SAMOAN CRICKET: FAUGA-SA V. PAGO PAGO
The captain of Fauga-sa drank deep from his _epu_ of _kava_, tossed the
heel-taps over his shoulder as etiquette required, and sent the shining
coconut cup spinning back across the mat to the feet of the _taupo_,
who, in festal regalia of dancing skirt and _tuiga_, presided at the
kava bowl. Then he nodded gravely to the Pago Pago captain opposite,
and each leaned forward and laid a honey-hearted hibiscus blossom in
the palm of his outstretched hand.
Instantly every voice within and without the council house was hushed,
and in the waiting silence the buzzing of a huge blue-bottle fly
sounded insistently above the lap of the wavelets on the beach and
the lisp of the leaves of the palms. Suddenly the buzzing ceased,
and with a great shout of triumph the Fauga-sa captain sprang to his
feet and waved a hand from the doorway, on which action his shout was
immediately taken up by the other eight and sixty members of his team,
who fairly set the hillsides ringing with their ululating cries.
And why should they not cheer? Had not the fly alighted upon the hand
of their chief and captain, Malatoba, thus giving him the "choice," and
would he not send the Pago Pagos in to bat during the storm which every
sign said was due for the next morning, leaving Fauga-sa the cool, dry
days that always follow a storm to finish in? What matter if Pago Pago
had eighty-five men to their sixty-nine?--the mud would soon wear down
the opposing runners and more than make up for so slight a handicap.
They arrive at the decision somewhat differently on the beach of Pago
Pago than at Lord's, but the winning of the toss is of no less importance
in Samoan cricket than in English.
Samoan cricket is not quite so primitive as that of the Esquimau
tribe in which the batsman, with a thigh bone, defends a wicket made
of ribs of the animal whose skull the bowler launches at it; but it
has sufficient points of divergence from its original model to make
some prefatory explanation essential to an understanding of it. In
the first place, then, a contest between two localities is a far more
representative one in the island game than in real cricket, for a team
consists of every able-bodied man in the village--every male not in his
first or second childhood--and if one village chances to be larger than
another it is all in the fortunes of war. The overwhelming advantage
this scheme might give to a large village over a small one is, to a
certain extent, minimized by the custom of having a relay of four men
to do the running for all of the batsmen of each team; and if its
runners are not men of great endurance as well as speed, a big team may
beat itself by wearing them out by heavy scoring in the earlier stages
of the contest.
The ball is "regulation," but the bat, in size and shape, is more like
that used in baseball than in cricket. It is made of light-coloured
native wood of medium weight, is of about three feet in length, and has
its large end slightly flattened for striking the ball. The handle is
bound with cinnet to insure a grip. The wicket consists of one stick
instead of three, the difficulty of hitting which, even undefended, makes
anything of the nature of "stone-walling" tactics quite superfluous. The
batsman, having no running to do, simply stands up and drives the ball
about until he is out, the latter event, except for special ground rules
that vary even between village and village, occurring under practically
the same conditions as in the orthodox game. Bowling, both as regards
"overs" and the distance from which, and the manner in which, the ball
is delivered, does not differ materially from ordinary cricket.
A game consists of but a single inning, and is never "drawn" unless the
score chances to be tied. It is finished when every man playing has had
his turn with the bat, a consummation which may be reached in anything
from four to twelve days. Time is not of the essence of the contest,
and as no one ever has any business or other engagements to call him
away, the game is always fought out to the bitter end.
The visiting team proceeds in boats to the village with which it is to
play, and remains there, the guest of the resident chief, during the
period of the match. Play on the first day usually commences in the
afternoon, but on the days following, except for short intermissions
taken by the fielding team for a triumphal dance after each "out,"
lasts from daylight to dark. The nights are spent in _kava_ drinking
and _siva-sivas_, and a Samoan village after a week of cricket is over
always relapses into an equal period of almost absolute somnolence
while it takes the rest cure.
