By Reef and Palm
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Louis Becke >> By Reef and Palm
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But, the Chilian officer said, on reaching the island he had found the
natives to be very peaceable and inoffensive, and, although much
alarmed at the appearance of his armed landing party from the corvette,
they had given him a letter from the Englishman, and had satisfied him
that Dr Francis ---- had remained with them for some twelve months
only, and had then left the island in a passing whale-ship, and
Commander Gallegos, making them suitable presents, bade them good-bye,
and steamed away to Valparaiso.
* * * * *
This was all the polite little commander had to say, and, after a
farewell glass of wine, his visitor rose to go, when the captain of the
corvette casually inquired if the POCAHONTAS was likely to call at the
island.
"I ask you," he said in his perfect English, "because one of my ship's
company deserted there. You, senor, may possibly meet with him there.
Yet he is of no value, and he is no sailor, and but a lad. He was very
ill most of the time, and this was his first voyage. I took him ashore
with me in my boat, as he besought me eagerly to do so, and the little
devil ran away and hid, or was hidden by the natives."
"Why didn't you get him back?" asked the captain of the POCAHONTAS.
"That was easy enough, but"--and the commander raised his eyebrows and
shrugged his shoulders--"of what use? He was no use to the corvette.
Better for him to stay there, and perhaps recover, than to die on board
the O'HIGGINS and be thrown to the blue sharks. Possibly, senor, you
may find him well, and it may suit you to take him to your good ship,
and teach him the business of catching the whale. My trade is to show
my crew how to fight, and such as he are of no value for that."
Then the two captains bade each other farewell, and in another hour the
redoubtable O'HIGGINS, with a black trail of smoke streaming astern,
was ten miles away on her course to Valparaiso.
A week after the POCAHONTAS lay becalmed close in to the lee side of
Rapa-nui, and within sight of the houses of the principal village. The
captain, always ready to get a "green" hand, was thinking of the
chances of his securing the Chilian deserter, and decided to lower a
boat and try. Taking four men with him, he pulled ashore, and landed at
the village of Hagaroa.
* * * * *
II
Some sixty or seventy natives clustered round the boat as she touched
the shore. With smiling faces and outstretched hands they surrounded
the captain, and pressed upon him their simple gifts of ripe bananas
and fish baked in leaves, begging him to first eat a little and then
walk with them to Mataveri, their largest village, distant a mile,
where preparations were being made to welcome him formally. The
skipper, nothing loth, bade his crew not to go too far away in their
rambles, and, accompanied by his boatsteerer, was about to set off with
the natives, when he remembered the object of his visit, and asked a
big, well-made woman, the only native present that could speak English,
"Where is the man you hid from the man-of-war?"
* * * * *
There was a dead silence, and for nearly half a minute no one spoke.
The keen blue eyes of the American looked from one face to another
inquiringly, and then settled on the fat, good-natured features of
Varua, the big woman.
Holding her hands, palms upwards, to the captain, she endeavoured to
speak, and then, to his astonishment, he saw that her dark eyes were
filled with tears. And then, as if moved with some sudden and sorrowful
emotion, a number of other women and young girls, murmuring softly in
pitying tones, "E MATE! E MATE!" ["Dead! Dead!"] came to his side, and
held their hands out to him with the same supplicating gesture.
The captain was puzzled. For all his island wanderings and cruises he
had no knowledge of any Polynesian dialect, and the tearful muteness of
the fat Varua was still unbroken. At last she placed one hand on his
sleeve, and, pointing land-ward with the other, said, in her gentle
voice, "Come," and taking his hand in hers, she led the way, the rest
of the people following in silence.
For about half a mile they walked behind the captain and his
boatsteerer and the woman Varua without uttering a word. Presently
Varua stopped, and called out the name of "Taku" in a low voice.
A fine, handsome native, partly clothed in European sailor's dress,
stepped apart from the others and came to her.
Turning to the captain, she said, "This is Taku the Sailor. He can
speak a little English and much Spanish. I tell him now to come with
us, for he has a paper."
Although not understanding the relevancy of her remark, the captain
nodded, and then with gentle insistence Varua and the other women urged
him on, and they again set out.
* * * * *
A few minutes more, and they were at the foot of one of the
massive-stoned and ancient PAPAKU, or cemeteries, on the walls of which
were a number of huge images carved from trachyte, and representing the
trunk of the human body. Some of the figures bore on their heads crowns
of red tufa, and the aspect of all was towards the ocean. At the foot
of the wall of the PAPAKU were a number of prone figures, with hands
and arms sculptured in low relief, the outspread fingers clasping the
hips.
