Part 15
So the chiefs of Rara sent to Tovutovu, saying, “Help us to rebuild our great _bure_, for the post is rotten. We have seen a _vesi_-tree seven fathoms long, and of great girth, which two men with outstretched arms cannot encompass. Let this be your work, for you are more numerous than we.”
And they said, “It is well.”
And every day the young men cut reeds and bamboos for the house in the plain across the river by Tovutovu, and cried to the people weeding their yams, “Our task is near finished; only the king-post is wanting.”
So the Tovutovu chiefs took the young men up the river to the great _vesi_-tree, and lit a fire about it to burn up the sap, and cut it down with their adzes. Then they lopped off the branches, and cut a hole in the butt of the tree, and took vines as thick as a man’s thigh and passed them through the hole, and dragged the tree inch by inch on rollers till they got it into the river. And they made rafts of bamboo, and bound them to the sides of the tree to make it lighter. And when night came on they camped on the river-bank, where they could hear the water swishing past the tree. And they sent a messenger to Rara, saying, “The tree is fallen!” This was for a sign to them to make ready for the feast, according to custom. And the messenger returned and said, “Drag the post to Vatuloaloa, where the river widens, and no farther; there we will make a feast, and bring the post to Rara on the morrow.”
So they toiled all the next day, dragging the post down the river, for there had been no rain, and the water was very shallow. And when they drew near Vatuloaloa they put on leaf girdles and blue conch-shells and chanted--
“E-mbia wanga é-mbi, E-dua thombo, ié!”
and each time they cried _ié!_ they hauled on the vine-rope with all their strength, and the great tree moved on a step. And now they had come to a place where the river was hemmed in with high cliffs, and the bed was obstructed by great boulders that had fallen from above. They could see the black rocks of Vatuloaloa below them. And there was a shout from the cliffs above, and when they looked up they saw the men of Rara standing on the edge, but instead of food-baskets they had spears and war-fans in their hands, and their faces were painted. And there came a shout from the cliff toward Tovutovu, and they looked and saw the men of Valekau standing prepared for battle. And one said, “What does Valekau here prepared for battle? Surely this is treachery!” So they threw down the Vine-rope and shouted, “How is it?” And the men of Valekau answered, “You shall be repaid to-day!” And they threw great stones down on them as they stood waist-deep in the angry water, and the men of Tovutovu fled, some up-stream and some down, splashing the water high above them; but when they reached the low bank there were armed men guarding them. Thus were they like a wild boar at bay encircled by barking dogs. And in their madness they took stones from the river-bed, and ran at the men of Valekau; but many were slain, and those who escaped lay all day in the thick rushes, and saw a great smoke rising from the plain where Tovutovu was, and knew that the doom of their wives and children was accomplished. And when night was come they crept from their hiding-places, and fled into the forest until the remnant of them was gathered together there. Thus was Tovutovu wiped out, and Rara and Valekau divided the spoil.
And the remnant of them went up the river to Uthadamu, and dwelt there many months. But their hearts yearned after their own land. So when the yams were ripe they sent an embassy to Rara saying, “We are few in number and in pitiable plight. We pray you, let us return again to our own earth and the foundations of our ancestors, that we may breathe again.” And the messenger returned, and said, “They accepted the whales’ teeth and said, ‘It is well. Return.’” So they went back, and built houses on their old foundations, and sent to Rara saying, “Appoint a day when we shall bring you offerings of atonement.”
And the elders of Rara spoke to the chiefs of Valekau, “Are we not weary of war? Our young men thirst only for battle, and neglect the food-plantations, so there is scarcity. It was not so when we were young. Now therefore let us lay war aside, and make peace.”
So they appointed a day when they should all meet together and take counsel. And on the appointed day the men of Tovutovu brought whales’ teeth and rolls of bark-cloth, and presented them to the chiefs of Rara and Valekau as an offering of atonement. And Dongai said, “We are met to-day to make peace, for we are all weary of war. Many brave warriors are dead, and the land is empty. As for us of Rara, the war did not come from us. We only repaid that which was done to us. To what end has it been, this fighting between brothers?”
