'It is now 4.30 P.M., calm and hot. Such a tiger-lily on my table,

and the pretty delicate achimenes, and the stephanotis climbing up the

verandah, and a bignonia by its side, with honeysuckle all over the

steps, and jessamine all over the two water-tanks at the angle of the

verandah. The Melanesians have, I think, twenty-nine flower gardens, and

they bring the flowers, &c.--lots of flowers, and the oleanders are a

sight! Some azaleas are doing well, verbenas, hibiscus of all kinds.

Roses and, alas! clove carnations, and stocks, and many of the dear old

cottage things won't grow well. Scarlet passion flowers and splendid

Japanese lilies of perfect white or pink or spotted. The golden one I

have not yet dared to buy. They are most beautiful. I like both the

red and the yellow tritoma; we have both. But I don't think we have the

perfume of the English flowers, and I miss the clover and buttercup. And

what would I give for an old-fashioned cabbage rose, as big as a saucer,

and for fresh violets, which grow here but have little scent, and lilies

of the valley! Still more, fancy seeing a Devonshire bank in spring,

with primroses and daisies, or meadows with cowslip and clover and

buttercups, and hearing thrushes and blackbirds and larks and cuckoos,

and seeing trout rise to the flies on the water! There is much

exaggeration in second-rate books about tropical vegetation. You

are really much better off than we are. No trees equal English oaks,

beeches, and elms, and chestnuts; and with very little expense and

some care, you have any flowers you like, growing out of doors or in a

greenhouse. You can make a warmer climate, and we can't a colder one.

But we have plenty to look at for all that. There, what a nice hour I

have spent in chatting with you!'

This same dreamy kind of 'chat,' full of the past, and of quiet

meditation over the present, reminding one of Bunyan's Pilgrims in the

Land of Beulah, continues at intervals through the sheets written while

waiting for the 'Southern Cross.' Here is a note (March 14) of the

teaching:--

'I am working at the Miracles with the second set, and I am able to

venture upon serious questions, viz. the connection between sin and

physical infirmity or sickness, the Demoniacs, the power of working

miracles as essential to the Second Adam, in whom the prerogative of the

Man (the ideal man according to the idea of his original condition) was

restored. Then we go pretty closely into detail on each miracle, and try

to work away till we reach a general principle or law.

'With another class I am making a kind of Commentary on St. Luke. With a

third, trying to draw out in full the meaning of the Lord's Prayer.

With a fourth, Old Testament history. It is often very interesting; but,

apart from all sham, I am a very poor teacher. I can discourse, or talk

with equals, but I can't teach. So I don't do justice to these or any

other pupils I may chance to have. But they learn something among us

all.'

He speaks of himself as being remarkably well and free from the

discomforts of illness during the months of March and April: and these

letters show perfect peace and serenity of spirit; but his silence and

inadequacy for 'small talk' were felt like depression or melancholy by

some of his white companions, and he always seemed to feel it difficult

to rouse himself. To sit and study his Hebrew Isaiah with Delitzsch's

comment was his chief pleasure; and on his birthday, April 1, Easter

Eve, and the ensuing holy days, he read over all his Father's letters

to him, and dwelt, in the remarks to his sisters, upon their wisdom and

tenderness.

Mr. Codrington says: 'Before starting on the voyage he had confirmed

some candidates in the Church in town: on which occasion he seemed to

rouse himself with difficulty for the walk, and would go by himself;

but he was roused again by the service, and gave a spirited and eloquent

address, and came back, after a hearty meal and lively conversation,

much refreshed in mind and body. This was on Palm Sunday. On Easter

Day he held his last confirmation of three girls and two Solomon Island

boys.

Then came the 'Southern Cross,' bringing with her from New Zealand a box

with numerous books and other treasures, the pillow that the old Bishop

of Exeter was leaning on when he died; a photograph, from the Bishop

of Salisbury, of his Cathedral, and among the gifts for the younger

Melanesians, a large Noah's ark, which elicited great shouts of delight.

'Well! [after mentioning the articles in order] all these things, and

still more the thought of the pains taken and the many loving feelings

engaged in getting them together, will help me much during the coming

months. All the little unexpected things are so many little signs of the

care and love you always have for me, and that is more than their own

value, after all. I always feel it solemn to go off on these voyages.

We have had such mercies. Fisher is doing quite well, getting about

on crutches; and that is the only hospital case we have had during the

whole summer.'

Then follows:--

'April 27th.--We start in a few hours (D.V.). The weather is better.

You have my thoughts and hopes and prayers. I am really pretty well: and

though often distressed by the thought of past sins and present ones,

yet I have a firm trust in God's mercy through Christ, and a reasonable

hope that the Holy Spirit is guiding and influencing me. What more can I

say to make you think contentedly and cheerfully about me? God bless you

all!'

So the last voyage was begun. The plan was much the same as usual. On

the way to Mota, the Bishop landed on Whitsuntide Island, and there was

told that what the people called a 'thief ship' had carried off some of

their people. Star Island was found nearly depopulated. On May 16,

the Bishop, with Mr. Bice and their scholars, landed at Mota, and the

'Southern Cross' went on with Mr. Brooke to Florida, where he found that

the 'Snatch-snatch' vessels, as they were there called, had carried off

fifty men. They had gone on board to trade, but were instantly clapped

under hatches, while tobacco and a hatchet were thrown to their friends

in the canoe. Some canoes had been upset by a noose from the vessel,

then a gun was fired, and while the natives tried to swim away, a boat

was lowered, which picked up the swimmers, and carried them off. One man

named Lave, who jumped overboard and escaped, had had two fingers held

up to him, which he supposed to mean two months, but which did mean two

years.

It was plain that enticing having failed, violence was being resorted

to; and Mr. Brooke was left to an anxious sojourn, while Mr. Atkin

returned to Mota on his way to his own special charge at Bauro. He says,

on June 9:--

'The Bishop had just come back from a week's journeying with William in

his boat. They had been to Santa Maria, Vanua Lava, and Saddle Island;

the weather was bad, but the Bishop, although he is tired, does not

think he is any the worse for his knocking about. He is not at all well;

he is in low spirits, and has lost almost all his energy. He said, while

talking about the deportation of islanders to Fiji, that he didn't know

what was to be done; all this time had been spent in preparing teachers

qualified to teach their own people, but now when the teachers were

provided, all the people were taken away. The extent to which the

carrying off of the natives has gone is startling. It certainly is time

for us to think what is to be done next. I do not think that it is an

exaggerated estimate, others would say it is under the mark, that one

half the population of the Banks Islands over ten years of age have been

taken away. I am trying not to expect anything about the Solomon Islands

before we are there, but we have heard that several vessels have

cargoes from there. If the people have escaped a little longer for their

wildness, it will not be for long.

'The Bishop still remained at Mota, while I went back to the Solomon

Islanders. The cliffs of Mota, and perhaps the intelligence of the

people, had comparatively protected it, though Port Patteson had become

a station of the "labour ships." The village of Kohimarama was not a

disappointment.'

Bishop Patteson proceeds:--

'Things are very different. I think that we may, without danger, baptize

a great many infants and quite young children--so many parents are

actually seeking Christian teaching themselves, or willing to give

their children to be taught. I think that some adults, married men, may

possibly be baptized. I should think that not less than forty or fifty

are daily being taught twice a day, as a distinct set of Catechumens.

Besides this, some of the women seem to be in earnest.

'About two hours and a half are spent daily by me with about

twenty-three grown-up men. They come, too, at all hours, in small

parties, two or three, to tell their thoughts and feelings, how they are

beginning to pray, what they say, what they wish and hope, &c.

'There is more indication than I ever saw here before of a "movement,"

a distinct advance, towards Christianity. The distinction between

passively listening to our teaching, and accepting it as God's Word

and acting upon it, seems to be clearly felt. I speak strongly and

habitually about the necessity of baptism. "He that believeth, and is

baptized" &c. Independently of the doctrinal truth about baptism,

the call to the heathen man to take some step, to enter into some

engagement, to ally himself with a body of Christian believers by some

distinct act of his own, needing careful preparation, &c., has a meaning

and a value incalculably great.

'"Yes, JESUS is to us all a source of pardon, light, and life, all these

treasures are in Him. But he distributes these gifts by His Spirit in

His appointed ways. You can't understand or receive the Gospel with a

heart clinging to your old ways. And you can't remake your hearts. He

must do it, and this is His way of doing it. You must be born again. You

must be made new men."

'But why write all this, which is so commonplace?

'I feel more than ever the need of very simple, very short services for

ignorant Catechumens.

'They used to throng our morning and evening prayer, perhaps 130 being

present, for about that number attend our daily school; but they could

not understand one sentence in ten of the Common Prayer-book. And it is

bad for people to accustom themselves to a "formal" service. So I have

stopped that. We baptized people have our regular service and at the end

of my school, held in the dark, 7-8.30 P.M., in the verandah, we kneel

down, and I pray extempore, touching the points which have formed the

lesson.

'I don't like teaching these adults who can't read a form of private

prayer. I try to make them understand that to wish earnestly is to pray;

that they must put what they wish for clearly before their own minds,

and then pray to God for it, through Christ. But I must try to supply

progressive lessons for the Catechumens and others, with short prayers

to be read by the teacher at the end (and beginning, too, perhaps) of

the lesson. Much must depend on the individual teacher's unction and

force.

'Well, I hope and trust to be able to tell you two months hence of some

of these people being baptized. Only three adults have been baptized

here on the island, and all three were dying.

'It is very comforting to think that all of us have been engaged in this

Mota work, Dudley, and Mr. Pritt, and Mr. Kerr, too, and all our present

staff have had much to do with it. Especially I think now of three young

men, all married, who came to me lately, saying, "All these years (an

interval of six or seven years) we have been thinking now and then about

what we heard years ago, when we were with you in New Zealand for a few

months." They are now thoroughly in earnest, as far as I can judge, and

their wives, as I hope, move along with them. How one old set must have

influenced them a long time ago. Bice, who speaks Mota very well, was

very energetic during his fortnight here. He is now gone on with Mr.

Brooke and Mr. Atkin that he may see the work in the Solomon Isles. I

meant to go; but there seemed to be a special reason why I should stay

here just now, vessels seeking labourers for Fiji and Queensland are

very frequently calling at these islands.

'Mr. Thurston, late Acting Consul at Fiji, was with me the day before

yesterday. He has taken a very proper view of this labour question;

and he assures me that the great majority of the Fiji planters are very

anxious that there should be no kidnapping, no unfair treatment of the

islanders. I have engaged to go to Fiji (D.V.) at the end of my island

work, i.e., on my return to Norfolk Island, probably about the end of

September. I shall go there in the "Southern Cross," send her on to her

summer quarters in New Zealand, and get from Fiji to New Zealand, after

six or eight weeks in Fiji, in some vessel or other. There are about

4,000 or 5,000 white people in Fiji, mostly Church of England people,

but (as I suppose) not very clearly understanding what is really meant

by that designation. It is assumed that I am to act as their Bishop; and

I ought to have been there before. But really a competent man might work

these islands into a Bishopric before long.

'We must try to follow these islanders into Fiji or Queensland. But how

to do it? On a plantation of, say, one hundred labourers, you may find

natives of eight or ten islands. How can we supply teachers at the rate

of one for every fifteen or twenty people? And there are some 6,000 or

7,000 islanders already on the Fiji plantations, and I suppose as many

in Queensland.

