BETWEEN THE ACTS
On our return to Nukualofa, we found that the hurricane had had its
bearing upon the negotiations. The king had promised to assemble all
his chiefs, and of the vessels at his disposal one had come to grief
and the remaining two were engaged in the pressing work of carrying
food for the relief of the homeless and hungry people of Vavau. There
was reason in his demand that he should not be asked to take the sole
responsibility of signing a momentous treaty, an act which might
afterwards be used against him by any disaffected chief, and there was
nothing left to do but to urge more rapid action and sit still until
the chiefs came. While my native agents were employed in allaying the
wild rumours that had been set abroad among the people, we were free to
do some sight-seeing.
We made an expedition to Bea to inspect the English guns, said to be
those abandoned by the landing party from H.M.S. _Favourite_, which
came to grief at the siege of Bea in 1840, and often cited by the
Tongans as evidence of how they beat a British man-o'-war. We found two
of them half buried in the grass in the middle of the village, and a
third serving as a fencing-post. They all bore the same mark:--
9 [Illustration] Pr.
P
1813
8:3:14
that is, 9-pounders, cast in Portsmouth in 1813, and weighing
8 cwt. 3 qrs. 14 lbs. It seemed unlikely that frigates in 1840 would have
been carrying iron guns cast in 1813, but an old man who had taken
part in the defence of Bea and old Tungi cleared up the difficulty between
them. The relics of the _Favourite_ had all been removed by another
ship, sent expressly from Sydney in the following year, and these guns
had been bought from the captain of a whaler which was wrecked at the
eastern part of the island some years after the siege. For many years
whalers and trading vessels had carried guns like these, which they had
probably bought cheap from the Admiralty, for purposes of trade.
One of our excursions was to the colony of flying-foxes at Hihifo,
where I wished to renew my acquaintance with old Ata, the hereditary
lord of the western district, who had not been on cordial terms with
the king since the royal marriage. His village lies upon the shores of
Maria Bay, so named by Tasman when he discovered the island in 1643,
and it is close to Kanakubolu, where the temporal kings were always
crowned, and from which they take their title of Tui Kanakubolu. The
ancient tree under which they sat was overthrown (_absit omen_) in a
gale a few years ago, and the present king caused pieces of the wood
to be inlaid in the throne of the royal chapel. But the feature of the
place is the flying-fox colony. Four or five great _toa_ trees stand
in the village square, and many thousands of these great fruit-eating
bats roost there in the sunshine, hanging head downward like noisome
fruit, crawling, scratching, quarrelling, killing the foliage with
their droppings and poisoning the air with their reek. At nightfall
they set forth in long procession for the banana plantations, levying
toll on them as far as Mua, fifteen miles distant, and returning to
their perch before daybreak. In no sense are they sacred, and away from
the colony they may be shot, but it is inauspicious to shoot them in
the village itself, because then they would go away and dire misfortune
would happen. For every great family in Tonga has its death portent;
with the Fatafehi it is the splitting of a great banyan tree; with the
Tui Kanakubolu it is the roar of breakers on the reef in calm weather;
with the Ata it is the sudden migration of the flying-foxes from the
trees in Kolovai.
We had a delightful ride along the grassy road shaded with orange
trees ripening to harvest. On either side of the road lay wide tracts
of uncultivated bush, and I was sorry to see, mingled with the matted
foliage, the ill-omened pink flowers of the _Talatala hina_. In the
Parliament of 1891, when I sat on the Treasury bench, a panic bill had
been hurried through, making it penal for any landowner to have this
plant on his land after March, 1902. If the fines then provided were
to be enforced now, the government would require no other source of
revenue, for the plant, then confined to a small district at the back
of the island, has now advanced to within a few miles of Nukualofa.
It is a tough, creeping vine, armed with sharp, reflexed thorns,
deep-rooted and very difficult to eradicate. Throwing its wicked arms
about a young tree it thrusts them up to the light, choking its
support in its tangled embrace. The story that it was introduced by a
trader in the straw of a packing-case is, perhaps, mythical, but it was
certainly unknown in Tonga thirty years ago. Unless strong measures
are taken to check it, there will come a day when neither cocoanuts
nor yams can be planted any more. Then Tonga, overrun with a tangle of
thorny vines, swarming with hornets, will not be a pleasant place to
live in.
This plant is not the only pest for which packing-straw is said to
be accountable. Between 1890 and last year hornets were introduced.
