Part 2
Sexton and myself were taken up to the fire, where some of the natives sat like tailors, dividing the clothes and other articles which they had taken from the bodies of the persons killed. We were given into the care of two of the natives, who covered us with a sort of mat, that formed the sail of the canoe. My wounds, which were still bleeding very much, they did not pay the least attention to.
It is impossible for me to describe our feelings during this dreadful night. We fully expected, every moment, to share the fate of those whom we had so lately seen cruelly murdered. We prayed together for some time, and after each promising to call on the other’s relations, should either ever escape, we took leave of each other, giving ourselves up for lost.
At length the morning came; and the Indians, after having collected all the heads, took us with them in their canoes to another island, which they called Pullan, where the women lived. On landing, I saw Captain Doyley’s two children, and a Newfoundland dog, called Portland, which belonged to the ship.
The Indians took us to some open huts which they had in the island, and placed us before a fire; I saw there the gown worn by Mrs. Doyley at the time she left the wreck, the steward’s watch and white hat, and several other articles of clothing, which belonged to those of the crew who left the ship in the first raft.
Near the huts a pole was stuck in the ground, around which were hung the heads of our unfortunate companions. Among them I plainly recognized Mrs. Doyley’s, for they had left part of the hair on it; and I knew Captain Moore’s by the face.
Every morning about sunrise, and every evening at sunset, one of the natives went close to the pole, and blew seven or eight times through a large shell; which made a noise somewhat like blowing through a cow’s horn; at the same time looking up steadfastly at the heads.
After this, the other people decked themselves with the green branches of trees, and some painted or rather rubbed their bodies over with a kind of ochre, of a red color and white, and came to the pole with great parade, holding their clubs and spears. Then they made a sort of corrobory, or dance; but I could not trace any signs of religion in these ceremonies, nor detect any thing like reverence paid to the pole.
I asked George Doyley what had become of his father and mother? He told me that they were both killed by the blacks, as well as all those who went away from the ship in the first raft, excepting himself and his little brother.
The little fellow gave a very distinct account of the dreadful transaction. He said he was so frightened when he saw his father killed by a blow on the head from a club, that he hardly knew what he did; but when his mother was killed in the same way, he thought they would kill him and his little brother too, and then he hoped they should all go to heaven together. I then told him that all the crew, except myself and Sexton, were murdered.
After we had been on the island a few days, a vessel came in sight, and I did all I could to induce the natives to take us to it; but they would not part with us. Seven days afterwards, two more ships, in company, came close to the shore. The natives seemed very much frightened at this, and were in the utmost confusion; they took us, and all the skulls, with the dog, and hid us among the bushes until the ships were gone.
We were very scantily supplied with provisions during our stay on the island. When the natives had been unsuccessful in fishing, they would eat it all themselves; and at other times, when they caught a good supply, they gave us the entrails and heads. This, with a sort of wild plum, and now and then a piece of cocoa-nut, which we got without their knowledge, was our only food.
We were sometimes so hungry as to be glad to eat the grass. Through doing this, I have often been attacked with such violent pains in the stomach, as made me unable to walk upright.
Little William Doyley was very ill-used during our stay here; he cried very much after his mother; and at times the natives, both men and women, would tie him up to a tree, and beat him with bamboos; on my asking them to leave off, as well as I could by signs, they would shoot at me with their bows and arrows. On one occasion, when the women were beating him, I went and released him, and very nearly lost my life, for an arrow was shot within an inch of my head. They sometimes tied him up and left him several hours.
Sexton and myself were chiefly employed in climbing trees, and breaking up fire-wood to cook the fish with; when they thought we had not enough, they would beat us with their hands, and sometimes with the wood.
They would at times take us with them in their canoes, to catch fish, which they did by spearing, and with lines and hooks. Their lines were made of the fibres of the outside shell or husk of the cocoa-nuts; and the hooks were neatly made of tortoise shell.
The number of Indians on this island amounted to about sixty. They were merely residing on the island during the fishing season; for their home, as I afterward found out, was a great distance off.
After remaining here, as near as I can recollect, three months, (for I had almost lost all remembrance of dates) the Indians separated. One party took me and William Doyley with them in a canoe; and George Doyley and Sexton stayed with the other party.
The party that took me along with them, set sail early in the morning, and about the middle of the day reached another small island to the northward, where we stayed a day and a night; it had a sandy beach. The next morning we left this island and went to another, which was very flat, and covered with low bushes; here we stayed a fortnight. We then sailed northward, stopping at other islands, as long as we could get food for the party; this food consisted of fish and wild fruits; our drink was water.
