It fills one with wonder to think of the strange and absurd things that
men, in all ages and in all parts of the world, have done to themselves
in order to improve their personal appearance. The flat-head Indian of
North America squeezes his forehead out of shape; the Eastern beauty
blackens her teeth and nails; the Chinaman shaves the hair off his head,
leaving a tuft on the top; the Englishman shaves the hair off his face,
leaving a tuft on each cheek,--and all of these deluded mortals run thus
deliberately in the face of nature, under the impression that by so
doing they are improving their personal appearance!
Not to be behindhand, the South-Sea islanders tattoo themselves. In
other words, they prick a multitude of little holes in their skins, and
rub into these some colouring matter, which, when thoroughly fixed,
cannot again be washed out. The ornamental devices with which they
thus, more or less, cover their persons are sometimes very cleverly and
tastefully done, and they would be really admirable if depicted on a
piece of wood or a sheet of paper; but when applied to the human body
they are altogether ridiculous.
The operation of tattooing is a very painful one; so much so, that a
great deal of it cannot be done at one time, and it is said that persons
sometimes die during the process. The inhabitants of nearly all the
islands practise it. Usually it is commenced at the age of eight or
ten, and continued at intervals till the individual is between twenty
and thirty years of age.
So important and difficult is the art of tattooing, that men devote
themselves to it professionally, and these professors are well paid for
their work. Here is an account of the operation.
The professor, having his victim on the ground before him, takes up his
instrument of torture. This consists of a small piece of stick with
sharp bones of birds or fishes attached to it. Having previously
sketched with a piece of charcoal the pattern intended to be tattooed,
he dips the points of the sharp bones into a colouring matter (which is
a beautiful jet black, procured from the kernel of the candle-nut),
applies it to the surface of the skin, and strikes it smartly with a
piece of stick held in his right hand. The skin is punctured in this
way, and the dye injected. With the calmness of an operator, and the
gravity of an artist, the professor proceeds as long as his patient can
endure the pain. Then he ceases, and when the part is sufficiently
recovered, the operation is continued until the device or pattern is
finished.
These patterns vary among different islanders. They consist of circular
and curving lines, and representations of palm-trees, animals, etcetera,
on the face and body; and to such an extent is tattooing carried, that
the whole body is sometimes covered so as nearly to conceal the original
colour of the skin.
Mr Ellis, who wrote long after the gallant Cook was in his grave, tells
us in his most interesting work on the South-Sea Islands, (Ellis's
_Polynesian Researches_), that the inhabitants of Tahiti were more
simple in their tattooing, and displayed greater taste and elegance than
some of the other islanders. "Though some of the figures are arbitrary,
such as stars, circles, lozenges, etcetera, the patterns are usually
taken from nature, and are often some of the most graceful. A cocoa-nut
tree is a favourite object; and I have often admired the taste displayed
in the marking of a chief's leg, on which I have seen a cocoa-nut tree
correctly and distinctly drawn; its roots spreading at the heel, its
elastic stalk pencilled as it were along the tendon, and its waving
plume gracefully spread out on the broad part of the calf. Sometimes a
couple of stems would be twined up from the heel and divide on the calf,
each bearing a plume of leaves.
"The ornaments round the ankle and upon the instep, make them often
appear as if they wore the elegant Eastern sandal. The sides of the
legs are sometimes tattooed from the ankle upward, which gives the
appearance of wearing pantaloons with ornamental seams. From the lower
part of the back, a number of straight, waved, or zigzag lines rise in
the direction of the spine, and branch off regularly towards the
shoulder. But, of the upper part of the body, the chest is the most
tattooed. Every variety of figure is to be seen here,--cocoa-nut and
bread-fruit trees, with convolvulus wreaths hanging round them, boys
gathering fruit, men engaged in battle, in the manual exercise,
triumphing over a fallen foe; or, as I have frequently seen it, they are
represented as carrying a human sacrifice to the temple. Every kind of
animal--goats, dogs, fowls, and fish--may at times be seen on this part
of the body; muskets, swords, pistols, clubs, spears, and other weapons
of war are also stamped upon their arms and chest."
