AWAY TO SUNNIER LANDS.
After boarding the _Ludgate Hill_, the tramp steamship on which they
had taken passage for New York, chiefly on account of her unusually
spacious cabins, they discovered, somewhat to their discomfiture, that
the cargo, listed by the agent as "notions," really consisted largely
of live stock--horses to be taken on at Havre, and a consignment of
monkeys. All their party were of the sort, however, who have a "heart
for any fate," so they agreed to regard this as only an added
adventure. As it turned out, they were not disappointed, for, as the
elder Mrs. Stevenson writes, "It was very amusing and like a circus to
see the horses come on board," while Jocko, a large ape, which soon
struck up a warm friendship with Mr. Stevenson, furnished them with a
vast amount of entertainment. The exceptional freedom which they
enjoyed on board, too, more than counterbalanced any lack of elegance.
In a vein of exuberant joy at this escape from the narrow confines of
the sick-room, Louis writes to his Cousin Bob:
"I was so happy on board that ship I could not have believed it
possible. We had the beastliest weather and many discomforts; but the
mere fact of its being a tramp ship gave us many comforts; we could
cut about with the men and officers, stay in the wheel-house, discuss
all manner of things, and really be a little at sea. And truly there
is nothing else. I had literally forgotten what happiness was, and the
full mind--full of external and physical things, not full of cares and
labors and rot about a fellow's behavior. My heart literally sang; I
truly care for nothing so much as that."
The two ladies took up knitting to while away the long hours at sea,
and so the days slipped peacefully by, with the invalid steadily
gaining in health until they struck a heavy fog on the Newfoundland
banks, where he caught a cold.
They reached New York on September 7, 1887, at the time when
Stevenson's fame was in its flood-tide. _Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde_ had
just made a tremendous impression on the reading public; the idea of
dual personality was being discussed on all sides; ministers preached
sermons about it. Stevenson was amazed and bewildered, though
immensely pleased, at the sudden turn of fortune's wheel. Here,
indeed, was success at last in full measure.
Their original plan had been to try the climate of Colorado, but the
long overland journey seemed too great an ordeal in his condition,
and, hearing of Saranac in the Adirondacks, then just coming into
prominence as a resort for consumptives, they decided to make a trial
of it. While Louis and his mother paid a visit to the Fairchilds at
Newport, his wife and stepson went on to the mountain place to make
arrangements.
This sanatorium was established by Doctor Edward Livingstone Trudeau,
a New York physician who had nursed his brother through tuberculosis
and later developed the disease himself. He had tried going South and
taking daily exercise, but as these attempts at a cure only made
matters worse, in a sort of desperation he went to the Adirondacks,
not so much for health as for love of the great forest and the wild
life. It was then a rough, inaccessible region, visited only by
hunters and fishermen, and was considered to have a most inclement and
trying climate. Trudeau was carried to the place of Paul Smith, a
guide and hotel-keeper, on a mattress, but it was not long before he
was able to move about and to get some enjoyment out of life. When he
first spent a winter there it was thought to mean his death-warrant,
but, to his own surprise, he soon began to eat and sleep, and lost his
fever. In 1876 he moved his family to Saranac and lived there always
after that. Physicians in New York, hearing of the case of Trudeau,
began to send patients now and then to try the climate at Saranac, and
in that small way the health resort, now so extensive, had its
beginning. Stevenson went there in the early days of the sanatorium,
when the place was a mere little logging village, where logs were cut
and floated down the river.
There were two churches in the place, called by the appropriate names
of St. Luke the Beloved Physician and St. John in the Wilderness, the
latter a picturesque structure of logs. These churches, both of the
Episcopal denomination, were built and furnished as a testimonial of
gratitude by persons who had recovered health or had friends under
treatment there.
As soon as Mrs. Stevenson had her people settled at Saranac she left
them and went to Indiana to visit her mother and sister, stopping on
the way for a few days with the Bellamy Storers at Cincinnati. "The
Storers live in a sort of enchanted palace," she writes, "and are very
simple and gentle and kind, and altogether lovely. Mrs. Storer has a
pottery, where poor ladies with artistic tastes get work and
encouragement. She also has a large hospital for children, and a
little girl of her own with a genius for drawing. Mr. Storer is six
feet three and a half inches in height and has a Greek profile and
soft large brown eyes."
The Stevensons reached Saranac when the woods were all aflame with
autumn glory, and to Mr. Stevenson's mother it all seemed unreal and
"more like a painted scene in a theatre" than actuality.
The house in which they lived, a white frame cottage with green
shutters and a veranda around it, belonged to a guide named Andrew
Baker, who took parties into the woods for hunting and fishing
excursions. Baker was a typical frontiersman--brave, obstinate,
independent, and fearless--who might have stepped out of _Leather
Stocking_, and he had a kind, sweet wife. The cottage stood on high
ground, so that its occupants could look down on the river, and the
view, except for the brilliant hues of the frost-tinted leaves, was
enough like the Highlands to make Louis and his mother feel quite at
home.
Life in the cottage was frontier-like in its simplicity, and the
Scotch lady, for whom this was the first experience in "roughing it,"
asked for many things that caused great surprise to the village
storekeeper, including such unheard-of luxuries as coffee-pots,
teapots, and egg-cups. Writing to her friend Miss Boodle, the
"gamekeeper" of Skerryvore, Mrs. Robert Louis Stevenson describes
their life at Saranac:
"We are high up in the Adirondack Mountains, living in a guide's
cottage in the most primitive fashion. The maid does the cooking (we
have little beyond venison and bread to cook) and the boy comes every
morning to carry water from a distant spring for drinking purposes. It
is already very cold, but we have calked the doors and windows as one
calks a boat, and have laid in a store of extraordinary garments made
by the Canadian Indians. I went to Montreal to buy these and came back
laden with buffalo skins, snow shoes, and fur caps. Louis wants to
have his photograph taken in his, hoping to pass for a mighty hunter
or sly trapper. He is now more like the hardy mountaineer, taking long
walks on hill-tops in all seasons and weathers. It is something like
Davos here, all the invalids looking stronger and ruddier than we who
are supposed to be in good health.... Every afternoon a vehicle called
a 'buckboard' is brought to our door, sometimes with one large horse
attached, and sometimes we have a pair of lovely spirited ponies. The
buckboard is so light that when we meet a stage-coach on the narrow
road we simply drive our horse up the hillside and lift the buckboard
out of the way. Very soon, however, we shall exchange it for a
sleigh."
It was a long, bitter winter spent amid the ice and snow, the
thermometer at one time showing 48 degrees below zero. By November 19
it was fiercely cold, and water and ink froze in the rooms with fires
going all day and night. When the kitchen floor was washed with warm
water, even with a hot fire burning in the room, the floor became a
sheet of ice. All food had to be thawed out before it could be eaten,
and the thawing-out process sometimes presented great difficulties, a
haunch of venison remaining full of ice after being in a hot oven for
an hour. Sometimes a lump of ice was left unmelted in the centre of
the soup-pot even when the water boiled all around it. The cold was
most intense at night, when the rivets could be heard starting from
the boards like pistol-shots, but during the day the temperature was
often quite mild. The snow was so deep that it reached the
second-story windows, and paths had to be shovelled out and kept clear
around the house. In the streets a snow-plough was used. By March the
Hunter's Home was nearly buried in the drifts, and in spite of a huge
open fireplace, in which great log fires were kept constantly burning,
and a stove in every room, it was impossible to do much more than
barely keep from freezing to death. When they went out, muffled up to
the ears in furs, they carried little slabs of hot soapstone in their
pockets, for it was a great comfort to thrust a frozen hand into a
toasting-hot pocket.