About a cable length from the wall stood two stone houses--memorials of
the olden time--and it was to these that Varua and the two white men,
attended now by women only, directed their steps.
* * * * *
The strange, unearthly stillness of the place, the low whispers of the
women, the array of colossal figures with sphinx-like faces set to the
sea, and the unutterable air of sadness that enwrapped the whole scene,
overawed even the unimaginative mind of the rough whaling captain, and
he experienced a curious feeling of relief when his gentle-voiced guide
entered through the open doorway the largest of the two houses, and, in
a whisper, bade him follow.
* * * * *
A delightful sense of coolness was his first sensation on entering, and
then with noiseless step the other women followed and seated themselves
on the ground.
Still clasping his hand, Varua led him to the farther end of the house,
and pointed to a motionless figure that lay on a couch of mats, covered
with a large piece of navy-blue calico. At each side of the couch sat a
young native girl, and their dark, luminous eyes, shining star-like
from out the wealth of black, glossy hair that fell upon their bronzed
shoulders, turned wonderingly upon the stranger who had broken in upon
their watch.
* * * * *
Motioning the girls aside, Varua released her hold of the white man's
hand and drew the cloth from off the figure, and the seaman's pitying
glance fell upon the pale, sweet features of a young white girl.
But for the unmistakable pallid hue of death he thought at first that
she slept. In the thin, delicate hands, crossed upon her bosom, there
was placed, after the manner of those of her faith, a small metal
crucifix. Her hair, silky and jet black, was short like a man's, and
the exquisitely-modelled features, which even the coldness of death had
not robbed of their beauty, showed the Spanish blood that, but a few
hours before, had coursed through her veins.
Slowly the old seaman drew the covering over the still features, and,
with an unusual emotion stirring his rude nature, he rose, and,
followed by Varua, walked outside and sat upon a broken pillar of lava
that lay under the wall of the PAPAKU.
* * * * *
Calling his boatsteerer, he ordered him to return to the beach and go
off to the ship with instructions to the mate to have a coffin made as
quickly as possible and send it ashore; and then, at a glance from
Varua, who smiled a grave approval as she listened to his orders, he
followed her and the man she called Taku into the smaller of the two
houses.
Round about the inside walls of this ancient dwelling of a forgotten
race were placed a number of seamen's chests made of cedar and camphor
wood--the LARES and PENATES of most Polynesian houses. The gravelled
floor was covered with prettily-ornamented mats of FALA (the
screw-palm).
Seating herself, with Taku the Sailor, on the mats, Varua motioned the
captain to one of the boxes, and then told him a tale that moved
him--rough, fierce, and tyrannical as was his nature--to the deepest
pity.
* * * * *
III
"It is not yet twenty days since the fighting PAHI AFI (steamer) came
here, and we of Mataveri saw the boat full of armed men land on the
beach at Hagaroa. Filled with fear were we; but yet as we had done no
wrong we stood on the beach to welcome. And, ere the armed men had left
the boat, we knew them to be the SIPANIOLA from Chili--the same as
those that came here ten years ago in three ships, and seized and bound
three hundred and six of our men, and carried them away for slaves to
the land of the Tae Manu, and of whom none but four ever returned to
Rapa-nui. And then we trembled again."
(She spoke of the cruel outrage of 1862, when three Peruvian
slave-ships took away over three hundred islanders to perish on the
guano-fields of the Chincha Islands).
"The chief of the ship was a little man, and he called out to us in the
tongue of Chili, 'Have no fear,' and took a little gun from out its
case of skin that hung by his side, and giving it to a man in the boat,
stepped over to us, and took our hands in his.
"'Is there none among ye that speak my tongue?' he said quickly.
"Now, this man here, Taku the Sailor, speaketh the tongue of Chili, but
he feared to tell it, lest they might take him away for a sailor; so he
held his lips tight.
"Then I, who for six years dwelt with English people at Tahiti, was
pushed forward by those behind me and made to talk in English; and lo!
the little man spoke in your tongue even as quick as he did in that of
Chili. And then he told us that he came for Farani [Frank].
