The Samoans were always a warlike race. When not unitedly repelling invasion by the all-conquering Tongans who sent fleet after fleet to subjugate the country, they were warring among themselves upon various pretexts--successions to chiefly t.i.tles, land disputes, abuse of neutral territory, and often upon the most trivial pretexts. In my own time I witnessed a sanguinary naval encounter between the people of the island of Manono, and a war-party of ten great canoes from the district of Lepa on the island of Upolu. I saw sixteen decapitated heads brought on sh.o.r.e, and personally attended many of the wounded. And all this occurred through the Lepa people having at a dance in their village sung a song in which a satirical allusion was made to the Manono people having once been reduced to eating sh.e.l.l-fish. The result was an immediate challenge from Manono, and in all nearly one hundred men lost their lives, villages were burnt, canoes destroyed, and thousands of coco-nut and bread-fruit trees cut down and plantations ruined.
Sometimes in battle the Samoans were extremely chivalrous, at others they were demons incarnate, as merciless, cold-blooded, and cruel as the Russian police who slaughter women and children in the streets of the capital of the Great White Czar, and I shall now endeavour to describe one such terrible act, which after many years is still spoken of with bated breath, and even amidst the suppressed sobs and falling tears of the descendants of those who suffered.
On the north coast of Upolu there is a populous town and district named Fasito"otai. It is part of the A"ana division of Upolu, and is noted, even in Samoa, a paradise of Nature, for its extraordinary fertility and beauty.
The A"ana people at this time were suffering from the tyranny of Manono, a small island which boasted of the fact of its being the birthplace and home of nearly all the ruling chiefs of Samoa, and the extraordinary respect with which people of chiefly lineage are treated by Samoans, generally led them to suffer the greatest indignities and oppressions by the haughty and warlike Manonoans, who exacted under threats a continuous tribute of food, fine mats and canoes. Finally, a valorous young chief named Tausaga--though himself connected with Manono--revolted, and he and his people refused to pay further tribute to Manono, and a b.l.o.o.d.y struggle was entered upon.
For some months the war continued. No mercy was shown on either side to the vanquished, and there is now a song which tells of how Palu, a girl of seventeen, with a spear thrust half through her bosom by her brother-in-law, a chief of Manono, shot him through the chest with a horse pistol, and then breaking off the spear, knelt beside the dying man, kissed him as her "brother" and then decapitated him, threw the head to her people with a cry of triumph--and died.
At first the A"ana people were victorious, and the haughty Manonoans were driven off into their fleets of war canoes time and time again.
Then Manono made alliance with other powerful chiefs of Savai"i and Upolu against A"ana, and two thousand of them, after great slaughter, occupied the town of Fasito"otai, and the A"ana people retired to inland fortresses, resolved to fight to the very last Among the leaders of the defeated people were two white men--an Englishman and an American--whose valour was so much admired, even by the Manono people, that they were openly solicited to desert the A"ana people, and come over to the other side, where great honours and gifts of lands awaited them. To their credit, these two unknown men rejected the offer with scorn, and announced their intention to die with the people with whom they had lived for so many years. At their instance, many of the Manono warriors who had been captured had been spared, and kept prisoners, instead of being ruthlessly decapitated in the usual Samoan fashion, and their heads exhibited, with much ignominy, from one village to another, as trophies.
For two years the struggle continued, the Manonoans generally proving victorious in many b.l.o.o.d.y battles. Then Fasito"otai was surprised in the night, and two-thirds of its defenders, including many women and children, slaughtered. Among those who died were the two white men. They fell with thirty young men, who covered the retreat of the survivors of the defending force.
The extraordinary valour which the A"ana people had displayed, exasperated the Manono warriors to deeds of unnamable violence to whatever prisoners fell into their cruel hands. One man--an old Manono chief--who had taken part in the struggle, told me with shame that he saw babies impaled on bayonets and spears carried exultingly from one village to another.
Broken and disorganised, the beaten A"ana people dispersed in parties large and small. Some sought refuge in the mountain forests, others put to sea in frail canoes, and mostly all perished, but one party of seventeen in three canoes succeeded in reaching Uea (Wallis Island), three hundred miles to the westward of Samoa Among them was a boy of seven years of age, who afterwards sailed with me in a labour vessel.
He well remembered the horrors of that awful voyage, and told me of his seeing his father "take a knife and open a vein in his arm so that a baby girl, who was dying of hunger, could drink".
Relentless in their hate of the vanquished foe, the Manono warriors established a cordon around them from the mountain range that traverses the centre of Upolu to the sea, and at last, after many engagements, drove them to the beach, where a final battle was fought. Exhausted, famine-stricken, and utterly disheartened by their continuous reverses, the unfortunate A"ana people were easily overcome, and the fighting survivors surrendered, appealing to their enemies to at least spare the lives of their women and children.
