Lolóma, or two years in cannibal-land: A story of old Fiji

by Henry Britton

The Song.

“The easterly breeze is blowing fair,”—

Said Bulitaundúa[^[12]] with gladsome air,

“My breeze, mayhap, for the Land o’ the fair!”

“Pull away from side to side,

Rolling below is the river-tide.

Hung out ahead is Screw-pine strand;

Pull away with a steady hand.

The other shore is the haunted land!

Pull away with a steady hand.

Pumice-stone isle looms up from the sea,

And the ‘Isle-of-Work’ is on the lee;

Pull away with a steady hand.”

Through the open reef to the great outside,

Rowed the god as he merrily cried,

“There’s a wondrous calm on all the land!

Pull away with a steady hand.”—

“Arrived at last at Vúya’s town,

Where the beautiful falls are leaping down!

The falls I ween, of Vúya’s Queen!”

“Maiden-in-waiting, go down to the reef,

A canoe is in, ’tis the voice of a chief!”

Biting her fingers, and clapping her hands,

The maid hail’d the chief as “Lord-o’-the-Lands!”

“Then what would you say,”—asked the fine grandee,

“If on this shore I crowned be?”

The maid ran back without further ado,

And the lady sped to the Lord’s canoe!

“What is the name of thy land?” she cried.

“Mine is a very long land!”—he replied,—

“Enquire of the flood and the ebbing tide!

Away from the sea, inland I abide.

My palace is called the Great Foundation!

And the houses are all like those of thy nation.

Then tell me at once, O child of the sea,

Wilt thou stay where thou art, or go with me?”

“In thy canoe I’ll go with thee!

My home at the dawn shall deserted be!”

“Then over the bow,”—said the god-like rower,

“Pull away with thy ‘Green-heart’ oar.”

[12]. Pronounced Boo-ly-town-doo-ah.

CHAPTER XIV.
A RIVAL’S STRATEGY.

A year passed away, and I was still the guest of Big-Wind, in the valley of Tivóli. I had carefully kept count of the time, by making a notch on a tree for every week. The days I recorded by means of seven pebbles, dropping one into my pocket each morning until the week was ended, and then beginning again. My wardrobe had long since been hopelessly ruined, and I was reduced to the comfortable Fijian sulu and turban, but I still preserved the European luxury of a pocket in the folds of my tapa.

The period of my indulgent captivity had been far from unpleasant to me. I did not omit to ascend the hills occasionally and scan the horizon for an English ship, but I had begun to think with less bitterness of having to pass the remainder of my life among the Fijians. As time wore on it seemed less and less likely that I should be rescued by some passing ship, as the only vessels which visited the country at this time went to Bau, and the Sandalwood coast on the island of Vanua Levu. However, a change in my circumstances was in store for me which I could not foresee.

Lolóma was now sixteen years of age, and she was claimed in marriage by Bent-Axe, to whom she had been affianced almost from her birth. The man was repulsive; the girl had the greatest possible aversion to him; and she had given abundant proofs of her attachment to me. Often had she in conversation with me wished that she lived in the white man’s country, where, as she expressed it, a girl may wed “the man to whom her spirit flies.” (She had learned that from me, and I may remark that in speaking to the savages of the institutions of my own country, I always represented them as superior to theirs, though sometimes at the sacrifice of strict accuracy.) I had not the slightest intention of surrendering her to my rival, who had treated me with ill-will from the first day of my arrival in the valley, and Lolóma said she would fly with me to another tribe to which she was vasu,[^[13]] and where we could live in peace, if I were willing. I was quite willing, in the absence of any better plan for settling the difficulty, but I preferred defeating my hated adversary on his own ground. I accordingly made a formal proposition to Big-Wind for his daughter’s hand. The old king was pleased, but feared that the customs of his country would make our marriage an impossibility, as the girl had been publicly pledged to Bent-Axe, who was his half-brother, and there was no precedent for breaking such an engagement. I was popular with the inhabitants of the valley, and knew that if the matter were put to the vote it would be decided in my favor, as Bent-Axe was universally detested for his cruel and overbearing disposition. But there was a great difficulty in my way. Shark, the priest, looked with high disfavor upon some innovations on native custom I had attempted to introduce, and he knew that I had spoken disrespectfully of his religion, calling the whole priesthood of the country impostors. He would naturally strain every nerve to prevent me from being established with official rank at the court of Big-Wind. The proposed marriage was made the subject of many grave deliberations in council. Shark and Bent-Axe exerted all their eloquence against me, but the chief secretly leaned towards me, and he was importuned in my behalf by Lolóma, his favorite daughter, and also her mother and sisters. At length it was decided by straining an abstruse point of native etiquette, that Bent-Axe had committed an act which nullified the engagement. The day of the marriage, after many busy preparations in the village, now arrived. The previous evening the deformed suitor had had an interview with Lolóma. He had sweetened his breath with the grayish clay which Fijian swains use to make themselves attractive, and he urged his cause with all the persuasiveness of which he was capable, but without avail.

[13]. A relationship which carries with it remarkable privileges. Vide p. [65].

Marriage in Fiji is a civil contract with which the priest officially has nothing to do. The customs observed on these occasions, some of which are very pretty, vary in different parts of the group. The leading idea, however, is an interchange of presents, a great feast, and a public acceptance of the woman by the man after the formal presentation. Popular opinion in the valley of Tivóli was in favor of a full-dress affair, on the pattern of a grand marriage in the family of King Finau of Tonga, in regard to which a fabulous account in a metrical form had gained currency.

The assembled multitude accordingly appeared on the village green in gala attire. All that paint, powder, oil, and floral decorations could do for the company, was done. The most striking picture in the group was old Big-Wind himself, as he advanced, erect on the green sward within the quadrangular mass of human beings sitting cross-legged, to present the bride.

His voice, gait, eyes, and dress, not to speak of his tall person and powerful limbs, singly and together proclaimed his superiority over the crowd, who, crouching at his feet, clapped their hands and uttered deep bass groans of salutation in token at once of their recognition of his high station, of their admiration of his person, and of their loyal submission to his rule. Rather more than six feet high—without shoes, of course, and exclusive of the hair which covered his head like a knoll with tall reed-grass, and which was dressed in the latest and most artistic style possible to the barbers of highest note—there he stood. Left cheek, right half of forehead, upper part of nose, and right eye surroundings deeply vermillioned; other bare portions of the face painted with lamp-black; lateral and lower features enveloped in bushy whiskers, beard, and moustache; frill of wild-boar’s tusks about his neck, making a formidable, defensive chevaux-de-frise for the throat, as well as a chiefly ornament and emblem of royal courage; ponderous pine-apple club mounted on right shoulder; aloft, and carried in left hand over all, a large sunshade made of the leaf of that most beautiful of palms, the fan-palm; those muscular arms so well able to put forth destructive might in the hour of battle; a profusely-decorated native dress fastened round the body with a sash sweeping off behind in a long train of snow-white gauzy fabric, made by the ladies of his harem—a subject fit for poet’s verse, and painter’s brush and pallet.

The bride, having previously been anointed with cocoanut oil scented with sandalwood, was swathed in choice mats of fine texture and masi of the silkiest softness. She wore so many yards of this material, which hid her pretty limbs in a shameful way, that she could neither sit down nor rise up without assistance from her maids. She had on her forehead a coronet of pearly-white beads, made of the inside of nautilus shells; there lay on her bosom a necklace composed of the white-scented flowers of the vasa, and her wrists and upper-arms were decorated with curiously-wrought shell bracelets and armlets. Her ornaments glimmered bravely on her brown throat and arms. She stood radiant in the sun—a gay, glad child of Nature—beautiful as the flushed flower of the hibiscus as it flames at noon, and fresh as roses washed by rain.

The six bridesmaids were similarly attired, but with less magnificence, and each was distinguished by a red riband, made of the membrane of a fine leaf. The lady and her attendants having walked in procession to the front of the Royal house, which faced one side of the quadrangle, the King delivered a brief address, at the end of which the first bridesmaid advanced to cut off the front lock of the bride, the woolly fringe which is only worn by maidens, when the priest, accompanied by Bent-Axe, suddenly appeared upon the scene.

“I forbid this marriage in the name of the gods,” said Shark. “Last night in the temple it was revealed to me that it is not for the good of the land. Forbear, or fear the just wrath of Dengeh.”

The King demanded an omen in proof of the divine displeasure.

Shark stood up before the people, and in accordance with a practice they were familiar with, poured a few drops of water on the front of his right arm near the shoulder. Then, gently inclining his arm, the course of the water was watched. If it found its way down to the wrist, the god was favourable to the marriage; if it ran off and fell on the ground, the decision would be the other way. None of the water reached the rascal’s wrist, for he had well oiled it for the occasion.

“I fear neither Dengeh nor his priest,” I interposed. “It is a lying omen. I am not of Shark’s religion, and his priestly oracle cannot answer for me.”

Big-Wind and his chieftains, after consultation, regarded this objection to the jurisdiction as a good one, and judgment was given accordingly.

“There is another reason why this marriage cannot proceed,” shouted Bent-Axe, glaring defiantly at me. “Will the white man maintain that a chief’s daughter should be given to a leper?”

I laughed aloud. I knew that leprosy was not uncommon in the country, and elephantiasis was prevalent, but I had never so much as seen a case of the former disease, and I knew that I was in perfect health.

“Let the papalangi be examined,” continued Bent-Axe. “On his right ankle you will see the mark of the doomed.”

Then I remembered, with a start, that I had that about me, known only to Bent-Axe, Lolóma, and myself, which would betray me into the skilfully-laid trap of this relentless savage. The previous day, in cutting a kau karo or itch-wood tree, a few drops of the sap, which is just like scalding water, fell upon my right ankle. I thought nothing of it, but soon afterwards severe itching pustules arose, and Bent-Axe saw me bathing the inflamed parts at a streamlet in the evening.

Big-Wind noticed my look of dismay and hesitation, and demanded an immediate explanation. I related the circumstance and was corroborated by Lolóma; but the priest examined the marks on my leg, and pronounced it a well-defined case of leprosy. It was determined that I should submit to be cured in the Fijian fashion, or that the marriage should not be consummated.

CHAPTER XV.
ORDEAL BY SMOKE.

The Fijian cure for leprosy is submission to the ordeal by smoke. It is like the old English ordeal by water in cases of suspected witchcraft. If the subject survived the experiment she was no witch; if she were drowned, as generally happened, she was a witch well got rid of.

Lepers in Fiji are cured or killed by smoke from the wood of the sinu ganga. This tree attains a height of 60ft., and is generally found in mangrove swamps. It bears minute green flowers arranged in catkins. When the tree is pierced, a white milk flows which is burning to the skin. The suspected leper is taken to a small empty house. Having been stripped naked, his body is rubbed all over with green leaves, and then buried in them. A small fire is lighted, and a few pieces of the sinu ganga are laid on it. Soon a thick black smoke begins to ascend. The patient is bound hand and foot, and drawn up over the fire by a rope fastened to his heels, leaving his head some 18in. from the ground, in the midst of the poisonous exhalations. The door is closed, the victim’s friends retire to a little distance, while he shouts and screams in the agony caused by the suffocating heat. The unfortunate wretch sometimes faints after a few minutes of this treatment. When the man is considered to be sufficiently smoked, the fire is put out, the slime is scraped from his body, and deep gashes are cut in his flesh with sharpened pearl-oyster shells, until the blood flows freely. He is then taken down and laid on the mats to await the result, which is sometimes death, and sometimes, strange to say, complete recovery.

I protested vehemently that I was no leper, and Lolóma joined her weeping remonstrances to mine, but without effect. The suspicion was too grave.

“I shall be avenged for this,” I cried, as I was hurried away, though I believed my hours were numbered. “I will come with the front of battle and the thunder of Britain, and Bent-Axe shall see if a white man can be tortured with impunity.”

“Every man is a wind in his own bay,” laughed the savage. “You are not in the land of the white man now, and your words are as idle as the sea-foam. To-morrow’s sun will see the fair Lolóma at rest in these arms.”

Smarting with rage, I was borne away to a native house, in which preparations for the ordeal I was to be subjected to had been made by the cunning priest and his friend the previous night. I was satisfied that it would not be their fault if I left the chamber alive. Soon the whole room was filled with smoke. I was triced up by the heels with my head dangling over the fire, and my two enemies and their assistants, being unable to bear the fumes any longer, left me. I knew that if possible, Lolóma would contrive my escape, but it took her a long time to divest herself of her gala trappings, in which she could not move, and the demons who plotted my destruction had laid their plans so well that I was in a fair way to be suffocated before a friendly hand could reach me.

The sun had just set when I found myself swinging in the accursed smoke, a prey to reflections which assumed the form of a horrid phantasmagoria, owing to the blood rushing to my head, and the stifling heat of the baleful exhalations. After the lapse of a few seconds I became incapable of clear thought. My brain thumped and bounded, and I shrieked aloud. Once, after terrible struggling, I reached the rope with my hands, and endeavoured to haul myself into an endurable position, but my nerveless fingers lost their hold, and I fell back in a swoon—an inert mass swinging to and fro in the smoky glare. I must have fainted when I had been suspended two or three minutes, though it seemed as many hours, for I felt as if my head were bursting all the time.

When I recovered consciousness I was lying on the ground in the hut, a few paces from the fire. Lolóma stood by, emptying a pipkin of water over me.

On my way to the place of torture I had learned from the conversation of Shark and Bent-Axe that its locality had been kept secret. Lolóma, watched by her relatives, had great difficulty in getting away until it was thought that sufficient time had elapsed for the ordeal by smoke to be accomplished. Then she tracked my executioners to the house. With her light step and lithe figure she was able to elude them in the gloom, and enter the building through a small aperture in the side, used as a window, and which was only closed by a mat. To cut the rope of sinnet with a bamboo knife was the work of a moment, and I fell to the ground in her arms.

“Run for your life,” were her first words to me as soon as she saw that I had regained consciousness.

I recovered myself quickly. My eyes were blinded and smarting with the smoke, but I snatched up a club which lay on the floor, and ran, as near as I could guess, after the retreating form of the girl through the doorway. Outside the hut a man emerged from the smoke and gloom and seized me by the left shoulder. It was Bent-Axe. With one blow from the club I felled him, and darted up a ravine towards the hills. In an hour’s time I was safe in my old cave, where there was some food, for Lolóma and I had kept up the habit of making festival excursions there, and the existence of the bower was still known only to us two.

The trees and shrubs around the entrance to the cave were spangled with a cloud of dancing fireflies, though I had never seen these insects in the locality before. Capturing three or four, I contrived an excellent lantern by placing them in a cocoanut cup, covering the top with a film of fine masi, through which the light shone. I found that by shaking the bowl violently I could excite these interesting insects to increase the light they emit from the luminous discs on each side of their bodies. Subsequent experience proved to me that with a little sugar-cane for food they would live in captivity for weeks. Furnished with my new-made lamp, I explored at leisure the long aisles and fretted vaults of my picturesque cell, which was beautiful beyond the dreams of architecture.

CHAPTER XVI.
OLD FRIENDS WITH NEW FACES.

In the course of an hour’s time I was rejoined by Lolóma, who told me that any thought of return to the town was out of the question, and that, as search would certainly be made for us, we must gain the protection of another tribe. There was a powerful chief on the coast, she added, to whose family she was vasu, and whose protection she would be sure of if she could once reach his dominions.

We set out in the moonlight, hand in hand, like another Adam and Eve, leaving our garden of Eden behind us, and not feeling very confident in regard to the adventures in store.

As we rambled on in the direction of the coast, Lolóma, whose natural gaiety of heart had returned, prattled of many things, but was often beguiled into silence by the splendour of the firmament. It is not surprising when one calls to mind the wondrous beauty of the calm, cloudless nights in Fiji, and the length of time the natives spend in the open air after the sun has set, that they pay some attention to the Heavenly bodies, and have names for them, and theories in regard to them, though bearing no resemblance to those of Copernicus or Galileo.

I learned from Lolóma’s astronomical discourses that when two stars are observed near the moon they are called “the moon’s wives;” the moon is therefore a masculine noun, a point which the language does not settle. What with us is superstitiously called the “man-in-the-moon” is by the Fijian spoken of as “The man and his wife.” The man is plaiting cocoanut fibre into sinnet, while the woman, mallet in hand, is beating out the bark of which she is going to make native cloth. Emblematic this, of the two great industries, for, food excepted, to the Fijian there is nothing like cordage and cloth—the former is used in building houses, lashing canoes, &c., and the latter, if not much used on the person, is valuable property for exchange or barter.

When a star is seen preceding the moon, as is often the case, the Fiji observer would be heard to say, “That star is the tug, towing the moon through the skies.” This is not a borrowed figure either, for the Fijian sailors on a large craft will often take small ones in tow.

The Southern Cross is called “Nga,” i.e., the “duck constellation.” The Fiji imagination sees in this constellation a resemblance to a flying duck. Popular belief says: the two “pointers” are two men; that nearest the cross is a blind man, the other can see. They were both after the duck to throw at it. The blind man threw first, and, as might be expected, missed. Off goes the duck, giving the man who can see, no chance. Our Fiji proverb-maker and moral philosopher has added this good moral lesson to the fable, “Let him that can see throw first.” Sometimes the “pointers” are referred to as viz., a slave and a chief. The slave shoots first and misses, thereby greatly disappointing his chief. Moral—“Never precede your superiors.” Mothers will sometimes try to quiet their peevish little ones by pointing to the “Nga,” in the Southern sky, and saying to “baby,” “Look up there at your duck.”

