The houses of the Society Islands are, indeed, little more than thatched roofs supported on pillars about seven or eight feet in height, the pillars tapering from the base to the top, and not being quite upright, but sloping a little inward. The floor is generally covered with grass and mats, while to the rafters of the roof are hung baskets, bundles of cloth, and other property.
Warfare among the Society Islands differs little from the mode which is practised in many other parts of Polynesia, and therefore does not require a lengthened notice.
Formerly, when their weapons were the spear, the club, and the sling, the wars used to be very protracted and caused much bloodshed, but the later introduction of fire-arms has had its usual effect, and not only reduced the number of wars but the loss of life in battle.
Some of their spears were dreadful weapons, the worst of which seems to have been a sort of trident, something like an eel spear. The head of it was armed with three bones from the tail of the sting-ray. They were not fastened to the head of the spear, but only slipped into sockets, just tightly enough to hold them. When an enemy was struck with either of these points, it became detached from the spear, and, in consequence of its peculiarly barbed edges, kept working its way deeper and deeper into the body, so that certain death was the result of a wound with one of these spears.
The natives of the Society Islands also used the bone of the sting-ray for secret assassination. They watched the intended victim while he slept, and, by gently touching him with a feather, made him turn about until he was in a favorable position. The fatal dagger was then struck into the body, and the assassin made his escape, being sure that the wound must sooner or later be mortal.
The peculiar character of the people shows itself in other ways. They are most tenacious of memory in everything that has a personal interest to them, and are equally unwilling to forget an injury or a benefit. They will cherish a life-long vengeance against any one who has offended them, so that one man has been known to follow another from year to year, from one island to another, with the certainty and tenacity of the bloodhound, and never to cease from his quest until he has avenged himself upon his enemy. There is, however, a redeeming point in this trait of character, namely, that although it is mostly exercised for evil purposes, it sometimes takes the opposite course. Mr. Bennett mentions that on one occasion, after a battle, a chief of the victorious side knew that among the flying enemy was a man who had shown a kindness to him in a former war. Knowing the fate that would befall the man if he fell into the hands of the victors, he followed on the track of the fugitive, and after seeking his friend from cover to cover, and from bush to bush, he at last discovered him, took him to his own house, kept him there for a time, and then dismissed him in safety.
Cruelty toward the vanquished is one of the invariable accompaniments of savage warfare, and we cannot expect to find that the Society Islanders are more free from it than others. The only cannibalism of which they are guilty is in connection with war, and even on those occasions the victorious party only eat a small portion of the dead adversary’s body, in accordance with custom, and do not feast upon human flesh, as many of the Polynesians do.
They are, however, on some occasions very cruel to the captured or wounded enemies, absolutely tearing them to pieces by degrees, and taking care to avoid the vital parts, so as to prolong the agony of the sufferer as much as possible. Even Pomaré, before he became a Christian, was guilty of many abominable atrocities. He has been known to take the children of vanquished chiefs, run sinnet cords through the backs of their necks, and drag them about until they died of the torture.
Even when the enemy was dead, the victors could not be content without insulting the senseless corpse. “When a combatant had slain a distinguished adversary,” writes Mr. Bennett, “after the fray was over, the perishing carcass was left upon the field for a day or two. It was then dragged to the marae, when the victor and his friends would stand over it, and exult in the most savage manner over the corrupted mass.
“Each taking a fibrous wand of cocoa-nut leaf, tough as whalebone, in his hand, to employ as a drumstick, they would beat the body with these till they were weary; saying to it, ‘Aha! we have you now; your tongue fills your mouth, your eyes stand out of your head, and your face is swollen; so would it have been with us, had you prevailed.’ Then, after a pause, they would renew their impotent stripes and not less impotent taunts. ‘Now you are dead, you will no more plague us. We are revenged upon you; and so you would have revenged yourself on us, if you had been the strongest in battle.’ Again: ‘Aha! you will drink no more kava; you will kill no more men; you will disembowel no more of our wives and daughters. As we use you, you would have used us; but we are the conquerors, and we have our vengeance.’