Part 3

The natives of these islands are remarkable from the other natives in these seas, not only from their extreme savage dispositions and eagerness to kill and eat their enemies, but from the dark colour of their skins and the manner in which they dress their hair. They allow it to grow at full length, when it is made very stiff by applying a mixture made of the ashes of burnt coral and then dyed in various colours; the grown people having it always black, when they pick it up into many curious shapes and being very thick and bushy their heads present a very singular and frightful appearance. Their bodies are nearly naked, with no covering except a piece of cloth made from the bark of a tree, wrapped around the waist; though they oil themselves with cocoanut oil which serves to protect their bodies from the rays of the sun and renders the skin soft and pliable.

The females wear a covering made of a sort of grass which is curiously interwoven and being of different colours presents a handsome appearance. Their bodies are oiled and their hair dressed the same as the men. Both sexes always lie with their necks resting on a stick so as not to injure the shape of their hair. The females, although at the complete disposal of the men, are not treated with great severity. They assist in tilling the ground, fishing and cooking; though a great part of their time is spent in fixing their hair. They display considerable ingenuity in making earthen-pots (which much resemble ours) and in making cloth nets.

The men of whatever rank are learnt the art of war and always carry their arms with them wherever they go. They are very ingenious in the construction of their houses and their war-weapons, but in particular in their canoes. Their houses are much like a one-story house in our country (but without windows) in their shape. They are framed of the limbs of trees seized together with a kind of sennet[46] made of the fibres of the cocoanut husk plaited together. On these are fastened small reeds and on them are secured the thatch with which the house is covered.

Their double canoes are formed of two single ones secured together by large timbers on which a platform is built and on which the sail is set and the natives stand. Single canoes have an outrigger and a platform built on the single canoe on which the sail is set. They commence building first by hollowing out the trunk of a tree, when planks are hew’d and seized on until it is of sufficient size, secured by timbers very much resembling those in a ship. The sail is made of mats, the rope of a kind of bark, and is so constructed as to be turned either way without the necessity of turning the canoe round when tacking at sea. The canoes are all fitted to sail either end first. They are sometimes very large containing room for 4 or 5 hundred persons[47] and nearly as long as a ship. They sail remarkably fast and the natives are very expert in the management of them and as the natives all go arm’d, from their savage dress they present a very formidable appearance.

The natives of these islands believe in a Great Spirit whom they think lives in the sky and who made all things. In every town there are a number of priests whom the natives think are endowed with divine powers by the Great Spirit with whom he sometimes converses and informs them how to direct the people. These priests have great influence with the chiefs in declaring war and managing the affairs of the nation.

The principal amusements consisted in a kind of dance, singing songs relating to the war exploits and fishing expeditions, performing warlike manœuvres, and in drinking the ava[48] extracted from the ava-root, of which they are immoderately fond.

[Illustration: MODEL OF A FIJIAN DOUBLE CANOE

Brought to the United States in 1856 by Capt. Thomas C. Dunn, while on the bark _Dragon_ of Salem. Now in the Peabody Museum of Salem.]

A ceremony of this kind was performed almost every morning at the King’s or one of the principal chief’s house and we always had an invitation to attend. A large bowl was prepared in which the cava or ava was put and mixed with water, when it forms a liquor which has much the same effect on a person as opium. The company sit round in a circle, the bowl in the centre, and while it is preparing, they all sing songs relating to some enterprise that is intended or perhaps past, the King having first invoked the Great Spirit to bless the liquor, the people all answering with a word which is equivalent to our amen. It was then carried round in cocoanut shells, the King drinking first, and so on according to the rank, though we always had the honour to drink next to the King. They always give a toast before drinking, frequently wishing the Great Spirit to bless us with a safe arrival to our country; sometimes that he might bless them with a great plenty of yams or fish.

We continued to live on good terms of friendship with the natives, which was much increased by our assisting them in repairing and learning them the use of the muskets and other weapons of which a great many fell into their hands. We always met with a welcome reception when we visited their houses and frequently received small presents of clothes, etc., for the work we did for them, so our situation became quite comfortable, although we could hardly suppress our feelings, to see our property and clothes destroyed, nor reflect on the great distance we were from our homes and friends and the future prospects, without pain and anxiety.

About the last of April, 1831, the king fitted out an expedition of thirty large canoes to go to a place about 50 miles distant to procure certain tribute of the mountaineers which he obliged them to pay him. The King and all the principal warriors, with the women and ourselves, started in the canoes and in two days arrived at the place where we were to meet the mountaineers with the tribute. It was on a beautiful plain where houses were built for the King and the chiefs with their families.

