Typee: A Romance of the South Seas
Page 39
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
STRANGE CUSTOM OF THE ISLANDERS--THEIR CHANTING, AND THE PECULIARITY OFTHEIR VOICE--RAPTURE OF THE KING AT FIRST HEARING A SONG--A NEW DIGNITYCONFERRED ON THE AUTHOR--MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS IN THE VALLEY--ADMIRATIONOF THE SAVAGES AT BEHOLDING A PUGILISTIC PERFORMANCE--SWIMMINGINFANT--BEAUTIFUL TRESSES OF THE GIRLS--OINTMENT FOR THE HAIR
SADLY discursive as I have already been, I must still further entreatthe reader's patience, as I am about to string together, without anyattempt at order, a few odds and ends of things not hitherto mentioned,but which are either curious in themselves or peculiar to the Typees.
There was one singular custom observed in old Marheyo's domesticestablishment, which often excited my surprise. Every night, beforeretiring, the inmates of the house gathered together on the mats, andso squatting upon their haunches, after the universal practice ofthese islanders, would commence a low, dismal and monotonous chant,accompanying the voice with the instrumental melody produced by twosmall half-rotten sticks tapped slowly together, a pair of whichwere held in the hands of each person present. Thus would they employthemselves for an hour or two, sometimes longer. Lying in the gloomwhich wrapped the further end of the house, I could not avoid lookingat them, although the spectacle suggested nothing but unpleasantreflection. The flickering rays of the 'armor' nut just served to revealtheir savage lineaments, without dispelling the darkness that hoveredabout them.
Sometimes when, after falling into a kind of doze, and awaking suddenlyin the midst of these doleful chantings, my eye would fall upon thewild-looking group engaged in their strange occupation, with their nakedtattooed limbs, and shaven heads disposed in a circle, I was almosttempted to believe that I gazed upon a set of evil beings in the act ofworking at a frightful incantation.
What was the meaning or purpose of this custom, whether it was practicedmerely as a diversion, or whether it was a religious exercise, a sort offamily prayers, I never could discover.
The sounds produced by the natives on these occasions were of a mostsingular description; and had I not actually been present, I never wouldhave believed that such curious noises could have been produced by humanbeings.
To savages generally is imputed a guttural articulation. This however,is not always the case, especially among the inhabitants of thePolynesian Archipelago. The labial melody with which the Typee girlscarry on an ordinary conversation, giving a musical prolongation to thefinal syllable of every sentence, and chirping out some of the wordswith a liquid, bird-like accent, was singularly pleasing.
The men however, are not quite so harmonious in their utterance, andwhen excited upon any subject, would work themselves up into a sort ofwordy paroxysm, during which all descriptions of rough-sided soundswere projected from their mouths, with a force and rapidity which wasabsolutely astonishing.
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Although these savages are remarkably fond of chanting, still theyappear to have no idea whatever of singing, at least as the art ispractised in other nations.
I shall never forget the first time I happened to roar out a stavein the presence of noble Mehevi. It was a stanza from the 'Bavarianbroom-seller'. His Typeean majesty, with all his court, gazed upon me inamazement, as if I had displayed some preternatural faculty which Heavenhad denied to them. The King was delighted with the verse; but thechorus fairly transported him. At his solicitation I sang it again andagain, and nothing could be more ludicrous than his vain attempts tocatch the air and the words. The royal savage seemed to think that byscrewing all the features of his face into the end of his nose hemight possibly succeed in the undertaking, but it failed to answer thepurpose; and in the end he gave it up, and consoled himself by listeningto my repetition of the sounds fifty times over.
Previous to Mehevi's making the discovery, I had never been aware thatthere was anything of the nightingale about me; but I was now promotedto the place of court-minstrel, in which capacity I was afterwardsperpetually called upon to officiate.
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Besides the sticks and the drums, there are no other musical instrumentsamong the Typees, except one which might appropriately be denominated anasal flute. It is somewhat longer than an ordinary fife; is made ofa beautiful scarlet-coloured reed; and has four or five stops, witha large hole near one end, which latter is held just beneath the leftnostril. The other nostril being closed by a peculiar movement of themuscles about the nose, the breath is forced into the tube, and producesa soft dulcet sound which is varied by the fingers running at randomover the stops. This is a favourite recreation with the females and onein which Fayaway greatly excelled. Awkward as such an instrument mayappear, it was, in Fayaway's delicate little hands, one of the mostgraceful I have ever seen. A young lady, in the act of tormenting aguitar strung about her neck by a couple of yards of blue ribbon, is nothalf so engaging.
