children who were Baptized last night. The parents of the children gave
a most beautiful pig, and the women attended to the cooking, the men
dispersing in many directions each in quest of his own business or
pleasure. I went with a party to Ruosi where we bathed, and got back in
time for the opening of the ovens, and the division of the feast. I said
grace and then each one partook of his or her share of the plentiful
repast, all eating together in the most harmonious fashion, and not as
in old days the sexes keeping religiously apart. This middle wall of
separation has been almost entirely broken down, and family life and
sociability have taken the place of the old seclusion and division. It
was a most glorious night but the people were too tired to dance, and we
all retired early to our houses. I kept busy till very late writing up
arrears of correspondence and reading, and was the last in the village
out of bed.
_Tuesday, August 17th._--The most glorious day from earliest morning
till now at night, the evening one of the most beautiful I ever saw,
when the moon rose it was a most perfect night above and below, the sky
studded with myriads of stars and absolutely cloudless, here everything
hushed in peaceful slumber, except the restless, ever-singing crickets,
whose buzz is continuously kept up by night and day. At the heathen end
of the village there was a sort of Irish wake kept up to-day, but there
was no “tangi” or any ceremony except a pig being killed, and a great
feast being prepared. Formerly, death days were kept with great
strictness, and the day of death and the 100th were observed with great
festivities. I have seen nothing of the kind now for years, and I
fancied the custom had quite died out. It was supposed in old days when
the people were still heathen, that the disembodied spirit, after it
left its earthly tenement, hung about hungry and restless on the thick
creepers in the bush, and on the day of death a great feast was prepared
for it, after which it retired to the place of departed spirits called
Banoi. This same Banoi is near Tasmouri, but I have never seen it. The
idea, I believe, is that when the spirit is at length at rest, its stone
is placed in a certain cave or pit there exists there, and the people
who have seen the place, tell me that certainly there far inland are
smooth seaside stones laid in wonderful regularity, and in old days
supposed to be put there by successive spirits in order as they died.
Until quite recently, no one ventured into this ghostly place, and it
was regarded as eminently sacred. Some day I hope to go there and
examine it for myself.
I cannot find out the rationale of the subsequent death days, but they
seem to have more to do with the living than the dead, and are supposed
to show the departed one that he or she is still kept in faithful and
affectionate memory.
In old days everyone was careful to have one good pig at least, in
readiness for the day of his death, and any others which he might
possess at the time of his departure, his friends were careful to kill
in his honour.
They carefully kept the days, principally the tens, I think, and
religiously observed the 100th, after which remembrance seemed no longer
necessary, but before that, I am afraid, there was a large amount of
selfishness about the death days, and more was thought of the living in
them than of the dead. The people tell me how strictly these days were
kept formerly, they dispensed with their regular ordinary food sometimes
for the whole 100 days, and ate only such roots and fruits as grow wild
in the bush, religiously abstaining from all garden produce until the
full time had expired. Some went even beyond this when a very particular
person died, and for the whole 100 days ate only one kind of root, and
that the most difficult to obtain, strenuously refusing to partake of
food in common with others. I have known a man myself adhere to this
rigid, self-imposed abstention, in the case of the death of a son, and
of a wife, not here however, but at Opa. A man once came into my house
over there, tired and hungry after a long fast and a laborious journey,
but he strictly refused a biscuit or other food which I ventured to
offer him, and when or where he ate I do not know, for the particular
food he had chosen to eat was most rare in the neighbourhood, I doubt
even if it was obtainable at all. Yet no privation or distress would
force him to break his rule, and eat promiscuously until the proper time
had elapsed. In the keeping of their days they are wonderfully accurate,
and you seldom find them wrong in their calculations. Their fingers are
their ready reckoners, and they have to do a great deal more work than
ours in assisting a weak memory, where the use of slate and pencil are
unknown. I very often ask people to count over the names of persons in
the place or neighbourhood, just to see how clever and correct they are
with their numbers. Here the whole ten fingers are used, at Opa only the
left hand, five fingers down being five, the first finger up and the
rest down six, and so on until all are up which makes ten, then two
tens, three tens, up to ten tens or one hundred. In the distribution of
food, too, it is wonderful how accurate they are, and it is very rarely
that any one is left out of the count. Of course, where the science of
numbers is unknown, nature teaches by a more roundabout, but scarcely
less accurate process. For all practical purposes and uses, their
fingers help them a great deal, indeed almost as far as their
requirements go, for their lives are very simple and their ways
uncomplicated. The leaves of a certain palm, however, lends them some
assistance, especially in the distribution of food, and as the person is
seen, or his name thought of, a leaf is broken off, and then the broken
leaves are counted. I have never heard of the toes being used as
assistants, although one might fancy their being of service.
