CHAPTER C.
TONGA—Continued.
WAR AND CEREMONIES.
NATURAL MILDNESS OF THE TONGANS — BOASTING DISCOURAGED — WAR APPARENTLY LEARNED FROM THE FIJIANS — FINOW’S SPEECH TO HIS SOLDIERS, AND A NEW DISCIPLINE — FATE OF THE VANQUISHED — THE DROWNED CHIEFS — CEREMONIES — KAVA-DRINKING — STRICT CODE OF ETIQUETTE — PREPARATION OF THE KAVA — A GRACEFUL PERFORMANCE — DISTRIBUTION OF THE KAVA — POINTS OF CEREMONY — A TONGAN PLANTATION — SETTING THE YAMS — CEREMONY OF INACHI — THE POLE BEARERS AND THEIR BURDEN — THE YAM PILLARS — LIFTING THE PIGS — DISTRIBUTION OF PROVISIONS, AND CONCLUSION OF THE CEREMONY — TOW-TOW, AND ITS OBJECT — PRESENTATION OF THE OFFERING — A GRAND SCRAMBLE — BOXING AND WRESTLING MATCHES — GOOD-HUMORED COMBATANTS — FIGHTS WITH CLUBS — THE SAMOAN AND TONGAN RULES.
By nature the Tongans are gentle and kind-hearted, and present a most curious mixture of mildness and courage. To judge by many traits of character, they might be stigmatized as effeminate, while by others they are shown to possess real courage, not merely the dashing and boastful bravery which is, when analyzed, merely bravado, and which is only maintained by the hope of gaining applause. The Tongan never boasts of his own courage, nor applauds that of another. When he has performed a deed of arms which would set a Fijian boasting for the rest of his life, he retires quietly into the background and says nothing about it. His king or chief may acknowledge it if they like, but he will be silent on the subject, and never refer to it.
For the same reason, he will not openly applaud a deed of arms done by one of his fellows. He will regard the man with great respect, and show by his demeanor the honor in which he holds him, but he will not speak openly on the subject. Mariner relates an instance in which a young warrior named Hali Api Api, who seems to have been the very model of a gentleman, performed a notable deed of arms, equally remarkable for courage and high-minded generosity. During a council, the king called him out, and publicly thanked him for his conduct. The man blushed deeply, as if ashamed at this public recognition of his services, saluted the king, and retired to his place without saying a word. Neither did he afterward refer either to his exploit or to the public recognition of it.
One warrior actually declared that he would go up to a loaded cannon and throw his spear into it. He fulfilled his promise to the letter. He ran up within ten or twelve yards of the gun, and, as the match was applied, threw himself on the ground, so that the shot passed over him. He then sprang up, and, in spite of the enemy’s weapons, hurled his spear at the cannon, and struck it in the muzzle. Having performed this feat, he quietly retired, and was never heard to refer to so distinguished an act of courage, though he was greatly respected for it by his countrymen.
We need not wonder that such men should establish a moral influence over the boastful but not warlike Fijians, and that the small colony established in the Fiji group should virtually be its masters. Two hundred years ago, the Tongan appears to have been ignorant of weapons and warfare, and to have borrowed his first knowledge of both from Fiji. Consequently, the Tongan weapons are practically those of Fiji, modified somewhat according to the taste of the makers but evidently derived from the same source. Captain Cook, who visited the islands in 1777, remarks that the few clubs and spears which he saw among the Tongans were of Fiji manufacture, or at least made after the Fiji pattern. Yet by a sort of poetical justice, the Tongan has turned the Fijian’s weapons against himself, and, by his superior intellect and adventurous courage, has overcome the ferocious people of whom he was formerly in dread.
Since the introduction of fire-arms, the superiority of the Tongans has made itself even more manifest, the Fijians having no idea of fighting against men who did not run away when fired at, but rushed on in spite of the weapons opposed to them.
It is possible that the Tongans may have learned this mode of fighting from Mariner and his companions. When the king Finow was about to make war upon a neighboring island, he assembled the warriors and made them an address, telling them that the system of warfare which had been previously employed was a false one. He told them no longer to advance or retreat according as they met with success or repulse, but to press forward at all risks; and, even if a man saw the point of a spear at his breast, he was not to flinch like a coward, but to press forward, and at risk of his own life to kill his foe. He also instructed them in the art of receiving the onset of the enemy with calmness, instead of indulging in cries and gesticulations, telling them to seat themselves on the ground as the enemy approached, as if perfectly unconcerned, and not to stir until ordered, even if they threw spears or shot arrows. But as soon as they got the word to advance they were to leap to their feet, and charge without regard to consequences. The reader may remember that this is exactly the strategy which was employed in Africa by the great Kaffir chief Tchaka.
It may easily be imagined how such a course of conduct would disconcert their opponents, and the Fijians in particular, with whom boasting and challenging took the place of valor. Emboldened by the apparent weakness of the enemy, they would come on in great glee, expecting to make an easy conquest, and then, just when they raised the shout of victory, they found themselves suddenly attacked with a disciplined fury which they had never been accustomed to meet, and were consequently dispersed and almost annihilated before they could well realize their position.
Though tolerably mild toward their captives, the Tongans sometimes display an unexpected ferocity. On one occasion, some of Finow’s men surprised and captured four of the enemy, whom they imagined to belong to a party who had annoyed them greatly by hanging on their track and cutting off the stragglers.