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Singing was not the only means I possessed of diverting the royal Meheviand his easy-going subject. Nothing afforded them more pleasure than tosee me go through the attitude of pugilistic encounter. As not one ofthe natives had soul enough in him to stand up like a man, and allow meto hammer away at him, for my own personal gratification and that ofthe king, I was necessitated to fight with an imaginary enemy, whom Iinvariably made to knock under to my superior prowess. Sometimes whenthis sorely battered shadow retreated precipitately towards a group ofthe savages, and, following him up, I rushed among them dealing myblows right and left, they would disperse in all directions much to theenjoyment of Mehevi, the chiefs, and themselves.
The noble art of self-defence appeared to be regarded by them as thepeculiar gift of the white man; and I make little doubt that theysupposed armies of Europeans were drawn up provided with nothing elsebut bony fists and stout hearts, with which they set to in column, andpummelled one another at the word of command.
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One day, in company with Kory-Kory, I had repaired to the stream for thepurpose of bathing, when I observed a woman sitting upon a rock inthe midst of the current, and watching with the liveliest interest thegambols of something, which at first I took to be an uncommonly largespecies of frog that was sporting in the water near her. Attracted bythe novelty of the sight, I waded towards the spot where she sat, andcould hardly credit the evidence of my senses when I beheld a littleinfant, the period of whose birth could not have extended back manydays, paddling about as if it had just risen to the surface, after beinghatched into existence at the bottom. Occasionally, the delighted parentreached out her hand towards it, when the little thing, uttering a faintcry, and striking out its tiny limbs, would sidle for the rock, and thenext moment be clasped to its mother's bosom. This was repeated againand again, the baby remaining in the stream about a minute at a time.Once or twice it made wry faces at swallowing a mouthful of water, andchoked a spluttered as if on the point of strangling. At such timeshowever, the mother snatched it up and by a process scarcely to bementioned obliged it to eject the fluid. For several weeks afterwardsI observed this woman bringing her child down to the stream regularlyevery day, in the cool of the morning and evening and treating it to abath. No wonder that the South Sea Islanders are so amphibious a race,when they are thus launched into the water as soon as they see thelight. I am convinced that it is as natural for a human being to swim asit is for a duck. And yet in civilized communities how many able-bodiedindividuals die, like so many drowning kittens, from the occurrence ofthe most trivial accidents!
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The long luxuriant and glossy tresses of the Typee damsels oftenattracted my admiration. A fine head of hair is the pride and joy ofevery woman's heart. Whether against the express will of Providence, itis twisted upon the crown of the head and there coiled away like a ropeon a ship's deck; whether it be stuck behind the ears and hangs downlike the swag of a small window-curtain; or whether it be permitted toflow over the shoulders in natural ringlets, it is always the pride ofthe owner, and t
he glory of the toilette.
The Typee girls devote much of their time to the dressing of their fairand redundant locks. After bathing, as they sometimes do five or sixtimes every day, the hair is carefully dried, and if they have been inthe sea, invariably washed in fresh water, and anointed with a highlyscented oil extracted from the meat of the cocoanut. This oil isobtained in great abundance by the following very simple process:
A large vessel of wood, with holes perforated in the bottom, is filledwith the pounded meat, and exposed to the rays of the sun. As theoleaginous matter exudes, it falls in drops through the apertures into awide-mouthed calabash placed underneath. After a sufficient quantity hasthus been collected, the oil undergoes a purifying process, and is thenpoured into the small spherical shells of the nuts of the moo-tree,which are hollowed out to receive it. These nuts are then hermeticallysealed with a resinous gum, and the vegetable fragrance of their greenrind soon imparts to the oil a delightful odour. After the lapse of afew weeks the exterior shell of the nuts becomes quite dry and hard, andassumes a beautiful carnation tint; and when opened they are found tobe about two-thirds full of an ointment of a light yellow colour anddiffusing the sweetest perfume. This elegant little odorous globe wouldnot be out of place even upon the toilette of a queen. Its merits as apreparation for the hair are undeniable--it imparts to it a superb glossand a silky fineness.