The islands are of volcanic formation, lofty and mountainous. The interior consists generally of a range of mountains some three thousand feet high, from which a series of spurs descend steeply to the coast, terminating for the most part in tremendous cliffs, at the foot of which the great rollers break in foam; for with a single exception there are no coral reefs, and a ship can sail in deep water within a cable's length of the rocks. Viewed at a distance from the sea, the aspect of the islands is somewhat stern and forbidding. Bare mountains, jagged peaks, sometimes lost in the clouds, and an iron-bound coast of black and beetling crags, buffeted eternally by the surf, make up a gloomy picture; but a nearer view discloses verdant valleys nestling between the ridges which radiate from the central mountains. These valleys are watered by mountain streams and clothed with dense tropical vegetation, their luxuriant green offering an agreeable contrast to the bareness and aridity of the frowning precipices and sharp peaks which soar above them. Cascades tumbling from high cliffs into the depths of the glens add to the beauty and charm of the scenery. So steep and precipitous are the ridges which divide these smiling vales from each other that the ascent and descent are in many places both difficult and dangerous even for the natives; European mountaineers need to have stout limbs and steady heads to accomplish them in safety. Hence in former days each valley contained a separate tribe, which was commonly in a state of permanent hostility towards its neighbours across the mountain barriers.[2] Of these tribes the most famous were the warlike and dreaded Taipiis or Typees, who occupied a beautiful valley at the eastern end of Nukahiva, and in their mountain fastness deemed themselves inaccessible to their enemies. However, in the early part of the nineteenth century an American naval officer, Captain David Porter, succeeded, not without great difficulty, in carrying havoc and devastation into these sylvan scenes.[3] Later in the century a runaway American sailor, Hermann Melville, spent more than four months as a captive in the tribe, and published an agreeable narrative of his captivity; but never having mastered the language, he was not able to give much exact information concerning the customs and beliefs of the natives.[4] As there is no maritime plain interposed between the mountains and the shore, the only way of passing from one valley to another is either to go by sea or to clamber over the intervening ridges. It would be materially impossible, we are told, unless at enormous and ruinous cost, to make a road or even a mule-path round any of the Marquesas Islands, as has been done in Tahiti.[5]
Despite their situation in the heart of the tropics, the Marquesas enjoy an extremely healthy climate subject to none of the inconveniences usually incidental to countries in the same latitude; endemic and epidemic diseases are alike unknown. European soldiers can work in the sun without accident and without exhaustion.[6] The climate has been described as an eternal spring, without winter or even autumn; though a perpetual succession of ripe fruits may seem to lend an autumnal air to the landscape, which yet is never chilled by hoar frosts or saddened by the sight of bare boughs and fallen leaves.[7] Even in the hottest days a cool wind blows from the sea, and at night there is a breeze from the land. Rain falls during some months of the year, especially from May or June to August or September; but on the whole there is little variation in the seasons;[8] the Marquesan year has been described as one long tropical month of June just melting into July.[9] Yet we are told that the northern islands sometimes suffer from droughts which may last for years; at such times vegetation languishes, till a fresh cloud-burst restores the verdure of the trees and grass as by magic.[10] It is then, too, that the cascades everywhere enliven the landscape by the glitter and roar of their tumbling waters, which, after dropping from the height, flow rapidly down their steep beds into the sea.[11]
§ 2. Physical Appearance of the Natives
Observers are generally agreed that from the purely physical point of view the Marquesan islanders are, or used to be, the noblest specimens of the Polynesian race. Captain Cook remarked that "the inhabitants of these islands collectively are, without exception, the finest race of people in this sea. For fine shape and regular features, they perhaps surpass all other nations."[12] To the same effect the naturalist George Forster, who accompanied Captain Cook, gives his impression of a crowd of Marquesan men, among whom were no women. He says: "They were tall, and extremely well limbed; not one of them unwieldy or corpulent like a Taheitian, nor meagre and shrivelled like a native of Easter Island. The punctuation" (by which he meant the tattooing) "which almost entirely covered the men of a middle age, made it difficult to distinguish their elegance of form; but among the youths, who were not yet marked or tattooed, it was easy to discover beauties singularly striking, and often without a blemish, such as demanded the admiration of all beholders. Many of them might be placed near the famous models of antiquity, and would not suffer in the comparison:
"Qualis aut Nireus fuit, aut aquosa
Raptus ab Ida."
Hor.
"The natural colour of these youths was not quite so dark as that of the common people in the Society Isles; but the men appeared to be infinitely blacker, on account of the punctures which covered their whole body, from head to foot. These punctures were disposed with the utmost regularity; so that the marks on each leg, arm, and cheek, and on the corresponding muscles, were exactly similar. They never assumed the determinate form of an animal or plant, but consisted of a variety of blotches, spirals, bars, chequers, and lines, which had a most motley appearance."[13]
Similarly, speaking of the Taipiis or Typees, Melville observes, "In beauty of form they surpassed anything I had ever seen. Not a single instance of natural deformity was observable in all the throng attending the revels. Occasionally I noticed among the men the scars of wounds they had received in battle; and sometimes, though very seldom, the loss of a finger, an eye, or an arm, attributable to the same cause. With these exceptions, every individual appeared free from those blemishes which sometimes mar the effect of an otherwise perfect form. But their physical excellence did not merely consist in an exemption from these evils; nearly every individual of their number might have been taken for a sculptor's model."[14] As to their stature, the same writer affirms that "the men, in almost every instance, are of lofty stature, scarcely ever less than six feet."[15] Similarly Captain Porter tell us that "they are far above the common stature of the human race, seldom less than five feet eleven inches, but most commonly six feet two or three inches, and every way proportioned. Their faces are remarkably handsome, with keen, piercing eyes; teeth white, and more beautiful than ivory; countenances open and expressive, which reflect every emotion of their souls; limbs which might serve as models for a statuary, and strength and activity proportioned to their appearance."[16] Another observer remarks of them that "the natives bear the palm for personal beauty from most other of the Polynesian tribes. The men are tall and muscular, though rather slightly framed; their deportment is graceful and independent; their features are handsome, and partake more of the European regularity of profile than is usual with Polynesian islanders."[17] The nose is straight or aquiline, sometimes short or slightly flattened, but never ill-shaped: the mouth is never large nor the lips thick: the forehead is rather low and somewhat retreating.[18] The hair is almost always straight or wavy; men or women with frizzly hair are very seldom seen, especially in the north-western group. The colour of the skin, where it is not darkened by tattooing, is a clear brown, resembling the bronzed appearance acquired by Europeans through exposure to a tropical sun.[19] The women are both absolutely and relatively shorter than the men; indeed Melville describes them as "uncommonly diminutive." Their complexion is lighter; in the parts of the body which are seldom exposed to the sun they are even said to appear as white as European women. Their features are good, but rather pretty than beautiful; their hands and feet are very shapely. Unlike the men, who are, or used to be, tattooed from head to foot, the women were tattooed very little, and that chiefly on the lips.[20] They took pains to whiten their skin by avoiding exposure to the sun and by washing themselves with the juice of a small native vine,[21] or by smearing themselves with a cosmetic in which the yellow of the turmeric root predominated.[22]