They have multiplied so rapidly that it is now unsafe to brush through
the thick undergrowth in which they build their nests. We had lived
on shore in Nukualofa for three weeks before we saw any, but on a
never-to-be-forgotten day in May, they made up for their neglect. About
ten the air began to vibrate with an angry hum, and we noticed a few
hornets cruising about the eaves of the verandah. An hour later they
were knocking against the window panes and crawling about the walls,
seeking entrance to the house. At lunch-time the dining-room was full
of them, and their angry hum almost drowned conversation. They were
making for the darker places, the shade of the shuttered bedrooms, the
backs of pictures and the folds of curtains. They took no notice of
us, but every now and then a couple would meet in the upper air, fall
pat upon the floor, and take to crawling. As there seemed no reason
why they should not choose to fall between the collar and the neck, or
crawl up the legs, we thought it time to seek sanctuary. But there was
none. Every corner of the house was theirs, and in the pitiless sun
outside the air was black with them. A hot argument arose about this
phenomenon, some of us maintaining that they were swarming, and, like
bees, would gather about their queen; others, who knew them better,
that they were male and female, and that this was their pairing time.
To that emotional hour I owe all my learning about hornets. The brute
so heavily barred with black stripes that he looks a wicked brown,
is the male, who has no sting, and may be trodden on with impunity;
the bright yellow beasts are females, with a barbed sting nearly as
long as their bodies. We disturbed the economy of Nature that day.
Our host had a five-gallon jar of some American insect powder, and we
lighted censers of the acrid stuff in every room until we had to dash
into the air to breathe. Would that I could remember the name of that
powder, to give its inventor a gratuitous advertisement! In half an
hour our enemies were all upon the floor at the mercy of a soft broom
and a dust-pan. We filled two buckets with their kicking bodies, and
fed the kitchen fire with them. We heard next day that every house
in Nukualofa, from the king's palace to the pigsties, had been made
uninhabitable, but that at sunset they had disappeared, to be seen no
more till next year.
Our escort of policemen were most obliging fellows. One was a Wesleyan,
the other a Free Churchman, and the friendly theological discussions in
which they indulged from time to time showed that the bitter sectarian
hatred, so sedulously nurtured by Mr. Baker, had quite died away.
Ten years before a Wesleyan could not have hoped for the humblest
government appointment.
I was bursting with the showman's pride as we rode into Kolovai,
having wrought the expectations of my companions to the highest pitch.
I begged them not to look up until we halted under the trees. When I
gave the word they looked up, and then they looked at me. Surely these
were not the trees! But the state of the foliage left no doubt upon
that point. We called an old woman out of a neighbouring house, and
there was no mistaking the concern in her tone as she was telling her
tale. Four days before, she said, at an hour before sunset, an albino
flying-fox had circled over the village, settling at last on the
branches of a tree over against the door of Ata's house. Early in the
morning it had flown over the trees, and the entire colony, which was
just settling down to sleep after its nocturnal excursion in search of
food, took to wing and followed it. Not a flying-fox had visited the
town since.
Our escort were very grave over the news. "You know our belief," said
Salesi; "when the _beka_ flies away, it is a sign to Ata's family.
Twice have I known it so; the last time when Ata's son, who was a tutor
in the Wesleyan college, died without warning, and it was always so in
the time of our fathers." I found old Ata and his wife in excellent
health and spirits to all outward seeming, though naturally the
flying-foxes were not mentioned in our conversation. Next day Nukualofa
was buzzing with the news of Ata's approaching dissolution. Ridicule of
the superstition was always met with the remark, "Well, wait and see;
it may not be this week, or this month, but none the less Ata has not
long to live"--a statement which, as the old gentleman's age verged
upon seventy, we were not in a position to gainsay. The king, who is
as enlightened as anyone in his kingdom, was scarcely less positive.
"It is one of those things," he said, "that one would fain laugh at,
but it has come true so often that one is compelled, against his will,
to believe it true." Well, ten days passed, and Ata attended the great
council of chiefs assembled to consider the treaty, the halest and
liveliest of the old gentlemen present. I noticed that while he was
chaffing two members of the cabinet, the bystanders regarded him with
the tender, melancholy interest which is supposed to be bestowed upon
the man in the condemned cell, and this may have told upon his spirits;
for certain it is that a few weeks after my departure from the islands
I received the news that he was dead. That superstition will die hard,
and if I were Ata's successor I would see to it that a few of the
flying-foxes were caught and tied to their perches by a string.
