The Man Who Knew Everything came to Samoa in November, when dark days
were on the land, and the nearing Christmas time seemed likely to be
as that of the preceding one, when burning villages and the crackle
of musketry, and the battle cries of opposing factions, engaged in
slaughtering one another, turned the once restful and beautiful Samoa
into a hell of evil passions, misery and suffering. For the poor King
Malietoa was making a game fight with his scanty and ill-armed troops
against the better-armed rebel forces, who were supplied, _sub rosa_,
with all the arms and ammunition they desired by the German commercial
agents of Bismarck, who had impressed upon that statesman the necessity
of making Samoa the base of German trading enterprise in the South Seas
by stirring up rebellion throughout the group to such an extent that
Germany, under the plea of humanity, would intervene--buy out the
British and American interests, and force the natives to accept a German
protectorate.
At this time the white population of Apia numbered about two hundred,
of whom one half were Germans--the rest were principally English and
Americans. For two years past a very bitter feeling had existed between
the staff of the great German trading firm, and the British and American
community. The latter had their places of business in Apia, and the
suburb of Matautu, the Germans occupied the suburb of Matafele, and
although there was a business intercourse between the people of the
three nationalities, there was absolutely none of a social character.
The British and American traders and residents were supporters of
King Malietoa, the Germans backed up the rebel party, and the natives
themselves were equally divided into pro-British, and pro-Germans.
At this time--when the Man Who Knew Everything arrived in Samoa from New
Zealand--I was living on shore. The vessel in which I was employed as
“recruiter” in the Kanaka labour trade was laid up in Apia harbour. Two
months previously we had brought a cargo of native labourers from the
Gilbert Islands to be indentured to the cotton planters in Samoa, and
finding the country in such a disturbed state, with business paralysed,
and no further demand for a fresh cargo of Kanaka “recruits,” we decided
to pay off most of the ship's company, and let the brigantine lie
up till the end of the rainy and bad weather season--from the end of
November till March, The skipper and a few of the native crew remained
on board, but I took up my quarters on shore, at a little Samoan village
named Lelepa--two miles from Apia. Here I was the “paying guest” of our
boatswain--a stalwart native of the island of Rarotonga. He had sailed
with me on several vessels during a period of some years; and on one of
our visits to Apia had married a Samoan girl of a good family.
Having much spare time on my hands I occupied it in deep-sea fishing and
shooting, and in making boat voyages along the coast, visiting a number
of native villages, where I was well-known to the people, who always
made me and my boat's crew very welcome--for the Samoans are naturally a
most hospitable race, and love visiting and social intercourse. On these
excursions Marama (the native boatswain) and some other of the ship's
crew sometimes came with me; on other occasions my party would be made
up of the two half-caste sons of the American Consul, two or three
Samoans and myself.
Towards the end of November there arrived from Auckland (N.Z.)
the trading schooner _Dauntless_. She brought one passenger whose
acquaintance I soon made, and whom I will call Marchmont. He was a fine,
well-set-up young fellow of about five and twenty years of age, and I
was delighted to find that he was a good all-round sportsman--I could
never induce any of the white traders or merchants of Apia to join me in
any of my many delightful trips. Marchmont was making a tour through
the Pacific Islands, partly on business, and partly on pleasure. He
was visiting the various groups on behalf of a Liverpool firm, who were
buying up land suitable for cotton-growing, and was to spend two months
in Samoa.
He and I soon made arrangements for a series of fishing and shooting
trips along the south coast of Upolu, where the country was quiet,
and as yet undisturbed by the war. But, although Marchmont was a most
estimable and companionable man in many respects, he had some serious
defects in his character, which, from a sportsman's point of view, were
most objectionable, and were soon to bring him into trouble. One was
that he was most intensely self-opinionated, and angrily resented being
contradicted--even when he knew he was in the wrong; another was his bad
temper--whenever he did anything particularly foolish he would not stand
a little good-natured “chaff”--he either flew into a violent rage and
“said things” or sulked like a boy of ten years of age. Then, too,
another regrettable feature about him was the fact that he, being a
young man of wealth, had the idea that he should always be deferred
to, never argued with upon any subject, and his advice sought upon
everything pertaining to sport. These unpromising traits in his
character soon got him into hot water, and before he had been a week in
Samoa he was nicknamed by both whites and natives “Misi Ulu Poto--mâsani
mea uma,”--“Mr. Wise Head--the Man Who Knows Everything”. The term
stuck--and Marchmont took it quite seriously, as a well-deserved
compliment to his abilities.
