THE AGE OF HISTORY
Of the centuries that lie between the age of myth and the age of history
there are but the feeblest echoes. From the ethnology of the people of
to-day we may infer that the stream of immigration swept down the
northern coast of Vitilevu, and, radiating from Rakiraki, crossed the
mountain range, and wandered down the two rivers, Rewa and Singatoka,
until it reached the southern coast and peopled Serua and Namosi.
Another stream must have crossed the strait to Mbua on Vanualevu, and
spread eastward. Melanesian blood can be traced even in the Lau
sub-group, but before any permanent settlement was made there Polynesian
castaways, driven westward by the prevailing wind, must have begun to
arrive. At the dawn of history, about 1750, Vitilevu was almost purely
Melanesian, but the Lau and Lomaiviti islands, Taveuni, Vanualevu, and
Kandavu were peopled by half-breeds between Melanesian and Polynesian,
the Polynesian strain waxing stronger with every mile from west to east.
The peopling of the waste lands was accelerated by war. There is
scarcely a tribe that does not claim to have migrated from another
place, sometimes from parts relatively remote from its present locality,
and if it were worth the labour, the history of the migrations of each
of them might even now be compiled, partly from its own traditions,
partly from the tie of _tauvu_ (common Ancestor-gods) with other tribes
distantly related to it. But, as it would be merely the history of a few
fugitives from the sack of a village, driven out to find asylum in a
waste valley, and founding in it a joint family which lived to grow
into a tribe, such an inquiry would be barren and profitless.
The traditions of Tongan immigration are too numerous to be set down
here. From 1790, if not earlier, an expedition to Fiji was an annual
occurrence. The most important was the arrival of the Tui Tonga's canoe
in Taveuni, from which sprang the chief family of the Tui Thakau, and
the stranding of the two little old men who instituted the _Nanga_ Cult,
which recalls the rites of the Polynesian _Malae_. The chiefs of the
Nandronga and Viwa (Yasawa) also trace their descent from Tongan
castaways, and are very proud of the connection.
The fact that traditionary history is so meagre is in itself an
indication that there were no powerful confederations before the
nineteenth century. The related tribes of Verata and Rewa in the south
and Thakaundrove in the north-east seem to have been the only powers
that wielded influence beyond their borders, but their intercourse with
other tribes must have been very restricted. In islands where male
castaways, having "salt water in their eyes," were killed and eaten,
there was little spirit for discovery and adventure.
The imprint of the Tongan immigration is to be seen, not only in the
blood of the tribes with whom the immigrants mingled, but in their
mythology, for whereas the religion of the inland tribes is pure
ancestor-worship, that of the coast tribes is overlaid with a mythology
that is evidently derived from Polynesian sources.
[Illustration: DESCENDANTS OF TONGAN IMMIGRANTS PERFORMING THE TONGAN
DANCE _LAKALAKA_.]
Early in the eighteenth century there seems to have been an upheaval
among the inland tribes of Vitilevu which sent forth a stream of
emigrants to the coast, whether as fugitives, or as voluntary exiles in
search of new lands, there is no tradition to show. This event was
destined to have a tremendous influence upon the political destiny of
the islands, for among the emigrants was the tribe of Mbau, sturdy
mountain warriors, still bearing in their physiognomy and dark
complexion the proof of their Melanesian blood and their late arrival in
the sphere of Polynesian influence. This tribe, humble as it was in its
origin, was destined, partly through chance, partly by its genius for
intrigue, to win its way within a century to the foremost position in
the group.
[Pageheader: THE RISE OF MBAU]
Rewa, descended from the earliest settlers on the delta of the great
river, could alone boast an ancient aristocracy and a complex social
organization which entitled it to be called a confederation. The rest of
the group was split up into tribes, little larger than joint families,
which treated all strangers as enemies, and held their lands at the
point of the spear.
The Mbau people settled upon the coast about a mile from the islet now
called by their name, but then known as Mbutoni, which is connected with
the mainland by a coral reef fordable at high water. Upon the islet
lived two tribes of fishermen, named Levuka and Mbutoni, who were
supplied with vegetable food by the inland chiefs in return for fish.
Being subject to the Mbauans, they supplied them with a navy, for a
tribe lately descended from the mountains was distrustful of the sea.
Wedged in between Verata on the north and Rewa on the south, Mbau was
continually at war with one or the other. Her pressing need was men,
"the men of Verata and Rewa" (to quote from the _meke_ that records her
history), and as she held her own, those who had grievances against her
powerful neighbours, broken tribes fleeing from their conquerors in the
hills, flocked to her for protection, and her needs were satisfied. But
her territory did not exceed ten square miles.
About 1760, Nailatikau being Vunivalu, or secular king, the chiefs moved
from the mainland to the islet, which was known thenceforward as Mbau.
The fishermen had for some time been waxing insubordinate, and their
offences culminated in the eating of an enormous fish which ought, by
custom, to have been presented to their chiefs. They were expelled from
the island. The Levuka tribe fled to Lakemba, still retaining their
hereditary right to instal each successive Vunivalu in his office. The
Mbau chiefs scarped away the face of the island so as to form the
embankment upon which the present town is built. Nailatikau died about
1770, and was succeeded by his second son Mbanuve. During his reign the
fishermen of Lasakau from the island of Mbenka, and of Soso, from the
island of Kandavu, were employed in reclaiming more land from the sea,
and were allowed to settle on the island. The first intermarriage with
the Rewa chiefs dates from this period. The story goes that a Rewa
canoe, being hailed as she passed Mbau, replied that she was bound for
Verata for a princess to mate with the king of Rewa; that the crew was
induced to take a Mbau lady in her stead, and that a Rewa princess was
sent to Mbau in exchange. Thus the Mbau chiefs passed from being
_parvenus_ to a place in the aristocracy of their adopted country.
As the date of the first arrival of Europeans, which was to have so
profound an influence upon the natives, is in dispute, it may be well to
mention the recorded voyages chronologically.
Tasman, who sighted Vanua-mbalavu in 1643, did not communicate with the
natives. Cook, who had had information about the group from Fijians
settled in the Friendly Islands, discovered the outlying island of
Vatoa, the southeasterly limit of the group, and called it Turtle
Island, but bore away to the north-east.
In April 1791, a few days after the famous Mutiny of the _Bounty_, Bligh
passed through the centre of the group in an open boat. His urgent need
of provisions would doubtless have impelled him to communicate with the
shore had he possessed firearms, and had he not just lost his
quartermaster in a treacherous attack made upon him by the natives of
Tofua. As it was he was chased along the northern coast of Vitilevu by
two sailing canoes, which only left him when he cleared the group by
Round Island, the most northerly of the Yasawa sub-group.
[Pageheader: THE FIRST EUROPEAN VISITORS]
The first Europeans who had intercourse with the natives, so far as we
know, were the prize crew of the little schooner built of native timber
in Tahiti by the _Bounty_ mutineers in 1791. Having shut up the
mutineers in "Pandora's Box" (as the little roundhouse on the
quarter-deck of H.M.S. _Pandora_ was called) Captain Edwards victualled
and manned the mutineer's schooner as his tender, but he parted company
with her in a storm off Samoa an hour before a fresh supply of stores
and water was to be put on board of her. The island of Tofua had been
the appointed rendezvous in such a contingency, and the schooner duly
made the island, but, having waited in vain for the _Pandora_, her
commander, now desperate for want of provisions, made sail to the
northwest, and cast anchor at an island which was almost certainly
Matuku in the Lau sub-group of Fiji. Here she lay for six weeks with
boarding nettings up, but the natives appear to have treated their
strange visitors with friendliness and hospitality. After terrible
sufferings, from which the midshipman lost his reason, and numerous
encounters with the natives of the Solomons or the New Hebrides, this
handful of brave seamen made the Great Barrier Reef opposite Torres
Straits, which, for want of time to search for a passage, they boldly
rode at in a spring tide, and jumped, escaping without injury to their
little vessel. Mistaken for pirates by the Dutch authorities, they were
clapped into prison, where Captain Edwards found them after himself
suffering shipwreck on the Barrier Reef.
Unfortunately neither Oliver, the gunner in command of the schooner, nor
any of his shipmates published the story of these adventures, and the
Record Office has been searched in vain for the log which they must have
handed over to Edwards; otherwise we might have had a very valuable
description of the Fijians a century ago. One or other of the native
poems describing the first arrival of European ships may refer to this
voyage.