These figures are not all crowded upon the same person, but each man
makes a selection according to his fancy. The women also tattoo their
persons, but not to such an extent as the men, and their designs and
figures are usually more tasteful.
Cook says that Mr Banks saw this operation performed on the back of a
girl about thirteen years old. The instrument used upon this occasion
had thirty teeth; about a hundred strokes were given in the minute, and
each stroke drew a little blood. The girl bore it bravely for about a
quarter of an hour; but at the end of that time the pain of so many
hundred punctures became unbearable. She first complained in murmurs,
then wept, and at last burst into loud lamentations, earnestly
beseeching the operator to stop. He, however, firmly refused, and when
she began to struggle, she was held down by two women, who sometimes
soothed and sometimes scolded her, and, now and then, when she became
very unruly, gave her a smart blow. Mr Banks stayed in a neighbouring
house an hour, and the operation was not over when he went away, yet it
was performed only on one side of the back; the other had been tattooed
some time before, and the loins had still to be done.
Tahiti is now one of the civilised islands of the South Seas. At the
time of Cook's visit the natives were absolutely savages. They lived in
a state of partial nakedness, and their manners and customs were of the
grossest description. Their religion and superstitions were degrading
in the extreme, and, until Christianity obtained a hold upon them, they
delighted in war, and practised horrible cruelties on their enemies.
Yet, even in their low condition, there were good points about those
islanders. Cook says that they were as large as the largest-sized
Europeans. The men were tall, strong, well-limbed, and finely shaped.
The tallest he saw, on a neighbouring island, was a man who measured six
feet three inches and a half. The women of the superior rank were above
our middle stature, but those of the inferior class rather below it.
Their complexion was a kind of clear olive or _brunette_, and the skin
of the women was smooth and soft. They had no colour in their cheeks,
but their faces were comely; the cheekbones were not high, neither were
the eyes hollow. Their eyes were sparkling and full of expression, and
their teeth good, but their noses being flat did not correspond with his
ideas of beauty. Their hair was black and coarse. The men had beards,
which they wore in many fashions, always, however, plucking out great
part of them, and keeping the rest perfectly clean and neat.
In most countries it is the custom of the men to wear short and the
women long hair. Here, however, Cook found this custom reversed. The
women cut it short round the ears, and the men--except the fishermen,
who were almost continually in the water--suffered it to flow in large
waves over their shoulders, or tied it up in a bunch on the top of their
heads. They were in the habit of anointing it with cocoa-nut oil, which
had the effect of rendering their heads very filthy; but in other
respects the natives of Tahiti were remarkable for cleanliness.
Their clothing consisted of native-made cloth or matting, and was very
scanty, but in many cases was tastefully put on and intermingled with
flowers. Some of the men wore a feather in their hair; others wore a
wig made of the hair of men and dogs. Both sexes wore ear-rings made of
pieces of stones, shells, or berries, which were speedily exchanged,
however, for the beads given them by the sailors, for, like all other
savages, they delighted in gay ornaments.
The houses of these people were very simple. They consisted of nothing
more than a thatched roof mounted upon pillars. They had no walls
whatever, and were open to every wind of heaven, but in so warm a
climate this was not considered a disadvantage. There were no rooms or
partitions of any kind in them, and they were usually large. Some
belonged to families, others were the public property of a district, and
these last were sometimes two hundred feet long by thirty broad.
All the houses were built in the woods that lay between the sea and the
mountains. No more ground was cleared for each house than was just
sufficient to prevent the droppings of the branches from falling on the
roof; so that the inhabitant could step at once from his cottage into
the shade of the forest, which was the most delightful and romantic that
could be imagined. It consisted of groves of bread-fruit and cocoa-nut
trees without underwood, and paths led in all directions through it from
one house to another. Only those travellers who have experienced the
intense overpowering heat of tropical countries can form a just
conception of the enjoyableness of a ramble through the shady groves of
Tahiti.