The exhibition cricket which is occasionally arranged for the benefit
of visitors in Samoa is usually played on a comparatively smooth
and level open space, bearing some slight resemblance to a regular
field, but when the natives are playing for their own amusement the
pitch is more likely than not to be located in the midst of a coconut
grove, and in the closest-built part of the village. Twelve successive
hours of fielding with a grilling tropical sun on the naked back has
its terrors even for a Samoan. He likes the shade of the coconuts
and the overhanging eaves of thatch, and there is something in the
uncertainty of handling the elusive caroms from ridge poles and
palm fronds that appeals to his simple native mind.
The game in question was between the teams of the villages of
Fauga-sa--the Falesá of Stevenson's story, "The Beach of Falesá"--and
Pago Pago, respectively the champions of the leeward and windward
sides of the island of Tutuila. The winning of the "toss" by Malatoba of
Fauga-sa was considered of great importance, for all the signs were for
a southwest gale during the first days of the match, and as no game
is ever called on account of inclement weather, it was figured that
Pago Pago's runners would soon tire in the rain and wind, making
heavy scoring impossible, while the batsmen could be retired just as
fast in rain as in sunshine. And, to a certain degree, thus it happened;
but the handicap to Pago Pago was only sufficient to cut down that
team's excess of batsmen and bring the game to the most spectacular
finish in the history of Samoan cricket.
The custom of having special men to do the running for the batsmen
originated, it is said, in the early days of the game, when a chief who
had been lamed in battle, and whose presence in the game was strictly
necessary from a social standpoint, was allowed the privilege of a
running substitute. The effect of the practice is the centring of this
work upon men specially chosen and trained for swiftness and endurance,
while any man able to stand erect qualifies as a batsman. The best bat
of the Apia team for many years was a grizzled old warrior with an
aromatic piece of sandal wood in place of a left leg that had been
snapped off by a shark in his younger days.
Pago Pago's main reliance in this game was not upon the number and
prowess of its batsmen, nor upon the skill and quickness of its
fielders, nor yet upon the speed and accuracy of its bowlers, but
rather upon two phenomenally swift runners imported for the occasion
from the crack Apia team of the island of Upolou. These men, Motu and
Roboki, were reputed so speedy that they could exchange places while
the ball was being passed from the wicket-keeper to the bowler, and
on good clean drives into the ocean it was said that they had often
piled up a dozen, and even a score, of runs. A Samoan cricket field
has no "boundaries," and running is kept up until the ball is returned
or declared "officially lost" by the umpire, a maximum of twenty runs
being allowed in the latter event.
With a great beating of drums, tooting of conches and blowing of horns,
the Fauga-sa men scattered out to their places, while Chief Mauga of
Pago Pago squared away to face the bowling of Chief Malatoba. Motu and
Roboki, the runners, crouched in readiness for a lightning start, the
umpires waved their insignias of office, folded umbrellas, and the big
game had begun!
The first ball struck a lump of coral, broke sharply to leg, and Mauga
ducked just in time to save his ribs, while the spheroid, spinning off
the wicket-keeper's fingers, struck a coconut trunk and ricocheted into
a bunch of bananas, Motu and Roboki completing four swift dashes up
and down their coral path before it was returned. The second ball
came straight for the wicket, and though it fell dead from Mauga's bat
almost at his feet, the nimble runners, like two dark spectres, again
changed ends. Eight more times they passed each other for the next
three balls, only one of which was touched by the batsman, and when,
on the last ball of the "over," Mauga stepped forward and laced out a
screaming drive high above the council house and into the bay, the
Pago Pago sympathizers fairly went wild with excitement. While a
lithe-limbed Fauga-sa fielder went darting like a seal through the
water after the ball, Motu and Roboki, their every nerve and muscle
strained to its utmost, were piling up the runs for Pago Pago.