This visit, or perhaps an unrecorded one about the same year, 1791, had
a sinister influence upon Fijian history, for the evidence which will be
set forth in a later chapter points to it as the cause of the terrible
epidemic of _Lila_ (wasting sickness) which decimated the group.
In the following year, 1792, Captain Bligh ran along the coast of
Taveuni in H.M.S. _Providence_, and was followed by canoes.
On April 26, 1794, the "snow" _Arthur_ touched at the Yasawa Islands,
and was attacked by the natives.
In 1802, or 1803, a vessel was wrecked on the Mbukatatanoa Reef,
subsequently named Argo, from a vessel of that name which was cast away
upon it. A number of Europeans wearing red caps over their ears and
smoking pipes were rescued by the natives of Oneata, and gunpowder seems
to have come into the hands of the natives, who used the powder for
blackening their faces and hair, and the ramrods of the muskets as
_monke_ (hair ornaments).[16] The tradition says that some of the white
men were killed and some taken to Lakemba by the Levuka tribe, the same
that had been expelled from Mbau, who happened to be at Oneata at the
time. We do not know what became of these survivors. Perhaps they were
slain as a propitiatory sacrifice to the god of pestilence, for from the
traditions of Mbau we learn that Mbanuve, the son of Nduru-thoko
(Nailatikau), the Vunivalu of the Mbau, died of a new disease introduced
by a foreign vessel, and was surnamed Mbale-i-vavalangi (He who died of
a foreign disease) in accordance with the custom of calling dead chiefs
after the place where they were slain, as Mbale-i-kasavu (He who fell at
Kasavu, etc.). On his death the Levuka people came from Lakemba to
instal his successor, Na-uli-you (New steer-oar), and they brought with
them a canvas tent, which was the first article of European manufacture
which the Mbau people had seen. We may fix this date with some
confidence. On the day of the installation there was a total eclipse of
the sun, the heavens were like blood, the stars came out, and the birds
went to roost at mid-day. While the dysentery was sweeping through the
islands the people were startled by the appearance of a great hairy star
with three tails. Now, the only total eclipse of the sun visible in Fiji
about this period was that which occurred at 9.20 a.m. on February 21,
1803. The total phase lasted 4.2 minutes, or within one minute of the
longest possible total phase. The comet is not so easy to identify. It
may have been Encke's comet of November 21, 1805, or the famous comet of
1807.[17]
[Pageheader: THE FIRST BEACHCOMBERS]
Shortly after Naulivou's accession, that is to say some time between
1803 and 1808, the first of the sandal-wood traders touched at Koro,
where some Mbau chiefs happened to be.[18] Joseph Waterhouse, the
missionary, was told that a white man, called "The Carpenter," and a
Tahitian deserted from this ship, and came to Mbau; that the white man
became inspired by Mbanuve, the late Vunivalu, and shivered and foamed
at the mouth like an inspired Fijian, and was, much to his own profit,
accepted by the Na-uli-you as a genuine priest. He dwelt in the house
erected over Mbanuve's grave, where he took to drinking kava to his own
undoing, but that before his death he told the natives that there was a
God superior to Mbanuve or any Fijian deity. I have never been able to
obtain any confirmation of this story: on the contrary I have been
assured that Charles Savage was the first European to land at Mbau, but
as the arrival of ships must have been not infrequent as soon as the
presence of sandal-wood had become known, and whalers were ranging the
Pacific, it is not improbable.[19]
[Pageheader: MISCONDUCT OF THE WHITES]
In 1808 there happened an event which left an enduring mark upon Fijian
history. The American brig _Eliza_, with 40,000 dollars from the River
Plate on board, was wrecked on the reef off Nairai. The majority of the
crew escaped in the ship's boats, and boarded another American vessel
which was lying off Mbua for sandal-wood; the rest took passage in
native canoes that happened to be at the island, one to Mbau and the
others to Verata, while the natives looted the wreck. The man who went
to Mbau was the Swede, Charles Savage, a man of much character and
resource. Having been refused leave to return to Nairai to search for a
musket, he pointed to a _nkata_ club, which bears a distant resemblance
to a gun, and bade them bring him from the wreck a thing of that shape,
and a cask of black powder like their own hair-pigment. The native
messengers were successful; the musket was found built into a yam-hut as
one of the rafters. Having demonstrated the uses of a musket before the
assembled chiefs, Savage took part in a reconnaissance towards Verata,
the state with which Mbau was then at war. He took with him a gourd
containing a letter addressed to the white men at Verata, bidding them
flee to him at Mbau, as it was the stronger state. The gourd was tied to
a stick just out of arrowshot, and as the canoe retired the Verata
people carried it into their fort, and in a few days later the other
whites joined him at Mbau. Savage with his musket now began to carry all
before him. He had a sort of arrow-proof sedan chair made of plaited
sinnet, in which he was carried into musket-shot of the enemy's
entrenchments, and from which he picked off the sentinels until the
garrison fled. Thus Mbau subdued all the coast villages as far as the
frontiers of Rewa. Savage cleverly kept his fellow-Europeans in the
background without arousing their enmity. He alone carried the musket;
he alone could speak the language fluently, and to him the other whites
thought that they owed the good-will of the natives. Two great ladies
were given him to wife, and the order of _Koroi_ was bestowed upon him
with the title of Koroi-na-vunivalu. Yet he stoutly refused to conform
to native customs, and so he kept the respect of the chiefs. Shortly
after the shipwreck the visits of ships became frequent, from India,
America, and Australia. They lay for many weeks off the Mbua coast,
while the crew cut and shipped sandal-wood; and the sailors, allured by
the story of the dollars lost in the _Eliza_, deserted, or were
discharged in considerable numbers. The dollars, though one or two were
found as lately as 1880, were scattered beyond recovery, and the sailors
drifted away, some to Mbau, and others to the villages on the
sandal-wood coast, where they took native wives, and adopted every
native custom except cannibalism.[20] The natives could give them
everything they wanted except tobacco and spirits, and to acquire these,
and to keep their position among their hosts, they would hire themselves
out to the masters of sandal-wood ships at a monthly wage of L4, paid
partly in knives, tools, beads, and firearms. William Mariner, who
visited Mbau in 1810 on board the _Favourite_, the vessel in which he
escaped from Tonga, found a number of whites there whose reputation both
for crimes, vices, and for quarrelling among themselves was so bad that
his informant, William Lee, was glad to make his escape from them.
During Savage's absence with the army they nearly brought annihilation
upon themselves. At a great presentation of food, the king's _mata_
omitted to set aside a portion for the white men, and they, incensed at
what they took for an intentional insult, ran to the stack of food, and
slashed the yams with their knives. Now, this is an insult which no
Fijian will brook, and they were promptly attacked. They killed a number
of their assailants with their muskets, but when the hut in which they
had taken refuge was fired, they had to make for the sea. Three were
clubbed as they ran, but two, Graham and Buschart, swam out to sea, and
returned only when they were assured of the chief's protection. Thus did
they save their lives, the first to perish more miserably at Wailea, the
second to be the means of discovering the fate of de la Perouse.
Savage could not afford to jeopardize his influence with the chiefs by
mixing in the quarrels of the other Europeans. With his two wives, who
were women of the highest rank, he lived apart from the others, in the
enjoyment of all the privileges of a native chief who was Koroi. But
when not engaged in fighting, he also spent the winter months on the
sandal-wood coast, working for the trading ships. Among the regular
arrivals was the East Indiaman _Hunter_ (Captain Robson), which, on her
third voyage to Fiji in 1813, carried Peter Dillon as mate. Dillon had
spent four months in the group in 1809, and had acquired a slight
knowledge of the language, besides winning the respect of the people for
his magnificent physique, and his Irish good humour. He had, as he tells
us, prepared a history of the islands from the date of their discovery
to 1825, but the manuscript has disappeared, and is not likely now to
come to light. Interesting as it may have been, its value as a history
would have suffered from the lively imagination of the writer.
