The Fijians Part 11

[Pageheader: THE LAMENT OF THE SHADES]

And when the G.o.ds of Ndelakurukuru heard this song they cried, "Liku tangoi ya io," which signifies in the language of the immortals, "The mortals' way of burial is well enough, are we to condemn it for a song?"

We are sitting and the stars are appearing, My feet are in the ferry canoe, There is trampling on the Path of the Shades They are following the "Long Road."

I go on and speak as I go, The world there is lying empty, I am standing on the firm ground, I stand on the hard path, The path that leads straight to Kauvandra, The dance of the "Mbuno-ni-tokalau" echoes, What tree shall I take shelter under, I sit under the _ndanindani_ tree, We sit there chattering, Our food is thrown away, Our children are weeping, I hate to be buried looking skywards, I hate being buried to be stamped upon, The hand with which I threw my _tinka_ stick has been torn off, My legs have fallen off, like rotten fruit.

Our bodies have been broken in half, Our teeth have showered down till not one is left, Our pupils have been turned round to show the whites, Turned so as to show the whites, The whole land is tremulous with haze, I sit down and weep with head bowed to the earth, Let us go and enter the house at Naisongolatha, Ndaunivotua has entered it (the singer of the _votua_), To teach us to sing the _votua_, They keep remembering as they dance, They sleep till it is daylight.

The reminiscence of Greek myth in Themba, the ghostly ferryman, and in the Water-of-Solace is, of course, mere coincidence. The republican sentiments of Charon find no echo in Fiji, for Themba reserved the hard-wood end of his craft for aristocratic pa.s.sengers. The Water-of-Solace, too, was a more complex invention than the Water of Lethe, for the Fijians, whose emotions are transient, make their Lethe an excuse for the shortness of their mourning for the dead. "And his friends also ceased from weeping, for they straightway forgot their sorrow, and were consoled." The saga is valuable for the light that it throws on the moral ethics of the Fijians. Cowardice and idleness were the most heinous crimes; a life of rapine and a violent death were pa.s.sports to the sacred mountain. A natural death was so contemned that the Shade was commanded by Taleya to re-enter the body and die respectably. This part of the story was of course devised to account for recoveries from trance and fainting fits. Life on earth was not a desirable possession. Seeing the misfortunes that overtook the spirit in its last journey, the Fijians might well have exclaimed with Claudio--

"The weariest and most loathed worldly life, Is Paradise to what we fear of death."

Yet so gloomy and joyless is the prospect of a return to life that the Shades who are offered the privilege by Taleya do not all obey, so "anxious are they to reach Nakauvandra."

Light is also thrown upon a fact wonderingly related by the early missionaries, that the widows of dead chiefs themselves insisted upon being strangled to his manes, although it was notorious that they did not love him. It was their good name that was at stake, for we read that when the Shade had missed his throw at the panda.n.u.s-tree, and knew therefrom that his wives would not be strangled, he went on weeping, for he had now a proof that they had been unfaithful to him in life.

[Pageheader: THE ANCESTOR G.o.d]

The religion of a primitive people springs from within them and reflects their moral qualities, and the modification that it receives from the physical character of the country in which they live is a mere colour that goes no deeper than the surface. Every turn in the "Long Road"

embodies an article of social ethics. If there had been no long spur protruding from Nakauvandra into the plain the story would have been different, but the moral ethics of the race would somehow have been ill.u.s.trated; the industrious and courageous would somehow have been rewarded; the man of violence would have had some advantage over the man of peace; the Shades would in some way have shown their preference for the terrors of death to the gloom of life; the idle and the cowardly would somehow have been put to shame.

