While looking for an opening between the little islands, a canoe with two occupants paddled off from one of the islands and we let them aboard. It was certainly a surprise to see Polynesians again, instead of the little woolly-headed negroids of the Solomons. These men were big, brown-skined, straight-haired fellows—that is, their hair would have been straight, had they ever combed it. As they came over the rail, Henry spoke to them in his own tongue; and what was our amazement to hear them answer him. And then Tehei decided that he wouldn't die, and started talking to them.
Our surprise will be appreciated when I say that these people's rightful home was five thousand miles p318 to the eastward. They did not know that there were any others in this part of the world who could speak their language. They piloted us inside the lagoon, and then to our further surprise we saw a white man's frame house on the beach of the largest island. When we dropped anchor, this man came aboard, and a happy man he was that day. For it was a lonesome time he had, with a sight of white people only once a year, when the steamer came after his copra.
He was a Dutchman, and had lived here so long that he had almost forgotten how to speak English. We came ashore with him, and went directly to his home. While we were there a small boy brought up a tiny shark's jaw and presented it to Jack with the king's compliments. As we had bought these small jaws for a half-stick of tobacco, Jack was disgusted and started to throw it away, but I asked for it and he gave it to me.
Then we were taken to see the king, who was squatting on a mat in the centre of a large grass house, his half-dozen wives seated around him. We shook hands, and with the trader as interpreter Jack made the king a present of coloured calico and some tobacco, and then told the king that he must give us a hundred cocoanuts in return. The old king started to say no, until Jack made as if to take back his presents, when the king hastily ordered the cocoanuts to be sent aboard. We went on through the village and came to the graveyard, and it was the most remarkable graveyard p319 I have ever seen. The graves lay so close together that there was scarcely room for a tombstone. The tombstones were straight slabs of granite, with no writing, but some of them had queer heads attached. There were no mounds over the graves—they sparkled with pure white sand, beaten flat; and all the graves were levelled off the same way, until they appeared like a long, paved sidewalk. At the outer edge of the graveyard were three wooden crosses that marked the graves of the former wives of the Dutch trader. He pointed to the three graves with pride, and later on he showed us his three living wives. He informed us that if one of them didn't make copra better he might find it necessary to make a cross for her—and I believe he meant it. For he was very brutal. A fine handsome young fellow had attached himself to our party wherever we went, and once the Dutchman gave him a crushing blow with his fist, apparently without reason. After that, Obi held aloof.
On going back to the trader's house, we noticed a Solomon Islander working around the place. When we asked why this native should be so far away from home, we learned that he had been recruited about five years before to work on a plantation for the trading company, and had been put at this lagoon to prevent his getting way. Those who have read Jack London's story, "Mauki," will understand, for this native was the original of that interesting character. p320
We lay at this lagoon for nearly a week. I got a great deal of fine coral in all colours of the rainbow, but it all faded white, except the red, which was so brittle that it broke to pieces. I saw trees of coral twenty feet high, and wonderful gardens of it, through which parrot-coloured fish swam in and out.
After piling our cockpit full of green cocoanuts that the king's subjects had selected for us, we had prepared to leave, when word came to us that across the lagoon were two missionaries, a Samoan and a Tonga Islander, who wanted to see us. The Dutchman had been careful not to tell us of them, for a very good reason.
Why the Dutchman did not want us to know of these missionaries, perhaps the most remarkable in the world, we soon learned after we had left this lagoon and stumbled on to another.
Two years before the time we were at Ontong Java, the mission-ship Southern Cross had steamed into this harbour with two missionaries, one of them from Samoa, the other from the Tonga Islands. These two men tried hard to land, but the natives said no, that their idols were good enough for them and they had no desire to change—if the white men wanted to land there would be no resistance, but no dark-skinned natives were going to be allowed to tell them about new gods.
The Southern Cross could not afford to remain long at this place, for it kept them moving to make their rounds twice a year, so the two missionaries were left p321 with fifty days' food and water in an open boat. Then for fifty days these missionaires tried to land, but were met with spears at the beach; and when the food and water was all gone, the Dutch trader took pity on them, and told the king that he had received a message from the great white master, saying that if the men were not allowed to land they would send schooners and kill everyone on the islands.