The uncivilized races of men in all countries of the world; vol. 2 of 2 / Being a comprehensive account of their manners and customs, and of their physical, social, mental, moral and religious characteristics

by J. G. Wood

The Niuans are good canoe-makers, constructing their vessels very neatly, and ornamenting them with devices in shells and mother-of-pearl. They manage these canoes well, and as a rule are excellent swimmers. There are, however, some families living in the interior of the island who, although they can be barely four miles from the sea, have never visited it, and are greatly despised by their neighbors because they can neither swim nor sail a canoe.

The native architecture is not particularly good, but it has been much improved by the instructions of the Samoan teachers, who have instructed the Niuans in their own mode of building houses, upon which the Niuans have engrafted their own mode of adornment, so that altogether the effect of a modern Niuan house is quaint, and at the same time artistic. The natives seem to be wonderfully quick at learning, and have even acquired the use of the pen, so that a Niuan can now be scarcely better pleased than by the gift of a pencil and a supply of white paper.

Nothing shows the wonderful advance that these people have made more than the fact that they have not only utterly discarded their old habit of murdering foreigners, but that they display the greatest eagerness to be taken as sailors on board European ships. They contrive to smuggle themselves on board without the knowledge of the captain and crew; and whereas in former times it was scarcely possible to induce a Niuan to venture on board an European ship, the difficulty is now, to find a mode of keeping them out of the vessels.

The method of disposing of the dead is twofold. When one mode is followed, the body is laid on a bier and left in the woods until all the flesh has decayed, when the bones are removed to the family burying-place, which is usually a cave in the limestone rock. When the other method is employed, the body is laid in a canoe, and sent adrift in the sea to go wherever the wind and tides may carry it.

CHAPTER CVIII.
THE SOCIETY ISLANDS.
APPEARANCE, DRESS, AND SOCIAL CUSTOMS.

DISCOVERY OF THE ISLANDS, AND REASONS FOR THEIR NAMES — THE ISLAND OF TAHITI OR OTAHEITE — CONFORMATION AND CLIMATE OF TAHITI — THEIR EFFECT UPON THE INHABITANTS — EFFEMINATE APPEARANCE OF THE MEN, AND BEAUTY OF THE WOMEN — SOCIAL CONDITION OF THE SEXES — GENERAL MODE OF LIFE IN TAHITI — SEPARATE TABLES FOR THE MEN AND WOMEN — POMARÉ’S CRUCIAL TEST, AND ITS RESULTS UPON IDOLATRY — DRESS OF THE SOCIETY ISLANDERS — MODES OF WEARING THE HAIR — TATTOOING IN TAHITI — MEANS EMPLOYED BY THE MISSIONARIES TO ABOLISH THE PRACTICE — HOSPITALITY OF THE TAHITANS — MODE OF MAKING PRESENTS — SOCIAL USE OF PRESENTS — THE BAKED PIG AND THE CLOTH — DISTINCTIONS OF RANK — REASONS FOR OMAI’S FAILURE — EXTERNAL INDICATIONS OF RANK — DEPORTMENT OF TAHITANS TOWARD THEIR SOVEREIGN — AMUSEMENTS OF THE TAHITANS — THEIR SONGS AND MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS — SURF RIDING — BOXING AND WRESTLING MATCHES.

This interesting group of islands was originally discovered in 1605 by De Quiros, and has derived the name of the Society Islands from the liberality of the Royal Society, which, in 1767, sent an expedition under Captain Cook for the purpose of observing the transit of Venus over the sun. There are many islands of this group, the best known of which is Tahiti, or Otaiieite, as the word was given in Cook’s Voyages. This island forms one of a portion of the group which is distinguished by the name of the Georgian Islands, in honor of George III.

Tahiti is singularly picturesque when viewed from the sea, in consequence of its mountainous character, the island being so filled with lofty peaks and crags that the only way of reaching the interior is by following the courses of the valleys. Sometimes the rocks shoot up into sharp and spire-like peaks, sometimes they run for miles in perpendicular precipices, several thousand feet in height; sometimes they are scarped and angular like gigantic fortresses, sometimes they are cleft into ravines of terrible depth, and sometimes they are scooped out into hollows like the craters of extinct volcanoes.

Down these craggy steeps dash torrents that fertilize the soil, and so equably genial is the temperature that every shelf and ledge is covered with luxuriant foliage and gorgeous flowers. Tahiti indeed, as has been well said, is the gem of the Pacific. Our business, however, lies not so much with the island as with its inhabitants—not the semi-civilized people of the present day, but the uncivilized people of 1769, when Captain Cook visited them. In the following description, we will take Tahiti as the typical island of the Society group, merely introducing the lesser islands by way of illustration of the manners and customs which pervaded the whole group.

In consequence of the superior fertility of Tahiti, and the consequent supply of food without the need of labor, the Tahitans are more plump and rounded of form than are the inhabitants of most other Polynesian islands. In the case of the men, the fair skin and plump rounded forms give them an effeminate appearance, and the earlier voyagers have all noticed the strong contrast between the dark, nervous, and muscular frames of the Tongan men, and the fair, smooth limbs and bodies of the Tahitans. The men, too, wear their hair long, and, if it were not that they permit the beard to grow to some length, they would well deserve the epithet of effeminate.