We came to one island where we stayed about a month, and from thence went to another, which the natives called Aroob, but which I afterwards learned was Darnley’s Island. This place I have very good reason to recollect; it was here that we were first treated with some kindness by the natives. After staying here about a fortnight, we again embarked, returning by the way we had come, to an island called by the natives Sirreb, situated near to Aureed.
Poor little William seemed to wish to stop on any of the islands where we landed; and cried for a long time after being on board the canoe, to return to them.
After remaining on this island rather more than a week, a canoe, with some of the natives of Murray’s Island, came there. They bought us of our captors for two bunches of bananas. We did not leave the island for three days after we were bought; but in that time went in the canoe with our new masters, who treated us very kindly. I was pleased to find that poor little William began to become more cheerful.
We returned by way of Darnley’s Island, stayed there a few days, and then went to Murray’s Island, where we afterwards lived until the period of our release by Captain Lewis, in the Isabella.
Upon our first landing on Murray’s Island, the natives flocked around us, wondering who we were. They began asking those who had brought us a great many questions, and speaking to us in a language very nearly like that of the other natives, and which I was just beginning to understand. Some of the children were very much frightened at us, and ran away as soon as they saw us.
I soon learned that the name of the person who bought me was Dupper; and little William was given into the care of a native called Oby, who lived near Dupper’s hut. This man soon got very fond of the little boy, as the child also became of him; indeed he seemed here to have quite forgotten his mother and father.
My name among these people, was Waki, and that of William, was Uass. I lived in the same hut with Dupper and his family, consisting of himself, his wife Panney, three sons, to all appearance young men, and two daughters, who were called Yope and Sarki.
In this place I was made as comfortable as I could expect, under the circumstances in which I was placed; my wounds had continued open during my wanderings, but they now began to heal, and my appearance soon altered for the better. I had now gone through all that could be called suffering; but still I constantly wished that some European vessel would touch at that shore, and take me once more to see my friends and country.
My new master (I should have called him father, for he behaved to me as kindly as he did to his sons,) gave me a canoe, about sixty feet long, which he purchased at New Guinea, (the island that forms one side of the straits, Australasia being the other,) for a large tomahawk and a bow and arrow. He also gave me a piece of ground, on which he taught me to grow yams, bananas, and cocoa-nuts. When we were not otherwise engaged, he taught me to shoot with the bow and arrow, and to spear fish.
Little William soon began to speak their language; and I also learned so much of it as to be able to converse in it with great ease; having no other than natives to speak to, it is more than probable that as I learned their language, I should have forgotten that of my native country.
Although William was in general more cheerful, he would now and then appear very uneasy. On these occasions, I used to ask Dupper to allow me to sleep along with the child. This made him much more happy. As soon as he could speak their language pretty freely, he would go down to the beach with the other children of the island; and the effect of the sun on his skin became very apparent. In a few months he could not be distinguished by his color from the other children; his hair being the only thing by which he could be known at a distance, from its light color.
Murray’s Island is about two miles across, and contains about seven or eight hundred people. During my stay there, I never perceived any person who was in any manner above the rest of the natives, as regarded being a king, or chief, or any thing of that kind; but the whole of the inhabitants seem entirely independent of each other.
The houses or huts of the natives are something in the form of a bee-hive, with a hole in the side, even with the ground, and about two feet and a half in height, which serves for an entrance. When you go in, you must creep upon your hands and knees. They are made by placing a pole upright in the ground, and putting stakes round it in a circle at equal distances: these are then all bent inwards, and fastened together near the top of the pole, to which they are firmly bound.
The outside is then covered with dried banana leaves, which are very large. The entrance is merely a place in the side left uncovered. The pole, or supporter, is generally ornamented with shells; and at the top of it, which sticks out above the rest of the hut, they mostly fasten the largest one they can find. Some of the huts have a quantity of skulls arranged round the inside.
Their canoes, or boats, are very large, mostly about fifty or sixty feet long, and some even larger than that. Two masts, opposite to each other, with a sail hanging between them, are placed nearly in the centre, but more towards the head of the canoe. The sail is made of plaited grass. When going with a side wind, they put one of the masts backwards, so that the sail stands slantingly. They use paddles of almost every shape; but the most general is merely a piece of wood cut flat, and broadest at the end which touches the water.