The Ndengei Myth

Ndengei is supreme among the _Kalou-Vu_ (original G.o.ds), and his authority was recognized by the whole of Vitilevu and its outlying islands, and by the western half of Vanualevu. The oldest tradition in which his name occurs mentions him as one of the first immigrants with Lutu-na-somba-somba, but his fame far exceeded that of his companions, and so many myths gathered about his name, that when the first missionaries arrived he had come to be a counterpart of Zeus himself. In serpent form he lay coiled in a cavern in the Kauvandra mountain above Rakiraki, and when he turned himself the earth quaked. Enormous offerings of food were made to him by the Rakiraki people. Several hundred hogs and turtle were carried to the mouth of the cavern, which the priests approached, crawling on their knees and elbows. One of the priests then entered the cave to proffer the request. If it was for a good yam-crop he would reappear, holding a piece of yam which the G.o.d had given him; if for rain, he would be dripping with water; if for victory, a fire-brand would be flung out in token that the enemy would be consumed, or a clas.h.i.+ng of clubs would be heard, one for each of the enemy that would be slaughtered. Beyond the limits of his own district he had scarcely a temple, and little actual wors.h.i.+p was paid to him, though in the great drought of 1838 King Tanoa of Mbau sent propitiatory offerings to him; and even in Raki-raki itself, there is a humorous song in which Uto his constant attendant, is represented as visiting the public feasts for the G.o.d's portion, and returning to Ndengei with the rueful intelligence that nothing but the under sh.e.l.l of the turtle was allotted to him. In some versions Ndengei has the head and neck only of a serpent, the rest of his body being of stone. He is the creator of mankind, but he has no emotions, sensations, or appet.i.tes except hunger.[52] Another version describes him as sending forth his son, Rokomautu, to create the land. He sc.r.a.ped it up from the ocean-bed, and where his flowing garment trailed across it there were sandy beaches, and where the skirt was looped up the coast was rocky. He also taught men how to produce fire.

When the missionaries first attempted the conversion of Rakiraki the people thought that Christianity was a mere variant of their own cult of Ndengei, using the following argument: Ndengei = the True G.o.d; Jehovah = the True G.o.d; therefore, Jehovah = Ndengei. Many years later the false prophet, Navosavakandua, whose career is set forth hereafter, used a similar argument to prove that his teachings did not clash with those of the missionaries, but were merely a newer revelation.

Ndengei was a purely Melanesian deity, and therefore, as I have said, the whole of Abraham Fornander's argument of a settlement of Polynesians in Fiji from the second to the fifth centuries a.d., which is founded on the fallacy that Ndengei was of Polynesian origin, falls to the ground.[53] For the serpent-wors.h.i.+p indicated in the serpent form of Ndengei, on which he lays so much stress, is a modern gloss, and, even if it had been ancient, it would have proved no connection with the Polynesians, since snake-superst.i.tions are common throughout Melanesia.

[Pageheader: THE SHOOTING OF THE SACRED PIGEON]

The great saga of the war in Nakauvandra is far older than the myth ascribing serpent form to Ndengei, and there the G.o.d figures as a splenetic and irascible old man, as no doubt he was in his remote earthly career. I take the story from the version written down by Ilai Motonithothoko, to whom I have referred elsewhere. When Ndengei had grown old the settlement on the Kauvandra mountain consisted of several villages, one of which belonged to Rokola and his carpenter clan, and the grandsons of the first arrivals were grown men. In the village of Nai-lango-nawanawa, on the slopes of the mountain, lived two twin grand-nephews of Ndengei, named Na-thiri-kau-moli and Na-kau-sambaria, who having brought down a pigeon with an arrow without injuring it, clipped its wings and tamed it. They gave the bird the name of Turukawa, and every morning and evening, and at flood-tide and ebb-tide, its cooing resounded far and wide over the mountain. Old Ndengei, hearing its voice, sent a messenger to ask the youths to give it to him, but they were absent from home, and the messenger, a.s.sured by their father that their consent was not necessary, took the bird to his master.

Ndengei wanted the bird for a practical purpose. Elderly Fijians are somnolent, and the pigeon's cooing at sunrise was useful in arousing him from slumber.

Next morning the twin brothers were startled at hearing their pigeon cooing in Ndengei's village, and when they heard that it had been taken away without their consent, they flew into a rage, crying, "Sombo! is this to be the way with us children of men?" And they made ready their bow, which was called Livaliva-ni-singa (Summer-lightning), and set forth to shoot Turukawa. And when they drew near the banyan-tree in which he was perched, they doffed their turbans; therefore the place is called Ai-thavu-thavu-ni-sala (the Doffing-place) to this day. And they shot an arrow at Turukawa, who fell dead to the ground. And they drew out the arrow, and went to the carpenters' village, Narauyamba, because it was fortified, and their own village was not fortified.

For four days Ndengei missed the cooing of his Awakener, and he sent Uto, his messenger, to see what had become of him. And Uto came to the banyan-tree, and found the body of Turukawa, and saw the arrow-wound, and said, "There is none who would so forget Ndengei as to kill his Awakener but the twin brothers whose bird he was. Why have they gone to live at Narauyamba, except it be because it has a war-fence?" And he told Ndengei his suspicions. Then he went to the brothers and questioned them, and they said, "Yes, we did shoot Turukawa."

Then Ndengei sent to them to come to him, and they refused. And his anger blazed up within him, and he cried with a terrible voice, "Go, tell them to depart to a land where I am not known!"