Added to the bitterness of the cold was the depression of grey,
sunless days, only too like their memories of Scotland, and while they
sat and shivered around their immense fireplace their thoughts turned
insistently towards sunnier lands. Many years before, when Mr.
Stevenson was a mere lad, it had been suggested that the South Seas
was the very place for him, and the plan for a voyage there some time
in the future had always lain dormant in his thoughts, waiting for the
opportunity. This old dream now came to mind again, and every glance
from their frost-covered windows at the bleak dreariness without made
their vision of tropical forests and coral strands seem the more
alluring. The project now began to take on definite shape, and days
were spent in poring over Findlay's directories of the Mediterranean,
the Indian Ocean, and the South Seas.
In the meantime much work was accomplished, the most important being a
series of twelve articles written by Mr. Stevenson for _Scribner's
Magazine_, including some of his best-known essays--_The Lantern
Bearers_, _A Chapter on Dreams_, etc. In the short hours of daylight
and the long, dark evenings he worked with his stepson on the novel
called _The Wrong Box_. It was here, too, that the story of the two
brothers, _The Master of Ballantrae_, was thought out, and _The Black
Arrow_, a book which failed to meet with Mrs. Stevenson's approval,
was revised. In the dedication to this last he says:
"No one but myself knows what I have suffered, nor what my books have
gained, by your unsleeping watchfulness and admirable pertinacity. And
now here is a volume that goes into the world and lacks your
_imprimatur_; a strange thing in our joint lives; and the reason of it
stranger still! I have watched with interest, with pain, and at length
with amusement, your unavailing attempts to peruse _The Black Arrow_;
I think I should lack humor indeed if I let the occasion slip and did
not place your name in the fly-leaf of the only book of mine that you
have never read--and never will read."
By the time spring had melted the deep snow around their mountain home
they had come to the definite decision to undertake the cruise in the
event that a suitable vessel could be secured for the purpose. Leaving
the other members of the family about to start for Manasquan in New
Jersey, Mrs. Robert Louis Stevenson went to San Francisco, where she
found and chartered the yacht _Casco_, belonging to Doctor Merritt of
Oakland, for a six months' cruise.
While in California she came to visit me at Monterey, where years
before we had all been so happy together. During the week she spent
there we did the things that she liked best--spending long delightful
days gathering shells on the beach at Point Cypress, where the great
seas roared in from across the wide Pacific and broke thunderously at
our feet. When noon came, bringing us appetites sharpened by the
sparkling air, we built a fire under the old twisted trees and
barbecued the meat we had brought with us. She seemed to be welling
over with happiness--partly because of her great pride and joy in her
husband's success, and partly because, after years spent in Alpine
snows, Scotch mists, London fogs, and fierce Adirondack cold, she had
come again into the sunlight of her beloved California.
While there she had a pleasant meeting with Louis's old friend Jules
Simoneau, of which she writes to her husband:
"At last your dear old Simoneau came to see me. He was laden with
flowers, and was dressed in a flannel shirt thrown open at the neck
and his trousers thrust in his boots. I saw him from the window and
ran out and kissed him. He was greatly pleased and talked a long time
about you. I told him you were going to send him the books, and he
almost cried at that. The following day he and his wife spent the
whole time in the woods searching for roots and leaves that are,
according to the Indians, a certain cure for lung disease where there
is hemorrhage. I have a great packet of them; one dose is divided off,
and I am to divide the rest in the same way. A dose means enough to
make a gallon of tea, of which you are to drink when so inclined.
Simoneau said: 'I thought you might be ashamed of a rough old
eccentric fellow like me.' I expressed my feeling in regard to him, to
which he replied: 'And yet I am rough and eccentric; you say I was
kind; I fear that to be kind is to be eccentric.'"
Having secured the _Casco_, she telegraphed to her anxiously waiting
husband for a positive decision, to which he sent back an instant and
joyous "Yes."
It is now thirty years since Robert Louis Stevenson passed that winter
in the snows of the Adirondacks, and the little logging-camp, as he
knew it, has grown into a great sanatorium, but his spirit still seems
to hover over the place, and those who seek the healing of its crystal
air have set up a shrine and made of him a sort of patron saint. The
Baker Cottage has been converted by the Stevenson Society into a
memorial museum, where many objects commemorative of him have been
collected. Among these are the woodcuts with which he amused himself
at Davos, and which were given to them by Lloyd Osbourne. Here Mr. and
Mrs. Baker, whose hair has been whitened by the snows of many winters
since the Stevenson days, receive the visitors who come to reverently
examine the relics left by the man who fought so bravely and so
successfully against the same insidious enemy with whom they
themselves are struggling. On the veranda, where, in that time so long
past, his slender figure might often have been seen walking up and
down, a beautiful bas-relief by Gutzon Borglum, representing him in
the fur cap and coat and the boots that he was so boyishly proud of,
has been set up. Just as the mantle of Stevenson fell upon Cummy[26]
and Simoneau, so now it has fallen upon this most amiable and
delightful old couple, the Bakers, making them in a way celebrities;
and to the patients his memory is like that of a dear departed elder
brother, to whom they are linked by the strong bond of a common
suffering and a common hope.
[Footnote 26: Alison Cunningham, Stevenson's old nurse.]
As soon as they could make ready the family set out, and by June 7
their train was rolling down the western slope of the Sierras into
California. At Sacramento they were met by their "advance agent," who,
as her mother-in-law remarks, "was looking so pretty in a new hat that
we were grieved to hear that it belonged to her daughter."
Immediately on reaching San Francisco they were plunged into a bustle
of preparation for the long cruise. While he rested from the fatigue
of the long overland trip Mrs. Stevenson went on with the work,
including, among other things, vaccination for all hands except the
sick man. Lymph was taken with them so that his wife could vaccinate
him if it should become necessary. The burden of these preparations,
including the winning over of Doctor Merritt, who was not inclined to
rent his yacht at first, fell upon the shoulders of Mrs. Stevenson.
Sending the others here and there on errands, getting the burgee to
fly at the masthead, purchasing all the multitudinous list of supplies
necessary for the long voyage, making sure that nothing that might be
needed by the invalid should be forgotten, with flying runs between
times to report to him at the hotel--these were busy days for her.
While they were in San Francisco Mrs. Stevenson had a strange and
dramatic meeting with Samuel Osbourne's second wife, a quiet, gentle
little woman whom he married soon after his divorce from Fanny Van de
Grift. Within a year or two after the marriage Osbourne mysteriously
disappeared, never to be heard of again, and his wife dragged out a
pitiful existence at their vineyard at Glen Ellen, in Sonoma County,
hoping against hope for his return. Finally her faith failed, and when
she met Mrs. Stevenson in San Francisco she fell on her knees before
her and burst into bitter weeping, saying: "You were right about that
man and I was wrong!" She was then taken in to see Louis, and the two
women sat hand in hand by his bedside and talked of the trouble that
had darkened both their lives. Both Mr. and Mrs. Stevenson felt great
compassion for the unhappy woman and did what they could to relieve
her financial needs.