They are expert in the use of the bow, which they call sireck; they make them of split bamboo; and they are so powerful that persons not accustomed to using the bow, would scarcely be able to bend them. Their arrows are pieces of wood made heavy at one end by a piece of stone or shell, sharpened at the end.
Their clubs are made of a hard black wood; the handle is made small, and has a knob at the end to prevent its slipping out of the hand.
They are very fond of all sorts of European articles; especially beads, glass, red cloth, bottles, and particularly of iron, which they call ‘torre.’ When they see a ship, they say directly, “We will get some torre.” They think iron is found in the white men’s country in large rocks; and that we merely have to break pieces off as we want them.
Of all things, they were most inquisitive about fire-arms, which they call by the same name as they do their bows. Dupper told me that some of their people had been killed by them, and they never could see what struck them. But I could not explain to him the way that a gun was made, for I scarcely knew myself; all I could tell him I did, but this only made him the more curious.
Their usual way of catching fish is by spearing; but they also take the small ones with a kind of net, something like a sieve. One party disturbs the water, by beating it with long bamboo sticks, and so drive the fish towards the other, who then spear or net them. Lobsters are caught in the following manner: a party will get on a sandbank at night, some of them holding a bunch of lighted cocoa-nut leaves above their heads; the lobsters, seeing the light, leave their holes, and are then speared by the others.
Turtles abound on the islands, and are caught by the natives very dexterously. When they see them asleep on the water, a party of seven or eight go in a canoe, four of the party paddling very slowly and silently towards them, the others squatting on the fore part of the canoe, with a rope fastened to their arms, and only their heads above the side of the canoe. Upon getting near enough, the parties in the canoe suddenly leap out, and catch the turtle by the fins; by which they are then hauled into the boat. I have seen three caught at one time in this manner.
After I had resided some months on this island, a native died in one of the huts near Dupper’s. Upon his telling me of the event, he said he was certain something very dreadful would happen soon. This remark of Dupper’s startled me; for it was the first death I had known on the island, and I could not help thinking of the fate of the crew of the Charles Eaton. An idea once or twice entered my mind that harm was intended to me on account of the death of this man; but Dupper treated me just the same as usual. Soon after sunset I went to rest, still feeling very uneasy. I had not lain very long, when I heard a noise, as of a person rattling shells, and breathing very hard.
Dupper uttered a short sentence in a language which I did not understand, and quite different from that of Murray’s Island, and then himself and all that were in the hut, hid their faces in the sand. I asked Dupper what the noise was; he told me, the spirit of the dead man.
The next day, I and some of the natives, with little William, were sitting under a bamboo fence, close to the huts, when I heard the same noise a short distance off. On looking among the bushes, I saw two figures, the one red and the other white, with what appeared to be a fan over each of their heads. They began throwing stones at us; and the natives, who were about twenty in number, instead of getting up and driving them away, sat still, and seemed to be totally unnerved. The figures were very short, not larger than children fourteen years of age. I was told that they were the spirits of their departed friends.
I have since taken a great deal of trouble to ascertain what these figures were; for they made me very uneasy. I took particular notice of them at the time, and have searched through all the huts; but never could discover any traces of dresses similar to those worn by the figures.
The club is their principal weapon: with it they endeavor to strike the head; and one blow is generally fatal. Their spears, which they throw with great accuracy, are made of bamboo, with points made of sharpened shells. They also use them in their hand with great dexterity.
Their bows are very dangerous instruments of warfare; as they sometimes poison their arrows. Being naked, they often get a slight scratch from one of these, and as they have no remedy for the poison, they die a painful and lingering death.
I was one afternoon sitting upon one of the hills in the island, when I saw a ship coming round a point of the island. My thoughts now turned upon the possibility of reaching this vessel, which approached nearer and nearer, and appeared as if intending to stop at the island. There was a merry-making in the village on that day: but my desire to leave the savage life, prevented me from taking part in it as usual; in fact, I wanted to draw the attention of those on board to myself before the natives should see her; but could not tell how to do so, the ship being so far off.
I did not attain my object, notwithstanding all my endeavors. As soon as the ship was observed, Dupper, as he usually did when a vessel came in sight, painted my body black, with a streak of red on the bridge of my nose, extending along my forehead, over each of my eye-brows. My ears having been pierced on my arrival at Murray’s Island, his wife and daughters hung tassels, made of plaited grass, to them. They also put ornaments round my neck, body, arms, wrists, and ancles.
