I appealed to Yorian, another Chief, if the medicine had not saved his life when he appeared to be dying, which he admitted to be the truth. The men had now slipped into their boat and were preparing to leave. Miaki shouted,—
“Let them go! Don’t kill them to-day.” Then he called to the Captain, “Come on shore and trade with us to-morrow.”
Next day they foolishly came on shore and began to trade. Natives surrounded the boat with clubs and tomahawks. But Miaki’s heart failed him when about to strike; and he called out,—
“Missi said that, if we kill them, a Man-of-war will come and take revenge on us.”
In the altercation that followed, the men thrust the boat into deep water and forced it out of the grasp of the savages; but they caught the Captain’s large Newfoundland dog and kept it prisoner. As a compensation for this disappointment, Miaki urged that my life and Abraham’s be at once taken, but again Nowar’s firm opposition and God’s goodness rescued us from the jaws of the lion. The Blue Bell left next morning, and the dog remained behind, as no one from the vessel would venture ashore.
Revenge for the murder of the four men killed to accompany Miaki’s child, threatened to originate another war; but the Chiefs for eight miles around met, and, after much speechifying, agreed that as they were all weak for war, owing to the measles and the want of food through the hurricanes, they should delay it till they all grew stronger. Nowar was, however, greatly excited, and informed me that Miaki had urged the people of an inland district to shoot Nowar and Abraham and me, and he pled with us again to take him and flee to Aneityum,—impossible except by canoe, and perhaps impossible even so. That night and the following night they tried to break into my house. On one occasion my valuable dog was let out, and cleared them away. Next night I shouted at them from inside, when they thought me asleep, and they decamped again. Indeed, our continuous danger caused me now oftentimes to sleep with my clothes on, that I might start at a moment’s warning. My faithful dog would give a sharp bark and awake me. At other times, she would leap up and pull at the clothes till I awoke, and then she turned her head quietly and indicated by a wondrous instinct where the danger lay. God made them fear this precious creature, and often used her in saving our lives. Soon after this six Inland Chiefs came to see me. We had a long talk on the evils of war, and the blessings of the Worship of Jehovah. I gave each a knife and a fork and a tin plate, and they promised to oppose the war which Miaki was forcing on. A man came also with a severe gash in his hand, which a fish had given him; I dressed it, and he went away very grateful and spread everywhere the news of healing, a kind of Gospel which he and they could most readily appreciate.
Another incident made them well-disposed for a season; namely, the use of a fishing-net. Seeing that the Natives had so little food—there being, in fact, a famine after the hurricane—I engaged an inland Tribe to make a net forty feet long and very broad. Strange to say, the Inland people who live far from the sea make the best fishing materials, which again they sell to the Harbour people for the axes, knives, blankets, and other articles obtained from calling vessels. They also make the killing-stones, and trade with them amongst the shore people all round the island. This kawas or killing-stone is made of blue whinstone, eighteen to twenty-four inches long, an inch and a half across, perfectly straight, and hewn as round and neat as any English tradesman could have done it, exactly like a large scythe stone, such as they use on the harvest fields in Scotland. The kawas seems to be peculiar to Tanna, at least I have not seen it on any other island. The Natives, with pieces of very hard heavy wood of the same size and shape, are taught to throw it from infancy at a given mark; in warfare, it is thrown first; where it strikes it stuns or kills, and then they spring forward with their large double-handed heavy club. Every man and boy carries his killing-stone and other weapons, even when moving about peaceably in his own village, war being, in fact, the only regular occupation for men!
Well, these same Inland people, the sort of artisans of the island, being mostly the women and the girls, manufactured for me this huge fishing-net. The cord was twisted from the fibre made out of the bark of their own trees, and prepared with immense toil and care; and not without touches of skill and taste, when woven and knotted and intertwined. This net I secured, and lent about three days each to every village all round the Harbour and near it. One night I saw them carrying home a large hog, which they had got from an Inland Chief for a portion of the fish which they had taken. I thought it right to cause them to return the net to the Mission House every Saturday evening, that they might not be tempted to use it on Sabbath. It was a great help to them, and the Harbour yielded them much wholesome food in lieu of what the hurricane had destroyed.
When, about this time, the John Knox came to anchor in the bay, a Native was caught in the act of stealing from her. Angry at being discovered, he and his friends came to shoot me, pretending that it was because the John Knox knew they were in want of food and had not brought them a load of Taro from Aneityum. Taro is a plant of the genus Arum, the Æsculentum, or Colocasia Æsculenta, well known all through Polynesia. The Natives spread it in a very simple way. Cutting off the leaves, with a very little of the old bulb still attached, they fix these in the ground, and have the new Taro about a year after that. It is of several kinds and of a great variety of colours—white, yellow, blue, etc. It grows best in ground irrigated by streams of pure water, or in shallow, swampy ground, over which the water runs. The dry-ground Taro is small and inferior, compared to the water-grown roots. Nutritious and pleasant, not unlike the texture of cheese when laid in slices on the table, in size and appearance like a Swedish turnip, it can be either boiled or baked. Hurricanes may destroy all other native food, but the Taro lies uninjured below the water; hence on islands, where it will grow, it forms one of the most permanent and valuable of all their crops.
Our people also demanded that the John Knox should bring them kava and tobacco. Kava is the plant, Piper Methysticum, from which they make a highly intoxicating drink. The girls and boys first chew it, and spit the juice into a basin; there it is mixed with water, and then strained through a fibrous cloth-like texture, which they get from the top of the cocoa-nut trees, where it surrounds the young nuts, and drops off with them when they are ripe. This they freely drink; it does not make them violent, but stupefies them and induces sleep like opium. A portion is always poured out to their Gods; and the dregs in every mouth after drinking are always spit out with the exclamation, “That’s for you, Kumesam!” It is sometimes offered and partaken of with very great ceremony; but its general use is as a soporific by the men, regularly after the evening meal. Women and children are not allowed to drink it. Many men have been attacked and murdered at night, when lying enfeebled and enfolded by kava. That, indeed, is their common mode of taking revenge and of declaring war. These angry men, who came to me about the John Knox, tried to smash in my window and kill my faithful dog; but I reasoned firmly and kindly with them, and they at last withdrew.