Orion and his belt are called Iri, i.e., the “Fan,” from their resemblance to a Bau fan. This is said to be the fan of the great god Dengeh. An accident happened to it once upon a time, when the god had fallen asleep near the fire. The fan dropping out of his hand got burnt on one side; hence the blank—the apparent absence of stars on one side. Another tale is, that the fan is that of a local god at a place called Nakasaleka, where, it is reported, mosquitoes never bite, for the simple reason, there are none there to bite, and there are none there to bite because the god with his big fan swept them all away.

One of the first stars, or, rather, the first star seen in the evening, is called “Dingodingo,” i.e., “One who eats in another’s house,” because he comes out to shine so close on the heels of day; in other words he enters into Day’s house, when, in fact, he himself belongs to Night. Another meaning of the same word is “the inspector.” This star, therefore, is out having a look at things before his companions.

A superstition with regard to comets says: “Whichever way the flag (i.e., the luminous tail) flies or streams, from that quarter we may expect to hear the news of the death of a great chief.”

A fable of the sun’s setting says: “A big fish swallows him, but in a little while will cast him up again in the East, i.e., he will rise in the morning.” The usual way of saying the “sun has risen” is “the sun has climbed.” The Fijian speaks of the sun as still climbing the sky, till he reaches the meridian. After that the expression is, “he goes to his drowning.”

An hour before daybreak, which is always the coldest part of the night in Fiji, we took shelter in a thicket, and rested till the sun was well up in the Heavens. We had scarcely any provisions with us, and there was little occasion for that. A piece of sugar-cane, easily carried, and renewable at many places, as we walked along, furnished a sweet and nourishing juice which appeased at once both thirst and hunger.

The heavy dew of tropical countries lies long upon the ground, the valleys are often filled with vapour until several hours after sunrise, and the steamy billows are frequently seen ascending after the bright glare of the sun has made itself felt severely in exposed places.

As we went on our course, the grass was spangled with mountain dew. The carpets of bright green in the thick glassy glades of the forest glistened. The bosky landscape was for a time half veiled in the thin vapouries of the early morning. Soon the atmosphere became as lucid as crystal, pure as an opal, and a sky of pale turquoise blue, free as yet from the mid-day sheen, lent a softening splendour to the view. Sometimes the eye took in at a glance, orange and lemon trees bending under the weight of their golden spheres, the umbrageous bread fruit with its scolloped and variegated leaves, the green tops of the palm, the tapioca, guava, ginger, turmeric, arrowroot, and croton oil plants, the luscious pine-apple, and banks covered with the wild chili, brilliant with a rare combination of colours, and gay with the fresh verdure of eternal spring. Little rivulets glided from the base of one hill to the other, bubbling round grassy knolls, glancing from beneath low tree-fringed rocks, and singing in soft tones of the cool green woods through which they came. Huge cloud-capped hills rose to a height of 2,000 feet on either hand like a vast natural amphitheatre, their sides often perforated by peaceful valleys radiating down to the sea, and the crannies and crags of their summits ringing with the sound of the wind.

On the banks of the rivulets were groves of Tahitian chestnuts, with their grooved trunks and knobby roots, affording a refreshing shade. After the monotonous grass and isolated screw-pines of the open plain the eye was often refreshed by the variegated leaves of the deciduous tavola, which, preparatory to falling off, assumes a variety of tints, in which brown, red, yellow, and scarlet are the most prominent. The balsamic odours of fragrant shrubs accompanied us on our way, and our road was tapestried with ferns and flowers, the graceful form of the wild plantain giving dignity to the landscape. The forest silence was broken only by the rustling of the leaves and the chattering of the cicadæ, and we saw no living object save that indicated by the occasional flash of a bright-winged parrakeet as it flew from tree to tree, startled by our approach. Gaining an eminence, the sedgy hollows below seemed covered with a veil of vapoury tissue.

Late in the afternoon we rested in a clump of sago palms on the verge of a pretty waterfall descending like a rainbow flash in a wildly romantic mountain gorge, above which towered a conical rock of great height. The approach was through tangled masses of diverse greenery which almost shut out the sunlight from this fairy dell. The water fell some 20ft. in a triple cascade down into a transparent pool formed in a rocky bed, and the three little jets there uniting made two more similar leaps to add their small volume to a pebbly brook which flowed on to the coast. As we sat in the shade of over-arching boughs, munching bananas and sugar-cane, and listening to the music of the waterfall, we were startled for a moment by a sudden splash, which resounded in the solemn stillness of the place. It was only a large shaddock, grown too heavy for its stem to bear, dropping into the stream.

Of all the flowers that gemmed the mead there were none more fair than Lolóma. Her rounded limbs, unmarked by vein or muscle, the small hand, and well-kept nails of her tapering fingers, bore testimony to the life of ease she led. Her complexion, the tender peach colour which lingers in the western sky for awhile after the disappearance of the great luminary, was in itself a proof that she had been carefully guarded from the sun. Her short but pliant neck, gently swelling shoulders, and moderately slender waist, her well-shaped feet with slightly-spreading toes, and her frank laughing eyes which knew no doubt, made her a fit subject for an artist. How piquantly she poised as she lingered on some grassy knoll, her small head resting on the neck buoyant as a flower on its stem! Replace her chaplet of dewy blooms by a crescent diadem, her simple liku by a light classical tunic, and there is the chaste huntress of ancient fable, of a darker hue, lacking only the thinness of the nose, the longer neck, the fuller eyes, and the compressed toes of the Grecian ideal. Vigorous in youthful blooming beauty, the unadorned charm of her flowing figure was a lovelier vesture than that of the lilies of the field. Full of passionate and impulsive affections, the soft smile of the south now played on her sun-kissed face, partly disclosing twin rows of fairy pearl.

We rioted in the mere physical enjoyment of life. We were happy with the happiness of the child who neither questions the wisdom of the moment, nor its hereafter. Her easy, unstudied abandonment, gave to Lolóma the grace of a fawn. It was enough for me in those idle moments to watch the shadows play on her soft wanton limbs, or to listen to her merry rippling laugh, showing her teeth white as the core of the fresh bread fruit, as she told some romantic or humourous story learnt in the village.

Sometimes the forest seemed an enchanted garden, in which we were en-canopied by a chaos of creepers which threw their garlands of gay flowers over all, adorning the scene with the varying enchantments of color. The primeval orchard was hung with luminous fruits like those stolen from Aladdin’s garden, and a curious dreamy golden hue rested on leaf and bough. From elevated spots we could see valley opening into valley in oft repeated succession; and beyond, the ocean, studded with islands, whose outlying reefs carded the waters into foam, while in the sky was reflected the soft blue of the sea.

We went on through dell and dingle, where intercepting boughs made sunny chequers on the green sward; on through mountain passes, where miniature cascades shook their loosened silver in the sun; on through thickets of flags and bamboos; and on through wide-reaching seas of verdure, till at last we sighted, from easy walking distance, the heaving ocean, flecked with constantly changing cloud-shadows, and glistening with the reflected radiance of the westering sun.

Casting her eye along the coast-line, Lolóma declared that she saw the chief town of the tribe to which she was vasu, though I could discern nothing but tree-tops. The name of the town, she said, was Ramáka, which means, “shining from a distance,” and its chief was the great Waikatakata whom she had visited three years previously.

I remembered the name Waikatakata. It was Hot-Water, whose people wished to make a hash of me, and from whom I had escaped in so marvellous a way, leaving my two companions, as I believed, to a terrible death. I knew, however, that on introducing myself as the husband of Lolóma, we should both be received with the honours due to vasus, and that the past would be entirely forgotten.

We made the shore line some two miles from the town. The sand was still luminous with the ebbed tide, and strewn with shells in glittering profusion. In one place these spoils of the ocean, were collected in a huge bank. When stirred with a stick, the shells ran down in rainbow streams. Lolóma gathered enough of vari-colored pieces for a new necklace, and I secured a magnificent orange cowrie, as a present for Waikatakata. As we threw ourselves down among the sea-born treasures of scarlet and gold, and yellow and saffron, which made a gorgeous mosaic pavement on the white sand, Lolóma’s shapely hands idly played with the brilliant shells, and a shade of sadness stole over her at the thought that we should soon be among strangers.

Towards evening we reached the outskirts of the town and intercepted a young slave, who told us that two white men were living with the chief, but he either could not or would not give us any particulars in regard to them. Could it be that an English ship had called there since the wreck of the Molly Asthore, and that I had missed the opportunity of returning to civilisation? Even if it were so, I felt at the moment that I hardly regretted it.

Our approach was duly heralded, and fitting preparations were made for the reception of the vasus. Once more I stood in the square fronting the chief’s house, where a year ago I had lain, bound hand and foot, and expecting immediate death. I thought of my unhappy companions, cut off in the prime of life, of the vile use to which their bodies had been converted, and of the probability that their friends and relatives would never learn their fate. At that moment what I took for two singularly light colored natives, wearing the ordinary malo, and naked otherwise, approached me.

“By all that’s wonderful,” said one of them.

“Jeerusalem! Tom Whimpy, is that you?” shrieked the other.

The recognition was mutual. To my infinite delight I saw before me in perfect health, Jacob Turner and Silas Cobb, the master and mate of the Molly Asthore, whom I had mourned as dead.

They had much to tell me of their adventures among the natives. I gathered from them in subsequent conversations that the body of the man who pursued me so closely after I had burst my fetters, and whom I had killed, was found and buried by his friends, and that the general opinion was that I had either died in the woods or been eaten by the kai tholos, or mountaineers.

The return to life of Turner and Cobb was more wonderful than my escape. It seemed that when they fell under the clubs, having good thick skulls, they were only stunned. On regaining consciousness, the cannibal oven was ready to receive them. They had been stripped, and were just about to be thrust in, when the captain, recalling his previous slight knowledge of the country, remembered the words of the prayer which is said by the priest, before the final act of sacrifice. The man who has used those words is sacred, and must not be eaten. He repeated the brief formula, and taught it to the mate who said it after him. They accordingly escaped death, and were adopted by the tribe, all of whom had behaved well to them since. Hot-Water had from the first desired that the white men should live, and the success of the ruse adopted gave him great pleasure.

As I entered the square with Lolóma and was formally presented to Hot-Water, who said he was glad I had come to join his tribe, I was no longer glared upon by a defiant crowd, but was waited upon by a cringing and obsequious populace. We were received with the homage due to vasus.

Two Matas[^[14]] were sent to us by the King, holding by either end a mat. They crawled up to us, and having spread the mat, we sat upon it. An official, whose rank was that of an ambassador, now shouted in a high key, the proper greeting, “Sa tiko!” (They sit.) “Sa tiko! Sa tiko! Sa tiko!” repeating the cry with increasing rapidity, and in descending tones for about a dozen times. Having rested long enough to recover breath, the man shouted again, “Sa tawa!” (Inhabited.) This was a compliment implied in the graceful insinuation that the place was empty before our arrival, but that it was now inhabited, the presence of such august personages being in itself security against social retrogression. “Sa tawa! Sa tawa!” was repeated many times quickly. Then half a dozen Matas advanced slowly towards us in sitting posture. When within a few feet of us, they bowed till their beards swept the ground. Rising, and clasping their beards with their hands, they cried, “Sa uru!” (Furled are your sails) “Sa uru! Woi! Woi!” Then they returned to the positions they had formerly occupied near their master.

[14]. Ambassadors.

I made a short speech to the chief, the people clapped their hands several times in the way peculiar to the Fijians, and the ceremony ended. Henceforth, this formal homage having been done us, we were honored guests, and at liberty to do almost as we chose. Such is the power of the vasu lévu, or great privileged.

CHAPTER XVII.
A CANOE VOYAGE.

Our life in the town of Ramáka was for a time very much as it had been in the valley of Tivóli, except that the inhabitants were of a more active and warlike character, and their amusements were often of a more robust nature, canoe-sailing on the open sea, which was often attended with danger, being especially a favorite pastime. There were also torchlight fishing excursions to the reef at low tide. These sporting parties were full of life and animation, and the women, who played a prominent part in them, found abundant opportunity on these occasions to indulge their taste for gossip and scandal.

After a time, we heard of what was going on in Turtle Town, in the valley of Tivóli, the news coming filtered through intervening tribes. It was known that Lolóma and I had taken up our abode in Ramáka, and it seemed that Bent-Axe, who had great influence with Big-Wind, was determined that war should be made upon our city of refuge. We learned that since our departure from the valley, my rival had not only rigidly abstained from the dance, but had kept the exact half of his great head of hair cropped to remind him of his revenge, and had taken an oath never to drink the milk of the cocoanut out of the shell until he had compassed the death of the papalangi who had robbed him of his bride.

There was a general belief in Ramáka that war was imminent, and the townspeople were desirous of being first in the field. The priest having been consulted, found that war was near at hand, for during the last thunderstorm the lightning split many trees; and fruit trees, long known as barren, had lately been seen with ripe fruit on them, a phenomenon never heard of before without its having been speedily followed by the beating of the war drums and the clash of arms.

It was well known that there were other white men living at the little island of Bau, under the protection of Naulivou.[^[15]] These white men were the first to introduce fire-arms into the country, and already, by virtue of this circumstance, the foundations of the future greatness of the kingdom of Bau had been laid. King Hot-Water was very anxious to obtain the aid of these white gods, or their weapons. Being very desirous of visiting Bau, which was two days sail by canoe from Ramáka, I undertook to accompany Hot-Water to that island, and assist him in the negotiation he had in view. We accordingly set sail one morning in Hot-Water’s best double canoe, with seventy natives as a retinue.

[15]. Grandfather of the late ex-King Thakombau.

A Fijian double canoe is a very wonderful piece of naval architecture. The single canoes are composed of two pieces hollowed out of the trunk of a tree, and joined together in the centre with marvellous exactness and security, considering the roughness of the Fijians’ tools, and that they have nothing stronger than sinnet to bind the wood with. The small single canoes, some of which are only 10 feet or 12 feet long, are propelled by sculling, but the large ones carry an immense mat sail. A double canoe is built by placing two large single canoes side by side, and bridging over the middle third of the hulk with a deck twice its own width, and raised on a deep plank built edgeways on each gunwale. The single canoe is balanced by a wooden frame or outrigger on one side, nearly as broad as the deck. All between the edge of the deck and the outrigger is open. The projecting ends of the canoe are boxed up, but the water washes in in the centre, and it is necessary when at sea to be constantly bailing.

In large canoes there is a house built on deck, with a sloping roof, under which the chief and the women of the party seek shelter in bad weather. The mat sail, which is very large in proportion to the canoe, is shaped something like a leg of mutton. It is hoisted on a mast by means of ropes, and when it is taken in, the mast comes down with it, and is laid horizontally on the deck. The mast is stepped in a chock at one end of the deck, and in order to ’bout ship it is necessary to unstep it and carry it to the other end, for the canoes cannot turn round. This is a very awkward arrangement, and men are often knocked overboard in unstepping the mast and attempting to carry it on their shoulders. If the man who has charge of the sheet does not slack away at once, when a sudden gust of wind takes the sail, the thama, or outrigger, is raised in the air, and the canoe capsizes; and unless the steersmen are careful to keep the sail on the weather side, the canoe will be swamped by the wind driving the sail against the mast, and forcing the outrigger under the water. The canoe is steered by a long oar, and when the sail is not up the vessel is propelled by vertical sculling, two men standing at one end of the deck and two at the other, throwing the full weight of their bodies on the sculls in a swinging motion from side to side.

The extreme length of one of these canoes is about 100 feet. A canoe that length would have a deck 46 feet long and 20 feet wide. The mast would be 62 feet high, the height from the keel to the house top 14 feet, and the draught of water 2 feet. Such a canoe would carry 100 persons and several tons of goods. The best of these canoes under a stiff breeze will travel over 10 miles an hour.

The construction of a canoe 60ft. or 70ft. long, occupies several years, and the completion of one is the occasion of great public rejoicings. It was the custom to launch new canoes upon the bodies of men used as rollers, and at every place which they visited upon their first voyage, fresh sacrifices took place, the victims being always eaten. The canoe builders are an hereditary caste, called “king’s carpenters.” These canoes, from their light draught of water, are well adapted to insular navigation, but they are not safe, for if a strong wind or heavy sea should suddenly arise, they become unmanageable, and are swamped. The natives never put to sea in them in bad weather, but they are often overtaken by it, and when out of swimming distance of the land, are drowned.

The little canoes used for inside reef passages and on the rivers, are extremely dangerous. The smallest jerk is sufficient to upset them. They do not sink, however, when this occurs, and the natives will sometimes, while supporting themselves in the water, bail a canoe out and right it. The duties in connection with the sailing of a canoe are not performed in a perfunctory manner. The sail is raised with a great shout; every manœuvre is executed with an accompaniment of laughter and singing, varied by playful addresses to the wind, while the scullers are also referred to in frequent expressions of thanks for their labours. Everyone exerts himself to make the whole affair a pleasure jaunt, and the labour is very much lightened by the jocoseness and good humour with which all the work is done.