The _Casco_ was a beautiful racing yacht, with cabin fittings of silk
and velvet, and was kept so shiningly clean by her crew that in the
islands she came to be known as the Silver Ship. At last all was
ready, and, with a cabin packed with flowers and fruit sent by
admiring friends, early in the morning of June 28, 1888, as the first
rays of the sun glinted back from the dancing water, the _Casco_ was
towed across the bay, amid salutes from the ferry-boats and the trains
on shore, and out through the narrow passage of the Golden Gate. Then
the Silver Ship, shaking out her snowy sails, turned her prow across
the glittering expanse straight towards the enchanted isles of which
Louis Stevenson had dreamed since he was a boy of twenty.
The women had already provided themselves with their old solace of
knitting for the slow-passing days at sea, and all settled down for
the long voyage. All through the story of their three years of
wandering among the islands of the South Seas runs the thread of the
wife's devotion; of how she took upon herself the fatiguing details of
preparations for the voyages, searching for ships and arranging for
supplies; of how she walked across an island to get horses and wagon
to move the sick man to a more comfortable place; of how she saved his
trunk of manuscripts from destruction by fire on shipboard, of how she
cheerfully endured a thousand discomforts, hardships, and even dangers
for the sake of the slight increase of health and happiness the life
brought to the loved one. She was not a good sailor and suffered much
from seasickness on these voyages. Some of the trials of life on the
ocean wave under rough conditions are described in a letter to her
friend Mrs. Sitwell:
"As for me, I hate the sea and am afraid of it (though no one will
believe that because in time of danger I do not make an outcry), but I
love the tropic weather and the wild people, and to see my two boys so
happy.... To keep house on a yacht is no easy matter. When I was
deathly sick the question was put to me by the cook: 'What shall we
have for the cabin dinner, what for to-morrow's breakfast, what for
lunch, and what about the sailors' food? And please come and look at
the biscuits, for the weevils have got into them, and show me how to
make yeast that will rise of itself, and smell the pork, which seems
pretty high, and give me directions about making a pudding with
molasses, etc.' In the midst of heavy dangerous weather, when I was
lying on the floor in utter misery, down comes the mate with a cracked
head, and I must needs cut off the blood-clotted hair, wash and dress
the wound, and administer restoratives. I do not like being the 'lady
of the yacht,' but ashore--oh, then I feel I am repaid for all!"
Even Louis himself, lover of the sea though he was, was forced to
acknowledge that under some circumstances his capricious mistress had
her unpleasant moods. "The sea," he writes to Sidney Colvin, "is a
terrible place, stupefying to the mind and poisonous to the
temper--the motion, the lack of space, the cruel publicity, the
villainous tinned foods, the sailors, the passengers." Again he
remarks concerning the food: "Our diet had been from the pickle tub or
out of tins; I had learned to welcome shark's flesh for a variety; and
an onion, an Irish potato, or a beefsteak had been long lost to sense
and dear to aspiration."
But the glamour of romance and the joy of seeing her husband gaining
strength hour by hour made all these annoyances seem things of small
account, and, just as the time spent at Hyères was the happiest in
Louis's life, so these South Sea days were the best of all for her.
It had been decided that their first landfall should be at the
Marquesas, a group which lay quite out of the beaten track of travel,
three thousand miles from the American coast. Peacefully the days
slipped by, with no event to record, until, on July 28, 1888, their
first tropic island rose out of the sea and sent them in greeting a
breeze laden with the perfume of a thousand strange flowers. They
first dropped anchor in Anaho Bay, Nukahiva Island, which, except for
one white trader, was occupied solely by natives, but lately converted
from cannibalism. As both Stevenson and his wife were citizens of the
world in their sympathies, it was not long before they were on terms
of perfect friendliness with the inhabitants. Soon after landing, Mrs.
Stevenson's housekeeping instincts came to the front, and she set to
work to learn something about the native cookery. Her mother-in-law
writes:
"Fanny was determined to get lessons in the proper making of 'kaku,'
so went ashore armed with a bowl and beater. Kaku is baked breadfruit,
with a sauce of cocoanut cream, which is made by beating up the soft
pulp of the green nut with the juice, and is delicious."[27]
[Footnote 27: _The Letters of Mrs. M. I. Stevenson,
Saranac to Marquesas._]
Although the _Casco_ had been originally built solely for coast
sailing, and was scarcely fit for battling with wind and wave on the
open sea, it was decided to take the risk and lay their course for
Tahiti through the Dangerous Archipelago. After taking on a mate who
was thoroughly acquainted with those waters, and a Chinese named Ah Fu
to serve them as cook, they sailed away from the Marquesas. Ah Fu had
been brought to the islands when a child, a forlorn little slave among
a band of labourers sent by a contractor to work on the plantations,
although, as the contract called for grown men, it was fraudulent to
send a child. On the islands the boy grew up tall and robust,
abandoned the queue, and no longer looked in the least like a Chinese.
He became one of the most important members of the Stevenson family,
remaining with them for two years. He was intensely attached to Mrs.
Stevenson, carrying his devotion so far that once during a storm, when
the ship was apparently about to go to the bottom, he appropriated the
signal halyards, for which she had expressed an admiration, to give
her as a present, explaining that "if the ship went down they wouldn't
want them, and if it were saved they would all be too grateful to miss
them." When the time came for him to leave the Stevensons and return
to his family in China, it nearly broke his heart to go. Mrs.
Stevenson writes of him:
"Ah Fu had as strong a sense of romance as Louis himself. He returned
to China with a belt of gold around his waist, a ninety dollar breech
loader given him by Louis, and a boxful of belongings. His intention
was to leave these great riches with a member of his family who lived
outside the village, dress himself in beggar's rags, and then go to
his mother's house to solicit alms. He would draw from her the account
of the son who had been lost when he was a little child, and, at the
psychological moment, when the poor lady was weeping, Ah Fu would cry
out: 'Behold your son returned to you, not a beggar, as I appear, but
a man of wealth!"
On September 8 they ran into the lagoon of Fakarava, a typical low
island forming a great ring some eighty miles in circumference by only
a couple of hundred yards in width, and lying not more than twenty
feet above the sea. Their experiences during a fortnight's stay on
this bird's roost in the Pacific are thus described by Mrs. Stevenson:
"Leaving the yacht _Casco_ in the lagoon, we hired a cottage on the
beach where we lived for several weeks. Fakarava is an atoll of the
usual horseshoe shape, so narrow that one can walk across it in ten
minutes, but of great circumference; it lay so little above the sea
level that one had a sense of insecurity, justified by the terrible
disasters following the last hurricane in the group. Not far from
where we lived the waves had recently swept over the narrow strip of
coral during a storm. Our life passed in a gentle monotony of peace.