'Some one knowing several languages, and continually itinerating from

one plantation to another, might do something; but I don't think a

native clergyman could do that. He must move about among white people

continually in the boats, &c. I ought to do it; but I think my day has

gone by for that kind of thing.

'I hope to judge of all this by-and-by. It might end in my dividing

my year into Melanesian work as of old, and Melanesian work in Fiji,

combined with the attempt to organise the white Church of England

community, and only a month or two's work in Norfolk Island. To do this

I must be in pretty good health. I may soon find out the limit of my

powers of work, and then confine myself to whatever I find I can do with

some degree of usefulness. We ought to make no attempt to proselytise

among the Fiji natives, who have been evangelised by the Wesleyans. But

there is work among our Western Pacific imported islanders and the white

people.

'Norfolk Island could be quite well managed without me. Mr. Codrington

could take that entirely into his own hands. I might spend a month or

two there, and confirm Melanesians and Norfolk Islanders, and quietly

fall into a less responsible position and be a moveable clergyman in

Fiji or anywhere else, as long as my strength lasts.

'Norfolk Island certainly was rather my resting-place. But I think I

am becoming more and more indifferent to that kind of thing. A tropical

climate suits me, and Fiji is healthy--no ague. Dysentery is the chief

trouble there. These are notions, flying thoughts, most likely never to

be fully realised. Indeed, who can say what may befall me?'

Never to be fully realised! No. He, who in broken health so freely and

simply sacrificed in will his cherished nook of rest on earth for a life

so trying and distasteful, was very near the 'Rest that remaineth for

the people of God.'

On June 26, the first public baptism in Mota took place, of one man, the

Bishop and Sarawia in surplices in front of their verandah, the people

standing round; but unfortunately it was a very wet day, and the rush of

rain drowned the voices, as the Bishop made his convert Wilgan renounce

individually and by name individual evil fashions of heathenism, just as

St. Boniface made the Germans forsake Thor and Odin by name. There were

twenty-five more nearly ready, and a coral-lime building was finished,

'like a cob wall, only white plaster instead of red mud,' says the

Devonshire man. It was the first Church of Mota, again reminding us of

the many 'white churches' of our ancestors; and on the 25th of June at

7 A.M., the first Holy Eucharist was celebrated there. It is also

the place of private prayer for the Christians and Catechumens of

Kohimarama.

The weather was exceedingly bad, drenching rain continually, yet the

Bishop continued unusually well. His heart might well be cheered, when,

on that Sunday evening in the dark, he was thus accosted:--

'I have for days been watching for a chance of speaking to you alone!

Always so many people about you. My heart is so full, so hot every word

goes into it, deep deep. The old life seems a dream. Everything seems to

be new. When a month ago I followed you out of the Said Goro, you said

that if I wanted to know the meaning and power of this teaching, I must

pray! And I tried to pray, and it becomes easier as every day I pray as

I go about, and in the morning and evening; and I don't know how to pray

as I ought, but my heart is light, and I know it's all true, and my mind

is made up, and I have been wanting to tell you, and so is Sogoivnowut,

and we four talk together, and all want to be baptized.'

This man had spent one season at St. John's, seven years before; but on

his return home had gone back to the ordinary island life, until at last

the good seed was beginning to take root.

The next Sunday, the 2nd of July, ninety-seven children were baptized,

at four villages, chosen as centres to which the adjacent ones could

bring their children. It was again a wet day, but the rain held up at

the first two places. The people stood or sat in a great half-circle,

from which the eldest children, four or five years old, walked out in a

most orderly manner, the lesser ones were carried up by their parents,

and out of the whole ninety-seven only four cried! The people all

behaved admirably, and made not a sound. At the last two places there

was a deluge of rain; but as sickness prevailed in them, it was not

thought well to defer the Baptism.

'It was a day full of thankful and anxious feelings. I was too tired,

and too much concerned with details of arrangements, new names, &c., to

feel the more contemplative devotional part of the whole day's services

till the evening. Then, for I could not sleep for some hours, it came on

me; and I thought of the old times too, the dear Bishop's early visits,

my own fourteen years' acquaintance with this place, the care taken

by many friends, past and present members of the Mission. The Sunday

Collects as we call them, St. Michael's, All Saints', Saint Simon and

St. Jude's calmed me, and my Sunday prayer, (that beautiful prayer in

the Ordination of Priests, 'Almighty God and Heavenly Father,' slightly

altered) was very full of meaning. So, thank God, one great step has

been taken, a great responsibility indeed, but I trust not rashly

undertaken.'

On July 4 the 'Southern Cross' returned, and the cruise among the New

Hebrides was commenced. Mr. Bice was left to make a fortnight's visit at

Leper's Island; and the Bishop, going on to Mai, found only three men on

the beach, where there used to be hundreds, and was advised not to go to

Tariko, as there had been fighting.

At Ambrym there was a schooner with Mr. Thurston on board, and

fifty-five natives for Fiji. On the north coast was the 'Isabella,'

with twenty-five for Queensland. The master gave Captain Jacob his

credentials to show to the Bishop, and said the Bishop might come on

board and talk to the people, so as to be convinced they came willingly,

but weighed anchor immediately after, and gave no opportunity; and one

man who stood on the rail calling out 'Pishopa, Pishopa,' was dragged

back.

Mr. Bice was picked up again on the 17th, having been unmolested during

his visit; but two of the 'Lepers,' who had been at Espiritu Santo, had

brought back a fearful story that a small two-masted vessel had there

been mastered by the natives, and the crew killed and eaten in revenge

for the slaughter of some men of their own by another ship's company

some time back.

On the voyage he wrote to the Bishop of Lichfield:--

'Off Tariko. Sloop: July 8, 1871.

'My dear Bishop,--Towards the end of April I left Norfolk Island, and

after a six days' passage reached Mota. I called at Ambrym (dropping

three boys) at three places; at Whitsuntide; at Leper's Island, dropping

seven boys; Aurora, two places; Santa Maria, where I left B----, and

so to Mota on the day before Ascension Day, and sent the vessel back at

once to Norfolk Island for the Solomon Island scholars. All our Aroa

and Matlavo party wished to spend Ascension Day with us; and after Holy

Communion they went across with Commodore William Pasvorang in a good

whale boat, which I brought down on the deck of the schooner, and which

Willy looks after at Aroa. We want it for keeping up a visitation of the

group.

'Bice, ordained Priest last Christmas, was with me. We found George and

all well, George very steady and much respected. Charles Woleg, Benjamin

Vassil and James Neropa, all going on well. The wives have done less

than I hoped; true, they all had children to look after, yet they might

have done more with the women. [Then as before about the movement.]

'After a week I went off in the boat, leaving Bice at Kohimarama,

the Mota station. I went to B---- first at the north-east part of the

island; back to Tarasagi (north-east point); sailed round to Lakona, our

old Cock Sparrow Point, where B---- and I selected one or two boys to

stay with him at Tarasagi. Thence we sailed to Avreas Bay, the great bay

of Vanua Lava, B---- going back to Tarasagi by land. Heavy sea and rain;

reached land in the dark 8 P.M., thankful to be safe on shore.

'On to Aroa, where I spent two days; Willie and Edwin doing what they

can. Twenty children at school; but the island is almost depopulated,

some seven hundred gone to Brisbane and Fiji. I did not go to

Uvaparapara; the weather was bad, I was not well, and I expected the

"Southern Cross" from Norfolk Island. Next day, after just a week's

trip in the boat, I got to Mota; and the next day the "Southern

Cross" arrived with Joe Atkin and Brooke and some twenty-four Solomon

Islanders, many of them pressing to stay at Norfolk Island, where about

eighty scholars in all are under the charge of Codrington, Palmer, and

Jackson.

'I sent Bice on in the "Southern Cross," as he ought to see something of

his brethren's work in the north and west. I had just a month at Mota,

very interesting.

'I hope to spend three weeks more at Mota, if this New Hebrides trip

is safely accomplished, and to baptize the rest of the children, and

probably some ten or fifteen adults. All seem thoroughly in earnest.

Some of the first scholars, who for years have seemed indifferent, are

now among my class of thirty-three adults. It would be too long a story

to tell you of their frequent private conversations, their stories,

their private prayers, their expressions of earnest thankfulness that

they are being led into the light.

'Some of the women, wives of the men, are hopeful. George's old mother

said to me, "My boys are gone; George, Woleg, Wogale--Lehna died a

Christian; Wowetaraka (the first-born) is going. I must follow. I listen

to it all, and believe it all. When you think fit, I must join you,"

i.e. be baptized.

'It is very comforting that all the old party from the beginning are

directly (of course indirectly also) connected with this movement.

Some of those most in earnest now came under the influence of the early

workers, Dudley, Mr. Pritt, &c.

'We need this comfort.

'From Mota some thirty or more have gone or been taken away, but the

other islands are almost depopulated. Mr. Thurston, late Acting Consul

in Fiji, was at Mota the other day seeking labourers. He says that about

3,000 natives from Tanna and Uvaparapara are now in Fiji, and Queensland

has almost as many.

'He admits that much kidnapping goes on. He, with all his advantages of

personal acquaintance with the people and with native interpreters

on board, could only get about thirty. Another, Captain Weston, a

respectable man who would not kidnap, cruised for some weeks, and left

for Fiji without a single native on board. How then do others obtain

seventy or one hundred more?

'But the majority of the Fiji settlers, I am assured, do not like these

kidnapping practices, and would prefer some honest way of obtaining men.

Indeed, many natives go voluntarily.

'In the Solomon Isles a steamer has been at Savo and other places,

trying to get men.

'Three or four of these vessels called at Mota while I was there. On one

day three were in sight. They told me they were shot at at Whitsuntide,

Sta. Maria, Vanua Lava, &c. And, indeed, I am obliged to be very

careful, more so than at any time; and here, in the North Hebrides, I

never know what may happen, though of course in many places they know

me.

'We are now at our maximum point of dispersion: Brooke at Anudha, J.

Atkin at or near San Cristoval, Gr. Sarawia at Mota, B---- at Santa

Maria, Bice at Leper's Island, Codrington at Norfolk Island, I on board

"Southern Cross."

'Leper's Island is very pleasant; I longed to stay there. All the people

wanting to come with us, and already discriminating between us and the

other white visitors, who seem to have had little or no success there.

'July 21st.--At anchor, Lakona, west side of Santa Maria. Pleasant to

be quietly at anchor on our old "shooting ground." We anchored for a day

and a night at Ambrym, near the east point, very safe and comfortable

place. Nine lads from five villages are on board. I bought about three

and a half tons of yams there. Anchored again at the end of Whitsuntide,

where I am thankful to say we have at last received two lads, one a

very pleasant-looking fellow. That sad year of the dysentery, 1862, when

Tanau died and Tarivai was so ill, two out of only three scholars from

the island, made them always unwilling to give up lads.

'Next day at Leper's Island. Anchored a night off Wehurigi, the east end

of the high land, the centre part of the island.

'Bice was quite feted by the people. We brought away three old and

twelve new scholars, refusing the unpromising old scholars. There is, I

hope, a sufficient opening now at Ambrym and Leper's Island to justify

my assigning these islands to Jackson and Bice respectively.

'Our plan now is to take very few people indeed from the Banks Islands

to Norfolk Island, as they have a permanent school and resident

clergyman at Mota. The lads who may turn out clever and competent

teachers are taken to Norfolk Island, none others.