[Illustration: "CHIEF MAUGA SQUARED AWAY
TO FACE THE BOWLING OF CHIEF MALATOBA"]
[Illustration: TO-A, WHO MADE THE BEST SCORE
FOR PAGO PAGO, FACING THE BOWLER
(Note his runner waiting, stick in hand, with foot raised)]
Seven times they had passed each other and turned and passed again,
and the swimmer had only reached the ball and thrown it awkwardly
to a team-mate close behind him. Twice more the runners flashed by
each other, and the ball was only at the shore. Motu signalled for
still another effort, and with canes outstretched the game fellows
went racing, each toward his goal. Half way up from the shore a
Fauga-sa fielder fumbled the ball, and all looked safe for the runners,
when a fragment of coco husk caused Roboki to turn his ankle just at
the instant he was about to pass his partner, sending him plunging,
head-on, into Motu, both of them collapsing into a jumbled heap. The
ball came on an instant later and both batsmen, through the failure
of their runners, were declared out. Motu and Roboki recovered
consciousness in the course of the next hour, but were of no further
use to their team until the following day.
Out of deference to the feelings of their opponents, the Fauga-sas
omitted the dance customarily indulged in each time a batsman is
put out, but when the next man to face the bowling popped up an
easy ball and was caught in the slips, they made up for lost time.
Whirling and yelling like dervishes, they rushed into a solid phalanx
formation, and then, with rhythmic clappings of hands and
stampings of feet, made a circuit of the ground, finally to end up in
front of the squatting ranks of the waiting batsmen of Pago Pago.
Here they continued their antics for a minute or two more, jocosely
pointing out the fate of the man just disposed of as the fate which
awaited the rest of his team. Then they broke up and went to
playing again.
Not in the least disheartened by so unpropitious a start, the Pago
Pago batsmen began slamming the ball about at this juncture, and
by dark, though only fifteen wickets had fallen, a total of 240 runs
had been put up, the largest half-day's score ever made in Samoa.
Most of these runs were the result of long drives, which, though
high in the air, were almost impossible to catch on account of the
trees. Only one man was clean bowled, most of the outs being due
to balls which flew up from the bat and were caught by one of the
horde that clustered at point.
A local ground rule which held that a ball was fairly caught when
intercepted rolling from a roof or dropping from a tree was
responsible for the finish of several good batsmen. Almost in the
middle of the field was a large thatch-roofed house, oval in form,
temporarily occupied by the scorers, the _taupo_ and her
handmaidens, and the distinguished visitors. A solid circle of
fielders ringed this house, and several men were retired on balls
smartly caught as they cannoned from the springy thatch.
Perhaps the most amusing event of the afternoon was the disgrace
brought upon himself by Samau, son of Chief Malatoba, and the crack
bat and fielder of the Fauga-sas. Samau was a dandified young blade
with a great opinion of himself as a lady's man, who, because of his
rather clever handling of a couple of long drives early in the game,
had been giving himself airs and doing a deal of noisy boasting. Just
as the setting sun dipped behind the towering backbone of the island
and a grateful coolness came creeping down with the shadows from
the bosky hillsides, Seuka, the pretty _taupo_ of Pago Pago, strolled
out through the coconuts, and when near Samau, threw up her lovely
arms and hands in the expressive Samoan gesture signifying a complete
surrender of heart and soul. Apparently no whit moved, the haughty
youth only tossed his Turkish towel-beturbaned head and proceeded
to knock down with one hand a sizzling hot drive that came toward
him headed for the beach. Thus spurned, the artful Seuka sank down
for a space upon a nearby mat in an attitude suggestive of the
profoundest grief, shortly, however, to return to the attack from a
perch on the veranda of the little white Mission church which stood
in the middle of Samau's territory.