_Wednesday, August 18th._--About midnight as I lay reading in bed, and a
perfect stillness reigned around, we experienced a very sharp shock of
an earthquake. My house shook so uncomfortably, that I really feared it
was coming down, and I had the sort of feeling as of some one trying to
upset it, and I felt as if I must say “Oh! do not, please leave off, you
will have it down.” My neighbour’s fence was shaken so, that I fancied
some considerable damage had been done. The vibration lasted a good long
time, some seconds I should say, after the real shock was over, and I
felt myself, a sort of palpitation for some considerable period. I was
not afraid, but no one can feel an earthquake without some instinctive
dread. Nothing, I think, makes one feel one’s littleness and
helplessness and insecurity more, and there is such a solemnity attached
to it, that you are very thankful when it is fairly over. Man, bird and
beast were roused into action at once, and there was quite an excitement
here for a time. Curiously enough, in the evening there was a very
bright and exceedingly beautiful after-glow, and I remarked to the boys
how like it was to the time when the terrible destruction was caused in
the gulf of Sunda, and I said casually, that I should not be surprised
if we had more earthquakes soon. The natives have a firm idea that they
are the precursors of rain, and certainly this morning we have had a
very heavy downpour. This is the first rain we have had for the whole
month I have been here, and the first day I have been kept to solitary
confinement. Most of the day I have been absolutely alone, and my pen
has been kept very busy writing letters and hymns and songs. With the
latter I have been very successful, and have managed four. One,
particularly successful, goes to the chorus of “Wait till the clouds
roll by,” and is as follows:--
Ge togatoga ririkqa.
Mati ni van ra[¨n]ai,
A la[¨n]i ni rowo na wia,
Tavi dago na tasgoro.
Gana sako na usu maraga,
Gana toura na gabe tar,
Gana tura goro na masi
Gana koko betegag.
Gana unui vagamatera
A le[¨n]ele[¨n]e mas
Gana tuwur, sogon le gete
Toli tasgoro rik ka sem.
of which the translation is:--
Wait a little bit longer,
Wait till the tide is low,
Wait till the wind blow fairer,
And then make the tasgoro.
Then we will take bow and arrow,
Then we will carry our nets,
Then we will stop in the fishes
And gather them properly up.
We will kill them dead with poison,
All and every kind of fish,
We will gather and lay them in baskets,
What a glorious tasgoro!
The _tasgoro_ I have before described. Part of beach enclosed, tabu’d,
and after lapse of time opened again to the public.
This evening we have sung this chorus with grand effect, and high as I
was previously in popular estimation as a poet, I have gone still higher
now. What a little thing wins popularity, how little is a thing so
easily purchased worth the having! One other song goes very prettily and
smoothly to “Home sweet Home,” and is much appreciated. It is, as far as
I could adapt it, the reproduction of the English song into Maewo.
“Dream Faces” supplied me with another very pretty little song, which
runs very well, the theme of which is the “moonlight.” “Our Jack’s come
home to-night,” lent me the music of a fourth song, which is peculiarly
native in expression, and slightly more comic than the two above
mentioned.
The production of this last was received with such peals of laughter,
that for a time confusion and merriment took the place of composure and
perfect gravity. It would lose its charm and half its meaning if I were
to attempt to translate it into English. Here, however, is the Maewo:--
Ta disava qarik Isei ni tau na as?
Eh? Ro[¨n]o lolora va! Ki isei qa ni sawu?
Wa sagoro ta sagoro Ki gida, sem, ta lai ra[¨n]ai!
