Life of John Coleridge Patteson : Missionary Bishop of the Melanesian Islands Part 67

'What he would really dread in England would be the being lionised, and being compelled to speak and preach here, there, and everywhere. And yet he would have no power to say nay. But the cold would shrivel him up, and society--dinners, table talk--would bore him, and he would pine for his warmth and his books. Not a bit the less does he dearly love you all.'

The brother and sisters knew it, and forebore to hara.s.s him with remonstrances, but resigned themselves to the knowledge that nothing would bring him home save absolute disqualification for his mission.

His own last letter from Taurarua dwells upon the enjoyment of his conversations with Sir William Martin and Bishop Cowie; and then goes into details of a vision of obtaining young English boys to whom a good education would be a boon, bringing them up at St. Barnabas, and then, if they turned out fit for the Mission there, they would be prepared--if not, they would have had the benefit of the schooling.

Meantime the 'Southern Cross,' with three of the clergy, had made the voyage according to minute directions from the Bishop. Mr. Atkin made his yearly visit to Bauro. He says:--

'I hardly expected that when we came back we should have found the peace still unbroken between w.a.n.go and Hane, but it is. Though not very good friends, they are still at peace. In the chief's house I was presented with a piece of pork, about two pounds, and a dish of tauma (their favourite), a pudding made of yams, nuts, and cocoa-nut milk, and cooked by steaming. Fortunately, good manners allowed me to take it away.

Before we left the village, it took two women to carry our provisions. A little boy came back with us, to stay with Taki. The two boys who ought to have come last year are very anxious to do so still.

'July 12th.--We anch.o.r.ed the boat on the beach at Tawatana, and I went into the oka (public house) to see the tauma prepared for the feast.

There were thirty-eight dishes. The largest, about four feet long, stood nearly three feet high. I tried to lift one from the ground, but could not; it must have been five hundredweight; the smallest daras held eighty or a hundred pounds. I calculated that there was at least two tons. When freshly made it is very good, but at these feasts it is always old and sour, and dripping with cocoa-nut oil. The daras, or wooden bowls, into which it is put, are almost always carved and inlaid with mother-of-pearl sh.e.l.l.

'There was a great crowd at the landing-place at Saa (Malanta) to meet us. n.o.body knew Wate at first, but he was soon recognised. The boat was pulled up into a little river, and everything stealable taken out. We then went up to the village, pa.s.sing some women crying on the way; here, as at Uleawa, crying seems to be the sign of joy, or welcome. Wate's father's new house is the best I have seen in any of these islands. It has two rooms; the drawing-room is about forty-five feet long by thirty wide, with a roof projecting about six feet outside the wall at the end and four feet at the eaves; the bed-room is about eighteen feet wide, so that the whole roof covers about seventy feet by forty. Wate's father lives like a chief of the olden time, with large property, but nothing of his own; all that he has or gets goes as soon as he gets it to his retainers.

'August 3rd.--Went to Heuru. The bwea began about ten o'clock. A bwea means a stage, but the word is used as we speak of "the stage." There is a stage in this case about three feet square, twenty feet from the ground, walled in to three feet height on three sides, with a ladder of two stout poles. On the bwea sit or stand two or three men, on either side having a bag; visitors run up the ladder, put their money or porpoise teeth into the bags if small, give it to the men if large; and, if their present is worth it, make a speech a little way down the ladder. A party from a village generally send up a spokesman, and when he has done go up in a body and give their money. Taki was orator for Waiio, and I led the party with my present of beads, which if red or white pa.s.s as money. The object of a bwea is to get money, but it may only be held on proper occasions. The occasion of this was the adoption of a Mara lad by the chief man at Heuru; to get money to pay the lad's friends he held a bwea that all his friends might help him. As he was a connection of Taki's, and Waiio is the richest of the settlements, he got great spoils from thence.... At Tawatana the young men put on petticoats of cocoa-nut leaves, and danced their graceful "mao." I had only seen it before at Norfolk Island; it is very pretty, but must be very difficult to learn; they say that not many know it. At Nora they danced another most dirty dance: all the performers were daubed from head to foot with mud, and wore masks covered with mud and ashes; the aim of the dance, as far as I could see, was to ridicule all sorts of infirmities and imbecilities, tottering, limping, staggering, and reeling, but in time and order. One man had a basket of dripping mud on his head which was streaming down his face and back all the time. A great point is that the actors should not be recognised. Mr. Brooke was likewise dropped at Florida. After this the rest of the party had gone on to Mota, where George Sarawia was found working away well at his school, plenty of attendants, and the whole place clean, well-ventilated, and well-regulated.

A watch sent out as a present to Sarawia was a delight which he could quite appreciate, and he had sent back very sensible right-minded letters. Of Bishop Patteson's voyage the history is pieced together from two letters, one to the sisters, the other to the Bishop of Lichfield.

Neither was begun till September, after which they make a tolerably full diary.

