the Creator. The -crash of the surf upon the outer reef, the waving of the breeze-stirred -cocoanuts, the flight of a solitary bird, contrasted with the marvelous -fabrication of man, the metal ship, thrown by a toss of the sea and a -puff of the wind among these evidences of a beautiful yet deadly design. - -The _Saint François_ crept along the coast of the atoll and anchored -opposite the pass, a good mile from the breakers. Everybody was on deck, -the black-gowned nuns with Mademoiselle Narbonne—she also in a tunic of -religious hue. Since we had left Nuku-hiva they had not appeared. The -contrary currents and confused trade-winds among these Pernicious -Islands had kept them in their cabin. The six-hundred-ton hull of the -_Saint_ had see-sawed through the two hundred leagues of the tropic of -Capricorn, and only hardened trenchermen like the ship’s officers and -myself could find appetite for food. Lutz, too, had raised a mournful -face to the deck but seldom. A few hundred sacks of copra awaited us at -Takaroa, and we put off a life-boat to bring it aboard. Lutz and I -accompanied the second officer with a command from the captain to stay -no longer than the cargo’s loading. Lying Bill’s schooner, the _Morning -Star_, was in the lagoon, and, seeing it there, I wondered if Mapuhi, -the great sailor of these atolls, had steered it through the narrow -pass. About the landing, despite the uniqueness of the steamship’s -arrival, was an unusual quietude, a hush that moved me to fear, as a -presage of evil. A cholera-stricken village in the Philippines had that -same dismal aura. A few natives were upon the coral mole, and the -_Mutoi_ came forward to examine our papers. - -“Let us go to the house of Mapuhi,” I said to Lutz. - -“_Ja wohl_,” he replied; “I have not met him in many years.” - -We left the mate and walked along the path past the traders’ stores. The -thousand feet that trod the coral road and had gone in and out the dozen -shops of the dealers and pearl-buyers during my stay on Takaroa were -missing, but more than the stir and hum of the _rahui_ was absent. A -depressing torpor possessed the little village. Mapuhi’s store was -closed tightly, and from no house or hut did a head show or a greeting -come. - -We saw that the door of one shop was ajar, and, going in, happened on a -pleasant and illuminating scene. Angry words in Tahitian we heard as we -mounted the steps, and smothered exclamations of a profane sort in -English which had a familiar note. Back of the counter was a very large -Tahitian woman who, with a heavy fishing-rod of bamboo, was thrashing a -white man. She was, between blows, telling him that if he got drunk or -spoke rudely to her again, she would “treat him as a Chinaman did his -horse in Tahiti,” which is a synonym for roughness. He was evading the -strokes of the bamboo by wriggling, and guarding with his arms, and was -cursing in return, but was plainly afraid of her. He was McHenry, my -ofttime companion of revels at the _Cercle Bougainville_ in Papeete, who -had come on the _Flying Fish_ with me from Tahiti, and had remained in -Takaroa. - -Many times he had boasted of his contempt for native women. - -“I’ve had my old lady nineteen years,” he said once, “and she wouldn’t -speak to me if she met me on the streets of this town. She wouldn’t dare -to in public until I recognized her.” - -Lutz and I did not utter a sound, but quickly descended the steps. - -“I never before saw a native wife beating her husband,” he commented -caustically. “That McHenry deserves it. Lying Bill often said McHenry’s -_vahine_ took a stick to him. Tahitian women will not be whipped -themselves.” - -Lutz should know. He had had fourteen years with a Tahitian mistress, a -wife in her own eyes as much as if wedded in a cathedral. Would he not -have to face her in Papeete when he should be married to Mademoiselle -Narbonne? Perhaps she had a stronger weapon than a rod! The _taua’s_ -sorcery might stretch over the ocean, and be potent in Tahiti. - -Lutz and I were almost at Mapuhi’s residence when we met Nohea, my host -of the fishing and diving. Nohea was in a black cloth coat and a blue -_pareu_, and his countenance was distressed. - -“_Ia ora na_, Nohea!” I called to him. “Is Mapuhi a Mapuhi at home?” - -“Mapuhi?” he repeated and shuddered. “Mapuhi _máte!_” - -Mapuhi dead! It did not seem possible; the giant I had known so -recently! - -Nohea began to weep and left us. Outside the inclosure of Mapuhi’s house -were a dozen men, and among them Hiram Mervin, the Paumotu-American who -had described to me the cyclone of Hikueru. We shook hands, and I asked -of what Mapuhi had died. Surely not of disease. The reef must have -beaten him at last. I could not think of that super-man yielding to a -clot or a kidney. He, who had made the wind and currents his sport, who -in the dark of night had sailed through foaming passes the white mariner -shunned in broad daylight, who had given largesse to his people for -decades, and who had made the shells and nuts of his isles pay him -princely toll, despite the cunning of the white, the _papaa_, who came -to take much and give little. - -“He was eighty,” said Hiram Mervin. “He took sick on Reitoru, that tiny -island near here. He was brought here. Some one wanted to give him -medicine. - -“‘No,’ he said, ‘my time has come. I will not live by things. I die -content. I have been a good Mormon since I accepted the Word. What I did -before was in darkness, when I was a gentile.’ - -“He passed away peacefully. We lost a bulwark of the church, but he will -reign with Christ.” - -Lutz and I did not wish to intrude upon the kin of Mapuhi, nor to remain -longer within the sound of the wailing that now issued from the house at -the news that I, the American, had come back on the steamship. This -extemporized burst of lamentation was a special honor to me and to the -decedent, an expression of a tie between us, and, though it swelled -suddenly at my arrival, was not the crying of hired mourners but the -lacrymation of sincere grief. In wakes among the Irish I had found -exactly the same spirit—an increase or instant renewal of the keening or -shrieking when one who had been dear to the dead person appeared. - -We two walked away, and encountered McHenry, who had learned of our -presence. McHenry was shaken by the castigation given him by his wife, -and assumed an air of brazen indecency and bluster to hide his -condition. - -“One bottle of booze and I’ll make ’em all quit their catabawlin’ an’ -dance a hula,” he said. “Much they care for except the bloomin’ francs -the ol’ boy left ’em!” - -McHenry exposed his own vulturous desires, and not the feelings of the -tribe of Mapuhi. To them the passing of Mapuhi was as to the Jews that -of their leader by Nebo’s lonely mountain. The great man had expired the -night before, and preparations were being made to bury him. In this -climate the body hastens to rejoin the elements. The chief was not to -lie in the common charnel in a grove on another _motu_ of Takaroa. As -suitable to his rank and wealth and his generosity to the Mormon church, -he had retained for himself a piece of ground beside the temple. A coral -wall inclosed the small necropolis. Within a hundred feet of the sea, in -the brilliant coral sand, rugged and bare, it was fit anchoring ground -for this ship among canoes. One tombstone leaned against the wall, a -plain slab of marble, inscribed: - - _Punau Mapuhi tei pohe ite 30 Me 1899_ - -Punau was the wife he had clung to under Mormonism, and who had borne -him the son and daughter I knew. Many years he had survived her, and had -not married another. The religion of polygamy had made of the old -barbarian an ascetic, who had been a Grand Turk under Protestantism and -Catholicism, between which he had wavered according to the novelty -offered. - -The body of Mapuhi was laid out in the principal room of his house, the -room in which I had met him and the American elders on my first landing. -Nohea and others had worked through the night to build a coffin. They -had used the strong planks the dead man had gathered from the deck or -cabin of the _County of Roxburgh_, and had polished them with -cocoanut-oil, so that they shone. The coffin was lined with the -sleeping-mat of Mapuhi, and in it he reposed, dressed in his churchly -clothes, a black frock coat, white trousers, and a stiff white shirt. No -collar cumbered his neck, nor were shoes upon the ample feet that had -walked on the floor of the sea. Most of the people of Takaroa took a -last look at him, but some did not, for fear. I gazed a few minutes at -his face. More than in life, the likeness to a mutilated Greek statue -struck me; perhaps the head of a Goth seen in the Vatican Gallery. -Strength, repose, and mystery were in the powerful mold of it, the -broad, low forehead, the rounded chin, and wide-open eyes. I had seen -many so-called important men in death, when as a reporter I wrote -obsequies at a penny a line. This Paumotuan chief’s corpse had more -majesty and peace than any of them—a nearer relation to my conception of -an old and wise child of the eternal unity, glad to be freed from the -illusion of life. - -In the village, the huts were still closed. No fisherman put off in a -canoe, and none sat making or mending nets. McHenry and I paddled out to -the _Morning Star_. The skipper was on deck with Ducat, the mate. Some -native had hurried to them with the amusing gossip of McHenry’s _vahine_ -beating him, and he had to bear a storm of ridicule. Lying Bill -rehearsed his boasts about her inferiority, and Ducat, who had -humiliated him before me long ago, taunted him with his submission to -her. - -“I didn’t want to kill her,” was all McHenry could retort. McHenry had a -story of Chocolat which was distracting. Captain Moét of the _Flying -Fish_ had come