HISTORY OF A DAY AS USUALLY SPENT IN TYPEE VALLEY--DANCES OF THE
MARQUESAN GIRLS
Nothing can be more uniform and undiversified than the life of the
Typees; one tranquil day of ease and happiness follows another in quiet
succession; and with these unsophisicated savages the history of a
day is the history of a life. I will, therefore, as briefly as I can,
describe one of our days in the valley.
To begin with the morning. We were not very early risers--the sun would
be shooting his golden spikes above the Happar mountain, ere I threw
aside my tappa robe, and girding my long tunic about my waist, sallied
out with Fayaway and Kory-Kory, and the rest of the household, and bent
my steps towards the stream. Here we found congregated all those who
dwelt in our section of the valley; and here we bathed with them. The
fresh morning air and the cool flowing waters put both soul and body in
a glow, and after a half-hour employed in this recreation, we sauntered
back to the house--Tinor and Marheyo gathering dry sticks by the way
for fire-wood; some of the young men laying the cocoanut trees under
contribution as they passed beneath them; while Kory-Kory played his
outlandish pranks for my particular diversion, and Fayaway and I, not
arm in arm to be sure, but sometimes hand in hand, strolled along, with
feelings of perfect charity for all the world, and especial good-will
towards each other.
Our morning meal was soon prepared. The islanders are somewhat
abstemious at this repast; reserving the more powerful efforts of
their appetite to a later period of the day. For my own part, with the
assistance of my valet, who, as I have before stated, always officiated
as spoon on these occasions, I ate sparingly from one of Tinor’s
trenchers, of poee-poee; which was devoted exclusively for my own use,
being mixed with the milky meat of ripe cocoanut. A section of a roasted
bread-fruit, a small cake of ‘Amar’, or a mess of ‘Cokoo,’ two or three
bananas, or a mammee-apple; an annuee, or some other agreeable and
nutritious fruit served from day to day to diversify the meal, which was
finished by tossing off the liquid contents of a young cocoanut or two.
While partaking of this simple repast, the inmates of Marheyo’s house,
after the style of the ancient Romans, reclined in sociable groups upon
the divan of mats, and digestion was promoted by cheerful conversation.
After the morning meal was concluded, pipes were lighted; and among them
my own especial pipe, a present from the noble Mehevi.
The islanders, who only smoke a whiff or two at a time, and at long
intervals, and who keep their pipes going from hand to hand continually,
regarded my systematic smoking of four or five pipefuls of tobacco in
succession, as something quite wonderful. When two or three pipes had
circulated freely, the company gradually broke up. Marheyo went to the
little hut he was forever building. Tinor began to inspect her rolls of
tappa, or employed her busy fingers in plaiting grass-mats. The girls
anointed themselves with their fragrant oils, dressed their hair, or
looked over their curious finery, and compared together their ivory
trinkets, fashioned out of boar’s tusks or whale’s teeth. The young men
and warriors produced their spears, paddles, canoe-gear, battle-clubs,
and war-conchs, and occupied themselves in carving, all sorts of figures
upon them with pointed bits of shell or flint, and adorning them,
especially the war-conchs, with tassels of braided bark and tufts of
human hair. Some, immediately after eating, threw themselves once more
upon the inviting mats, and resumed the employment of the previous
night, sleeping as soundly as if they had not closed their eyes for a
week. Others sallied out into the groves, for the purpose of gathering
fruit or fibres of bark and leaves; the last two being in constant
requisition, and applied to a hundred uses. A few, perhaps, among the
girls, would slip into the woods after flowers, or repair to the stream
will; small calabashes and cocoanut shells, in order to polish them
by friction with a smooth stone in the water. In truth these innocent
people seemed to be at no loss for something to occupy their time; and
it would be no light task to enumerate all their employments, or rather
pleasures.
