Atolls of the Sun

by Frederick O'Brien

It was a double-panelled door, and a separate painting covered each; to the left a seated girl wearing a pareu and to the right a girl playing the vivo, the Tahitian flute, a female figure standing, and the white rabbit Gauguin introduced afterward into many paintings. I might have bought the door of Madame Charbonnier or somewhat similar windows and doors in another house occupied by Gauguin for a hundred francs or perhaps two or three times that much. At any rate, for an inconsiderable sum, because they had no value as examples of the painter’s ability nor were they intrinsically beautiful or attractive. Stephen Haweis, a talented English artist, who was there with me, bought the door, and W. Somerset Maugham a window, which I saw afterward in a New York gallery for sale at some thousands of dollars.

I was mentioning Gauguin’s name at Mataiea, in Tahiti, at the house of the chief of that district, Tetuanui, a gentleman of charming manners and great knowledge of things Tahitian. Rupert Brooke and I had walked to the ancient marai, or temple, and the poet and I had tried to rebuild the ruin in our imagination. I had seen marais better preserved, and I had talked with many who had studied their formation and history.

This one, very famous in the annals of Tahiti, was not far from Tetuanui’s home, and on it had been enacted strange and bloody sacrifices in the days of heathenry. It was on the sea-shore, and, indeed, much of it had fallen into the water, or the surf had encroached upon the land. We had spent some hours about it, and had wondered about the people who had made it their cathedral a few score years ago. Here we were living with their grandchildren. The father of the chief’s father might have participated in the ceremonies there, might have seen the king accept and eat the eye of a victim, or feign to do so, for cannibalism had long passed in Tahiti even a century ago.

Walking back to Mataiea, we met the chief returning from his day’s labor directing the repair of roads, for, though a chevalier of the Legion of Honor, a former warrior for the French against tribes of other islands, Tetuanui had small means, and was forced to be a civil servant of the conquerers.

“We have been to see the marai,” said Brooke.

“Oia mau anei teie?” replied Tetuanui. “Is that so? I have not been there for a long time. The last time was with that white painter Gauguin. He lived near here, and one day I spoke of the marai, and he asked me to show it to him. We walked down there together, but he was disappointed that it was so broken down.”

Once again the chevalier gave me a glimpse of the barbarian. He and his amiable wife took occasional boarders, and there were two San Francisco salesgirls there for a week. They were shocked at our bathing nude in the lagoon in front of the house, although we wore loin-cloths to walk to the beach and back. They complained to the chief, who was astonished, for Brooke was strikingly handsome, and the Tahitian girls were open in their praise of his beauty.

“They should have seen that Gauguin,” said Tetuanui, as he begged our pardon for telling their indignation. “He was always semi-nude and often nude. He became as brown as a Tahitian in a few months. He liked to lie in the sun, and I have seen him at the hottest part of the day sitting at his easel. You know, he had a wife here in the way that the whites take our women, and one day he and she were in swimming, and came out on the road before putting on pareus. A good missionary complained of them—it was not quite proper, truly, and the gendarme warned both of them. Gauguin was furious, for he hated the gendarmes before that.”

Ten years were gone since Gauguin, having fled from Tahiti and a fate that he could not escape, had expired here in Atuona in a singular though anguished resignation. His atelier and dwelling had been just below Peyral’s on the opposite side of the road I trod so often to and from the beach, and Peyral had known him as well as such a man can know a master. Mouth of God, the husband of Malicious Gossip, saw Gauguin dead in his house, and it was he who told me that Kahuiti, the recent cannibal chief, had a tiki made by Gauguin. I went to Taaoa, past the Stinking Springs and the house of Mademoiselle Narbonne, to see it.

I remembered that James Huneker said, “In the huts of the natives where cataloguing ceases, many pictures may be found.”