SLAVERY FORMERLY PRACTISED--BAINING CHARACTERISTICS--AN
UNKNOWN RACE--THREE DEGREES OF RELIGIOUS DEVELOPMENT--
TINGENATABARAN--ETHICAL PERCEPTION OF THE SULKAS--
TAMBOO--MAGIC
I was looking forward with some curiosity to my promised visit to
bush kanaka villages about ten miles away, situated on the frontier
of settled territory in a south-westerly direction from Herbertshöhe.
The inhabitants I was given to understand had a trace of Baining
blood in them. On making inquiry, I found that in the short space
of four weeks it was impossible to compass a visit to the Baining
mountains, further west, where dwell the people so lately discovered
and ethnographically so interesting, because so distinct from others
in the Archipelago (as yet known). And since much speculation circles
round the Bainings, for all who know them regard them as the
probable aboriginals of New Britain, I think it may be desirable to
outline the events which brought the fact of their existence to the
knowledge of the German administration. In the kanaka language it is
significant that the word “Baining” means a “slave,” or, “one who
has to run!” and very fittingly has this name been applied, as the
following testifies:
It was in 1897 that news of a slave hunt was first brought to the
authorities by a Wesleyan missionary from a place on the north
coast of the peninsula called Kabakada. His report ran that in
the preceding year the natives of the small islands of Massava,
Massikunabuka and Urar had leagued together to entice an inland
people, living in the mountains, down to a given spot on the
seashore, under the pretence that they wanted to exchange goods for
taro and pigs. In response to their message, a goodly number of
Bainings, laden with produce, approached the canoes of the islanders
for purposes of barter, when they were suddenly seized by the
occupants, whilst others pushed the canoes off into deep water. The
Bainings, unable to swim, without arms, were easily captured and
fastened into the boats, when another party, who had previously
hidden their spears in the sand, killed the remainder.
About forty were massacred and some thirty enslaved, the bodies of
the slain being taken to the respective homes of the marauders and
eventually eaten. On receiving this news a punitive expedition was
at once sent to teach these evil doers that such practices were not
compatible with the white man’s rule. They offered little resistance,
most of them delivering up their slaves when called upon. The coast
was patrolled for a time, a few having escaped German vigilance. In
1898, with the destruction of the village, which was the headquarters
of the traffic, the rest of the slaves were given up and received
by the Roman Catholic Mission. Compared with the Gazelle kanakas,
this race is still less physically developed. A German traveller,
Gustaf Fritsch, says of them, that they are lighter in colour when
once the filth is removed. With the short nose depressed at the
root, he considers they resemble the Australian type. Their hair,
coloured with clay or chalk, hangs in wild locks over their faces;
some wear a scanty, goat-like beard and, says he, all have frightful
ringworm. His examination of about fifty skulls convinced him that
there were strong resemblances to those of certain Australian races.
Only as cannibals do they possess any affinity with other Archipelago
dwellers. They do not use shell-money; it is unknown amongst them.
Barter is their medium of exchange, and taro, pigs and bananas,
serve that purpose. They have no totems. In their dances, the sexes
dance together; throughout the islands the reverse of this is the
case. Water for washing purposes, says a writer, is unknown amongst
them, water for drinking purposes being often conveyed considerable
distances in hollow bamboo canes. Their huts, the most miserable in
Melanesia, are so small that one must crouch to enter.
Apparently, they differ too, from surrounding races, in that they are
agricultural nomads.
Dr Schnee, deputy governor in 1903, during Dr Hahl’s absence in
Europe, visited the Baining country and repeatedly found forsaken
huts in ruins. It seems the custom to build dwellings, cut down the
bush in the vicinity and plant taro, after a time to go away, and
perhaps, after a lapse of years, return to the same spot. He relates
in his book on the South Seas that some of these mountaineers, who,
for the first time in their lives, saw white men advancing towards
them, evinced no sign of surprise or fear, and this not from any
savage stoicism, but from sheer stupidity. He describes how they sat
stolidly watching his approach and, greatly to the disgust of his
native police, permitted themselves to be caught, without offering
the slightest resistance; yet they possess rude spears into which
bone is inserted, generally at the end, and there are also primitive
stone axes in use.
The Admiralty boys had scoffed at them as not worth calling men, and
had considered them dirty as pigs!
In connection with this primitive race who, whether they fled to the
mountains to escape volcanic eruptions, or whether, on the incoming
of more virile races, they withdrew to the more secluded region, is
not yet decided, it is interesting to note that in the mountainous
interior of the southern portion of New Ireland, there exists to-day
a people whom Europeans have never yet seen; but who, from reports
of natives living on adjacent coasts, seem to offer the possibility
of eventually proving to be racially allied with the Bainings. The
coastals describe them as speaking an unintelligible language and as
being antagonistic to them. Dr Thurnwald was hoping to make their
acquaintance during his stay. It is impossible, as it would be
unwise, to speculate as to whence and at what date the Bainings first
came to New Britain for the spread of primitive races, especially in
the Pacific, seems conditioned largely by geographical circumstances.