One morning two of Kubu's nieces, accompanied by an aged duenna,
brought presents from their uncle, who perhaps felt that, since his
dual rôle as my friend and the king's father-in-law had been beyond his
powers, some pledge of our old intimacy would not be out of place.
Among the things was a set of stamps for printing the native cloth, and
when I hastened to appropriate these, the younger sister, who has
kittenish manners, broke in with "Oh, but _I_ made these; they are not
for you, they are for this gentleman!" Webber did his best to rise to this
embryonic flirtation, but it died stillborn in nods and smiles for want
of an interpreter. As the conversation dragged and the ladies showed no
consciousness of having discharged their mission, it was suggested that
they should face the camera by way of complimentary dismissal. They
were nothing loath, but the elder sister stipulated for the loan of a
silk handkerchief to hide her neck. As she had the ordinary English
neck of not ungraceful outline, and her sister, who had no neck to
speak of, showed none of this bashfulness, our curiosity was aroused.
It was thus that we discovered the Tongan ideal of female loveliness.
The perfect woman must be fat--that is most imperative--her neck must
be short (like the younger sister's); she must have no waist, and
if Nature has cursed her with that defect she must disguise it with
draperies, or submit to be "miscalled" in the streets of Nukualofa; her
bust and hips and thighs must be colossal. The woman who possesses
all these perfections will be esteemed chief-like and elegant, and her
nose will not matter, though, if she have that organ flat to the face,
she will be painting the lily. There chanced to be an illustrated paper
on the table, and when we showed them the wasp-waisted ladies in the
fashion plates they chuckled with amusement and derision. The king,
whom I afterwards asked for a definition of female beauty, confirmed
all they said, and added a philosophical explanation of his own. He
said that the human eye demanded a sufficiency in the things presented
to it; if they were insufficient, it found them ugly. The Tongan dress
did not conceal the form as does the European; consequently Tongan
ladies were expected to be satisfying in respect of the portions of
their anatomy that are exposed to view. We may be content with a
simpler explanation. In days gone by the chief women got more to eat
than their inferiors, and _embonpoint_ became a chiefly attribute.
This mark of high birth being once stereotyped, men chose their
wives accordingly, and the Tongan dames will grow stouter with every
generation. It is not a pleasing prospect.
[Illustration: THE COLONY OF FLYING FOXES AT KOLOVAI
_From a photograph by J. Martin, Auckland_
They were seen on the same trees by Vason, the renegade missionary, in
1799
To face page 202
]
At one stage in our negotiations the king began to develop a remarkable
capacity for digression. At any other time his excursions would have
been interesting, for, untrained as he is, he possesses the historical
and literary instinct, and he can tell a good story. I think that it
was while we were discussing the relative merits of the Tongan synonyms
for the word Protectorate that he suddenly inquired my opinion upon
the close connection between the Tongan and Hebrew tongues. I hastened
to turn the subject, assuring him that I had never thought about the
matter, for that hoary folly of the Ten Lost Tribes was in the air;
but he said that it was his own discovery. Someone had given him a
Hebrew book to look at, and in one page he had found no less than six
Tongan words. He quoted the conjunction _kaeuma'a_, which, he said,
occurred in both languages with the same meaning. On another occasion
he brought out the piece of hand-made red cloth which I was to take
home as a present to the Queen. This had been given by Captain Cook to
the Tamahá, the noblest lady in the land, and had been preserved by the
family of the Tui Haatéiho. It was a large piece of hand-made woollen
cloth, rather loosely woven and of a rusty red colour, with a black
selvedge edge, and it smelt strongly of sandalwood oil, having been
worn on great occasions by chiefs anointed with that precious essence.
It is now, I believe, among the curiosities in the royal collection
at Windsor Castle. He then told me some native traditions of Cook's
visit. When the vessels were seen approaching Hihifo in 1773 there was
a heated discussion among the Tongans as to whence they came. The king
mimicked the querulous intonation of the old Tongans very funnily.
"Whence come they?" said one. "Seuke!" exclaimed the old chief,
Eikinaba, a noted wit in his day, "why, from the land of riches--from
Babalangi!" (or, as we might say, from Brobdignag), and the nickname
Babalangi has stuck to Europeans ever since. _Ba-ki-langi_ ("shooting
up to heaven") is the derivation which Fatafehi favours, meaning that
the ships' masts reached to the sky. When the Tongans boarded the
_Resolution_, the same chief, Eikinaba, noticed a strange yam on the
deck and picked it up. "I _give_ you that," said Tute (Cook), and from
that day this kind of yam was called the _Kivi_. Favoured perhaps by
the cooler climate and the new soil, this yam has grown to colossal
dimensions. Cook had probably brought it from Rarotonga, or from Tahiti.