Captain Robson's methods of obtaining a cargo would not have commended
itself to the Aborigines' Protection Society. On anchoring at Wailea, he
was wont to enter into a contract with Vonasa, the chief, to aid him in
his wars in return for a full cargo. The enemy's forts were carried with
a two-pounder, and the bodies of the slain were then dismembered,
cooked, and eaten in Robson's presence. On this occasion the same policy
was pursued, but whether owing to the exhaustion of the forest or to the
indolence of the natives, a full cargo was not forthcoming. At the end
of four months, two hundred Mbauans, led by two of the king's brothers,
arrived in their canoes to take their white men back to Mbau, and with
their help Robson resolved to punish the faithlessness of the Wailea
people. The landing party fell into the ambush known in Fijian tactics
as _A Lawa_ (The Net), that is to say, they were drawn on by the feigned
flight of a party of the enemy until they were surrounded. Dillon, with
Savage and three others, gained the summit of a low hill, where they
kept their assailants at bay, while the bodies of their comrades were
cooked and eaten in their sight. Despairing of help from the ship,
Savage went down to try his powers of persuasion on the chiefs, but he
too was treacherously killed and laid in the oven before Dillon's eyes.
Their ammunition exhausted, the prospect of torture before them, the
three Europeans had resolved upon suicide, when by a fortunate accident
they were able to seize a heathen priest who had ventured too near, and
by holding him as hostage for their lives, they made their escape. In
the following year Mbau took ample vengeance for the massacre of their
chiefs.[21]
[Pageheader: THE MASSACRE OF WAILEA]
There is a story that Maraia, Savage's half-caste daughter, then a child
of four,[22] remembered her father's last night at Mbau. Lying awake she
saw him open his sea-chest which he always kept locked, and take from it
a string of glittering objects. Startled by her childish exclamation,
for he thought himself alone, he kissed her and said that he was going
away for a long time, and must hide his property in a place of safety.
That night he poled himself over to the mainland, and when she awoke
next morning the canoes had sailed for Mbua, from whence her father
never returned. Probably the string was made of Chilian dollars from the
wreck, which now lie buried somewhere on the mainland opposite Mbau.
After Savage's death Mbau continued to consolidate her power. News of
her success tempted the broken tribes to flee to her for protection, and
settle on the conquered lands. Thus did Namara become borderers
(_mbati_) to Mbau. The story is a curious illustration of Fijian
contempt for human life. Two brothers of Namara had stolen down to the
sea shore for salt, and were seen by the king, Naulivou, then cruising
along the shore in his great canoe. He presented them in sport with a
shark and a sting-ray. Overwhelmed by his condescension, the brothers
began to contend for the honour of giving his dead body in return for
the fish. Their cousin standing by exclaimed, "Is a man's life more
precious than a banana? Let the elder be clubbed." So the elder bowed
his head to the club of the younger brother, who presented the body to
the chief. Grieved at what they had done, Naulivou ordered the body to
be buried, and said, "I wanted no return for the fish. Go, fetch your
wives and children, and settle on this land, and be my _mbati_
(borderers), for I have need of true men."
The navigable canal called Nakelimusu, which shortens the voyage between
Mbau and Rewa by connecting two of the river mouths, and is almost the
only example of native engineering, was constructed in this reign
shortly after the sack of Nakelo in 1810. The Queen of Rewa at that time
was a Mbau princess, and when Nakelo sent her submission to Mbau,
craving leave to rebuild the fortress, one of the conditions imposed was
that the isthmus between the two rivers should be cut at its narrowest
point, where it is about 400 yards wide. The Nakelo men dug a ditch into
which the water could wash at high tide, and the rapid current did the
rest.
Though Mbau did not long enjoy a monopoly of muskets she was able to
purchase more ammunition than her rivals. European sailors still
continued to pour into the islands, for after the exhaustion of the
sandal-wood forests, whalers began to frequent the group, and there
sprang up a desultory, but profitable trade in _beche-de-mer_, the
sea-slug so highly prized by Chinese epicures, and in cocoanut oil. None
of these attained the same influence as Savage. They were rather the
chief's sycophants and handy men, who mended muskets, and beguiled his
leisure by telling stories of far-off lands. A chief likes to have in
his retinue some alien, unfettered by the _tabu_, whom he can make his
confidant, and a chief who could not boast of having a tame white man
was not much esteemed. A tame negro was a curiosity even more highly
prized. The natives as a body appear to have treated the white men with
tolerant contempt, as beings destitute of good manners and the
deportment proper to those who consort with chiefs.
In 1828 Mbau was at the zenith of her power. She had absorbed the
Lomaiviti islands, and was disputing the Lau group with the Tongan
immigrants. On the northern coast of Vitilevu her influence was felt as
far west as Mba, and she exercised a nominal suzerainty over Somosomo,
the state then paramount over the eastern half of Vanualevu. The inland
and western tribes of Vitilevu alone were entirely independent of her
influence.
[Pageheader: INSURRECTION AGAINST TANOA]
That her empire was the influence of a person rather than of a state was
shown in 1829, when her leader, Naulivou, better known by his posthumous
title of Ra Matenikutu (Lord Lice-Slayer) died. His younger brother,
Tanoa, who succeeded him, had neither his ability nor his physique.
Among the Europeans he was known contemptuously as "Old Snuff," from his
habit of daubing himself with black pigment, and he was unpopular among
his own people. From the day of his accession there were rumours of
conspiracy, and during his absence at Ovalau in 1832 the rebellion broke
out. Tanoa fled to Koro, and would there have been put to death, had not
Namosimalua of Viwa, who had been sent to arrest him, secretly connived
at his flight to Somosomo, where he was safe. The rebels installed as
Vunivalu one of his brothers named Tuiveikoso, chosen because he could
be trusted to act as their tool, and refrained from the usual custom of
putting Tanoa's adherents to death, though Namosimalua of Viwa, whose
motives are not easy to understand, urged that the king's son, Seru,
should be killed. But the boy was allowed to live on at Mbau, where he
grew to manhood, without exciting any suspicion of the mark which he was
to make upon Fijian history.
At first the Europeans took no part in these political disturbances. The
more respectable of them had removed to the adjacent island of Ovalau,
where they formed a settlement under the protection of Tui Levuka,
plying the trades of boatbuilding and sail-making, and selling native
produce to passing vessels. Those who chose to remain at Mbau were
Fijianized whites who lived upon the natives.
Tanoa was not idle. Being _vasu_ to Rewa he had no difficulty in
inducing the king of that state to ally himself with Somosomo and to
declare war with Mbau. By the promise of a cargo he even hired an
American vessel to bombard Mbau. Having taken up a position at the
anchorage she fired a broadside, but the Europeans on the islet, having
trained a gun upon her, carried away her jib-boom at the second shot,
and she slipped her cable and returned to Somosomo.
The leader of the rebellion was Ratu Mara, a man born before his time.
Professing to be in favour of peace, of free intercourse, and of a new
era of bloodless government, he was immensely popular with the whites.
He is still remembered as the only Fijian warrior who took fortified
villages by direct assault, and who was absolutely fearless in battle.
It is even said that, on hearing of the missionaries in Tonga, he
declared his intention of inviting them to Fiji to displace the religion
in which he no longer believed. In person he was tall and very powerful,
and his acts show him to have been of great intelligence and
perseverance. Friendly as they were to Mara, the Europeans so much
disliked the other chiefs of the usurping government, who had advocated
a massacre of all foreigners, that they resolved to support Tanoa, and
secretly sent him a contribution of arms and ammunition.
Tanoa had meanwhile been undermining the power of the usurpers by the
old expedient of bribing the borderers. In obedience to an oracle at
Somosomo he had removed to Rewa, and was intriguing with a party at
Lasakau, the eastern end of Mbau, inhabited by fishermen. A number of
villages on the mainland had also been won over. Seru meanwhile, though
grown to manhood, was believed to be above suspicion. His only objects
in life seemed to be its amusements. He was the leader and the idol of a
band of youths of his own age, who passed the days and nights in sports
and wantonness. Suddenly, by a preconcerted arrangement a number of
villages declared for Tanoa, and when the news reached Mbau one morning,
it was found that the Lasakauans had built a war fence during the night,
dividing their quarter of the town from that of the chiefs. Aghast at
this turn of events the chiefs summoned a council of war. Namosimalua
urged the immediate arrest of Seru, and his own nephew, Verani, whom he
suspected of treachery, but it was then too late. The two youths had
taken refuge in Lasakau. Namosimalua's musket, fired at his nephew, was
the signal for civil war. But the _coup d'etat_ was complete. The
Lasakauans had prepared a number of flaming darts which they threw into
the thatch of the nearest houses. A strong wind swept the conflagration
through the town. In half-an-hour every house was in ashes, and the
inhabitants were fleeing to the mainland.