My new acquaintance, I must mention, had a most extensive and costly
sporting outfit--all of it was certainly good, but much of it quite
useless for such places as Samoa and other Polynesian Islands. Of rifles
and guns he had about a dozen, with an enormous quantity of ammunition
and fittings, bags, water-proofing, tents, fishing-boots, spirit stoves,
hatchets in leather covers, hunting knives, etc., etc.; and his
fishing gear alone must have run into a tidy sum of money. This latter
especially interested me, but there was nothing in it that I would have
exchanged for any of my own--that is, few-deep-sea fishing, a sport in
which I was always very keen during a past residence of fifteen years in
the South Seas. When I showed my gear to Marchmont he criticised it with
great cheerfulness and freedom, and somewhat irritated me by frequently
ejaculating “Bosh!” when I explained why in fishing at a depth of 100
to 150 fathoms for a certain species of _Ruvettus_ (a nocturnal-feeding
fish that attains a weight of over 100 lb.) a heavy wooden hook was
always used by the natives in preference to a steel hook of European
manufacture. I saw that it was impossible to convince him, so dropped
the subject; and showed him other gear of mine--flying-fish tackle,
barb-less pearl-shell hooks for bonito, etc., etc He “bosh-ed” nearly
everything, and wound up by saying that he wondered why people of sense
accepted the dicta of natives in sporting matters generally.
“But I imagine that they do know a little about such things,” I
observed.
“Bosh!--they pretend to, that's all. Now, I've never yet met a Kanaka
who could show me anything, and I've been to Tonga, Fiji and Tahiti.”
Early one morning, I sent off my whaleboat with Marama in charge to
proceed round the south end of Upolu, and meet Marchmont and me at
a village on the lee side of the island named Siumu, which is about
eighteen miles distant from, and almost opposite to Apia, across the
range that traverses the island. An hour or so later Marchmont and I set
out, accompanied by two boys to carry our game bags, provisions,
etc. Each of them wore suspended from his neck a large white cowrie
shell--the Samoan badge of neutrality--for we had to pass first through
King Malietoa's lines, and then through those of the besieging rebel
forces.
It was a lovely day, and in half an hour we were in the delightful
gloom of the sweet-smelling mountain forest. In passing through King
Malietoa's trenches, the local chief of Apia, Se'u Manu, who was in
command, requested me to stay and drink kava with him. Politeness
required consent, and we were delayed an hour; this made the Man Who
Knew Everything very cross and rather rude, and the stalwart chief
(afterwards to become famous for his magnanimous conduct to his German
foes, when their squadron was destroyed in the great _Calliope_ gale
of March, 1889) looked at him with mild surprise, wondering at his
discourtesy. However, his temper balanced itself a little while after
leaving the lines, when he brought down a brace of fine pigeons with
a right and left shot, and a few minutes later knocked over a mountain
cock with my Winchester. It was a very clever shot--for the wild cock of
Samoa, the descendant of the domestic rooster, is a hard bird to shoot
even with a shot gun--and my friend was much elated. He really was a
first-class shot with either gun or rifle, though he had had but little
experience with the latter.
A few miles farther brought us to the little mountain village of
Tagiamamanono. It was occupied by the rebel troops from the Island of
Savai'i. Their chiefs were very courteous, and, of course, we were asked
to “stay and rest and drink kava”. To refuse would have been looked
upon as boorish and insulting, so I cheerfully acquiesced, and Marchmont
and I were escorted to a large house, where I formally presented him to
our hosts as a traveller from “Peretania,” whom I was “showing around
Samoa”. Any man of fine physique attracts the Samoans, and a number of
pretty girls who were preparing the kava cast many admiring glances at
my friend, and commented audibly on his good looks.