But no mercy was shown. As night began to fall, the Manonoans began to dig a huge pit at a village named Maota, a mile from the scene of the battle, and as some dug, others carried an enormous quant.i.ty of dead logs of timber to the spot. By midnight the dreadful funeral pyre was completed.
In case that it might be thought by my readers that I am exaggerating the horrors of "The Pit of Maota," I will not here relate what I, personally, was told by people who were present at the awful deed, but repeat the words of Mr. Stair, an English missionary of the London Missionary Society, whose book, ent.i.tled Old Samoa, tells the story in quiet, yet dramatic language, and although in regard to some minor details he was misinformed, his account on the whole is correct, and is the same as was told to me by men who had actually partic.i.p.ated in the tragedy.
The awful preparations were completed, and then the victors, seizing those of their captives who were bound on account of their strength and had a few hours previously surrendered, hurried them to the fatal pit, in which the huge pile of timber had been lit. And as the flames roared and ascended, and the darkness of the surrounding forest was made as light as day, the first ten victims of four hundred and sixty-two were cast in to burn, amid the howls and yells of their savage captors.
Mr. Stair says: "This dreadful butchery was continued during one or two days and nights, fresh timber being heaped on from time to time, as it was with difficulty that the fire could be kept burning, from the number of victims who were ruthlessly sacrificed there.
"The captives from Fasito"otai were selected for the first offerings, and after them followed others in quick succession, night and day, early and late, until the last wretched victim had been consumed. Most heartrending were the descriptions I received from persons who had actually looked on the fearful scenes enacted there.
"Innocent children skipped joyfully along the pathway by the side of their conductors and murderers,{*} deceived by the cruel lie that they were to be spared, and were then on their way to bathe; when suddenly the blazing pile (in the Pit of Noata) with the horrid sight of their companions and friends being thrown alive into the midst, told them the dreadful truth; whilst their terror was increased by the yells of savage triumph of the murderers, or the fearful cries of the tortured victims which reached their ears."
* I was told that the poor children were led away as they thought to be given si mea ai vela--"something hot" (to eat).--[L.B.]
When I first saw the dreadful t.i.to (pit) of Moata, it was at the close of a calm, windless day. I had been pigeon-shooting in the mountain forest, and was accompanied by a stalwart young Samoan warrior. As we were returning to Fasito"otai, he asked me if I would come a little out of the way and look at the "t.i.to," a place he said "that is to our hearts, and is, holy ground". He spoke so reverently that I was much impressed.
Following a winding path we suddenly came in view of the pit. The sides were almost covered with many beautiful varieties of crotons, planted there by loving hands, and it was very evident to me that the place was indeed holy ground. At the bottom of the pit was a dreadful reminder of the past--a large circle of black charcoal running round the sides, and enclosing in the centre a large s.p.a.ce which at first I thought was snow-white sand, but on descending into the pit with uncovered head, and looking closer, found it was composed of tiny white coral pebbles.
Hardly a single leaf or twig marred the purity of the whiteness of the cover under which lay the ashes of nearly five hundred human beings.
Every Sat.u.r.day the women and children of Fasito"otai and the adjacent villages visited the place, and reverently removed every bit of _debris_, and the layer of stones, carefully selected of an equal size, was renewed two or three times a year as they became discoloured by the action of the rain. Encompa.s.sing the wooded margin of the pit were numbers of orange, lime and banana trees, all in full fruit. These were never touched--to do so would have been sacrilege, for they were sacred to the dead. All around us were hundreds of wood-doves and pigeons, and their peaceful notes filled the forest with saddening melody. "No one ever fires a gun here," said my companion softly, "it is forbidden. And it is to my mind that the birds know that it is a sacred place and holy ground."
CHAPTER XXII ~ VANaKI, THE STRONG SWIMMER
On the afternoon of the 4th of June, 1885, the Hawaiian labour schooner _Mana_, of which I was "recruiter" was beating through Apolima Straits, which divide the islands of Upolu and Savai"i. The south-east trade was blowing very strongly and a three-knot current setting against the wind had raised a short, confused sea, and our decks were continually flooded. But we had to thrash through it with all the sail we could possibly carry, for among the sixty-two Gilbert Islands "recruits" I had on board three had developed symptoms of what we feared was small-pox, and we were anxious to reach the anchorage off the town of Mulifanua at the west end of Upolu before dark. At Mulifanua there was a large German cotton plantation, employing four hundred "recruited" labourers, and on the staff of European employes was a resident doctor. In the ordinary course of things we should have gone on to Apia, which was twenty miles farther on, and our port of destination, and handed over my cargo of "recruits" to the manager of the German firm there; but as Mulifanua Plantation was also owned by them, and my "recruits" would probably be sent there eventually, the captain and I decided to land the entire lot at that place, instead of taking them to Apia, where the European community would be very rough upon us if the disease on board did turn out to be small-pox.