The food eaten by the natives was chiefly vegetable. They had tame
hogs, dogs, and poultry, but these were not plentiful, and the visit of
Cook's ship soon diminished the numbers of animals very considerably.
When a chief killed a hog it was divided almost equally amongst his
dependants, and as these were numerous, the share of each individual at
a feast was not large. Dogs and fowls fell to the lot of the lower
classes. Cook says that he could not commend the flavour of their
fowls, but he and his crew unanimously agreed that a South-Sea dog was
little inferior to English lamb! He conjectured that their excellence
was owing to the fact that they were fed exclusively upon vegetables.
Like everything else in Tahiti, the art of cooking was somewhat
peculiar. The preparation of a dog for dinner is thus described:--
"The dog, which was very fat, we consigned over to Tupia, who undertook
to perform the double office of butcher and cook. He killed him by
holding his hands close over his mouth and nose, an operation which
continued above a quarter of an hour. While this was going on, a hole
was made in the ground about a foot deep, in which a fire was kindled,
and some small stones were placed in layers alternately with the wood to
get heated. The dog was then singed by holding him over the fire, and
by scraping him with a shell the hair came off as clean as if he had
been scalded in hot water. He was then cut up with the same instrument,
and his entrails being taken out, were sent to the sea, where, being
carefully washed, they were put into cocoa-nut shells with what blood
came from the body.
"When the hole was sufficiently heated, the fire was removed, and some
of the stones,--which were not so hot as to discolour anything that
touched them,--being placed in the bottom, were covered with green
leaves. The dog and the entrails were then placed upon the leaves,
other leaves were placed above them, the whole was covered up with the
remainder of the hot stones, and the mouth of the hole was closed with
mould. In somewhat less than four hours it was again opened and the dog
taken out excellently baked. Nearly all the fish and flesh eaten by the
inhabitants is dressed in this way."
The sea in those regions affords the natives great variety of fish; the
smaller of which they usually eat raw. They have also lobsters, crabs,
and other shell-fish, all of which they are very fond of. Indeed,
nothing seems to come amiss to them. They even eat what sailors call
_blubbers_, though some of these are so tough that they have to allow
them to become putrid before they can chew them.
Their chief vegetable, the bread-fruit, is so curious a plant that it
merits particular notice. It costs them no more trouble or labour to
procure it than the climbing of a tree. In regard to this tree Cook
says that it does not indeed shoot up spontaneously, but if a man plants
ten of them in his lifetime, which he may do in about an hour, he will
sufficiently fulfil his duty to his own and to future generations.
True, the bread-fruit is not always in season; but when its ready-made
loaves are not to be had, the South-Sea islander has plenty of
cocoa-nuts, bananas, plantains, and other fruits to supply its place.
The bread-fruit tree is large and beautiful. Its trunk, which is
light-coloured and rough, grows to a height of twelve or twenty feet,
and is sometimes three feet in diameter. Its leaves are broad, dark
green, and a foot or eighteen inches long. The fruit, about the size of
a child's head, is round, covered with a rough rind, and is at first of
a light pea-green hue; subsequently it changes to brown, and when fully
ripe, assumes a rich yellow colour. It hangs to the branches singly, or
in clusters of two or three together. One of these magnificent trees,
clothed with its dark shining leaves and loaded with many hundreds of
large light green or yellowish fruit, is one of the most beautiful
objects to be met with among the islands of the south.
The pulp of the bread-fruit between the rind and the core is all
eatable. The core itself, which is about the size and shape of the
handle of a knife, is uneatable. The bread-fruit is never eaten raw.