We left the shore of Viti Lévu with a light breeze on a mildly ruffled sea. As the canoe, named the Marama, or Lady, gently made her liquid way, fresh headlands or islets came into view, and as we glided through the soft sunlight, we seemed to form a part of some magnificent mirage of a painter’s dream.

The Fijian sailors, like those of other countries, have their superstitions. When there is a calm they whistle to the wind, or say sweet things to it, using every art of verbal cajolery to lure it to their craft. The shark is one of their gods. By every sailor tribe he is regarded as a deadly enemy, and extraordinary efforts are made to propitiate him when at sea. When sailing in their canoes the people often throw him roots of kava, and make all sorts of covenants with him, promising that if they only get on shore again alive and well, they will treat him to a feast of fat things, and always be willing to give him the best they have without stint. With these and other fair promises, they comfort one another in times of danger, hoping all the while that their canoe may outride the storm; but if it should not, that the shark-god may have no power to touch them when swimming to land. The savage prowler of the deep is, however, but seldom satisfied with prayers, promises, or gifts from his fearing, and therefore worshipping, children, many of whom on their way to Hades, pass yearly through his horrible jaws. At certain seasons he is said to be more than usually wrathful and voracious. This is perhaps when tribes of smaller fish on which he loves to prey, frequent the bays, harbours, and rivers of the islands. At these times many natives are afraid to bathe in the sea till the shark’s priests have declared his anger to have cooled down. There are many wild traditions about this god, one of which is that should the king of the sharks, who is the greatest god among them, unfortunately happen to be near when a canoe is capsized, he will swallow the whole lot—men, ropes, paddles, oars, mast, spars, and canoe! “So,” says a priest, who may happen to be a passenger in a canoe that as yet is only in danger of capsizing, “Be very careful my brave tars, be very careful!” As he watches the labouring craft, he continues—“Bale away, boys! Stand by the sheet! Luff, luff! Steady! Be men! It is for your lives! Ah, that’s the way! Bravo! Bravo! Your wives and children are at home, looking for your return! The shark, the god of sharks is at hand!”

Various portions of the ocean are consecrated like the most sacred places on shore, and the greatest possible marks of respect are shown to the spirits of such waters by all sea-going people when sailing near or over them. When passing over these marine spirit abodes, the sailor must remove his turban, neck ornaments, and armlets, take his comb and “head-scratcher” out of his big head of hair, wash the paint from his face, give the groan or grunt of respect as to a high chief, and in every other way, however high his own rank may happen to be, make himself in all things of no account.

Nearing the capital of Naulivou’s kingdom, an exquisite panorama unfolded itself to our view. We were in the magic circle of a fairy ring of islands. The curious illusion of the mirage fell upon the scene. Headlands basked and glittered in the distance; lofty mountain cones hung in the air with their inverted images reflected below; sunny peaks were now draped with opalescent clouds, now flushed with purpling red, as we entered the realms of the enchanted land. It was a brilliantly radiating spectacle, seen through an undulating curtain of rosy muslin.

Our voyage to Bau was a highly successful one. Naulivou received us graciously, and promised a contingent of warriors with muskets for Turner, Cobb, and myself. Among the Europeans the old king had living with him, were Charles Savage, a Swedish sailor, who, having been wrecked in an American brig, was the first white man who landed in Fiji. Three of the others were convicts who had escaped in an open boat from New South Wales, and there were two English sailors who had run away from trading ships. They told me that an occasional sandalwood trafficker visited Bau, and that I should certainly before long get the opportunity of a passage to India or China if I wished it; for themselves, they were content to remain in the country. After a week’s feasting, Hot-Water set sail again for his home on the coast of Viti Lévu, it being understood that a party lent by our allies would follow in a few days.

The return voyage was begun under the most auspicious circumstances. Our huge mat sail was hoisted in the early morning. The lightly clouded East was marked with great crimson bars. Though there was wind enough to move our craft, the water was so smooth that every object was reflected in sharp outline, while the horizon glittered like a band of steel. Then the equable trade wind reached us, corrugating the sea with furrows as regular as those of a ploughed field. Not a breath seemed to be lost on the sensitive surface. This continued until we were in sight of Ramáka again.

Quite suddenly the whole aspect changed. Heavy dark clouds, charged with electricity, massed in mountainous folds to windward, a violent tropical squall bore down upon us, and the humid air became oppressively stifling. The sail was lowered with great difficulty before the full force of the wind reached us, but the deck-house had been loosened, and the canoe, which had been severely strained, labored helplessly in a cauldron-like sea, and was drifting at the mercy of the waves.

We were gradually nearing the land, however, and the water must get smooth as we progressed. In a short time the squall had passed, the dark pall was lifted from the Heavens, and the native sailors, who had been greatly alarmed, had begun to assume their wonted alacrity, when a sharp cry of terror from the bows of the canoe attracted the attention of all to that quarter. Two waterspouts, which seemed to be rapidly approaching us, were in full view. Many of the natives threw themselves down, covered their faces with their hands, and appeared to give up all hope.

The movement of these terrible columns was so rapid that there seemed to be no chance of escape. Waterspouts are formed by the sucking up of the foam of the waves by an aerial eddy, the water ascending with a whirling motion. Of the two magnificent objects before us, one seemed like a pillar supporting the clouds, and the other like an inverted cone connected with the clouds. The water at the base was terribly agitated. The aqueous cylinders appeared to be enveloped in a mist, caused by the action of the wind on the small particles of water, but the spiral twisting of the interior could be vaguely seen, and the action of these bodies was accompanied by a tempestuous sound which was awe-inspiring.

King Hot-Water disdained to show any fear of the monstrous apparition, but calmly divested himself of his personal adornments, metaphorically sat in sackcloth and ashes, and devoutly made the tama to his God. The crew were prostrate with terror. As the waterspouts approached, the snow-white flashes of foam became blinding. I abandoned all hope, and prepared myself for the end with such calmness as I could command. Casting a last shuddering glance towards the impending horror, I saw that by a slight change in their course, directed by the shifting wind, they would not overwhelm us. But already I felt the throbbing pulsation they imparted to the sea, and two great waves, which they raised in their passage by our bows, sundered the timbers of the ill-fated Marama. In a moment the whole company, men, women, and children, numbering 70 in all, were struggling in the cruel sea.

The turbulence of the waters soon subsided, and in a short time the shipwrecked party had the advantage of a comparatively smooth sea. The disaster had not been observed at Ramáka, and the wrecked canoe-load had no hope of reaching their homes except by swimming. The distance being only six miles, this was easy of accomplishment by the natives, but that which made the position so alarming was the well-known fact that this particular locality was infested by numbers of sharks of the most ravenous kind, against whose attacks the unhappy people knew they could not hope successfully to cope.

The King’s companions had no great love for him, but they feared him and his Government, and they knew that it would be as well to be eaten by a shark as to return home without him. The 69 unfortunates, including the women and children, accordingly formed themselves into a circle, having a diameter of about 60ft., round the King and myself, whom they regarded with superstitious reverence. As they swam, they shouted and splashed with their feet, until they produced the miniature resemblance of an annular reef endowed with locomotive powers. The King occupied the central space, and swam serenely on, in that diagonal, half-sitting posture in which Polynesians can get so comfortably through the water. I was a good swimmer, but had no hope of being able to support myself till we reached the shore. Hot-Water, however, was quite at his ease, and he told me to rest on his shoulder whenever I felt tired.

The shark is a timid creature in some respects, and His Majesty knew that no such monster would break through the charmed ring unless it should be one with tattoo marks on its belly, when it would be a god come to console him in his trouble, and show him an easier mode of deliverance. Feeling that he was of divine origin himself, it was only natural to his mind that some such incident should occur, and he thought that, whatever might happen to his attendants, the divinity which hedged him would preserve him at all hazards.

The villainous footpads of the sea, which give an especial terror to Polynesian waters, were not long in making their appearance. When the first straight back-fin appeared above the water, gliding steadily on, a howl of terror went up from the devoted band which surrounded the royal personage.

The sharks came prowling round, one or two at a time, occasionally thrusting out of the water their great brown shagreened heads, without daring to touch the ring. When they received a large accession of numbers and became bolder, they darted about, sometimes coming close up and then retreating, as though making a deliberate selection of some particular victim. Then they lingered near to the living fence, rubbing their cold, horny noses against the bare bodies of the Fijians, who yelled woefully, beseeching Dakuwaqa, their Neptune, to protect them. One of the children was the first sacrifice offered for the lives of the king and his white friend.

The taste of the blood which floated on the water at once aroused the dormant appetites of the sharks, and they made a terrific onslaught, never daring, however, to penetrate the circle. Their horrid rows of saw teeth now gleamed frequently in the sun, as they turned on their sides to bite. Some of the men were armed with bamboo knives, and fought boldly. When a shark turned on his side to make a good mouthful, these often gave him a fatal stab; but they were no match for an enemy so numerous and so insidious in their mode of attack.

The women and children were the first links missed from the chain. Then men began to drop out, but those who remained, constantly closed up, and preserved an unbroken circle round us, the onward motion never being stayed.

The sharks now surrounded the whole party, and feasted pretty much at will. When a man fell out, there was a lull in the attack until his body was devoured. But the appetites of these rapacious fishes seemed to grow by what they fed on. Many of the men who still swam on had lost a leg or an arm. The foam raised in beating the water to scare the sharks from penetrating the protecting band, was crimson with blood.

To those who now began to notice the strange appearance from the shore, however, the water had only that rose colour which it has in the tropics when thrown up between the sunlight and the spectator, and little attention was paid to a disturbance which might have been caused by a shoal of fish. Meanwhile the unhappy swimmers were in sight of their homes. They could see the stilted roots of the mangroves skirting their shores, the stony beach, the houses in the town, and the temples on the rising ground. To not a few of them it was a farewell glance. The remorseless monsters who had them at their command, ceased not their attentions, and with a despairing cry many poor fellows continued falling out of their places, notwithstanding their assiduity in shouting the tama to their god.

The chain was at length reduced to very narrow dimensions. It consisted of only 30 men, and Hot-Water was less easy in his mind than he had been, for there was another mile of swimming to be done before that blood-red circle could tinge the waters which rippled on the shores of Ramáka.

Assuming an upright position in the water, the King took off his turban. The long thin folds of fine white tapa were floated by the wind in the direction of the island. The waving cloth was seen, and at the same time the heads of the men in the water were discerned. A small canoe was speedily manned, and the 30 shipwrecked mariners with their chief and myself were taken on board and landed in safety.

The custom of the loloku was duly observed to propitiate the manes of the departed sailors. That night was one of wailing in Ramáka, for the households already desolated had each to give up a life in honour of the dead.

Had I been among the drowned, Lolóma would have been strangled in order that her spirit might accompany mine in the next world, where, according to the Fijian belief, it would have a variety of experiences in the various “circles” of Hades.

CHAPTER XVIII.
THE TEMPLE IS SET IN ORDER.

In the course of a few months, the interval having been employed in the valley of Tivóli in making preparations for war, ambassadors were received from King Big-Wind, at the instigation of Bent-Axe, demanding the restoration of Lolóma and myself. The reply was an emphatic refusal, Hot-Water being desirous of keeping all the white men who came within his influence about him; and it was understood on both sides that war was inevitable.

The time was now one of stirring interest to all the tribes under the dominion of Hot-Water. Every village and hamlet was on the move. The great chieftains and their warriors of all ranks, with blackened faces and ornamented clubs and spears, were in readiness to march for the enemy’s land. Their last offerings to the gods must, however, be first presented, and words of encouragement and blessing be received in return from the soothsaying and shaking priests.

The old temple of Ramáka was rebuilt to propitiate the deities. The frames of this spirit-house were composed of rough hardwood posts, chopped from the vesi, one of the most sacred trees in cannibal mythology. The rafters were made of lighter wood or bamboos, and the walls were reed-work. The roof was thatched with long grass; the interior was lined with a beautiful net of sinnet-work.

There were some singular ceremonies in connection with the erection of the temple, which only occupied a few days. When everything was ready for planting the first post, or, as we should say, “laying the foundation stone,” the priest took a bunch of cocoanuts, and shook them lustily over each hole that had been dug for the principal posts or pillars of the building. This shaking loosened some of the riper nuts from the stalk. The first hole into which a nut dropped was chosen for the first, or foundation post, which was thenceforward called the “god-pillar,” and the part of the temple where it stood was “holy ground”—a charmed spot, where the oracle delighted to dwell, and the priest to sleep and dream. It was in truth his sanctum sanctorum. There was a tradition in the tribe that on the erection of the first temple in Ramáka, living human bodies were put into the holes with the posts, and buried with them. It was a common practice to kill men for the occasion, and place them standing on their feet in the holes with the temple pillars.

When the edifice was ready for “opening,” or “consecration,” a fast of four days was proclaimed and strictly observed. While it lasted, work of every description, and conversation, as well as eating and drinking, were tabooed, and the large town remained as still and silent as death. At the end of the fourth day the silence was broken by the blast of trumpets and the roll of drums; the people burst forth from their houses as from so many graves, and gave themselves up to the wildest revelry. The night was kept awake with noise. The disturbed parrots in the trees hard by, joined in the chaos of sounds, which lasted till dawn, when, suddenly, the scene changed to one of hearty industry in preparing puddings, killing pigs, and making and heating ovens for a great feast. Four days of fasting had whetted the people’s appetites; their feelings may, therefore, be imagined, when they sat down to a dinner consisting of 200 pigs, and untold quantities of yams, taro, vegetable puddings, bananas, cocoanuts, &c.

The temple furniture was as sacred as the temple itself. The edifice contained a stone dressed up in white native cloth, on which libations were poured. A small “wooden-face,” or idol, a trumpet shell or two, some cups and bowls for the priest’s own use in kava-drinking,—a few wooden forks for eating human flesh with,—a rack for spears and clubs, which had taken part in some horrible tragedy, and, being defiled with blood, were regarded as god-favored arms, against which no enemy would be able to stand,—some turmeric and cocoanut oil, a few turbans, smoked and oiled,—a string or two of white cowrie shells,—a couple of wooden pillows, some ornamental mats on the floor, two or three bundles of new mats on the beams overhead for future use, and a few bleached skulls, together with a long strip of white native cloth, reaching from the roof to the floor, forming the path down which the god passes to enter the priest, concluded the inventory of the sacred utensils and trappings of the new temple.

Simple as were the temple, its furniture, and all its surroundings, the pretensions of the place and its inhabitant (the priest, Katonivére, which means basket for plots, or box-of-tricks) were by no means of a character in keeping. You could not become acquainted with the priest, whose scheming heart was a bottomless deep, or with the laws and superstitions of his abode, without feeling that you had got within the circle of darkness and mystery, hypocrisy, and spiritual jugglery.

Many were the prohibitions that guarded the place. No native dared to enter with his turban on. Women and children were not admitted. It was not a place for worshipping assemblies, and those who came on religious business with the priest sat down on the grass plot outside. No eating was permitted within the walls, except to the priest and a favored few. No animal that was believed to be the shrine[^[16]] of a god worshipped by any person serving the temple, was accepted as an offering. On entering, the visitor had to pass the threshold on his hands and knees, to show his respect for the place, its priest, and its god. If repairs were ordered, an offering of food was required by the gods before the workmen could begin their work. If anyone passing the temple pointed at it, if children played in front of it, if, in a word, anything at all was done which the priest had said was not to be done, the offender or offenders were sure to be punished sooner or later by cruel anathemas. The ban of the angry priest would rest upon the objects of his displeasure, not unfrequently till it had wrought its work of death.

[16]. Some Fijian gods dwell in objects both animate and inanimate, which, when so occupied, are called the shrine of the god.

One afternoon the bulk of the warrior bands were seated on and around the lawn in front of their god’s house. The usual gifts of food and whale’s teeth were presented and accepted according to the formal custom, and short speeches were made both by petitioners and petitioned. The war being a popular one, the priest’s address and invocation, offered in the same breath, were favourable and inspiriting to the soldiers.

Then the yangona or kava-drinking party was formed. The liquor being ready, the chief men gathered round to pay their respects to the spiritual powers, and to hear from the old man representing those powers, the various oracular sayings he had to deliver, the influence of all of which on the warrior was to make him sleep soundly on that, his last night at home, and dream of fighting and victory, of a safe and glorious return to his wives and children; of the pleasure of eating the unholy meal of human flesh, and, having washed the paint, and sweat, and dust of battle from his face, of the peaceful and still more victorious work of planting yams and sugar-cane.

The first bowl of kava was handed to the priest—Box-of-Tricks—that venerable and wily man, who had been oiled up for the occasion. The drink was quaffed by him to the last drop, and the vessel was returned to the cup-bearer amidst a great clapping of hands. Now came the moment of chief interest in listening to the deliverance of the people’s “guide, philosopher, and friend.”

With a whining, sing-song, and rapid utterance, old Box-of-Tricks spoke as follows:—“In the presence of our great chiefs, the chiefs of the land, the ‘Eyes-of-the-Country,’ the chiefs of tribes, the chiefs of towns great and small, in the presence of the ‘Strength-of-the-Country,’ the ‘Fruit-of-the-Screw-Pine,’ let me be bold to speak. Our land is in evil plight, my chiefs! We are at war with our enemies! You are going to fight! Go! Club the impudent foe and burn his towns! May the ‘Teeth-of-the-Yangona’ fight bravely, and all come back alive. May none of them be clubbed! May every arrow of the enemy fly wide of the mark! May the young men live and be strong to kill in the battle! May they beat back all our foes, spoil all their plots, and fill our ovens with flesh that the gods may have plenty to eat, and once more bring us peace and rest.”

