Two Years with the Natives in the Western Pacific Part 13

CHAPTER XVI

THE SANTA CRUZ ISLANDS

After my return to Port Vila, where I again had the honour of being Mr. King's guest, and having practically finished my task in the New Hebrides, I decided not to leave this part of the world without visiting the Santa Cruz Islands, a group of small islands north of the New Hebrides and east of the Solomon Islands. This archipelago has not had much contact with civilization, and is little known. I had a good opportunity to go there, as the steam yacht Southern Cross of the Anglican mission in Melanesia was expected to stop at Vila on her way to the Solomons. She touched at the Santa Cruz island of Nitendi going and returning, and could therefore drop me and take me up again after about six weeks. While waiting for her arrival, I investigated some caves on Leleppa, near Port Havannah, which the natives reported to be inhabited by dwarfish men; but the results were insignificant.

Pa.s.sage having been granted me by the skipper of the Southern Cross, I once more sailed the well-known route northward through the New Hebrides and Banks Islands; but from Ureparapara onward I was in strange waters. The Southern Cross was a steamer of about five hundred tons, built especially for this service, that is, to convey the missionaries and natives from the headquarters on Norfolk Island to the different islands. Life on board was far from luxurious; but there was good company and an interesting library. I had the pleasure of making some interesting acquaintances, and the missionaries gave me much valuable information about the natives and their customs. When the tone of the conversation in the evening threatened to become too serious, our jovial Captain S. speedily improved matters by his grotesquely comical sallies. A strenuous life was that of the missionary who was responsible for the organization of the voyage; he had to visit the native communities, and went ash.o.r.e at every anchorage, sometimes through an ugly surf or dangerous shoals, generally with overcrowded whale-boats; and this went on for three months. I had nothing to do, and amused myself by comparing the boys from the various islands, who were quite different in looks, speech and character. There were the short, thick-set, plebeian natives from the New Hebrides, the well-built men from the Solomons, with their long faces and open, energetic expression, the languid, sleepy boys from the Torres Islands and the savage Santa Cruzians.

The trip of the Southern Cross was important as an experiment, being the first with an exclusively native crew. Hitherto the Melanesians had been considered incapable of any work calling for energy, initiative and conscientiousness. Captain C. was convinced that this was unjust, and started on this voyage without any whites except the officers; the result was most satisfactory. The natives, when carefully and patiently trained, work quite as well as low-cla.s.s whites, and have proved themselves capable of more than plantation work.

It was a bright morning when we entered the lovely Graciosa Bay on Nitendi. The island had a much more tropical aspect than those of the New Hebrides, and the vegetation seemed more varied and gayer in colour. Natives in canoes approached from every side, and all along the beach lay populous villages, a sight such as the now deserted sh.o.r.es of the New Hebrides must have afforded in days gone by. Hardly had we cast anchor when the ship was surrounded by innumerable canoes. The men in them were all naked, except the teachers the missionaries had stationed here; all the others were genuine aborigines, who managed their boats admirably, and came hurrying on board, eager to begin bartering.

The natives here have a bad reputation, and are supposed to be particularly dangerous, because they never stir from home without their poisoned arrows. A missionary had recently been forced to leave the island, after having been besieged by the natives for several days. But it would seem that they are not hostile unless one of their many intricate laws and customs is violated, which may happen easily enough to anyone unacquainted with their habits.

I took up my quarters with the only white man in the place, a Mr. M., who managed a cocoa-nut plantation for an Australian company with boys from the Solomons. My first task was to find servants, as none had dared accompany me from the New Hebrides to the ill-famed Santa Cruz Islands. Through his coprah trade Mr. M. knew the people well, and by his help I soon found two boys who had some vague notion of biche la mar, real savages, who served me well in a childish, playful way. They were always jolly, and although they seemed to look upon what they did for me rather as a kindness than a duty, we got along fairly well. When it became known that my service implied good food and little work, many others applied, but I only chose one young fellow, probably the most perfect specimen of a man I have ever seen. He kept himself scrupulously clean, and in his quiet, even behaviour there was something that distinguished him from all the rest. It is difficult to put the beauty of a human body into words; I can only say that he was of symmetrical build, with a deep chest and well-developed limbs, but without the great muscles that would have given him the coa.r.s.e aspect of an athlete. His greatest charm was in the grace of his movements and the natural n.o.bility of his att.i.tudes and his walk; for he moved as lightly and daintily as a deer, and it was a constant pleasure, while walking behind him during our marches through the forest, to admire his elastic gait, the play of his muscles and the elegant ease with which he threaded the thicket. I tried to take some photographs of him, but without great success, owing to technical difficulties; besides, the face had to be hidden as much as possible, as to a European eye the natives'

