GRIM-VISAGED WAR.
At length the day of conflict arrived. The enemy had been seen
clustering on the heights, two miles distant from Ramáka, the bolebole
or public review of the soldiers had been held, and Hot-Water’s forces
marched forth, led by their chief, redolent of oil, turmeric, and
sandalwood preparations, and his great head of hair glistening like dew
in the sunlight The priest bore before the host a sacred stone, which
was said to have fallen from the sky, and was venerated and feared as a
representative of the God of War. Hot-Water delivered a spirit-stirring
harangue to his troops, in which he bid them roll on like the
multitudinous sea, break on the enemy with the roar and irresistible
force of ocean waves, and drive them to their fastnesses like the
receding tide.
The head-dresses were of a most elaborate and grotesque kind. The
Fijians exhaust their ingenuity in arranging striking coiffures.
Sometimes the hair was black, sometimes white with lime obtained from
the coral, or powdered ashes of the bread-fruit leaf, and sometimes
marked with different shades of red. Many had their hair frizzed out
with a comb till it resembled a wig 8 or 9 inches thick, being of an
equal height at the top, back, and sides. I noticed one man with
whitened hair from which black tufts arose in regular order. Another
appeared to be enveloped in a thick hood. A third presented a wall-like
front a few inches back from his forehead, the carving appearing to have
been done on a solid substance. A fourth wore his hair in corded tassels
behind; the hirsute ornamentation of a fifth took the form of tiers
arranged with geometrical accuracy, while a sixth presented alternate
cones and flat spaces. In short, the variety of styles was infinite, and
these dandies were as vain of the figure they cut as any ball-room
_belle_. There were faces painted in stripes, circles, and spots; faces
like clowns, and faces with only a brilliantly red nose glaring from a
wide surface of jet black. To produce these effects the seeds of the
vermilion tree, charcoal, fungus, and coral lime are used. When the lime
has been washed off, the hair is left a set tawny colour.
Big-Wind must have had under his command altogether 2,000 men, but they
were not so well skilled in war as the redoubtable foes they had to
meet. Hot-Water’s army did not number more than 1,500 effectives, but
they had a tower of strength in their three white men, Turner, Cobb, and
myself, each armed with a brown bess and 12 rounds of ammunition.
As we advanced up hill I thought of the following words which the
warriors chanted the previous evening as a stimulus to the brave, and in
ridicule of renegades:
Where is he our fearless hero,
He who led us forth so bravely?
Fall’n in battle, fall’n in charging,
Fall’n and dragged away to vict’ry.
Vict’ry found in burning oven!
Where is he, the coward turncoat?
He who ran at sight of foeman!
Ran ere ever glanced an arrow!
Ran with glee to tell his clansmen
How he bravely brought the message,
Bravely turned his back on fighting!
The first engagement took place on the wooded slope of a hill.
Big-Wind’s picked men descended boldly from the crest to the attack.
None of the combatants carried either shield or target. With their
athletic figures and polished weapons glinting in the sun, they made an
imposing and formidable appearance. Clubs were always directed against
heads, and spears against the body. The conch-shell sounded the onset,
and soon the wood rang with the clash of these lustily wielded weapons.
Spears armed with the thorns of the sting-ray, were burst into shivers
up to the very grasp, and sharp-edged clubs, sometimes thrown, and
sometimes used like a battle-axe, were occasionally buried fast in the
skulls at which they were aimed. I more than once distinguished the
exquisitely symmetrical form of Big-Wind, his turban of white masi
floating in the wind as he laid about him in the eddy and whirl of the
fight, the markings on his painted skin shining like diamonds embossed
upon a black velvet ground. I also saw Bent-Axe leading another wing of
the attacking party in all the splendour of savage raiment, and with the
habitual look of dissolute audacity on his ill-favoured visage.