'We must take our large parties from islands where there is as yet no

permanent teacher: Ambrym, Leper's Island, the Solomon Islands.

'Meanwhile the traders are infesting these islands, as Captain Jacobs

says, "like mosquitoes." Three vessels anchored at Mai during the day

I was there. Three different vessels were at Ambrym. To-day I saw four,

three anchored together near the north-east side of Santa Maria. B----

saw six yesterday.

'The people now refuse to go in them, they are much exasperated at their

people being kept away so long. Sad scenes are occurring. Several white

men have been killed, boats' crews cut off, vessels wrecked.

'We shall hear more of such doings; and really I can't blame the

islanders. They are perfectly friendly to friends; though there is much

suspicion shown even towards us, where we are not well known.

'As far as I can speak of my own plans, I hope to stay at Mota for a

time, till the "Southern Cross" returns from Norfolk Island; then go to

the Solomon Islands; return by way of Santa Cruz and probably Tikopia,

to Mota; thence to Norfolk Island; thence probably to New Zealand, to

take the steamer for Fiji. We have no chart on board of Fiji; and I

don't think it right to run the risk of getting somehow to Levuka with

only the general chart of the South Pacific, so I must go, as I think,

to New Zealand, and either take the steamer or procure charts, and

perhaps take Mr. Tilly as pilot. I don't like it; it will be very cold;

but then I shall (D.V.) see our dear Taurarua friends, the good Bishop

and others, and get advice about my Fiji movements. The Church of

England folk there regard me as their Bishop, I understand; and the

Bishops of Sydney and Melbourne assume this to be the fitting course. A

really able energetic man might do much there, and, in five years, would

be Bishop of Levuka.

'This is all of Melanesia and myself; but you will like to have this

scrawl read to you.

'How I think of you as I cruise about the old familiar places, and think

that you would like to have another trip, and see the old scenes with

here and there, thank God, some little changes for the better. Best

love, my dear dear Bishop, to Mrs. Selwyn, William and John.

'Your very affectionate

'J. C. PATTESON.'

About forty, old scholars and new, had been collected and brought back

to Mota; where, after landing the Bishop, Captain Jacobs sailed back

to Norfolk Island, carrying with him the last letters that were to be

received and read as from a living man. All that follow only came in

after the telegram which announced that the hand that had written them

was resting beneath the Pacific waters. But this was not until it had

been granted to him to gather in his harvest in Mota, as will be seen:--

'Mota: July 31, 1871.

'My dearest Sisters,--You will be glad to know that on my return hither

after three weeks' absence, I found no diminution of strong earnest

feeling among the people. George Sarawia had, indeed, been unable to do

very much in the way of teaching 60 or 90 men and women, but he had done

his best, and the 100 younger people were going on with their schooling

regularly. I at once told the people that those who wished to be

baptized must let me know; and out of some 30 or 40 who are all, I

think, in earnest, 15, and some few women are to be baptized next

Sunday. These will be the first grown-up people, save John Wilgan,

baptized in Mota, except a few when in an almost dying state. They think

and speak much of the fact that so many of their children have been

baptized, they wish to belong to the same set. But I believe them all

to be fairly well instructed in the great elementary truths. They can't

read; all the teaching is oral, no objection in my eyes. It may be

dangerous to admit it, but I am convinced that all that we can do is to

elevate some few of the most intelligent islanders well, so that they

can teach others, and be content with careful oral teaching for the

rest. How few persons even among ourselves know how to use a book! And

these poor fellows, for I can only except a percentage of our scholars,

have not so completely mastered the mechanical difficulty of reading as

to leave their minds free for examination of the meaning and sense of

what they read. I don't undervalue a good education, as you know. But

I feel that but few of these islanders can ever be book-learned; and

I would sooner see them content to be taught plain truths by qualified

persons than puzzling themselves to no purpose by the doubtful use of

their little learning. You know that I don't want to act the Romish

Priest amongst them. I don't want to domineer at all. And I do teach

reading and writing to all who come into our regular school, and I make

them read passages to verify my teaching. At the same time, I feel that

the Protestant complaint of "shutting up the Bible from the laity," is

the complaint of educated persons, able to read, think, and reflect.

'The main difficulty is, of course, to secure a supply of really

competent teachers. George, Edward, Henry, Robert, and some three or

four others are trustworthy. I comfort myself by thinking that a great

many of the mediaeval Clergy certainly did not know as much nor teach as

well.

'Yesterday I baptized 41 more children and infants on again an

unpropitious day. I was obliged to leave 42 to be baptized at some

future time. The rain poured down. The people will bring them over

to-morrow. The whole number of infants and children will amount to 230

or more, of adults to perhaps 25 or 30. You will pray earnestly for

them that they may lead the rest of their lives "according to this

beginning."

'There is much talk, something more than talk, I think, about putting up

a large church-house here, on this side of the island (north-west side)

and of a school-house, for church also, on the south-east side.

'We have all heavy coughs and colds; and I have had two or three very

disturbed nights, owing to the illness of one of the many babies. The

little thing howls all night.

'All our means of housing people are exhausted. People flock here for

the sake of being taught. Four new houses have been built, three are

being built. We shall have a large Christian village here soon, I hope

and trust. At present every place is crammed, and 25 or 30 sleep on the

verandah. The little cooking house holds somehow or other about 24 boys;

they pack close, not being burdened with clothes and four-posters. I

sleep on a table, people under and around it. I am very well, barring

this heavy cold and almost total loss of voice for a few hours in the

morning and evening.

'August 1st.--Very tired 7 A.M., Prayers 7.20-8.20, school 8.20-10;

baptized 55 infants and young children. Now it is past 1; a boisterous

day, though as yet no rain. I had a cup of cocoa at 6.30, and at 10.30

a plate of rice and a couple of eggs, nice clean fare. The weather is

against me, so cold, wet, and so boisterous. I got a good night though,

for I sent Mrs. Rhoda and her squalling baby to another house, and so

slept quietly.

'I am sorry that teaching is so irksome to me. I am, in a sense, at it

all day. But there is so much to be done, and the people, worthy souls,

have no idea that one can ever be tired. After I was laid down on my

table, with my air-pillow under my head and my plaid over me, I woke up

from a doze to find the worthy Tanoagnene sitting with his face towards

me, waiting for a talk about the rather comprehensive subject of

Baptism.

'And at all odd times I ought to be teaching George and others how to

teach, the hardest work of all. I think what a life a real pedagogue

must have of it. There is so much variety with me, so much change and

holiday, and so much that has its special interest.

'The "Southern Cross" has been gone a week. I hope they have not this

kind of weather. If they have, they are getting a good knocking about,

and they number about 55 on board.

'August 6th.--To-day there is no rain, for the first time for weeks. It

blew a heavy gale all night, and had done so with heavy rain for some

days before.

'At 8 A.M. to-day I baptized 14 grown men, one an old bald man, and

another with a son of sixteen or so, five women and six lads, taught

entirely in George's school. Afterwards, at a different service, 7

infants and little children were baptized. 238 + 5 who have died have

now been baptized since the beginning of July. To-day's service was very

comforting. I pray and trust that these grown-up men and women may be

kept steadfast to their profession. It is a great blessing that I could

think it right to take this step. You will, I know, pray for them; their

position is necessarily a difficult one.

'It is 2 P.M., and I feel tired: the crowds are gone, though little

fellows are as usual sitting all round one. I tell them I can't talk;

I must sit quietly, with Charlotte Yonge's "Pupils of St. John the

Divine." Dear me, what advantage young folks have nowadays, though

indeed the dangers of these times far outweigh those of our young days.

'I suppose Lightfoot's "Commentaries" hardly come in your way. They are

critical and learned on the Greek of St. Paul's Epistles. But there are

dissertations which may be read by the English reader. He seems to me to

be a very valuable man, well fitted by his learning, and moderation, and

impartiality, and uncontroversial temper to do much good. His sympathies

with the modern school of thought are, I fancy, beyond me.

'There is no doubt that Matthew Arnold says much that is true of the

narrowness, bigotry, and jealous un-Christian temper of Puritanism; and

I suppose no one doubts that they do misrepresent the true doctrine of

Christianity, both by their exclusive devotion to one side only of the

teaching of the Bible, and by their misconception of their own favourite

portions of Scripture. The doctrine of the Atonement was never in

ancient times, I believe, drawn out in the form in which Luther, Calvin,

Wesley, and others have lately stated it.

'The fact of the Atonement through the Death of Christ was always

clearly stated; the manner, the "why," the "how" man's Redemption and

Reconciliation to God is thus brought about, was not taught, if at all,

after the Protestant fashion.

'Oxenham's "History of the Catholic Doctrine of the Atonement" is a

fairly-written statement of what was formerly held and taught. Such

words as "substitution," "satisfaction," with all the ideas introduced

into the subject from the use of illustrations, e.g. of criminals

acquitted, debts discharged, have perplexed it perhaps, rather than

explained, what must be beyond explanation.

'The ultra-Calvinistic view becomes in the mind and language of the

hot-headed ignorant fanatic a denial of God's Unity. "The merciful Son

appeasing the wrath of the angry Father" is language which implies two

Wills, two Counsels in the Divine Mind (compare with this John iii. 16).

I suppose that an irreverent man, being partly disgusted with the

popular theology, having no scruples about putting aside Inspiration,

&c., and conceiving that he himself is an adequate representative of

the nineteenth century's intelligence, and that the nineteenth century's

intelligence is most profound and infallible, sets to work to demolish

what is distasteful to himself, and what the unerring criticism of the

day rejects, correcting St. Paul's mistakes, patronising him whenever he

is fortunate enough to receive the approbation of the great thinkers

of our day, and so constructs a vague "human" religion out of the

Christianity which he criticises, eliminating all that lies beyond

the speculative range of the mind, and that demands assent by its own

authority as God's Revelation. I don't know how to state briefly what I

mean.

'I think I can understand that this temper of mind is very prevalent in

England now, and that I can partly trace the growth of it. Moreover, I

feel that to ignore, despise, or denounce it, will do no good.

'As a matter of fact, thousands of educated men are thinking on these

great matters as our fathers did not think of them. Simplicity of

belief is a great gift; but then the teaching submitted to such simple

believers ought to be true, otherwise the simple belief leads them into

error. How much that common Protestant writers and preachers teach is

not true! Perhaps some of their teaching is untrue absolutely, but it is

certainly untrue relatively, because they do not hold the "proportion

of the faith," and by excluding some truths and presenting others in an

extravagant form they distort the whole body of truth.

'But when a man not only points out some of the popular errors,

but claims to correct St. Paul when he Judaizes, and to do a little

judicious Hellenizing for an inspired Apostle, one may well distrust the

nineteenth century tone and spirit.

'I do really and seriously think that a great and reverently-minded man,

conscious of the limits of human reason--a man like Butler--would find

his true and proper task now in presenting Christian teaching in an

unconventional form, stripped of much error that the terms which we all

employ when speaking doctrine seem unavoidably to carry with them.

'Such a man might ask, "What do you mean by your theory of Substitution,

Satisfaction, &c.?" "Where do you find it?" "Prove it logically from the

Bible." "Show that the early Church held it."

