FREDERICK O'BRIEN
WITH MANY ILLUSTRATIONS FROM PHOTOGRAPHS
T. Werner Laurie, Ltd.
1919
FOREWORD
There is in the nature of every man, I firmly believe, a longing to see and know the strange places of the world. Life imprisons us all in its coil of circumstance, and the dreams of romance that color boyhood are forgotten, but they do not die. They stir at the sight of a white-sailed ship beating out to the wide sea; the smell of tarred rope on a blackened wharf, or the touch of the cool little breeze that rises when the stars come out will waken them again. Somewhere over the rim of the world lies romance, and every heart yearns to go and find it.
It is not given to every man to start on the quest of the rainbow's end. Such fantastic pursuit is not for him who is bound by ties of home and duty and fortune-to-make. He has other adventure at his own door, sterner fights to wage, and, perhaps, higher rewards to gain. Still, the ledgers close sometimes on a sigh, and by the cosiest fireside one will see in the coals pictures that have nothing to do with wedding rings or balances at the bank.
It is for those who stay at home yet dream of foreign places that I have written this book, a record of one happy year spent among the simple, friendly cannibals of Atuona valley, on the island of Hiva-oa in the Marquesas. In its pages there is little of profound research, nothing, I fear, to startle the anthropologist or to revise encyclopedias; such expectation was far from my thoughts when I sailed from Papeite on the Morning Star. I went to see what I should see, and to learn whatever should be taught me by the days as they came. What I saw and what I learned the reader will see and learn, and no more.
Days, like people, give more when they are approached in not too stern a spirit. So I traveled lightly, without the heavy baggage of the ponderous-minded scholar, and the reader who embarks with me on the “long cruise” need bring with him only an open mind and a love for the strange and picturesque. He will come back, I hope, as I did, with some glimpses into the primitive customs of the long-forgotten ancestors of the white race, a deeper wonder at the mysteries of the world, and a memory of sun-steeped days on white beaches, of palms and orchids and the childlike savage peoples who live in the bread-fruit groves of “Bloody Hiva-oa.”
The author desires to express here his thanks to Rose Wilder Lane, to whose editorial assistance the publication of this book is very largely due.
CONTENTS
[CHAPTER I]
Farewell to Papeite beach; at sea in the Morning Star; Darwin's theory of the continent that sank beneath the waters of the South Seas
[CHAPTER II]
The trade-room of the Morning Star; Lying Bill Pincher; M. L'Hermier des Plantes, future governor of the Marquesas; story of McHenry and the little native boy, His Dog
[CHAPTER III]
Thirty-seven days at sea; life of the sea-birds; strange phosphorescence; first sight of Fatu-hiva; history of the islands; chant of the Raiateans
[CHAPTER IV]
Anchorage of Taha-Uka; Exploding Eggs, and his engagement as valet; inauguration of the new governor; dance on the palace lawn
[CHAPTER V]
First night in Atuona valley; sensational arrival of the Golden Bed; Titihuti's tattooed legs
[CHAPTER VI]
Visit of Chief Seventh Man Who is So Angry He Wallows in the Mire; journey to Vait-hua on Tahuata island; fight with the devil-fish; story of a cannibal feast and the two who escaped
[CHAPTER VII]
Idyllic valley of Vait-hua; the beauty of Vanquished Often; bathing on the beach; an unexpected proposal of marriage
[CHAPTER VIII]
Communal life; sport in the waves; fight of the sharks and the mother whale; a day in the mountains; death of Le Capitaine Halley; return to Atuona
[CHAPTER IX]
The Marquesans at ten o'clock mass; a remarkable conversation about religions and Joan of Arc in which Great Fern gives his idea of the devil
[CHAPTER X]
The marriage of Malicious Gossip; matrimonial customs of the simple natives; the domestic difficulties of Haabuani
[CHAPTER XI]
Filling the popoi pits in the season of the breadfruit; legend of the mei; the secret festival in a hidden valley
[CHAPTER XII]
A walk in the jungle; the old woman in the breadfruit tree; a night in a native hut on the mountain
[CHAPTER XIII]
The household of Lam Kai Oo; copra making; marvels of the cocoanut-groves; the sagacity of pigs; and a crab that knows the laws of gravitation
[CHAPTER XIV]
Visit of Le Moine; the story of Paul Gauguin; his house, and a search for his grave beneath the white cross of Calvary
[CHAPTER XV]
Death of Aumia; funeral chant and burial customs; causes for the death of a race
[CHAPTER XVI]
A savage dance, a drama of the sea, of danger and feasting; the rape of the lettuce
[CHAPTER XVII]
A walk to the Forbidden Place; Hot Tears, the hunchback; the story of Behold the Servant of the Priest, told by Malicious Gossip in the cave of Enamoa
[CHAPTER XVIII]
A search for rubber-trees on the plateau of Ahoa; a fight with the wild white dogs; story of an ancient migration, told by the wild cattle hunters in the Cave of the Spine of the Chinaman
[CHAPTER XIX]
A feast to the men of Motopu; the making of kava, and its drinking; the story of the Girl Who Lost Her Strength
[CHAPTER XX]