The battle raged fiercely and without advantage to either side. A shout
of exultation from the Tivóli people told us that they had been the
first to secure a body, which was immediately tied with sinnet and
carried off on a pole rove through the corpse. The obtaining of the
first offering for the temple, was considered a good omen for Big-Wind.
Believing that the tide of fortune was turning against him, Hot-Water
called upon the white men to bring their foreign weapons into play.
The rattle of musketry was heard in the hills of Viti Lévu for the first
time. The people saw the flash, heard the report, and soon learned that
a terrible messenger of death was among them. Recognising me, they
shouted that the Child of the Hurricane was a god after all, and that it
was useless to attempt to prevail against the enemy for whom he fought.
Bent-Axe, the King’s Lieutenant, was furious when he found his soldiers
deserting him. He reminded them that he was born in the daytime, and was
therefore a great warrior; and, moreover, that he was invulnerable, not
only against white men, but against gods, being the possessor of
god-armour.
It will be as well to explain here that one of the most wonderful elfin
tribes of Cannibal-land is a marine tribe, remarkable for two things—its
population, which defies arithmetic, and the depth of mystery, which, as
the Fijian imagines, inwraps it. Its people are a sort of demigods,
known in many places as “Children of Water,” or “Water Babies.” Some of
the poets and legend-mongers speak of them as the “People of the Plain,”
and “God-soldiers,” _i.e._, soldiers, who, on great occasions, are
specially favoured by the gods, and in their turn are able to help
landsmen in their battles with their own species. They are believed to
be more nearly related to gods than men; and the former, in consequence
of that nearer relationship, have made them war-proof—living
fortifications in fact—against which no weapon whatever can prevail.
From this belief arose numbers of professional men who gave it forth to
the world that they likewise were favoured with this close connexion
with the gods, and had thereby gained possession of the grand secret by
which any hero going out to meet his foe, might be so clothed with
“god-armour,” as to cause arrows to glance aside, clubs to fall
harmlessly, and spears to lose their piercing power.
Turner and Cobb blazed away, and the enemy rapidly melted in presence of
the sulphurous charm. Bent-Axe, however, advanced, club in hand, to the
spot where I stood, perfectly drunk with passion; his heavy brow was
corrugated with anger; his large nostrils were distended, and fairly
smoking; his eyeballs blazed red like a lighted coal when blown upon;
and his foam-covered mouth wore a murderous and contemptuous grin.
I raised my musket, and called on him to surrender.
“When the shell of the giant-oyster shall have perished by reason of
years, still will my hatred of you be hot,” roared the savage.
“The white man,” said I “is merciful. He knows his power, but does not
wish to exercise it.”
“You are like the kaka,”[17] tauntingly responded Bent-Axe, “you only
speak to shout your own name.”
Footnote 17:
The onomatopoetic name for parrot in Fiji.
He swung his massive club aloft to fell me, and I discharged my weapon
at his breast. When the smoke cleared away, the savage was gone, but his
club lay at my feet, and it was stained with blood.
Big-Wind withdrew his forces behind a rampart of brushwood six feet
thick, and his men, with renewed courage, waving long streamers from the
battlements, shouted defiance to the foe. Under the direction of
Hot-Water, a huge fascine of boughs and dried leaves tied together with
sinnet, was constructed. His soldiers rolled it before them in the
complete security of its shelter. When it reached the rampart, a light
was applied. The fascine burst into flames, and in a few minutes the
brushwood fence had disappeared with it. A volley from the white men’s
muskets completed the discomfiture of the enemy.
The fortune of war was all with us. Hot-Water’s troops followed up their
advantage, and a fearful scene of carnage ensued. The women of Ramáka
came out to meet the victorious soldiers on their return, laden with
hopelessly wounded prisoners and dead bodies. Nameless indignities were
put upon the slain, and songs were chanted which will not bear
translating.
In the impromptu triumphal chants, allusion was made to the men who had
most distinguished themselves in the contest. I heard frequent reference
to myself as the slayer of the redoubtable Bent-Axe, and also to the
might of the white man’s matchless arms.