'Butler, as you know, reproved the curiosity of men who sought to find

out the manner of the Atonement. "I do not find," he says, "that it is

declared in the Scriptures." He believed the fact, of course, as his

very soul's treasure. "Our ignorance," he says, "is the proper answer to

such enquiries."

'At the same time, no one now can do, it seems, what another

Butler might do, viz., deal with the Bible as the best of the

nineteenth-century men wish to hear a divine deal with it. He would

never make mere assertions. He would never state as a proved truth, to

be presented to a congregation's acceptance, a statement or a doctrine

which really equalled only an opinion of Wesley or any other human

teacher. He would never make arbitrary quotations from Scripture, and

try to prove points by illogical reasoning, and unduly pressing

texts which a more careful collation of MSS. has shown to be at least

doubtful. And by fairness and learning he would win or conciliate

right-minded men of the critical school. What offends these men is the

cool reckless way in which so many preachers make the most audacious

statements, wholly unsupported by any sound learning and logical

reasoning. A man makes a statement, quotes a text or two, which he

doesn't even know to be capable of at least one interpretation different

from that which he gives to it; and so the critical hearer is disgusted,

and no wonder.

'One gain of this critical spirit is, that it makes all of us Clergy

more circumspect in what we say, and many a man looks at his Greek

Testament nowadays, and at a good Commentary too, before he ventures to

quote a text which formerly would have done duty in its English dress

and passed muster among an uncritical congregation. Nowadays every

clergyman knows that there are probably men in his congregation who

know their Bible better than he does, and as practical lawyers, men of

business, &c., are more than his match at an argument. It offends such

men to have a shallow-minded preacher taking for granted the very points

that he ought to prove, giving a sentence from some divine of his school

as if it settled the question without further reference even to the

Bible.

'This critical spirit becomes very easily captious; and a man needn't be

unbelieving because he doesn't like to be credulous. Campbell's book

on the Atonement is very hard, chiefly because the man writes such

unintelligible English. I think Shairp in his "Essays," gives a good

critique as far as it goes on the philosophical and religious manner of

our day.

'Alexander Knox says somewhere in his correspondence with Bishop Jebb

that he couldn't understand the Protestant theory of Justification. And

it does seem to be often stated as if the terms employed in describing a

mere transaction could adequately convey the true power and meaning of a

Divine mystery.

'But I only puzzle you, I dare say, and certainly I am liable to the

charge of not writing intelligible English. I can tell you I am glad

enough that I am not called on to preach on these subjects after the

fashion that a preacher in England must go to work.

'It is a cool thing to say, but I do believe that what half our

English congregations want is just the plain simple teaching that our

Melanesians get, only the English congregations wouldn't stand it.'

A letter to Arthur Coleridge is of the same date:--

'Mota Island: August 6, 1871--

'My dear Arthur,--I have had a busy day, having baptized thirty-two

persons, of whom twenty-five are adults; and then the crowd, the

incessant talking, teaching, and the anxious feeling which attend any

step of so much importance as the Baptism from heathenism. Fourteen

of the men are married, two are elderly, several are middle-aged,

five women are among the number. I believe that God's spirit is indeed

working in the hearts of these people. Some twelve or thirteen years

have passed, and only now have I felt that I could take the step of

baptizing the infants and young children here, the parents promising

that they shall be sent to school as they grow up. About 200 young

children have during the past month been baptized: things seem hopeful.

It is very happy work; and I get on pretty well, often very tired, but

that doesn't matter.

'I could wish all my good friends were here, that those who have been

enabled to contribute to this end might see for themselves something

of the long hoped for beginning of a new state of things in this little

island.

'August 11.--In a little more than a month 248 persons have been

baptized here, twenty-five of them adults, the rest infants and young

children. I am very sorry to think that I must leave them soon, for I

expect the "Southern Cross" in a few days; and I must go to the Solomon

Islands, from them to Santa Cruz Island, and so to Norfolk Island,

calling here on the way. Then I am off to the Fiji Islands for, I

suppose, a month or six weeks. There are some 6,000 or 7,000 white

people there, and it is assumed by them and the Church people in this

part of the world that I must be regarded as their Bishop. Very soon a

separate Bishop ought to be at work there, and I shall probably have to

make some arrangement with the settlers. Then, on the other hand, I want

to look into the question of South Sea Islanders who are taken to the

Fiji plantations.

'How far I can really examine into the matter, I hardly know. But many

of the settlers invite me to consider the matter with them.

'I believe that for the most part the islanders receive good treatment

when on the plantations, but I know that many of them are taken away

from their islands by unfair means.

'The settlers are only indirectly responsible for this. The traders and

sailing masters of the vessels who take away the islanders are the most

culpable. But the demand creates the supply.

'Among all my multifarious occupations here, I have not much time for

reading; I am never alone night or day. I sleep on a table, with some

twelve or more fellows around me; and all day long people are about me,

in and out of school hours. But I have read, for the third time I think,

Lightfoot's "Galatians"--and I am looking forward to receiving his book

on the Ephesians. He doesn't lay himself out to do exactly the work

that Bishop Ellicott has done so excellently, and his dissertations are

perhaps the most valuable part of his work. He will gain the ear of the

men of this generation, rather than Ellicott; he sympathises more with

modern modes of thought, and is less rigid than Ellicott. But he seems

very firm on all the most essential and primary points, and I am indeed

thankful for such a man. I don't find much time for difficult reading;

I go on quietly, Hebrew, &c. I have many good books on both Old and New

Testaments, English and German, and some French, e.g. Keuss and Guizot.

'I like to hear something of what this restless speculative scientific

generation is thinking and doing. But I can't read with much pleasure

the fragmentary review literature of the day. The "Cornhill" and that

class of books I can't stand, and sketchy writings. The best specimens

of light reading I have seen of late are Charlotte Yonge's "Pupils of

St. John the Divine," and Guizot's "St. Louis," excellent.

'I did read, for it was put on board, Disraeli's novel. I was on my back

sea-sick for four days; what utter rubbish! clever nonsense! And I have

read Mr. Arnold's "St. Paul and Protestantism." He says some clever

things about the Puritan mind, no doubt. But what a painful book it is:

can't he see that he is reducing all that the spirit of a man must needs

rest on to the level of human criticism? simply eliminating from the

writings of the Apostles, and I suppose from the words of the Saviour,

all that is properly and strictly Divine.--[Then follows much that has

been before given.]--How [winding up thus] thankful I am that I am far

away from the noise and worry of this sceptical yet earnest age!

'There is something hazy about your friend Davis's writings. I know some

of his publications, and sympathise to a very considerable extent with

him. But I can't be sure that I always understand him: that school has a

language of its own, and I am not so far initiated as to follow.

'I can't understand Maurice, much as I respect him. It is simply wasting

my time and my brains to attempt to read him; he has great thoughts,

and he makes them intelligible to people less stupid than me, and many

writers whom I like and understand have taken their ideas from him; but

I cannot understand him. And I think many of his men have his faults. At

least I am so conceited as to think it is not all my fault.

'Do you know two little books by Norris, Canon of Bristol, "Key to the

Gospel History," and a Manual on the Catechism?

'They are well worth reading, indeed I should almost say studying, so as

to mould the teaching of your young ones upon them.

'How you would be amused could you see the figures and scenes which

surround me here! To-day about 140 men, women, lads and girls are

working voluntarily here, clearing and fencing the gardens, and digging

the holes for the yams, and they do this to help us in the school; we

have two pigs killed, and give them a bit of a feast. The feeling is

very friendly. A sculptor might study them to great advantage, though

clothing is becoming common here now. Our thirty-four baptized adults

and our sixteen or twenty old scholars wear decent clothing, of course.

'Well, I must leave off.

'I think very often of you, your wife and children, and, indeed, of you

all. It would be very nice to spend a few weeks with you, but I should

not get on well in your climate.

'The heat seems to suit me better, and I am pretty well here. Indeed I

am better than I have been for more than a year, though I have a good

deal of discomfort.

'Good-bye, dear Arthur. How often I think of your dear dear Father.

'Your affectionate Cousin,

'J. C. PATTESON.'

To the sisters, the journal continues--recording, on August 14, the

Baptism of twelve men and women the day before, the Communion of

sixteen at 7 A.M., the presence of fifty-six baptized persons at morning

service. More than 100 were working away the ensuing day in preparing

yam gardens for Kohimarama, while two pigs were stewing in native ovens

to feast them afterwards; and the Bishop was planting cocoa-nut trees

and sowing flower seeds, or trying experiments with a machine for

condensing water, in his moments of relaxation, which were few, though

he was fairly well, and very happy, as no one can doubt on reading

this:--

'Lots of jolly little children, and many of them know me quite well and

are not a bit shy. They are often very sad-looking objects, and as they

don't get regularly washed, they often have large sores and abscesses,

poor little things. But there are many others--clean-skinned, reddish

brown, black-eyed, merry little souls among them. The colour of the

people is just what Titian and the Venetian painters delighted in, the

colour of their own weather-beaten Venetian boatmen, glowing warm rich

colour. White folks look as if they were bleached and had all the colour

washed out of them.

'Some of the Solomon Islanders are black, and some of the New Hebrides

people glossy and smooth and strong-looking; but here you seldom see any

very dark people, and there are some who have the yellow, almost olive

complexion of the South European. Many of the women are tattooed from

head to foot, a regular network of a bluish inlaid pattern. It is not

so common with the men, rather I ought to say very unusual with them,

though many have their bodies marked pretty freely.'

On the 17th sixteen more adults were baptized, elderly men, whose sons

had been baptized in New Zealand coming in, and enemies resigning deadly

feuds.

The work in Mota is best summed up in this last letter to Bishop

Abraham, begun the day after what proved the final farewell to the flock

there, for the 'Southern Cross' came in on the 19th, and the last voyage

was at once commenced:--

"'Southern Cross": Sunday, August 20, 1871.

'My dear dear Friends,--Yesterday the "Southern Cross" came to me at

Mota, twenty-seven days after leaving that island for Norfolk Island

with some fifty Melanesians on board under charge of Bice.

'Into what a new world your many kind affectionate letters take me!

And how good it must be for me to be taught to think more than I, alas!

usually do, about the trials and sorrows of others.

'I have had such a seven weeks at Mota, broken by a three weeks' course

in the New Hebrides, into two portions of three and four weeks.

'Last year we said in our Report, that the time seemed to be come when

we should seek to move the people in Mota to do more than assent to the

truth of our words and the blessings promised in the Gospel, when

we should urge them to appropriate to themselves those blessings, by

abandoning their ignorant heathen ways, and embracing Christianity.

'That time has come in the good Providence of God, in answer to His

all-prevailing Intercession, and hastened (who can doubt it?) by the

prayers of the faithful everywhere--your Whit-Sunday thoughts and

prayers, your daily thoughts and prayers, all contributing to bring

about a blessed change indeed in the little island.

'In these two months I have baptized 289 persons in Mota, 231 children

and infants, seventeen of the lads and boys at Kohimarama, George

Sarawia's school, and forty-one grown and almost all married men and

women.

'I have tried to proceed cautiously and to act only when I had every

human probability of a personal conviction and sincere desire to embrace

Christian teaching and to lead a Christian life. I think the adult

candidates were all competently instructed in the great truths.

'I feel satisfied of their earnestness, and I think it looks like a

stable, permanent work. Yet I need not tell you how my old text is ever

in my mind, "Thine heart shall fear, and be enlarged." Now more than

ever are your prayers needed for dear old George Sarawia and his infant

Church.