faces often seem to have a brutal expression. The men of Santa Cruz, too, wear disfiguring nose-rings of tortoise-sh.e.l.l hanging down over their mouths, so large that when eating they have to be lifted up out of the way with the left hand. Another ugly habit is the chewing of betel, the nut of the areca palm, which is mixed with pepper leaves and lime. The lime is carried in a gourd, often decorated with drawings and provided with an artistically carved stopper. The leaves and this bottle are kept in beautifully woven baskets, the prettiest products of native art, made of banana fibre interwoven with delicate designs in black. Betel-chewing seems to have a slightly intoxicating effect; my boys, at least, were often strangely exhilarated in the evening, although they had certainly had no liquor. The lime forms a black deposit on the teeth, which sometimes grows to such a size as to hang out of the mouth, an appendage of which some natives seem rather vain.

The dress of the men consists of a narrow belt of bark and a strip of tapa worn between the legs. Around their knees and ankles they wear small, shiny sh.e.l.ls, and on their chests a large circular plate of tridacna-sh.e.l.l, to which is attached a dainty bit of carved tortoise-sh.e.l.l representing a combination of fish and turtle. This beautiful ornament is very effective on the dark skin. In the lobes of the ears are hung large tortoise-sh.e.l.l ornaments, and on the arms large sh.e.l.l rings or bracelets braided with sh.e.l.l and cocoa-nut beads are worn.

The men are never seen without bows and arrows of large and heavy dimensions. Like all the belongings of the Santa Cruzians, the arrows show artistic taste, being carefully carved and painted so as to display black carving on a white and red ground. The points of the arrows are made of human bone.

I bought one of the excellent canoes made by these people, and often crossed the lovely, quiet bay to visit different villages. The natives take great care of their canoes, and make it a point of honour to keep them spotlessly white, which they do by rubbing them with a seaweed they gather at the bottom of the ocean.

On approaching a village it requires all the skill of the native not to be dashed by the swell against the reefs. A narrow sandy beach lies behind, and then a stone terrace 6 feet high, on which the gamal is built. Generally there was great excitement when I landed, and the men came rushing from all sides to see me. They were not hostile, only too eager for trade, and I had to interrupt my visits for a week and trade only at the house where I was staying, so as to give them time to quiet down. This helped matters a little, although, until the day I left, I was always the centre of an excited mob that pulled at my sleeves and trousers and shrieked into my ears. I was always cordially invited to enter the gamals; these were square houses, kept very clean, with a fireplace in the centre, and the floor covered with mats. As usual, the roof was full of implements of all sorts, and over the fire there was a stand and shelves, where coprah was roasted and food preserved.

The natives are expert fishermen, and know how to make the finest as well as the coa.r.s.est nets. They frequently spend the mornings fishing, a flotilla of canoes gathering at some shallow spot in the bay.

The afternoons are mostly spent in the village in a dolce far niente. Each village has its special industry: in one the arm-rings of sh.e.l.l are made, in another the breastplates, in a third canoes, or the fine mats which are woven on a loom of the simplest system, very similar to a type of loom found in North America. Weaving, it will be remembered, is quite unknown in the New Hebrides.

An object peculiar to these islands is feather money. This consists of the fine breast-feathers of a small bird, stuck together to form plates, which are fastened on a strip of sinnet, so that a long ribbon of scarlet feathers is obtained of beautiful colour and brilliancy. These strips are rolled and preserved in the houses, carefully wrapped up and only displayed on great occasions. Considering how few available feathers one little bird yields, and how many are needed for one roll, it is not surprising that this feather money is very valuable, and that a single roll will buy a woman. At great dances the circular dancing-grounds along the sh.o.r.e are decorated with these ribbons.

For a dance the men exchange the nose-ring of tortoise-sh.e.l.l for a large, finely carved plate of mother-of-pearl. In the perforated sides of the nose they place thin sticks, which stand high up towards the eyes. In the hair they wear sticks and small boards covered with the same feathers as those used for feather money. They have dancing-sticks of a most elaborate description, heavy wooden clubs of the shape of a canoe, painted in delicate designs and with rattles at the lower end. The designs are black and red on a white ground, and are derived from shapes of fish and birds. Similar work is done on carvings showing the different species of fish and birds; the drawing is exquisite, and shows fine feeling for ornamental composition.

