One of the white settlers offered his services as guide, to pilot us up the Roankiddi river as far as a village of the natives about two miles inland, where the chief of the nation dwelt, and several American missionaries had formed a settlement. Before reaching the main stream, which is about 100 feet wide and is densely wooded on either side, we had to pass various small branches and canals, which appeared to be artificially constructed, and wind about in a succession of extraordinary meanderings beneath an elastic covering of conical mangrove roots. For about a mile inwards there was nothing but dreary, swampy, unlovely mangrove forest, after which the vegetation on either shore began to assume an unusually variegated but thoroughly tropical appearance. Palms, bread-fruit trees, pandanus trees, papayas, caladias, Barringtonias, were the chief representatives of this abounding forest flora.
The animals on this island seem to be less numerous and less varied; there are no large ones at all. Of doves, as also of sand-pipers and parrots, we saw some very beautiful species, of which the fowling-pieces of our sportsmen furnished numerous specimens for our zoological collection. All along the bank of the river and around the hills lay scattered at will, under the shade of the most beautiful and abundant vegetation, the dwellings of the natives. Near where the pretty Roankiddi falls into the sea, rises on the left bank the handsome mission house built of wood, which serves the missionaries for school, church, and residence in one. Close by is a stone building, which serves as a larder. Unfortunately, the sole missionary, Mr. Sturges of Pennsylvania, was absent on a tour of inspection, and only his assistant (a native of the Sandwich Islands, who had received his education in the States) was at home with his family. A third missionary, also a native of the Sandwich Islands, lives at what is called Foul-weather Harbour, where he also occupies his time with meteorological observations.
The mission, which has been in the island since 1851, is supported at considerable expense. A schooner, the property of the American Missionary Society, keeps up regular communication with the neighbouring islands and the Sandwich Islands, and supplies the missionaries with provisions and other necessaries. These industrious, energetic men have quite recently made experiments in planting several sorts of vegetables, as also tobacco and sugar-cane, nearer their houses, in the hope, if successful, of inciting the
natives to similar exertions. The great resources at the disposal of the Protestant missionaries, and the circumstance that they attend to the temporal as well as the eternal weal of their dusky neophytes, exhausting their medical skill in illness, educating their children, ministering to their wants both by advice and co-operation, must be regarded as the main causes of the rapid spread of Protestantism throughout the races of the Pacific Ocean. We have seen missions, of which the schools, places of worship, and dwelling-houses, constructed of iron, were imported from the United States ready made, while the expenses of maintenance were defrayed by an annual grant of 20,000 dollars. What a gratifying contrast to the wretched appliances with which Catholic oversea missions are compelled to eke out a precarious existence!
We landed at a spot where the Roankiddi promised to be navigable for vessels of a better class than the hollowed-out canoes of the natives, and for the remainder of the distance to the chief's residence we followed a footpath through the forest. Close to the landing-place is a large, hall-like building, which is used as an assembly-room by the natives on the occasion of their festivities. Around the interior of this are ranged couches stuffed with straw for families of rank, not unlike berths round a ship's cabin. The centre of the hall is set apart for slaves and servants, who during these rude réunions are busily employed preparing food and drink for strangers. As often as a meeting is deemed necessary, invitations are sent off to the various chiefs requesting their co-operation.
On very important occasions these are intoned through a conk. As soon as all are assembled the king lays the subject-matter of the debate before them, when every one present is at liberty to express his opinion. Frequently these discussions become very animated, especially when the orators happen to have partaken too freely of Kawa, when only the interference of the less excited chiefs can prevent the disputants from coming to blows. When we saw it, there were in the hall of justice, as it might be termed, a number of huge, lengthy, but elegant canoes, painted red, which gave it rather the appearance of a shed than a festive hall.
The footpath to the chief's residence led through a most beautiful tropical landscape. The estate of the Nannekin (as the natives designate a king in their own language) was laid out quite in the European fashion, and the entrance was indicated by a wooden gateway. The house itself, a lengthy oblong of wood and cane-work, with a roof of palm-leaves, and built upon a sort of platform of two or three courses of stone, and furnished in every part with numerous large apertures serving as windows, presented from without a very comfortable, even imposing appearance; but the interior was bare, ill-equipped, and sadly out of order. A row of wooden columns, irregularly cut, and partially covered with gay-coloured stuffs, running parallel with the thin exterior walls, formed a narrow passage, a closer view of which was, however, shut off by cotton hangings stretching across. The clothes and other property of the family hung here at
random, suspended from pegs and lines all round the wide hall, and in the middle a hole had been excavated, which apparently was intended for a fire-place. Among the articles of furniture we specially noticed a large iron chest, with iron clampings, and a very singular-looking loom, on which a fabric was being woven in variegated colours. The chief was not at home, and had to be summoned, his timely absence affording an excellent opportunity for examining the environs of the palace a little more closely. In immediate proximity were a number of bread-fruit trees (Dong-dong), the fruit of which forms the staple diet of the natives, and has long been prepared by them in quite a unique manner.
The bread-fruit, so soon as it is ripe, is stripped of its husk, and cut into small pieces. These the natives place in pits dug for the purpose about three feet deep, in which they are placed in layers carefully wrapped in banana leaves so as to prevent moisture reaching them. Thus prepared, the pits are filled up to within a few inches of the surface, covered with leaves, and weighted with heavy stones so distributed as to diffuse an equal pressure throughout. Thus each pit is both air and water tight. After a short time fermentation sets in, till the whole is converted into a substance resembling cheese. The original idea of thus storing the bread-fruit is said, according to tradition, to have been suggested to the natives by a violent hurricane having at a remote period levelled all the bread-fruit trees on the island, thus causing a
great famine. The fruit thus treated continues fit for consumption for years, and, despite its sour taste and nauseous odour when exhumed, it is regarded by the natives as a most palatable and nutritive dish, when well kneaded, placed between two banana leaves, and baked between two hot stones. Besides the bread-fruit, the principal articles of food in use among the natives are cocoa-nuts, sugar-cane, yams, pigeons, turtle, fish, and trepang, the sort of sea-cucumber of which we have already given a description, and which the natives eat in the raw state.