'More than five weeks have pa.s.sed since I left New Zealand, more than three since I left Norfolk Island. Mr. Codrington and I reached Mota on the morning of the eighth day after leaving Norfolk Island. I spent but half an hour on sh.o.r.e with George Sarawia and his people; sailed across to Aroa and Matlavo, where I landed eight or ten of our scholars; and came on at once to the Solomon Islands. On Sunday morning (September 4) what joy to find Mr. Atkin well and hearty!

'Mr. Brooke, who took up his abode at the village of Mboli, had with him Dudley Lankana and Richard Maru, but they were a good deal absorbed by their relations, and not so useful to him as had been hoped, though they kept out of heathen habits, and remained constant to their intention of returning.

'"Brooke," says the Bishop, "knows and speaks the one language of Anudha very well, for there is but one language, with a few dialectical varieties of course."

'A nice little house was built for him at Mboli, which I have always thought to be a very healthy place.

'The coral grit and sand runs a long way in sh.o.r.e under cocoa-nut groves, but there is no very dense undergrowth. The wind when easterly blows freely along and is drawn rather upon the sh.o.r.e there. Two miles to windward of Mboli is the good harbour of Sara, where the vessel anch.o.r.ed with us.

'Brooke's house was raised on poles, five feet from the ground; the floor made of neat smooth bamboos, basket-worked. He had his table and two benches, one easy cane chair, cork bed, boxes, harmonium, and plenty of food.

'Close to his house is the magnificent kiala, or boat house, about 180 feet long, 42 high, and about as many feet broad, a really grand, imposing place. Here Brooke, in surplice, with his little band, had his Sunday services, singing hymns, and chanting Psalms, in parts, in the presence of from 150 to 300, once nearly 400 people, to whom he spoke of course, usually twice, making two sermonets.

'The island is unlike any other; much more open, much less bush, but it is not coral crag that crops out, but almost bare reddish rock, with but little soil on it, and the population, which is large, finds it hard to procure food.

'Three brothers, Takua, Savai, and Dikea, are the princ.i.p.al men. Local chiefs exercise some small authority in each village. Anudha, or Aunta, is properly the name of a small island, for there is no one great mainland, but many islands separated by very narrow salt-water creeks and rivers, along which a skiff may be sculled.

'Brooke has been over every part of it. His only difficulties arose from jealousy on the part of Takua and Savai, who, living at Mboli, were very wroth at his not being their tame Pakeha, at his a.s.serting his independence, his motive in coming to teach all, and make known to all alike a common message. Especially they were indignant at his making up small parties of boys from different parts of the island, as they of course wanted to monopolise him, and through him the trade. He has evidently been firm and friendly too, keeping his temper, yet speaking out very plainly. The result, as far as bringing boys goes, is that we have now thirteen on board, including Dudley and Richard, from six different parts of the island. But so vexed was Takua, that he would not fulfil his promise of sending his two little girls.

'The fortnight spent in the Solomon Islands has been very fine; winds very light, and very little rain. We have at length got Stephen Taroniara's child, a little girl of about seven years old, Paraitaku, from the old grandmother and aunts. So, thank G.o.d, she will be brought up as a Christian child. She is a dear little thing.

'This work of Mr. Atkin and Mr. Brooke in the easterly and more north-westerly parts of the Solomon Islands respectively, is the nearest approach that has yet been made to regular missionary operations there.

Our short visits in the "Southern Cross," or my short three to ten days'

visits on sh.o.r.e are all useful as preparing the way for something more.

But it is the quiet, lengthened staying for some months among these islanders that gives opportunities for knowing them and their ways. They do everything with endless talk and discussion about it; and it is only by living with, and moving about constantly among them, that any hold can be gained over them. I think that the Mission is now in a more hopeful state than ever before in these islands.

'Our parties of scholars are large. They trust quite little fellows with us, and for any length of time. True, these little fellows cannot exercise any influence for years to come; but if we take young men or lads of sixteen or eighteen years old, it needs as many years to qualify them (with heathen habits to be unlearned, and with the quickness of apprehension of new teaching already gone) for being useful among their people as would suffice for the arrival of these young children at mature age.'

Three Tikopian giants had made a visit at Mota in the course of this year, attracted by the fame of the hospitality and fertility of the place. George Sarawia had got on well with them, and tried to keep them to meet the Bishop, but one of them fell sick, and the others took him away. This was hailed as a possible opening to those two curious isles, Oanuta and Tikopia, in so far as the 'Southern Cross' work was concerned. The Bishop continues, to his former Primate:--

'On the whole, things seem to be going on favourably. The Banks Islanders are very shy now of the vessels sent to carry off men to Fiji or Queensland. They will find their way into the Solomon Islands soon.

One, indeed, a cutter, has taken about twenty men from Ulava. They were all kept under hatches. We warn the people wherever we go.

'The pressing question now is how to supply our young men and women, married Christian couples, with proper occupations to prevent their acquiescing in an indolent, useless, selfish life.

'When their "education is finished," they have no profession, no need to work to obtain a livelihood for themselves, wives, and children. They can't all be clergymen, nor all even teachers in such a sense as to make it a calling and occupation.