into Takaroa a month or two before with Chocolat, a -fair-sized dog. The tricks Chocolat did when I was on Moét’s schooner -were incomparable with his later education. - -“The bloomin’ pup would stand on his hind legs and dance to a tune Moét -whistled,” said McHenry. “He could count up to five with cards, and -could pick all the aces out of a piquet pack. He would let Moét throw -him overboard in port, and catch a rope’s end with his teeth and hold on -while he was pulled up. He was a reg’lar circus performer. You know Moét -and I ain’t very close. He done me a dirty turn once. I knew if I could -ever get Chocolat to Papeete, an’ on the steamer from San Francisco, I -could sell him to a bloody American tourist for a thousand francs. Moét -watched me like a gull does the cook when he empties his pail overside. -Now, you know me; I ain’t nobody to say to you can’t do this or that. I -laid for that pup, and, when I went aboard the schooner just before she -sailed, I took a little opium I got from the Chink pearl-buyer here; and -I put a pill of it in a piece of fresh pork, and took it aboard in my -pocket. Just before I was goin’ into my boat, after a drink or two with -Jean, I’d been watchin’ Chocolat stretched out nappin’ on the deck. I -put the meat alongside of his mouth, and he ate it like a shark does a -chunk o’ salt horse. Soon I saw he was knocked out, an’ I asked Moét to -go down into the trade-room an’ get me a piece o’ tobacco. He’d no -sooner ducked than I grabbed the bloody pup by the scruff an’ stuffed -him into my trousers’ front. He was like dead. I was in the boat in a -second with no one seein’ him, and reached up to get the tobacco from -Moét’s hand. - -“Of course the purp never let out a bloomin’ whimper, an’ I got away and -to shore with no proof that I had snared the bow-wow. Moét had trained -Chocolat to let out a hell of a yell if any one as much as took him -toward the rail, and so he would have to think that the cur had fallen -overboard on his own hook. I took him to my store unbeknown to any one, -and tied him to a chair. He never come to for three hours, an’ was -sluggery for a day or two. I was waitin’ for Moét to sail, but the next -day he comes ashore an’ makes a bee-line for my joint. I saw his boat -puttin’ off, an’ I give Chocolat to my Penrhyn boy who tied him in a -canoe, an’ hiked out in the lagoon with him. Moét looks me up an’ down, -curses his _sacres_ an’ his Spanish _diablos_ an’ _’Sus-Marias_, an’ -crawled through my place from top to bottom, shoutin’, ‘Chocolat! -Chocolat! _Pettee sheen!_’ an’ half cryin’. He had to trip his anchor -the next day, and I had the _sheen_ all right. - -“I was goin’ to smuggle him on board Lyin’ Bill’s cockroach tub an’ to -Papeete, when one day I come back from Mapuhi’s and found him gone, an’ -his string chewed through. He had skinned out, an’, though I asked -everybody on this island about him, everybody knew nothin’. After three -days I give the beast up. I know the Kanaka, an’ I knew that no fat -little dogs are let run loose very long. About two weeks later, I went -to another _motu_ to buy some copra, an’ the first native I run into was -wearin’ Chocolat’s collar on his arm. He was a Mormon churchman, too, -but he swore he found the collar in a canoe.” - -Poor little brown Chocolat! He had entertained me often on the _Flying -Fish_ with his antics, and Jean Moét had such dreams of his future! A -kindly fate may have bestowed on him the favor of a quick death by -hotpotting rather than the ignominy of circus one-night stands or the -pampered kennel of a millionaire. He had had his year at sea, and died -in the full flush of doghood. - -The news that Lutz was a passenger on the _Saint François_ with -Mademoiselle Narbonne brought a prolonged whistle from Ducat, and an -exclamation from Lying Bill: - -“Well, ’e’ll bloody well get ’is! Maná won’t take a club to ’im because -the ’usban’ does the beatin’ when ’e’s a Dutchman, but she’s not lettin’ -’im walk over ’er so easy. I ’ad a long palaver with ’er on the voyage -up. She says everybody in Taaoa knows Barbe is a leper, an’ she’s -preparin’ to ’ave the bleedin’ Frog doctors cage ’er up out there by -Papenoo, if she goes to Tahiti.” - -“I never heard before that she had leprosy,” said Ducat. “I think that -Maná is spreading that report to scare Lutz.” - -“I feel sure that it has not reached him,” I said. “Nobody in Atuona -would mention it to him.” - -Abruptly there occurred to me the cryptic assertion of Peyral at my -first sight of Barbe in the mission church. - -“I wouldn’t be her with all her money,” he had said. “Me, I value my -skin.” - -That was weeks or months before Lemoal had come to me, or I had known of -the _taua_, or of Lutz’s courtship. If there had been a plot against her -happiness, it must have been laid early, or what did Peyral mean? - -McHenry broke in on my train of reasoning. - -“I’ll see that the German