At sunrise we walked from our front door into the warm, shallow waters
of the lagoon for our bath; we cooked our breakfast on the remains of
an old American cooking stove I discovered on the beach, and spent the
rest of the morning sorting over the shells we had found the previous
day. After lunch and a siesta we crossed the island to the windward
side and gathered more shells. Sometimes we would find the strangest
fish stranded in pools between the rocks by the outgoing tide, many of
them curiously shaped and brilliantly colored. Some of the most
gorgeous were poisonous to eat, and capable of inflicting very
unpleasant wounds with their fins. The captain suffered for a long
time with a sort of paralysis in a finger he had scratched when
handling a fish with a beak like a parrot....
"The close of the placid day marked the beginning of the most
agreeable part of the twenty-four hours; it was the time of the moon,
and the shadows that fell from the cocoanut leaves were so sharply
defined that one involuntarily stepped over them. After a simple
dinner and a dip in the soft sea, we awaited our invariable visitor,
M. Donat Rimareau, the half-caste vice-president. As it was not the
season for pearl fishing, there were no white men on the island,
though now and again a schooner with a French captain would appear and
disappear like a phantom ship. The days were almost intolerably hot,
but with the setting of the sun a gentle breeze sprang up. We spent
the evenings in the moonlight, sitting on mattresses spread on the
veranda, our only chair being reserved for our guest. The conversation
with M. Rimareau, who was half Tahitian, was delightful. Night after
night we sat entranced at his feet, thrilled by stories of Tahiti and
the Paumotus, always of a supernatural character. There was a strange
sect in Fakarava called the 'Whistlers,' resembling the spiritualists
of our country, but greater adepts. When M. Rimareau spoke of these
people and their superstitions his voice sank almost to a whisper, and
he cast fearful glances over his shoulder at the black shadows of the
palms. I remember one of the stories was of the return of the soul of
a dead child, the soul being wrapped in a leaf and dropped in at the
door of the sorrowing parents. I am sure that when my husband came to
write _The Isle of Voices_ he had our evenings in Fakarava and the
stories of M. Rimareau in mind. I know that I never read _The Isle of
Voices_ without a mental picture rising before me of the lagoon and
the cocoa palms and the wonderful moonlight of Fakarava."[28]
[Footnote 28: Preface by Mrs. Stevenson to _Island
Nights Entertainments_.]
It was the Fakaravans who gave the name of _Pahi Muni_, the shining or
silver ship, to the _Casco_.
Here the two ladies of the Stevenson party took lessons from the niece
of a chief in plaiting hats of bamboo shavings and pandanus, and Mrs.
Louis learned how to make them beautifully. This hat-making is the
constant "fancy-work" of all Tahitian women, and serves in lieu of the
tatting and embroidery of civilized lands. The best hats are made of
the stalks of the arrowroot plant.
In the last week of September, bidding a regretful farewell to M.
Rimareau and his delightful moonlight talks, they set sail for
Papeete, the capital and port of entry of the Society Group--most
beautiful of all the islands of the Pacific. But, though they were
entranced with the grandeur and charm of its scenery--its towering
cliffs, leaping cascades, and green, palm-fringed flat land of the
coast--Papeete did not treat them well, and their old enemy, which had
forgotten them for some happy months, again found them out there and
Louis had a severe relapse, with a return of the hemorrhages. It was
clear that Papeete did not agree with him, and it was decided to
remove him to a more suitable place. After a perilous trip around the
island in the _Casco_, during which the ship was twice nearly lost on
the reefs, they reached Taravao, but found it hot and full of
mosquitoes. Mr. Stevenson was now very ill, and it was imperatively
necessary, not only to find a more salubrious spot, but also some
means of transporting him to it. His wife, equal to the occasion, as
always, set out on foot across the island, following a trail until she
reached the shanty of a Chinese who had a wagon and a pair of horses.
"These she hired to take them to Tautira, the nearest village of any
size, a distance of sixteen miles over a road crossed by
one-and-twenty streams. Stevenson was placed in the cart, and,
sustained by small doses of coca, managed, with the help of his wife
and their servant, to reach his destination before he collapsed
altogether."[29]
[Footnote 29: _The Life of Robert Louis Stevenson_, by
Graham Balfour.]
They found a house and made him as comfortable as possible. It was not
long before Princess Moë, ex-queen of Raiatea, and a most charming
person, heard of their arrival and came to see them. "I feel," writes
Mrs. Stevenson, "that she saved Louis's life. He was lying in a deep
stupor when she first saw him, suffering from congestion of the lungs
and a burning fever. She made him a dish of raw fish salad, the first
thing he had eaten for days; he liked it and began to pick up from
that day. As soon as he was well enough she invited us to live with
her in the house of Ori, the sub-chief of the village, and we gladly
accepted her invitation." There they lived as "in fairyland, the
guests of a beautiful brown princess."
When the _Casco_ had been brought around to Tautira it was discovered
in a peculiar way that their danger in the recent trip from Papeete
had been greater than they had realized. The elder Mrs. Stevenson gave
a feast on board to a number of native women, and during its progress
one of the women offered a prayer for their deliverance from the
perils of the sea, praying especially that if anything were wrong with
the ship it might be discovered in time. The elder Mrs. Stevenson had
tried in vain to persuade Captain Otis to go to church at the places
where they stopped. This time the church came to him and he couldn't
escape, but stood leaning disgustedly against the mast while the
prayer was said. After the visitors left he made some impatient
exclamation against "psalm-singing natives," and struck the mast a
hard blow with his fist. It went through into decayed wood, and the
captain was aghast. Mrs. Stevenson, on her part, was triumphant, and
she always loved to tell that story and dwell on the expression of
the scoffing captain's face as he saw a prayer answered. Both masts
were found to be almost entirely eaten out with dry-rot, and if either
had gone by the board off the reefs of any of the islands nothing
could have saved the _Casco_ from going to the bottom. The ship was at
once sent to Papeete for repairs, but as it was impossible to obtain
new masts of a proper size there, they were obliged to be content with
patching up the old ones. This let the party in for a long stay at
Tautira, at which none repined, for the scenery and climate were
delightful, and their new friends hospitable and interesting.
Following island custom, Mrs. Louis Stevenson and the Princess Moë
exchanged names--each taking the name of the other's mother--that of
Mrs. Stevenson being Terii-Tauma-Terai, part of which meant heaven and
part gave her a claim to some land in the neighbourhood.
Chief Ori a Ori (Ori of Ori, a clan name) was a magnificent figure of
a man, standing six feet three and broad and strong in proportion. "He
looked like nothing so much as a Roman emperor in bronze," says Mrs.
Stevenson, and when he appeared at a feast with a wreath of golden
yellow leaves on his head, all the company cried out in admiration. As
he spoke very good French, communication with him was easy, and many a
pleasant evening was spent in his house at Tautira, exchanging strange
tales of old, wild, bloody days in the Scottish Highlands and in the
Southern Seas. Both the Stevensons conceived a warm friendship for
Ori, which endured as long as they lived.
As they used to do in Barbizon, in the old French days, Mrs. Louis
Stevenson set herself to making silhouettes of the different members
of the strangely assorted company, gathered from the four quarters of
the globe. First she did the portrait of Ori by throwing the shadow of
his head on the wall with the help of a lamp, then drawing the outline
and filling it in with India ink. It turned out so good that Ori
demanded likenesses of all the rest, and soon the house was turned
into a veritable picture-gallery.