But this also they refused to do, and Rokola ordered his carpenters to build a war-fence of _vesi_ timber, very high, with neither joint nor c.h.i.n.k in it. And when Ndengei knew that the carpenters had entrenched themselves, he sent messengers to Rokomouto to come and help him.

Then there was war in Kauvandra--such a war as has never since been seen in Fiji. Joined to Ndengei were Rokomouto and his clan, who had settled on Viwa, and together they laid siege to the fortress. Many heroes fell on either side, but never a warrior could storm the wall of _vesi_ built by the carpenters. But now Rokola devised a dreadful engine of war.

Before the gate of his fortress there was a ragged rift in the mountain-side. He sent out his warriors to cut stout vines in the forest, and suspended a bridge of twisted vines over the chasm. From the tops of two stout posts, planted within the fortress, he stretched ropes that appeared to be mere supports to the bridge, but were in reality a trap such as the men of Notho use when they would snare wild duck in their taro-beds. For when a man trod upon them he was caught fast in a noose, and the defenders hauled suddenly upon the ropes, and swung him high over the rampart into their midst, where they could club him at leisure. Then warriors were sent out to flee before the enemy to entice them on the bridge, and many were caught in the trap, and swung into the fortress to meet their doom. Thus were Ndengei's forces dispirited.

[Pageheader: THE GREAT DELUGE]

There were traitors in Ndengei's camp, who were conspiring with the enemy, and carrying food to him by night. These men were seized, and being found guilty on their own confession, were exiled from Kauvandra for ever. They left the mountain, some going towards Matailombau, others towards Navosa. Now, when Ndengei saw that he could not prevail against the fortress, he sought out one Mbakandroti, a man related to the carpenters, who had chosen to take part with Ndengei against his own kin, and bade him devise a plan for betraying the fortress. That night a spirit appeared to Mbakandroti in a dream, and told him to cut down a _vungayali_-tree that grew close to the rampart. And when he had related his dream, one Vueti was appointed to cut it down. He had scarce laid his stone axe to the root when water began to gush forth from the wound.

All that day the water poured into the fortress, and by nightfall it was knee-deep, and rising still. So the carpenters took counsel, and resolved to ask pardon of Ndengei, since the G.o.ds were with him. So Ndengei took counsel with his chiefs, and they said, "These craftsmen are too valuable; we cannot destroy them; let them be exiled!" The fountain had now become a mighty river flowing southward from the mountain, and the craftsmen built them canoes in haste, and embarked, and sailed down the stream till they came to a new land, and there they settled. These are the ancestors of the carpenter clan at Rewa.[54] But there was no pardon for the twin brothers; to their exile there was to be no limit. Yet, for Rokola's sake, they were given time to build their canoe. And Rokola built them a vessel such as has never since been seen in Fiji, and named it Nai-vaka-nawanawa (the Lifeboat), and sailed away down the stream into the western ocean, and were never heard of more; only the prophecy remains that one day they will come again. It will presently be related how the false teacher Na-vosa-vakandua turned this prophecy to account.

The Epic of Dengei

Ko Dengei sa tangi langalanga, "Bongi ndua, bongi rua ka'u yandra Bongi tolu, bongi va ka'u yandra, Sa tambu ndungu ndina ko Turukawa, Isa! nonku toa, na toa turanga, Isa! nonku toa, na toa tamata, Tiko e ulunda na ka rarawa, Au lolova kina, au tambu kana, Matanivanua, mai thithi manda, Mai thithi sara ki Narauyamba, Mo tarongi rau na ndauvavana, 'Kemundrua, ru vanai Turukawa?'

Sa tambu ndungu ni vakamataka, Ma lolo koto Kotoinankara, Ma mbunotha no a wai ni matana, Vakasunka me ramothe mai w.a.n.ka."

Thus did Dengei weep tears of annoyance, "One night, two nights have I lain awake, Three nights, four nights have I lain awake, Not once has Turukawa cooed, Alas! my fowl, my n.o.ble fowl!

Alas! my fowl, my man-like fowl, Sorrow has taken possession of my brain, I am sick with it; I cannot eat, Come, herald, run, Run straight to Narauyamba, Question the archers, and say, 'You, did you shoot Turukawa?

Not once did he coo at daybreak, The 'Cave-dweller'[55] is still fasting, The tears are welling from his eyes; The men are off to sleep on board.'

[Pageheader: THE CRAFTSMEN DECLARE WAR]

The Herald Speaks

Nonku nduri tiko ni karakaramba, Sa talaki ma Kotoinankara, "Matanivanua mai thithi manda, Mo lakovi rau na turanga, Nonku toa sa mate vakathava?