sausage learns about it damn soon,” he said -spitefully. “He’s doin’ too good a business in both copra an’ women.” - -The whistle of the _Saint François_ blew the recall of boats and crew. - -“Why don’t you stay, an’ go to Papeet’ with me,” asked Captain Pincher. -“We’ll ’ead out in a day or two when the wind is right. You’re in no -‘’urry. You want to see ’em lay ol’ Mapuhi in the grave.” - -I agreed, and paddled to shore with McHenry. Natives were taking the -last load of copra out to the steamship, and I rode on the bags with -McHenry. On the deck of the _Saint François_ I passed Barbe and the nuns -on my way below to get my trifling belongings. McHenry stayed above, -and, when I had bidden good-by to the captain and the first officer, I -sought the three women, with my canvas bag in hand. The sisters were my -friends, and I shook their hands. I was about to say _au revoir_ to -Barbe when she walked with me a few yards to the gangway. I explained my -intention not to continue on the steamship. - -“What shall I do?” she implored, as she squeezed my hand nervously. “I -am afraid of everything—” - -The whistle sounded again. - -Lutz, who was talking with McHenry, approached me, and drew from me my -reason for carrying my assets with me. I thought he appeared relieved at -my leaving, and that his hopes to see me in Papeete were shammed. In the -boat I glanced up to see Mademoiselle Narbonne leaning over the rail, -her black cloud of hair framing her pale face with its look of sadness -and perplexity, and her eyes still demanding of me the answer to her -question. - -“I bloody well put a roach in Lutz’s ear,” said McHenry, as we rowed -back. - -That he had even mentioned Barbe’s name I did not believe. Lutz would -have taken him by the throat, and thrown him overboard. On the strand at -the atoll again, I saw the smoke streaming from the steamship’s funnel -as she set out for Papeete; and I sent an unspoken message of good will -to the groping ill-matched pair whom I could not call lovers, and yet -both of whom were searching for the satisfaction of heart and ambition I -too sought. - -Mapuhi was interred that afternoon an hour before sunset. In these -atolls where there is no soil, and where water lies close under the -coral surface, even burial is difficult. Cyclones as in Hikueru have -torn the coral coverings off the graves, and swept the coffins, corpses, -and bones into the lagoon and the maws of the sharks and the voracious -barracuda. For Mapuhi a marble cenotaph would be ordered in Tahiti, and -cover him when made in a few weeks. - -Nohea and two elders dug the grave. About four feet deep, it was wide -enough to rest the huge body in the glistening coffin. This was borne on -the shoulders of six young men, nephews of Mapuhi, and in the cortège -were all of the Takaroans of age. Solemnly and silently they marched -down the road. All who owned black garments wore them, and others were -in white trousers, some with and others without shirts, but all treading -ceremoniously with bowed heads and serious faces. Nohea was the leader, -carrying the large Book of Mormon from the temple, and at the grave he -read from it verses about the resurrection, the near approach of the -coming of Christ, and Mapuhi’s being quiet in the grave until the -trumpet rang for the assembling of the just, the unjust on opposite -sides for judgment. - -“Mapuhi a Mapuhi will sit very close to Brigham Young in the judgment -and afterward will be among the great on earth when the rejected are -cast into the terrible pit of fire, and the elect live in plenty and -happiness here.” - -The heavy ivory sand rattled on the wood, and the remains of Mapuhi, -last link between the healthy savagery and the present semi-civilization -of the Paumotuan race, were one with the mysterious beach he had so long -dwelt upon. He had been born before the white man ruled it, and his life -had spanned the rise of the imperial industrialism which had destroyed -the Polynesian. - -After the funeral I took my bag to the hut of Nohea, to live the few -days until the _Morning Star_ left for Papeete. Our frugal meal was soon -eaten, and the old diver and I sat outside his door in the cool of the -sunset glow. We talked of Mapuhi. - -“We had the same father but different mothers,” said Nohea. “Mapuhi was -twenty years older than I. For many years he was as my father to me.” - -“Where is Mapuhi now?” I asked, to discover his beliefs about the soul. -Nohea trembled, and looked about him. - -“Is he not in the hole in the coral?” he said, with alarm. - -“Oh, yes, Nohea,” I replied, “the body of Mapuhi is in the coral, but -where is that part that knew how to dive, to steer the schooner, to grow -rich, and to pray? Where is that _varua_ or spirit which loved you?” - -Nohea responded quickly: “That is with the gods, with Adam, Christ, -Joseph Smith, and Brigham Young. Mapuhi is with them making souls for -the bodies