[Pageheader: THAKOMBAU'S _COUP D'ETAT_]
As soon as the news reached Rewa, the army was put in motion. Village
after village was destroyed, though, contrary to the wish of Seru, its
inhabitants were spared by the king of Rewa. Tanoa himself re-entered
Mbau at the close of 1837, after an exile of five years. Seru received
three names. His own party called him Thikinovu (the centipede), which
bites without warning; the usurpers called him Na Mbi (the turtle pond),
in allusion to the number of people who were killed and eaten by him,
but the name by which he was generally known was Tha-ko-mbau
("destruction to Mbau," or "Mbau is undone "),[23] signifying the
success of his _coup d'etat_.
The day of reckoning had come. A price was set upon the head of all the
usurping chiefs, and no one dared to give them asylum. Thakombau slew
many of them with his own hand, and they were cooked and eaten by the
Lasakauans, whose hereditary duty it was to provide material for the
cannibal ovens. Grisly stories are told of this orgy of revenge. It is
said that a rebel whom Thakombau hated was brought before him, he
ordered his men to cut out the man's tongue, and that he ate it raw,
joking with the wretched man about the change in his fortunes. When
tired of the sport he sent him out to be further tortured, and when
death released him from his sufferings he was cooked and eaten.
The arch-rebels, Mara and Namosimalua, were the last to be taken.
Thakombau pursued Mara from village to village until he came to Namata,
where he suffered a repulse. He then set himself to buy over the Namata
chief. Early one morning Mara's faithless hosts surrounded him. His
magnificent courage did not desert him. For some time he fought
single-handed for his life, but numbers prevailed. Gashed by hatchets
and knives, he fell at last, and his body was presented to Thakombau.
Namosimalua was allowed to return to Mbau, and Tuiveikoso, the
figure-head of the rebellion, and Tanoa's elder brother, were not
molested.
In 1837 the first missionaries, Mr. Cross and Mr. Cargill, of the
Wesleyan Missionary Society, arrived in the group. The Lau islands,
already colonized by Tongans, were the natural starting-point for their
labours; but Mr. Cross visited Mbau, and had an interview with
Thakombau, from whom he sought permission to settle on the islet. The
moment was unfortunate, and the young chiefs answer very natural under
the circumstances. "Your words are good to me, but I will not hide from
you that I am now at war, and cannot myself hear your instruction nor
even assure you of safety." Mr. Cross misunderstood the answer. If he
had seized upon the bare permission to reside at Mbau, itself a great
concession, his labours would have been greatly lightened. As it was,
his departure gave great offence to Thakombau, who opposed all further
overtures from the missionaries, and the offer was not renewed for
fifteen years.
In September, 1837, a great meeting was held at Mbau. Having made
submission to his brother, Tuiveikoso, an aged, corpulent and lame man,
was pardoned by Tanoa, who described him as "a great hog, grown too fat
to walk about, and able to do nothing but sleep, and wake to pick his
food." The sole guilt of the rebellion was fixed upon Namosimalua. On
the following day he was brought to trial, when he frankly admitted
having accepted six whales' teeth to kill Tanoa. To the astonishment of
everybody Tanoa gave him his life. The secret of the confession and
Tanoa's clemency was that, to use a Fijian metaphor, Namosimalua had
been "eating with both sides." It says much for his diplomacy that he
preserved his life against the hatred of Thakombau, who had not
forgotten his endeavours to persuade the rebels to kill him.
[Pageheader: PUNISHMENTS FOR PIRACY]
The rebels had made one serious mistake. During Tanoa's exile in 1833
they had urged Namosimalua to seize the French brig, _L'Aimable
Josephine_ (Captain Bureau), lying at Viwa. The Viwa chief, scenting
danger, declined at first to have anything to do with the project, but
his scruples were overborne, and the crew was massacred by Namosi's
nephew, who was thereafter called Verani (Frenchman). The captured
vessel did not prove to be of much value. Her native crew did not dare
to sail her within sight of other vessels, and eventually she was cast
away. In October, 1838, M. Dumont d'Urville, who touched at the group on
his return voyage from the Antarctic sea, exacted reparation for this
act of piracy by burning Viwa, the inhabitants being in hiding in the
neighbourhood. He did not then know that Captain Bureau had to some
extent provoked his fate by taking part in native wars.
In 1840 Captain Wilkes, of the United States Exploring Expedition,
visited the group, and deported Veindovi, the king of Rewa's son, for
having instigated the massacre of part of the crew of an American
vessel. He also severely punished the people of Malolo, an islet at the
western extremity of Vitilevu, for the murder of two of his officers.
These proceedings undoubtedly had a great effect in protecting the lives
and property of Europeans from chiefs whom they had offended.
In the same year war broke out between Somosomo and Vuna, two districts
in the island of Taveuni. Mbau pursued her usual policy of weakening her
rivals by supporting the weaker side, and, regardless of the debt owed
to Somosomo by Tanoa during his exile, espoused the cause of Vuna.
Thakombau's elder brother, Wainiu, who was vasu to Somosomo, and had
designs upon the succession to Tanoa, took the opportunity of betraying
his intentions. He fled to Somosomo, whence he proceeded to buy over the
borderers of Mbau on the mainland, within a few miles of the town. The
most formidable of the tribes that joined him was Namena, which
Thakombau was powerless to reduce by open attack. The stratagem which
reduced Namena from a powerful tribe to its present condition of serfdom
is worth narrating for the light it throws upon Fijian methods of
diplomacy. Namena sent messengers to Viwa to win over Namosimalua to the
cause of Wainiu. The chief received them apparently with open arms, but
secretly informed Thakombau that he had a plan for effecting the
massacre of all Namena's fighting men without a campaign. The plan was
simple. Mbau was to lay siege to Viwa, and the Viwans were to invite
Namena to garrison the town. But only blank cartridge was to be used,
and the rest was to be left to him. The Viwans, many of whom were
nominally Christians, for the missionaries had settled in the island,
were kept in the dark till the last moment. Mbau played their part in
the comedy admirably. When the blank cartridge was fired many of the
warriors feigned death, but when they reached the moat, the gates were
thrown open, and the Viwans joined their mock assailants in massacring
the unfortunate Namenans. One hundred and forty warriors were slain, and
forty widows were strangled to their manes, a blow from which the tribe
has never recovered.
Thakombau had now virtually become regent. He had not only to direct the
foreign policy of the confederation, but to keep a watchful eye upon
conspirators at home. One of his brothers, Raivalita, sailed from Vuna
with the intention of assassinating him. But the plot was betrayed, and
as Raivalita left the house after reporting his arrival to his father,
he was waylaid and clubbed. In 1845 war broke out between Mbau and Rewa,
owing chiefly to a personal feud between Thakombau and Nkara, son of the
king of Rewa, who had had an intrigue with one of Thakombau's wives. It
was an illustration of the old Fijian proverb that a quarrel between
brothers is the most difficult to patch. There had been almost annual
skirmishes between the border villages, in which the chiefs took
desultory interest, but in this war the issue lay between the chiefs
themselves. Hostilities were precipitated by an act of treachery. Rewa
had burned the town of Suva[24] during the absence of the fighting men,
and had sent a message to Mbau saying that, as honour was satisfied, the
people would be spared. But on the following day the fugitives were
ambushed on the Tamanoa heights.[25] The war dragged on for six months,
being for the most part little more than the burning of outlying
villages, and the cutting off of stragglers, all of whom were killed and
eaten. The ties of vasu between members of the royal families had much
confused the issue. One of the sons of the king of Rewa, Thoka-na-uto
(or Mr. Phillips, as he preferred to call himself) had joined Mbau from
the first, and a number of the border villages had followed his example,
and were in the field against their feudal lord. White men were fighting
on both sides, in one or two cases naked and blackened like the natives.
[Pageheader: DESTRUCTION OF REWA]
The end came in June, 1845. Defections from Rewa had been frequent;
indeed, in this war desertion was scarcely regarded. Early in June the
Rewans had sent a chief to Mbau to treat for peace, a fatal step, for
Thakombau bought over the envoy to betray his countrymen. The Mbau army
was to invest the town, and while it was attacking, traitors within the
walls were to set it on fire, and begin slaying their fellow-citizens.
