After the photography Louis and I went to call on the missionary. He and his wife were at home, evidently expecting us. His wife is enormously stout, with small features and an unpleasant expression; the man rather sensible and superior-looking. A number of women and the pilot who had brought us into the lagoon ranged themselves on the floor in front of us. One of the ladies, a plain body, seeming more intelligent than the rest, possessed a countenance capable of expressing more indignation than one would think possible. She wished to have our relationship explained to her. Louis and I were husband and wife; this statement was received with a cry of anger, but at the announcement that Lloyd was our son, she fairly howled; even Lloyd's name seemed objectionable. About mine there was a good deal of discussion, as they appeared to have heard it before. We drank cocoanuts under the disapproving eye of the intelligent lady, and, after receiving as a present a pearl-shell with a coral growth on its side from the missionary's wife, and another, somewhat battered, from his daughter, I gave, in return, the wreath from my hat and we departed.
Louis and Lloyd went back to the ship, but I remained, with Tin Jack, to see the church. All but three little girls were too lazy to show us the way; so, accompanied by the trio, we started on a broad path of loose, drifting coral sand. The church was a good, substantial structure of white coral, with benches and Bible rests, but there was no attempt at decoration. The room was large enough to hold all the inhabitants of the village twice over. As in most of the other islands, being "missionary"—religious—goes by waves of fashion. In Penrhyn, at any moment, the congregation may turn on the pastor and tell him he must leave instantly, as they are tired of being missionary. They have the "week of jubilee," which means the whole island goes on a gigantic "spree," when Penrhyn is not a pleasant, or hardly a safe, abiding-place. We stopped at the schoolhouse on the way back, a large, ill-smelling room, containing for furniture one table with pearl-shell disks let into the legs, standing on a dais. The only really neat house was the trader's, and he had a Manihikian wife.
The laws of Penrhyn, some of them very comical, are stringently enforced. There is no nonsense about "remain within your houses" here, for, after nine o'clock, remain you must. Last night our cook was shut into a house where he was paying a visit, and was not allowed out until after the breakfast hour. There was also a rumour that Tin Jack, being seen after curfew, had to run, the police after him, to the house of the trader, where he remained until morning. Our sailors, to-day, somehow offended the natives and came running back to the ship pursued by a crowd. The children are much more prepossessing than their parents, some of them, especially the little girls, being quite pretty and well-behaved. It is much easier to restrain them and keep them within bounds than if they were white children in similar case. Every scrap of orange-peel thrown overboard was gathered up by them to be converted into ornaments. A bit of peel cut into the shape of a star, with a hole in the centre for the purpose, would be drawn over the buttons of their shirts and gowns, while long strings were worn hanging over the breast, or twined round the head and neck. The trader's little half-caste boy was clad in the tiniest imaginable pair of blue jeans, with a pink cotton shirt, and had little gold earrings in his ears.
10th.—None of our party cared to go on shore. I sent a chromo representing a "domestic scene" to the trader's wife in return for her present of a coral-grown shell. The shell I afterward gave to the cook and another to the second steward, who, by this time, was almost insane with excitement and pleasure. We had a very busy day receiving shell and packing it in the wooden cases that are still being made on the forward deck. The black sailors work extraordinarily well and with perfect willingness and good nature. They make play of everything, and in spite of their small stature and slender, elegant figures, handle great weights with the utmost ease and dexterity. The little native boys work as hard as any in helping pack the shell. One little naked fellow of about ten, I was told, was deaf and dumb, but I should never have guessed it.
As soon as there was a movement on the ship the young girls came swimming out to us like a shoal of fish. The sea was dotted with the black heads over which they held their parcel of clothes in one hand to keep them dry, making their toilets on the lower rungs of the ship's ladder. One girl would stand at the foot of the ladder where she received the clothes of the newcomer; as the latter emerged dripping from the sea her garment was dexterously dropped over her head, so that she rose with the utmost decorum fully clad.
Louis soon had his particular following, some three or four little girls eight or ten years of age. They made him sit down and then sang to him. One of these children must have been the daughter of the indignant lady we met at the missionary's house, for her powers of expression were the same. She was, however, pleased to signify approval of Loia (Lloyd). If Louis attempted to leave these small sirens he was peremptorily ordered to resume his seat, and the singing redoubled in vigour. They had shrill voices and sang not badly. Louis bought a tin of "lollies" from the trade room and regaled his little maids on that and plug tobacco. Oranges and biscuits were given to the people quite freely, and the leavings from our table were continually passing about. The cook said the contents of the swill-pail were eaten clean, pumpkin rinds being a favourite morsel. Except for the "lollies," the little girls generously divided with their friends, but the boys were more selfish. One little fellow who had secured a whole pumpkin rind ran about the deck with a wolfish terror, trying to find a hiding-place where he could devour his prize safe from the importunities of his mates.
Tin Jack, without my knowledge (I should have stopped him had I known) donned the wig and beard and false nose; his appearance created a real panic. One girl was with difficulty restrained from jumping overboard from the high deck, and many were screaming and rushing about, their eyes starting with terror; Louis's little girls ran to him and me and clung to us. A fine, tall young woman kept up a bold front until Tin Jack took hold of her, when she slipped through his hands, a limp heap on the deck. I tried in vain to get near him to make him cease with his cruel jest, but he was running among the frightened crowd, and I could not make him hear me through the confusion and noise. The girl who tried to jump overboard collapsed among some bags on top of the shell, where, covering her face, she wept aloud. I climbed over to her and soothed her, and tried to explain that it was not the devil but only Tin Jack with a mask. The children were the first to recover from their terror, soon recognising Tin Jack, either from his voice, or his walk, or something that marked his individuality, for in the afternoon they returned to the ship, fetching other children, and boldly demanded that these, too, should be shown the foreign devil. All evil spirits, and there are many in Penrhyn, are called devils.
Speaking about the superstitions of Penrhyn, Mr. Hird recalls the following grisly incident that occurred when he was stopping on the island. A man who was paralysed on one side had a convulsion which caused spasmodic contractions on the other side. One of the sick man's family began at once to make a coffin. "But the man's not dead," said Mr. Hird. "Oh yes," was the reply; "he's dead enough; it's the third time he has done this, so we are going to bury him." Mr. Hird went to the native missionary, but his remonstrances had no effect; he kept on protesting until the last moment. "Why look," he said, "the man's limbs are quivering." "Oh that's only live flesh," was the reply, and some one fell to pommelling the poor wretch to quiet the "live flesh." The belief was that the man's spirit had departed long before and a devil who wished to use the body for his own convenience had been keeping the flesh alive. Mr. Hird thinks that the man was insensible when buried and must soon have died.
The "Janet Nichol" at anchor off Penrhyn Island