In the Track of the Trades / The Account of a Fourteen Thousand Mile Yachting Cruise to the Hawaiis, Marquesas, Societies, Samoas and Fijis

by Lewis R. Freeman

"The Reverend B—— and wife."

"Um-well, hardly. He's Anglican, you know, and there's been some trouble with Father Le P—— over converts. Better not put them down."

"The R——'s, who had us to tea when we drove around the island. They're of the missionary set, aren't they?"

"Yes, but they're Presbyterians. They have a suit on now for some of the Catholic land which adjoins them; so they wouldn't do with Father Le P——. But they're friends of the B——'s, though. You might put the B——'s down and scratch Father Le P—— off."

The next two families mentioned were at odds with both of the sub-factions, the lines of which we were plotting, and so were not put down at all for the moment. Then came three that were friendly to Father Le P——, which resulted in his name being added again, while those of the B——'s and the R——'s were scratched off. And so it went on for a couple of hours. The missionary set ultimately resolved itself into five irreconcilable factions, and to these we discharged our obligations separately with the two teas and a dinner on board and a tea and a dinner at the hotel.

The list of the trader and official set was more complicated still. His Excellency, the Governor, we started with, of course. Monsieur le Secretaire was also passed, but Captaine G—— could not be included because he had recently come to blows with the Secretary over cards at the Cercle Militaire. The dashing Major L—— was passed, but not Lieutenant P——, of the gunboat, who was in the black books of Government House because he had once violated official etiquette by bringing a jag to dinner instead of acquiring it during the evening. Le Compte de R—— it was also necessary to leave off from our Number One list because he and the truculent Secretary had recently quarrelled over the question of precedence at an official reception.

Without a "trial balance" we quickly came to the conclusion that the Anglo-Saxons and the Germans—except the Consuls—would not do with the French; so an evening of green drinks was planned for the latter by themselves. The Anglo-Saxon list was the hardest task of the lot, and before it was completed we learned that A—— had another wife living in Auckland and that the children of the two families visited back and forth; that the present Mrs. B—— was the first Mrs. C——, and before that was a barmaid in D——'s saloon; that the E——'s, F——'s, G——'s and H——'s were involved in a four-cornered lawsuit and were not on speaking terms; that the Misses I—— travelled to Sydney and back unchaperoned and carried on something scandalous; that J——'s son eloped with K——'s daughter and deserted her in San Francisco for a vaudeville actress; that—but these samples will, perhaps, prove sufficient to give an idea of the nature of the tasks which confronted us.

Even under the coaching of the sympathetic and almost omniscient Consul, feuds which had smouldered unsuspected or differences which had cropped up over night supervened to cast palls of frigidity over even the gayest of our gatherings, and the most fervently thankful moment we knew in the course of the whole cruise was the one in which the last boatload of the guests from the last of our half score or more of "duty" parties cleared the gangway and we told ourselves that all was over without a single shooting affray, fist fight or even a hair-pulling.

How much simpler entertaining had been in the Marquesas, where the common run of social feuds were along the line of that of "Chewer-of-Thumbs," who was reluctant about coming aboard with "Masticator-of-Boys'-Ears" on the ground that the latter's grandfather had eaten his—the "Chewer's"—grandmother, and afterwards was said to have complained of indigestion. "Fancy—indigestion from one of the 'Chewer-of-Thumbs' lineage!" And all we had to say was that the idea was so preposterous that it must have been meant as a joke; upon which they both swarmed gleefully aboard the yacht, where the reconciliation was completed and made permanent by "Masticator's" magnanimous action in smuggling one of our cases of canned salmon into "Chewer's" canoe and helping him get away with it.

Tahitian—I mean "missionary" Tahitian—ideas of modesty were amusingly illustrated by a warning we received from a well educated and intentioned young half-caste, zealous in the enthusiasm of recent conversion, to the effect that our bathing costumes—regulation American bathing suits—were the occasion of no small amount of unfavourable comment among the "better class of Papeetans."