Here, though somewhat exhausted by this mental effort, yet proceeding more rapidly than ever, and speaking as if he were the god he represented, the old priest, after referring to the offerings made and accepted, concluded with the cheering words:—“Hereby is my wrath appeased. I will no longer be angry with the Teeth-of-the-Yangona.” At which most gracious announcement the people shouted with remarkable emphasis “Mana endeena!” wonderful and true!

After a few more formalities, and a little more drinking, the ceremony concluded, and stern faces relaxed.

The “Eyes-of-the-Country” named by the priest are the ambassadors, who, as their name suggests, are supposed to be wide awake enough to see everything going on in and out of the land. They are universal spies, the bearers of royal messages to other tribes, clever mischief makers, and generally notorious for negotiating political affairs in any way but according to their instructions. In all fairness, however, it must be added that they were without doubt as a class, the first and only genuine orators in Cannibal-land. Three other poetical expressions used by Box-of-Tricks deserve a passing notice. They are the “Teeth-of-the-Yangona,” the “Fruit-of-the-Screw-Pine,” and the “Strength-of-the-Country.” These figures of speech mean the strong young men, and experienced warriors going forth in the conscious pride and might of their youth and manhood’s prime, to meet the foe. Young men are employed to masticate the kava-root, so that when put into water it may the more readily give out its intoxicating juices. These young men are therefore called the “Teeth-of-the-Yangona,” or the “kava-root chewers.” The best portion of the army is spoken of as the “Fruit-of-the-Screw-Pine” or Pandanus,—the most sacred and popular tree in the mythologies of Fiji. The fruit when ripe resembles the pine-apple, but is of a deeper and richer colour. Used by our cannibal orator, it represented the ripeness of manly strength, and was another name for the men whom he also called the “Strength-of-the-Land,” or as we should say, the “Flower of the Army.” The “plenty of flesh to eat” referred to, meant human flesh, the word used having no other signification.

CHAPTER XIX.
GRIM-VISAGED WAR.

At length the day of conflict arrived. The enemy had been seen clustering on the heights, two miles distant from Ramáka, the bolebole or public review of the soldiers had been held, and Hot-Water’s forces marched forth, led by their chief, redolent of oil, turmeric, and sandalwood preparations, and his great head of hair glistening like dew in the sunlight The priest bore before the host a sacred stone, which was said to have fallen from the sky, and was venerated and feared as a representative of the God of War. Hot-Water delivered a spirit-stirring harangue to his troops, in which he bid them roll on like the multitudinous sea, break on the enemy with the roar and irresistible force of ocean waves, and drive them to their fastnesses like the receding tide.

The head-dresses were of a most elaborate and grotesque kind. The Fijians exhaust their ingenuity in arranging striking coiffures. Sometimes the hair was black, sometimes white with lime obtained from the coral, or powdered ashes of the bread-fruit leaf, and sometimes marked with different shades of red. Many had their hair frizzed out with a comb till it resembled a wig 8 or 9 inches thick, being of an equal height at the top, back, and sides. I noticed one man with whitened hair from which black tufts arose in regular order. Another appeared to be enveloped in a thick hood. A third presented a wall-like front a few inches back from his forehead, the carving appearing to have been done on a solid substance. A fourth wore his hair in corded tassels behind; the hirsute ornamentation of a fifth took the form of tiers arranged with geometrical accuracy, while a sixth presented alternate cones and flat spaces. In short, the variety of styles was infinite, and these dandies were as vain of the figure they cut as any ball-room belle. There were faces painted in stripes, circles, and spots; faces like clowns, and faces with only a brilliantly red nose glaring from a wide surface of jet black. To produce these effects the seeds of the vermilion tree, charcoal, fungus, and coral lime are used. When the lime has been washed off, the hair is left a set tawny colour.

Big-Wind must have had under his command altogether 2,000 men, but they were not so well skilled in war as the redoubtable foes they had to meet. Hot-Water’s army did not number more than 1,500 effectives, but they had a tower of strength in their three white men, Turner, Cobb, and myself, each armed with a brown bess and 12 rounds of ammunition.

As we advanced up hill I thought of the following words which the warriors chanted the previous evening as a stimulus to the brave, and in ridicule of renegades:

Where is he our fearless hero,

He who led us forth so bravely?

Fall’n in battle, fall’n in charging,

Fall’n and dragged away to vict’ry.

Vict’ry found in burning oven!

Where is he, the coward turncoat?

He who ran at sight of foeman!

Ran ere ever glanced an arrow!

Ran with glee to tell his clansmen

How he bravely brought the message,

Bravely turned his back on fighting!

The first engagement took place on the wooded slope of a hill. Big-Wind’s picked men descended boldly from the crest to the attack. None of the combatants carried either shield or target. With their athletic figures and polished weapons glinting in the sun, they made an imposing and formidable appearance. Clubs were always directed against heads, and spears against the body. The conch-shell sounded the onset, and soon the wood rang with the clash of these lustily wielded weapons. Spears armed with the thorns of the sting-ray, were burst into shivers up to the very grasp, and sharp-edged clubs, sometimes thrown, and sometimes used like a battle-axe, were occasionally buried fast in the skulls at which they were aimed. I more than once distinguished the exquisitely symmetrical form of Big-Wind, his turban of white masi floating in the wind as he laid about him in the eddy and whirl of the fight, the markings on his painted skin shining like diamonds embossed upon a black velvet ground. I also saw Bent-Axe leading another wing of the attacking party in all the splendour of savage raiment, and with the habitual look of dissolute audacity on his ill-favoured visage.

The battle raged fiercely and without advantage to either side. A shout of exultation from the Tivóli people told us that they had been the first to secure a body, which was immediately tied with sinnet and carried off on a pole rove through the corpse. The obtaining of the first offering for the temple, was considered a good omen for Big-Wind. Believing that the tide of fortune was turning against him, Hot-Water called upon the white men to bring their foreign weapons into play.

The rattle of musketry was heard in the hills of Viti Lévu for the first time. The people saw the flash, heard the report, and soon learned that a terrible messenger of death was among them. Recognising me, they shouted that the Child of the Hurricane was a god after all, and that it was useless to attempt to prevail against the enemy for whom he fought.

Bent-Axe, the King’s Lieutenant, was furious when he found his soldiers deserting him. He reminded them that he was born in the daytime, and was therefore a great warrior; and, moreover, that he was invulnerable, not only against white men, but against gods, being the possessor of god-armour.

It will be as well to explain here that one of the most wonderful elfin tribes of Cannibal-land is a marine tribe, remarkable for two things—its population, which defies arithmetic, and the depth of mystery, which, as the Fijian imagines, inwraps it. Its people are a sort of demigods, known in many places as “Children of Water,” or “Water Babies.” Some of the poets and legend-mongers speak of them as the “People of the Plain,” and “God-soldiers,” i.e., soldiers, who, on great occasions, are specially favoured by the gods, and in their turn are able to help landsmen in their battles with their own species. They are believed to be more nearly related to gods than men; and the former, in consequence of that nearer relationship, have made them war-proof—living fortifications in fact—against which no weapon whatever can prevail. From this belief arose numbers of professional men who gave it forth to the world that they likewise were favoured with this close connexion with the gods, and had thereby gained possession of the grand secret by which any hero going out to meet his foe, might be so clothed with “god-armour,” as to cause arrows to glance aside, clubs to fall harmlessly, and spears to lose their piercing power.

Turner and Cobb blazed away, and the enemy rapidly melted in presence of the sulphurous charm. Bent-Axe, however, advanced, club in hand, to the spot where I stood, perfectly drunk with passion; his heavy brow was corrugated with anger; his large nostrils were distended, and fairly smoking; his eyeballs blazed red like a lighted coal when blown upon; and his foam-covered mouth wore a murderous and contemptuous grin.

I raised my musket, and called on him to surrender.

“When the shell of the giant-oyster shall have perished by reason of years, still will my hatred of you be hot,” roared the savage.

“The white man,” said I “is merciful. He knows his power, but does not wish to exercise it.”

“You are like the kaka,”[^[17]] tauntingly responded Bent-Axe, “you only speak to shout your own name.”

[17]. The onomatopoetic name for parrot in Fiji.

He swung his massive club aloft to fell me, and I discharged my weapon at his breast. When the smoke cleared away, the savage was gone, but his club lay at my feet, and it was stained with blood.

Big-Wind withdrew his forces behind a rampart of brushwood six feet thick, and his men, with renewed courage, waving long streamers from the battlements, shouted defiance to the foe. Under the direction of Hot-Water, a huge fascine of boughs and dried leaves tied together with sinnet, was constructed. His soldiers rolled it before them in the complete security of its shelter. When it reached the rampart, a light was applied. The fascine burst into flames, and in a few minutes the brushwood fence had disappeared with it. A volley from the white men’s muskets completed the discomfiture of the enemy.

The fortune of war was all with us. Hot-Water’s troops followed up their advantage, and a fearful scene of carnage ensued. The women of Ramáka came out to meet the victorious soldiers on their return, laden with hopelessly wounded prisoners and dead bodies. Nameless indignities were put upon the slain, and songs were chanted which will not bear translating.

In the impromptu triumphal chants, allusion was made to the men who had most distinguished themselves in the contest. I heard frequent reference to myself as the slayer of the redoubtable Bent-Axe, and also to the might of the white man’s matchless arms.

CHAPTER XX.
THE CANNIBAL BANQUET.

What Homer says of the Cyclops, and Herodotus of the Scythians, and what moreover we are loth to believe of the ancient Britons, must be written against the Fijians as matters of history unmixed with myth or poetic fiction. They were cannibals.

No cup was so highly prized by a Fiji chieftain for drinking the chiefly drink—kava—out of, as that made from a human skull, the value of which would be increased a hundred per cent. by its being the skull of his greatest enemy.

If there is any reason for doubting that the ancient Scots preferred a “ham of herdsman” to a piece of beef, or that Richard Coeur de Lion enjoyed a Saracen’s head more than a leg of pork, there is none whatever to doubt that to a Fijian’s taste there was nothing so delicious as the flesh of one of his countrymen, the more so if that countryman were in any sense his own or his country’s foe. And of the many desirable portions, there was none he so much longed for, or ate with such gusto, as the heart. Query? is it not highly probable that the passion of revenge when at its height of savage success, produces an effect on the conqueror’s appetite, whetting it to ungovernable sharpness, and giving it a keener relish for the flesh of the victim than could ever be felt under the influence of other passions? How else can we account for an act like that of Sir Ewan Cameron, who declared the flesh of an English trooper whom he had killed after a desperate struggle, to be the “sweetest morsel he had ever tasted?” or, for the deed of one of the French revolutionists, who ate the heart of the Princess Lamballe? or, for the still more horrible deeds of every day life in Cannibal-land?

Be this as it may, the acts themselves are unquestionable. No war, however insignificant, was ever waged without enemy eating enemy. The word in general use to express the practice, is a compound of two words, one of which means the “eating,” while the other adds to it the idea of reciprocity. The name of the vile thing, therefore, is the “eating-of-one-another,” even as by a similar compound the language tells how, in battle, the work of the soldiers is the “killing-of-one-another.”

Of the institutions peculiar to Fiji, cannibalism stood at the head. The revolting epithet to which the practice has given rise, has been, and will again be, applied in this work to this country of lovely isles, for the simple reason that no other country on the face of the earth so well deserves it. It would, however, be unfair to argue therefrom that the Fijian race ought in consequence to be placed in the lowest rank of the human family. So far from this being so, they are, when compared with some other uncivilised races not cannibal, a highly civilised people. Cannibalism amongst them is an evidence of that religious fanaticism which originated and perpetuated it, rather than of their own high or low position in the scale of uncivilised nations. It was a part of his religion for the Fijian to be a man-eater, whether his victims were slain in battle, or cast helpless shipwrecks on shore. This was but poor cheer for the experienced and noble swimmer to strike out boldly for dear life. Deprived of his canoe by the cruel storm, he had yet before him many a long furlong of rough sea; shoals of hungry sharks set on tearing him in pieces ere his feet could reach the strand; and last, and more to be dreaded than tempest, sea or sharks, men like himself, waiting to rob him of the life which, in spite of the leaden weight at his heart, he had struggled so hard to keep. As he wades feebly towards the land, he knows there is no hope, for he sees the smoke curling upwards from the oven that is ready to receive him, and he hears the voices of men coming from behind the bushes to greet him,—to slay and eat him; and he knows them to be impelled to the deed, not alone by a liking for human flesh, but also by the unsparing requirements of an inveterate religious superstition. That this was even so there is abundant evidence to prove. The names of gods, priests, and temples, as likewise the character and themes of various imprecations, prayers, benedictions, legends, songs, and witnesses of every description, lead to no other conclusion.

The clear connection of Fiji cannibalism with religion, discovers its relation to the cannibalism practised by the Goands of India, and the Aborigines of America, who believed that the eating of human flesh was a thing in which the gods delighted. Revenge, approved and even instigated by the gods, was the great motive power which enabled the Fijian to engage in the horrible work with zest and freedom from all conscience-pangs. While, however, revenge was in most instances the father of the thought to kill and eat, it should be borne in mind that in cases of shipwreck, revenge could have little or no part in the business, except in so far as it was mixed up in the belief of the eaters of the shipwrecked ones, which belief taught that the gods had taken revenge for offences committed by the castaway sailors.

It will thus appear that the cannibal of Fiji was rarely guilty of hunting up the innocent and those who never did him any wrong, merely to gratify his appetite for this kind of food. Such cannibalism may have been common enough among the Kookees of India, but was not so with Fijians.

Finally, whatever the immediate or remoter causes of individual acts of cannibalism may have been, this much seems clear, that the strength of the whole evil lay in the religious belief, propagated by the priests, encouraged by the poets, and practised by the chiefs and people, that it was an institution founded and patronized by the gods of Cannibal-land. The Fijian man-eater was taught from early childhood, that the gods would often punish a crime by forsaking the objects of their care, whether on the battle-field or the briny deep, and leaving them in the hands of other and strange gods, who, in war, were those of the enemy, and in shipwreck, those of the tribe on whose shores they were thrown. Everything of an untoward nature that happens to a man is, according to the Fijian’s creed, punishment for some known or unknown sin. It was, therefore, a most binding religious duty for the people to eat what the gods provided, seeing that by so doing they were at most, only willing instruments of punishment in the hands of incensed and dreadful spirits.

If in war the oven was the only grave for the fallen soldier, and in shipwreck the only life-boat for the castaway sailor, and this, moreover, by order of the gods, we need not be surprised at the countless works of darkness, for which these people, in many things the highest of uncivilised races, have made themselves notorious; for, what will not men do when goaded on by the irresistible force of religious superstition, and the conscientious belief that their religion not only sanctions, but also demands and sanctifies the deed?

It was now my lot to be the witness of a cannibal orgie, the abominations of which will never be erased from my memory.

An important preliminary to the feast was the convivial yangona or kava ring, in which the king and the leading chiefs joined. This intoxicating beverage, to which the Fijians are largely addicted, is an infusion of the root of the piper methysticum, which is chewed by young men or girls, and then strained through a handful of hibiscus fibres. A large bowl having been filled, the process being accompanied by some set ceremonies, the cup-bearer in a stooping attitude presented the first cup to the king. His Majesty passed it on to the priest, who poured a few drops as a libation on the sacred stone in his charge, called the Fallen-from-Heaven, which preceded the army in the last engagement.

There remained a large cocoanut bowl nearly full of the liquor, and Box-of-Tricks availed himself of the opportunity to show the young men how well he could quaff the draught without once removing the vessel from his lips. Taking the bowl in his hands he said: “This is the libation to the great temple. Know that the mind of all here is that thy people may live, and that the trees may bear abundant fruit. This is the first offering of thy children. May our land be established, and may the fish continue to rise up out of the sea. Then shall we live, and all those who plot against us be clubbed.”

Raising his voice to a sort of recitative, the priest continued his prayer:

“O ye gods whom now we honor,

Let your minds be undivided.

Give us treasure, life and pleasure.

Let our women and our children

In our houses live and prosper.

Sweep diseases from amongst us.

In the race with ev’ry evil,

Make the distance far between us.

Spare the hands that make your kava,

Spare the feet that carry water.[^[18]]

Lead our foes astray in fighting,

Lead them where our clubs may fell them.

O ye gods who once our chiefs were,

Break the teeth of evil speakers,

Headlong cast them into ditches;

Kill our foes, but spare thy servants.”

[18]. The women, who are the drawers of water.

When the priest finished drinking, all the company clapped their hands together quickly in time, ending abruptly with a loud shout, which was caught up by those outside the ring, and was carried to the most distant outskirt of the town.

This part of the ceremony reminded me of the scene in “Hamlet.”

“And let the kettle to the trumpet speak,

The trumpet to the cannoneer without,

The cannons to the Heavens, the Heavens to earth,

Now the king drinks to Hamlet.”

When the King drank, and those next of high rank in their proper order, the same formulas were observed. After each draught, the string of the kava bowl was always thrown towards the man next in rank, whose turn it now was. Each cup, which generally measured a pint and a half, was drained without pausing.