'Some wants they have--houses fit for persons who like reading and writing, a table, a bench, a window becomes necessary. Coral lime houses would be good for them. They make and wear light clothing, they wash and cook on new principles, &c.; but these wants are soon supplied. Only a practical sense of the duty of helping others to know what they have been taught will keep them from idleness and its consequences. And how few of us, with no other safeguard against idleness, would be other than idle!

'Some, I think, may be helped by being a.s.sociated with us, and with their friends of the Solomon Isles, New Hebrides, in spending some months on sh.o.r.e, where they would soon acquire a fair knowledge of the language, and might be of great use to less advanced friends. This would be a real work for them. Just as Mission work is the safeguard of the settled Church, so it must be the safeguard of these young native Churches.

'No doubt the Missionary spirit infused into the Samoan and Karotongan Churches kept them living and fruitful. I am trying to think upon these points.

'If the contrast be too violent between the Mission station with its daily occupations and the island life, it becomes very difficult for the natives to perpetuate the habits of the one amidst the circ.u.mstances of the other.

'The habits acquired at Norfolk Island ought to be capable of being easily transferred to the conditions of the Melanesian isles.

'They ought, I think, to wear (in the hot summer and on week days) light loose clothing, which could be worn at home; or clothing of the same shape and fit (though perhaps of warm materials) might be worn.

'The circ.u.mstances of the two places must be different, but we must minimise the difference as much as possible.

'I often think of the steady-going English family, with regular family prayers, and attendance twice at Church on Sunday, and the same people spending two months on the Continent. No opportunity is made for family prayers before the table d'hote breakfast; and at least one part of the Sunday is spent in the Roman Catholic Cathedral, or in a different way from the home use. And if this be so with good respectable folk among ourselves, what must be the effect of altered circ.u.mstances on our Melanesians?

'It is not easy to keep up the devotional life on sh.o.r.e at home, or in the islands, or on board s.h.i.+p with the same regularity. And where the convert must be more dependent than we ought to be on external opportunities, the difficulty is increased. So if the alteration be as little as possible, we gain something, we make it easier to our scholars to perpetuate uninterruptedly the Norfolk Island life.

'To live with them and try to show them how, on their island, to keep up the religious life unchanged amidst the changed outward circ.u.mstances is a good way, but then we can't live among them very long, and our example is so often faulty.

'Curiously do these practical difficulties make us realise that there may really be some benefit in artificial wants; and that probably the most favourable situation for the development of the human character is a climate where the necessaries of life are just sufficiently difficult of production to require steady industry, and yet that nature should not be so rigorous as to make living so hard a matter as to occupy the whole attention, and dwarf the mental faculties.'

How remarkable, is the date of the following thoughts, almost like a foreboding:--

'September 19th, 10 A.M. (to the sisters).--We are drawing near Santa Cruz, about 100 miles off. How my mind is filled with hopes, not unmingled with anxiety. It is more than eleven years since we sought to make an opening here, and as yet we have no scholar. Last year, I went ash.o.r.e at a large village called Taive, about seven miles from the scene of our disaster. Many canoes came to us from that spot, and we stood in quite close in the vessel, so that people swam off to us.

'They are all fighting among the various villages and neighbouring islets of the Reef Archipelago, twenty miles north of the main island.

It is very difficult what to do or how to try to make a beginning.

G.o.d will open a door in His own good time. Yet to see and seize on the opportunity when given is difficult. How these things make one feel more than ever the need of Divine guidance, the gift of the Spirit of Wisdom and Counsel and ghostly strength. To human eyes it seems almost hopeless. Yet other islanders were in a state almost as hopeless apparently. Only there is a something about Santa Cruz which is probably very unreal and imaginary, which seems to present unusual difficulties.

In a few days, I may, by G.o.d's goodness, be writing to you again about our visit to the group. And if the time be come, may G.o.d grant us some opening, and grace to use it aright!

'At Piteni, Matama, Nupani, a.n.a.logo, I can talk somewhat to the people, who are Polynesians, and speak a dialect connected with the Maori of New Zealand. I think that the people of Indeni (the native name for Santa Cruz) are also more than half Polynesians; but I don't know a single sentence of their language properly. I can say nothing about it. They destroy and distort their organs of p.r.o.nunciation by excessive use of the betel-nut and pepper leaf and lime, so that no word is articulately p.r.o.nounced. It is very hard to catch the sounds they make amidst the hubbub on deck or the crowds on sh.o.r.e; yet I think that if we had two or three lads quietly with us at Norfolk Island, we should soon make out something.

'Don't think I am depressed by this. I only feel troubled by the sense that I frequently lose opportunities from indolence and other faults. I am quite aware that we can do very little to bring about an introduction to these islanders; and I fully believe that in some quite unexpected way, or at all events in some way brought about independently of our efforts, a work will be begun here some day, in the day when G.o.d sees it to be fit and right.

(To the Bishop of Lichfield.)

'September 27th.--Leaving Santa Cruz we came to this group from Ulava with light fair winds; left Ulava on Sat.u.r.day at 6 P.M., and sighted the island, making the west side of Graciosa Bay on the next Wednesday; sea quite smooth; thermometer reached 92 degrees.