A feast was given by the chief for the captain of the _Casco_, and,
says the elder Mrs. Stevenson, "Ori had such respect for Fanny's
cooking powers that he insisted she should prepare the feast; so she
stuffed and cooked a pair of fowls, two roast pigs, and made a
pudding."
These days of pleasant intimacy with the Stevensons were doubtless the
brightest in the whole life of the island chief, and he kept them
always in affectionate remembrance. Years afterwards, when Mrs.
Stevenson was living in San Francisco after the death of her husband,
two of her friends, Doctor and Mrs. Russell Cool, went to Tahiti, and
were commissioned by her to visit Chief Ori a Ori. The Cools took with
them a phonograph and themselves made records of a speech by Ori to
Mrs. Stevenson, which, with its translation, was afterwards reproduced
for her in San Francisco. But let us hear Mrs. Cool's own story of
this visit:
"Ori had never seen a phonograph in his life, but his interest was
that of a clever and civilized person--with none of the ignorance and
terror and superstition of a savage. He was more than interested in
everything relating to Louis and Tamaitai,[30] asking all sorts of
questions, intelligent ones, too, about their life in Samoa; then in
San Francisco; about Tamaitai's personal appearance--if her hair was
gray; whether she had a town house and country house, and whether they
were near the ocean and the mountains. He had a perfect picture when
we had answered them all, and he was so pleased and grateful to
us--bearers of interesting news. All this time we sat out on the
veranda of his cottage, on a moonlight night almost too heavenly to be
real--a tropical night filled with beauty and romance. Then there was
a lull in the conversation, and Ori said: 'And now tell me about John
L. Sullivan!' We fell down from romantic heights with a thud! Then we
reflected that as Louis was the greatest man intellectually that Ori
had ever met, so John L. Sullivan, the famous fighter, was the
greatest man in that line of his time. The islanders, in common with
other primitive peoples, admire physical perfection tremendously, and
feats of strength are celebrated in fable, song, and story. To Ori
there was nothing incongruous in placing John L. Sullivan, the famous
prizefighter, and Robert Louis Stevenson, the noted writer--two great
men--side by side.
[Footnote 30: Tamaitai was the Samoan name of Mrs.
Stevenson.]
"We stayed all night out at Ori's place, and as a mark of honor my
husband was given Louis's bed and I was given Tamaitai's. Ori's wife,
a little dear, kissed our hands all round because we came from
Tamaitai. Their love and admiration for her was so sincere and
touching--it is the sweetest memory I have of Tahiti. We went to see
Ori especially for Tamaitai, for she wished to know the condition of
his eyes, and whether he needed glasses. His eyes were all right then,
but later on developed some trouble, but he was so very old at that
time that he was not willing to make the trip around the island for
examination."
In 1906 the Society Islands were devastated by a terrific hurricane,
and, hearing that Ori had suffered great loss, Mrs. Stevenson sent him
a sum of money to help tide him over the crisis. He was very grateful
for this assistance and wrote her a letter of heartfelt thanks, saying
the money would be used to build a new house for himself and family to
take the place of the houses that had been swept away.
Two dream-like months were spent on this lovely island of Tautira,
while day after day, like shipwrecked mariners, they scanned the sea
in vain for some signs of the long-delayed _Casco_. At last provisions
fell so low that there seemed no prospect ahead of them but to live on
the charity of their kind friend Ori. Thinking of this one day Mrs.
Stevenson could not restrain her tears, and the chief, divining the
cause of her distress, said to Louis: "You are my brother; all that I
have is yours. I know that your food is done, but I can give you
plenty of fish and taro. We like you and wish to have you here. Stay
where you are till the _Casco_ comes. Be happy--_et ne pleurez pas!_"
They were deeply moved by this generous offer from a man to whose
island they had come as utter strangers, and to celebrate the occasion
Louis opened a bottle of champagne, which, curiously enough, was all
that was left in their provision-chest. From this time they lived
almost entirely on native food--raw fish with sauce made of cocoanut
milk mixed with sea-water and lime-juice, bananas roasted in a little
pit in the ground, with cocoanut cream to eat with them, etc. All this
sounds luxurious, but after some time on this diet the white man
begins to feel a consuming longing for beefsteak and bread and coffee.
At last the repaired _Casco_ hove in sight, and, after a
heart-breaking farewell from their now beloved friend, Ori a Ori, and
his family, they set sail for Honolulu. The voyage of thirty days was
a wild and stormy one, and they were obliged to beat about the
Hawaiian Islands for some days before they could enter, eating up the
last of their food twenty-four hours before arrival, but finally the
Silver Ship, flying like a bird before a spanking trade-wind, ran into
port around the bold point of Diamond Head. The deep translucent blue
of the water was broken by ruffles of dazzling foam where treacherous
reefs lay hidden, and on the horizon lay piles of those fat
feather-bed clouds that are never seen so intensely white in any other
place. Their arrival was the cause of great rejoicing to Mrs.
Stevenson's daughter, who was then living in Honolulu, for the
_Casco_, long overdue, had been given up as lost.
They found Honolulu very beautiful. Taking a house at Waikiki, a short
distance from town, they settled down to finish _The Master of
Ballantrae_. In these surroundings, which seemed to them
ultra-civilized after their experiences in the Marquesas and the
Societies, they were able to enjoy a little family life. Under a great
_hau_-tree that stood in the garden a birthday-party was given to
Austin Strong, the little son of Mrs. Stevenson's daughter. Just as
though it had been prearranged, in the midst of the party who should
come along but an Italian with a performing bear, the first that any
of the children had ever seen! The silent witness to these festivities
of years ago, the great _hau_-tree, still stands.
It was at this time that Stevenson began work on the scheme of his
book on the South Seas. This was one of the rare occasions when he and
his wife reached a deadlock in their opinions, and, unfortunately for
the success of the book, he refused to accept her advice. Writing to
Sir Sidney Colvin, she says:
"I am very much exercised by one thing. Louis has the most enchanting
material that any one ever had in the whole world for his book, and I
am afraid he is going to spoil it all. He has taken into his
Scotch-Stevenson head that a stern duty lies before him, and that his
book must be a sort of scientific and historical, impersonal thing,
comparing the different languages (of which he knows nothing really)
and the different peoples, the object being to settle the question as
to whether they are of common Malay origin or not.... Think of a small
treatise on the Polynesian races being offered to people who are dying
to hear about Ori a Ori, the 'making of brothers' with cannibals, the
strange stories they told, and the extraordinary adventures that
befell us! Louis says it is a stern sense of duty that is at the
bottom of it, which is more alarming than anything else ... What a
thing it is to have a man of genius to deal with! It is like managing
an over-bred horse!"
"This letter," justly comments Sir Sidney, "shows the writer in her
character of wise and anxious critic of her husband's work. The
result, in the judgment of most of his friends, went far to justify
her misgivings."
It had been their intention to return to England by way of America in
the following summer, but the state of Mr. Stevenson's health was
still not good enough to warrant this venture, and, besides, the short
cruise among the islands in the _Casco_ had but whetted their
appetites for more. It was finally decided that while the elder Mrs.