The proud youth tried valiantly for a while to stem the tide of his
ebbing interest in the game, but the little lady seemed so palpably
smitten with his charms that, out of the very softness of his heart, he
finally edged over and, still keeping his eye fixed on the batsman,
began to talk to her. Soon Seuka was observed holding something
playfully behind her back and tantalizing the scornful Samau by
denying him a look. At last the unlucky fellow's curiosity got the
better of him, and for one fatal moment he was seen to turn his back
and begin to scuffle with the laughing coquette for the possession of
the keepsake she was withholding. At the same instant the batsman
smote the ball a ringing crack and sent it flying into the top of a tall
coco palm above the church. From the palm the ball dropped to the
roof of the mission, rolled to the veranda, and finally fell off almost
upon the head of the frightened Samau, who was standing gaping
foolishly at the wildly gesticulating horde of his team mates who
came bearing down upon him. It would have been an easy catch had
he been attending to business, and as the full enormity of the crushed
dandy's offence dawned upon him, he turned tail and ran for the bush,
closely followed by a dozen irate Fauga-sa men and a black and white
cur. Being the fastest man on his team, Samau easily outdistanced the
pursuit, but it was said that he stayed in the bush all night, and that
he was only allowed to enter the game next day upon the solemn
promise not to speak to another woman until his return to the home
village.
The second day the expected storm came on, and on that and the two
following days there was a gale of wind and almost incessant rain.
Through it all the game went merrily on, and despite unfavourable
conditions Pago Pago continued to add to its score until, when the last
batsman was out on the fifth day, a total of 1,386 runs had been
chalked up to its credit. By this time fine weather had set in again, but
even with this in their favour it did not seem possible for the Fauga-sas
to equal the tremendous score that faced them. When twenty-three
wickets went down the first day for a paltry three hundred runs the
situation looked more hopeless than ever.
Things brightened up for a while on the second day when Samau, the
disgraced one, batted up a rattling eighty-two, fifteen of which were
put up by his speedy runners during a diversion among the fielders
caused by a nest of hornets which one of the batsman's swift drives
had unexpectedly dislodged from a bread-fruit tree. After this the
Fauga-sa batting slumped off again, and the day closed with something
in excess of seven hundred runs to the team's credit, and thirty-nine
wickets down. The third day seventeen more wickets fell for fewer than
three hundred runs, so that on the morning of the fourth day--the ninth
of the match--the fag end of the Fauga-sa batting faced a shortage of
nearly four hundred runs.
The first man to encounter the bowling on what proved to be the final
day of the match was a youth called "Johnny," a nickname which took
its origin from the fact that its bearer had once been employed as
a dishwasher in the galley of the American gunboat stationed in the
harbour. He had been playing baseball with the Yankee marines, and
that this was his first game of cricket was evident when he squared
away with his bat over his shoulder as though facing pitching instead
of bowling. Heedless of the redicule heaped upon him for his lack of
"form," "Johnny" calmly stepped out and slammed the first ball--which
chanced to be a full pitch--over the tops of the highest palms and down
into a running stream in the bottom of a little gully. Down the stream
it went, bobbing merrily on the way to the beach, and before it was
recovered the swift-footed runners had traversed the course a dozen
times. The second ball came at the batsman's feet, and the hockey-like
sweep he made of it narrowly missed being caught by the bowler. The
third ball struck away in front of him, and, stepping back, "Johnny"
smote it hard and true, straight into the house where sat the scorers,
the visitors and the members of Chief Mauga's household. All scattered
as they saw it coming, and the whizzing sphere had traversed nearly
the whole distance to the further side of the house before it landed,
dull and heavy, in the ribs of little Oo-hee, the misshapen dwarf kept
by Mauga in the capacity of mascot and jester.
Oo-hee was stretched bawling on the mat, but the question of how hard
he was hit was entirely lost sight of in the excitement surrounding
the momentous import attaching to the fact that he had been hit at
all. A dwarf is regarded with the same superstitious awe in Samoa
as in other parts of the world, and there, too, no better method is
known of deflecting a current of bad luck than by touching the hump
of a hunchback. But actually to bring down a hunchback with a cricket
ball was a thing unprecedented. Pago Pago looked serious about it and
Fauga-sa began to take heart--surely something was going to happen!