of Mormon babies on earth. When Israel gathers by and by, I -will see him again, for we will all live in America and be happy.” - -“But Nohea,” I protested, “you will not be happy away from Takaroa. Your -canoe and your fishing-nets and spears will be left behind.” - -Nohea was confused, but his faith was strong. - -“The elders have explained that in America, where all the saved people -shall live after the judgment, we shall have everything we want. The -fish will jump on the hook, the canoe will paddle itself, and the -cocoanuts will be always ready for eating or cool for drinking.” - -I tried to draw our conversation around to Mapuhi again, but Nohea, as -the darkness grew thicker, busied himself in making a fire of cocoanut -husks and leaves, and evaded any reference to the dead. - -Only after the moon began to come up, he said, “I must now go to keep -watch at the grave of Mapuhi. It is my duty, and I must go.” - -He brought from his hut a crazy-quilt, and wrapped it about him, and -with extreme hesitancy walked away through the obscurity to carry out -the obligation of friendship. - -Hardly can we guess at the horror he had to overcome to do this. The -remnant of fear of the dead that our slight inheritance of ancestral -delusions causes to linger in some of us is the merest shadow of the -all-pervading terror that weakens the Paumotuan at thought of the ghost -of the defunct which stays near the corpse to threaten and perhaps to -seize and eat the living. Associated, maybe, with the former -cannibalism, when the living consumed the dead, Nohea, though earnest -Mormon, believed that the _tupapau_ hovered over the grave or in the -tree-tops, to accomplish this ghastly purpose. Had Punau, the widow of -Mapuhi, been living, she would have had to spend her nights for several -weeks by his sepulcher. Being a chief, there were many to perform this -devoir, and before I entered the hut to sleep I saw several small fires -burning about the spot where the watchers cowered and whispered through -the night. Of the dangers of this office of friendship or widowhood, -every atoll in the Paumotus had a hundred tales, and Tahiti and the -Marquesas more. In Tahiti, the _tupapau_, the disembodied and malign ego -of the dead, entered the room where the remains were laid out. - -[Illustration: - - Photo by Dr. Theodore P. Cleveland - Paumotuans on a heap of brain coral -] - -[Illustration: - - Photo by Dr. Theodore P. Cleveland - Did these two eat Chocolat? -] - -[Illustration: - - Photo from Brown Bros. - The Stonehenge men in the South Seas -] - -A frightening noise was heard in the room or in that part of the house, -followed by sounds and movements of a struggle, and in the morning gouts -of blood were on the walls. In Moorea, near Tahiti, I met an educated -Englishman, there twenty-five years, who said that on analysis the blood -proved to be human. A cynic in most things, he would not deny that he -believed the circumstance supernatural. - -The _tupapau_ had many manifestations: knocks at doors and on thatched -roofs, cries of sorrow and of hate. White it was in the night, and often -hovering over the house or the grave. It might be that the Ghost Bird, -the _burong-hantu_, a reality which is white, and whose wings make -little or no noise when flying, was the foundation of this phantom. - -In the meanwhile the schooner _Morning Star_ had gone to Tikei for -cargo. Lying Bill was to anchor off the pass of Takaroa in a few days on -his voyage to Tahiti and to send ashore a boat for me. For nine nights -the vigil was kept by the grave of Mapuhi. About four o’clock each -morning the ward by the grave was abandoned, and Nohea threw himself -wearily on his mat near me. Only one time, on the last evening, I -questioned him about the _tupapau_, and then realized my discourtesy; it -was for him to initiate this subject. - -“Have you heard or seen anything _rima atua nianatura_? Anything by the -hand of the spirit?” - -Nohea wrapped himself more tightly in his quilt, and his answer came -from under it: - -“This morning I heard a scratching. This is our last night, thank the -gods. I think it was the _tupapau_ saying farewell. We never look at the -grave.” - -About two the next morning Nohea shook me. - -“The _Fetia Taiao_ is off the passage,” he said. - -He had heard in the still air the faint slap of her canvas as she jibed, -I thought, but that could not have been, as she was too far away. His -awareness was not of the ear or eyes, but something different—the -keenness of the conscious and unconscious, which had preserved the -Paumotuan race in an environment which had meant starvation and death to -any other people. - -I had my possessions already on the schooner, and, forbidding Nohea to -wait with me at the mole, I embraced him and left him. A wish to look at -the grave took hold of me, and I walked along the path to it. The sun, -though below the horizon, was lessening