As the skipper and I were standing aft, watching the showers of spray that flew over the schooner every time a head sea smacked her in the face, one of the hands shouted out that there was a man in the water, close to on the weather bow. Hauling our head sheets to windward we head-reached towards him, and in a few minutes the man, who was swimming in the most gallant fashion, was alongside, and clambered on board. He was a rather dark-skinned Polynesian, young, and of extremely powerful physique.
"Thanks, good friends," he said, speaking in halting Samoan. ""Tis a high sea in which to swim. Yet," and here he glanced around him at the land on both sides, "I was half-way across."
"Come below," I said, "and take food and drink, and I will give you a _lava-lava_ (waistcloth)." (He was nude.)
He thanked me, and then again his keen dark eyes were fixed upon Savai"i--three miles distant.
"Art bound to Savai"i?" he asked quickly.
"Nay. We beat against the wind. To-night we anchor at Mulifanua."
"Ah!" and his face changed, "then I must leave, for it is to Savai"i I go," and he was about to go over the rail when we held him back.
"Wait, friend. In a little time the ship will be close in to the pa.s.sage through the reef at Saleleloga" (a town of Savai"i), "and then as we put the ship about, thou canst go on thy way. Why swim two leagues and tempt the sharks when there is no need. Come below and eat and drink, and have no fear. We shall take thee as near to the pa.s.sage as we can."
The skipper came below with us, and after providing our visitor with a navy blue waistcloth, we gave him a stiff tumbler of rum, and some bread and meat. He ate quickly and then asked for a smoke, and in a few minutes more we asked him who he was, and why he was swimming across the straits. We spoke in Samoan. "Friends," he said, "I will tell the truth.
I am one of the _kau galuega_ (labourers) on Mulifanua Plantation.
Yesterday being the Sabbath, and there being no work, I went into the lands of the Samoan village to steal young nuts and _taro_. I had thrown down and husked a score, and was creeping back to my quarters by a side path through the grove, when I was set upon by three young Samoan _manaia_ (bloods) who began beating me with clubs--seeking to murder me.
We fought, and I, knowing that death was upon me, killed one man with a blow of my _tori nui_{*} (husking stick) of iron-wood, and then drove it deep into the chest of another. Then I fled, and gaining the beach, ran into the sea so that I might swim to Savai"i, for there will I be safe from pursuit" ""Tis a long swim, man--"tis five leagues." He laughed and expanded his brawny chest "What is that to me? I have swam ten leagues many times."
* A heavy, pointed stick of hardwood, used for husking coco- nuts.
"Where do you belong?" asked the skipper in English.
He answered partly in the same language and partly in his curious Samoan.
"I am of Anuda.{*} My name is Vanaki. Two years ago I came to Samoa in a German labour ship to work on the plantations, for I wanted to see other places and earn money, and then return to Anuda and speak of the things I had seen. It was a foolish thing of me. The German _suis_ (overseers) are harsh men. I worked very hard on little food. It was for that I had to steal. And I am but one man from Anuda, and there are four hundred others from many islands--black-skinned, man-eating, woolly-haired pigs from the Solomon and New Hebrides, and fierce fellows like these Tafito{**} men from the Gilbert Islands such as I now see here on this ship. No one of them can speak my tongue of Anuda. And now I am a free man."
* Anuda or Cherry Island is an outlier of the Santa Cruz Group, in the South Pacific. The natives are more of the Polynesian than the Melanesian type, and are a fine, stalwart race.
** Tafitos--natives of the Pacific Equatorial Islands such as the Gilbert Group.
"You are a plucky fellow," said the captain, "and deserve good luck.
Here, take this dollar, and tie it up in the corner of your waistcloth.
You can buy yourself some tobacco from the white trader at Salelelogo."
"Ah, yes, indeed. But" (and here he dropped into Samoan again, and turned to me) "I would that the good captain would take me as a sailor for his next voyage. I was for five years with Captain Macleod of Noumea. And I am a good man--honest, and no boaster."
I shook my head. "It cannot be. From Mulifanua we go to Apia And there will be news there of what thou hast done yesterday, and we cannot hide a man on this small ship." And then I asked the captain what he thought of the request.
"We ought to try and work it," said the skipper. "If he was five years with Jock Macleod he"s all right."
We questioned him further, and he satisfied us as to his _bona-fides_, giving us the names of many men--captains and traders--known to us intimately.
"Vanaki," I said, "this is what may be done, but you must be quick, for presently we shall be close to the pa.s.sage off Saleleloga, and must go about When you land, go to Miti-loa the chief, and talk to him privately. There is bad blood between his people and those of Mulifanua----"
"I know it It has been so for two years past."
"Now, listen. Miti-loa and the captain here and I are good friends. Tell him that you have seen us. Hide nothing from him of yesterday. He is a strong man."