And something did happen, too, and that right speedily. "Johnny" missed
his fourth ball, and the fifth, just touching the butt of his bat, went
hopping and spinning off along the ground like a wounded duck. Some
idea of such a resemblance must have been awakened in the active mind
of the little black and white village cur, who, cocked up in the shade of
a palm had been conducting a punitive expedition against a particularly
aggravating flea, for he pounced on the ball with a glad yelp and began
shaking it like a thing alive. No whit dampened in ardour by the failure
of the object of his attack to fight back, the frisky canine kept
valiantly at his task, and when the onrush of fielders seemed to threaten
him with total annihilation, he began to dodge and skip about among them
as though proud to be the centre of so much attention. But when he saw
Mauga, roaring with rage at the thought of the Fauga-sa runners adding
to their team's score at the rate of a run every three or four seconds,
seize a cutlass and come charging down upon him, he realized that he
had made a mistake. Whereupon, therefore, he tucked his wisp of a tail
between his legs and flew as the bee flies, straight for the bush, even
forgetting, in his terror, to drop the ball.
When Mauga and the rest of his braves came back from a bootless chase,
it was to be met with the disconcerting news that not another ball was
to be found in the village. Anxiously renewed inquiry, however, met
with better reward, for one of the missionary's boys was found to have
an old ball, still quite hard and round and in good condition in every
respect, save for the fact that one side of it, in lieu of anything
better to hand, had been patched with a piece of shark's hide. Under
ordinary conditions the Pago Pagos would not have thought of
consenting to use such a ball, for the surface of dry shark's hide has
all the roughness of a rasp combined with the sharpness of the nettle;
but the game seemed nearly won, and it is not in the Samoan nature to
brook the postponement of a certain triumph if it can possibly be
helped.
Fauga-sa was chalked up with twenty runs for the lost ball, and the
game was started up again. Gingerly settling the prickly sphere back in
his fingers, the bowler delivered the sixth ball of "Johnny's" over,
and this the latter, swinging wildly, missed and was clean bowled.
This lucky beginning filled the Pago Pagos with great elation, from
which state they were rudely jostled a moment later when the next
batsman drove a hot line ball which scoured out the palm of the hand of
one of the swarm of cover-points and set him howling home to bind the
wound with ti leaves. After that the fielders handled the dreaded ball
as if it was a live coal, and though wickets kept falling from time to
time, runs came fast between until, when the last Fauga-sa man but one
was out, the total of the team's runs was but four behind the aggregate
of Pago Pago.
The final batsman was an old man with weak eyes, who, after missing
three balls, caught the fourth on the edge of his bat and shot it high
up into the top of a towering coconut palm. Like a swarm of wolves
the Pago Pago fielders, with outstretched hands, crowded beneath the
preciously-freighted fronds, and like the shuttles of a madly-driven
loom the runners of Fauga-sa darted back and forth. Once, twice,
thrice, four times--and finally--five times they go, and then one of the
umpires waves his umbrella and announces that Fauga-sa has won
the game.
[Illustration: "WHIRLING AND YELLING LIKE DERVISHES
THEY MADE A CIRCUIT OF THE GROUND"]
[Illustration: "A SINEWY BROWN FIGURE STARTS
CLAMBERING UP THE TREE"]
But stay! A sinewy brown figure starts clambering up the tree. Now he
has reached the top, now grasped the ball with eager hand, and now he
is back among his team-mates on the ground. And listen! What was that?
The second umpire is speaking--he announces that Pago Pago wins the
game.
And which team really won the contest is a moot question to this day;
but if ever you chance to go to the island of Tutuila and desire to
start a Samoan "Donnybrook," just mention, on an occasion when one or
more stalwarts from both of these villages are within hearing of your
voice, the last championship game that was ever played between the Pago
Pago and Fauga-sa teams.