Ro[¨n]o lolora va! Toli sagoro rik!
Da! ta sagoro da! Ge riri betigag!
Ta sagoro tei rik Ga laia ra[¨n]ai sag!
Kare mawmaw, tei riki vak! Ge wosawosa limamu!
A wula marama! Tolina rik ka sem!
The “Dream Faces” song is as follows:-
Nan ligo asik suri marama, --I’ll make my song about the moonlight,
Tolina rik sem a wula marama, --Charming indeed is the light of the moon,
Osoos ti rasu mera na maran, --Darkness has flown, it is light as the day,
Non eteete ti lita soun na --His brightness chased the night far away.
qo[¨n].
Nan ligo asik suri marama, --I’ll make my song about the moonlight,
A[¨n]eisa tea le isi Tamada, --Some day I ween in our great Father’s land,
Ala na maran vagatewa tau, --There day unending for ever will be,
Qon tigai ala, moa marama, --Night is unknown there, light only endless.
The light called “marama,” is looked upon by natives as the perfection
of light, because it is, I suppose, unaccompanied by the burning heat of
the sun. I therefore use it as illustrating better the idea of heaven’s
light. Maran is the light of day.
_Thursday, August 19th._--The village was hushed in the stillness of
slumber again about midnight, and I was preparing for bed, too, and
kneeling down to say my prayers, when another quite sharp earthquake
shock was felt, and the sensation came upon me very solemnly and
impressively while so engaged. I cannot say why I trembled, but I did,
and it was quite instinctive. However, I went to bed and slept
profoundly. We have had another slight shock of domestic earthquake here
this morning, and Ann, one of our young married women, after rating her
husband, started off for Naruru, and we were quite in a ferment here for
a short time. However, this evening, her parents went for her, and I
have had to give her a scolding. I told her that anger was like a charge
of dynamite, it not only exploded itself, but it produced destructive
effects far and wide, indeed there was no knowing what the extent of its
mischief might be. She seemed penitent, and was utterly ashamed of her
unchristian conduct. I am thankful to say that scenes of domestic
warfare are uncommon here, and, generally speaking, a great deal of
harmony prevails, but of course there are clouds in the most perfect
day, and the smoothest ocean is at times ruffled by the sudden breeze.
Beyond this, our day has been like most other days, except for the
thatching of Peter’s “gamal,” which has brought together a large
concourse of people, and has been the occasion of a great festivity this
evening. Arthur, Patrick and myself walked down to Ruosi in the
afternoon, where we bathed, and returned in the evening. Our evening
duties as usual.
_Friday, August 20th._--Certainly we are blessed with the most glorious
weather. This morning was simply perfect, and one almost wishes one
could keep some of its coolness for the middle of the day, when the heat
is very great.
After school and breakfast this morning, some of the people invited me
to go with them eel catching. As the performance was new to me, I gladly
assented. The scene of the sport lay in the direction of the water fall,
and I took my camera, hoping to get a good view of it.
We followed the course of the stream, and waded through the taro
gardens, and finally found ourselves in the most advantageous position
for a photograph. It ought to be good, after all my efforts to secure
the picture, but I could not get far enough away. While I have been
writing this, since I began the last sentence, an earthquake shock has
shaken the place very perceptibly, and, why I know not, has left a
tremour all over me, which I cannot explain. The picture being shot
off, I hastened back to where the eel catching was going on. The water
was cleverly dammed off above two large pools, and then one pool
“teemed” out with buckets. In the first pool nothing was discovered, and
the next proceeding was to empty the full pool into the now empty one.
This took some time, but it was finally accomplished, and one large eel
was captured, the sole occupant of the pool, and the only sport afforded
after a long day’s work. Disappointment was depicted on all
countenances, and I was rather disgusted too, having expected to see
some sport. I comforted myself with a most glorious bathe in the broad
flowing river, and hastened home to drown my disappointment in a cup of
tea.