* * * * *
"Now this Farani was a young white man of PERETANIA (England), big and
strong. He came to us a year and a half ago. He was rich, and had with
him chests filled with presents for us of Rapa-nui; and he told us that
he came to live a while among us, and look upon the houses of stone and
the Faces of the Silent that gaze out upon the sea. For a year he dwelt
with us and became as one of ourselves, and we loved him; and then,
because no ship came, he began to weary and be sad. At last a
ship--like thine, one that hunts for the whale--came, and Farani called
us together, and placed a letter in the hands of the chief at Mataveri,
and said: 'If it so be that a ship cometh from Chili, give these my
words to the captain, and all will be well.' Then he bade us farewell
and was gone.
* * * * *
"All this I said in quick words, and then we gave to the little
fighting chief the letter Farani had written. When he had counted the
words in the letter, he said: 'BUENO, it is well,' and called to his
men, and they brought out many gifts for us from the boat--cloth, and
garments for men and women, and two great bags of canvas filled with
tobacco. AI-A-AH! many presents he gave us--this because of the good
words Farani had set down in the letter. Then the little chief said to
me, 'Let these my men walk where they list, and I will go with thee to
Mataveri and talk with the chief.'
"So the sailors came out of the boats carrying their guns and swords in
their hands, but the little chief, whose AVAGUTU (moustache) stuck out
on each side of his face like the wings of a flying-fish when it leaps
in terror from the mouth of the hungry bonito, spoke angrily, and they
laid their guns and swords back in the boats.
"So the sailors went hither and thither with our young men and girls;
and, although at that time I knew it not, she, who now is not, was one
of them, and walked alone.
"Then I, and Taku the Sailor, and the little sea-chief came to the
houses of Mataveri, and he stayed awhile and spoke good words to us.
And we, although we fear the men of Chili for the wrong they once did
us, were yet glad to listen, for we also are of their faith.
* * * * *
"As we talked, there came inside the house a young girl named Temeteri,
whom, when Farani had been with us for two months, he had taken for
wife; and she bore him a son. But from the day that he had sailed away
she became sick with grief; and when, after many months, she told me
that Farani had said he would return to her, my heart was heavy, for I
know the ways of white men with us women of brown skins. Yet I feared
to tell her he lied and would return no more. Now, this girl Temeteri
was sought after by a man named Huarani, the son of Heremai, who
desired to marry her now that Farani had gone, and he urged her to
question the chief of the fighting ship, and ask him if Farani would
return.
* * * * *
"So I spoke of Temeteri. He laughed and shook his head, and said: 'Nay,
Farani the Englishman will return no more; but yet one so beautiful as
she,' and he pointed to Temeteri, 'should have many lovers and know no
grief. Let her marry again and forget him, and this is my marriage gift
to her,' and he threw a big golden coin upon the mat on which the girl
sat.
"She took it in her hand and threw it far out through the doorway with
bitter words, and rose and went away to her child.
"Then the little captain went back to the boat and called his men to
him, and lo! one was gone. Ah! he was angry, and a great scar that ran
down one side of his face grew red with rage. But soon he laughed, and
said to us: 'See, there be one of my people hidden away from me. Yet he
is but a boy, and sick; and I care not to stay and search for him. Let
him be thy care so that he wanders not away and perishes among the
broken lava; he will be in good hands among the people of Rapa-nui.'
With that he bade us farewell, and in but a little time the great
fighting ship had gone away towards the rising sun.
* * * * *
"All that day and the next we searched, but found not him who had
hidden away; but in the night of the second day, when it rained
heavily, and Taku (who is my brother's son) and I and my two children
worked at the making of a KUPEGA (net), he whom we had sought came to
the door. And as we looked our hearts were filled with pity, for, as he
put out his hands to us, he staggered and fell to the ground.
"So Taku--who is a man of a good heart--and I lifted him up and carried
him to a bed of soft mats, and as I placed my hand on his bosom to see
if he was dead, lo! it was soft as a woman's, and I saw that the
stranger was a young girl!
"I took from her the wet garments and brought warm clothes of MAMOE
(blankets), and Taku made a great fire, and we rubbed her cold body and
her hands and feet till her life came back to her again, and she sat up
and ate a little beaten-up taro. When the night and the dawn touched
she slept again.
* * * * *
"The sun was high when the white girl awoke, and fear leapt into her
eyes when she saw the house filled with people who came to question
Taku and me about the stranger. With them came the girl Temeteri, whose
head was still filled with foolish thoughts of Farani, her white lover.
"I went to the strange girl, put my arm around her, and spoke, but
though she smiled and answered in a little voice, I understood her not,
for I know none of the tongue of Chili. But yet she leaned her head
against my bosom, and her eyes that were as big and bright as Fetuaho,
the star of the morning, looked up into mine and smiled through their
tears.