A journey to Taaoa; Kahuiti, the cannibal chief, and his story of an old war caused by an unfaithful woman
[CHAPTER XXI]
The crime of Huahine for love of Weaver of Mats; story of Tahia's white man who was eaten; the disaster that befell Honi, the white man who used his harpoon against his friends
[CHAPTER XXII]
The memorable game for the matches in the cocoanut-grove of Lam Kai Oo
[CHAPTER XXIII]
Mademoiselle N——
[CHAPTER XXIV]
A journey to Nuka-hiva; story of the celebration of the fête of Joan of Arc, and the miracles of the white horse and the girl
[CHAPTER XXV]
America's claim to the Marquesas; adventures of Captain Porter in 1812; war between Haapa and Tai-o-hae, and the conquest of Typee valley
[CHAPTER XXVI]
A visit to Typee; story of the old man who returned too late
[CHAPTER XXVII]
Journey on the Roberta; the winged cockroaches; arrival at a Swiss paradise in the valley of Oomoa
[CHAPTER XXVIII]
Labor in the South Seas; some random thoughts on the “survival of the fittest”
[CHAPTER XXIX]
The white man who danced in Oomoa valley; a wild-boar hunt in the hills; the feast of the triumphant hunters and a dance in honor of Grelet
[CHAPTER XXX]
A visit to Hanavave; Père Olivier at home; the story of the last battle between Hanahouua and Oi, told by the sole survivor; the making of tapa cloth, and the ancient garments of the Marquesans
[CHAPTER XXXI]
Fishing in Hanavave; a deep-sea battle with a shark; Red Chicken shows how to tie ropes to sharks' tails; night-fishing for dolphins, and the monster sword-fish that overturned the canoe; the native doctor dresses Red Chicken's wounds and discourses on medicine
[CHAPTER XXXII]
A journey over the roof of the world to Oomoa; an encounter with a wild woman of the hills
[CHAPTER XXXIII]
Return in a canoe to Atuona; Tetuahunahuna relates the story of the girl who rode the white horse in the celebration of the fête of Joan of Arc in Tai-o-hae; Proof that sharks hate women; steering by the stars to Atuona beach
[CHAPTER XXXIV]
Sea sports; curious sea-foods found at low tide; the peculiarities of sea-centipedes and how to cook and eat them
[CHAPTER XXXV]
Court day in Atuona; the case of Daughter of the Pigeon and the sewing-machine; the story of the perfidy of Drink of Beer and the death of Earth Worm who tried to kill the governor
[CHAPTER XXXVI]
The madman Great Moth of the Night; story of the famine and the one family that ate pig
[CHAPTER XXXVII]
A visit to the hermit of Taha-Uka valley; the vengeance that made the Scallamera lepers; and the hatred of Mohuto
[CHAPTER XXXVIII]
Last days in Atuona; My Darling Hope's letter from her son
[CHAPTER XXXIX]
The chants of departure; night falls on the Land of the War Fleet
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
[Village of Atuona, showing peak of Temetiu]
[Where the belles of Tahiti lived in the shade to whiten their complexions]
[Lieutenant L'Hermier des Plantes, Governor of the Marquesas Islands]
[The ironbound coast of the Marquesas]
[Schooner Fetia Taiao in the Bay of Traitors]
[The public dance in the garden]
[Antoinette, a Marquesan dancing girl]
[Marquesans in Sunday clothes]
[The pool by the Queen's house]
[Nothing to do but rest all day]
[A native spearing fish from a rock]
[A volunteer cocoanut grove, with trees of all ages]
[Splitting cocoanut husks in copra making process]
[Cutting the meat from cocoanuts to make copra]
[A Marquesan home on a paepae]
[The haka, the Marquesan national dance]
[The old cannibal of Taipi Valley]
[Enacting a human sacrifice of the Marquesans]
[Interior of Island of Fatu-hiva, where the author walked over the mountains]
[Kivi, the kava drinker with the hetairae of the valley]
[The Pekia, or Place of Sacrifice, at Atuona]
[Marquesan cannibals, wearing dress of human hair]
[Tepu, a Marquesan girl of the hills, and her sister]
[A tattooed Marquesan with carved canoe paddle]
[A chieftess in tapa garments with tapa parasol]
[Père Simeon Delmas' church at Tai-o-hae]
[Gathering the feis in the mountains]
[Near the Mission at Hanavave]
[Starting from Hanavave for Oomoa]
[Where river and bay meet at Oomoa, Island of Fatu-hiva]
[Removing the pig cooked in the umu, or native oven]
[The Koina Kai, or feast in Oomoa]
[Putting the canoe in the water]
[Pascual, the giant Paumotan pilot and his friends]
[Spearing fish in Marquesas Islands]
[A canoe in the surf at Oomoa]
[The gates of the Valley of Hanavave]
[A fisherman's house of bamboo and cocoanut leaves]
[Tahaiupehe, Daughter of the Pigeon, of Taaoa]
Author's Note. Foreign words in a book are like rocks in a path. There are two ways of meeting the difficulty; the reader may leap over them, or use them as stepping stones. I have written this book so that they may easily be leaped over by the hasty, but he will lose much enjoyment by doing so; I would urge him to pronounce them as he goes. Marquesan words have a flavor all their own; much of the simple poetry of the islands is in them. The rules for pronouncing them are simple; consonants have the sounds usual in English, vowels have the Latin value, that is, a is ah, e is ay, i is ee, o is oh, and u is oo. Every letter is pronounced, and there are no accents. The Marquesans had no written language, and their spoken tongue was reproduced as simply as possible by the missionaries.