Presently, as we were all smoking and exchanging compliments in the
high-flown, stilted Samoan style, there entered the house a strapping
young warrior, carrying a wickerwork cage, in which were two of the
rare and famous _Manu Mea_ (red-bird) of Samoa--the _Didunculus_
or tooth-billed pigeon. These were the property of the young chief
commanding the rebel troops, and had simply been brought into the house
as a mark of respect and attention to Marchmont and me. Money cannot
always buy these birds, and the rebel chief looked upon them as
mascottes. No one but himself, or the young man who was their custodian,
dared touch them, for a Samoan chief's property--like his person--is
sacred and inviolate from touch except by persons of higher rank than
himself. I hurriedly and quietly explained this to Marchmont.
“Bosh! Look here! You tell him that I want to buy those birds, and will
give him a sovereign each for them.”
“I shall do no such thing. I know what I am talking about, and you
don't. Fifty sovereigns would not buy those birds--so don't say anything
more on the subject. If you do, you will give offence--and these Samoans
are very touchy.”
“Bah--that's all bosh, my dear fellow. Any way, I'll give five pounds
for the pair,” and to my horror, and before I could stay him, he took
out five sovereigns, and “skidded” them along the matted floor towards
the chief, a particularly irascible young man named Asi (Sandalwood).
“There, my friend, are five good English sovereigns for your birds. I
suppose I can trust you to send them to the English Consul at Apia for
me. Eh?”
There was a dead silence. Asi spoke English perfectly, but hitherto, out
of politeness, had only addressed me in Samoan. His eyes flashed with
quick anger at Marchmont, then he looked at me reproachfully, made a
sign to the custodian of the birds, and rising proudly to his feet, said
to me in Samoan:--
“I will drink kava with you alone, friend. Will you come to my own
house,” and he motioned me to precede him. Never before had I seen
a naturally passionate man exhibit such a sense of dignity and
self-restraint under what was, to him, a stupid insult.
I turned to Marchmont: “Look what you have done, confound you for an
ass! If you are beginning this way in Samoa you will get yourself into
no end of trouble. Have you no sense?”
“I have sense enough to see that you are making a lot of fuss over
nothing. Tell the beastly savage that he can keep his wretched birds. I
would only have wrung their necks and had them cooked.”
The young warrior who held the cage, set it down, and striding up beside
the Man Who Knew Everything dealt him an open-handed back-hand blow
on the side of the head--a favourite trick of Samoan wrestlers and
fighters--and Marchmont went down upon the matted floor with a smash.
I thought he was killed--he lay so motionless--and in an instant there
flashed across my memory a story told to me by a medical missionary
in Samoa, of how one of these terrific back-handed “smacks” dealt by a
native had broken a man's neck.
However, in a few minutes, Marchmont recovered, and rose to his feet,
spoiling for a fight. The natives regarded him with a sullen but assumed
indifference, and drew back, looking at me inquiringly. The matter
might have ended seriously, but for two things--Marchmont was at heart a
gentleman, and in response to my urgent request to him to apologise
for the gross affront he had put upon our host--did so frankly by first
extending his hand to the man who had knocked him down. And then, as he
never did things by halves, he came with me to Asi and said, as he shook
hands with him:--
“By Jove, Mr. Asi, that man of yours could knock down a bullock. I never
had such a thundering smack in my life.”
The chief smiled, then said gravely, in English, that he was sorry that
such an unpleasant incident had occurred. Then, after--with its many
attendant ceremonies--we had drunk our bowls of kava, and were smoking
and chatting, Asi asked Marchmont to let him examine his gun and rifle
(Marchmont had a Soper rifle and one of Manton's best make of guns; I
had my Winchester and a fairly good gun). The moment Asi saw the Soper
rifle his eyes lit up, and he produced another from one of the house
beams overhead, and said regretfully that he had no cartridges left,
and was using a Snider instead. Marchmont promptly offered to give him
fifty.
“You must not do that,” I said, “it will get us into serious trouble.