* * * * *
"There was a creat buzzing of talk among the women. Some came to her
and touched her hands and forehead, and said: 'Let thy trembling cease;
we of Rapa-nui will be kind to the white girl.'
"And as the people thronged about her and talked, she shook her head
and her eyes sought mine, and hot tears splashed upon my hand. Then the
mother of Temeteri raised her voice and called to Taku the Sailor, and
said: 'O Taku, thou who knowest her tongue, ask her of Farani, my white
son, the husband of my daughter.'
* * * * *
"The young girls in the house laughed scornfully at old Pohere, for
some of them had loved Farani, who yet had put them all aside for
Temeteri, whose beauty exceeded theirs; and so they hated her and
laughed at her mother. Then Taku, being pressed by old Pohere, spoke in
the tongue of Chili, but not of Temeteri.
"Ah! She sprang to her feet and talked then! and the flying words
chased one another from her lips; and these things told she to Taku:--
She had hidden among the broken lava and watched the little captain
come back to the boat and bid us farewell. Then when night came she had
crept out and gone far over to the great PAPAKU, and lay down to hide
again, for she feared the fighting ship might return to seek her. And
all that day she lay hidden in the lava till night fell upon her again,
and hunger drove her to seek the faces of men. In the rain she all but
perished, till God brought her feet to this, my house.
"Then said Taku the Sailor: 'Why didst thou flee from the ship?'
"The white girl put her hands to her face and wept, and said: 'Bring me
my jacket.'
"I gave to her the blue sailor's jacket, and from inside of it she took
a little flat thing and placed it in her bosom.
* * * * *
"Again said old Pohere to Taku: 'O man of slow tongue, ask her of
Farani.' So he asked in this wise:
"'See, O White Girl, that is Pohere, the mother of Temeteri, who bore a
son to the white man that came here to look upon the Silent Faces; and
because he came from thy land, and because of the heart of Temeteri,
which is dried up for love of him, does this foolish old woman ask thee
if thou hast seen him; for long months ago he left Rapa-nui. In our
tongue we call him Farani.'
* * * * *
"The girl looked at Taku the Sailor, and her lips moved, but no words
came. Then from her bosom she took the little flat thing and held it to
him, but sickness was in her hand so that it trembled, and that which
she held fell to the ground. So Taku stooped and picked it up from
where it lay on the mat, and looked, and his eyes blazed, and he
shouted out 'AUE!' for it was the face of Farani that looked into his!
And as he held it up in his hand to the people, they, too, shouted in
wonder; and then the girl Temeteri cast aside those that stood about
her, and tore it from his hand and fled.
"'Who is she?' said the white girl, in a weak voice to Taku; 'and why
hath she robbed me of that which is dear to me?' and Taku was ashamed,
and turned his face away from her because of two things--his heart was
sore for Temeteri, who is a blood relation, and was shamed because her
white lover had deserted her; and he was full of pity for the white
girl's tears. So he said nought.
"The girl raised herself, and her hand caught Taku by the arm, and
these were her words: 'O man, for the love of Jesu Christ, tell me what
was this woman Temeteri to my husband?'
"Now Taku the Sailor was sore troubled, and felt it hard to hurt her
heart, yet he said: 'Was Farani, the Englishman, thy husband?'
"She wept again, 'He was my husband.'
"'Why left he one as fair as thee?' said Taku, in wonder.
"She shook her head. 'I know not, except he loved to look upon strange
lands; yet he loved me.'
"'He is a bad man,' said Taku. 'He loved others as well as thee. The
girl that fled but now with his picture was wife to him here. He loved
her, and she bore him a son.'
"The girl's head fell on my shoulder, and her eyes closed, and she
became as dead; and lo! in a little while, as she strove to speak,
blood poured from her mouth and ran down over her bosom.
"'It is the hand of Death,' said Taku the Sailor.
* * * * *
"Where she now lies, there died she, at about the hour when the people
of Vaihou saw the sails of thy ship.
"We have no priest here, for the good father that was here three years
ago is now silent [i.e. dead]; yet did Taku and I pray with her. And ere
she died she said she would set down some words on paper; so Alrema, my
little daughter, hastened to Mataveri, and the chief sent back some paper
and VAI TUHI (ink) that had belonged to the good priest. So with weak hand
she set down some words, but even as she wrote she rose up and threw out
her hands, and called out: 'Francisco! Francisco!' and fell back, and was
dead."