'I never had such an experience before. It is something quite new to me.

Classes regularly, morning and evening, and all day parties coming to

talk and ask questions, some bringing a wife or child, some a brother,

some a friend. We were 150 sleeping on the Mission premises, houses

being put up all round by people coming from a distance.

'Scarce a moment's rest, but the work so interesting and absorbing, that

I could scarcely feel weariness. The weather for six out of the seven

weeks was very rainy and bad generally; but I am and was well, very

well--not very strong, yet walking to Gatava and back, five or six

miles, on slippery and wet paths, and schooling and talking all day.

'The actual services were somewhat striking. The behaviour of the people

reverent and quiet during the infants' and children's baptisms; and

remarkably so during the baptisms of adults.

'You can understand the drift of my teaching: trying to keep to the

great main truths, so as not to perplex their minds with a multiplicity

of new thoughts.

'I think that I shall have to stay a few days at Mota on my return

(D.V.) from Solomon and Santa Cruz Islands, as there are still many

Catechumens.

'I am half disposed to ordain George Priest on my return (D.V.) Yet on

the whole I think it may be better to wait till another year. But I am

balancing considerations. Should any delay occur from my incapacity to

go to Mota, which I don't at all anticipate, it would be a serious thing

to leave such a work in the hands of a Deacon, e.g. ten communicants are

permanent dwellers now in Mota; and I really believe that George, though

not learned, is in all essentials quite a fit person to be ordained

Priest. This growth of the work, owing, no doubt, much to him, is a

proof of God's blessing on him.

'I pray God that this may be a little gleam of light to cheer you, dear

friends, on your far more toilsome and darksome path. It is a little

indeed in one sense; yet to me, who know the insufficiency of the

human agency, it is a proof indeed that the Gospel is dunamis Theou eis

soterian.

'I can hardly realize it all yet. It is good to be called away from it

for a month or two. I often wished that Codrington, Palmer, and the rest

could be with me: it seemed selfish to be witnessing by myself all this

great happiness--that almost visible victory over powers of darkness.

'There is little excitement, no impulsive vehement outpouring of

feeling. People come and say, "I do see the evil of the old life; I

do believe in what you teach us. I feel in my heart new desires, new

wishes, new hopes. The old life has become hateful to me; the new life

is full of joy. But it is so mawa (weighty), I am afraid. What if after

making these promises I go back?"

"What do you doubt--God's power and love, or your own weakness?"

'"I don't doubt His power and love; but I am afraid."

'"Afraid of what?" '"Of falling away."

'"Doesn't He promise His help to those who need it?"

'"Yes, I know that." '"Do you pray?"

'"I don't know how to pray properly, but I and my wife say--God, make

our hearts light. Take away the darkness. We believe that you love us

because you sent JESUS to become a Man and die for us, but we can't

understand it all. Make us fit to be baptized."

'"If you really long to lead a new life, and pray to God to strengthen

you, come in faith, without doubting."

'Evening by evening my school with the baptized men and women is the

saying by heart (at first sentence by sentence after me, now they know

them well) the General Confession, which they are taught to use in the

singular number, as a private prayer, the Lord's Prayer, the Creed, the

ten Commandments (a short version). They are learning the Te Deum. They

use a short prayer for grace to keep their baptismal vows.

'I think that they know fairly well the simpler meaning of these various

compendiums of Prayer, Faith and Duty. But why enter into details? You

know all about it. And, indeed, you have all had your large share, so to

say, in bringing about this happy change.

'And then I turn from all this little secluded work to the thoughts of

England and France, the Church at home, &c....

'I have now read the "Guardian's" account of the civil war in France.

There is nothing like it to be read of, except in the Old Testament

perhaps. It is like the taking of Jerusalem.

'It is an awful thing! most awful! I never read anything like it. Will

they ever learn to be humble? I don't suppose that even now they admit

their sins to have brought this chastening on them. It is hard to say

this without indulging a Pharisaic spirit, but I don't mean to palliate

our national sins by exaggerating theirs. Yet I hardly think any mob but

a French or Irish mob could have done what these men did.

'And what will be the result? Will it check the tendency to

Republicanism? Will Governments unite to put down the many-headed

monster? Will they take a lesson from the fate of Paris and France? Of

course Republicanism is not the same thing as Communism. But where are

we to look for the good effects of Republicanism?

'August 22nd.--The seventh anniversary of dear Fisher's death. May God

grant us this year a blessing at Santa Cruz!

'Your affectionate

'J. C. PATTESON.'

The last letter to the beloved sister Fanny opened with the date of her

never-forgotten birthday, the 27th of August, though it was carried

on during the following weeks; and in the meantime Mr. Atkin, Stephen,

Joseph and the rest were called for from Wango, in Bauro, where they had

had a fairly peaceable stay, in spite of a visit from a labour traffic

vessel, called the 'Emma Bell,' with twenty-nine natives under hatches,

and, alas! on her way for more. After picking the Bauro party up, the

Bishop wrote to the elder Mr. Atkin:--

'Wango Bay (at anchor): August 25, 1871.

'My dear Mr. Atkin,--You may imagine my joy at finding Joe looking

really well when we reached this part of the world on the 23rd. I

thought him looking unwell when he spent an hour or two with me at Mota,

about ten weeks since, and I begged him to be careful, to use quinine

freely, &c. He is certainly looking now far better than he was then, and

he says that he feels quite well and strong. There is the more reason to

be thankful for this, because the weather has been very rough, and

rain has been falling continually. I had the same weather in the Banks

Islands; scarcely a day for weeks without heavy rain. Here the sandy

soil soon becomes dry again, it does not retain the moisture, and so far

it has the advantage over the very tenacious clayey soil of Mota.

'Nearly all the time of the people here has been spent--wasted, perhaps,

we should say--in making preparations for a great feast: so that Joe

found it very hard to gain the attention of the people, when he tried

to point out to them better things to think of than pigs, native money,

tobacco and pipes. Such advance as has been made is rather in the

direction of gaining the confidence and good-will of the people all

about, and in becoming very popular among all the young folks. Nearly

all the young people would come away with him, if the elders would allow

them to do so. I have no doubt that much more has been really effected

than is apparent to us now. Words have been said that have not been

lost, and seed sown that will spring up some day. Just as at Mota, now,

after some twelve or thirteen years, we first see the result in the

movement now going on there, so it will be, by God's goodness, some day

here. There at Mota the good example of George Sarawia, the collective

result of the teaching of many years, and the steady conduct, with one

exception, of the returned scholars, have now been blessed by God to

the conversion of many of the people. We no longer hesitate to baptize

infants and young children, for the parents engage to send them to

school when they grow up, and are themselves receiving instruction in a

really earnest spirit.

'Many, too, of those who have for some time abandoned the old ways, but

yet did not distinctly accept the new teaching, have now felt the "power

of the Gospel;" and though many candidates are still under probation,

and I sought to act with caution, and to do all that lay in my power

to make them perceive the exceeding solemnity of being baptized, the

weighty promises, the great responsibility, yet I thought it right to

baptize not less than forty-one grown men and women, besides seventeen

lads of George's school, about whom there could be no hesitation. It

has, indeed, been a very remarkable season there. I spent seven weeks

broken by a New Hebrides trip of three weeks' duration into two periods

of three and four weeks. Bice was with me for the first three weeks;

and with a good many of our scholars turned into teachers here, we three

(Bice, George, and I) kept up very vigorous school: a continual talking,

questioning, &c., about religion, were always going on day and night.

Many young children and infants were baptized, about 240 in all + 41 +

17.

'You will, I am sure, pray more than ever for George and all these

converts to Christianity, that they may be strengthened and guarded

against all evil, and live lives worthy of their profession. We hope to

spend two or three days there on our return (D.V.); and if so, Joe will

write you his impressions. Meanwhile, I tell him what I fully believe,

that no one hearty effort of his to benefit these poor people is thrown

away. Already they allow us to take boys, and perhaps this very day we

may go off with two young girls also. And all this will result in some

great change for the better some day.

'You will want to hear a word about myself. I am much better, partly I

confess owing to the warmth of the climate, which certainly agrees with

me. I may feel less well as we draw by-and-by to the south once more.

'I can't take strong exercise, and that is a privation. It did me good,

and I feel the want of it; but I am much better than I was a year or ten

months ago, and I do my work very fairly, and get about better than I

expected. Remember me kindly to Mrs. Atkin and Mary, and believe me to

be

'Your very sincere Friend,

'J. C. PATTESON.'

Mr. Brooke and Edward Wogale had had a far more trying sojourn at

Florida.

'Wogale suffered much from his eyes; and the labour ships were

frequently on the coast--all the three varieties: the fairly conducted

one with a Government agent on board; the "Snatch-snatch," which only

inveigled, but did not kill without necessity; and the "Kill-kill,"

which absolutely came head-hunting. It was a dreary eleven weeks.

'On July 11, a "Sydney vessel," as the natives called it, was on the

west of the island, and nine natives were reported to Mr Brooke as

having been killed, and with so much evidence that he had no doubt on

the subject.

'On the 13th Takua came to him to say the "Kill-kill" vessel had

anchored four miles off. What was he to do?

'"How was it you and Bisope came first, and then these slaughterers? Do

you send them?"

'Mr. Brooke advised them to remain on shore; but if the strangers landed

and wanted to kill or burn them, to fight for their lives. "Your words

are the words of a chief," said Takua.

'This ship, however, sailed away; but on August 13 another came, much

like the "Southern Cross," and canoes went out to her, in one of them

Dudley Lankona. These returned safely, but without selling their fruit;

and Dudley related that the men said, "Bishop and Brooke were bad, but

they themselves were good, and had pipes and tobacco for those who would

go with them."

'These, however, went away without doing them harm, only warning them

that another vessel which was becalmed near at hand was a "killer," and

the people were so uneasy about her that Mr. Brooke went on board,

and was taken by the captain for a maker of cocoa-nut oil. He was

a Scotchman, from Tanna, where he had settled, and was in search of

labourers; a good-natured friendly kind of person on the whole, though

regarding natives as creatures for capture.

'"If I get a chance to carry a lot of them off," he said, "I'll do it;

but killing is not my creed."

'Mr. Brooke hinted that the natives might attack him, and he pointed to

six muskets. "That's only a few of them. Let them come. We'll give it

them pretty strong."

'He was rather taken aback when he found that he was talking to a

clergyman. "Well, wherever you go nowadays there's missionaries. Who

would have thought you'd got so far down?"

'And he looked with regret at Mr. Brooke's party of natives in their

canoes, and observed, "Ah! my fine fellows, if your friend was not here

I'd have the whole lot of you: what a haul!"

'He said the other ship was from Queensland, and had a Government agent

on board, of whom he spoke with evident awe.

'On Mr. Brooke's return, Takua and Dikea were furbishing up old guns

which some incautious person on board the "Curacoa" had given them,

and they were disappointed to find that there could be no attack on the

vessel.'

She, however, was scarcely gone before, at the other end of the island,

Vara, four out of five men were killed by a boat's crew. The survivor,

Sorova, told Mr. Brooke that he and one companion had gone out in one

canoe, and three more in another, to a vessel that lay near the shore.