the sombrous color of the small -hours, and I could discern vaguely the outline of the walled -burial-ground. The splash of oars in the water and the rattle of -rowlocks warned me of the approach of the boat for me, but I still had -five minutes. - -I sat down on the wall at the farthest end away from the grave. Soon I -would be in my own country, among the commonplace scenes of cities and -countryside. I would resume the habits and conventions of my nation, and -enter into the struggle for survival and for repute. Those goals shrunk -in importance on this strip of coral. Never would I be able to express -in myself the joy and heat of life, and the conquest of nature at its -zenith of mystery, as had the man whose tenement of clay was so near. -Love had been his animating emotion. In all the welter of low passions, -of conflicting religions, and commercial standards imported to his -island by the whites, he had remained a son of the atoll, brother and -father of his tribe, disdainful of the inventions and luxuries offered -him for his wealth, but shaping his course adroitly for his race’s -happiness. - -Deep in this strain of reflection, I was recalled to actuality by a -grating sound, a queer crunching and creaking. It came from about the -tomb, and was like a hundred rats dragging objects on a stone -floor—slithering discordant, offensive. If I could have fainted it would -have been relief, for I was seized with mortal terror. I could not -reason. The boat from the schooner was nearing fast, and would be at the -mole in a minute or two. I must go, but I could not move. Then suddenly -a bar of light flung up from the sea, the first of the dawn, and by its -feeble glimmer I saw a swarm of creatures about the barrow. They were -the robber-crabs who had come out from the groves, and they were pulling -the pieces of coral off the burial heap, and digging to pierce the -coffin. Scores of the grisly vampires were working with their huge claws -at the pile, and, as they rushed to and fro on their tall, obscene legs, -they were the very like of ghouls in animal form. This was the -“scratching” Nohea had heard when with their back to the grave he and -his fellow-watchers dared not turn to see them. - -I should have thrown rocks at the foul monsters, have scattered them -with kicks and curses, but my deliverance from the supernatural was so -comforting I could only burst into nervous laughter and run down the -road to the mole. I leaped into the boat, and gave the order to shove -off. In half an hour I was aboard the _Morning Star_ and our sails -spread for Tahiti and California. - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - AFTERWARD - - A LETTER FROM EXPLODING EGGS - - Atuona, Hiva-Oa, Aperiri, 1922. - - O Nakohu. - - O au Kaoha tuuhoa Koakoau itave tekao ipatumai to Brunnec; Na - Brunnec paki mai iau, tuu onotia Kaoha oko au iave; Atahi au ame - tao ave oe itiki iau Aua oto maimai omua ahee taua I Menike ua - ite au Ta Panama ohia umetao au ua hokotia au eoe Ite aoe. - - Mea meitai ote mahina ehee mai oe I Tahiti ahaka ite mai oe iau - Eavei tau I Tahiti etahi Otaua fiti tia mai mei Tahiti Ta maimai - oe eavei tau I Tahiti Patu mai oe itatahi hamani nau naete inoa - Brunnec. - - Eahaa iapati mai oe ukoana iau totaua pae ua pao tuu tekao iave - Kaoha oe iti haa metaino iau tihe ite nei mouehua Upeau oe iau - eiva ehua ua Vei hakaua taua oia tau ete taiene ohua iva ehua. - - Kaoha nui I Obriand. - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - FROM EXPLODING EGGS - - Atuona, Hiva-Oa, April, 1922. - - It is I, Nakohu, always, my dear master. I have been very glad - to receive news of you by Le Brunnec, and I have seen that you - have not forgotten me. - - It has given me much sorrow that I did not go with you. I should - have seen Panama and many things, but I was afraid that you - would grow tired of me and sell me to other Americans. - - If it is true that you will return here, write to me in advance - by Le Brunnec, and I will go to get you in Papeete. For your - stay in Atuona, fear nothing. I have now a nice house of my own - on the edge of the river. There you will live and it will be my - wife who will do the cooking and I will go to get the food for - all of us; that will be much better than before. - - I am very happy that you have not forgotten me in so long. It is - true that you had told me that you would come back before nine - years. I shall wait always. - - Love to you, Obriand. - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - LETTER FROM MALICIOUS GOSSIP - - Atuona, Hiva-Oa, Iunio, 1915. - - E tuu ona hoa: - - U Koana i au taoe hama ni, koakoa oko an i te ite i ta oe tau te - kao. A oe e koe te peau o Mohotu Vehine-hae, i te a te tekao, - mimi, pake, namu, Tahiatini, aoe i koe toia, ate, totahi teoko, - tohutohui toia hee, mehe ihepe Purutia i tihe mai nei io matou. - Titihuti, na mate ite hitoto. Te moi a Kake ua mate ite