The plot was entirely successful. As the enemy reached the bank of the
river opposite Rewa, the town burst into flames. The traitors within its
walls had already begun slaughtering. Meanwhile, a Mbau chief shouted to
the queen to cross the river in a canoe to her own people, the Mbauans,
and to bring her children and Mbau retainers with her. As they were
embarking the king himself came down to the canoe. The Mbauans shouted
to him to go back, but he would not. As he was crossing the river he was
fired upon; he was wounded by a spear as he was disembarking. Then
Thakombau ordered one of his brothers to club him, but he was afraid to
strike so great a chief. The wretched king pleaded hard for life, and
his wife joined her entreaties; but Thakombau reminded him of the
calumnies he and his sons had spoken, and told him sternly that he must
die. Snatching from an attendant a club with an axe head lashed to it,
he clave his skull to the jaw, and his wife and children were splashed
with his blood.
Indirectly the Rewa war had a sinister bearing upon the fortunes of the
whites. In May, 1844, a European, who had fought on the Rewa side
against Mbau, sailed for Lakemba with one of Tanoa's wives, who had run
away from Mbau, and was now deputed by the Rewans to induce Lakemba to
revolt from Thakombau's government. He was wrecked on the island of
Thithia, and the Europeans of Levuka, hoping to recover some of the
vessel's gear, of which they stood in need, sailed to that island.
Failing in this, they went on to Lakemba, whither the shipwrecked man
had escaped. For a time they hesitated to give him a passage to Rewa,
for he was as much disliked by them as he was by the natives, and they
knew the danger of displeasing Thakombau. But he offered a sum of
passage-money which overcame their scruples, and they carried him off
just in time to escape the war canoe which Thakombau had sent in pursuit
of him.
Thakombau not unnaturally regarded this as an act of hostility, and Tui
Levuka, who was becoming alarmed at the power of the whites in his town,
and at the extent of land which he had alienated to them, seized the
opportunity for beseeching his suzerain to deport them from the island.
The peremptory order for their removal was a severe blow to the
prosperous little settlement, which had to abandon the fruits of so many
years of labour, and begin life afresh. A fine schooner, half built, had
to be abandoned on the slips, and the houses left to be gutted by the
natives. It speaks well for their peaceable disposition that they did
not remove to Rewa, where they might have restored its waning fortunes
in the struggle with Mbau, and that they chose Solevu Bay in Mbua, which
was at peace with Thakombau. The new settlement was unhealthy and
inconvenient for communication with ships, and long before the five
years of exile was completed Tui Levuka and the Mbau chiefs had repented
of their precipitancy, which had cut them off from the services of the
white artisans which were so necessary to them. The request for
permission to return, made early in 1849, was readily granted.
[Pageheader: THE SECOND REWA WAR]
In 1846 Thakombau led an army of 3000 men, nominally to help Somosomo
against Natewa, but in reality to increase his own influence at the
expense of his ally. This he did by commanding the attack in person,
and contriving to spare the lives of the defenders, while receiving
their submission himself. The result of this campaign, for which
Somosomo paid an enormous subsidy, was to make Natewa a tributary of
Mbau, and diminish the influence of Somosomo.
On September 1, 1847, Rewa was again destroyed by Thakombau. The sister
whom he had promised to Tui Nakelo as a bribe for his treachery to Rewa
had been given instead to Ngavindi, chief of Lasakau, and Tui Nakelo in
revenge offered to join Ratu Nkara, the son of the king of Rewa, whose
feud with Thakombau had provoked the last war. Between them they rebuilt
Rewa, and repulsed the Mbauans sent to prevent them. But Tui Nakelo was
assassinated by means of a plot devised by Thakombau, who advanced to
Tokatoka, and sent thence a message to Ratu Nkara that he wished him no
ill, and that if he would remove with his people to the islet of
Nukulau, and allow him to burn Rewa _pro forma_, he would molest him no
further. Ratu Nkara accordingly withdrew all his men, not to the islet
mentioned in the message, but to a hill top whence he could watch the
Mbau canoes surrounding Nukulau to capture him, "Pig's dung!" he
exclaimed; "does Thakombau take me for a fool!"
In 1849 Captain Erskine visited the group in H.M.S. _Havannah_, and gave
Thakombau an exhibition of the precision of marine artillery, which had
an important bearing on the history of the next few years. It inflamed
the king with a desire to possess a gunboat of his own, and two were
ordered, one from America and one from Sydney. The almost annual visit
of ships of war about this time had impressed Thakombau with the
importance of doing nothing that would give any excuse for foreign
intervention. But neither Captain Fanshaw, Captain Erskine, nor Sir
Everard Home, who urged Thakombau in turn to abandon cannibalism and the
strangling of widows, the last named so vehemently that they parted on
bad terms, had much effect upon him. The fact was that, as after events
proved, Thakombau did not feel himself strong enough to do so. In the
fifteen years between 1835 and 1850 he had fought his way into the
foremost place in Fiji, and his influence in the latter year was such
that the American Consul, Mr. Miller, in a letter of remonstrance
actually addressed him officially as Tui Viti (King of Fiji). But the
Europeans could not see beneath the surface, and none knew, as he
himself did, upon what a quicksand his power was built. His maintenance
of the ancient customs, his opposition to Christianity, denounced so
bitterly by the missionaries, was part of a set policy. Had he embraced
Christianity when it was first pressed upon him, he would have remained
the petty chief of a few square miles, a mere vassal of the mission, all
his days, for the missionaries discountenanced war, and it was only by
war that he could hope to extend his influence. He alone of all his
people foresaw that the mission would destroy, first the ancient polity,
and ultimately the independence of the Fijians. His dialogues with the
missionaries,[26] who for fifteen years were importuning him to let them
live at Mbau, bantering as they were in tone, show how consistent was
his policy, and they do not justify all the abuse that was heaped upon
him by the mission historians. He respected the men; he objected to
their doctrine, which, he said, might be suitable enough for Europeans,
but was not adapted to the Fijians. His forbearance to the missionaries
who so often thwarted him was remarkable: he allowed them to live at
Viwa, within sight of Mbau, and to proselytize his subjects: he was
personally kind and courteous to them, though he received nothing at
their hands in return, as by Fijian usage he had a right to expect. The
missionaries, so far from allowing him any personal credit for his
kindliness, crowed over his courtesies as surrenders to their diplomacy.
As an absolute sovereign he had cause enough to quarrel with them.
Without preaching actual treason, they were always denouncing the
customs which he practised, and denying the pretensions to divinity
which were accorded to every ruling chief; the mission stations were
cities of refuge to which every disaffected native fled when his treason
was discovered. They themselves admit that the converted natives openly
boasted that they were exempt from service in the army, and that
murderers, "who were punishable even by Fijian law, fled to mission
stations, and hypocritically professed an anxiety for Christian
instruction."[27] The Christian natives refused to fight for their
country. There was in fact a party in the state which denied their
ruler's authority, and were not only apostates from the national
religion, but disaffected towards the government. It was therefore
remarkable, not that he made an attempt to persecute, but that he made
only one.
[Pageheader: PERSECUTION OF CHRISTIAN CONVERTS]
In December, 1850, Thakombau declared war on all Christians. The heathen
villages on the Tailevu coast for a distance of fifty miles rose, and
laid siege to Dama and to the island of Viwa, where the missionaries
lived, but Thakombau had issued orders that no injury should be done to
the lives and property of the Europeans, lest there should be a pretext
for foreign intervention. The missionaries appealed to a Tongan chief,
who, with 300 men, was on a visit to Mbau. This chief dispatched a canoe
to act as a guard for the missionaries, and some of its crew were killed
by the besieging force. The Tongans were now involved in the war, and as
the whites were also supporting the Mission with supplies, Thakombau
very wisely called off his troops and there was peace.
In 1850 Thakombau had touched the pinnacle of his fortunes, and we are
now to see upon what his authority rested. So long as he ran in the
grooves of custom his power was absolute, but no sooner did he introduce
innovations than it began to crumble beneath him. Late in 1851 the two
gunboats of sixty tons, ordered by him abroad, were delivered, and the
agents began to press for payment. He ordered a levy of _beche-de-mer_
throughout his dominions. The labour entailed by this new tax was far
less than that of house-building or providing food, but the one was new,
and the others sanctified by custom. Moreover, his subjects knew that
the _beche-de-mer_ they were called upon to fish would find a ready sale
with the Europeans. Many of the villages flatly declined to obey; some
took the sacks, and let them rot in their houses; others burned the
sacks before the eyes of the king's messengers. In January, 1852,
Thakombau, who seldom abandoned any project in the face of opposition,
took 1000 fishers with him to Mathuata, and set them an example by
fishing with his own hands, but his men worked grudgingly, and the
proceeds of the expedition were small. He then sent a party in the ship
to New Caledonia, where sufficient _beche-de-mer_ was collected to pay
for one of the vessels, and she was handed over to him. This purchase
was the most unpopular act of his reign.