He saw four blacks in her, as he thought Ysabel men. A white man came

down from the boat, and sat in the bow of Sorova's canoe, but presently

stood up and capsized both canoes, catching at Sorova's belt, which

broke, and the poor fellow was thus enabled to get away, and shelter

himself under the stern of the canoe, till he could strike out for land;

but he saw a boat come round from the other side of the ship, with four

men--whether whites or light-coloured islanders was not clear--but they

proceeded to beat his companions with oars, then to fall on them with

tomahawks, and finally cut off their heads, which were taken on board,

and their bodies thrown to the sharks.

These men evidently belonged to that lowest and most horrible class

of men-stealers, who propitiate the chiefs by assisting them in

head-hunting.

Of course the island was full of rage, and on the 26th again another

brig was in sight. Spite of warning, desire to trade induced five men to

put off in a canoe. Two boats came down, and placed themselves on either

side. Mr. Brooke could not watch, but a fierce shout arose from the

crowd on shore, they rushed to the great canoe house, and a war fleet

was launched, Dikea standing up in the foremost, with a long ebony spear

in his hand. Fortunately they were too late: the boats were hauled up,

and the brig went off at full sail. Whether the five were killed or

carried captive is not clear.

The whole place was full of wailing. Revenge was all the cry. 'Let not

their pigs be killed,' said Takua; 'we will give them to Bisope, he

shall avenge us.' His brother Dikea broke out: 'My humour is bad because

Bisope does not take us about in his vessel to kill-kill these people!'

When, two days later, the 'Southern Cross' was unmistakeably in sight,

Takua said, 'Let Bisope only bring a man-of-war, and get me vengeance

on my adversaries, and I shall be exalted like--like--like our Father

above!'

The residence of Mr. Brooke in the island, and the testimony of their

own countrymen to the way of life in Norfolk Island, had taught the

Floridians to separate the Bishop from their foes; but it could scarcely

be thus in places where confidence in him had not been established.

The Bishop meanwhile wrote on:--

'The New Zealand Bishops have sent me a kind letter, a round robin,

urging me to go to England; but they are ignorant of two things:-- 1st,

that I am already much better; 2nd, that I should not derive the benefit

generally to my spirits, &c. from a visit to England as they would, and

take it for granted that I should do so.

'They use only one other argument, viz., that I must rest after some

years' work. That is not so. I don't feel the pressure of work for a

very simple reason, viz., that I don't attempt to work as I used to do.

'But just now, it is quite clear that I must not go, unless there were a

very obvious necessity for it. For, 1st, Mota needs all the help we can

give; 2nd, several Melanesians are coming on rapidly to the state

when they ought to be ordained; 3rd, we are about to start (D.V.) new

stations at Ambrym, Leper's Island, and Savo; 4th, the school is so

large that we want "all hands" to work it; 5th, I must go to Fiji, and

watch both Fiji and Queensland; 6th, after the 1872 voyage, we shall

need, as I think, to sell this vessel, and have another new one built

in Auckland. The funds will need careful nursing for this. But I will

really not be foolish. If I have a return of the bad symptoms, I will go

to Dr. Goldsboro', and if he advises it strongly, will go to England.

'The deportation of natives is going on to a very great extent here, as

in the New Hebrides and Banks Islands. Means of all kinds are employed:

sinking canoes and capturing the natives, enticing men on board, and

getting them below, and then securing hatches and imprisoning them.

Natives are retaliating. Lately, two or three vessels have been taken

and all hands killed, besides boats' crews shot at continually. A man

called on me at Mota the other day, who said that five out of seven in

the boat were struck by arrows a few days before. The arrows were

not poisoned, but one man was very ill. It makes even our work rather

hazardous, except where we are thoroughly well known. I hear that a

vessel has gone to Santa Cruz, and I must be very cautious there, for

there has been some disturbance almost to a certainty.

'Whatever regulations the Government of Queensland or the Consul of Fiji

may make, they can't restrain the traders from employing unlawful

means to get hold of the natives. And I know that many of these men

are utterly unscrupulous. But I can't get proofs that are sufficient to

obtain a verdict in a court of law.

'Some islands are almost depopulated; and I dread the return of these

"labourers," when they are brought back. They bring guns and other

things, which enable them to carry out with impunity all kinds of

rascality. They learn nothing that can influence them for good. They are

like squatters in the bush, coming into the town to have their fling.

These poor fellows come back to run riot, steal men's wives, shoot,

fight, and use their newly acquired possessions to carry out more

vigorously all heathen practices.

'September 3rd.--At anchor: Savo Island: Sunday. The experiment of

anchoring at Sara (Florida) and this place answers well. The decks

were crowded and crammed; but the people behaved very well, barring the

picking up of everything they could lay hands upon, as is natural to

many persons whose education has been neglected.

'Yesterday I took Wadrokala (of Nengone) to the village here, where he

is to live with some of our old scholars from these parts, and try to

begin a good work among the people. He has four baptized friends, a

married couple being two, and three other very good lads, to start with.

It was a long and very hot walk. A year ago I could not have got through

it. I was tired, but not over-tired.

'And now we have had Holy Communion; and this afternoon we take our

party on shore: Wadrokala's wife Carry, and Jemima, their daughter of

eight or nine. There is no fighting or quarrelling here now. I know all

the people, so I leave them with good hope.'

On the 7th, Joseph Atkin began a letter as follows:--

'Our Bishop is much improved in health and strength. His stay at Mota

has put new life into him again; the whole island is becoming Christian.

'The Bishop is now very strong and clear about establishing permanent

schools on the islands; I fear in almost too great a hurry. The great

requisite for a school is a native teacher; and generally, if not

always, a teacher ought, as George was at Mota, to be well supported by

a little band of native converts, who, if their teaching, in the common

use of the word, is not much, can, by their consistent lives, preach a

continual sermon, that all who see may understand. What is the use of

preaching an eloquent sermon on truth to a people who do not know what

it means, or purity of which they have never dreamt? Their ears take

in the words, they sound very pleasant, and they go away again to their

sin; and the preacher is surprised that they can do so. I do not forget

the power of the Spirit to change men's hearts, but do not expect the

Holy Spirit to work with you as He never worked with anyone else, but

rather as He always has worked with others.... If in looking into the

history of Missions, you find no heathen people has been even nominally

and professionally Christianised within, say, ten or fifteen years, why

not be content to set to work to try that the conversion of those to

whom you are sent may be as thorough and real as possible in that time,

and not to fret at being unable to hurry the work some years?'....

This letter too was destined never to be finished, though it was

continued later, as will be seen.

The Bishop's next letter is dated--

'September 16th.--Off the Santa Cruz group, some twenty miles distant.

To-morrow, being Sunday, we stay quietly some way off the islands;

and on Monday (D.V.) we go to Nukapu, and perhaps to Piteni too, wind

permitting. You can enter into my thoughts, how I pray God that if it be

His will, and if it be the appointed time, He may enable us in His

own way to begin some little work among these very wild but vigorous

energetic islanders. I am fully alive to the probability that some

outrage has been committed here by one or more vessels. The master of

the vessel that Atkin saw did not deny his intention of taking away from

these or from any other islands any men or boys he could induce to come

on board. I am quite aware that we may be exposed to considerable risk

on this account. I trust that all may be well; that if it be His will

that any trouble should come upon us, dear Joseph Atkin, his father and

mother's only son, may be spared. But I don't think there is very much

cause for fear; first, because at these small reef islands they know me

pretty well, though they don't understand as yet our object in coming

to them, and they may very easily connect us white people with the other

white people who have been ill-using them; second, last year I was on

shore at Nukapu and Piteni for some time, and I can talk somewhat with

the people; third, I think that if any violence has been used to the

natives of the north face of the large island, Santa Cruz, I shall hear

of it from these inhabitants of the small islets to the north, Nukapu,

and Piteni, and so be forewarned.

'If any violence has been used, it will make it impossible for us to go

thither now. It would simply be provoking retaliation. One must say,

as Newman of the New Dogma, that the progress of truth and religion

is delayed, no one can say how long. It is very sad. But the Evil One

everywhere and always stirs up opposition and hindrance to every attempt

to do good. And we are not so sorely tried in this way as many others.'

Contrary winds--or rather a calm, with such light wind as there was,

contrary--kept the vessel from approaching the island for four days

more, while the volcano made every night brilliant, and the untiring pen

ran on with affectionate responses to all that the last home packet had

contained, and then proceeded to public interests:--

'Then the great matters you write about--the great social and religious

crisis in England now. Moreover, who can estimate the effect of this

German and French war upon the social state of Europe? Possibly a

temporary violent suppression in North Germany of Republican principles,

a reaction, an attempt to use the neutrality of England as a focus for

political agitation. And then the extravagant luxury side by side with

degrading poverty! It is a sad picture; and you who have to contemplate

it have many trials and troubles that are in one sense far away from me.

'September 19th.--Here we are becalmed; for three days we have scarcely

made ten miles in the direction we want to go. It is not prudent to go

near the large island, unless we have a good breeze, and can get away

from the fleets of canoes if we see reason for so doing. We may have one

hundred and fifty canoes around us, and perhaps sixty or eighty strong

men on deck, as we had last year; and this year we have good reason

for fearing that labour vessels have been here. Many of the people here

would distinguish between us and them; but it is quite uncertain, for

we can't talk to the people of the large island, and can't therefore

explain our object in so doing. 'Yesterday, being becalmed, a large

canoe, passing (for there was occasionally a light air from the north)

from Nupani to Santa Cruz, came near us. It could not get away, and the

"Southern Cross" could not get near it. So we went to it in the boat. I

can talk to these Nupani people, and we had a pleasant visit. They knew

my name directly, and were quite at ease the moment they were satisfied

it was the Bishop. They will advertise us, I dare say, and say a good

word for us, and we gave them presents, &c.

'I shall be thankful if this visit ends favourably, and oh! how thankful

if we obtain any lads. It seems so sad to leave this fine people year

after year in ignorance and darkness, but He knows and cares for them

more than we do. 'The sun is nearly vertical; thermometer 91°, and 88°

at night; I am lazy, but not otherwise affected by it, and spend my day

having some, about an hour's, school, and in writing and reading.

'I think that the Education question has been more satisfactorily

settled than I dared to hope a year ago. A religious, as opposed to

an irreligious education has been advisedly chosen by the country, and

denominationalism (what a word!) as against secularism. Well, that's

not much from a Christian country; but it isn't the choice of an

anti-Christian, or even of a country indifferent to Christianity.

'Mrs. Abraham and Pena have sent me Shairp's little book on "Religion

and Culture." It is capital; and if you knew the man you would not

wonder at his writing such sensible, thoughtful books. He is one of the

most "loveable" beings I ever knew. His good wholesome teaching is about

the best antidote I have seen to much of the poison circulating about in

magazines and alluring ignorant, unsound people with the specious name

of philosophy. And he is always fair, and credits his opponents with all

that can possibly be imagined to extenuate the injury they are doing by

their false and faithless teaching.'

Here the letter suddenly ceases. No doubt this last sentence had given

the last impulse towards addressing the old Balliol friend above named,

now Principal of St. Andrew's, in the following:--

'"Southern Cross" Mission Schooner,

'In the Santa Cruz Group, S.W. Pacific: September 19.

'My dear Principal,--You won't remember my name, and it is not likely

that you can know anything about me, but I must write you a line and

thank you for writing your two books (for I have but two) on "Studies on

Poetry and Philosophy," and "Religion and Culture."