Then Bonawai of Valekau spoke. “It is true, O chiefs of Rara, that the war has been an evil one, for all our fortresses have been burned, and the land is empty. But neither did the war begin with us. True it is that the tree grows from the root, but there would be no root unless a seed had first been sown. Chiefly do I blame you, chiefs of Rara, for you were the cause of these wars. Have you forgotten that stick with which fish are taken--a magic contrivance of the foreigners--by which a man could stand and take fish until his arms fell to his sides from weariness? This we sent to beg of you, and you churlishly refused.”
The men of Rara bowed their heads, and picked at the ground. Then Dongai spoke: “O chiefs of Valekau, it is true that ye sent to beg this stick, but we hungered for fish, and--how could we give it, not having yet seen its magic?--and--and----”
“And ye knew not how to use it,” said Vasualevu.
“Then,” said Nkio, the herald, “if it be peace show us now this magic stick, for we know that ye have it hidden.”
“We cannot show it to you.”
“Why?”
“We dare not, lest the gods of the foreigners be angry.”
“This is foolishness,” muttered the elders of Valekau. “What peace is this when we ask and are refused? We pray you, show us the stick.”
“Be not angry, O chiefs of Valekau, but in truth we know not where it is.”
Then the anger of Valekau was roused, and they said, “Ye are befooling us! Have ye forgotten how ye refused us before?” And they began to go out from the house.
Then Koronumbu of Rara spoke. “Why do ye hide the truth in doubtful sayings? Know then, chiefs of Valekau, that we never had this stick ye speak of, but when ye sent to beg it of us shame came upon us that we had it not, and we could not tell you, fearing that ye would despise us.”
There was silence for a space, and the elders of Rara sat with bowed heads. Then Bonawai, the crafty, spoke, “See that ye tell no one, for if the coast people hear this tale how shall we endure their ridicule when they ask us, ‘Why went ye up against Rara? Did ye hunger for fish?’ Therefore hide this thing, and let no one know it.”
FOOTNOTES:
[3] A reed-lance tipped with ironwood (_toa_) with which the game of _tinka_ is played.
[4] Women and children--non-combatants.
THE FIRST COLONIST.
This is a true story, or at least it is as true as any other that depends for its details upon tradition. It is the story of a man who had an opportunity and used it; who, being but a shipwrecked sailor, knew how to make himself feared and respected by the arrogant chiefs who had him at their mercy; who tasted the sweets of conquest and political power; and who brought about, albeit indirectly, the cession of Fiji to England. Many have the dry bones of the story--how the Swede, Charles Savage, a shipwrecked sailor or runaway convict, armed with the only musket in the islands, raised Bau from the position of a second-rate native tribe to be mistress of the greater part of the group; and how after a few years of violence and bloodshed he was killed and eaten by the people of Wailea who thus avenged hundreds of their countrymen whom Savage had helped to bring to the ovens of Bau. To clothe these dry bones with living flesh we must turn to native tradition,--those curious records, often silent as to great events, while preserving the most trivial details--often indifferent to sequence, always disdainful of chronology.
Fiji is linked to the rest of the Pacific by that romantic history, stranger and more absorbing than any fiction, which ended in the tragedy and the pastoral comedy of Pitcairn Island; for Lieutenant Hayward, who was despatched from Tonga in a native canoe by Captain Edwardes of the Pandora to search for the missing mutineers of the Bounty, was the first white man of whose landing in Fiji we have any authentic record. His visit was forgotten by the natives in the horror of the great pestilence, the _Lila balavu_, or wasting sickness, the first-fruits of their intercourse with the superior race. “From that time,” says an epic of the day, “our villages began to be empty of men, but in the time before the coming of the sickness every village was so crowded that there was no space to see the ground between the men, so crowded were they.” From this pestilence dated the custom of strangling those sick of a lingering illness lest they should, in the malignity of misery, spit upon the food and lie upon the mats of the healthy, and thus make them companions in their suffering. No wasting sickness was like the great _Lila_, for men and women lay till the bark-clothes rotted from their bodies, and their heads seemed in comparison to be larger than food-baskets; and they were so feeble that they lacked the strength to pull down a sugar-cane to moisten their parched throats unless four crawled out to lend their strength to the task.