Au tambu kila no a kena thala."

Soraki ka tukutuku ko Mata, Ma mbolea mai ko Nakausamba, 'Matanivanua, mo na ngalu manda, O kenda kethe na luve ni tamata, Oi au na luve ni mathawa, Oi au na luve ni vula thandra, Vakathambethambe nga ko Waithala, Ka levu ko cava kei Mata, Au kaya mo na sa vavi manda, Tha nde ko senga ni na laukana, Ni ko rui kaisi tha sara, Au a lenkata na vula ma thandra."

Ko Nathirikaumoli ma vosaya, "Me tukuna ma Kotoinankara, Nona ruve e rawata vakathava?

E kune e wai, se rawata matha?

Ko la'ki tukuna me nda tu sa vala, Sa vu ni tha nga ko Turukawa, Me tawase kina ko Nakauvandra, Sa tha nondatou tiko vata, Me ngundu na masi me tou sa vala."

Kena moto ma rara no kivata, Na malumu me thavu e na wakana, Ko wilika ma na sai mbalambala, Tiko sombu ndaru na okaokata, E undolu vakatini sa rawa, Me tou tinia na masi ni vala, A ndrondro a ue ki sankata.

Mataisau era mbose toka, Era mbose, era ndui vosavosa, Me nkai vosa mai ko Rokola, "Mbai vesi mo ndou la'ki vonota, Matamata mo ndou la'ki karona,"

Na mbongi ni vala ka sa tini toka, Kena wa ma mbuki ma so vota, Velavela ko Lutunasombasomba, Sai koya nga na ndauloloma, Nda nkai nanuma tale nona vosa, "Tou a nkai kune ka ngona, O ndou nguthe tou na mbokola, Me mai mbaleta nai votavota."

E tini na vuthu ka tambu na vosa.

I am wearied with the labour of poling, Dispatched with this message from the Cave-dweller, "Come, herald, run, Summon the two chiefs to come to me, Why was my fowl slain?

I know of no evil that he did."

Thus the herald gave his message, Nakausamba answers him boastfully, "Herald, hold thy peace, We are all the children of men, I am the child of s.p.a.ce, I am the child of the rising moon, Which Waithala made to rise, This herald is full of questions, My way would be to have thee roasted, It would be a pity not to have thee eaten, For thou art the worst of lowborn men; I have confined the rising moon."

Then speaks Nathirikaumoli, "Tell this to the Cave-dweller, How came he by his pigeon?

Found he it in the water, or found he it on land, Go, tell him that we will fight for it, Turukawa is the root of the evil, It is by him that Kauvandra is divided, It is not well that we should live together, Up with the flag and let us fight."

His spear lies ready on the shelf, And his club can be s.n.a.t.c.hed from the eaves, Have you counted the spear-points of tree-fern?

Sit down and let us number them, Ten times one hundred in all; Let us hoist the pennants of war, The welkin rings with the tumult.

The craftsmen are sitting in council, They consult, each gives his opinion, Rokola now speaks, "Go and fit close a rampart of vesi, Give special heed to the gate,"

Ten days has the battle raged, The rope has snared them; they are dismembered, Lutunasombasomba is dishonoured, He it is who is to be pitied, Let us then recall his words, "We are now in terrible plight, You gloat over our corpses, Thinking how ye will dismember them for the feast."

The poem is finished and there is silence.

Vunivasa

Ndungu toka ni singa ko Turukawa, Sa tambu ndungu ni vakama taka, Tangi ko Ndengei ru sa lomana, Isa nonku toa, na toa turanga, U vula ndua koto ni tambu kana, U vula rua koto ni lolovaka, Me ndua me thithi ki Narauyamba, I tarongi rau na ngone turanga, Oi ndrua, ru vanai Turukawa, Sa tambu ndungu ni vakamataka, "Tiko i ulunda na tiko vinaka, Ru sanga voli nai vakayandra."

Ra tukia ni mbongi na veivala, Ndua nai valu ma sorovi rawa.

Tambu ni sorovi mo ndru la'ki kamba, Era mba nai valu i ruarua, Ndua i yaviti yae; ndua i tambili, yae, Ului Ndreketi era sa mbini.

Seu nai valu i matasawa, Ia la'ki seu ki sawana, Ru la'ki samuti ko Nakauvandra, Vosa i cei a vuna vala?

Thimbi koto nai valu sa rawa, Lave a osooso ni turanga, Enda vala, enda vala, enda vala--i!

Second Choir