The male portion of the company entered the rara or square, in procession, with spears advanced, and strips of white masi flowing from them like pennons. They were headed by Hot-Water, whose appearance was magnificent. This comely savage was in the flower of his age, and he advanced with the proud step of a conqueror. His body was powdered a glossy jet, saving his face, which was painted in diamond patterns of the deepest red. He wore tortoise-shell armlets; his knees were bossed with colored grasses; his brow was adorned with a frontlet of scarlet cock’s feathers fixed on a palm leaf; and there lay on the upper portion of his breast a large boar’s tusk suspended from his neck by a cord braided from the ornamental tufts of hair taken from his deadliest foe’s head. His brawny shoulder sustained his favorite club, known as “The-Priest-is-Too-Late.” His train of native cloth, flowing from his waist, and borne by obsequious pages, was upwards of 100 yards in length. It was carried at the side of the following phalanx, and did not keep the warriors in the front rank more than a few yards apart from him.

Those who followed were in the proper order of precedence according to the laws of Fijian chivalry. First came kings and chiefs of large islands or districts; then chiefs of towns and districts, and ambassadors; next were distinguished warriors of lower birth than those who went before them, together with carpenters and chiefs of the turtle fishermen; then the kai sis or common people, the slaves captured in the war, and whose lives had been spared, bringing up the rear. The gay and glittering procession marched round the square, their heads a sea of waving tapa, and finally squatted on the turf in the form of a semi-circle. All the women in the district, arranged in the order of their rank, sat behind the men, having been waiting for the arrival of the procession. The ground having a slight ascent from the inner point of the semi-circle, the appearance presented was that of a crowded amphitheatre. Hot-Water occupied a post of honor, reclining on a heap of printed tapa, piled along a low platform. I was placed next the King, and drained the kava-bowl after him.

Lolóma sat with the king’s favorite wife on an elevated point at the right wing of the company. I was near her as a spectator, taking no part in the martial display. She was radiant with sunny smiles, her dark eyelashes quivering with delight in the spectacle, and her round limbs aglow with youthful blood and passionate life. As the wild barbaric music of conch-shells, bamboo pandean pipes, and wooden drums, awoke the echoes in the neighboring hills, I could not help wishing that this were a field of tourney in which all the bravery of the isle were about to contend; that Lolóma was the elected queen of love and beauty, crowning a noble spectacle by her presence, and whose delicate hand would award the palm of conquest; and that the blast of conch-shells which now pierced the air with its shrill sound were the bray of challenging trumpets from knights of princely mien, instead of the prelude to the ghastly formulas and the hideous banquet I was about to witness, the thought of which, notwithstanding that I had all a young man’s taste for the strange and horrible, filled me with loathing for the people by whom I was surrounded, and made me sick at heart. There was one drop of comfort in the debasing ordeal. Lolóma enjoyed the spectacle with a woman’s fondness for display, but she was not a cannibal. No member of her tribe ate human flesh, because the shrine of their god was human. She would take no part in the Saturnalian rites. She would do nothing that would revolt me.

Ovens on a large scale had been prepared. They were from 10 to 12ft. deep, and 60ft. in circumference. These receptacles having been filled with wood, large stones were laid in layers on the fuel, and were covered up until thoroughly heated. Then the joints of the human bodies were placed on the hot stones, and covered with leaves, a layer of earth enclosing all. While the process of cooking was proceeding, green baskets to carry the bokola were plaited; the vegetables to be eaten were boiled in earthen pots, and taro-paste and sauce were prepared.

The steam penetrating the covering of leaves and earth, showed that the cooking was done. The ovens were formally opened. The Tui Rara, or master of the feast, called out in order of precedence the names of the great personages to whom the meat was to be alloted, and their attendants received at his hands their several portions. When a portion was alloted to a distinguished chief, there was a loud shout from the multitude, followed by an approving clapping of hands. The sub-division of the meat to heads of families was made after the alloted parcels had been received at the hands of the Tui Rara.

There were 20 bodies prepared for the feast, all the seriously wounded prisoners having been killed to add to the number of the slain. These miserable remains, which had been subjected to every conceivable species of indignity, were formally presented at the temple, and accepted by the priest as a peace offering to his god. Then they were carried on slight hurdles (the head lolling on one side, and the legs dangling over the other) to the public square, and set up in a row in a sitting posture. Their faces were gaily painted with vermilion and soot, to give them a life-like appearance as in time of war.

Next a herald advanced in presence of the multitude, and touching each ghastly corpse in turn in a friendly way, the profoundest silence being preserved by the spectators, harangued it in a jocular manner, expressing his extreme regret at seeing such a fine fellow in so sorry a plight, asking if he did not feel ashamed of himself after his recent loud boasting from behind the fortress, and wondering why he should have ventured so far down the hill, unless it was to see his dear friends of Ramáka. Finally the herald addressed them in more excited strains, and wound up by knocking the bodies down like so many ninepins, amid shouts of laughter from the bystanders.

At length the corpses were ignominiously dragged into the shade of a clump of iron-wood trees which skirted the temple. A sacrificial stone marked the spot where hundreds of prisoners of war in past times had been killed, a heap of whitening skulls attesting their number.

Here the dissecting began. It was performed with sharpened shells and split bamboos by the dautava tamata, or cutter-up of men, who handled his instruments skilfully. The bodies having been disembowelled, and the head removed, the feet were cut off at the ancles, and the legs from the knees; the thighs were dissevered from the hip joints, the hands from the wrists; the fore arms were cut off at the elbows, and the shoulders were taken out of the sockets—the operator, who was watched with great interest by a crowd of onlookers, displaying no mean surgical skill. Each of these divisions was treated as a separate joint. Having been enclosed in green plantain leaves, the several pieces were placed in the oven. When the stones became red hot, green leaves were put on them to slacken the heat.

Some of the septs or families received their portion of the horrible repast on large wooden dishes covered with a cloth of fresh leaves. I noticed one dish 12 ft. long, 4ft. wide, and 3ft. deep. It would almost have held an ox roasted whole. Vast heaps of yams, and walls of taro and other vegetables had been prepared to accompany the meat. This portion of the feast alone must have weighed several tons. I noticed that several of the chiefs were linga tambu—not allowed to touch food with their hands for a certain time. These were fed by one of their wives, or a herald.

My attention was so particularly attracted to one blear-eyed old savage, who sat cross-legged, blinking demoniacally as he cleverly picked with his teeth the flesh from a human hand, that I asked his name. I was told that he was the head chief of a neighbouring town, who was known by the nickname of “Turtle Pond,” conferred upon him because of his enormous capacity for eating bokola. The turtle pond is a pool of water fenced or walled in to receive captured turtles, until the butcher is ready for them. This old reprobate was said to have eaten in his time 800 men, most of whose skulls formed a ghastly obelisk near his house. Truly, in Shaksperian phrase, “he was a man of an unbounded stomach.”

When the banquet was at its height, a sudden commotion and loud shouting in the direction from which the company had first entered the square, attracted my attention to that quarter. I saw that a procession had been formed, and that what appeared to be a chief of distinction was being borne aloft on a bamboo-litter by four men, while a large crowd circled round, dancing and singing in a high state of delight. The chief was in a sitting posture. His face was painted in four diamond shapes of alternate red and black; what I afterwards discovered to be a huge wig was upon his head; and he bore in his hand the well-known club of Bent-Axe, called “The Disperser,” which had so nearly sent me to my last account, and on which still remained the blood-stains I noticed when it fell at my feet. It was my enemy in full dress, sure enough. What could this mummery mean? Had he surrendered and made his peace with the tribe?

The procession approached me, and I gazed intently at the figure. I was within a few feet of it, and I now saw, horror of horrors! that there were cracks in the face like the fissures in the crackling of baked pork, and that the eyes had disappeared, their places being taken by a clumsy representation in paint and clay! The case was clear. Bent-Axe had been baked whole, and was now being paraded for the amusement of the company preparatory to being eaten! The great chief of yesterday was to-day a scapegoat in grimmest ironic symbol of revelry!

I turned away from the sickening spectacle. There was another wild tattoo beaten on the lali, followed by a shrill scream from the conch-shells, and I knew that the body was about to be divided as a bonne bouche for a few of the leading personages.

I learned afterwards that Bent-Axe was taken prisoner while trying to escape. The gunshot wound I inflicted on him made him an easy prey, however. He was put into the oven while still living.

At the close of the banquet there was a scramble among the common people for the shin bones, which are valued for sail needles. The debauch ended for the greater part of the company in a helpless lethargy, which it took them days to recover from. I was given to understand, however, that this carouse would always be treasured in their minds for all future time as a great and memorable feast, just as the participants in the brilliant tournament of feudal days rejoiced to remember “the gentle and joyous passage of arms at Ashby.”

As I moved away from the revolting picture, the western sky was still suffused with the sun’s last rays; a crimson haze illuminated the sylvan cloisters at the back of the town, and as the colour gradually faded from the gay dracænas and croton shrubs, and the innumerable laughing ripples of the sea made answer to the murmurings of the dreamy palms, I could not but wonder that a country which seemed suited by nature to be the abode of the highest forms of civilisation should be inhabited by a race of what I could only at that moment regard as the most debased and hopeless savages; nor could I help contrasting the magnificent pageant of the tranquil tropic evening, whose beauty is calculated to elevate the soul of man, with the horrible orgie of which I had just been a witness.

CHAPTER XXI.
A FISHING ADVENTURE.

High noon in the tropics! The giant bakas twist and flicker in the mirage, as though they were floating on the sultry air. The glaring slopes roll and welter in the sun, whose convex gleams build up the pearly dome of air. The landscape, viewed through the luminous atmosphere, is adorned with all the enchantments of colour. A hanging rock is clothed with luxuriant masses of the deeply blue clitoria. Tufts and rosy tassels flutter from the dilo trees, and showers of pink stamens illuminate the shadows cast by the boughs. The small grey-green leaflets of the sensitive plant contract in quivering circles over a rood of ground, as I set the nearest one in motion with my foot.

As the sun climbs to the zenith, a great silence reigns. There is a lull in the almost ceaseless buzz and chirp of insect life. The bronze lizards, with bright blue tails and sparkling diamond eyes, lie motionless with heads raised, gasping in the heated air. The coloured tree-snakes, which are hardly distinguishable from the foliage in which they seek their prey, ensconce themselves in cool leafy wrappings. The butterflies—the rare pale yellow, the small white silvery one resembling the silkworm moth, and the richly coloured dark beauty with spots on its wings like those in a peacock’s tail—which so bravely unfolded their charms to the morning sun, have retired from the mid-day glare, and are lying exhausted with outspread wings on glossy leaves. The cooing of the wood-pigeon and the ring-dove is hushed. The hardy hawk no longer skims the upper air. The parrots of splendid garb which animate and adorn the woods—the winged gems which illuminate the atmosphere at every turn—are lazily swinging in the sheltered foliage. The soil appears to undulate with the flickering exhalations of heat. The tree-ferns lean aside in langour. Not even the shrill trumpet of the mosquito is now heard.

The sun sinks towards the west, and soon the palpitating life of the tropics is in full flow again. The chorus of innumerable insects is deafening. Every tree, shrub, and blade of grass seems to live and to breathe at every pore. The great heart of Nature with its teeming life throbs around.

Lying lazily in the dark shadow of a bread-fruit tree, I watched through the veil of leaves the strange procession of cloud-forms, following their capricious imagery and their monstrous and curiously changing shapes. Lolóma, playing in the leafy folds of a shaddock tree which scented the neighborhood, was fancifully decorating herself with its fragrant flowers, which resemble the orange blossom. When I told her that was the bridal flower of English people, nothing would satisfy her but a full description of the wedding ceremonies of the kai papalangis. Disporting herself in the glories of a new parti-coloured liku, which shone like shot silk in the sun, she tripped lightly on the sward, courting my admiration of some fresh artistic arrangement of flowers. So the hours fled away with childish prattle, the dreamy melody of merry words, and the low soft laughter of perfect happiness.

When the sun had lost his power, the more vivid colours in the landscape died out, and were succeeded by rich purple tints, and the long woodland reaches assumed a tint of pale emerald beneath the indigo blue of the sky. Then the populace came out to amuse themselves with the sport of reed-throwing on the level turf, swimming in the surf on the coral beach, engaging in loud-voiced fishing parties, or searching the shell-strewn sand for decorative ornaments. There were bleaching on the sand, volutes, harps, marginelles, cones, and every variety of exquisitely colored shells, which, being daily washed by the sea, retained their beauty for a long time. The orange cowrie is here the costliest gift of the sea. This beautiful shell, once quite plentiful, is now extremely rare. Wading out to the reef, which separates the lagoon waters from the dark purple of the outer ocean, we enter on the wonderfully beautiful submarine rainbow produced by the sun gleaming on the sunken coral. The colors of the solar prism are marvellously blended. The parrot fishes which glide about—the tiny fishes of pale blue and bright green, with bands of black, white, and gold, and sky-blue collars, which dart in and out of the subaqueous growths—give an indescribable charm to the picture. It was Lolóma’s delight to watch her own supple reflection gleaming in these tranquil depths. She was bright as the sunshine, and wild as the sea-spray with which she sported. As she rose from the waves, her limbs glistening, after a dive in the surf, she was a veritable sea-nymph.

As the sun went down, the little town of Ramáka was enveloped in an ethereal golden mist, that rose from the water and the shore. The buildings floated on a lake of rose-hued radiance;—the mountaintops in the background, bathed in a brief flush of crimson, seemed to flicker with flame. When the great Eye of Day, as the Fijians poetically name the sun, was closed behind the watery horizon, the rosy cones of the hills faded to a duller hue. But soon the stars rushed out, for there is no twilight in the tropics; the moon illuminated the sea with long lines of rippling light; the reef, the ocean, the coral strand and the hills above, shone like a sparkling garland of jewels, and the long cool night was welcomed after the blazing heat of the day. Then the inhabitants gave themselves up to evening amusements, prominent among which were the fishing parties.

There were various methods adopted for catching fish. Fishhooks of wood, shell, or bone, were used; and sometimes the craftsmen relied on the glare of the torch made of bunches of dried reeds, when the finny spoils were to be secured by spearing. Occasionally fish were temporarily stupefied, and made easy of capture with the hand, by throwing into the water the pointed fruit of the vutu rakaraka, and the stem and leaves of the duvu ganga, which were also on some occasions drawn through the water by a long vine or creeper. The favourite method, however, was the construction of a fence of bark, leaves, and sticks, which enclosed the fish in the middle of the circle. The space in the middle was gradually contracted by hauling on both ends of the fence. Soon the space became so small that the fish were forced to jump over the barrier on every side. Then the fun commenced. Some caught the scaly creatures in their hands, others speared them, and not a few scooped them up in hand-nets. The babel of sounds with the shouting, prancing, splashing, and laughter which all this gave rise to, as the merry people gathered in the silvern harvest of the sea, it would be impossible to describe. Not infrequently a single canoe was brought into requisition in the sport. The frail skiff often got swamped in deep water. Nothing damaged, the occupants would jump out, and pressing down one end until the greater part of the water had run out, they let go suddenly; then swimming along by the side, they baled out the remainder and jumped in again.

But the most curious fishing incident is that of the arrival of the balolo—the Fijian whitebait season. The balolo is a strange annelidan, which comes into these waters regularly each November, just after the first quarter of the moon. Its periodical appearance is always predicted with unerring certainty. The worm-like creature, with its cylindrical jointed body, coloured green, red, brown, or white, is found floating on the surface in millions in the early morning. The water becomes thick with wriggling balolos, and they are scooped up by the hand. The Fijians carry their vermicelli away in leaves, and bake them in ovens, afterwards going in for a “diet of worms.”

I often joined in the fishing excursions. One evening, some hours after the sun had sunk like a globe of fire beyond the watery horizon, and the moon had risen high in the Heavens,—lured by the beauty of the silver-shining sea, I had remained out on the reef, unmindful that the prattling fishing parties had trooped home. Enchained by the magic beauty of the spectacle, and lulled by the monotonous booming of the heaving ocean, as it rolled against the great natural breakwater, I hardly noticed that the tide was rapidly coming in, and that the water on the highest point of the reef was already above my ancles. Turning shorewards, my right foot sunk into a depression in the coral formation, and I immediately felt that I was in the grip of a vice. My foot had entered the expanded jaws of an enormous clam-shell, which instantly shut upon it. These bi-valves, in shape like an oyster, have a terrible power of holding whatever comes within their grip, though I was not aware of it at the time. A good wrench failing to give me liberty, I stooped and sought to disengage my foot with my hand. I might as well have tried to tear a rock in two. The shell was firmly fixed in the coral, which seemed to have grown round it, and no mortal fingers could dislodge it from its position.

Now for the first time the desperate peril of my situation dawned upon me. I was paralysed for a few moments with the thought that entered my mind like a flash, that I had no chance of escape from death—a slow and lingering death—death in its most agonising form—dying by inches while in the full flow of health. My recent companions were all out of hail, the town was two miles distant, and I should remain bound to this rock till the flowing tide drowned me. The water rose with each succeeding wave, and chilled me with the terror of the prospect. I shouted aloud for help, though knowing none could come. My puny voice was lost in the hollow murmuring of the sea, as it rambled among the branching coral and cavernous ledges. Straggling members of the fishing parties were still visible a thousand yards from me, but they were rapidly widening the distance. Faint echoes of their jocund songs borne on the light wind, added another pang to the thought that I should never rejoin them. They would soon regain the town. I should probably not be missed for several hours, and then no one would know where to search for me. Even now, with the water up to my waist, and the sea breaking on the reef, I was not an object that could be discerned more than a few paces off.