Stevenson went on a visit to Scotland the rest of the party should
sail again for the South Seas, and they began at once to make
preparations. The charter of the _Casco_ having come to an end, it was
necessary to find another vessel. All these details were taken in hand
by Mrs. Stevenson and her son, while Louis went to Molokai to visit
the leper colony, in which he had become intensely interested after
discovering that every island visited in the _Casco_ was afflicted
with the curse of leprosy. They saw many distressing cases, and their
admiration for Father Damien and his unexampled heroism rose higher
and higher. It was while they were in Honolulu that Mr. Stevenson read
the letter written by the Reverend Mr. Hyde, and printed in a
missionary paper, which inspired his eloquent defence of Father
Damien, afterwards written and published in Sydney, Australia.
In the meantime Mrs. Stevenson made arrangements to charter the
_Equator_, a trading schooner of only sixty-four tons register, but
stanchly built and seaworthy, and having the added advantage of being
commanded by a skilful mariner, Captain Denny Reid. On June 24, 1889,
taking the faithful Ah Fu as cook, and this time accompanied by Mrs.
Stevenson's son-in-law, Joseph Strong, they sailed away for the
Gilbert Islands. During their stay in Honolulu they had struck up a
great friendship with the interesting and genial King Kalakaua, and on
the day of their departure he appeared at the wharf with the royal
band of musicians to see them off in proper style.
As Mrs. Strong, Mrs. Stevenson's daughter, did not wish to leave her
son Austin and the voyage was considered too hazardous for so young a
child, she went to Sydney to await the arrival of the _Equator_.
Through lovely days and glorious nights they sailed along, the little
schooner lying so low in the water that they were brought close to the
sea, "with a sort of intimacy that those on large ships, especially
steamers, can never know."
Captain Reid is described by Mrs. Stevenson as "a small fiery
Scotch-Irishman, full of amusing eccentricities, and always a most gay
and charming companion." Beneath this jolly sea-dog exterior, however,
some eccentricities lay hidden that the crew did not always find
amusing. Hearing a noise of splashing in the water by the ship's side,
Mrs. Stevenson found on inquiry that it was the captain taking his
regular morning bath while surrounded by a circle of sailors to keep
off the sharks. When she asked him if he did not think it selfish to
expose the sailors to the danger in order to protect himself, he
answered: "No, for if the captain should be lost think how much worse
it would be for all on board than if it were a mere sailor!"
Their first stop in the Gilberts was at the port of Butaritari in the
island of Great Makin, their arrival being unfortunately timed to
strike the town just when the taboo against strong drink had been
temporarily lifted by the king, and the whole population was engaged
in a wild carouse. For a few days their situation seemed precarious,
but the king at length restored the taboo, and after that peace
settled again over the island.
After a stay of about a month at Butaritari they moved to Apemama,
ruled over by the strong and despotic king Tembinoka, who, although
usually unfavourable to whites, admitted the Stevensons to his closest
friendship. He said he was able to judge all people by their eyes and
mouths, and, they having passed his examination successfully, he
proceeded at once to do all in his power to make them comfortable.
They were provided with four houses, "charming little basket-work
affairs, something like bird-cages, standing on stilts about four feet
above the ground, with hanging lids for doors and windows," and a
retinue of several more or less useless servants, who spent most of
their time in frolicking.
When they chartered the _Equator_ it had been in the agreement that
the ship should be permitted to engage in her legitimate occupation of
trading in the islands when opportunity offered. She now went off on a
cruise for copra, while the Stevensons stayed on shore at Apemama,
where they spent six peaceful weeks. As they were again marooned
longer than they expected, provisions began to run short, and it
became necessary to live on the products of the island. Wild chickens
were plentiful, and the handy Ah Fu found no difficulty in shooting
them with a gun borrowed from the king, but a constant diet of these
birds finally palled on them, and they were overjoyed when some of the
king's fishermen caught several large turtles. "Never," says Mrs.
Stevenson, "was anything more welcome than these turtle steaks!" The
long deprivation of green vegetables caused a great desire for them,
and Louis said: "I think I could shed tears over a dish of turnips!"
As Mrs. Stevenson always carried garden-seeds with her, she took
advantage of their extended stay here to plant onions and radishes,
which soon came up and were received with intense appreciation.
The shrewd Tembinoka, judge and critic of his fellow men, whom they
found to be the most interesting of all their South Sea acquaintances,
did not fail to perceive unusual qualities in the wife of his guest.
He remarked: "She good; look pretty; plenty chench (sense)."
The king desired a new design for a flag, and all set to work to
produce a suitable one. Mrs. Stevenson's drawing, which consisted of
three vertical stripes of green, red, and yellow, with a horizontal
shark of black showing white teeth and a white eye, pleased him best
and was adopted. The design was afterwards sent to Sydney and
Tembinoka's flag manufactured from it. The shark was a neat reference
to the king's supposed descent, of which he was very proud, from a
fish of that species.
Finding that the whole island was rapidly falling away from
Christianity, the king the worst of all, the Stevensons felt it to be
their duty to go to church every Sunday, to set an example, although
they understood nothing of the services, which were conducted in the
native language. During the latter part of their stay they gave an
exhibition of magic-lantern pictures--wretched daubs, it is true--of
the life of Christ. That their efforts to do good were not all in vain
was proved by the gratifying news received some time afterwards that
all the natives, including the despot king, were returning to their
Christian duties and the big church was full again.
The absence of the _Equator_ was so prolonged that they were in great
alarm lest she might be lost, but at last she hove in sight.
After much discussion during the long days aboard ship and ashore,
their plans had been definitely formed to make Apia, Samoa, their next
port of call, and bidding farewell, with many regrets, to the island
king, the little schooner once more raised her sails to the breeze.
Stern old savage as Tembinoka was, he could not restrain his tears
when he saw these delightful visitors from across the seas sail away
forever, leaving him to the dull society of his many wives, whom he
described as "good woman, but not very smart." Later, while living in
Samoa, they were pained to hear of the death of their dear old friend
Tembinoka, king of the island where they had spent so many happy days.
It seemed that he had an abscess on his leg, and one of the native
doctors lanced it with an unclean fish-bone, which caused
blood-poisoning and the death of the king in great agony. For the
better protection of his heir he left directions that his body should
be buried in the centre of the royal residence, no doubt with the idea
of frightening away evil-doers through their superstitious fears.
This time they took with them a passenger, a German trader named
Höflich, of whom Lloyd Osbourne writes:
"When Paul Höflich, then trading in Butaritari, learned that Louis had
chartered the _Equator_ for Samoa, he packed up his merchandise and
with this and twenty tons of copra engaged passage for the neighboring
island of Maraki, distant about sixty miles. For this passage he paid
sixty dollars. In spite of all efforts, however, the _Equator_ failed
to reach Maraki, being foiled by light airs and violent currents; so
there was nothing left to do but to carry Paul on with us to Samoa,
and though the captain tried to make him pay an increased passage he
smilingly but firmly refused. We always thought that the twenty tons
of copra saved our lives, for it stiffened the ship in the dreadful
little hurricane that almost capsized us."
I shall let Paul Höflich tell his own story of the days when he
cruised with the Stevensons, in the letters he was kind enough to
write me:
"My dear Mrs. Sanchez:
"In reply to your letter to pen any little happenings concerning Mr.