'The "Moral Dynamic" and the latter book are indeed the very books

I have longed to see; books that one can put with confidence and

satisfaction into the hands of men, young and old, in these stirring and

dangerous times.

'Then it did me good to be recalled to old scenes and to dream of old

faces.

'I was almost a freshman when you came up to keep your M.A. term; and as

I knew some of the men you knew, you kindly, as I well remember, gave

me the benefit of it. As John Coleridge's cousin and the acquaintance

of John Keate, Cumin, Palmer, and dear James Eiddell, I came to know men

whom otherwise I could not have known, and of these how many there still

are that I have thought of and cared for ever since!

'You must have thought of Riddell, dear James Riddell, when you wrote

the words in p. 76 of your book on "Religion and Culture": "We have

known such." Yes, there was indeed about him a beauty of character that

is very very rare. Sellar is in the north somewhere, I think I have seen

Essays by him on Lucretius.

'I think that he is Professor at some University. I am ashamed to know

so little about him. Should you see him, pray remember me most kindly

to him. As year after year passes on, it is very pleasant to think there

are men on the other side of the world that I can with a certainty count

upon as friends.

'I find it difficult to read much of what is worth reading nowadays, and

I have little taste for magazines, &c., I confess.

'But I know enough of what is working in men's minds in Europe to be

heartily thankful for such thoughtful wholesome teaching as yours.

'Indeed, you are doing a good work, and I pray God it may be abundantly

blessed.

'I remain, my dear Friend,

'Very sincerely yours,

'J. C. PATTESON.'

This is the last letter apparently finished and signed!

To the Bishop of Lichfield the long journal-letter says:--

'Tenakulu (the volcano) was fine last night, but not so fine as on that

night we saw it together. But it was very solemn to look at it, and

think how puny all man's works are in comparison with this little

volcano. What is all the bombardment of Paris to those masses of fire

and hundreds of tons of rock cast out into the sea? "If He do but touch

the hills, they shall smoke."

'And now what will the next few days bring forth? It may be God's will

that the opening for the Gospel may be given to us now. Sometimes I feel

as if I were almost too importunate in my longings for some beginning

here; and I try not to be impatient, and to wait His good time, knowing

that it will come when it is the fulness of time. Then, again, I am

tempted to think, "If not soon, if not now, the trading vessels will

make it almost impossible, as men think, to obtain any opening here."

But I am on the whole hopeful, though sometimes faint-hearted.

'To day's First Lesson has a good verse: Haggai, ii. 4;l and there is

Psalm xci. also.'

Then follows a good deal about further plans, and need of men; ending

with the decision that the present 'Southern Cross' ought to be sold,

and that a new one could be built at Auckland for £2,000, which the

Bishop thought he could obtain in New Zealand and Australia.

'Yet now be strong, O Zerubbabel, saith the Lord; and be strong, O

Joshua, son of Josedech, the high priest; and be strong, all ye people

of the land, saith the Lord, and work: for I am with you, saith the Lord

of hosts.'

A much smaller additional vessel would be useful; and he merrily says:--

'You don't know an amiable millionaire, with a nice quick yacht from 70

to 120 tons, to be given away, and sent out to Auckland free of expense,

I suppose.

'We must give up all idea of our Chapel for a time, but we can do

without it. And a vessel is necessary.'

The last of this letter is on Delitzsch and Biblical criticism, but too

much mixed up with other persons' private affairs for quotation.

Reading Hebrew with Mr. Atkin, or studying Isaiah alone, had been the

special recreation throughout the voyage.

His scholar Edward Wogale has given a touch of that last morning of the

20th:--

'And as we were going to that island where he died, but were still in

the open sea, he schooled us continually upon Luke ii. iii. up to

vi., but he left off with us with his death. And he preached to us

continually at Prayers in the morning, every day, and every evening on

the Acts of the Apostles, and he spoke as far as to the seventh chapter,

and then we reached that island. And he had spoken admirably and very

strongly indeed to us, about the death of Stephen, and then he went up

ashore on that island Nukapu.'

That island Nukapu lay with the blue waves breaking over the circling

reef, the white line of coral sand, the trees coming down to it; and

in the glowing sun of September 20, the equatorial midsummer eve, four

canoes were seen hovering about the reef, as the 'Southern Cross' tried

to make for the islet.

Mr. Brooke says that this lingering had seemed to intensify the Bishop's

prayer and anxiety for these poor people; and, thinking that the unusual

movements of the vessel puzzled the people in the canoes, and that they

might be afraid to approach, he desired that at 11.30 A.M. the boat

should be lowered, and entered it with Mr. Atkin, Stephen Taroniara,

James Minipa, and John Nonono. He sat in the stern sheets, and called

back to Mr. Brooke: 'Tell the captain I may have to go ashore.' Then he

waited to collect more things as presents to take on shore, and pulled

towards the canoes; But they did not come to meet the boat, and seemed

undecided whether to pull away or not. The people recognized the Bishop;

and when he offered to go on shore they assented, and the boat went on

to a part of the reef about two miles from the island, and there met two

more canoes, making six in all. The natives were very anxious that they

should haul the boat up on the reef, the tide being too low for her to

cross it, but, when this was not consented to, two men proposed to take

the Bishop into their boat.

It will be remembered that he had always found the entering one of their

canoes a sure way of disarming suspicion, and he at once complied. Mr.

Atkin afterwards said he thought he caught the word 'Tabu,' as if in

warning, and saw a basket with yams and other fruits presented; and

those acquainted with the customs of the Polynesians--the race to

which these islanders belonged--say that this is sometimes done that

an intended victim may unconsciously touch something tabu, and thus may

become a lawful subject for a blow, and someone may have tried to warn

him.

There was a delay of about twenty minutes; and then two canoes went with

the one containing the Bishop, the two chiefs, Moto and Taula, who had

before been so friendly to him, being in them. The tide was so low that

it was necessary to wade over the reef, and drag the canoes across to

the deeper lagoon within. The boat's crew could not follow; but they

could see the Bishop land on the beach, and there lost sight of him.

The boat had been about half-an-hour drifting about in company with the

canoes, and there had been some attempt at talk, when suddenly, at about

ten yards off, without any warning, a man stood up in one of them,

and calling out, 'Have you anything like this?' shot off one of the

yard-long arrows, and his companions in the other two canoes began

shooting as quickly as possible, calling out, as they aimed, 'This for

New Zealand man! This for Bauro man! This for Mota man!' The boat was

pulled back rapidly, and was soon out of range, but not before three out

of the four had been struck; James only escaped by throwing himself back

on the seat, while an arrow had nailed John's cap to his head, Mr. Atkin

had one in his left shoulder, and poor Stephen lay in the bottom of

the boat, 'trussed,' as Mr. Brooke described it, with six arrows in the

chest and shoulders.

It was about two hours since they had left the ship when they reached

it again: and Mr. Atkin said, 'We are all hurt? as they were helped

on board; but no sooner had the arrow-head, formed of human bone, and

acutely sharp, been extracted, than he insisted on going back to find

his Bishop. He alone knew the way by which the reef could be crossed in

the now rising tide, so that his presence was necessary. Meantime Mr.

Brooke extracted as best he might the arrows from poor Stephen.

'We two Bisope,' said the poor fellow, meaning that he shared the same

fate as the Bishop.

As Joseph Wate, a lad of fifteen, Mr. Atkin's Malanta godson and pupil,

wrote afterwards, 'Joe said to me and Sapi, "We are going to look for

the Bishop, are you two afraid?"

'"No, why should I be afraid?"

'"Very well, you two go and get food for yourselves, and bring a beaker

full of water for us all, for we shall have to lie on our oars a long

time to-day."'

The others who pulled the boat were Charles Sapinamba, a sailor, and

Mr. Bongarde, the mate, who carried a pistol, for the first time in the

records of the 'Southern Cross.'

They had long to wait till the tide was high enough to carry them

across the reef, and they could see people on shore, at whom they gazed

anxiously with a glass.

About half-past four it became possible to cross the reef, and then two

canoes rowed towards them: one cast off the other and went back; the

other, with a heap in the middle, drifted towards them, and they rowed

towards it.

'But' (says Wate), 'when we came near we two were afraid, and I said to

Joe, "If there is a man inside to attack us, when he rises up, we shall

see him."'

Then the mate took up his pistol, but the sailor said, 'Those are the

Bishop's shoes.'

As they came up with it, and lifted the bundle wrapped in matting into

the boat, a shout or yell arose from the shore. Wate says four canoes

put off in pursuit; but the others think their only object was to secure

the now empty canoe as it drifted away. The boat came alongside, and

two words passed, 'The body!' Then it was lifted up, and laid across the

skylight, rolled in the native mat, which was secured at the head and

feet. The placid smile was still on the face; there was a palm leaf

fastened over the breast, and when the mat was opened there were five

wounds, no more.

The strange mysterious beauty, as it may be called, of these

circumstances almost makes one feel as if this were the legend of a

martyr of the Primitive Church; but the fact is literally true, and can

be interpreted, though probably no account will ever be obtained from

the actors in the scene.

The wounds were, one evidently given with a club, which had shattered

the right side of the skull at the back, and probably was the first, and

had destroyed life instantly, and almost painlessly; another stroke

of some sharp weapon had cloven the top of the head; the body was also

pierced in one place; and there were two arrow wounds in the legs, but

apparently not shot at the living man, but stuck in after his fall, and

after he had been stripped, for the clothing was gone, all but the boots

and socks. In the front of the cocoa-nut palm, there were five knots

made in the long leaflets. All this is an almost certain indication that

his death was the vengeance for five of the natives. 'Blood for blood'

is a sacred law, almost of nature, wherever Christianity has not

prevailed, and a whole tribe is held responsible for the crime of one.

Five men in Fiji are known to have been stolen from Nukapu; and

probably their families believed them to have been killed, and believed

themselves to be performing a sacred duty when they dipped their weapons

in the blood of the Bisope, whom they did not know well enough to

understand that he was their protector. Nay, it is likely that there had

been some such discussion as had saved him before at Mai from suffering

for Petere's death; and, indeed, one party seem to have wished to keep

him from landing, and to have thus solemnly and reverently treated his

body.

Even when the tidings came in the brief uncircumstantial telegram, there

were none of those who loved and revered him who did not feel that such

was the death he always looked for, and that he had willingly given his

life. There was peace in the thought even while hearts trembled with

dread of hearing of accompanying horrors; and when the full story

arrived, showing how far more painless his death had been than had

he lived on to suffer from his broken health, and how wonderfully the

unconscious heathen had marked him with emblems so sacred in our eyes,

there was thankfulness and joy even to the bereaved at home.

The sweet calm smile preached peace to the mourners who had lost his

guiding spirit, but they could not look on it long. The next morning,

St. Matthew's Day, the body of John Coleridge Patteson was committed

to the waters of the Pacific, his 'son after the faith,' Joseph Atkin,

reading the Burial Service.

Mr. Atkin afterwards wrote to his mother. He had written to his father

the day before; but the substance of his letter has been given in the

narrative:--

'September 21, 1871.

'My dear Mother,--We have had a terrible loss, such a blow that we

cannot at all realise it. Our Bishop is dead; killed by the natives at

Nukapu yesterday. We got the body, and buried it this morning. He was

alone on shore, and none of us saw it done. We were attacked in the boat

too, and Stephen so badly wounded that I am afraid there is small hope

of his recovery. John and I have arrow wounds, but not severe. Our

poor boys seem quite awe-stricken. Captain Jacobs is very much cut

up. Brooke, although not at all well, has quite devoted himself to the

wounded, and so has less time to think about it all.