Twelve years passed. The places of the dead were filled. The crops and animals wasted in the funeral feasts were again abundant, when the men of the eastern isles saw white men for the second time. On a night in the year 1803 there was a great storm from the east. When morning broke and the men of Oneata looked towards the dawn, they saw a strange sight. On the islet Loa, that marks the great reef Bukatatanoa, red streamers were waving in the wind. Strange beings, too, were moving on the islet--spirits without doubt. There were visitors in Oneata, men of Levuka in the island of Lakeba, offshoots in past time from distant Bau, holding special privileges as ambassadors who linked the eastern with the western islands. Two of these, bolder and more sophisticated than the natives of the place, launched a light canoe and paddled cautiously towards Loa. They gazed from afar, resting on their paddles, and returned with this report: “Though they resemble men, yet they are spirits, for their ears are bound up with scarlet, and they bite burning wood.” Then the elders of Oneata took much counsel together, wishing yet fearing to approach the spirits that were on Loa; but at last they bade the young men launch the twin canoe Taiwalata, and sailed for Loa. And as they drew near, the strange spirits beckoned to them, until at last they drifted to the shore and took them into the canoe to carry them to Oneata. But one of them they proved to be mortal as themselves, for he was buried on Loa, being dead, whether of violence or disease will never now be known. Here the traditions become confused. There were muskets and ammunition in the wrecked ship, but the men of Oneata knew nothing of their uses, else had the history of Fiji perhaps been different. They hid the casks of powder to be used as pigment for the face, and the ramrods to be ornaments for the hair. And one of them, says the tradition, smeared the wet pigment over hair and all, and when it would not dry as charcoal did, but lay cold and heavy in the hair, he made a great fire in the house and stooped his head to the blaze to dry the matted locks! None knew what befell. There was a sudden flash, very bright and hot, and a tongue of flame leaped from the head and licked the wall, and the chief sprang into the rara with a great cry, for his hair was gone, and the skull was more naked than on the day when he was born. It was, they said, the work of spirits; and they used the black powder no more.
The strangers had scarce landed when a second great pestilence broke out. There is pathos in the fragmentary saga of the time which has been handed down to us--
“The great sickness sits aloft, Their voices sound hoarsely, They fall and lie helpless and pitiable, Our god Dengei is put to shame, Our own sicknesses have been thrust aside, The strangling-cord is a noble thing, They fall prone; they fall with the sap still in them.
* * * * * * *
A lethargy has seized upon the chiefs, How terrible is the sickness! We do not live; we do not die, Our bodies ache; our heads ache, Many die, a few live on, The strangling-cord brings death to many, The _malo_ round their bellies rots away, Our women groan in their despair, The _liku_ knotted round them they do not loose, Hark to the creak of the strangling-cords, The spirits flow away like running water, _ra tau e_.”
Many of the foreigners never left Oneata alive. A doubtful tradition ascribes their death to the pestilence; a more detailed says that they were slain by the men of Levuka. As the natives believed them to be the cause of the sickness, we may accept the more tragic of the two.
It was a year of terror. Here is a fragment of another poem of the same time:--
“Sleeping in the night I suddenly awake, The voice of the pestilence is borne to me, _uetau_, I go out and wander abroad, _uetau_, It is near the breaking of the dawn, _uetau_, Behold a forked star, _uetau_, We whistle with astonishment as we gaze at it, _uetau_, What can it portend? _uetau_, Does it presage the doom of the chiefs? _e e_.”
From contemporary traditions we gather that the comet had three tails, the centre tail being coloured and the two outer white; that it rose just before daybreak, and that it was visible for thirty-seven nights in succession. Was this the comet of 1803, or Donati’s? Here, as in all ages and countries, the comet was believed to be an omen of coming evil--not the ravages of the unknown plague, but the death of some great chief. In like manner the comet of 1843 presaged the fall of Suva, and that of 1881 the death of King Cakobau.