Asi”--and I turned to the chief--“will understand why we must not give
him cartridges to be used for warfare. It would be a great breach of
faith for us to do so--would it not?”
Keenly anxious as he was to obtain possession of the ammunition, the
chief, with a sigh of regret, acquiesced, but Marchmont sulked, and for
quite two hours after we had left the rebel village did not exchange a
word with me.
After getting over the range, and whilst we were descending the slope to
the southern littoral, some mongrel curs that belonged to our carriers,
and had gone on ahead of us, put up a wild sow with seven suckers, and
at once started off in pursuit. The old, razor-backed sow doubled
and came flying past us, with her nimble-footed and striped progeny
following. Marchmont and I both fired simultaneously--at the sow. I
missed her, but my charge of No 3 shot tumbled over one of the piglets,
which was at her heels, and Marchmont's Soper bullet took her in the
belly, and passed clean through her. But although she went down for a
few moments she was up again like a Jack-in-the-box, and with an angry
squeal scurried along the thick carpet of dead leaves, and then darted
into the buttressed recesses of a great _masa'oi_ (cedar) tree, which
was evidently her home, followed by two or three game mongrels.
Dropping his rifle, Marchmont ran to the trees, seized the nearest
cur by the tail, and slung it away down the side of the slope, then he
kicked the others out of his way, and kneeling down peered into the dark
recess formed by two of the buttresses.
“Come out of that,” I shouted, “you'll get bitten if you go near her.
What are you trying to do? Get out, and give the dogs a chance to turn
her out.”
“Bosh! Mind your own business. I know what I'm about. She's lying
inside, as dead as a brickbat I'll have her out in a jiffy,” and then
his head and shoulders disappeared--then came a wild, blood-curdling
yell of rage and pain, and the Man Who Knew Everything backed out with
the infuriated sow's teeth deeply imbedded into both sides of his
right hand; his left gripped her by the loose and pendulous skin of her
throat. One of the native boys darted to his aid, and with one blow of
his hatchet split open the animal's skull.
“Well, of all the born idiots----” I began, when I stopped, for I
saw that Marchmont's face was very pale, and that he was suffering
excruciating pain. A pig bite is always dangerous and that which he had
sustained was a serious one. Fortunately, it was bleeding profusely, and
as quickly as possible we procured water, and thoroughly cleansed, and
then bound up his hand.
As soon as we got to Siumu I hurried to the house of the one white
trader, and was lucky in getting a bottle of that good old-fashioned
remedy--Friar's balsam. I poured it into a clean basin, and Marchmont
unhesitatingly put in his hand, and let it stay there. The agony was
great, and the language that poured from the patient was of an extremely
lurid character. But he had wonderful grit, and I had to laugh when he
began abusing himself for being such an idiot. He then allowed a
native woman to cover the entire hand with a huge poultice, made of the
beaten-up pulp of wild oranges--a splendid antiseptic. But it was a
week before he could use his hand again, and his temper was something
abominable. However, we managed to put in the time very pleasantly
by paying a round of visits to the villages along the coast, and were
entertained and feasted to our heart's content by the natives. Then
followed some days' grand pig hunting and pigeon shooting in the
mountains, amidst some of the most lovely tropical scenery in the world.
Marchmont killed a grand old tusker, and presented the tusks to the
local chief, who in return gave him a very old kava bowl--a valuable
article to Samoans. He was, as usual, incredulous when I told him that
it was worth £10, and that Theodor Weber, the German Consul General, who
was a collector, would be only too glad to get it at that price.
“What, for that thing?”
“Yes, for that thing. Quite apart from its size, its age makes it
valuable. I daresay that more than half a century has passed since the
tree from which it was made was felled by stone axes, and the bowl
cut out from a solid piece.” It was fifteen inches high, two feet in
diameter, and the four legs and exterior were black with age, whilst
the interior, from constant use of kava, was coated with a bright yellow
enamel. The labour of cutting out such a vessel with such implements--it
being, legs and bowl, in one piece--must have taken long months. Then
came the filing down with strips of shark skin, which had first been
softened, and then allowed to dry and contract over pieces of wood,
round and flat; then the final polishing with the rough underside of
wild fig-leaves, and then its final presentation, with such ceremony, to
the chief who had ordered it to be made.