Of the number of curious petitions to which I had to listen, the
strangest came from a singularly ill-favoured private in the king's
guards. He waylaid me in the road with a letter in an official
envelope, which I took to be a message from the palace. It contained,
however, a long and confused recital of the love troubles of one
Josefa, who, being enamoured of Ana, the daughter of an Englishman and
the most beautiful _taahine_ in all the world, had eloped with her into
the bush. At this, as it appeared, Ana's father, the Englishman, had
been much incensed (as was not unnatural), and had haled Josefa before
the British Consul, who had fulminated threats, scaring Josefa out of
his wits. Would I therefore order the Consul to marry the pair out of
hand, for, loving each other with so consuming a passion, how were they
to wait five years?
When I asked who had written this mysterious letter in the envelope
superscribed "On His Tongan Majesty's Service," the bearer's sheepish
look betrayed the fact that he had written it himself. In fact, he
himself was Josefa, and, looking at his countenance, I could only
wonder at the lady's taste. It then transpired that she was barely
sixteen (love's arrows strike early in these latitudes), and he had
been guilty of nothing less than the abduction of a British subject
under age, for her father was an English carpenter legally married to
a Tongan wife. I could only counsel the love-sick guardsman to win
consent from the father, or in the alternative to contain his soul in
patience till she was twenty-one. It seemed to be cold comfort, for
the father had terminated their last interview by chasing him with a
carpenter's adze, and I suspect that by this time the friendly forest
has again swallowed up the pair, and the carpenter is abroad with his
chopper.
The eaves-dropping nuisance at the palace was little less tiresome than
it had been ten years before, when one had to bawl state secrets into
the deaf ears of old King George. One morning, while I was explaining
the treaty to the king's ministers, I chanced to see in a mirror the
reflection of a girl on her hands and knees, with eyes and ears wide
open at a chink of the door, which she had pushed ajar. Our eyes met
in the glass, and she scurried away like a frightened rabbit, but I
was not surprised to hear afterwards that many of my remarks were
being quoted verbatim in the town. Accordingly when the king asked
me one morning to come into his private chapel to hear an important
communication, I understood his reasons. As we crossed the compound he
remarked in a loud voice for the benefit of the sentry, "Yes, all that
remains of the sacred tree has been inlaid in the state chair like your
coronation stone in England. Come and see." Sitting on the two thrones
on the daïs we were at last secure from eaves-droppers, and could talk
freely. He told me that there were two Tongan words that expressed the
feeling of his country towards England--_falala_ and _faha'a_. Rising
and leaning against one of the pillars of the aisle, he said, "This is
_faha'a_: then I spring away from it so, and cry, 'Oh! but it won't
bear my weight!' and you say, 'Don't be afraid; _falala be ki ai_'
('Lean upon it without fear')" As his mighty bulk thrust against the
wooden post, it cracked ominously. It was fortunate that the king is
not superstitious, for the post represented England in his metaphor.
The European merchants had a well-founded grievance in their complaints
against the premier, my old colleague Sateki. It was not that he was
obstinate, or that he was ignorant, though I was assured that the most
stubborn Carolina mule might resent being mentioned in the same breath
with the Prime Minister; it was that he was no longer incorruptible.
There were slanderous stories of cases of merchandise delivered at
his door that had never been paid for over the counter, but, putting
these aside, there was the fact that a certain Semitic firm, not long
established in the group, had the ear of the Cabinet, imported most of
the stores required by the government, and could oblige its friends and
harass its enemies with an ease that would have been impossible if the
Cabinet had been impartial. When I brought these matters to the notice
of the king he said, "Without doubt Sateki is very unpopular; you see,
he is like Mr. Joseph Chamberlain." Perhaps my face betrayed surprise,
for he hastened to add, "Of course, I do not mean that he is as able
as Mr. Chamberlain, or as eloquent; what I mean is that, like Mr.
Chamberlain, Sateki says just what is in his mind without thinking, and
seldom opens his lips to speak without hurting somebody's feelings."
Perhaps I should add that His Majesty's only English journal is the
_Review of Reviews_.