R. L. Stevenson while I was with the Stevenson party on board the old
_Equator_, I may say that I am very pleased to do so, but I am afraid
the results will be meagre, for the length of time I had the pleasure
of being with them did not exceed ten weeks. Besides, it is now just
twenty-seven years ago. I boarded the _Equator_ while she was among
the islands cruising for copra, and in due time we reached Apemama and
dropped anchor in the lagoon near the king's boat fleet. Going on
shore we found the party hale and much pleased with the ship's
arrival. In the evening the king, a fat and clever native, paid a
visit and entertained us by telling about his ancestors. On the
mother's side they came from a shark, and the father resigned in his
favor, as he was not so high a chief as his son, the descendant of the
shark.
"Mrs. Stevenson told us she had a garden planted with all kinds of
things, but the soil was stubborn and would not yield anything good
but cocoanuts; in fact, all the plants seemed to be growing into
cocoanut trees. She also told us about her first experience as a
medicine man. One day a man came along, sat down, and complained of a
severe headache, asking for 'binika,' by which he meant painkiller.
The lady thought he meant vinegar, and told him it was useless against
a headache, but he persisted. So a generous portion was poured out and
handed to him, to be used externally. He received it, smelled it, and
suspicion was visible on his countenance, but, being too polite to
return it, he swallowed the whole and returned the glass, profusely
thanking Mrs. Stevenson. He then rose and left, more sick than when he
came.
"The king offered Mrs. Stevenson a sewing-machine, saying he had a
houseful of them, and as his arsenal was short of boat anchors he used
the sewing-machines as such for his fleet.
"In a few days everything was snug, and we left the moorings to beat
through the passage, and from there pointed her head for Maraki. A
nice breeze favored us, but gradually it moderated, and as the weary
days dragged on a rumor started that there was a Jonah on board. At
first we eyed each other with distrust, then it was whispered and at
last openly declared that I must be the Jonah. I mildly protested,
saying that Mrs. Stevenson was most likely to blame. I told them all
sorts of stories to prove that sailors believed that a woman on board
would bring bad luck to a ship, but all to no avail. Their idea that
the passenger for Maraki was a Jonah had taken firm hold. Worse still,
I began to believe it myself, and made up my mind to jump the ship as
soon as I had a chance.
"In the meantime we were creeping slowly along until one morning, lo
and behold, my island hove in sight. As the sun rose the breeze
freshened and I got hilarious. We were drawing nearer our anchorage in
good style and could see my station now plainly, and the natives
gathering on the beach. I pictured myself already landing amidst their
shouts of welcome, when, to my horror--I shudder even now as I pen
these lines--the wind died out. I whistled for wind until my lips
blistered, but all in vain, for the breeze kept straight up and down.
Jonah was at work again. I demanded loudly of the captain to be put
on shore, but he only shrugged his shoulders. The argument brought up
Mr. Stevenson, who said 'What about that for a boat?' nodding at a
certain small deck house. 'It resembles a skiff, and I dare say the
trade-room will spare a pair of paddles.' 'The very thing,' said I,
and began sharpening my sheath knife to cut the lashings. While I got
busy Mrs. Stevenson came to me and I told her what way I was going on
shore. 'Why,' she said, 'if you make your appearance in a miserable
craft of that kind your reputation on Maraki will be gone forever.
Besides they might take you for a Jonah fresh from a whale and turn
you right back to sea again. It would be safer to stay on board and
make another attempt to reach Maraki, this time via Samoa.' I did not
think I was getting quite a square deal, but I stayed. The current had
taken us out of sight of land when a strong and fair breeze sprang up
and carried us by noon next day to our anchorage in Butaritari lagoon.
"Here the party went ashore, biding the vessel getting ready for sea.
In a week we lifted anchor and made for the passage, but the _Equator_
was unwilling to leave. She hung on to a reef, and not until she had
parted with her false keel would she push on and gain the open. During
the first few weeks we had to beat to the eastward, which brought much
calm and rainy weather. Mrs. Stevenson soon found that her berth was
not the driest place in the ship. The tropical sun had warped the
decks so that the rain found its way into the cabins. So Mrs.
Stevenson would emigrate to the galley-way with her couch, and, with
the help of an umbrella ingeniously handled, manage to do fairly well
for a night's rest.
"One calm morning she called to tell us that sharks were around, and
that one of them was wearing the glasses Mr. Osbourne had lost out of
a boat at Maraki. Sure enough there were lots of them, and we soon had
shark and chain hooks over the side, pulling them in and despatching
them quickly and painlessly, but we never caught the one with the
glasses on. Mrs. Stevenson said he could probably see a little better
than the others. Now it seems that all these sharks stirred the
appetite of Mr. Stevenson for shark steak--at least he advocated
making a meal of them. Mrs. Stevenson mildly remonstrated, pointing
out that it would be gruesome to eat the ancestors of Tembinoka, the
man who had sheltered them for weeks. Mr. Stevenson could not see so
far back, so the shark steak came on the table, but his wife managed
to evade it. At last a breeze sprang up and the sharks took their
leave.
"One night it blew stiff and we shortened sail, but with little
advantage. The ship capered about till she had her topmast overboard
with the jib attached to it. This episode occasioned the composition
of the song 'On board the old _Equator_,' by Mrs. Stevenson and Mr.
Osbourne, I believe for Mr. Stevenson's birthday. I sang it on that
occasion for the first time, and later at Apia at a dinner given for
the ship. This was before Mr. Stevenson had given away his
birthday,[31] so he was allowed to enjoy it, as did we all. Speeches
were made and we drank his health, severally and all together. We felt
as happy as any crew on board of a 20,000 tonner."
[Footnote 31: See _The Letters of Robert Louis
Stevenson_, page 279.]
* * * * *
Of this jolly party, gathered together by the _camaraderie_ of the
sea, Lloyd Osbourne writes:
"The rousing chorus was sung in unison: 'Captain darling, where has
your topmast gone, I pray? Captain darling, where has your topmast
gone?' Such things sound foolish years afterwards, but at the time are
gay and funny. Now, looking back, it seems as though the incongruity
of the party was the funniest thing about it--Louis, my mother,
myself, the boyish young Scotch captain, the big Norwegian mate, the
Finnish second mate, Rick, a Russian ex-sea-captain, Paul Höflich, Joe
Strong the artist, all the very best of friends, who had lived a month
together crowded to suffocation, and yet were better friends than ever
when they left the ship."
* * * * *
To continue the story of Paul Höflich:
"On the twenty-sixth morning out Mrs. Stevenson called from the deck:
'Come up and see Samoa!' Proudly the vessel cut her way towards the
mountainous island covered with dark green forest from peak to beach.
We were all struck with its beauty and elated with expectations as to
its hidden shadowy secrets. Inside of an hour we dropped anchor in the
port of Apia, and a friend came off and took the party on shore. The
vessel's stay was five days, and then we up sails and pointed her head
for Maraki, to get rid of the last passenger, the Jonah of the
voyage. Before our departure Mr. Stevenson gave a dinner, where we
gathered for the last time around the hospitable board. Needless to
say, I was in love with the island and acquired a piece of land to
bring me back for sure.[32]
[Footnote 32: Mr. Höflich returned to Samoa a year or
two later to remain, and was always a valued friend of
the Stevensons.]