A long roller passed over my head. When it receded, I remained shoulder-deep in the water. I shouted again, aimlessly. I tugged with desperation at the trap which held me, and sickened at the sense of the utter hopelessness of my position. I wondered how long I should live after it became a question of holding my breath while the waters passed over me. The feeling of fearful loneliness that crept over me was intensified by the wild uproar of the waves as they dashed upon the barrier, sounding in the broken spaces with a terrible bellowing and hissing, which seemed to my excited fancy demoniacally malignant, as though evil spirits were rejoicing in the prey so soon to be delivered up to them, and were now sporting around it with malicious glee. The moon threw down her soft light, striking with silvery sheen the familiar peaks and headlands, and lacing the sea with paths of glittering quicksilver. The stars were twinkling above like so many fireflies. The beauty of the night only added to my misery.

The level water reached to my chin. I strained my neck to keep it from gurgling in my throat. I shrieked again, and was answered by the deep moaning of the sea. A heavy bank of clouds sailed over the moon and obscured her light. There was nothing visible but the long stretch of dusky waters. My death, thought I, is near at hand, and my last moments are to be shrouded in pitying darkness. I could no longer bear the frightful situation. With a wild despairing cry, I closed my eyes, determined to end my life at once, and make no fresh struggle to keep my lips above the salt flood. My voice was answered by an excited question in Fijian: “Ah thava?” “What is that?” Could I be dreaming, or had I already passed into the world of spirits? I felt my head seized by a friendly hand, and then I sunk into unconsciousness.

Three men were poling along in their canoe from a point lower down the coast, to which they had been to fetch firewood, and the prow of the wanqua had almost run against me. These sailors took in the situation at once. Their long sharp-pointed poles were brought to bear in detaching the clam from the rock, one of their number sinking in the water and directing the operation with his hands. Then I was lifted into the canoe, the shell adhering bodily to my foot. I presently revived. After I had been deposited in the town, one half of the shell was pulverised by a hardwood club. The flesh on my ancle was a good deal torn by the frantic exertions I had made to free myself. I was not long in recovering from these injuries, but the incident itself made a lasting impression on me, and ever afterwards I was very careful about wandering on the reef alone.

CHAPTER XXII.
THE BIG FISH.

Half a mile from Ramáka, a small stream which had its source in the mountains found its way to the beach and discharged itself into the sea. The banks of this stream, within the tidal influence, were skirted with mangroves, an encroaching growth well fitted to secure a footing on the uncertain brink of the ocean. These strange semi-aquatic plants hold in their meshes a vast quantity of decaying animal and vegetable matter deposited by the tides, which alternately cover and uncover their roots and part of the trunks. The remains of dead leaves, molluscs, and sea-weed, ferment in the sun, forming a noisome mass in the black mud and ooze. The pendulous roots of the mangrove take the shape of loops and arches from 6 to 10ft. high, supporting the body of the tree. These mazy arcades and thickets maintain an unequal strife with the ocean, but the matted roots holding the soil, often promote the growth of land, and gradually appropriate portions of Neptune’s domain. The receding waters disclose an immense variety of festering life. Sea-urchins, crabs, and many nameless things struggle in the slime. Mussels, barnacles, and oysters, cling to the branches, passing half their time in the water and half out, as the tide flows and ebbs. Crabs and worms, sea-centipedes, and strange limbless forms, wriggle and scuttle together in the fierce sun, like maggots rioting in carrion. The sea-birds here find dainty banquets, and they love to visit these localities.

The banks of this stream had of late acquired an evil name. They were said to be haunted by an enormous fish, or marine monstrosity, which swallowed up men, women, and children who came within its reach. Those Fijians who had seen the creature, and had lived to tell the tale, were too terrified at the sight to be able to give anything like an accurate description. It was a fact that in the course of a few weeks, nine people who had gone to bathe in the river or draw water, had disappeared. It was believed that they had been gobbled up by what some called “the big fish,” and others a marine deity.

I determined to solve the mystery if possible; so one evening, wading through the mangrove swamp, I gained the shelter of a cavern which the sea had hollowed out of the rocky face of the rising shore, and there waited patiently for the appearance of the monster. That it was no myth was certain, for I saw in the ooze beneath the mangroves, the marks of dentated feet that belonged to some animal which was, I believed, unknown to me. As I sat in my dismal place of watching, the sombre bats, which figure in many a gruesome Fijian story, flapped their wings against me, giant nocturnal moths and beetles joined black Vesper’s pageant, and the melancholy hoot of the owl took part in the nightly revels. I could dimly see the flying foxes hanging by their unwebbed thumbs from creviced rocks, till it suited them to spread the umbrella-like membrane which covers their slim fingers, and dive into the sable night. Screeching sea-birds, just going to rest, mingled their hoarse voices with the sighing of the breakers near at hand, and the saddened tone of the wind as it sang through the crags and crannies of the rocks.

Presently I heard a rustling sound among the mangrove roots close by. The noise seemed to me like that of some creature whose scales rubbed against each other. Then there was a splash in the river, and all was silent. I stole cautiously from my hiding-place, and gained a position which commanded a view of the river’s banks for some short distance. In a few minutes there emerged from the stream a creature nearly 20 feet in length. It stretched itself, and remained motionless on the muddy bank. I saw it clearly in the bright light of the moon, which now emerged from a heavy pall of clouds which had long obscured it. There was no mistaking the creature—it was a crocodile. I was as much surprised as an English gentleman would be at finding his favourite trout stream filled with crocodiles, for they are as foreign to Fiji as to Great Britain. It was an inexplicable puzzle.

I made my way back to the town cautiously, and narrated my discovery. After I had told the leading chiefs assembled in Hot-Water’s house all I knew about crocodiles, which was that they were good swimmers, but could not turn very rapidly either in the water or on land, it was proposed that a man should be placed in the river as a bait, and that when the crocodile had seized him, a large party of Fijians should be at hand to kill it with their long spears. I would not consent, however, to the cruelty they wished to practice on a human being. It was eventually agreed that a rope of sinnet, with a running noose at the end, should be passed over the bough of a tree near the lurking place of the unwelcome visitor; that a man should sit in the loop where it trailed on the ground; that he should run off as soon as he had enticed the creature into the proper position; and that then 14 men, concealed at a distance, should haul on the rope, and hoist the crocodile into a secure position in which he could be killed at leisure. The trap was laid on the following day, and it answered admirably. No one volunteered to act as the bait, but a Fijian, being ordered by his chief to undertake the duty, discharged it with so much address that the moment the crocodile extended his jaws to seize him, he slipped away, and the noose was tightly drawn. When the crocodile, dangling helplessly from the tree, had been killed with spears, its body, which measured about 18ft. in length from the nose to the tip of the tail, was cut up, baked, and eaten, the bones being preserved for the making of spear-heads and needles.

The capture of the crocodile was made the occasion of a great holiday festival. The incident was witnessed from a distance by the greater part of the townspeople, and the wild shouts of delighted laughter which went up as the creature rose in the noose, struggling vainly, could have been heard a mile off. No other crocodile[^[19]] or alligator has ever been seen in Fiji. I believed until quite recently that this one had been drifted by currents from the East Indies. Explorations within the last year or two in New Britain and New Ireland, islands on the east coast of New Guinea, however, show that the rivers of those countries abound with alligators. It is therefore much more probable that the unwelcome visitor found its way from one of those islands. Had there been a pair of them, they would probably have succeeded in establishing their race in Fiji.

[19]. The destruction of a crocodile in Fiji about the beginning of the century is a well-attested fact.

CHAPTER XXIII.
THE DEATH OF HOT-WATER.

A week or so after the incident of the capture and death of the crocodile, Hot-Water, who had been in indifferent health for some time, was attacked by a violent cold, which settled on his chest, and it was apparent that he would not live long. One evening he sent for me to his house to say farewell. A large company were assembled, silently expecting his death. It was known that his end was very near, for the town had recently been enveloped in a dense fog, and there was an eclipse of the moon that night,—certain forerunners of the death of a great chief.

Hot-Water was greatly exhausted, but he raised himself as I entered the gloomy chamber, lighted only by the flickering flame of a wick floating in a pan of oil placed near the chief. Addressing the assemblage, though speaking with difficulty, he told them in symbolic language that as the musket and axe of the white man were truthful, so was his religion true—that as the foe fell before his firing and the tree before his chopping, so should fall their old religion smitten by the new and truthful one—that in a few more years they would set aside their gods of darkness and conform in many respects to the habits of the papalangis. Commending me to the protection of the tribe when he was gone, he lay back and became incapable of further speech.

Glancing round the company, I saw that these remarks had been received with anything but favour. It was well known that the King’s successor, his brother, Ratu Bolatha (ill-omened canoe), would be no friend to me for personal reasons; also, that he was opposed to the settlement of white men in the country, and the minor chiefs and people were preparing to follow the views of the new régime, under which white men would be regarded as no better than themselves, while I had always been looked upon as a sort of God.

On the following day I went to the King’s house, to enquire after Hot-Water again. Entering the building, I found the floor occupied by three groups of men and women, the middle figure of each group being held in a sitting posture and covered by a large veil of masi. On either side of each veiled figure there stood in line, seven or eight men, one company hauling against the other on a cord of sinnet passed twice round the neck of the central figure, which was in each case one of the old chief’s wives. All were motionless as wax figures. I had arrived during a strange hush—a haunted silence—it was the moment of death with the victims. Accustomed as I was to barbarous scenes, I could not but feel a thrill of horror. I was told that ten widows had now been strangled to accompany their lord to Hades.

Turning to the body of the King, I found, to my great surprise, that he was not dead. He raised his hand feebly and tried to speak, but without articulate utterance. At that moment the dolorous wail of two conch-shells, like a passing knell, published his death to the community. I remonstrated with the bystanders; they replied that his spirit was gone, and that he was dead;—his body might move, but that it did unconsciously. The body was already dressed for the grave. It was covered all over with a coat of black powder; the turban was secured by a chaplet of white cowries, and the flowing folds of a new sulu lay at the feet. An attendant approached, and laid in the hollow of the King’s arm his famous war club. It was an ushering in of Death with all the etiquette and observance of a punctilious court—a grim masquerading of the King of Terrors, in which there was no real sorrow or feeling displayed. And yet Hot-Water was a chief, distinguished by a few of the rarer Fijian virtues as well as by personal attractions.

At the sound of the conch-shells announcing the demise of the King, the chief priest turned towards the King elect and saluted him with the words “Peace, Sir, the King is dead; but his successor lives.” Then a loud flourish of trumpet-shells from the door of the royal residence informed the people that they owed allegiance to Bolatha, Tui Ramáka.

The bodies of the women, whose lives had been so cruelly sacrificed, were dressed in gala attire with vermilion powder spread on their faces and bosoms, as though they were being decked for the bride-bed rather than the grave. Then they were laid by the side of the dead chief. Visitors came in large parties to weep over the bodies, after the manner of the keening at an Irish wake. The corpses were watched during the night, the watchers singing a succession of dirges.

The burial of the late King was accompanied by many strange observances. The grave was lined with mats on which the bodies of the wives selected to accompany their husband to the spirit-world were laid, the King being placed on them. He had with him his club to help him in making his way through the difficulties which beset the paths of Hades. A strong man was also killed and buried with him in order that he might go before and hold the Fijian Cerberus when he attempted to prevent His Majesty from entering any of the spiritual Kingdoms. The old King was heard to moan after the soil had been heaped on him, but that was not regarded as a sign that his spirit was still in its earthly tenement, and the grave closed over him. The grave was only three feet deep, and its place was well indicated by the deceased’s long train of masi, some yards of which, being left above ground, were festooned on the branches of a neighbouring tree.

Many mourning ceremonies followed on the death of the King. His children prepared a feast in honor of his spirit, which was now to them a god, and made wreaths and necklaces of sweet-smelling flowers and leaves, which were called “garlands for the departing spirit.” Many near relations each cut off a finger, and the digits were stuck in rows along the eaves of the late King’s house. The coast, for several miles, was made tambu, which meant that no one might fish there. Vast groves of cocoanuts were also declared to be sacred. One mourning custom observed, called Vakavindiulo, “jumping-of-maggots,” was a public lamentation in which the mourners pictured to themselves the corruption which had taken place in the body of the departed, the fourth day after burial. Another was called the Vakandrendre, “causing-to-laugh.” It consisted in the performance of comic games to help the friends of the deceased to forget their grief.

At length the funeral banquetings were over, all necessary usages had been fully complied with, the old King was gathered to his fathers, and Ratu Bolatha reigned in his stead. The passing of the chiefdom into the hands of a ruler who was not friendly to the white man, would, I was fully aware, lead to disagreeable consequences to me. However, it was not in accordance with Fijian custom to do anything hurriedly, and I knew that I should have time to look about me. So I continued the even tenor of my way, secretly revolving in my mind, however, various methods of protecting myself from an impending blow.

CHAPTER XXIV.
A DISEMBODIED SPIRIT.

In the hope of keeping on good terms with the bete or priest, Box-of-Tricks, I called upon that sagacious individual, taking with me a suitable present—a necklace made of pieces of whales’ teeth, which were very valuable in Fiji, and equivalent to diamonds with us.

The Temple to which I directed my steps lay in the deep shadow of upas trees, from which the priests obtain a kind of poison for the sorcerer’s work. At the base of a huge vesi was the great sacrificial stone, indented with blows, which told of the many victims who had been there offered to the gods, and notches in the trunk of the tree accurately attested their number. The dark foliage of the upas trees shed a funereal gloom around, which well suited this weird spot. The grass seemed to have withered where the priest’s shadow fell.

I found the old man seated inside the Temple, his long white beard flowing over a table made of human bones. His glittering, snake-like eyes, rested upon fearful decorations which were the remnants of slain bodies; and one of his long bony hands clutched a skull used for drinking yangona. Strips of tapa trailing from the roof to the floor, forming veil-like curtains, were the steps down which the gods came when invoked by their powerful servant. It was impossible to enter this place of baleful emanations, with its sombre surroundings and sinister tenant, without an involuntary shudder. The occasional glimmer of the ocean, momentarily seen through the open door and thick leaves, was the only thing that recalled the mind from the supernatural to the natural.

I desired to discourse with the priest on the subject of our recent bereavement. I extolled the virtues and wisdom of the departed.

“Aye,” answered the ecclesiastic, “he was indeed a master of words and the salt of language. Capsized is the land we live in; capsized is our stricken country.”

At the same time his evil heart gave the lie to his words, for he was secretly pledged to the retrogressive policy of Bolatha, the banishment of white men, and the restoration of all the old heathen customs, some of which the dead chief had allowed to fall into desuetude.

“The noble Hot-Water,” continued Box-of-Tricks, “is in the land of shadows, now to dwell forever with immortals, for have I not seen him pass successfully through all the portals of Hades?”

Fixing his eyes straight before him, they assumed a strange dull glare, and the priest had evidently passed into the world of visions. He proceeded, speaking like one in a trance:

“Methinks I see great Hot-Water now, with chiefly bearing, in his habit as he lived. He is at the Place-of-Dying, overlooking the sea, where the human spirits of our tribe take their departure for the other world. See! He is looking with his large earnest eyes towards the beach just in front of the village! His gaze is fixed upon his favorite canoe, drawn up on the sand and partly shaded by that clump of palms. Day after day, for a week or more, he has come to look at that little craft, the father of delightful reminiscences to him. Hark! He speaks! He is saying to himself ‘Oh, that canoe! Why don’t they put it on my grave! Oh, that fast little sailer! If it were only here, shouldn’t I be able to hoist sail, and away to those who await my coming!’ But, alas! his friends have been unmindful of their duty. The spirit of the canoe cannot therefore depart to its late owner and captain, who must now proceed on the inevitable submarine passage as best he may.

“Now he takes the dreadful dive into the Great Passage. The waters have not overwhelmed him—he emerges in the Place of Refuge. I see him with other spirits at the Face-Washing-Water, where they are washed with boiling water, which removes their outward and worldly appearance. One of Hot-Water’s companions is a bachelor. May the gods befriend him! This is no place for single spirits. Already the officers of the place are putting him under a large rock which will press him as a beetle is pressed under the foot of mortals! Bear up, brave heart! The utmost limit of thy fortitude must be fully ascertained by those who are now thy spiritual chiefs. According to thy endurance and chiefly bearing under trial shall their future treatment of thee be.

“Behold, a beautiful tree appears in view. Have a care, good spirits, for here lurks a grim monster, the King of the state you are now traversing. The lake hard by is the Face-Washing-Water. Speed on, but beware the fence guarded by King Spirit-Smiter. Dash on bravely now, and heed not the ghostly figure, or dreadful will be your doom. On, great Hot-Water presses, with club upraised—the spirit of the very club he used in the wars of earth, and which his weeping friends put into his hands just as he was coming away. Uplifted also is the club of the great Smiter; and now, crash! crash! crash! To right and left flies the flimsy fence. Well done, great chief. The horrible Smiter’s hands are paralysed, and he himself stands aside in blank wonderment at the uncommon daring of the hero, whose spirit, he now sees, is that of no ordinary child of earth, but one of the bravest of the brave.

