Characteristics of Marquesan Natives—Mixed Creeds—Temao and
Mendos—Queen Vaekehu
IT may strike one as rather overdrawn that a girl of Waylao’s age should
interrogate a priest, or worry about religion at all. But the maids of
southern climes must not be judged in the same way as the maids of our
own lands. From infancy a child in the South Seas hears wild discussions
on creeds. Ere the dummy is cast altogether from their lips they see the
big, tattooed chief pass down the forest track swearing against the
fates that brought the white man to his demesne. Yes, with his old tappa
blanket wrapped about him, he shouts and yells his defiance to the
missionary, or to anyone who would speak disparagingly about his race.
Half-caste girls and youths (children of the settlers) lived in a world
of perpetual change. For those isles, where I found myself as a boy,
were not only populated by fearless shellbacks who drifted in on the
tide.
Tai-o-hae at that time was surrounded by wild scenery and
mountain-guarded glooms. Those glooms were haunted by handsome, tattooed
native men and picturesquely robed girls. By night one could hear their
songs from afar, chants in a strange tongue, as they flitted soft-footed
through the moonlit forest.
In cleared spaces of those wild valleys nestled villages full of the
hubbub of native life. I spent days in those tiny pagan cities, and so
got a good insight into the native ways.
[Illustration: NATIVE TATTOOED WITH ARMORIAL BEARINGS]
Through the influence of emigrant missionaries, their arguments, hopes
and ambitions seemed to be based on the subject of creeds. Natives who
one day had embraced Catholicism, or Protestantism, or had become
sun-worshippers, Mormons, Buddhists and Mohammedans, to-morrow cast the
faith aside and re-embraced some other creed that appeared to give
greater hope of earthly happiness. These changes were chiefly caused by
some apparent miracle performed by a native who had gone over to a new
creed. He would rush into the village and tell the excited mob of his
success; probably some scheme had met with sudden triumph. I myself have
heard a native chief shout in this wise:
“What ams ze goods of a creed that promise me heaven to-mollow, when me
allee samee have heaven to-day?”
His prayers had evidently been answered. His neighbour’s chickens were
missing, or the adulterously inclined wife of the high chief Grimbo had
fallen into his arms—at last.
Withal, they were a fine race. I have seen dethroned kings and stately,
tattooed chiefs stalk into the grog shanties for a drink. They still
retained something of their erstwhile majesty as they flung the coin
(just begged from some white man) carelessly on the bar. Even the
well-seasoned shellbacks looked up from their drinks as one old king of
other days stalked into the white man’s gin palace. Their oaths were
hushed as they saw that handsome, god-like figure with the atmosphere of
past barbarian splendour wrapped about him. About his loins was flung a
decorated, tasselled loin-cloth. It was drawn down and tied in a bow in
true native cavalier fashion at one tawny knee. His handsome,
chestnut-brown physique was artistically tattooed with the armorial
bearings of his tribe. No laugh or gibe escaped the lips of the white
men as he stood there, looking scornfully at them as they sat in rows,
and poured the last dregs of the fiery rum down his wrinkled throat.
Then that remnant of the past splendour of the South Sea Rome gave us
all a glance of defiance and stalked out of the bar door, followed by
his obsequious retinue—namely, a mangy dog, three scraggy (once
handsome) women and two nude children. To see such fine men and to
realise the true independence of their natures made me think of the lost
potentialities of the never-to-be South Sea Empire. What would their
race have become had their blue sky-lines been adamant crystal walls,
whereon ships bringing the reformers from civilised lands would have
dashed and been smashed to atoms?
I have often thought what sparkling, terraced cities of heathen beauty
might not have arisen on those sunny isles, enshrined by those horizons
of mythological stars that shine in the heathen’s poetic imagination.
Yes, they were wonderful lands, more wonderful than romance.
Chiefs would come into the grog shanty and for a drink tell one of the
most exciting events of Marquesan history. True enough, they were wont
to exaggerate, but a close observer could easily sift the truth from
fiction.
I recall Temao. He was a regular travelling volume of Marquesan lore,
romance, mythology and breezy barbarian crime.
Temao would stalk into Ranjo’s store and entertain Uncle Sam, Grimes and
all the rest with the history of Marquesan royalty for a period of about
forty years. As the white men filled him with rum, his eyes would flash
with grateful eloquence, and he would tell such tales that even those
seasoned shellbacks gasped.
Much that was told me first-hand of the terrors of those heathen times I
heard from a white man, one called Mendos, an old-time beachcomber. He,
I am sure, was one of the most wonderful characters that ever roamed
those Southern Seas. I have heard a lot about Bully Hayes, a South Sea
character, but to my mind Mendos stood far from the ruck of the ordinary
type of trader, for such he had been. He was well advanced in years and
intellectually superior to any man I met in those days. From him I heard
much about Queen Vaekehu. Indeed I believe that he was the only white
man who had once been the barbarian queen’s lover. But it’s not my
intention to dwell here on Mendos and his adventures.
As Queen Vaekehu was one of the most romantic royal personages of her
time, I feel that it would be interesting to give a brief account of
her, based on hearsay and also my own intimate reminiscences. This I
will attempt in another chapter.
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