HOUSE FENCES ON VAO, MADE FROM STONE WALLS AND REED SCREENS.
These same people can be so gay, childlike, kind and obliging, tactful and generous, that one can hardly believe the accounts one often hears of sudden outbreaks of brutal savagery, devilish wickedness, ingratitude and falsehood, until one has experienced them himself. The flattering and confiding child will turn suddenly and without apparent reason into a man full of gloom and hatred. All those repressing influences which lead the dwellers in civilized lands to some consistency of action are lacking here, and the morals of the natives run along other lines than ours. Faith and truth are no virtues, constancy and perseverance do not exist. The same man who can torture his wife to death from wanton cruelty, holding her limbs over the fire till they are charred, etc., will be inconsolable over the death of a son for a long time, and will wear a curl, a tooth or a finger-joint of the dead as a valuable relic round his neck; and the same man who is capable of preparing a murder in cold blood for days, may, in some propitious evening hour, relate the most charming and poetic fairy-tales. A priest whom I met knew quite a number of such stories from a man whom he had digged alive out of the grave, where his relatives had buried him, thinking him old enough to die. This is not a rare occurrence; sometimes the old people themselves are tired of life and ask to be killed.
What has preserved the old customs so well on Vao is the aversion of the natives to plantation work. But one day, while I was there, a ship rode at anchor off the coast, and a member of the French survey party landed, collected all the men on the beach, and told them that unless there were thirty men on board that evening, the whole tribe would be driven out of the island, as the island belonged to the French company. This was, to say the least, extremely doubtful; moreover, it would never have been feasible to expropriate the natives in this summary way. They were furious, but, unprotected as they were, they had to obey, and in the evening nearly all the young men assembled on the beach and were taken away in whale-boats, disappearing in the mist and darkness of the night. The old men and the women remained behind, crying loudly, so that the terrible wailing sounded sadly over the sea. Even to the mere spectator it was a tragic moment when the tribe was thus orphaned of its best men, and one could not help being revolted by the whole proceeding. It was not womanish pity for the men who were taken off to work, but regret for the consequent disappearance of immemorial forms of tribal life. Next day the beach was empty. Old men and women crossed over to the yam-fields, the little children played as usual, but the gay shouts were silent, the beautiful, brown, supple-bodied young men were gone, and I no longer felt the joy of living which had been Vao’s greatest charm. The old men were sulky and sad, and spoke of leaving Vao for good and settling somewhere far inland. It is not surprising that the whole race has lost the will to live, and that children are considered an undesirable gift, of which one would rather be rid. What hopelessness lies in the words I once heard a woman of Vao say: “Why should we have any more children? Since the white man came they all die.” And die they certainly do. Regions that once swarmed with people are now lonely; where, ten years ago, there were large villages, we find the desert bush, and in some districts the population has decreased by one-third in the last seven years. In fifteen years the native race will have practically disappeared.
Chapter VI
Port Olry and a “Sing-Sing”
The event just described reduced my chance of finding servants in Vao to a minimum, as all the able-bodied young men had been taken away. I therefore sailed with the missionary for his station at Port Olry. Our route lay along the east coast of Santo. Grey rain-clouds hung on the high mountains in the interior, the sun shone faintly through the misty atmosphere, the greyish-blue sea and the greyish-green shore, with the brown boulders on the beach, formed a study in grey, whose hypnotic effect was increased by a warm, weary wind. Whoever was not on duty at the tiller lay down on deck, and as in a dream we floated slowly along the coast past lonely islands and bays; whenever we looked up we saw the same picture, only the outlines seemed to have shifted a little. We anchored near a lonely isle, to find out whether its only inhabitant, an old Frenchman, was still alive. He had arrived there a year ago, full of the most brilliant hopes, which, however, had not materialized. He had no boat, hardly ever saw a human being, and lived on wild fruits. Hardly anyone knows him or visits him, but he had not lost courage, and asked for nothing but a little salt, which we gave him, and then sailed on.
In Hog Harbour we spent the night and enjoyed a hearty English breakfast with the planters, the Messrs. Th., who have a large and beautiful plantation; then we continued our cruise. The country had changed somewhat; mighty banks of coral formed high tablelands that fell vertically down to the sea, and the living reef stretched seaward under the water. These tablelands were intersected by flat valleys, in the centre of which rose steep hills, like huge bastions dominating the country round. The islands off the coast were covered with thick vegetation, with white chalk cliffs gleaming through them at intervals. A thin mist filled the valleys with violet hues, the sea was bright and a fresh breeze carried us gaily along. The aspect of the country displayed the energies of elemental powers: nowhere can the origin of chalk mountains be more plainly seen than here, where we have the process before us in all its stages, from the living reef, shining purple through the sea, to the sandy beach strewn with bits of coral, to the high table mountain. We anchored at a headland near a small river, and were cordially welcomed by the missionary’s dogs, cats, pigs and native teacher. There was also a young girl whom the father had once dug out of her grave, where a hard-hearted mother had buried her.
I had an extremely interesting time at Port Olry. The population here is somewhat different from that of the rest of Santo: very dark-skinned, tall and different in physiognomy. It may be called typically Melanesian, while many other races show Polynesian admixture. The race here is very strong, coarse-featured and lives in the simplest way, without any industries, and is the primitive population in the New Hebrides.