I explained all this to Marchgiont, and he actually believed me and did
not say “Bosh!”
“I thought that you made a fearfully long-winded oration on my behalf
when the chief gave me the thing,” he remarked.
“I did. I can tell you, Marchmont, that I should have felt highly
flattered if he had presented it to me. He seems to have taken a violent
fancy to you. But, for Heaven's sake, don't think that, because he
has been told that you are a rich man, he has any ulterior motive. And
don't, I beg of you, offer him money. He has a reason for showing his
liking for you.”
I knew what that reason was. Suisala, the chief of Siumu, had, from
the very first, expressed to me his admiration of Marchmont's stalwart,
athletic figure, and his fair complexion, and was anxious to confer on
him a very great honour--that of exchanging names. Suisala was of one of
the oldest and most chiefly families in Samoa, and was proud of the fact
that the French navigator Bougainville had taken especial notice of his
grandfather (who was also a Suisala) and who had been presented with
a fowling piece and ammunition by the French officer. As I have before
mentioned, physical strength and manliness always attract the Samoan
mind, and the chief of Siumu had, as I afterwards explained to
March-mont, fallen a victim to his “fatal beauty”.
One morning, a few days after the presentation of the _tanoa_
(kava-bowl) to the Man Who Knew Everything, a schooner appeared outside
the reef and hove-to, there being no harbour at Siumu. She was an
American vessel, and had come to buy copra from, and land goods for, the
local trader. There was a rather heavy sea running on the reef at the
time, and the work of shipping the copra and landing the stores
proved so difficult and tedious that I lent my boat and crew to help.
Unfortunately Marama was laid up with influenza, so could not take
charge of the boat; I also was on the sick list, with a heavy cold.
However, my crew were to be trusted, and they made several trips during
the morning. Marchmont, after lunch, wanted to board the schooner, and
also offered to take charge of the boat and crew for the rest of the
day. Knowing that he was not used to surf work, I declined his offer,
but told him he could go off on board if he did not mind a wetting. He
was quite nettled, and angrily asked me if I thought he could not take
a whaleboat through a bit of surf as well as either Marama or myself. I
replied frankly that I did not.
He snorted with contempt “Bosh. I've taken boats through surf five times
as bad as it is now--a tinker could manage a boat in the little sea that
is running now. You fellows are all alike--you think that you and your
natives know everything.”
“Oh, then, do as you like,” I replied angrily, “but if you smash that
boat it means a loss of £50, and----”
“Hang your £50! If I hurt your boat, I'll pay for the damage. But don't
begin to preach at me.”
With great misgivings, I saw the boat start off, manned by eight men,
using native paddles, instead of oars, as was customary in surf work.
Marchmont, certainly, by good luck, managed to get her over the reef,
for I could see that he was quite unused to handling a steer oar.
However, my native crew, by watching the sea and taking no heed of the
steersman, shot the boat over the reef into deep water beyond. But in
getting alongside the schooner he nearly swamped, and I was told began
abusing my crew for a set of blockheads. This, of course, made them
sulky--to be abused for incompetence by an incompetent stranger, was
hard to bear, especially as the men, like all the natives of their
islands (Rotumah and Niue), were splendid fellows at boat work.
However, the boat at last cast off, and headed for the shore, and then
I saw something that filled me with wrath. As the lug sail was being
hoisted, March-mont drew in his steer-oar, and shipped the rudder, and
in another minute the boat was bounding over the rolling seas at a great
rate towards the white breakers on the reef, but steering so wildly
that I foresaw disaster. The crew, in vain, urged Marchmont to ship the
steer-oar again, but he told them to mind their own business, and sat
there, calm and strong, in his mighty conceit.
On came the boat, and we on shore watched her as she rose stern up to a
big comber, then down she sank from view into the trough, broached to,
and the next roller fell upon and smothered her, and rolled her over and
over into the wild boil of surf on the reef.