"As I look back now I cannot help admiring Mrs. Stevenson for her
bravery and endurance in her resolution to remain with her husband.
For us men this life was right enough, but for a refined woman it
meant great hardship. When Mr. Stevenson, in his birthday speech on
board, said with moist eyes that he had never enjoyed a voyage and
company so well as ours, Mrs. Stevenson deserved the largest share of
that praise. I remember how she took care of him. A doctor in Tahiti,
who apprehended his early end, gave his wife a vial of medicine, which
she carried sewn in her dress for three years to have it handy. I have
a much-prized photograph of her on which she wrote 'Dear Paul. This is
to remind you of the days when we were so happy on board of the old
_Equator_.' This gives me a sad pleasure in recalling the old times
when the South Seas seemed to us so much brighter than now.
Civilization is coming to the natives at the rate of geometrical
progression, and soon their good qualities will be swept away by greed
and false education.
"I have the honor to remain,
Yours faithfully,
P. Höflich."
That the voyage was a rough one is clear from Mr. Stevenson's
description in a letter to Sir Sidney Colvin:
"On board the _Equator_, 190 miles off Samoa. We are just nearing the
end of our long cruise. Rain, calms, squalls, bang--there's the
fore-topmast gone; rain, calms, squalls--away with the staysail; more
rain, more calms, more squalls; a prodigious heavy sea all the time,
and the _Equator_ staggering and hovering like a swallow in a storm;
and the cabin, a great square, crowded with wet human beings, and the
rain avalanching on the deck, and the leaks dripping everywhere;
Fanny, in the midst of fifteen males, bearing up wonderfully." She
rejoiced, nevertheless, that her mother-in-law had not accompanied
them on this voyage, with its extreme discomfort and hardship, but
adds, "and yet I would do it all over again."
In the early part of December, 1889, they arrived at the Navigator
Islands--so called by Bougainville because of the skill with which the
natives managed their canoes and sailed them far out to sea--and, as
related above by Paul Höflich, dropped anchor in the harbour of Apia.
They were not especially attracted to this place at first, the scenery
being of a softer and less striking character than that of Tahiti, but
as time passed the charm of the place grew upon them more and more,
and finally they decided to make it their permanent headquarters
between cruises. To this end they bought four hundred acres in the
"bush," as the great tropical forests are called, and after making
arrangements for the erection of a temporary cabin during their
absence, they sailed on the steamer _Lubeck_ for Sydney, with the
intention of going on from there for a visit to England.
It was during this stay in Sydney that Mr. Stevenson wrote his famous
defense of Father Damien. When he realized that its publication might
result in a suit for libel and the loss of all he had in the world, he
thought it only right to ask for a vote of the family, for without
their concurrence he would not take such a step. The vote was
unanimously in favour of the publication. When the pamphlets were
ready, his wife, with her son and daughter, set to work addressing
them and sending them far and wide. It was certain that he would not
appeal in vain in such a matter to his wife, for in their sympathies
with the unfortunate and unjustly used they were as one.
Their hopes of going to England, based on the long respite of eighteen
months during which Mr. Stevenson had been free from his old trouble,
were dashed to the ground by a severe cold caught in Sydney and a
return of the hemorrhages. His only chance seemed to lie on the
sea--in fact, the doctor said nothing would save him but the South
Seas--but when his wife went to the water-front to secure passage she
found that, owing to a sailors' strike, only one ship, the _Janet
Nichol_, an iron-screw steamer of about six hundred tons, was going
out. She went to the owners and asked to be taken, but they refused,
on the ground that they didn't want women on board. Nevertheless she
went right on, with pitiful persistence, with her preparations, and
finally had the sick man carried down to the landing-place and rowed
out to the ship. She had won out, but they received her very
reluctantly. And such a ship! It must have looked fine, however, to
Mrs. Stevenson, after the _Equator_, for she writes: "Think of two
bathrooms and only one other passenger besides ourselves, a nice long
wide deck to walk on, steam to run away from squalls with, and no
flopping about in calms." But when her daughter went on board to see
them off she was horrified at the sight of it--black with coal dust,
manned by Solomon Island "black boys," and just as they stepped on
deck Tin Jack (Jack Buckland[33]) came up the gangway drunk and fell
off into the water. It was pandemonium, but very exciting, and in the
midst of it Mrs. Stevenson was calmly looking after her husband and
keeping up a smiling, courageous face.
[Footnote 33: Tin is the equivalent in the islands for
Mr. Jack Buckland was the living original of Tommy
Haddon in _The Wrecker_.]
As soon as they were at sea Louis recovered, and after stopping off at
Apia for a look at their new property, they went the rounds of the
"low islands," visiting thirty-three in all. Although they confessed
to a certain monotony in these islands, their adventures, of which
Mrs. Stevenson kept a regular diary, were many and exciting. These
notes were written for her husband's benefit, but as it happened that
he made but slight use of them, she prepared them for publication
herself in a volume called _The Cruise of the Janet Nichol_. "This
diary," she says in her preface, "was written under the most adverse
conditions--sometimes on the damp up-turned bottom of a canoe or
whale-boat, sometimes when lying face downward on the burning sands of
the tropic beach, often in copra sheds in the midst of a pandemonium
of noise and confusion, but oftener on board the rolling _Janet_,
whose pet name was the _Jumping Jenny_, but never in comfortable
surroundings."
It was on this voyage, during which they were well tossed about by the
frisky _Janet_, that the ship was set on fire by the spontaneous
combustion of some fireworks in one of the cabins. In the midst of the
excitement some native sailors were seen by Mrs. Stevenson about to
toss overboard a blazing trunk. She stopped them in time and was
thankful to discover that she had saved all her husband's manuscripts.
At the end of the cruise, from which his health did not benefit as
much as had been hoped, they returned to Sydney, meeting there a
reception which, while irritating enough at the time, afterwards
afforded them much amusement. They went directly from the ship to the
most fashionable hotel, but, not being known there, their queer
appearance, with their Tokalu buckets, mats, shells, straw hats, etc.,
brought upon them a severe snubbing. Then they went to the Oxford, a
little old inn on George Street, where they were courteously received
and given the whole first floor, without being asked to show their
credentials. The next morning every paper in Sydney had their names on
the front page, and all the clubs, societies, churches, and schools
sent cards to the fine hotel, whose proprietor had to send a messenger
three times a day to the Oxford with a basketful of letters for the
Stevensons. The proprietor, now aware of what he had done, came in
great chagrin to beg them to come back, and offered them the rooms
for half price--for nothing--but they refused; and, besides, they were
too comfortable at the Oxford to be willing to leave. After that,
whenever Mrs. Stevenson went to Sydney she always stayed at the
Oxford, for she was always loyal to those who showed her
consideration.
During their stay in Sydney at this time Mr. Stevenson was so ill that
he was compelled to keep his room, and all thought of a return to
England was now definitely abandoned. Plans were set on foot for
establishing a permanent residence in Samoa, and while Lloyd Osbourne
went to England to bring the furniture from Skerryvore, the Stevensons
returned to Apia and camped in a gate lodge on their place until the
new house should be built.