hitoto, - i tepo na mate, titahi, popoui ua mate, tatahi, popoui ua mate, - titahi, popoui ua mate, te moupuna o Titihuti. U fanau an i te - tama e moi o (Elizabethe Taavaupoo) toia inoa pahoe kanahau - tautau oko, aoe e hoa e koe to mana metao ia oe, ua inu matou i - te kava kona oko Bronec, kona oko Tahiapii, kona oko au, ia tihe - to matou metao ia oe, ua too matou i te pora Kava à la santé te - Freterick. Ena ua tuu atu nei i te ata na oe, upeau au ia ia - Lemoine a tuu mai te ata na Freterick. Mea nui tau roti i tenei - u fafati au e ua, roti ua tuu i una ou, mea Kaoha ia oe, me ta - oe vehine. Kaoha atu nei A poro me Puhei ia oe, Kaoha atu nei - Moetai kamuta ia oe. Kaoha atu nei Nakohu. - - Kaoha atu nei Timoia oe, Kaoha nui Kaoha nui Ua pao tete kao. - - Apae, umoi e koe tooe metao ia matou. - - Nau na tooe hoa. - - TAVAHI. - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - Atuona, Hiva-Oa, June, 1915. - - Ah my dear friend: - - I have received your letter. I was very happy to have news of - you. - - Ghost Girl has not forgotten and still says, “Dance, tobacco, - rum.” - - Many Daughters is not over her sickness; she is worse; when she - walks she rolls like the Prussian ship that came here. - - Titihuti died of dysentery. The little daughter of Kaké died of - dysentery. The one died in the evening, Titihuti; in the morning - the little girl of Titihuti died. I have given birth to a little - daughter; her name is Elizabeth Taavaupoo, a pretty little girl, - healthy and plump. - - We have not stopped thinking of you, dear friend. We drank kava. - Happy was Le Brunnec, happy was Tahiapii (sister of Tavati, the - little woman in blue). I too was happy. Our thoughts went out to - you. - - We took the bowl of kava and drank to the health of Frederick. - Here I send you as a present my picture. I told Le Moine to take - my photograph for you. - - I have many roses now; I took two of them which I put on my head - as a souvenir for you and your lady. In this letter you have the - love of Aporo and Puhei, of Moetai, the carpenter, and of Nakohu - and of Timoteo. - - Great love to you; great love to you. - - I have finished speaking; farewell, and may you not forget us in - your thoughts. - - I, your friend, - - MALICIOUS GOSSIP. - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - LETTER FROM MOUTH OF GOD - - E tuu ona hoa: - - E patu atu nei au i tenei hamani ia oe me tou Kaoha nui. Mea - meitai matou paotu. E tiai nei an i taoe hamani, me te Kakano - pua, me te mana roti, u haa mei—tai au i titahi keke fenua kei - oko, mea tanu roti. Eia titahi mea aoe au e kokoa koe nui oe i - kokoa koe nui oe i kaoha mai ian Koakoa oko nui matou i taoe - hamani A patu oe i titahi hamani i tooe hoa, o Vai Etienn ena - ioto ote Ami Koakoa, Apatu oe ia Vehine-hae ena i tohe ahi, o te - haraiipe. - - E na Tahiatini i Tarani me L’Hermier, Mea meitai a fiti mai oe i - Atuona nei Kanahau oko to matou fenua me he fenua Farani - meitaioko tu uapu O Hinatini ena ioto ote papu meitai Kaoha atu - nei tooe hoa Timo ia oe, u tuhaa ia mei a oe, e aha a, ave oe i - tuhaa meia ia. - - E metao anatu ia ia oe. Kaoha atu nei Kivi ia oe, E hee anatu i - te ika hake Ua pao te tekao kaoha nui. - - Tavahi T, MM. TIMOTHEO. - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - Ah my dear friend: - - I write you this letter to send you my good wishes. We are all - well. I have awaited in vain a letter from you with the flower - seeds you promised me. I have inherited a very large piece of - land where I could plant roses. - - We have been very sorry that you have not given us more of your - news. We have missed you much. - - If you wish to write to your friend Vai Etienne, he is in heaven - far away. - - As for Ghost Girl, she must have fallen into hell. - - Many Daughters’ soul must have rejoined l’Hermier in France. - - You would do well to return to Atuona. Our land is very - beautiful—our roads like those in France. - - Vanquished Often is dead, but she must be in paradise. - - Your friend, Timoteo, sends you greeting. If you have forgotten - him, he has not forgotten you. Come back and we will again drink - the kava together. - - Kivi tells me that he still thinks of you and that he still goes - fishing. - - It is finished. - - Kaoha nui, MOUTH OF GOD. - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - LETTER FROM LE BRUNNEC TO FREDERICK O’BRIEN AT SAUSALITO, CALIFORNIA. - -(Translation) - - Atuona, Hiva-Oa, June, 1922. - - Cher ami: - - You ask me what has become of Barbe Narbonne, of the valley of - Taaoa. I will tell you briefly, and probably some of what I - shall say you already know. She was married to Wilhelm Lutz, the - Tahauku trader, in Tahiti, and all went well. Her mother was at - the wedding, but not Maná, his long-time companion in Taiohae - and Atuona. The married pair occupied the upper floor of the - German firm’s big store. There was much gaiety among the Germans - and her Tahitian friends. For the first time Barbe rode in an - automobile, saw a moving picture, heard a band of music, and - attended prize-fights. They were married at the first of July, - and on the fourteenth was celebrated the Fall of the Bastille, - with tremendous hulas, much champagne, and speeches by the - governor, and even by the friendly Germans, such as Monsieur - Lutz. - - _Hélas!