The Man Who Knew Everything came off badly, and was brought on shore
full of salt water, and unconscious. He had been dashed against the
jagged coral, and from his left thigh down to his foot had been terribly
lacerated; then as the crew swam to his assistance--for his clothing had
caught in the coral, and he was under water and drowning--and brought
him to the surface, the despised steer-oar (perhaps out of revenge)
came hurtling along on a swirling sea, and the haft of it struck him a
fearful blow on the head, nearly fracturing his skull.
Fearing his injuries would prove fatal, I sent a canoe off to the
schooner with a message to the captain to come on shore, but the vessel,
having finished her business, was off under full sail, and did not see
the canoe. Then the trader and I did our best for the poor fellow, who,
as soon as he regained consciousness, began to suffer agonies from the
poison of the wounds inflicted by the coral. We sent a runner to Apia
for a doctor, and early next morning one arrived.
Marchmont was quite a month recovering, and when he was fully
convalescent, he kept his opinions to himself, and I think that the
lesson he had received did him good. He afterwards told me that he
determined to sail the boat in with a rudder purely to annoy me, and was
sorry for it.
When he was able to get about again as usual, the devil of restlessness
again took possession of him and he was soon in trouble again--through
the bursting of a gun. I was away from Apia at the time--at the little
island of Manono, buying yams for the ship which was getting ready for
sea again--when I received a letter from a friend giving me the Apia
gossip, and was not surprised that Marchmont figured therein.
“Your friend Marchmont,” so ran the letter, “is around, as usual, and in
great form, though he had a narrow squeak of having his head blown
off last week through his gun bursting while out pigeon-shooting up by
Lano-to lake. It seems that it was raining at the time, and the track
down the mountain to the lake was very slippery. He had Johnny Coe the
half-caste, and two Samoans with him. Was carrying his gun under his arm
and going down the track in his usual careless, cock-a-hoopy style when
he tripped over a root of a tree and went down, flat on his face, into
the red slippery soil. He picked himself up again quick enough, and
began swearing at the top of his voice, when a lot of ducks rose from
the lake and came dead on towards him. Without waiting to see if his gun
was all right, although it was covered with mud, he pulled the trigger
of his right barrel, and it burst; one of the fragments gave him a
nasty jagged wound on the chin and the Samoan buck got a lot of small
splinters in his face. After the idiot had pulled himself together he
examined his gun and found that the left barrel was plugged up with hard
red earth. No doubt the other one had also been choked up, for Johnny
Coe said that when he fell the muzzle of the gun was rammed some inches
into the ground.”
When I returned to Apia with a cutter load of yams, I called on
Marchmont and found him his old self. He casually mentioned his mishap
and cursed the greasy mountain track as the cause. At the same time he
told me that he was beginning to like the country and that the natives
were “not a bad lot of fellows--if you know how to take 'em”.
Then came his final exploit.
There is, in the waters of the Pacific Isles, a species of the trevalli,
or rudder fish, which attains an enormous size and weight. It is a good
eating fish, like all the trevalli tribe, and much thought of by both
Europeans and natives, for, being an exceedingly wary fish, it is not
often caught, at least in Samoa. In the Live Islands, where it is more
common, it is called _La'heu_ and in Fiji _Sanka_. One evening Lama, one
of the Coe half-caste boys, and I succeeded in hooking and capturing one
of these fish, weighing a little over 100 lb. In the morning the Man
Who Knew Everything came to look at it, was much interested, and said he
would have a try for one himself after lunch.
“No use trying in clear daylight,” I said; “after dusk, at night (if not
moonlight), or before daybreak is the time.”
“Bosh!” was his acidulous comment “I've caught the same fish in New
Zealand in broad daylight.” I shook my head, knowing that he was wrong.
He became angry, and remarked that he had found that all white men who
had lived in foreign countries for a few years accepted the rubbishy
dictum of natives regarding sporting matters of any kind as infallible.
