Part 17

Meanwhile the chiefs furiously incited their men to capture the hill with a rush. There were four muskets between the three defenders. Wilson, being a bad shot, was kept loading while the other two fired. Buschart, an old rifleman, shot twenty-seven men with twenty-eight shots: Dillon seldom missed. In the face of these heavy losses the men would not respond to their chiefs, but kept off, shouting defiance. The ovens containing the bodies of the men killed in the morning were now opened, and the roast joints of human flesh distributed among the different chiefs, assembled from all parts of the coast, with the same order and ceremony as is used in the apportionment of feasts on public occasions. From time to time the chiefs shouted to Peter to come down before it grew too dark to cook his body properly, and boasted of the number of white men they each had killed. To his reply, that if they killed him their countrymen on board the ship would suffer, they cried that the captain might kill and eat his prisoners if he chose, but that they meant to kill and eat him (Peter) as soon as it grew dark enough to approach him without being shot. Dillon’s greatest fear was that they would be tortured. He had heard from Savage stories of the flaying and branding of prisoners, of eyelid-cutting and nail-drawing, and he resolved to use the last cartridges upon himself and his companions.

Late in the afternoon the little party were horrified to see the boat returning from the ship with all the eight hostages. They believed that the captain would take the precaution of releasing four only until they were safe on board, but now they had no longer any lien upon the mercy of their assailants. As soon as they landed, the hostages were led unarmed up the hill by the priest, who delivered an imaginary message from the captain, bidding them hand over the muskets to him and return to the ship. While he was haranguing Buschart, the idea of seizing him flashed across Dillon’s mind. It was a desperate expedient, but they were in a desperate plight. He suddenly presented his musket at the man’s head, swearing that he would shoot him dead unless he led him safely to the boat. The priest was the only man among the natives who possessed sufficient influence to keep the infuriated warriors in check. He was taken by surprise, and did not attempt to escape. Shouting to his people to sit down, he led the strange procession down the hill, through the angry multitude, now silent under protest, and on to the beach, walking slowly with a musket-muzzle at each ear, and another between his shoulders. Arrived at the beach, he said that he would rather be shot than move another step towards the boats. The whites backed into the water, still covering him with their muskets, until they reached the boats. Then, as they pushed off, the natives rushed down and sent a shower of harmless arrows and stones after them. Six of the crew and eight of the white men from Bau had perished.

On the following morning Dillon made an unsuccessful attempt to recover the bones of the Europeans. A native flourished the thigh bones of the first mate, but refused to part with them, saying that they were to be made into sail-needles.

The canoes had set sail for Bau with some fifty of their company wounded. They had not communicated with the ship, and had therefore left behind two Europeans and a number of their women. The ship sailed the same day, and being unable to land her native passengers at Bau, carried them on to New South Wales. Buschart and a Lascar were, however, landed at Tucopia, where they were found thirteen years afterwards, and were instrumental in the discovery of the remains of De la Pérouse’s ill-fated expedition.

So gross an insult as the slaughter of two of the Vunivalu’s brothers could not go unpunished. On the return of the canoes the indignation in Bau was intense. A strong expedition was at once fitted out, and before the end of the year Wailea was in ashes, and Vonasa and half his tribe had followed their victims to Naicobocobo. Many were slain in the sack of the town, but a few were carried captive to Bau to glut the vengeance of Vunivalu himself. There, at the mercy of their captors, they died such a death as amply avenged the chiefs who fell at Wailea.

Thus did Charles Savage, the Swede, meet a death in harmony with his stormy life, and with the fate that he had brought upon so many others. His works followed him. Epic poems, now half-forgotten, were composed in his honour. With the descendants of the people among whom he lived he has almost attained the dignity of a legendary hero, and but for their conversion to Christianity he would undoubtedly have been given a place in their Pantheon. He is remembered while all that is left of the gigantic and heroic Dillon is the name of the little hill that saved his life in Wailea Bay. Though the tragedy itself is almost forgotten, the knoll is still called Koroi-Pita (Peter’s Hill). Through Savage, Bau rose to a rank among her sister tribes that she never forfeited. When the growing intercourse with foreigners demanded the recognition of Fiji as a people obeying acknowledged leaders, Bau fell naturally into the place of sovereign over all her rival States, and as possessing power to cede to England the territory of all for the common good. Therefore in time to come, when some historian, weary of seeking an untried field for his pen, turns to Fiji, he will, in valuing the political forces that have led to this end, give a leading place to the deeds of Charles Savage, the first colonist.

THE END.

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