Bau was now rising into fame. Her people, like their neighbours of the Rewa delta, had swept down from the sources of the Rewa, the cradle of the race, had for a time held a precarious footing among the older tribes by dint of constant fighting, and had at last fought and schemed their way to independence. Opposite to their stronghold Kubuna lay the tiny island of Bau, protected from a land attack by two miles of shallow sea.
Bau, or Butoni as it was then called, was occupied by the chiefs’ fishermen, who bartered their fish for the produce of the plantations on the mainland. But the security of their island made them insolent, and, to punish them, the chiefs resolved to attack and occupy their village. The incursion was made about the year 1760, and the fishermen were banished from the place for a time. With the help of their dependants the chiefs scarped away the side of the hills and reclaimed land from the shallow sea, facing it with slabs of stone. Thenceforth Butoni was known as Bau, the place of chiefs.
Secure in their island stronghold, the chiefs of Bau soon forgot their common origin with the poor relations they had left behind on the mainland to cultivate the plantations. The pursuit of arms has in every age conferred aristocracy, while the cultivation of the food on which warriors and cultivators alike exist has ever tended to sink men to serfdom. Under Banuve, the son of Durucoko, Bau had begun to make her power felt. Banuve had a definite policy; he tolerated no rivals. When the chief of Cautata presumed on his relationship to Bau by his mother, no warning was given him. He was attacked in the night, and his stronghold of Oloi burned. Yet this harsh discipline failed to satisfy his jealous kinsman. Intrenchments could be rebuilt, and half-beaten tribes are doubly dangerous. Eight times was Cautata rebuilt, and eight times was it reduced to ashes; nor was there peace until earth had been brought as a _soro_, and Cautata had acknowledged herself to be a hewer of wood and a drawer of water for Bau. But Banuve did not often risk open battle when there were so many who would fight for fighting’s sake. In his day Bau was first known as the nest in which plots were hatched, because Bau knew that the whale’s tooth proffered to an ally in secret was a surer weapon than the club. When the comet threw its glare over Bau, presaging evil, there were two States against whom Banuve’s plots could not prevail. Seven miles north of the little island was Verata, an intrenched fort in a deep bay that faces the island of Viwa. Till Bau was colonised, Verata drew tribute from the coast as far as Buretu, and the struggle for the mastery was ever impending. To the southward was Dravo allied with Nakelo, too strong to be yet attempted.
Such was the position of Bau when the pestilence reached it, by means, it is said, of a canoe from Ovalau. Cholera, dysentery, or whatever it may have been, it struck chief and commoner alike. “Their limbs became light, and when they would walk they reeled and fell, and where they fell they lay; nor was there any to tend them, for all were stricken alike. Then did war cease, for the strong warriors were stricken and withered like the _daiga_ that droops in the evening. They were as men bereft of sense, for those who had strength launched the canoes and sailed away, and the sick died more swiftly when there was none left to bring them food: their bodies rotted in the houses, or were devoured by the hogs. Yet the living could not escape by flight, for the pestilence, borne on the wind that filled their sails, overtook them even in the place whither they fled.... None can tell the terror and the pity of that time.”
From Bau, however, they did not attempt to escape, for the sickness was raging on the mainland opposite to them, and beyond the mountains there were none but enemies. They stayed and sickened and died, and the last to die was Banuve, surnamed Sevuniqele (“the first-fruits”), their Vunivalu. And his spirit went and stood on the bank of the swift stream at Lelele, and Cema answered his cry, and brought to him the vesi canoe on which chiefs only may embark. And he crossed the eel-bridge and made ready his stone to throw at the great pandanus by which the love of wives is proved. And his stone went true to the mark. So he rested, knowing that his wives must soon follow him to bear him company in the world of spirits. Nor did he wait in vain, for on that very day four of his wives were strangled and buried with him in the same tomb. Henceforth he was not Banuve, but Bale-i-vavalagi (“He-who-fell-by-the-foreign-pestilence”). The doom of the forked star had fallen.