* * * * *
IV
The captain of the POCAHONTAS dashed the now fast-falling tears from
his eyes, and with his rough old heart swelling with pity for the poor
wanderer, took from Taku the sheet of paper on which the heart-broken
girl's last words were traced.
Ere he could read it a low murmur of voices outside told him his crew
had returned. They carried a rude wooden shell, and then with bared
heads the captain and boatsteerer entered the house where she lay.
Again the old man raised the piece of navy blue cloth from off the
sweet, sad face, and a heavy tear dropped down upon her forehead. Then,
aided by the gentle, sympathetic women, his task was soon finished, and
two of his crew entered and carried their burden to its grave. Service
there was none--only the prayers and tears of the brown women of
Rapa-nui.
* * * * *
Ere he said farewell the captain of the whale-ship placed money in the
hands of Varua and Taku. They drew back, hurt and mortified. Seeing his
mistake, the seaman desired Varua to give the money to the girl
Temeteri.
"Nay, sir," said Varua, "she would but give me bitter words. Even when
she who is now silent was not yet cold, Temeteri came to the door of
the house where she lay and spat twice on the ground, and taking up
gravel in her hand cast it at her, and cursed her in the name of our
old heathen gods. And as for money, we here in Rapa-nui need it not.
May Christ protect thee on the sea. Farewell!"
* * * * *
The captain of the POCAHONTAS rose and came to the cabin table, and
motioning to his guests to fill their glasses, said--
"'Tis a real sad story, gentlemen, and if I should ever run across
Doctor Francis, I should talk some to him. But see here. Here is my
log; my mate, who is a fancy writist, wrote it at my dictation. I can't
show you the letter that the pore creature herself wrote; that I ain't
going to show to any one."
The two captains rose and stood beside him, and read the entry in the
log of the POCAHONTAS.
"November 28, 187-.
This day I landed at Easter Island, to try and obtain as a 'green' hand
a young Chilian seaman who, the captain of the Chilian corvette
O'HIGGINS informed me, had run away there. On landing I was shown the
body of a young girl, whom the natives stated to be the deserter. She
had died that morning. Buried her as decently as circumstances would
permit. From a letter she wrote on the morning of her death I learned
her name to be Senora Teresa T----. Her husband, Dr Francis T----, was
an Englishman in the service of the Chilian Republic. He was sent out
on a scientific mission to the island, and his wife followed him in the
O'HIGGINS disguised as a blue-jacket. I should take her to have been
about nineteen years of age.
"SPENCE ELDRIDGE, MASTER.
"MANUAL LEGASPE, 2ND OFFICER.
"Brig POCAHONTAS, of Martha's Vineyard, U.S.A."
"Well, that's curious now," said the skipper of the NASSAU; "why, I
knew that man. He left the island in the KING DARIUS, of New Bedford,
and landed at Ponape in the Caroline Group, whar those underground
ruins are at Metalanien Harbour. Guess he wanted to potter around there
a bit. But he got inter some sorter trouble among the natives there,
an' he got shot."
"Aye," said the captain of the DAGGET, "I remember the affair. I was
mate of the JOSEPHINE, and we were lying at Jakoits Harbour when he was
killed, and now I remember the name too. Waal, he wasn't much account,
anyhow."
* * * * *
Ten years ago a wandering white man stood, with Taku the Sailor, at the
base of the wall of the great PAPAKU, and the native pointed out the
last resting-place of the wanderer. There, under the shadow of the
Silent Faces of Stone, the brave and loving heart that dared so much is
at peace for ever.
BRANTLEY OF VAHITAHI
One day a trading vessel lay becalmed off Tatakoto, in the Paumotu
Archipelago, and the captain and supercargo, taking a couple of native
sailors with them, went ashore at dawn to catch some turtle. The turtle
were plentiful and easily caught, and after half a dozen had been put
in the boat, the two white men strolled along the white hard beach. The
captain--old, grizzled, and grim--seemed to know the place well, and
led the way.
* * * * *
The island is very narrow, and as they left the beach and gained the
shade of the forest of coconuts that grew to the margin of high-water
mark, they could see, between the tall, stately palms, the placid
waters of the lagoon, and a mile or so across, the inner beach of the
weather side of the island.
For a quarter of a mile or so the two men walked on till the widest
part of the island was reached. Here, under the shadow of some giant
PUKA trees, the old skipper stopped and sat down on a roughly hewn slab
of coral, the remains of one of those MARAE or heathen temples that are
to be found almost anywhere in the islands of Eastern Polynesia.
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