The position of women in Santa Cruz is peculiar, although the Suque does not exist, and therefore no separation of fires is enforced. Masculine jealousy seems to have reached its climax here, for no man from another village even dares look at a woman. The women's houses are a little inland, away from the gamal and separated by high walls from the outer world. Most of the houses are square, but there are some circular ones, a type very rare in these regions. To my regret I was never able to examine one of these round houses, so that I have no idea how they are built. To enter the women's quarters, or to approach nearer than 100 metres to any woman, is a deadly offence, and such breaches of etiquette are the cause of frequent feuds. Only once I was taken by one of my boys through the lanes of his village, and this was considered very daring, and the limit of permissible investigation. However, with the help of Mr. M., who was practically a "citizen" of one of the villages, I succeeded in taking some photographs of women; but only the oldest dowagers and some sick girls presented themselves, and among them I saw the most repulsive being I ever met,--an old shrivelled-up hag. At sight of such a creature one cannot wonder that old women were often accused of sorcery.

It is surprising how much inferior physically the women of Nitendi are to the men. The men are among the best made people I ever saw, while the women are the poorest. The dress of the women consists of large pieces of tapa, worn around the hips and over the head, and a third piece is sometimes used as a shawl. Tapa is not made at Graciosa Bay, but inland; it is often painted in simple but effective geometrical designs.

The majority of the population lives near the sea; I was credibly informed that there are hardly any people inland. The Santa Cruzian is a "salt-water man," and there is a string of villages all along the coast. The inhabitants of the different villages keep very much to themselves, and their territories are separated by a strip of forest, and on the sh.o.r.e by high stone walls leading far out into the sea. On the whole, the two thousand people in the bay live very quietly, certainly more so than the same number of whites would without any police. It is not quite clear in what respect our civilization could improve them, as, like most aborigines, they have a p.r.o.nounced sense of propriety, justice and politeness. There is very little disputing or quarrelling, and differences of opinion are usually settled by a joke, so that in this respect the savages show a behaviour far superior to that of many a roaring and swearing white.

I found neither drums nor statues here, and of the local religion I could learn nothing. There is a skull-cult, similar to that on Malekula: a man will paint the skull of a favourite wife or child yellow, shut all the openings with wooden stoppers and carry the relic about with him. Towards the end of my stay I obtained possession of some of these interesting skulls. The idea in shutting the holes is doubtless to preserve the spirit of the dead inside the skull.

One evening I crossed the bay to attend a dance. The starless sky shone feebly, spotted with dark, torn clouds. A dull silver light lay on the sea, which was scarcely lighter than the steep sh.o.r.es. In the silence the strokes of our oars sounded sharp and energetic, yet they seemed to come from a distance. In the darkness we felt first the outrigger, then the canoe, lifted by a heavy swell, which glided away out of sight in monotonous rhythm. Then light began to play around us, indistinct at first, then two silver stripes formed at the bow and ran along the boat. They were surrounded by bright, whirling sparks, and at the bow of the outrigger the gayest fireworks of silver light sprang up, sparkling and dying away as if the boat had been a meteor. The oars, too, dripped light, as though they were bringing up fine silver dust from below. The naked boy in front of me shone like a marble statue on a dark background as his beautiful body worked in rhythmic movements, the light playing to and fro on his back. And ever the sparks danced along the boat in hypnotizing confusion, and mighty harmonies seemed to echo through the night air. The feeling of time was lost, until the opposite sh.o.r.e rose to a black wall, then, through the silence, we heard the cold rush of the surf beating moodily on the reef. We slackened speed, the fairy light died and the dream ended. We kept along the sh.o.r.e, looking for the entrance, which the boys found by feeling for a well-known rock with their oars. A wave lifted us, the boys bent to their oars with all their might, we shot across the reef and ran into the soft sand of the beach.

But as the rain fell now in torrents, there was no dance that night.

Mr. M. and I attempted a few excursions, but bad weather interfered with our plans, and a rainy period of three weeks followed. One squall chased the other, rattling on the roof, forming swamps everywhere, and penetrating everything with moisture. I was glad when the Southern Cross came back for me, especially as this was to be the beginning of my homeward journey.