Banuve’s eldest son, Ra Matenikutu (“The lice-killer”), succeeded naturally to the office of Vunivalu; but the rites of confirmation could not be performed until the arrival of the men of Levuka, whose peculiar province it is to conduct the ceremony. The traditions of Oneata say that they took with them to Bau on this occasion one of the white men; but the historians of Bau affirm that they came bringing with them no strangers, but a canvas house and the first foreign possessions seen by the Bauans.
We shall never know now what became of the red-capped sailors cast upon the reef at the ends of the earth in that stormy night of 1803. Perhaps they perished of the disease they brought with them; perhaps, like Gordon in the New Hebrides, they were sacrificed to the Manes of those whose death they had unwittingly brought about. Their fate is not even one of the thousand mysteries of the sea which men would fain solve.
On the day fixed for the rite there was another portent. The sky was cloudless at high noon, when the sun suddenly paled and turned to the colour of blood. The air grew dark, the birds settled on the trees to roost, and the stars came out. There was silence among the people sitting before the spirit _bure_, Vatanitawake--the silence of a great fear. Then the god entered into one of the priests, and he screamed prophecies in the red darkness, foretelling war and the greatness of Matenikutu, the son of Bale-i-vavalagi, and crying that the face of the sun was red with the blood that he should shed.
This dramatic scene was no invention of the elders of Bau, for the tradition of the eclipse is to be found in Rewa, in Nakelo, and in Dawasamu, and in every case the day is fixed as the day of the confirmation of Ra Matenikutu. He saw many strange sights during his stormy reign, but assuredly none more weird and terrible than this scene in the lurid twilight, when he was declared Vunivalu.
In that year there were other strange omens, foretelling the change of the old order. The heavens rained lumps of ice, that broke down the yam-vines and the stalks of the taro; and the people, touching them, said that burning stars had fallen from heaven. There followed a great storm. For many days the rain fell without ceasing, and the waters rose. The basin of the Rewa river, draining half the island, was swept with a torrent greater than any that have been seen before or since, and the waters rose over the housetops, sweeping seawards in a roaring muddy flood. The strong fled to the hills and saved their lives; the sick and the aged were swept out to sea. When the waters subsided, the face of the country was changed, for the flood had covered the land and the reefs with a great layer of black earth. Thus were the flats of Burebasaga raised above the reach of the water, and thus was the land purged of the pestilence.
And now the new order was at hand. In 1808 the American brig Eliza, with 40,000 dollars from the River Plate, was wrecked on the reef of Nairai Island. The crew were allowed to live. Some of them made their way in the ship’s boats to another American vessel that chanced to be lying at Bua Bay, ninety miles distant; five others, two of them Chinamen, were carried by the natives to Verata; one, named Charles Savage, made his way to Bau in a canoe that chanced to be sailing thither. The hull was looted by the natives, who used the silver dollars--_lavo_ they call them still, from their resemblance to the bean of that name--as playthings to be skimmed along the shallow water, or buried with the posts of a new house. Eighty years have passed, and though many sailors have deserted their ships with the purpose of enriching themselves from this lost treasure, and the natives have long ago learned the value of money, these records of the wreck are still occasionally found.
As soon as Savage reached Bau he besought Ra Matenikutu to send him to Nairai to search for a thing he wanted from the wreck, and when this was not granted he promised that if the thing were brought to him he would make Bau pre-eminent above all her enemies, even over Rewa and Verata. The thing they were to look for was like a _ngata_ club, but heavier, and they must also find a black powder such as men use to paint their faces for war. The messengers searched diligently. They found the black powder, but none knew this thing of which the White man spoke. But at the last, when they were wearied with the search, one remembered that a _ngata_ club of a strange pattern had been built into a yam-house set up to hold the crop that was but just dug. There they found it, as the ridge-pole of the yam-shed, the weapon that should enable Bau to crush her rivals, and should bring even her at last under the dominion of a stronger than she.