My appearance had somewhat disturbed the usual formality of the meeting, and the chief, having commanded silence, went on with his speech.
As soon as it was over, I descended from my stilts, and begged him to grant the petition I had to make. I praised Dick as he had deserved, and told the chief all he had done for me; and, to my great joy, he replied that he would protect him, as, his owner being dead, no one else could claim his services.
On this I hurried off and brought in Dick, who was well received by the people. I afterwards told the chief the trick I had played, at which he was very much amused.
Dick at once set to work to make himself useful, and soon gained Motakee’s confidence, so that he allowed us both to roam about as we chose.
The victory gained by our friends over the Typees, the tribe they had attacked, had put them in excellent humour. They had burned down their villages, destroyed their fruit trees, and carried off their canoes. The slaughter had been, we were sorry to hear, considerable on both sides; for the Typees possessed several strong forts, formed of large stones and huge pieces of timber. These had been taken by assault, when all within had been put to the sword. Dick said he was surprised that savages could construct such strong works, for it would have proved a tough job, even to English sailors, to take some of those he had seen.
Months and months passed by, and yet no vessel had come near the island, in which we might make our escape. The people had got, we suspected, a bad name; for the Dolphin was not the only vessel, we found, they had cut off, while they had attempted unsuccessfully to capture several others. Our only hope was that a man-of-war would come in, which might carry us off by force, should the natives refuse to give us up.
The chief, who had adopted me as his son, seemed determined not to let me go, and I found that I was narrowly watched wherever I wandered.
Dick managed, at length, to communicate with some of the other men; though one or two were content to remain among the natives, having married and adopted their customs: the rest expressed an earnest wish to escape.
A tremendous storm having occurred, when it seemed as if the whole island would be carried away by the fury of the waves, the wreck of the Dolphin was cast up on the beach.
Dick told me that Mat Davis had long been thinking of building a vessel, and that the carpenter’s tools having been among the first things landed, he hoped, if he could get hold of them, to be able to build a craft which would convey us to the coast of South America. He had persuaded the chiefs, that if they could have such a vessel as he described, they might not only overpower all the neighbouring tribes, but sail in quest of foreign lands, which they might conquer. The chiefs listened eagerly to this proposal, and promised to assist him in carrying out his undertaking.