This time we touched at a small island called Tucopia, where a primitive Polynesian population still exists, probably the only island where this is the case. When the steamer approached we saw the people running about on the reef in excitement, and soon countless canoes surrounded us. The appearance of these islanders was quite new to me. Instead of the dark, curly-haired, short Melanesians, I saw tall, light-coloured men with thick manes of long, golden hair. They climbed aboard, wonderful giants, with soft, dark eyes, kind smiles and childlike manners. They went everywhere, touched everything, and flattered and caressed us. We were all eager to go ash.o.r.e, and at the edge of the reef an excited crowd awaited our arrival impatiently and pulled our boat violently on the rocks in their eagerness. Two tall fellows grabbed me under the arms, and, w.i.l.l.y-nilly, I was carried across the reef and carefully deposited under a shady tree on the beach. At first I did not quite trust my companions, but I was powerless to resist, and soon I became more confident, as my new friends constantly hugged and stroked me. Soon a missionary was brought ash.o.r.e in the same way, and then, to our greatest surprise, a man approached us who spoke biche la mar. He asked if we had no sickness on board, for some time ago the same ship had infected the island with an epidemic that had caused many deaths. We a.s.sured him that we had none, and he gave us permission to visit the island, telling us, too, that we were to have the great honour of being presented to one of the four chiefs. This was indeed something to be proud of, for in Polynesian islands the chieftainship, as I have said, is hereditary, and the chiefs are paid honours almost divine. We took off our hats and were led before the chief, a tall, stout man, who sat in a circle of men on a sort of throne, with his ceremonial spear leaning against a tree beside him. His subjects approached him crouching, but he shook hands with us and smiled kindly at us. A n.o.ble gesture of the hand gave us leave to taste a meal prepared to welcome us, which looked most uninviting, but turned out to be beautifully cooked sago and cocoa-nut cream. We could not finish the generous portions, and presently signed that we were satisfied; the chief seemed to regret that we did not do more honour to his hospitality, but he gave us permission to walk about. While all the other natives ran about in great excitement over our visit, the good old man sat on his throne all the time, quite solemnly, although I am convinced that he was fairly bursting with curiosity. We hurried through the village, so as to get a general idea of the houses and implements, and then to the beach, which was a beautiful sight. Whereas on Melanesian islands the dancing-grounds only are kept cleared, and surrounded by thick shrubbery for fear of invasion, here all the underbrush had been rooted out, and the sh.o.r.e was like a park, with a splendid view through dark tree-trunks across the blue sea, while the golden, G.o.dlike forms of the natives walked about with proud, regal gait, or stood in animated groups. It was a sight so different in its peaceful simplicity from what I was accustomed to see in Melanesia, it all looked so happy, gay and alluring that it hardly needed the invitations of the kind people, without weapons or suspicion, and with wreaths of sweet-scented flowers around their heads and bodies, to incline us to stay. Truly, the sailors of old were not to blame if they deserted in numbers on such islands, and preferred the careless native life to hard work on board a whaler. Again and again I seemed to see the living originals of some cla.s.sical picture, and more and more my soul succ.u.mbed to the intoxicating charm of the lovely island.

But we could not stay; the steamer whistled, and we had to leave. A young native was going to Norfolk Island, and he took leave of his family and the chief in a manly way which was touching to witness. He bowed and laid his face on the knees of some old white-haired men with finely chiselled, n.o.ble faces. They seemed to bless him, then they raised his head and tenderly pressed their faces against his, so that their noses touched. The boy brushed away a tear and then jumped bravely on board.

When we came on board, the steamer was crowded with natives, and they refused to leave. We had to drive them away energetically, and as their canoes were soon overcrowded, many of them jumped into the water with shouts and laughter, and swam several miles to the sh.o.r.e, floating happily in the blue sea, with their long hair waving after them like liquid gold. Thus I saw the last of the dream-island, bathed in the rays of the setting sun. My regret was shared by the boy, who stood, still ornamented with flowers and wreaths, at the stern of the steamer, looking sadly back at his disappearing paradise.

Our good times, too, were over. We had a dull, rainy night, a heavy, broadside swell, and as the steamer had not enough ballast, she rolled frightfully. In this nasty sea we were afraid she might turn turtle, as another steamer had done some months ago. The storm became such that we had to lie at anchor for five days, sheltered by the coast of Gaua. It was with real relief that I left the Southern Cross at Port Vila; sorry as I was to leave my friends on board, I did not envy them the long voyage to New Zealand.

Two days later I took the mail steamer for Sydney. Although tired enough, and glad to return to the comforts of civilization, I felt real regret at leaving the places where I had spent so many delightful hours, and where I had met with so much kindness on all sides.

THE END