The usual mode of dressing it is to remove the rind and the core, divide
the pulp into three or four pieces, and bake it in an oven similar to
the one just described. When taken out, in somewhat less than an hour,
the outside of the fruit is nicely browned, and the inner part so
strongly resembles the crumb of wheaten bread as to have suggested the
name of the tree. It is not, however, quite so pleasant to the taste,
being rather insipid and slightly sweet. Nevertheless it is extremely
good for food, and is much prized by the natives, to whom it may almost
be said to be the staff of life.
The tree on which this excellent fruit grows, besides producing two,
and, in some cases, three crops in a year, furnishes a species of gum,
or resin, which oozes from the bark when cut, and hardens when exposed
to the sun. It is used for pitching the seams of canoes. The bark of
the young branches is employed in making several varieties of native
cloth. The wood of the tree is also valuable for building houses and
canoes. There are nearly fifty varieties of the bread-fruit tree, for
which the natives have distinct names, and as these varieties ripen at
different times, there are few months in the year in which the fruit is
not to be had.
Not less valuable to the natives of these islands is the cocoa-nut tree,
the stem of which is three or four feet in diameter at the root, whence
it tapers gradually without branch or leaf to the top, where it
terminates in a beautiful tuft or plume of long green leaves which wave
gracefully in every breeze.
One of the singular peculiarities of this tree is its power of
flourishing in almost any soil. It grows equally well on the
mountain-side, in the rich valleys beside the streams, and on the barren
sea-beach of the coral reefs, where its only soil is sand, and where its
roots are watered by the waves of every rising tide. Another
peculiarity is, that fruit in every stage may be seen on the same tree
at one time--from the first formation, after the falling of the blossom,
to the ripe nut. As the tree is slow in growth, the nuts do not
probably come to perfection until twelve months after the blossoms have
fallen. The successive ripening of the nuts, therefore, seems to have
been purposely arranged by our beneficent Creator, with a special view
to the comfort of man. Each nut is surrounded by a tough husk, or
shell, nearly two inches thick, and when it has reached its full size it
contains a pint, or a pint and a half, of the juice usually called
cocoa-nut milk.
The kernels of the tough outer husks, above referred to, are the
"cocoa-nuts" which we see exposed for sale in this country, but these
nuts give no idea of the delightful fruit when plucked from the tree.
They are old and dry, and the milk is comparatively rancid. In the
state in which we usually see cocoa-nuts they are never used by the
natives except as seed, or for the extraction of oil.
Some varieties of this tree grow to a height of sixty or seventy feet.
As all the nuts are at the top the gathering of them would be an
extremely difficult matter were it not for an ingenious contrivance by
which the natives manage to climb the trees; for it may be easily
understood that to _shin_ up an exceedingly rough pole of seventy feet
high, with bare legs, would try the mettle of most men--civilised as
well as savage. The plan is simple. The native strips off a piece of
tough bark from a branch, and therewith ties his feet together, leaving
them, however, several inches apart, grasping the trunk with his arms he
presses his feet against each side of the tree so that the piece of bark
between them catches in the roughnesses of the stem; this gives him a
purchase by which he is enabled to leap or vault up like a monkey.
The wood of the tree is excellent. The natives make pillars for their
houses and their best spears from it. A species of what we may call
natural cloth is found, ready-made, on its leaves, with which they make
sacks, and shirts, and jackets. Plaited leaflets form coverings for
their floors. Baskets are made from the leaves, matting and cordage of
the fibrous husk, and oil is extracted from the nut. Besides all this,
the shells of the old nuts are used as water-bottles, and, when carved
and highly polished, they form elegant drinking-cups.
The perfect adaptation of the bread-fruit and cocoa-nut trees to the
varied wants of the South-sea islanders tells, more eloquently than
could be told in words, of the wisdom and benevolence with which the
Almighty cares for His creatures, even while those creatures are living
in the habitual neglect of Himself, and in the violation of all His
laws.