IX
Descendants of Mutineers—Cannibalism—I play a Violin Overture at what I fear is a Cannibalistic Feast—A Samoan Chief’s Philosophy—Musings
Before I proceed I will tell you about the crew of the Bounty just as I heard it from the lips of one of the descendants of the old mutineers whom I have awhile back spoken of.
The Bounty left England considerably more than a hundred years ago, and made a voyage to the South Seas, calling at the Isle of Tahiti. No one knows exactly what the mutiny was about; anyway there certainly was a mutiny and the crew cast the Captain and one or two officers adrift, then ran the ship ashore in the Pacific and hid themselves in the Isles among the savage Tahitian men and women. The latter being beautiful to look upon, the sailors took them to wife, and with my knowledge of seafaring men of my own day I can assure you that they did not grieve much over their exile and thoroughly enjoyed themselves. The Government sent out a search for them and some of them got collared and were taken home to England and executed. The remainder, who had gone off to another Isle taking their wives with them, eluded their pursuers, lived and ended their lives on the Isle of “Pitcairn” and left behind them hundreds of half-caste children, who turned out to be anything but what one would have expected, being an intelligent and upright race. It appears that the mutineers went in for debauchery; fought over each other’s wives, and even their comrades’ daughters as the years rolled by. Eventually they all died excepting Adams, the mutineer ring-leader, who, seeing all his old comrades dead, grew pious and remorseful over his wild career, and being king of the Island race brought the whole family up to be strictly upright and honest in all their ways, and he succeeded too; and there they are out there to-day in the South Seas, happy and industrious. By the irony of fate old Adams proved to be the best and most successful missionary that ever reared a brood in the South Seas, and all men who have been that way will agree with all I have said and tell you that even to this generation the Island children of those parts are brave sailors, and their faces resemble the long dead lineaments of those sailors of long ago, and most of the families have English names, such as Johnson, Noble, etc.
I am now going to tell you about cannibalism in the Pacific Islands just as I saw it and heard of it. Of course, a lot has been written on the subject by many travellers, but you may be interested to know my views and experiences on this gruesome but interesting matter.
I knew two Islanders who still hungered after the flesh of man; they were not the true natives of Samoa, for the Samoans were not at all addicted to cannibalism. One night they listened to me as I sat playing the violin under the shade of some banyan-trees, and invited me into the forest village to their den. Well, when I arrived inside their snug little homestead I noticed a grizzled old man and woman nibbling away at the remains of a thigh bone of some departed enemy whom they had roasted and eaten. As I looked across at them sitting there enjoying that awful meal they swiftly hid the bone behind them. The man was a simple-looking fellow; his shrunken gleaming eyes gazed kindly upon me, but I could not conjure up in my heart much love for him, especially when he grinned and revealed his yellowish front teeth that had chewed up the remains of who knows who? Some missing white trader, or someone of his own race, or even a missionary with M.A. after his name. They were very fond of missionaries, as I’ve heard that they eat well, being nicely nourished, and not being addicted to too much drink they have not the rum-flavour that traders have had who have met the awful fate of supplying the cannibalistic festive board with meat.
I felt rather nervous as I caught sight of that awful remainder of departed woe, but I took good care not to let them see that I had noticed, as they knew what would happen to them if they were found out, and consequently, I being at that moment in their power, they might have thought it advisable to put an end to my existence and make me into provisions for their secret larder! I was very young, white and tender in those days and would have eaten well.
I am quite sure these remarks of mine may make you think I treat such things as cannibalism lightly, but it is not so; good and bad are comparative, and when I sit here and write and see life with sadder and more earnest eyes I simply think what a lucky fellow I was not to have been born in the South Seas. Had my parents been South Sea Islanders, and I born in Fiji instead of Kent, doubtless someone would have already recorded in their autobiography my own cannibalistic revels and terrible sins, for I am adventurous and wayward enough now with all the advantages of birth and education—so what would I have been if I had crept into the world and seen the first light and heard the first sounds in some Fijian moonlit forest? And you too, reader, what would you have been? Probably both happier than we are now—who knows?
Well, I looked over at that grim couple and smiled pleasantly to let them see I had noticed nothing, and as I spoke to them and the woman picked her teeth with her finger and nearly choked as she swallowed the mouthful that she sought to conceal, and said, “No savee,” I heard a noise outside in the forest and they both jumped up. I looked outside and saw a group of the savages passing along through the forest. It was already twilight, yet I could see most of their swarthy faces distinctly and I at once recognised an old Tongan friend of mine whom I had long since thought had gone back to Tonga. The four of us left the den and went across the clearing and met the group as they hurried along, dragging behind them a heavy load. What I am going to tell you is absolute truth, and I will tell you the details just as I saw them with my own eyes. That load which they dragged behind them was a body, and they were off into the forest depth bound for the grand cannibalistic feast!
As I came up to them they all looked startled and frightened and made as though to go for me, and I believe now that I look back that had not my Tongan friend appealed on my behalf I should have been immediately killed. I had my fiddle with me, and they looked upon my violin as some kind of enchanter, some spirit of the dead, and after a hurried consultation, standing there under the trees with fierce faces and frizzly heads, muttering in guttural tones, they all turned toward me, and one said, “Ova lu-lu,” and made signs that I should follow them into the forest and play music to them, their intention being not to kill me but to entice me on with them so that I could not return and give them away, and so I was commandeered.