After school this evening, I was sitting here alone, when four men came
in, in whispers, and shut the door behind them, and when they had sat
down, they said, still in the lowest accents, “we wish to see your
Eucharistic vessels.” I proceeded to exhibit them, and they seemed quite
awe struck. Miss Patteson would have been pleased to have seen how her
noble gift was valued and appreciated. The exhibition of the beautiful
vessels gave me much food for conversation with these men, and I told
them I hoped the day was not far distant when they would be regularly
used in the Church here, and they themselves be partakers from them of
the Blessed Tokens of Redeeming Love, the bread of the world in mercy
broken, the wine of the soul in mercy shed.
_Saturday, August 21st._--General holiday as usual. Nothing of
particular importance marked the day, except the visit of three nice
fellows from Uta. The British Workman’s Almanac adorns my walls, and
they were particularly struck with the picture of Lord Shaftesbury which
occupies the centre. Curiously, many others have admired this same
picture, why I do not know, except perhaps from its size. I told these
visitors all about the late Earl, of his philantrophy and the goodness
of his life, and I told them too, of the philantrophy and goodness of a
greater than he, “who went about doing, and healing all manner of
diseases and sicknesses among the people.” They asked me if I had heard
the earthquake of late, to which I responded in the affirmative, and
told them of the terrible outburst of volcanic power at Tarawera, and
the fearful and alarming results, and I said there was no knowing but it
might be our turn next, and we ought to try and be prepared for whatever
lay before us. I urged them to fly, while they had the opportunity, to
the Higher Rock, for there we should find shelter and protection until
the tyranny were overpast, and any such visitation would be but to bring
us the quicker to a haven of rest and safety, whither such things never
come. They asked me if I could not spare some regular teacher to come
and live with them, to teach them the wonderful things of God’s law, and
expound more fully to them, the things concerning the Kingdom of God. I
promised them a weekly service, but I could do no more just yet.
_Sunday, August 22nd._--A most glorious Sabbath morning. We had school
before breakfast, both because it was cooler and also on account of the
blue bottle flies, which become very troublesome in the heat of the day,
where people are congregated together. Before our school duties were
over, they became very numerous, and I was not sorry to get back to the
refuge and quiet of my own house. After breakfast we had Morning Prayer,
a very nice service, but not rendered more solemn by the presence, in
crowds, of those disgusting pests, the flies. However, they are an
inevitable worry, from which there seems no chance of escape. After
Prayers I went to the Unduna villages, and talked to the few people I
found there. They were keeping Sunday, they said, i.e. they were doing
no work and were generally idling. I asked why they did not come to
Church as formerly, and they said it was too far. I asked why then did
not they build a school there, and I would be responsible for the
teaching in it. They so far assented as to say that they would see about
it, when they had got through with their yam planting. There is a nice
little population there, and I have always had it on my conscience that
nothing practical or definite had been done for them. Natives do not
care to go to the trouble of a few yards more or less for religion, so I
suppose the alternative is that religion must go to them. One very nice
man called “Vangoro,” was most energetic about the building, in
promising to get it done and helping all he could, he is a leading man
there too, and I hope my desire will be accomplished.
It was very hot coming back, and I was in a liquid state when I got
home. The evening was deliriously cool and fine, and I enjoyed it
outside my house with several of the people.
Evensong was a very nice quiet service, and I preached on the subject of
the Collect (9th Sunday after Trinity), the “spirit to think and do
always such things as were rightful.” I hope I got intelligent
attention. We had some nice singing afterwards, and the people went very
quietly home.
_Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday._--Blank days.
On Monday there were great festivities here, and a dance till morning. I
began to feel ill in the evening, and spent a most wretched night. On
Tuesday I was unwell all day, and could do nothing. On Wednesday I was
fearfully ill all day with a severe attack of fever and ague, and lay
down under all the wraps I could secure, until the hot fit came on with
a very severe headache. In the evening the boys surprised me by saying
there was a white man outside, and I was glad to welcome Mr. Blackburne,
Government agent of the Sybil, from Queensland. The vessel anchored at
the watering place, and the boys told him “Missionary he plenty sick.”
He therefore very kindly came up and spent the night with me. He has
just left me now, and I have not strength to go with him to the ship.
However, I am better to-day, and hope after a big dose of Quinine he has
given me, that I shall be better.