After the King and chiefs were seated in the houses, a party of the women of the mountains marched out in front of our King, fancifully dress’d with flowers and strips of bark of various colours, each having a fish-net of superior workmanship and each bearing in her hand a sort of fan, with which they beat time to a sort of solemn tune which they sung. After performing a number of dances before the King, they divested themselves of their ornaments and nets which became the property of our women, and marched off followed by the shouts and praises of all our party.

A party of the men then presented themselves dressed with a large quantity of curiously-coloured cloth[49] and after performing various dances and manœuvres and leaving their dresses for the men of our party, they marched for the mountains having likewise received the King’s approbation and our shouts and expressions of admiration.

The tribute was now examined by the King’s command. It consisted of 280 hogs, vast quantities of yams, cava-root, etc., on which the High-Priest of our nation envoked the Great Spirit for his approbation of the tribute. The priest, after a ceremony of twirling a cocoanut round two or three times, pronounced that it was very Good, and that it would be proper to have a feast of pork and yams, drink cava, etc. The King then gave orders for a certain number of hogs to be killed, the rest to be divided, and the cava got ready and as we had had nothing to eat for some days we all joined in obeying orders. Each one of the party, ourselves not excepted, received a portion of the provisions and while the King drank his cava, the people prepared the feast.

The King gave the mountaineers a few presents and a specimen of his eloquence in which he informed them that as the ship cast away on his shores had rendered him very powerful, he should expect a larger tribute the next year, giving them to understand he should be ready to use forcible means if it became necessary. With this, the chief took his leave of us and we commenced, according to the advice of the priest, to eat. At night we repaired to the canoes with the tribute and on the next morning started for the town where on the 20th of April we arrived.

On our return, the 2nd officer of the ship, with the carpenter and a number of the crew, left in a canoe to go to Bow, having understood by the natives that a vessel was lost in the same gale that had wrecked our ship and that the Captain and crew resided there. We found the natives of another town, enemies to the King, had set fire to the _Glide_ and she had burnt nearly up.

The 2nd chief, to whom the ship had been delivered, when we abandon’d her, was now taken sick and the priest continued to howl through the night for his recovery. On our asking the reason of such proceedings they told us that the priest was angry because a sufficient sacrifice of pigs had not been made and that the Great Spirit had caused a sickness to afflict the greatest warrior. A number of hogs were immediately killed and buried and numbers of the friends of the chief’s cut off a finger or toe[50] to satisfy the Great Spirit.

We learn’d that it was the custom to cut off their fingers or toes on the death of their friends or on the sickness of their chiefs. We saw a number of very aged people who had become feeble and infirm, call round their friends and bid them farewell and then allow themselves to be strangled and buried without showing any signs of fear for the future or regret for leaving the past.

On the 6th of May we received a letter which was written previous to the gale, from which we learned that the vessel lost at Bow was the brig _Niagara_,[51] Capt. Nathaniel Brown, and that she was from Salem.

Nothing particular occurred until the 22nd of May, 1831, when a sail was seen standing for the anchorage at 5 P. M. At sundown we were on board and she proved to be the schooner _Harriet_, Capt. Young, from the Sandwich Islands and last from Wallis Island. They took us all on board the schooner and after procuring the cables, anchors, etc., of our ship we proceeded for Bow.

On the 9th of June, we arriv’d off Averlon and found there the bark _Peru_,[52] Capt. Egleston, of and from Salem. Captain Egleston took Capt. Archer, Mr. Burnham and the remainder of our crew on board; likewise the Captains Brown and Vanderford[53] of the _Niagara_ with the officers and crew and we proceeded on our course to Bow, where we arrived on June 10th, and anchored off the island where Mr. Manini, supercargo of the schooner, purchased the cables and anchors of the brig _Niagara_, from the King of Bow. Having succeeded in getting them on board we got underweigh and ran down to Avalon and anchored near the bark _Peru_. Capt. Brown came on board the schooner and Capt. Young agreed to forward us to the Sandwich Islands.

On the 26th of June, we lost sight of the Fegee Islands, steering to the N. E. for Wallis Island[54] and arriving there three days later, we found the brig _Chinchilla_,[55] Capt. Meek. Capt. Young not finding it for his interest to return to the Sandwich Islands at present, on the 12th July sailed, intending to return in the space of 6 or 8 weeks, leaving us to reside in their houses and wait for his return.

[Illustration: SHIP CHINCHILLA OF NEW YORK

“Scrimshawed” on a whale’s tooth. Presented to the East India Marine Society of Salem in 1825 by Capt. William Osgood. Now in the Peabody Museum of Salem.]