When the ship came near enough to us for their glasses to make observations, the natives broke branches off the trees, and waved them. I did the same myself, and, to my unspeakable joy, saw her come near to the shore and drop her anchor. I then thought my deliverance certain; but was sadly disappointed that no boat came off to the shore. I went down to the beach along with Dupper and William, and some of the natives, but still no boat appeared, and I waited till the night set in.
Next morning, soon after sunrise, several canoes went away to the ship, Dupper and myself being in one of them; William was left on the island. We were in the third or fourth that got along-side and we dropped directly under the stern.
A rope was thrown from the vessel into our canoe, and I caught hold of it, and tried to get on board by it. But I had sprained my wrist, by a fall, a day or two before, and waving the branch had made it exceedingly painful, so that I could not climb. One of the crew held out a roll of tobacco to me, but I could not reach it; so I asked him to lower the boat for me to get in.
The captain and officers were at that time bartering with the natives for curiosities and tortoise shell; they had one of the cutters lowered, but put their pistols and naked cutlasses into it. When the natives saw that, they thought mischief was intended to me and to themselves; they immediately let go the rope, and paddled towards the shore. I stood up in the canoe; but Dupper took hold of me and laid me down in the middle of it. The boat rowed a little way after us and then returned to the vessel.
A few hours afterwards, the boat came close to the beach, with, I believe, the captain on board, to shoot birds. One of the natives took little William on his shoulders, and went down to the beach, he walked towards the boat, and beckoned to the crew to come and take him.
I had often mentioned to the natives that the white people would give them axes, and bottles, and iron, for the little boy; I told them his relations were rich, and would be glad to give them a great deal if they would let them have him back.
The captain made signs for the natives to go nearer to the boat; for he stopped at some distance; but neither party would approach the other, and the boat soon after returned to the vessel. I was kept among the bushes all this time, by Dupper and his sons: but I could plainly see every thing that took place. The ship sailed next morning, and we were both left on the island. All my hopes of deliverance by means of this vessel, were thus put an end to.
This vessel’s sailing without me, made such an impression upon my mind, that for three or four days I could eat no food, and at length became extremely ill. I think at times I was light-headed, for I did not know what I was doing. When I got better, which was in about a week, the idea that I should end my days among the savages settled upon me, and I became quite melancholy.
My health after this began visibly to decline; and it grieved me to see William was also getting thin and sickly; for I had no remedy in case of illness. Nor did I ever see the natives make use of any thing either to prevent or cure diseases to which they are subject.
One morning, Dupper was trying to straighten a piece of an iron bolt, and was heating it very hard with a large piece of stone, without being able to make any impression upon it. I told him to make a large fire, and put the iron into it, which would soften it. He did so, and his astonishment was very great when he found it answer the purpose.
He was very much pleased with me for this discovery, and often told the other natives of it. Almost all of them had a piece of iron, obtained from the different wrecks which had happened on the island, or by trading with the Europeans; and we were after this frequently employed in straightening or altering the shape of these iron articles, as it might suit the various fancies of their owners.
After we had been about a year on Murray’s Island, Dupper told me that the natives intended to go on a trading voyage to Dowder, (this I afterwards learned was the name they called New Guinea,) and I was to be one of the party.
For this journey, twelve large canoes about sixty feet long, each containing from ten to sixteen persons, men, and women, and children, were prepared. As many shells as the natives could collect were put into the canoes, and we set sail. The natives of New Guinea wear these shells for ornaments; and in return for them, the Murray Islanders get canoes, bows and arrows and feathers.
When we came to Darnley’s Island, Dupper left me in the charge of a native of that place, named Agge, telling me he was afraid that the New Guinea people would steal or murder me. The party did not stay long on this island, for the next morning they left me, not expecting to see them again for a month.
How great was my surprise, when on the following evening, Dupper returned to the island where he had left me. I asked him whether he had changed all his shells so quickly, or whether any thing serious had happened, that he had come back so soon.
He told me that they stopped at an island called Jarmuth, to pass the night, and that a quarrel ensued between one of the natives of that island, and a Murray Islander, named Newboo, and Dupper’s two nephews, about a pipe of tobacco. Another of the natives of Jarmuth had attempted to take from one of the Murray Islanders his moco, an ornament worn round the calf of the leg, made of the bark of bamboo.
These outrages had caused a fight with bows and arrows, in which several of the Jarmuth people were wounded, and one of them shot through the body; but none of the Murray Islanders were hurt. On this account the voyage was not taken, but we all returned to Murray’s Island.
About three days after this, the Jarmuth people sent a message offering peace; but it was not accepted, and they were still unreconciled when I came away.