_ The _Scharnhorst_ and _Gneisenau_, the kaiser’s - cruisers, came here to Atuona, robbed my store, took Jensen, the - Dane, and steamed to Tahiti. When the authorities there saw - them, they must fire a pop-gun at them, and provoke in turn a - rain of six-inch shells. A Chinese was killed, every one ran to - the woods, and many stores were set on fire and burned. - - When the cruisers were gone, Monsieur Lutz and all the Germans - were imprisoned on Motu-Uta, the beautiful little islet a - thousand feet from Lovaina’s Annexe Hotel. Madame Lutz was - reproached by the church, the government, and by every one not - in prison, for marrying the “animal” Lutz, and immediately they - began to give her a divorce on that very ground—that the husband - was a German, and therefore not a human being, but an animal. It - did not take long, and again she was Mademoiselle Narbonne. - - Now she was free, rich, and in civilization. She danced and sang - and was dressed in your American clothes, for no ships came from - France. But, as in Atuona, rumors began that she was leprous. - That did not matter much to the Tahitians who, if they like one, - care nothing for what one has, but the whites ceased to be in - her company. They did not say aloud what they thought, but only - that she had loved a German. - - Maná went every day of good weather in a little canoe about the - islet of Motu-Uta, at a certain distance prescribed by the - guards, and made a gesture to Monsieur Lutz, who sat or stood - within an enclosure and looked out to sea. Poor Lutz! He died of - an aneurism, or, if you will, of a broken Prussian heart. - - Mademoiselle Narbonne one day went toward Papenoo. At Faaripoo - she saw the inclosure of the leprosarium, where the three or - four score lepers are confined. She returned to the Marquesas - Islands. - - _Pauvre fille! Personne n’a voulu se marier avec elle et elle - vit avec un vieux Canaque de Taaoa. Elle est retournée à la - brousse_—Poor girl! Nobody wants to marry her and she lives with - an old Kanaka of Taaoa. She has returned to the jungle. - - I will tell you, my friend, that no matter what Lemoal has said, - or her own fears, Mademoiselle Narbonne is not a leper. But the - sorcery of the _taua_ has ended her. These Marquesans, even if - half white, are yet heathen. - - Daughter of the Pigeon is dead of tuberculosis. Ghost Girl died - of influenza in Tahiti, where she had gone to continue her - joyous life. Peyral and his white daughters have fled to France. - Exploding Eggs has taken the daughter of Titihuti; and her - husband, from whom he seized her, is content to live with them. - Governor L’Hermier des Plantes is governor of the Congo. Song of - the Nightingale is in prison for making cocoanut rum. Seventh - Man Who Is So Angry has lost his wife of tuberculosis. - Vanquished Often died of leprosy in childbirth. Le Moine, the - artist, went mad and is dead. Grelet, the Swiss, is dead. _Père_ - David, _Père_ Simeon, _Père_ Victorin, are well, as all the - nuns. Jimmy Kekela is well; his sister is shut up in a leper - hospital. McHenry has been expelled from Tahiti for selling - alcoholic liquors to the natives of the Paumotus. Lemoal is - dead. Hemeury François and Scallamera are dead. Vai Etienne, son - of Titihuti, is dead. _Commissaire_ Bauda went to the wars. - - I have named my second child after you, Frederick. You remember - her mother, At Peace, the sister of Malicious Gossip. We dwell - in comfort and happiness. Return to live with us. - - Votre dévoué - - LE BRUNNEC. - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - ● Transcriber’s Notes: - ○ Missing or obscured punctuation was silently corrected. - ○ Typographical errors were silently corrected. - ○ Inconsistent spelling and hyphenation were made consistent only - when a predominant form was found in this book. - ○ Text that was in italics is enclosed by underscores (_italics_). - - - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Atolls of the Sun, by Frederick O'Brien - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ATOLLS OF THE SUN *** - -***** This file should be named 62697-0.txt or 62697-0.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/6/2/6/9/62697/ - -Produced by Chris Whitehead, Barry Abrahamsen, and the -Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net -(This file was produced from images generously made -available by The Internet Archive) - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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