Refusing to show me the tackle he intended using, at two o'clock he
hired a native canoe, and paddled off alone into Apia Harbour. Then he
began to fish for _La'heu_, using a mullet as bait. In five minutes
he was fast to a good-sized and lusty shark, which promptly upset the
canoe, went off with the line and left him to swim. The officer of the
deck of the French gunboat _Vaudreuil_, then lying in the port, sent a
boat and picked him up. This annoyed him greatly, as he wanted, like an
idiot, to swim on shore--a thing that a native would not always care to
do in a shark-infested place like Apia Harbour, especially during the
rainy season (as it then was), when the dreaded _tanifa_ sharks come
into all bays or ports into which rivers or streams debouch.
That evening, however, Marchmont condescended to look at the tackle I
used for _La'heu_, said it was clumsy, and only fit for sharks, but,
on the whole, there were “some good ideas” about it; also that he would
have another try that night. I suggested that either one of the Coe lads
or Lama should go with him, to which he said “Bosh!” Then, after sunset,
I sent some of my boat's-crew to catch flying-fish for bait. They
brought a couple of dozen, and I told Marchmont that he should bait with
a whole flying-fish, make his line ready for casting, and then throw
over some “burley”--half a dozen flying-fish chopped into small pieces.
He would not show me the tackle he intended using, so I was quite in the
dark as to what manner of gear it was. But I ascertained later on that
it was good and strong enough to hold any deep sea fish, and the hook
was of the right sort--a six-inch flatted, with curved shank, and
swivel mounted on to three feet of fine twisted steel seizing wire. My
obstinate friend had a keen eye, even when he was most disparaging
in his remarks, and had copied my _La'heu_ tackle most successfully,
although he had “bosh-ed” it when I first showed it to him.
Refusing to let any one accompany him, although the local pilot candidly
informed him that he was a dunderhead to go fishing alone at night in
Apia Harbour, Marchmont started off about 2 A.M. in an ordinary native
canoe, meant to hold not more than three persons when in smooth water.
It was a calm night, but rainy, and the crew of the French gunboat
noticed him fishing near the ship about 2.30. A little while after,
the officer of the watch saw a heavy rain squall coming down from the
mountain gorges, and good-naturedly called out to the fisherman to
either come alongside or paddle ashore, to avoid being swamped. The
clever man replied in French, somewhat ungraciously, that he could quite
well look after himself. A little after 3 A.M. the squall ceased, and
as neither Marchmont nor the canoe was visible, the French sailors
concluded that he had taken their officer's advice and gone on shore.
About seven o'clock in the morning, as I was bathing in the little river
that runs into Apia Harbour, a native servant girl of the local resident
medical missionary came to the bank and called to me, and told me a
startling story. My obstinate friend had been picked up at sea, four
miles from Apia Harbour, by a _taumualua_ (native-built whaleboat). He
was in a state of exhaustion and collapse, and when brought into Apia
was more dead than alive, and the doctor was quickly summoned I at once
went to see him, but was not admitted to his room, and for three days he
had to lie up, suffering from shock--and, I trust, a feeling of humility
for being such an obstinate blockhead.
His story was simple enough: During the heavy rain squall his bait
was taken by some large and powerful fish (he maintained that it was
a _La'heu_, though most probably it was a shark), and thirty or forty
yards of line flew out before he could get the pull of it. When he did,
he foolishly made the loose part fast to the canoe seat amidships,
and the canoe promptly capsized, and the fore end of the outrigger
unshipped. Clinging to the side of the frail craft, he shouted to the
gunboat for help, but no one heard in the noise of the wind and heavy
rain, and in ten minutes he found himself in the passage between the
reefs, and rapidly being towed out to sea. He tried to sever the line by
biting it through (he had lost his knife), but only succeeded in
losing a tooth. Then, as the canoe was being dragged through the water
broadside on, a heavy sea submerged her and the line parted, the shark
or whatever it was going off. Never losing his pluck, he tried in the
darkness to secure the loose end of the outrigger, but failed, owing to
the heavy, lumpy seas. Then for two anxious, miserable hours he clung to
the canoe, expecting every moment to find himself minus his legs by the
jaws of a shark, and when sighted and picked up by the native boat he
was barely conscious.
He learnt a lesson that did him good. He never again went out alone in
a canoe at night, and for many days after his recovery he never uttered
the word “Bosh!”