“Now the great chief looks seaward, expecting some one from out the briny deep from which he himself but lately emerged. He pauses in front of a screw-pine, and throws whales’ teeth at it. Once, twice, three times, twenty times! and struck the mark ten times! He has twenty wives, and ten of them are being strangled that they may have the privilege of accompanying their lord through all the kingdoms of this mysterious world. How the prospect has lifted the cloud which a few minutes ago rested on his chiefly features! How quickly now he turns with cheerful face and beaming eye towards the beach, remarking as he does so, ‘They cannot be long in coming! They will soon be here!’ True, indeed. Even as he speaks, the ten wives arrive by the old and well-beaten submarine road. The water is dripping from their hair, and the mark of the strangling cord is still about their necks, which, but yesterday, sweet-smelling flowers bedecked. Oh! beneficent customs of our fatherland, long may they survive, and may the people never turn from the instructions of their priests.

“Again, I see Hot-Water in the Third State. Being a man of arms, he bears a club upon his shoulder. Here the country is well planted with food for the benefit of new arrivals. Hot-Water was not cut off untimely, for see! his bananas in Hades are ripe. Yonder wretched spirit is that of a poor man who committed suicide in his youth, and he is obliged to live on green fruit.

“Hark! Do you not hear sounds as from a multitude of voices chanting. We are in the Fourth State of the Spirit-World—the Land of Song. The great King of the country is also its music-master. There is no place so joyous and gleesome as this. Great Hot-Water seems himself again. His moonlight nights are all come back to him, and he enjoys them as heartily as he used to do in the old world.

“Slowly and reluctantly the spirits are gliding away to the Fifth State. Their eyes are drooping and fireless, and their faces are pale with the paint of Death, who, for the fifth time, is already touching them with his icy hand. Even now they are in the country where reigns and rules with iron will the hideous despot, King Back-Chopper. The song is hushed, and the dance is done. No more are there any sweet-smelling flowers, or cool breezes, or moonlight walks under the village trees! Nothing but the awful King, stalking abroad to chop, with his spiritual tomahawk, the backs of his spiritual subjects! Hot-Water bears the torture bravely. He knows that it cannot last for ever, and that with none but himself to thank, King Back-Chopper has hourly to behold, to his infinite chagrin, spirits whom he has long victimised, bolting at last through the very gate of which he is himself the porter, to

“The Sixth and Last State—‘the Place-of-Everlasting-Standing.’ Hot-Water is in the land of shadows. I see his noble spirit moving through space in the care of the gods. It is enough. Great is Dengeh, and the priests are his prophets.”

I learned from this semi-visionary deliverance of the wily Box-of-Tricks more than I had ever known before of the future state the Fijians believe in. The old priest was now too excited to talk to me on any other subject, so I left him to his mummeries.

CHAPTER XXV.
THE SPIRIT-WORLD.

To while away idle hours, I had many conversations with the old priest on the subject of the religion of his countrymen. The cannibal, I found from him, as, indeed I had had many previous opportunities of observing, was a most fanatical believer in spirits and the spirit-world. His creed taught him that everything in nature and art was a duality in unity. In other words, that everything had two kinds of life, physical and spiritual. These two were but one in this visible existence, but at death the physical nature returned to earth, while the spiritual, retaining the form of the physical, lived on in another world. According to this teaching, animals, plants, stones, and in brief, all things in creation, and every work of man’s hand, had inner and spiritual selves. And just as there were starting places and paths for human spirits bound from this world to another, so also were there the same conveniences for the spirits of pigs, rats, snakes, bananas, taro, yams, canoes, clubs, spears, etc.

The Hades of the cannibal is both physical and spiritual, but its physical character is so only in appearance. The spirit of the body goes to the other world, retaining the likeness of the living man in an impalpable form. This belief has sometimes proved a stumbling-block to Fijians, particularly the older men, in their attempts to become acquainted with one of the main doctrines of the Christian religion. When examining candidates for baptism, missionaries have frequently been struck with the answer to their question, “Do you believe in the resurrection?” “Yes, I believe that my spirit will rise from the grave, and that my body will go to ruin.” The cannibal had no notion of a resurrection of the body until he learned it from Christianity. But he was no materialist, for he not only held that every material thing had a spirit of its own, but that when done with in this world, it would send to the invisible one its spiritual counterpart.

As departed spirits approach the shores of the new land, they are not unfrequently met by kindred spirits who have gone before. Among the first things which these friends are anxious to learn from the fresh arrivals, is the cause of separation between their spirits and their bodies. Was it the weakness of old age, the diseases of childhood, an epidemic, the wreck of a canoe, the wrath of a chief, the club of an assassin, the spear of a foe in fight, or a wilful leap from a precipice? The persons thus met, and greeted with earnest enquiries like these, are generally of some standing in society. No one takes any interest in the spirits of serfs. They have to tramp the weary road to the hidden country all alone, and introduce themselves on reaching it. Their liberated spirits pass into Hades to be again crushed with heavy burdens—to be tried and persecuted in a thousand ways, to be slain over and over again, and driven to other “states,”—but only to go through like trials, and be for ever hammered about for the sole crime of not being chiefs.

The spirit-world of the cannibal, as revealed to us in his mythologies, is certainly a very wonderful one. It is a vast country in the interior and on the outside of our earth. That it begins on the surface there is no doubt, but how far down its boundaries reach has not been determined. There are not fewer than six provinces or states. Dante would call these divisions of the spirit-world, “circles.” To be nearer the Fijian’s idea, it is better to regard them as lands or countries, which, if we saw them, we should look upon as duplicates of the islands forming the Fiji group. The future life of human spirits is occupied in travelling through all these states; the last of which, in the course of ages, admits the wandering ones to an unmistakeable immortality; or, if that be too much for them, to a kind of half-and-half annihilation, the true nature of which the philosophers of this religion have failed to explain. Each of these spiritual states is inhabited by aboriginal spirits, the real owners of the spiritual soil, who are governed by a king or great chieftain. In poetry the aborigines are spoken of as “the people who sprung up in Hades,” or “the people who arose out of the taro-beds of Hades.” Immigrants from earth have to be very careful that they respect the people and laws, and obey the chiefs of these mysterious realms. There is in each state a class of aboriginal chiefs called “Ambassadors to Earth.” Their duty is one of the utmost importance. They are expected to keep open communication with mortals, to whom they are required to make known the excellencies of the spirit-world, and the character of its government. We will now enter the region itself, and with the reader and our cannibal guides, pass at a good walking-pace through each of its six divisions.

The first of these is on the earth’s surface, and in the air about us. It is named the “Place of Dying.” It is the locality and its neighborhood where a human spirit leaves the body at death. For the convenience, as it would appear, of being able to think of the departed, congregated in one or two spots instead of in many, each village in Fiji has its one or two “Places of Dying” in or near it. Such a place may be regarded as the spirit-village of the real and visible one. At death, spirits go to this place and abide there for a season. It is from this sacred and most dreaded waiting place, that they watch the movements of the living; observe how they grieve at their bereavement, and how they show their grief by fulfilling all funeral rites and ceremonies.

The spirit does not take its departure till after some flitting and fluttering around old scenes,—as though, like the butterfly just burst forth from its cocoon, and taking short flights to prepare itself for greater efforts, he were anxious by shaking off the stiffness of his bodily life to be ready for some grand achievement. With some spirits the object of thus waiting about is to fall in with other spirits, whose company will lessen the dreariness of the untravelled way. Company is a delightful thing to the cannibal, whether his road lie on this or the other side of the dividing line between the two worlds. When spirits prefer remaining for kindred spirits, they must keep themselves well employed in the meantime. The spirits of old men take great pleasure in plaiting sinnet. The art they know so well in this world will not be forgotten in the other. The spirits of houses, canoes, &c., must be tied with spiritual sinnet; the demand for workmen will therefore never cease. But the day comes, sooner or later, when there can be no more lingering of departed spirits near the dear old village, with its groves of cocoanut palms and bread-fruit trees. The dreadful dive must be taken, and every spiritual shark and other enemy infesting the watery way, be fought and overcome, or the second state of the cannibal’s Hades will never be reached. The said dive is mostly made after rough and smooth journeys of various distances by land, to some place on the sea coast, or to islands and reefs near it. These places, whence the spirits start for a new sphere, are known by different names, more or less appropriate, as the “Leaf,” the “Bath,” the “Distant Reef,” “the Great Passage,” &c. It was strongly asserted, and by many almost as stoutly believed, that spirit-canoes used to arrive at these stations, to convey the spirits of great chieftains to the spirit-shore. But whether passengers by canoes, or brave swimmers trusting solely to the might of their own spiritual muscles, all, or nearly all, come up in due time on the beach leading to the grand entrance of the second state.

This may be known as the “Rocks” or “Place of Refuge.” It is on the western end of Vanua Levu. Here is the universal gathering place—the much talked of rendezvous of human spirits. It is from here that, after numerous crucial tests, the spiritual immigrants are permitted to pass on to further trials, hardships, and pleasures. That company of spirits you see yonder, coming from the beach, is a party of warriors whose bodies not long since licked the dust. The war-paint is still upon them, and in their present condition they cannot be allowed to proceed much further. No newly-arrived spirit can, until he has been exhibited four successive days to the aboriginal dwellers. Their exhibition over, they are removed to a place called the “Face-Washing-Water,” where they are washed with boiling water, which removes their outward and worldly appearance,—the very epidermis of their spirits,—after which their true spiritual skin shines forth. But here comes a spirit who has evidently had some attention given to his toilette de mort ere he came here. He will surely pass without the application of boiling water. Perhaps! but he has to find a lake somewhere in this neighbourhood called “Reflecting-Water,” which is the great looking-glass for spirits. If the oil, turmeric, and sandalwood preparations, with other cosmetics used upon him by his mourning friends for the purpose of improving his make-up and rendering his personal appearance as perfect as possible, shall be seen in this mirror to have effected that most desirable object, well and good; he shall pass without having to submit to the scalding trial experienced by the soldiers; but if not, why then there is nothing for him but the “Face-Washing-Water,” which will not fail to wash out every trace of the art known in other parts of the world as Madame Rachel’s, and, by a virtue and process peculiar to itself, make him “beautiful for ever.” Now there enters the spirit of a bachelor, who is much to be pitied, not so much because of his “single blessedness” when in the world, as for the long and intensely painful solitude that is before him, not to speak of other miseries, which, see! are already beginning! The officers of the place are putting him under a huge rock, which will press him as a cheese is pressed. He has but lately shuffled off his mortal coil, and, judging from our limited knowledge and experience, it seems not unlikely that this process will make him shuffle off his spiritual one. Honours are heaped upon the married, but the unmarried are greeted from all sides with the taunting words, “Most miserable of men!” Old maids receive no better treatment. If it could be avoided, it should at any expense, for this is no place for spinsters and bachelors. Let the living take timely warning, and never venture here, if men, without their “better halves;” if, women, without the sign of marriage, viz.: the absence in their hair of certain curls or locks, which will exempt them from these tortures. The laws of cannibal-land and its spirit-world are very plain on this important business. He is no hero who has not a wife, and but a very little one who has not many. No more is a woman a heroine who has not a husband, or who has more than one.

Let us now seek the shade of that beautiful tree, which, of course, is a spiritual one, for we are still in spirit-land, where things and people of every name and character are but

“Shadows vain!

Except in outward semblance.”

A grim monster abides in the vicinity of this tree. He is an aboriginal spirit, and the King of the state. That lake hard by is the Face-Washing-Water; and there, coming along the narrow path by that clump of banana trees, is a stranger with blackened face. He is making for the lake, but there is in his way a fence well guarded by the King, whose title of office for this particular duty is “Spirit-Smiter.” Our friend will not be able to pass him without a challenge. But if he be a chieftain of high rank, he may succeed in dashing bravely through the fence in spite of its ghastly guardian. If, on the contrary, he be a man of low degree, a turncoat or a coward, or one of the “uncircumcised,” he will make for the woods to avoid the hurdles and their awful guard, even as Bunyan’s pilgrim turned aside into “Bye-path Meadow,” to escape the roughness of the right road. Woe betide the poor wretch if the “Clubber” or any of his tribe catch him anywhere out there. He will be eaten by the cannibal aborigines of the state as sure as he is a spirit. On, the warrior presses, wielding his club right dexterously. The fence is smashed, and the Smiter is vanquished. Had the dreaded Spirit-Smiter prevailed, instead of the glorious son of Mars, the inhabitants of Fiji would have been made aware of the melancholy event by a great calm, which to them is always a sign that the Smiter has smitten a spirit.

The spirit of another man is busily picking up stones to throw at the fruit of a screw-pine, standing some 40 or 50 yards from his right hand. Count the stones as he throws them, and you will learn both the number of his widows and how many of them are being strangled and hurried off with the utmost despatch to follow and wait upon their lord throughout his future career in the land of spirits. Unfortunate wretch! He has thrown ten times, and never once hit the object of his aim. He left ten wives behind, not one of whom is coming to alleviate the miseries of his solitude, in whose face he discovers no charms; and he therefore sits down to moan and howl over his lonely and pitiful lot, or to address himself upbraidingly to his yet unstrangled wives, and their thoughtless and hardhearted friends. “Oh, I am weary of waiting here,” he exclaims. “Once I was weary with collecting many riches for you and your kinsfolk, and this is their love to me for all my pains.” The state of morals among his countrymen is growing worse and worse. The greatest and most dearly cherished institutions of the land are falling into neglect; and so this disconsolate spirit has nothing before him but wailing and weeping to tramp his lonely way.

But here is another spirit of far more chiefly bearing than the last. He is too rich to throw stones at the screw-pine, and uses whales’ teeth instead. Out of 20 shots he has struck the mark 7 times. He has 20 wives, and 7 of them are being strangled, that they may have the unspeakable privilege of accompanying their lord through all the kingdoms of this mysterious world.

The love of cannibal women for their husbands was not the outcome of the heart’s deepest and tenderest affections, but a compound made up of one part of something akin to love, and nine parts of fear; the whole leading to a hero-worship which enslaved both body and mind here and spirit hereafter. While he lived, the woman was the hero’s beast of burden, not his loving or beloved companion; and when he died the mesmeric power of his tyrannic will, sweeping once more over and through her spirit, like the last and fiercest gust of a hurricane, bent all her nature to one idea, which, inspired by superstition, led her to court death for his sake.

“But still they come!

Such a long train of spirits, I should ne’er

Have thought that death so many had despoil’d.”

Some in the crowd have never had their ears bored; their future life will in consequence be one of much misery. An officer, whose duty it is to punish such unprepared immigrants, will presently come along, and, piercing every unbored ear with his ponderous spear, will thrust into the hole thus made the heavy log of wood from 2 to 3 yards long, used by the women of Fiji for beating native cloth or tapa on. The merciless judge condemns each offender to carry this burden in his ear forever; i.e., during the unknown period of his stay in this state. How great must be the necessity for having one’s ears bored while in this life. Men used to bore the lobes of their ears, and stretch them so much afterwards, that in the course of a few years they would hang dangling on their shoulders.

State the Third, like all the other States, has its “Spirit-Smiter,” who is distinguished by peculiar and special characteristics of his own. He of this State is its King. It is said that he keeps a cock which crows without fail on the approach of a human spirit. When once the Smiter strikes with his club, the effect is as though the very bones of the smitten child of earth crumbled away from his less material substance. This bone dust, the old dogmas tell us, is saved, and afterwards passed forward to another state in the Cannibal Hades, where it serves as fuel for the household fires of that country. The most remarkable feature of spiritual existence here, is that each earth-born spirit carries about with him an appropriate mark by which the work he was most distinguished for before leaving the body is published to all who meet him. The spirit now passing up the hill to the right was a great yam-planter, for his forehead bears upon it the figure of a yam. On another you will see the impress of sugar-cane, or bread-fruit, or taro, or whatever sort of vegetable he was in the habit of cultivating most abundantly. Here and there we shall meet some fine old men having their foreheads branded with figures of various vegetables, and carrying fire-sticks in their hands. They were men reported in their day as noted planters, the real producers of their country’s wealth—men who would not let the tall reeds grow where the yam-vine ought to creep, for want of fire to burn them off the ground. It is one of the first duties of the chief of this state to see that his country is well planted for the benefit of expected arrivals from earth. He has gardens for the spirit of each inhabitant of Fiji. The disembodied spirit on arrival hurries away to the banana plantation. Should no ripe bananas be found, he will have to put up with unripe ones; whence it will be known by the people of the place that he left the earth before his time. If he committed suicide, or was drowned or murdered, or if in any other unnatural way he met his death, his friends will say, “He died before his bananas in Hades were ripe.”

Sounds of music strike upon the ear. We are in the Fourth State—the land of song. The subjects of this mirthful state, sing again and again the natural songs of the aboriginal race without weariness. It were well if they could abide here for ever. But the spirit-world of the cannibal is too like his old one, for that, in its countless alternations between pleasure and pain. There are some even now, whose time being up, are gliding away to the Fifth State.

The indescribable delights they so lately experienced are in this state all unknown. Death comes at last to their relief, and grim King Back-Chopper loses his prey. Spirits whom he has long tortured are hourly escaping him and passing to the Sixth and Last State, which is known in the old legends as “The-Place-of-Everlasting-Standing.”