The long-expected death of old Tanoa occurred in 1852, and, despite the
protests of the missionaries and captains of ships-of-war, Thakombau
took part in the immemorial ceremony of strangling his father's widows,
who, in accordance with custom, themselves contended for the honour of
being strangled to prove their loyalty to the dead. The missionaries
affect to trace his troubles to this act of barbarity, but they had
probably the effect of delaying them, by proving to his chiefs that
their king was before all things a Fijian still.
[Pageheader: REVOLT AGAINST THAKOMBAU]
On the death of Thoka-na-uto (Mr. Phillips), who as Thakombau's ally was
nominally king of Rewa, Ratu Nkara came from his hiding-place in the
mountains and succeeded to the chieftainship. He is the most romantic
figure in Fijian history. Years of guerrilla warfare, when he was a
fugitive with a price upon his head, had not broken his indomitable
spirit, nor weakened his lifelong defiance of his victorious enemy,
Thakombau. He had never stooped to the acts of treachery that had
stained the career of his rival, and had he lived longer his courage and
skill in warfare would have raised the city of his fathers from its
ashes to be the capital of the first state in Fiji. Rewa was rebuilt,
and Nkara set about corrupting the border villages of Mbau. He was
successful beyond his hopes. In a few weeks Mbau was enclosed in a ring
of revolted towns, for not only was the mainland aflame from Kamba to
Namena, but Ovalau, under Tui Levuka, had declared its independence.
There can be no doubt that for this the Europeans at Levuka were partly
responsible. They had never forgiven their summary expulsion from
Levuka in 1844, nor Thakombau's request to Captain Macgruder to deport
them all from the group. They were at this time the most orderly and
law-abiding community of Europeans in the Pacific, having by hard work
and trading accumulated a good deal of property. They were not in a
position to take up arms openly against Thakombau, and their only overt
act was to punish the natives of Malaki, an island subject to Mbau, for
the destruction of an English cutter called the _Wave_. In December,
1853, Levuka was destroyed by an incendiary who was believed to be
acting under the orders of Verani, Thakombau's lieutenant. The whites
lost all they possessed, and on the following day Thakombau visited the
town in order to express his sympathy, and avert any suspicion of
connivance. During his progress through the ruined town the Europeans,
many of whom knew him well, let him pass without a sign of recognition,
and he left the place anxious and dispirited.
At this juncture he had sore need of friends. The unexpected revolt of
his personal serfs at Kamba was a veritable disaster, for they had
charge of his largest canoe, the sails and stores of his gunboat, and
his principal magazine. A few days after his formal installation as
Vunivalu on July 26, 1853, his army was beaten off by the Kambans, his
faithful lieutenant Verani was assassinated in Ovalau, and the rebellion
spread. He knew that he had now to reckon with traitors among his own
kin. Ratu Mara,[28] who had for many months been a voluntary exile from
Mbau, had returned to the delta to be the figure-head of the rebellion,
and Tui Levuka, whose authority was not sufficient to control the rebels
of Ovalau, persuaded the Europeans to send for him. At this moment a
schooner arrived from Sydney with a consignment of arms for Thakombau,
and the European consignee, Pickering, declined to deliver them.
On October 30, 1853, Thakombau yielded to the importunities of the
missionaries so far as to allow the Rev. Joseph Waterhouse[29] to take
up his residence at Mbau, probably in the hope that he would be a
useful advocate in the event of misunderstanding with European
governments. In November he received an unexpected visit from King
George Tubou of Tonga, then on his way to Sydney. He turned this visit
to good account by promising the king a large canoe (the celebrated Ra
Marama) if he would revisit him on his return home. There now seemed to
be a prospect of a favourable turn to his fortunes. Tui Levuka, doubtful
of the success of his rebellion, made a secret compact with him to play
the traitor to his own side, and Thakombau now prepared to crush Kamba.
His plans were impeded by the secession of his kinsman Koroi-ravulo, who
secretly bribed five hundred of his army to absent themselves from the
rendezvous, and in March, 1854, he set forth with barely 1500 men. He
had foolishly neglected to seize the opportunity of a hurricane, which
had levelled the defences of Kamba, and when the assault was made the
Kamba garrison had been stiffened with a number of whites and
half-castes from Levuka, who foresaw that the fall of Kamba would place
Levuka in the power of the victorious army. Thakombau commanded the
assault in person. Having cleared broad roads for retreat in case of a
sortie 500 men advanced to the attack, but they were seized with a
sudden panic, and the whole army fled in confusion to their canoes. A
further defeat at Sawakasa, the stronghold of Koroi-ravulo, completed
Thakombau's discomfiture.
Ratu Nkara and his friend Mr. Williams, the United States Consul, Ratu
Mara, Tui Levuka, and the Europeans of Ovalau, who had combined to bring
him to this pass, styled themselves the "League." Their agreement, as
set forth in a letter from Pickering to Williams, afterwards made
public, was "to stop all ships of going to Mbau," and to invoke the aid
of the first ship-of-war that might arrive. Consul Williams's
ill-directed activity in the cause proved the undoing of all the
schemes, for he wrote a violent letter to the newspapers in Sydney,
urging the destruction of Mbau as the first duty of civilized nations,
which, when translated to Thakombau, convinced him that his only chance
of salvation lay in conciliating the missionaries. A letter which he
received at the same time from King George of Tonga persuaded him that
it was high time to embrace Christianity. His defeat at Kamba after so
many favourable omens had rudely shaken whatever belief he may have had
in the gods of his fathers, and if he now rejected the support of King
George and the missionaries he would have had no friends left. He had
been profoundly moved by the news of the assassination of Tui Kilakila,
the chief of Somosomo, which, the missionaries assured him, was a
judgment on him for his opposition to Christianity, and he was moreover
suffering from a painful disease of the leg. Cut off as he was from
communication with the Europeans who opposed the conversion of Mbau,
there was no hostile counsel to neutralize the persuasions of the
missionaries.
[Pageheader: THAKOMBAU CONVERTED]
On April 28, 1854, the momentous decision was made. Assembling his
chiefs he read the two letters to them, and announced his decision,
reminding them of the prosperity of Tonga since the adoption of
Christianity. On the following Sunday he attended service with about
three hundred of his chiefs and retainers, all clad in waistcloths, for
the missionaries had ordained that the outward sign of conversion should
be clothes. As soon as the people had recovered from their astonishment
there was a convulsion that nearly cost Thakombau his life. Rewa was
still stoutly heathen, and all the malcontents in Mbau flocked to the
enemy. The island of Koro also rose. Mbau was now hemmed in, and for the
first time since 1835 it was put into a state of defence. But there were
traitors within. Yangondamu, Thakombau's cousin, won over by two of the
king's brothers who had joined the enemy, had engaged to assassinate
him. His house was crowded with young chiefs anxious to pay court to the
rising power, while Thakombau sat alone, deserted by all but the
missionary and a faithful Tongan. This immediate peril was averted by
the dispatch of Yangondamu in command of a force to reduce the Koro
rebels, and while he was away a Captain Dunn arrived from America with a
cargo of arms, which he insisted upon selling to the Mbauans despite the
entreaties of the Europeans.
The missionaries had already made a clean sweep of cannibalism, the
slaughter of prisoners, and the strangling of widows, but when they
tried to force a constitution on European lines upon the king they found
him obstinate. "I was born a chief, and a chief I will die," he said,
and his firmness, distasteful as it was to the missionaries, saved, not
only himself, but also the cause of the mission; for, as Waterhouse
himself records, "the populace, long favourably inclined towards the new
religion, now hated Christianity because it was the religion of
Thakombau," and if Thakombau had added to the other sins the abdication
of his authority, nothing could have saved him or the cause of his
foreign advisers.