History, traditions, and soundings demonstrate often that, where
was once dry land, is now ocean floor. Geologists also declare that
in the miocene period Australia and New Guinea were probably joined,
and if the marsupial was the highest form of vertebrate found in
Australia, it is certain man, if evolved from mammals, must be looked
for elsewhere. As we can hardly imagine him entering that continent
by any other way than from the north, and taking into account the
volcanic nature of the region of Dampier’s Straits, the acknowledged
resemblance of the Baining to certain Australian types does not seem
altogether without features to commend it to our consideration.
Recollecting, too, that Java, where Dr Dubois at Trinil, in 1891,
found in pliocene strata his _Pithecanthropus Erectus_, is not so far
distant, one may reasonably be led to look for some of the oldest
types of man in this portion of the globe.
The very simplest belief in a spirit world, unaccompanied by
witchcraft of any description, very markedly distinguishes the
Bainings from every other race in the Archipelago.
Indeed, it appears to me most interesting, so far as present
information goes, to recognise in the three peoples which the German
Government have differentiated in New Britain, three distinct degrees
of development in religious belief.
The lowest form is certainly that belonging to this lately-discovered
race I have been describing, for the Bainings, who seem nearer the
animal kingdom than any other, have yet from the “loftiest fashion of
their sleep” evolved a kind of heaven. Here, and Mr Parkinson is my
authority, there are no localised spirits; however, in the absence
of that dread of evil from unseen influences, which is universal in
the Archipelago, there exists the faint glimmer of a belief in a
world surrounding them of impersonal and omnipresent spirit life;
the only thing at all approaching an embodied spirit is a weird
belief sometimes found amongst them of a mystic snake, which if it
eats personal _débris_, causes death to the possessor. These snakes,
known as _chankis_, live inside knotted and gnarled trunks of trees,
and are dangerous to mankind.
In points of development the beliefs of the Gazelle natives rank
second. Here incantations, spells, magic of all description are part
and parcel of everyday existence: the dread of evil spirits, with a
constant fear to arouse their enmity, is ever present; accompanying
this, there is a fairly defined belief in a heaven where it is
desirable for the soul of the departed to enter. The following
description of ceremonies attending the burial of their chiefs in the
Gazelle Peninsula affords an insight into their ideas of what befits
a man for a future existence. The dead body lies generally in the
hut for three days after death, during which time it is decked out
with flowers and with chains of tamboo, the acquisition of which is
the main object of the kanaka’s life. Tamboo, then, is wound round
the neck, over the shoulders and arms of the corpse which, in some
cases, is further and quite artistically painted with daubs and
circles of white and vermilion, the object of this being not so much
to make it ready for heaven as to make it “dam flash” to overawe an
admiring and gaping crowd of relations in the forthcoming Sing-Song.
The burial fires are then ignited outside the hut, a howling crowd
enter and lament around the corpse. After a big feast, when roast
pig is enjoyed by the company, the nearest relative hands out the
much-desired bequests of tamboo to his kindred, according to the
wishes and instructions of its former owner, when the corpse can be
buried. But all this, exciting though it be, with the screeching,
overfeeding, and big fires, accompanied the whole night through
with native music to facilitate and encourage the departing spirit
to enter on its new life, are but preliminaries leading up to the
culminating moment, when at early dawn on the following morning,
the crucial moment has arrived. For the soul of the deceased can
only enter into Tingenatabaran, that place in the far east where
souls plentifully supplied with tamboo go, at sunrise. If a cloud
appears on the horizon then the watchers know that the soul is
safely inside. Here it is met by the guardian of that sacred spot,
the spirit Tolamean, who asks the newcomer, “Where is the tamboo you
have brought?” and if the candidate seeking admission cannot meet the
requirements, it goes to Jakupia, a bleak, undesirable place. The
point here is that the quantity of tamboo forms the test condition
of entrance. The belief of the Sulka ranks higher than the latter,
inasmuch as the admission into heaven depends not on shell-money, but
as to the way in which the life has been spent on earth. Here we may
note the entrance of ethical perceptions into the mind of the savage.
The Sulkas have curious burial festivities. The corpse of a chief is
sometimes placed in a sitting position in a shallow hole dug in the
ground, from which his body from the waist is visible, over this a
hut is built, thatched with dried palm or banana leaves, the whole
enclosed within a ring of big stones, and fires are kindled. The
kinsfolk lie close by, men on one side, women on the other, when it
is whispered quietly from one to the other the desirable moment when
the party simultaneously, next morning, shall drive the soul out of
the deceased. This is effected quietly, that the spirit may not hear
and prepare itself to resist.