After a long and most tedious stay on this island, on the 8th of November, the American whale-ship _Braganza_[56] arrived from a cruise off Japan for the purpose of procuring vegetables, water, etc. On the 26th, the brig _Chinchilla_ arrived from Port Jackson, having been obliged to put into that port for provisions. Finding that Capt. Meek was not to return to the Sandwich Islands at present and no chance offering for a passage to a civilized port, I went on board of the _Braganza_, it being the intention of Capt. Wood to cruise for whales about the Equator for the space of 4 or 5 months and then to proceed to some port for supplies, where I should probably find an opportunity to return to the United States.

On Nov. 29th, we left Wallis Island and proceeded towards the Equator where we cruised until the 1st of February, 1832, and succeeded in taking 25 c. of Sperm Oil. Then finding the head of the main-mast rotted badly and the weather rather unfavourable for prosecuting the whaling business we bore away and steered for Otaheite and on the 23rd February we arrived at _Eamco_,[57] an island a short distance from Otaheite where the Captain intended to repair his main-mast. We found at Otaheite, the ship _Atlantic_, Capt. Fisher, who intended to cruise for a short time for whales and then proceed for the United States. I immediately shipped on board and on the 28th February, signed his articles intending to sail the next day. Early the next morning we got underweigh and stood out to sea steering to the south east under short sail with the man at the mast-head looking for whales.

It was on the morning of 20th of April, just as the sun was rising, that the man at the mast-head cried out “There she blows!”[58]

It was very still on board; the ship steered close to the wind, a light breeze from east and not a sound heard except the slight ruffling the ship made as she forced her way through the water. But nothing could have acted so forcibly on our feelings as the cry that whales were in sight. In a moment the ship was in confusion, the sailors came up from below and ran to clear their boats and see all in readiness for the pursuit.

“Where away?” enquired the Captain, as he was coming up the companion-steps and without waiting for an answer ordered the ship to be hove to and the boats manned.

The order was promptly executed by the respective officers and on ascertaining they were sperm whales, he ordered the officers to lower the boats and pursue them. The whales were but a short distance from the ship and we had a good opportunity to observe their movements. The boats, sufficiently armed and manned, soon got amongst the whales, when the man at the mast-head had orders to inform those on deck of the movements in the boats and to inform those in the boats by signals of the situation of the whales.

[Illustration: A SHOAL OF SPERM WHALE OFF THE ISLAND OF HAWAII IN 1833

From an engraving by J. Hill after a painting by T. Birch. The picture shows the famous Roach (Rotch) whaling fleet,--the _Enterprise_, _Wm. Roach_, _Pocahontas_ and _Houqua_, all from Nantucket.]

In a few moments we perceived by a great splashing, which one of them made, that the 1st officer had hove his harpoon into one of them. After running under water some time and taking the line out of the boat to a considerable distance, the whale came up on top of the water. The other whales immediately joining the wounded one and gave the other boats an opportunity of striking also, which they immediately improved and all three of the boats were each fastened to a whale at the same time. After the whales became exhausted they hauled up to them and lanced until they were dead.

In this manner the boats continued to improve their time and weapons until 6 of these huge animals were forced to yield their valuable bodies to the superior skill of Nantucket whalemen. They were soon towed alongside the ship and secured by their tails being fastened to the bows. The crew then proceeded to take the blubber on board. Large tackles were secured on the main-mast, the falls taken to the windlass, and every person stationed in his particular place. The officers at the ship’s side, on stages, to cut the blubber as it is hove on board with the tackles. The harpooners on deck to receive the blubber and overhaul the tackles. The carpenter sharpening the spades, the cooperer preparing the casks, the seamen heaving at the windlass, and the Captain superintending the whole.

They commenced by cutting a hole in the blubber near to the head of the whale, into which a tackle was hooked which served to steady the whale while the officers cut off the head which was hoisted on board. They then proceeded to peel the blubber off the whale, the officers cutting it with their spades into strips about 6 or 8 feet in width and from 12 to 18 feet in length, while it is hove in with the tackles. This causes the whale to turn over and over until the blubber is all off, when they cut the carcass adrift and left it a banquet for the sharks and birds of which there were great numbers around the ship.

After having secured the blubber of all the whales sail was again made on the ship and we proceeded on our way around Cape Horn. In a few days the blubber was tried out and stow’d in the ship’s hold and thus ended what the whalers term’d a fare of sperm oil.