On November 8, 1854, Thakombau was induced by Captain Dunn to hold a
conference with his brother, Ratu Mara, on his ship, the _Dragon_. This
meeting, effected with so much difficulty, resulted in nothing but a
profession of reconciliation. Thakombau had so far humbled himself as to
sue his enemy, the king of Rewa, for peace, but his overtures were
haughtily rejected. In the same month he attended an inquiry held by
Captain Denham on H.M.S. _Herald_, at which he formally withdrew all the
charges he had made against the Europeans, much to the chagrin of the
missionaries, who had forwarded them to the commander. The Europeans had
sent three representatives, who roundly charged the king with the
burning of Levuka, but of this charge he seems to have cleared himself.
This was the first occasion on which he officially stated the limits of
his dominions. He had explained the suzerainty which he claimed over
Somosomo, Lakemba and other states, but when asked point-blank to
declare the limits of the territory in which he would undertake to
protect the Europeans, he indicated a territory no larger than an
English country parish, and his reply was disconcerting to those who had
been styling him Tui Viti, King of Fiji.
[Pageheader: A DEATH PORTENT]
His conciliatory spirit, being set down to fear, had availed him
nothing, and in the last months of 1854, the fate of Mbau still hung in
the balance. Ratu Nkara had offered to end the contest by a duel between
the two kings. "It is shameful," he said, "that so many warriors should
perish; let you or me die": but Thakombau replied, "Are we dogs that we
should bite one another? Are we not chiefs? Let us fight with our
warriors like chiefs."
But in January, 1855, the low tide of Thakombau's fortunes began to
turn. Rewa was stricken with alarm at the news of a portent. Andi Thivo,
one of the Rewa queens, noticed that tears were exuding from one of the
roots of taro set before her. She addressed it, asking why it wept. Was
Rewa to be destroyed? Was her father about to die? Was Thakombau? Were
any of the chiefs whom she named? But the taro made no sign. Was her
lord, the king of Rewa, near his death? A voice from the taro said
"Yes," and the weeping ceased. The report spread through the length and
breadth of the land, and the people waited in hushed expectancy. To them
their king was already dead. Suddenly the war-drums themselves were
hushed. The omen was fulfilled; Ratu Nkara, "the Hungry Woman," "the
Long Fellow," was no more. A mighty man, Thakombau's only dangerous
enemy, had fallen. He died of dysentery on January 26, 1855, having in
his last moments promised to turn Christian if he recovered, swearing
nevertheless to have the blood of Thakombau. But he was speechless
during his last moments, and could not bequeath a continuance of the war
to his chiefs.
Though he had shown the missionaries many kindnesses and allowed them to
live with him, though he had had more intercourse with white men than
any other chief, he died in the faith of his fathers. In the last months
of his life he was with difficulty restrained from wading into the
river, where sharks were seen, in order to prove to the missionary,
Moore, that his person was sacred to them. A fortnight before his death
he completed the building of two heathen temples to ensure his victory
over Mbau, and sent a polite message to the missionary asking him to
hold his services in another part of the town, "lest the gods should be
angry at the noise." He said that he did not intend any disrespect to
Jehovah, but was putting his own gods on their last trial, and desired
to give them every chance of success. Though his chiefs were still
heathen, out of respect for the missionary only one of his wives was
strangled, and she, as they explained, was old and already half dead.
On the death of Thakombau's personal enemy Rewa was glad enough to make
peace with Mbau, but the Mbau rebels, who had to fear reprisals,
continued the struggle. But in March King George of Tonga arrived at
Mbau with forty large canoes to take away the war-canoe presented to him
by Thakombau. After trying in vain to bring about a reconciliation, and
suffering the loss of one of his own chiefs through the treachery of the
rebels, King George agreed to lend his troops to Thakombau. The prospect
of this foreign interference so incensed the people that tribes which
had hitherto taken no part in the struggle threw in their lot with the
rebels, and every one who opposed Christianity, or had anything to fear
from Mbau, joined the enemy. The priests were inspired; the oracles
spoke. The Tongan fleet would be derelict at Kamba for want of hands to
work the sails after the battle. It was to be a death-struggle between
the old gods and the new.
The promontory of Kamba was to be the battlefield, and the fortress at
its extremity swarmed with warriors. For three days the allied fleets
waited near the fort in the hope that it would capitulate without a
siege, but on April 7 they bore down upon the promontory--a formidable
spectacle. They were received with a volley of musketry. By all the
rules of Fijian warfare this should have checked the landing for that
day, but to the astonishment of the Kambans it did nothing of the sort.
The sails were lowered, and, leaving their dead and wounded to the care
of their women, the Tongans rushed to the attack. There were more
surprises in store for the garrison; instead of hiding behind trees, and
trying to scare the defenders into flight, the Tongans advanced to the
assault in the open, and recked nothing of the men who fell. King
George, who commanded in person, had decided to invest the town by
throwing up fortifications fronting the defences, and to starve it into
submission, but the Vavau warriors pressed on, and took the place by
assault. They afterwards defended themselves for this act of
insubordination by saying that they were looking for the defences, and,
taking the rampart for mere outworks, had found themselves in possession
of the town before they were aware of their mistake--a familiar form of
Tongan boasting. The Tongans lost fourteen killed and thirty wounded;
the Mbauans, who had been mere spectators, escaped almost scatheless.
More than two hundred of the enemy were killed, the greater part by the
heathen Fijians on the Mbau side, and two hundred prisoners were taken.
Thakombau was willing to spare all but Koroi-ravula, but King George
interfered to save his life, which was justly forfeited by European as
well as Fijian law. The submission of the rebels was complete. No less
than twenty thousand natives proved their allegiance to Thakombau by
accepting Christianity and adapting their customs to the wishes of the
missionaries.
[Pageheader: THE TONGANS TAKE KAMBA BY ASSAULT]
It is not to be understood that the conversion of Thakombau was the
first success of the missionaries. A printing press had been at work for
many years, and, even in the Mbau territory, many hundreds of the
natives had been taught to read and write. There were mission stations
in Lakemba, Somosomo, Rewa, Levuka and Mbua, and in many of the coast
villages there were native teachers, the Christian and heathen natives
living amicably side by side. The Christians claimed immunity from war
service, and it was therefore not to be wondered at that Thakombau
showed indecent glee when appealed to by the missionaries for help
against persecution at Mbau. "You have often refused to fight for me,
and now you have a war of your own on your hands, and I am glad of it."
But the Lau group professed Christianity to a man; in the Lomaiviti
islands the heathen were in a minority, and now, by Thakombau's
conversion, the north-east coast of Vitilevu adopted the new faith. Only
the inland and western tribes of the two large islands continued in the
faith of their fathers, and these were soon obliged to fight for their
religion.
In 1858 Thakombau's peace of mind was again rudely disturbed. Williams,
the United States Consul, whose enmity against Thakombau was personal,
had never relaxed his efforts to bring about foreign intervention.
During the Fourth of July festivities in 1849 Williams's house on the
island of Nukulau had been burned to the ground, and though report
attributed the fire to pure accident during a display of fireworks by
its convivial master, Williams laid his loss at the door of Thakombau.
There were other claims by American citizens, and Williams's persistency
at length induced the American Government to send a frigate to make
inquiries. Commodore Boutwell had visited Mbau in 1855. His high-handed
treatment of Thakombau, and his ready acceptance of the _ex parte_
statement of the claimants, passed almost unnoticed in that eventful
year, but in 1858 the king was made to realize that the American award
of L9000 as compensation to American residents was no empty threat, but
was a claim that must be met. He had had a sinister experience of the
danger of levying from his subjects contributions not sanctioned by
custom, and he knew that the task was hopeless.
But this was not all. A new star had risen on the eastern horizon, and
Mbau was now threatened by the Tongans. Occasional intercourse between
Tonga and Fiji had taken place for perhaps three or four centuries,
through canoes plying between the different Tongan islands having been
driven westward by the trade wind, but it was not until later in the
eighteenth century that it became regular. At the time of Cook's visit
in 1772 it had become as much a part of every young chief's education to
take part in a warlike expedition to Fiji as it was in England a little
later to make the grand tour. The Tongans steered for Lakemba, where
they took part with one or other of the factions that happened to be at
war, and, having taken the lion's share of the loot, and built
themselves new war-canoes in Kambara of _vesi_, a timber very scarce in
Tonga, they set sail for their own country. But not a few stayed behind,
and gradually a little colony of Tongan-speaking half-castes established
itself in all the principal windward islands.
