Tamafanga, the beautiful singer, handsome Tamafanga of the South Seas—where was he?
“Tamafanga!” I yelled again, as I felt like some wild madman, not knowing what to do or realising to the full how hopeless was my call to that wild night of storm-swept seas. Then I cried like a child. The next night and the next night—I wept again as I lay in my bunk. Ah! Why be ashamed that I loved dear, singing Tamafanga?
Brother or sister, believe me, I would not have wept half so much had a king lain down to rest in that bit of old sacking, to awaken far away on those relentless, mountainous seas of the night, miles and miles astern.
The whole crew missed Tamafanga, I never heard so many genuine regrets. The cook hardly spoke for two days, only puffed his pipe, stared from the extemporised galley at the sea and murmured: “Well! Well!”
But why be sad? It’s done now, long years ago. Fate got its whack of sorrow out of Tamafanga, so I suppose we must smile and be cheered at the thought that Destiny did a cowardly act and was happy in doing it. There is little more worth recording about that unfortunate passage.
After Tamafanga ceased singing, and went to the bottom of the Pacific to await the trump of doom, I became depressed, though, of course, I had no right to be. Depression over the loss of something that has nothing to do with the materialistic side of one’s own existence is a sign of mental disorder.
But I must admit that the crew of the Rockhampton were all tarred with the same brush, and when I played the violin in the forecastle it was very obvious that they all missed Tamafanga’s voice.
The weather following that hurricane was gloriously fine for the rest of the voyage. The days crept out of eternity and shone like vast blue mirrors between the tropical nights of twinkling myriads of stars.
I do not think I had a good sound sleep throughout the whole passage to Nuka Hiva. It was the saddest, the most uncomfortable voyage I ever experienced in those parts. The Rockhampton was one of the old, wooden clipper ships, the sailors said that she was built of bug teak—some kind of a tropical hard wood that bred bugs. True enough, those insects fairly lifted me out of my bunk, turned me over and sought the tenderest spots. It may sound blasphemous, but I believe that Providence watches over the interests of bugs.
The instincts of those semi-human things was truly marvellous. Attacked viciously all night by them, we would search by daylight—and never find one. They migrated through the deck cracks into the hold during the day. At night I would creep into my berth and sight thousands of pairs of tiny reddish whiskers (South Sea bugs grow beards) twiddling through the deck cracks. We kept a strong light on so as to make them think that it was broad daylight. But do you think that they were gulled? Not they! Though storms raged, though men wept, though romantic Tamafanga, with his sweet songs, was swept into the raging seas of eternity—we arrived off Tai-o-hae and not a bug lost!