Early next morning, perhaps at sunrise, perhaps when the kaa (bird)
pipes its first notes, the sleepers spring up suddenly, set up a
fearful noise, pile loads of dry cocoanut wood on to the fires,
shake and rattle the frail, temporary hut, to frighten the dead
man’s soul away from its home, and thus speed it on its way to Mlol,
a mystic, undefined region, supposed to be somewhere in the middle
of the earth. Before the soul arrives there, it passes two rocks
named Kilkil and Kovangal, where its progress is stayed, and where
it is asked to give an account of its past life. If this is deemed
favourable, it proceeds on its way; if the reverse, it must return
and wander southward.
The Sulkas are afraid of some departed spirits, who, they believe,
return and prey upon mortals. Some, they think, return to shine by
night in the fireflies!
Meteors are souls of Sulkas, hurled from the highest heaven, to dip
into the sea. With this race, earthquakes, thunder and lightning
especially, are regarded as avengers of crime, and proceed from the
will of Kot, who is a powerful spirit unfriendly to men.
In the Gazelle Peninsula funereal ceremonies vary according to the
occupation and the standing of the deceased, and in the case of women
and children are of the simplest description.
Sometimes the skeleton of a chief will, after a year or two, be
disinterred, and the skull, painted with vermilion and adorned with
feathers, be hung up in some prominent place, where the neighbours
will assemble, dances and Sing-Song be held in its honour. It might
be supposed that ancestor-worship of some kind was the motive for
this homage to the dead, but Mr Parkinson states that this is by no
means the case, since the natives are quite ready to sell the skull
for a trifle.
The desirability of obtaining tamboo under all circumstances is
now the ruling passion of the kanakas. Not only does this mystic
and venerated medium of exchange pave the way to a more desirable
sphere, it also buys tobacco and wives, rights wrongs and compensates
injuries.
In olden times when a man died without visible wounds the cry was “he
has been bewitched,” and it was the duty of the nearest male relative
to discover and kill the enemy who threw the fatal spell, but now
that the European imposes his will and forbids human life to be
taken, matters are amicably arranged between the contending parties
by means of tamboo.
In the same way an injured husband does not now seek to kill the
invader of his marital rights, but the transgressor pays instead,
a sum of shell-money, which solaces the outraged feelings of the
defrauded husband. Owing to this phase of things, those savage
virtues which existed in pre-German days have not improved; on the
contrary, a slackening of the primitive code of morality has been
distinctly noticeable.
The origin of this shell-money was regarded by the kanakas of
inland regions, such as the vicinity of the Vunakokor Mountain, as
mysterious. Certain finer wits than the rest had the cunning to
attribute its manufacture to unearthly sources. By imposture of
different kinds, there have always been natives able to turn the
ignorance of their fellows to their own advantage, but the coastals
living in the region of Weberhafen on the north coast, know very
well whence it comes, whatever stories they may choose to spread
of its being showered on them by spirit hands, for yearly when the
south-east winds begin to blow, canoes are fitted out for lengthy
excursions to the vicinity of that volcanic group known as the Father
and Sons on the north-west coast. Sometimes they venture as far as
the William Peninsula, where they trade or use coercion with the
natives there for the tiny shells.
The value varies, the white being most prized, but a string a yard
long is worth from two to three marks. Chiefs who possess a good
deal of tamboo have special huts erected wherein to keep it. Much as
they love tamboo, witchcraft undoubtedly plays a more important part
in the lives of these savages than even cupidity. The simplest form
of magic is known by the name of Malira. It consists of a combination
of leaves, fruits, weeds, fibre, and such like, fresh, dried or
pulverised as the special recipe dictates, which is generally mixed
with the food of the person who is to be bewitched, or it may be
introduced with powder used in betel chewing, sometimes the spell
works when the person simply touches the magic concoction. A recipe
known to be effective is a godsend to its discoverer, he can sell it
for much tamboo.
The Malira is used mostly as a love-spell, to bring about an illness,
or for healing purposes. Its uses are manifold, but the native
distinguishes keenly between witchcraft and poison.
Another magical process is called Pepe, but the properties of both
are only the vehicles by which the ever-present spirits may or may
not effect that which is asked of them. The native has long since
come to the conclusion that his witchcraft is powerless against the
European, and his solution of that problem is that the white man,
whom he recognises as greatly his superior, comes from a land where
he has his own spells and his own special make of spirits.
The early residents at Herbertshöhe relate how, when they first
appeared in the island, the natives gave themselves the utmost
trouble to cast the strongest spells they knew over the new-comers;
but gradually as they found their magic unavailing, gave it up as
useless, since their spirits could not prevail against those of the
white men.