We had a tolerable passage to the United States and on the 25th June, arrived at Nantucket, 119 days from Otaheite, and on the 29th June, 1832, I reached my home in Danvers after having been absent 37 months and 8 days.

FOOTNOTES:

[2] Tasmania. William Endicott says in his Log of this voyage: “Van Diemen’s Island appears from the sea to be high and irregular barren land covered with snow to the summits. The shore is bound with craggy rocks.”

[3] Situated at the northerly end of North Island, this was the principal rendezvous of European and American vessels during the early intercourse with the Pacific. Endicott says in his Log: “The Bay of Islands is a fine place for procuring wood, water, potatoes, pigs and vegetables.”

[4] “Indiaman,” “Diana” and “Tower Castle.”

[5] “New Zealander” of New Zealand.

[6] The primitive Maori method of cooking bodies was to dig a hole in the ground about two feet deep in which was placed a quantity of stones. A fire was built over these and when they were red hot most of them were removed. Those remaining were covered with alternate layers of leaves and flesh until there was as much above as below ground. Two or three quarts of water was then thrown over the pile, old mats spread over it and the whole covered with earth to confine the steam. In twenty minutes the flesh was cooked. Cannibalism was entirely abandoned by 1840 owing to the influence of the missionaries.

[7] The Friendly or Tonga Islands are a group lying south-east of Fiji between 18° and 20° south latitude and 174° and 176° west longitude. They comprise some 150 islands, mostly very small, of which only a few are inhabited. They were discovered by Tasman in 1643 and became a British protectorate in 1900. The natives are of Polynesian stock and have become Christians through the efforts of the Wesleyan Mission established here in 1822. Probably the best early account of the natives of any Pacific islands is William Mariner’s “An Account of the Natives of the Tonga Islands.”

[8] The Fiji islands are an important group of the Central Pacific lying largely between latitude 15°30′ and 19°30′ South and longitude 177° East and 178° West. They comprise some 155 islands, of which 100 are inhabited, and numerous islets and reefs. The group was discovered by Tasman in 1643 and was ceded to Great Britain by Thakombau on Oct. 10, 1874. The natives are of Melanesian stock with an admixture of Polynesian. The mountaineers of Vanua Levu show the purest strain while the costal tribes of that and the surrounding islands show a very pronounced strain of Tongan blood. All are now Christian through the efforts of the Wesleyan missionaries who went there in 1835 and a white man or woman is safer with these natives than on the streets of New York or Chicago.

[9] The result of the infusion of Tongan blood.

[10] War was the chief object in life for the Fijian man and so great was the desire for killing that two men always walked abreast for fear that if one were behind he would be overcome by the temptation to club his companion.

[11] Cannibalism was not practised exclusively on those killed in war. It was tabu or forbidden to the lower classes and they were most frequently the victims. Sometimes if a chief wanted a body for a feast he would send one of his dependents out to waylay a man of the lower classes. He would approach his unsuspecting victim from behind and strike him on the head with a club before he was aware that anything was to happen. Persons dying a natural death were never eaten but those shipwrecked were rescued only that they might be eaten. Neither sex nor age was a deterrent. One chief was so fond of human flesh that he boasted that he never passed a person that he did not wonder how they would taste. The method of cooking bodies was either by baking, in a manner similar to that practised in New Zealand (see note, page 16), or by boiling. The body was rarely baked whole but was dismembered and the trunk cast aside unless the supply was very short.

[12] Turtle Island--Vatoa.

[13] Civil account--civil day. When at sea the log-book day corresponded with the astronomical day and extended from noon to noon; but when anchored for any extended period of time the log-book record was kept in civil time, that is from midnight to midnight.

[14] Mbau or Ambau, a native town on a small island at the southerly end of Ambau Bay on the easterly side of Viti Levu, the largest island of the Fiji group. This town was the residence of Tanoa, the most influential chief in the Islands. It was off this town that the French brig “l’Amiable Josephine” was cut off by the chiefs of Rewa (or Viwa, a town on Viti Levu, the second most influential town in Fiji) in July, 1834, and the captain and all the crew but three were killed. In retaliation for this Dumont D’Urville destroyed the town of Viwa in 1839. In August, 1834, the chief Vendovi of Rewa massacred the mate and five men of the crew of the brig “Charles Doggett” of Salem. One of the crew was eaten.

[15] Brig “Quill,” of Salem, 189 tons, built at Hingham in 1818. Owned by John W., Nathaniel L. and Richard S. Rogers; commanded by Joshua Kinsman.

[16] Mr. Driver.

[17] Oahu, Hawaiian Islands.