[Pageheader: THE TONGAN CONQUESTS]
In 1837 the influence of the Tongans in Fiji received an unexpected
impetus from the arrival of the first Wesleyan missionaries, who sailed
from Tonga to Lakemba with a retinue of Tongan teachers. They were at
once joined by all the resident Tongans, who were now as zealous in
converting the Fijians to Christianity as they had formerly been in
converting their property to their own use. The countenance and
encouragement of the white missionaries fostered their natural
arrogance, and, when persuasion failed to effect conversion, stronger
methods were sometimes resorted to. By the year 1848 the Tongans had got
thoroughly out of hand, and King George, who was not yet secure against
conspiracy, foresaw that any rival who might choose to recruit partisans
in Fiji could return to Tonga with a formidable army. In order to
provide a legitimate outlet for the ambition of his cousin Maafu, he
dispatched that redoubtable warrior to Fiji ostensibly as governor of
the Tongan colony, in reality as conqueror of as much of the group as he
could take. Maafu's strong personality, aided by the lash, soon reduced
the turbulent Tongans to order, and island after island of the eastern
group went down before him. The Tongan teachers, now established in most
of the western islands, acted as his political agents, and the
missionaries were powerless to discountenance aggressions that were
avowedly made with the object of spreading the Christian faith. So
horrible were the excesses of his warriors in these raids that the
Wesleyan authorities were occasionally obliged to wash their hands of
him, but their somewhat half-hearted protests did not prevent Taveuni
and the greater part of Vanualevu from falling under his control.
The Tongans had carried all before them by their superior courage and
dash in frontal attack, and by their intelligent use of European
weapons.[30] In 1858 Maafu's cruisers were ravaging territory claimed by
Mbau, and the two powers stood face to face. Thakombau was wise enough
to see that, in the event of an open rupture, even if he should gain an
initial advantage over Maafu's warriors, he could not hope to stand
against a power that had all Tonga to draw upon for recruits, and that
with America pressing for its debt, and Maafu bent upon conquest, he had
every prospect of finding himself in vassalage to one or the other. In
his extremity he turned to Mr. Pritchard, the English Consul, who,
having a firm belief in the future of the islands as a cotton-growing
country, was anxious to attract immigrants with capital. On Mr.
Pritchard's advice, Thakombau executed a deed of cession, offering the
sovereignty of the group to England on condition that he should retain
the rank and title of Tui Viti (King of Fiji) accorded to him by the
American Government,[31] and that, in return for 200,000 acres of land,
the British Government should satisfy the American claims.
Some pressure was put upon the Home Government from the Australian
colonies to induce it to accept the offer upon the ground of the high
price to which cotton had risen in consequence of the disturbances in
the Southern States of the Union. Colonel Smythe, R.A., was sent out to
report upon the proposal, but, in the face of his assurance that
Thakombau's authority controlled less than half the group, the
Government, already embarrassed by the expenses of a Maori war, could
not entertain the offer.
The prospect of annexation had attracted from New Zealand a large number
of Englishmen, some of whom settled in the island. In 1861 the European
colony numbered 166 adults, of whom the majority were respectable
people. They bought large tracts of land from the native chiefs, who
sold recklessly whether the land belonged to them or not.
[Pageheader: ANNEXATION]
From 1861 to 1869 the Europeans increased to 1800, and the control of
political affairs passed from the native chiefs to Europeans, who served
as a check upon Maafu's ambition. The mission spread rapidly, until by
1870 all but a few of the inland tribes were nominally Christian.
Various unsuccessful attempts were made to establish a settled
government, but in 1871 Thakombau was declared constitutional sovereign
of the entire group, with a ministry and two houses of parliament, a
form of government ridiculously unsuited to the needs of the country,
seeing that the natives, who numbered nearly one hundred to one, were to
have no votes. Thakombau had an army officered by white men, and made
abortive attempts to conquer the interior, but the new government did
little beyond plunging into debt, and splitting the country into
factions. In 1873 the political state of the group had become
intolerable, and on British Commissioners being sent to inquire into the
matter on the spot, the chiefs were induced, after some hesitation, to
cede the sovereignty to England unconditionally. The Deed of Cession was
signed in September, 1874. No doubt the chiefs acted to some extent
under pressure from the Europeans, who had purchased land which they
could not enjoy while it was in occupation by natives, and for which
they desired to have titles. The Lands Commission had a task of
extraordinary difficulty. Tracts had been sold by chiefs who had no
title to them, and sometimes the same land had been sold to two or more
purchasers. Many of the deeds produced could never have been understood
by the natives who signed them, and often the boundaries were
imperfectly described. Sir Arthur Gordon,[32] the first Governor, wisely
decided to govern the natives as far as possible through the machinery
that he found in operation, and it encountered no open opposition with
the exception of an insignificant rising in the western interior of
Vitilevu, where the tribes, provoked by the encroachments of their
neighbours on the coast, and alarmed at the ravages of the measles,
reverted to their heathen gods for a few months. This outbreak was put
down by native levies.
Thakombau, who received a pension of L1500 a year, was loyal to the
British Government, and, both in the administration of his own province
and in his intercourse with other chiefs, used his immense influence to
promote the contentment of his people under their new rulers. At his
death in 1882 the last of the great chiefs passed away, for Maafu had
died in the preceding year.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 16: One of them, having thus smeared his head, stooped to the
fire to dry it; the powder flared up, and he leapt forth into the _rara_
singed bare to the scalp.]
[Footnote 17: The native poems of the time refer also to a hailstorm,
which destroyed the plantations, a hurricane which caused a tidal wave
and a great flood, and raised the alluvial flats of the Rewa delta
several feet, a tradition which has support in the fact that a network
of mangrove roots underlies the soil at a depth of four or five feet.
The hurricane is said to have carried the pestilence away with it.]
[Footnote 18: They boarded her and directed her to the sandal-wood
district in Mbau, returning to the shore with a pig, a monkey, two geese
and a cat, besides knives and axes and mirrors. The native historians
name her captain "Red-face."]
[Footnote 19: It is well here to correct an error for which Thomas
Williams was originally responsible, and which has been copied by almost
every writer on Fiji since his day, namely, that "about the year 1804 a
number of convicts escaped from New South Wales, and settled among the
islands." The only foundation for this story is that "Paddy" Connor, who
was actually a deserter from a passing ship, was popularly supposed to
have "done time," and that the morals of the early settlers were such
that if they were not convicts they ought to have been. Putting aside
the extreme improbability that escaped convicts should beat 1200 miles
in the teeth of the prevailing wind, while so many eligible
hiding-places lay near at hand, it is certain that the first white
settlers were all shipwrecked sailors, deserters, or men paid off at
their own request.
According to M. Dumont d'Urville, two escaped convicts named "Sina" and
"Gemy" (? Jimmy) were concerned in the seizure of the _Aimable
Josephine_ in 1833.]
[Footnote 20: Among the settlers in 1812 was one who was believed to be
secretly addicted to cannibalism, and was ostracized by his own
countrymen.]
[Footnote 21: The story of this adventure, as narrated by Dillon, in his
_Voyage in the South Seas_, is the most dramatic passage in Polynesian
literature.]
[Footnote 22: The same Maraia who was afterwards forcibly married to the
captain of a Manila ship.]
[Footnote 23: Cakobau, according to Fijian spelling.]
[Footnote 24: Now included in the grounds of Government House.]
[Footnote 25: The massacre took place on the site of the present
residence of the manager of the Bank of New Zealand, and four hundred
persons were massacred without distinction of sex or age.]
[Footnote 26: See _The King and People of Fiji_, by Joseph Waterhouse.]
[Footnote 27: Waterhouse, p. 188.]
[Footnote 28: The second rebel chief of that name.]
[Footnote 29: Author of _The King and People of Fiji_.]
[Footnote 30: Maafu was the first to employ cannon in native craft in
Fiji. He had two small pieces mounted on the decks of canoes, which, if
they did but little execution in a bombardment, often ended a siege by
striking terror into the hearts of the garrison.]
[Footnote 31: Mr. Miller, the British Consul in Hawaii, first addressed
Thakombau as "Tui Viti" (King of Fiji) in a letter written in 1849 on
the subject of the American claims, it being the policy of the claimants
to make one chief responsible for damages sustained in every part of the
group, however remote from the frontiers of Thakombau's territory.]
[Footnote 32: Now Lord Stanmore.]