_Tuesday, August 31st._--I have wasted a whole week, and only to-day
feel equal to doing anything or going anywhere. To-day for the first
time for a week, I have moved out of the village boundaries, and have
been to the river with the boys and bathed.
It has been a sickly time here all together, and many besides myself
have been laid by. It is bearably pleasant to be pent up day by day
within doors when feeling well, but almost unbearably so when one feels
ill and out of sorts. However, I trust it is all over now, please God,
and I must endeavour to make up for lost time. Several of the people,
Arthur included, have been quite ill through eating a certain eel,
caught somewhere in the sea and very poisonous. They all detected the
burning, stinging sensation on their lips, tongue and palate as soon as
they had eaten it, but fancied it was the taro. From that time till the
end of the week, they have been all laid up, and one or two have been
very bad indeed. They have experienced not only burning, sharp pains
internally, and pricking, poignant stabbing pains in the palms of the
hands and soles of the feet, but have suffered a great deal also from
strong and utter prostration with an abhorrent distaste for food.
Several others were warned betimes from partaking, or the poisoning
might have been more general. This particular eel was caught by a
heathen on a Sunday, and therefore its peculiarly deleterious and
poisonous qualities have been traced by the more virtuous to that fact,
of which no cognizance was taken before it was cooked and eaten, nor
would have been afterwards, but for its effects. The really admitted
fact, however, I believe, is that certain fish caught at certain parts
of the beach at particular seasons of the year, have all a more or less
poisonous effect on those who eat them. The people themselves say it is
the feed they find there which makes them poisonous, but it may be
inherent in the nature of the particular fish. I remember on many
occasions on board the _Southern Cross_, the natives looking askance at
some very tempting looking fish which had been caught, and pronouncing
them dangerous to eat. On one very memorable occasion, when dinner was
over, one of the senior boys being cook, and one of the most poisonous
of fish having been served and partaken of by all, this youth without a
change of feature saying to some remark that was passed, “Oh! Yes, we
die in our country if we eat that fish.” This was reassuring after what
had passed, and we eyed one another with wistful and anxious faces,
thinking whether or not perchance our end may have been hastened by our
wilful inadvertence in thus partaking of deadly poison. But we neither
swelled, nor fell down dead, and felt no ill effects. Many a time, too,
since, I have eaten the same fish with the like happy and successful
result. This particular kind of eel, however, has played the same _post
mortem_ tricks before, and taken his revenge for wrongs received before
going into the oven. The people tell me that those who have eaten, have
become like mummies, their hair and skin have changed to a ghastly
leaden hue, and have fallen off like a snake’s skin. How far this is
true or fable, I know not, but it may be partially credible. Nothing of
the sort has happened fortunately, at this present crisis, and the
sufferers are about again.
A dull, dark evening ushered in a blustery, rough night, and the coughs
and sneezings and other demonstrative sounds peculiar to people who do
not carry pocket handkerchiefs, bore testimony to the fact of an
epidemic catarrh, contracted during a very inclement week. Like the
Norfolk Islanders, they look for the source of such things in the world
without, and accuse my friend Mr. Blackburne of having brought it here,
all the way from Queensland. In what part of his luggage he secreted so
desirable a communication I know not, but they are decidedly of opinion
that he it was who ‘gave them’ the cold, and they were unwise enough to
‘catch it’ from him. He ‘had’ the cold, they said, when he came here,
and certainly said I, I believe he took it away again. However, as colds
are catching, I suppose they must be left content with their belief, and
to ‘bless him,’ I hope, every time they sneeze.
_Wednesday, September 1st._--Another full month past and gone, and
leaving I fear, but a poor memory of much good done behind it. The days
here certainly fly past one after another in rapid flight, and the very
monotony of existence speeds their departure. One day is so like another
that it passes unmarkedly by, and one finds oneself, all at once, at the
end of the week, and is brought to final consciousness of the rapid
rotation of time’s wheels at the end of the month. What has been done in
the month? I fear there is but a poor record. God grant that I myself
may have, by His Grace, made one step forward, and have been
instrumental in leading others also onward to a higher and better life,
and to that final epoch where the flight of time is unmarked by days and
weeks and months and years, for time itself will be swallowed up in
eternity.