Here, for ever, the spirits remain in a standing posture. They may never walk, sit, or lie down. It is the state of upright, motionless, absolute immortality, for every spirit that can bear it. But restless spirits who hate so monotonous and statue-like a life, are taken in hand by the King of the realm, and reduced to something akin to annihilation! Hence, perhaps, the opinion that chiefs alone are heirs of immortality; all others being unable to pass the trials which thicken around them, in the several states through which we have hastened our tour of inspection. If, however, they should succeed in outliving the dangers and deaths encountered there, they can surely never survive the last and greatest test of all, with which King Lothea never fails to try every spirit that comes within the circle of his jurisdiction. All who cannot stand, Fakir-like, for ever, and without any sign of unrest or discontent whatsoever, must at last submit to have their spiritual legs taken from under them. Every leg thus removed is forthwith converted into spiritual mould, for the spiritual taro-beds of the great Spirit-King. The annihilation here indicated is, to say the most, but very partial; for, if nothing but the extremities of human spirits are destroyed, we may safely infer that our cannibal philosopher’s doctrine of annihilation is one of milder form than that contended for by learned “destructionists” of other lands.

I have now gone the round of the “Circles,” having faithfully followed my native guides into the very heart of the land of shadows and out again. Nothing remains but to note two or three general characteristics of the cannibals’ future home, and then to take our leave of the Spirit-World—a world which, in whatever light we may view it, to the Fijian is a very matter-of-fact one after all.

Spirits dwell a long time in each state unless they fail of endurance, when they are at once removed by a process akin to, and in Cannibal-land called, another death. The doctrine therefore that a man can die but once, is not to be found in the cannibals’ creed. Transmigration is an article in it, but it is only a spiritual migration from place to place, not from one body to another, except in the case of high-class gods, who have the power of passing from body to body when necessary, in order to effect more readily and perfectly their deep designs, either for or against the cannibal portion of the human race. The popular notion in Cannibal-land and times about these future homes of departed spirits, was that on the whole more happiness could be found in them than in this, the first stage of man’s existence. The least pleasant thing connected with it was the difficulty of getting there in safety; and when there, in passing the several tests in such a manner as to be entitled to be let alone to a full enjoyment of whatever was enjoyable. All things considered, it is a fine country, where the spirits of chiefs live with chiefs, and those of common men with spirits of their own order. Youth is seldom or never renewed, for old folks are seen there in great numbers, trusting to their walking-sticks in all their feeble attempts to shamble along the public walks of the place. There is work to be done, but it is always pretty easy, special trials excepted. There is no lack of what the Fijian would call fine houses and good gardens. There is, moreover, no scarcity of food, for the spirits feast ad libitum on the fat of the land. And there will always be enough of sailing and fighting to satisfy the characteristic craving of cannibal-spirits for the “spice of life.”

The cannibal was taught not to dread the thought of going to this Spirit-World, but on the contrary to long rather for the change. It was such beliefs as are now before us, and such teaching of them, that doubtless nerved many a widow to follow her departed husband with cheerful obedience to the wishes of his friends, and kept her from shrinking at the sight of the rope which was to end her miseries in this life. Bodily life was valued at a low price,—at no price at all in fact, and nowhere, either in the philosophy or poetry of Cannibal-land, were the people taught to consider

“That the dread of something after death,—

The undiscover’d country, from whose bourn

No traveller returns,—puzzles the will,

And makes us rather bear those ills we have

Than fly to others that we know not of.”

CHAPTER XXVI.
A TREACHEROUS CHIEF.

Turner and Cobb, the two companions who survived with me the wreck of the Molly Asthore, were absent from Ramáka when Hot-Water died. They were away on a visit to the sandalwood coast, on the island of Vanua Levu, with a party of natives. About three weeks had elapsed from the date of the consignment of our friendly old chief to the earth when they returned in a large double canoe, bringing the joyful intelligence that an English-manned barque from the East Indies, named the Sarah Jane, was at Bua, trading with the natives, her chief object being to obtain a cargo of sandalwood for the China market. Captain Jackson, of the Sarah Jane, having lost two men in a skirmish with the natives in Natewa Bay, was short-handed, and he had expressed his desire to ship Turner, Cobb, and myself for the voyage to China.

I had now been two years in the country. I spoke the language fluently, and had become thoroughly accustomed to the native mode of life. The intense desire to return to a civilised land, and the fellowship of white people, which afflicted me during the first few weeks of my enforced residence in the islands, had gradually worn off. I had not only become reconciled to my fate—I liked it. And what would become of Lolóma if I said farewell to Fiji? She could not accompany me to the home of the white man, and to part from her was impossible. When I listened to her beguiling voice, looked into her frank and tender eyes, and watched the gay, pretty toss of her head, in fresh, unconscious coquetry, or gazed upon the fiery langour of her embrowned limbs, the idea of separation became intolerable.

A few days after the return of Turner and Cobb from Vanua Levu, the Sarah Jane put into the port of Ramáka to take on board a quantity of yams, which had been promised in a message sent to her captain by Bolatha. I stepped once more on an English ship. As I listened to brief, fragmentary accounts of the most striking events that had occurred in Europe during the past two years, and to some items of Sydney news (for the vessel had called there only two months back), strange reflections crowded upon my mind, and I felt that the spirit of civilisation was strong within me. However, the authorities against whom I had transgressed in Sydney were still in power, and it would not do for me to return there at present.

The delight Lolóma felt in inspecting the cordage and fittings, the hold, the forecastle, and the cuddy of a real ship, was unbounded. Her sunny-natured disposition was all aglow with happiness. Life never seemed to her to be more a merry and gladsome frolic than it did that day. It was pleasure enough to be in the sun and laugh like the rippling torrent as it leaps from stone to stone.

Bolatha paid a visit of state to the Sarah Jane, accompanied by a large number of his retainers, and exchanged presents with the captain. As he carefully inspected the various quarters of the vessel, I noticed the covetous gleam which fired his eye, and boded no good to the Englishmen.

On the following day, Captain Jackson was invited by Bolatha to a grand meke (song and dance) given in his honour. He had been treated with a great show of friendliness, and, nothing doubting, he went ashore unarmed, accompanied by two of his sailors. The barque was left in charge of the mate and the remainder of the crew. Turner and Cobb, who had already taken up their abode on the vessel, were also on board.

In the midst of the shore festivities, of which I was an idle spectator, Lolóma ran to me in intense excitement, saying she had overheard the chiefs talking, and that the ship was to be captured, and all the white men, including myself, slain. I started to my feet with the intention of secretly giving warning to Jackson, but I was too late. Before I had gone three paces, Jackson, and the two sailors who accompanied him, were clubbed from behind, and I was near enough to see that the blows were fatal. At the same moment, by a preconcerted signal, the ship was attacked. She was surrounded with canoes, whose occupants had been trading with the sailors in a friendly way. Her decks were also covered with natives. Suddenly an onslaught was made with clubs, spears, and bows and arrows. The white men were taken unawares, but they were prompt in resistance. Turner and Cobb were luckily below at dinner, and sitting within reach of the arm-rack. The sailors on deck had vigorously laid about them with belaying pins, sheath-knives, and capstan-bars; and Turner and Cobb’s steady firing of musketry through the skylight soon cleared the decks of Fijians, with the exception of seven who lay dead. As soon as Turner and Cobb gained the deck, and fired upon the canoes, the whole flotilla retreated in disorder. The well-planned attempt to capture the vessel had failed. The casualties on the side of the Europeans were two sailors badly wounded.

At this time I was running my fleetest with Lolóma to the cavernous retreat in which I had waited for the crocodile to make his appearance. Pausing on rising ground to take breath, I was overjoyed to see that the attack on the barque, which lay half a mile from the shore, had aborted. I now believed that by making a detour, and gaining possession of a small canoe, I could paddle on board in the night time without much difficulty.

In the evening we were imprisoned by an unexpected event—a sudden thunderstorm of great violence. There was a premonitory hollow uproar in the higher regions of the air, and then the storm broke with magnificent fury on the flank of the mountain range which backed the town. Monarchs of the wood, held in the python-folds of enormous creepers, were levelled. The atmosphere was filled with branches driven before the wind, and they added to the noise of the sweeping ruin. Then the gloom was pierced with vivid flashes of forked lightning, tracing deep fissures in the clouds; the thunder leaped from peak to peak with its salvos of flying artillery; and the storm plunged through space, enacting a direful tragedy. No wonder that at such a time the Fijians picture to themselves their war-god riding on the whirlwind and directing the storm. Lolóma clung to me in wild affright.

The sea rolled mountainously towards my hiding-place. As it hurled itself against the crags, the concussion was terrific—the tumult deafening. The earth seemed to tremble beneath me. After nightfall the storm abated, leaving the atmosphere filled with electricity. Streams of electric fire exploded in every direction. The fretting and churning sea was filled with a dazzling blaze of phosphorescence; rocks in this mysterious realm were bathed with strange splendours, forming dancing phantoms in a scene of weird revelry. The kelps and sea-weeds were stars and comets—the waters cast up on the hill-side were gleaming rivulets in their return. Away to the horizon stretched an ocean of molten metal, changing with lambent flames of green, blue, and white; and on this ghastly welter of coloured fire was projected the shadow of the hulk of the Sarah Jane, whose silent spars reeled among the sheafs of vivid flame. On the shore the subsiding waves rippled beneath the mangrove bushes, flooding them with an unearthly pale light. More than once a globe of fire descended from the inky clouds, and on reaching the sea burst into a shower of sparks. Whenever I caught sight of the ship on which my fortunes depended, she was dragging heavily at her anchor chains; and she often seemed, from the constant play of the lightning upon her spars, to be on fire in a dozen different places at once. Slowly the strange and terrifying aspect of the lava-sea faded away, giving place to the blackness of night.

It was long, however, before the electrical disturbance of the atmosphere completely subsided. With the first streak of day, I clambered up the irregular face of the rocky promontory which had given me shelter, and gained the table-land at its summit. The trees occasionally emitted livid wavering flames, similar to those of St. Elmo’s light. Their appearance was accompanied by a crackling sound, like that of the burning of wet powder. I found that when I touched these flames, the light clung to me without causing any sensation. Marvelling much at this phenomenon, I turned my face to the ocean, being anxious about the safety of the barque. At that moment a party of Bolatha’s men, lying in ambush to take me prisoner, rushed upon me. I was too quick for them, and rapidly gained the summit of a small rocky eminence from which I could look down upon them. Carrying my flame-tipped fingers to my head, which was uncovered, I was suddenly illuminated by an electric aureola, and presented the appearance of a glorified saint. On beholding this strange transformation, the Fijians ran off, screaming with terror. Before they were out of ear-shot I heard them shout, partly from conviction, and partly with the view of propitiating the newly-found deity, “The Child of the Hurricane is a God indeed!”

CHAPTER XXVII.
FAREWELL TO CANNIBAL-LAND.

As soon as the natives were well out of sight, I made my way to the coast, accompanied by Lolóma. Reaching the beach in the rear of a narrow headland, which shut out the town from view, we took possession of a small canoe, which was lying unoccupied on the sand, and, launching the frail skiff, we were soon on our way to the ship, which would be within half a mile as soon as we rounded the headland referred to. When we reached the point, a double canoe, with its huge mat sail, and full of armed men, shot out from the river side, and gave chase. It seemed that Bolatha had taken extraordinary precautions to prevent my escape. The sea was smooth, with a light breeze blowing, and Lolóma and I, paddling vigorously, were making good headway. Had the double canoe got the wind on her quarter, she would have overhauled us in a very short time, but fortunately she was obliged to make “boards,” and the tacking manœuvre being slowly executed, we forged ahead. The light wind shifting a couple of points, however, the double canoe gained a distinct advantage. Our only chance now was to be observed by the barque, and to get within the protection of her muskets. We strained every nerve. The prow of our light skiff cut through the vari-coloured surface of the water like a knife ripping up a piece of silk. The occupants of the large canoe were within thirty yards, and I saw them stringing their bows. I also saw, to my unspeakable satisfaction, that we were observed from the Sarah Jane. Another three minutes, and her fire would send the miscreants to the right-about. I rose in the little canoe, and shouted derisively at our pursuers. They saw the situation, and saluted us with a flight of arrows. At the same moment three musket-shots from the barque laid low two of the cannibals, and the big canoe was put about.

The tension of the moment was so great that I had not noticed that several of the arrows struck our canoe, though most of them fell short. Turning my head (for in paddling I sat with my back to my companion) to cheer Lolóma with the prospect of speedy safety, I saw that the paddle had fallen from her hand, and that, with an expression of intense pain in her usually merry face, she was endeavouring to pull from her bosom a bone-headed arrow which had pierced her. I drew out the envenomed shaft, and she fainted. The life stream flowed from her side, in spite of all that I could do to stanch the wound, which was clearly mortal. Seeing our distress, three of the sailors in the barque put off in a boat to our assistance. Lolóma was tenderly lifted into it, and I followed, hardly knowing what I did. The canoe was allowed to drift away.

Laid on a mattress on the deck of the barque, Lolóma revived for a few minutes. Her eyelids opened, quivering with a sweet surprise, as of one not knowing what had happened, and what was the meaning of the saddened group around her. They closed again, and she lay dreaming soft and warm, and smiling in her dream as I had so often seen her in happy days. Once more she moved. The tear-drops gemmed her eyes dark fringes; her lips parted, and, bending low, I heard the faintly whispered words which to the Fijian mind convey a whole world of pathos which cannot be reproduced in English: “Au sa lako! Dou sa tiko!” (Literally, “I go! You remain!”) Her necklace of pink shells, fresh from the ebbing wave, burst asunder with the last movement which shuddered through her frame, and her little sea-born treasures rolled upon the deck. They would never be strung together again. So also was the silver cord of her life for ever broken. Her spirit had flown like that of a flower, whose existence is all too short. I turned my face seaward, and looked out into the gray moaning world of waters. The gulls were solemnly rocking on the heaving billows of the barren, dreary, ever-restless main, and all the light seemed to have gone out of the heavens.

Lolóma was buried next day in deep water, just inside the reef. The ship’s carpenter made a coffin, which was heavily shotted, and her remains were lovingly decorated with gay flowers which the maidens of Ramáka had brought on board two days before. As her body was committed to the deep, to find its resting place among the branching coral and brilliant marine growths, the sky was draped in sables—its changing splendours were gone; the monotonous lap of the water was a dirge, the screech of the sea-bird was a knell. The cocoanut tufts on the beach were waving dismally like funereal plumes, when an immense wave dashed upon the barrier with the roar of a thunder-clap, sending a vast column of foam into the air. The sun showed himself with sudden brightness through the clouds, and the sifted spray was shot with all the prismatic hues. Now I remembered the Fijian belief that when the reef roars louder than usual it is a sign that the newly departed spirit has been borne to the future world on a rainbow.

---

All our ammunition being exhausted, it was impossible to punish Bolatha and his abettors for the murder of Jackson and the two sailors; but, by threatening to take the ship close in shore and destroy the town, we obtained possession of the bodies and buried them at sea. They were thus saved from the cannibal oven, and from the disinterment and indignities they would have suffered had we committed them to the earth.

Turner navigated the ship to Calcutta, where her owners gave him the command, and he completed the voyage to China to dispose of the sandalwood on board, Cobb and myself accompanying him as second and third officers. Years elapsed before I again saw my old home in Sydney. I wrote to my father from Calcutta, but the letter miscarried, and I had long been mourned as dead. My youthful escapade had been forgotten, and there was no more respected merchant in the city than Joe Whitley, whose liberation from gaol I secured in so illegal a way.

Since the time of my two years residence in Fiji, great changes have come over the country. The prophecy of Hot-Water in regard to the acceptance of the new religion has been fully verified, and the islands have been given up to the rule of the white man. That this beautiful archipelago is destined to become a valuable British possession there can be no doubt. It is equally true that the native race is doomed to extinction, so that the words of the sable goddess of Vúya to her successful lover may be taken prophetically as the piteous wail of a people,

“Whose home at the dawn shall deserted be.”

The dawn for the new heroes is already falling on our eyes. For the aboriginal heroes it is the twilight of evening. They will pass, to be remembered only as an intelligent race of savages who wisely changed their religion, but foolishly sold their country. They will soon be seen paddling swiftly away in their own canoes, through the mists and shadows of their closing history,

“To the islands of the blessed,

To the kingdom of Ponemah,

To the land of the hereafter.”

But it is not with such thoughts that I prefer to think of Fiji and its people. Memory will always carry me back to the days when their many virtues and vices were their own, and a dignity of character was theirs which could not co-exist with the white settlements. I think of a land bright with flowers, and gay with the bloom of perpetual spring; of a little brown figure coquettishly braided with colored grasses, of her merry ways and words, of the delight I took in her simple stories of fairies and pixies, of the charm of her lithe form as she danced in the moonlight with her handmaidens, the fireflies like diamonds in her hair, while I was intoxicated with the beauty and wonder of the scene; of the ripple of a low laugh, of the musical sound of words that died in a caress; and of the fresh fragrance of sea and mountain wafted on cool winds in the land of malua, where the people sat, “every man under his vine and under his fig-tree,” and reaped the fruits of the earth almost without toil.

THE END.

APPENDIX.
I.