If everything else in the performance could be interpreted as readily as that portion which exhibits the power and usefulness of the “full tide” in lifting weights, such as canoes, and the force of the out-going tide in floating them to sea, the whole would become clothed with truth. There is little doubt that the poet himself, and the more intelligent men of the heroic days of Fiji, were well able to find the exact counterpart of every figure and exaggerated picture in the song, the entire drift and meaning of which they well understood.
In those parts which paint the eating propensities and capabilities, together with the characteristic greed and generosity of the race, there is little more—making every allowance for the savage brain that produced it—than a well-charged caricature; just as another cannibal poet, wishing to represent the almost unlimited extent to which polygamy was carried in his time, asks, respecting a chief of great renown, and after whom many chiefs have since been named—
Who is like the great Ritóva,
The chief with a million wives?
I’m weary with asking—“Who?”
CHAPTER XII.
THE FIJIAN NIGHTS’ ENTERTAINMENTS.—SECOND NIGHT.—CAPTURE OF THE EBBTIDE.
On the next occasion on which the company assembled in Big-Wind’s house disposed themselves to story-telling, I gave them “Ali Baba, or the Forty Thieves,” which was quite to the taste of my audience.
Trumpet Shell responded with a continuation of “Prince Hightide,” in which is recorded the wonderful capture of the leviathan canoe.
The people of Cannibal-land are a selfish and jealous race, as, likewise, are all their gods. Each tribe likes to be thought first in everything. If a tribe in the North has a great and wonderful god, who, by many miraculous deeds has clearly established his reputation, and made his name a household word, a tribe in the South must place itself in a position to be able to boast such another, or it will never rest. If the former can talk of its monster canoe, with her god-like captain and giant crew, sweeping gloriously over the waters of the Pacific, the latter will fume and fret till it also can tell to future generations, that its god was one of no second-rate powers, inasmuch as he captured that very canoe, in a way that put into the shade every other capture ever made on the high seas, and, by many other deeds of might, utterly astonished both the world of men and the world of gods.
The Prince Hightide was indeed a powerful god—a worthy son of him who shakes the world! As for his canoe, the Ebbtide, who can measure her proportions? But Tanóva, a god of Kandávu, claimed to be as high and mighty as the Prince. A poet says that this Tanóva used often to ask: “What will the world say of me, if, to prove my equality with Prince Hightide, I capture his beautiful craft? Let the world decide the question—‘which is the greater god, he that builds a monster canoe, or he that captures her when she is built?’” The capture of the Ebbtide now became the object of Tanóva’s ambition, and he determined to take advantage of every opportunity for completing and carrying out his plans. The scheme was in his brain, and there he kept it for a time to ripen. One day Ratúva, another god of Kandávu, sailed away on a visit to the great northern deity, Prince Hightide, whom he found on board his canoe of world-wide renown. The Prince having been informed of the distinguished visitor’s arrival alongside, looked down from the deck and very graciously invited him to climb the vessel’s side. The invitation was, of course, accepted; and Ratúva set about climbing; but the distance was so great that it took him a whole day to reach the deck, and what astonished him still more, another day to reach the Prince’s quarters amidships. In the course of conversation between these two important personages, Ratúva took occasion to inform the Prince that he should shortly be in need of all the canoes he had left at home, but the worst of it was that most of them were out of repair, and must be re-lashed before they could be sent again to sea. He being therefore greatly in want of sinnet for this work, had come over the ocean to beg some of that most necessary article of His Highness. The Prince replied, “It is well! It is good! There is sinnet enough and to spare; far more than you can take in your canoe; so in a few days I will send my sons in the Ebbtide with a good cargo of the ‘pith of your petition.’” This is quite a Fijian phrase, and a very pretty one it is. With this princely promise, Ratúva returned to his own land more than satisfied with the result of his mission. On his way he called on the Hero-god Tanóva, to pay his respects and to give him the good news. “I have been,” he began, “to the gates of the Spirit-land, even to the home of the noble Prince Hightide.” “Oh, you have, have you?” said Tanóva, “and what is the news?” “Why, that I begged sinnet of him, and he not only gave a large quantity, but promised to send his sons in the Ebbtide with more.” “And what else?” asked Tanóva. “Well, all about the Prince himself, to be sure, and his miracle of a canoe!” “Pshaw! What canoe?” asked the envious Tanóva, with a sneer. “Well all I know is,” replied the successful sinnet-beggar, “we may live for ten generations and never set our eyes on such another wonder! Why just think, I climbed, and climbed, and was a whole day in getting on board, then I walked, and walked, and walked, and was another day in making my way to the Prince’s cabin.” These cabins, or canoe-houses, are always placed in the middle of the canoe, and on deck, there being no accommodation whatever between-decks on these rough ocean coaches.