My own mornings I spent in a variety of ways. Sometimes I rambled about
from house to house, sure of receiving a cordial welcome wherever I
went; or from grove to grove, and from one shady place to another, in
company with Kory-Kory and Fayaway, and a rabble rout of merry young
idlers. Sometimes I was too indolent for exercise, and accepting one of
the many invitations I was continually receiving, stretched myself out
on the mats of some hospitable dwelling, and occupied myself pleasantly
either in watching the proceedings of those around me or taking part
in them myself. Whenever I chose to do the latter, the delight of the
islanders was boundless; and there was always a throng of competitors
for the honour of instructing me in any particular craft. I soon became
quite an accomplished hand at making tappa--could braid a grass sling as
well as the best of them--and once, with my knife, carved the handle of
a javelin so exquisitely, that I have no doubt, to this day, Karnoonoo,
its owner, preserves it as a surprising specimen of my skill. As noon
approached, all those who had wandered forth from our habitation, began
to return; and when midday was fairly come scarcely a sound was to be
heard in the valley: a deep sleep fell upon all. The luxurious siesta
was hardly ever omitted, except by old Marheyo, who was so eccentric
a character, that he seemed to be governed by no fixed principles
whatever; but acting just according to the humour of the moment,
slept, ate, or tinkered away at his little hut, without regard to the
proprieties of time or place. Frequently he might have been seen taking
a nap in the sun at noon-day, or a bath in the stream of mid-night.
Once I beheld him perched eighty feet from the ground, in the tuft of a
cocoanut tree, smoking; and often I saw him standing up to the waist
in water, engaged in plucking out the stray hairs of his beard, using a
piece of muscle-shell for tweezers.
The noon-tide slumber lasted generally an hour and a half: very often
longer; and after the sleepers had arisen from their mats they again
had recourse to their pipes, and then made preparations for the most
important meal of the day.
I, however, like those gentlemen of leisure who breakfast at home and
dine at their club, almost invariably, during my intervals of health,
enjoyed the afternoon repast with the bachelor chiefs of the Ti, who
were always rejoiced to see me, and lavishly spread before me all the
good things which their larder afforded. Mehevi generally introduced
among other dainties a baked pig, an article which I have every reason
to suppose was provided for my sole gratification.
The Ti was a right jovial place. It did my heart, as well as my body,
good to visit it. Secure from female intrusion, there was no restraint
upon the hilarity of the warriors, who, like the gentlemen of Europe
after the cloth is drawn and the ladies retire, freely indulged their
mirth.
After spending a considerable portion of the afternoon at the Ti, I
usually found myself, as the cool of the evening came on, either sailing
on the little lake with Fayaway, or bathing in the waters of the
stream with a number of the savages, who, at this hour, always repaired
thither. As the shadows of night approached Marheyo’s household were
once more assembled under his roof: tapers were lit, long curious chants
were raised, interminable stories were told (for which one present was
little the wiser), and all sorts of social festivities served to while
away the time.
The young girls very often danced by moonlight in front of their
dwellings. There are a great variety of these dances, in which, however,
I never saw the men take part. They all consist of active, romping,
mischievous evolutions, in which every limb is brought into requisition.
Indeed, the Marquesan girls dance all over, as it were; not only do
their feet dance, but their arms, hands, fingers, ay, their very eyes,
seem to dance in their heads.
The damsels wear nothing but flowers and their compendious gala tunics;
and when they plume themselves for the dance, they look like a band of
olive-coloured Sylphides on the point of taking wing. In good sooth,
they so sway their floating forms, arch their necks, toss aloft their
naked arms, and glide, and swim, and whirl, that it was almost too much
for a quiet, sober-minded, modest young man like myself.
Unless some particular festivity was going forward, the inmates of
Marheyo’s house retired to their mats rather early in the evening; but
not for the night, since, after slumbering lightly for a while, they
rose again, relit their tapers, partook of the third and last meal of
the day, at which poee-poee alone was eaten, and then, after inhaling a
narcotic whiff from a pipe of tobacco, disposed themselves for the great
business of night, sleep. With the Marquesans it might almost most be
styled the great business of life, for they pass a large portion
of their time in the arms of Somnus. The native strength of their
constitution is no way shown more emphatically than in the quantity of
sleep they can endure. To many of them, indeed, life is little else than
an often interrupted and luxurious nap.