'It would only be selfish to wish him back. He has gone to his rest,

dying, as he lived, in his Master's service.

It seems a shocking way to die; but I can say from experience that it is

far more to hear of than to suffer. In whatever way so peaceful a life

as his is ended, his end is peace. There was no sign of fear or pain on

his face--just the look that he used to have when asleep, patient and a

little wearied. "What a stroke his death will be to hundreds!" What his

Mission will do without him, God only knows Who has taken him away. His

ways are not as our ways. Seeing people taken away, when, as we think,

they are almost necessary to do God's work on earth, makes one think

that we often think and talk too much about Christian work. What God

requires is Christian men. He does not need the work, only gives it to

form or perfect the character of the men whom He sends to do it.

'Stephen is in great pain at times to-night; one of the arrows seems

to have entered his lungs, and it is broken in, too deep to be got out.

John is wounded in the right shoulder, I in the left. We are both maimed

for the time; but, if it were not for the fear of poison, the wounds

would not be worth noticing. I do not expect any bad consequences, but

they are possible. What would make me cling to life more than anything

else is the thought of you at home; but if it be God's will that I am to

die, I know He will enable you to bear it, and bring good for you out of

it.

'Saturday, 23rd.--We are all doing well. Stephen keeps up his strength,

sleeps well, and has no long attacks of pain. We have had good breezes

yesterday and to-day--very welcome it is, but the motion makes writing

too much labour. Brooke and Edward Wogale are both unwell--ague, I

believe, with both of them; and Brooke's nerves are upset. He has slept

most of to-day, and will probably be the better for it.'....

His private journal adds:--

'September 21st.--Buried the Bishop in the morning. The wounded all

doing well, but Stephen in pain occasionally. Calm day, passed over a

reef in the morning, about eighteen miles north of Nukapu, nine fathoms

on it. Thermometer ninety-one degrees yesterday and to-day. Began

writing home at night. Began reading Miss Yonge's "Chaplet of Pearls."

'Friday, 22nd.--A light breeze came up in the evening, which freshened

through the night, and carried us past Tenakulu. Stephen doing very

well, had a good night, and has very little pain to-day. A breeze

through the day, much cooler. I am dressing my shoulder with brine. Read

some sermons of Vaughan's, preached at Doncaster during Passion Week.

'Saturday, 23rd.--Breeze through the day. A few showers of rain.

Brooke and Wogale down with ague; gave Wogale ipecacuanha and quinine

afterwards. Read Mota prayers in evening. All wounds going on well.

Finished "Chaplet of Pearls," and wrote a little.

'Sunday, 24th.--This morning the wind went round to N.E. and N. and then

died away. We were 55 miles W. of the Torres Islands at noon. Brooke

took English and Mota morning Prayers. I celebrated Holy Communion

afterwards. John came into cabin; I went out to Stephen.

'Brooke and Wogale both better, but B---- quite weak.'

During that Celebration, while administering the Sacred Elements, Mr.

Atkin's tongue stumbled and hesitated over some of the words.

Then the Mota men looked at one another, and knew what would follow.

He knew it himself too, and called to Joseph Wate, his own special

pupil, saying (as the lad wrote to Mr. Atkin the elder), 'Stephen and I

again are going to follow the Bishop, and they of your country--! Who is

to speak to them?'

'I do not know.'

Then he said again, 'It is all right. Don't grieve about it, because

they did not do this thing of themselves, but God allowed them to do

it. It is very good, because God would have it so, because He only looks

after us, and He understands about us, and now He wills to take away us

two, and it is well.'

There was much more for that strong young frame to undergo before the

vigorous life could depart. The loss was to be borne. The head of the

Mission, who had gone through long sickness, and lain at the gates of

the grave so long, died almost painlessly: his followers had deeply

to drink of the cup of agony. The night between the 26th and 27th was

terrible, the whole nervous system being jerked and strained to pieces,

and he wandered too much to send any message home; 'I lost my wits since

they shot me,' he said. Towards morning he almost leapt from his berth

on the floor, crying 'Good-bye.'

Mr. Brooke asked if he would have a little Sal volatile.

'No.'

'A little brandy?'

'No.'

'Do you want anything?'

'I want nothing but to die.'

Those were his last words. He lay convulsed on a mattress on the floor

for about an hour longer, and was released on the morning of the 29th.

Stephen, with an arrow wound in the lungs, and several more of these

wounds in the chest, could hardly have lived, even without the

terrible tetanus. He had spent his time in reading his Mota Gospel and

Prayer-book, praying and speaking earnestly to the other men on board,

before the full agony came on. He was a tall, large, powerfully framed

man; and the struggles were violent before he too sank into rest on

the morning of the 28th, all the time most assiduously nursed by Joseph

Wate. On St. Michael's Day, these two teachers of poor Bauro received at

the same time their funeral at sea.

John Coleridge Patteson was forty-four years and a half old.

Joseph Atkin, twenty-nine.

Stephen Taroniara probably twenty-five--as he was about eighteen when

he joined the Mission in 1864. His little girl will be brought up at

Norfolk Island; his wife Tara, to whom he had been married only just

before his voyage, became consumptive, and died January, 1873, only

twenty minutes after her Baptism. As one of the scholars said, "Had the

songs of the angels for joy of her being made a child of God finished

before they were again singing to welcome her an inheritor of the

kingdom of heaven?"

John Nonono showed no symptoms of tetanus, but was landed at Mota to

recover under more favourable circumstances than the crowded cabin could

afford.

Calms and baffling winds made the return to this island trying and

difficult, and Mota was not reached till the 4th of October. George

Sarawia was still perfectly satisfactory; and his community, on the

whole, going on hopefully. Want of provisions, which Mota could not

supply, made the stay very brief; and after obtaining the necessary

supplies at Aurora, the 'Southern Cross' brought her sad tidings to

Norfolk Island on the 17th. That day Mrs. Palmer wrote:--

'On Monday afternoon, 15th, Mr. Codrington went for a ride to the other

side of the island, and there espied the schooner, eight miles off. He

rode home quickly, and soon the shouting and racing of the boys told us

that the vessel had come. They were all at arrowroot-making. Never,

I think, had the whole party, English and natives, seemed in higher

spirits. Mr. Bice walked to the settlement, to see if she was far in

enough to land that night; we asked him to call and tell us on his way

home.

'Next morning Mr. Bice rode down to see if it really was the schooner,

and was back to breakfast, all thinking we should soon see them come up.

'Mr. Codrington and Mr. Bice got their horses ready to ride down, and I

got the rooms ready, when, in an hour, a Norfolk Island boy rode up to

say the flag was half-mast high.'

'We told the boys and girls something was wrong, to stop their joyous

shouting and laughing; and then I waited till Mr. Jackson returned, and

all he could say was, "Only Brooke has come!"'

What more shall I tell? Comments on such a life and such a death are

superfluous; and to repeat the testimonies of friends, outpourings of

grief, and utterances in sermons is but to weaken the impression of the

reality!

There is pain too in telling the further fate of Nukapu. H.M.S.

'Rosario,' Commander Markham, then cruising in the Southern Pacific,

touched at Norfolk Island, and Captain Markham undertook at once to go

to the island and make enquiries.

A protest was drawn up and signed by all the members of the Mission

against any attempt to punish the natives for the murder; and Captain

Markham, a kind, humane, and conscientious man, as no one can doubt,

promised that nothing of the kind should be attempted.

But the natives could not but expect retaliation for what they had done.

There was no interpreter. They knew nothing of flags of truce; and when

they saw a boat approaching, full of white men, armed, what could they

apprehend but vengeance for 'Bisope'? So they discharged a volley of

arrows, and a sergeant of marines was killed. This was an attack on the

British flag, and it was severely chastised with British firearms. It

is very much to be doubted whether Nukapu will ever understand that her

natives were shot, not for killing the Bishop, but for firing on the

British flag. For the present the way is closed, and we can only echo

Fisher Young's sigh, 'Poor Santa Cruz people!'

Bishop Patteson's will bequeathed his whole inheritance to the

Melanesian Mission, and appointed that the senior Priest should take

charge of it until another Bishop should be chosen.

The Rev. Robert Codrington, therefore, took the management, though

refusing the Episcopate; and considering the peculiar qualifications

needful for a Melanesian Bishop, which can only be tested by actual

experiment on physical as well as moral and spiritual abilities, it has,

up to the present moment (May 1873), been thought better to leave the

See vacant, obtaining episcopal aid from the Bishop of Auckland.

But this implies no slackness nor falling off in the Mission. By God's

good providence, Coleridge Patteson had so matured his system that it

could work without him. Mr. Codrington and the other clergy make their

periodic voyages in the 'Southern Cross.' Kohimarama flourishes under

George Sarawia, who was ordained Priest at Auckland on St. Barnabas Day,

1873. Bishop Cowie has paid a visit to Norfolk Island, and ordained

as Deacons, Edward Wogale, Robert Pantatun, Henry Tagalana, to work in

Mota, Santa Maria, and Ara. Joseph Wate remains the chief teacher of the

lads from Bauro; but there is much to be done before the work in that

island can be carried on. The people there seem peculiarly devoid of

earnestness; and it is remarkable that though they were among the first

visited, and their scholars the very earliest favourites, Stephen has

been the only one whose Christianity seems to have been substantial. But

the sight of his patient endurance had the same effect on those who

were with him in the ship as Walter Hotaswol's exhortations had had on

himself, and several of them began in earnest to prepare for Baptism.

The English staff of the Mission has been recruited by the Rev. John

R. Selwyn, and the Rev. John Still, as well as by Mr. Kenny from New

Zealand. And there is good hope that 'He who hath begun a good work will

perform it unto the day of the Lord.'

As to the crimes connected with the murder, the Queen herself directed

the attention of Parliament to it in her Speech at the commencement of

the Session of 1872. The Admiralty do what in them lies to keep watch

over the labour vessels by means of Queen's ships; and in Queensland,

regulations are made; in Fiji, the British Consul endeavours to examine

the newly arrived, whether they have been taken away by force. But

it may be feared that it will not be possible entirely to prevent

atrocities over so wide a range; though if, as Bishop Patteson

suggested, all vessels unregistered, and not committed to trustworthy

masters, were liable to be seized and confiscated, much of the shameless

deceit and horrible skull-hunting would be prevented.

Perhaps the fittest conclusion to the Bishop's history will be the words

written by Henry Tagalana, translated literally by Mr. Codrington:--

'As he taught, he confirmed his word with his good life among us, as

we all know; and also that he perfectly well helped anyone who might be

unhappy about anything, and spoke comfort to him about it; and about his

character and conduct, they are consistent with the law of God. He gave

the evidence of it in his practice, for he did nothing carelessly, lest

he should make anyone stumble and turn from the good way; and again he

did nothing to gain anything for himself alone, but he sought what he

might keep others with, and then he worked with it: and the reason was

his pitifulness and his love. And again, he did not despise anyone, nor

reject anyone with scorn; whether it were a white or a black person he

thought them all as one, and he loved them all alike.'

'He loved them all alike!' That was the secret of John Coleridge

Patteson's history and his labours.

Need more be said of him? Surely the simple islander's summary of his

character is the honour he would prefer.