December 16, l906 — Early 1907
For the next week I kept in doors for the most part by the advice of Finau lest I should be injured by the wantonness or malice of the lower orders who took every opportunity of insulting me. On the 16th of December Finau, having a mind to go to the island of ‘Uiha for the sake of the recreation of shooting rats, invited me to accompany him. The inhabitants of this island made great rejoicings on account of Finau’s arrival. I remained there three or four days, spending the time principally in shooting rats. Rats are frequently used as an article of diet by the lower orders; the chiefs shoot them merely for amusement.
One morning during our stay at this island, some of the natives brought me my watch which they had procured out of my sea chest. With looks of curiosity they inquired what it was. I took it from them, wound it up, and put it to the ear of one them. Every hand was now outstretched with eagerness to take hold of it. It was applied in turns to their ears. They were astonished at the noise it made. They listened again to it, turned it on every side, and exclaimed, “mo’ui” (it is alive!) They then pinched and hit it, as if expecting it would squeak out. They looked at each other with wonder, laughed aloud, snapped their fingers, and made a clucking noise with the tongue, expressing amazement. One brought a sharp stone for me to force it open. I opened it in the proper way and showed them the works. Several endeavored to seize hold of it at once. He who got it ran away with it and all the rest after him. In about an hour they returned the watch completely broken to pieces. One had the case, another the broken dial, and the wheels and works distributed among them. They then gave me the fragments and made signs for me to put it together and make it do as it did before; upon which, I gave them to understand that they had killed it, and that it was impossible to bring it to life again. The man who considered it his property exclaimed, “maumau’i” (spoiled!) and made a hissing noise expressive of disappointment. He accused the rest of using violence; and they in return accused him. While they were thus in high dispute there came another native who had seen and learned the use of a watch on board a French ship. [The “French ship” could have been either the expedition of La Perouse in 1787 or of D’Entrecasteaux in 1793. As it was D’ Entrecasteaux who had been the most recent visitor, and who had spent a longer time in the Tonga Islands. No doubt this Tongan native learned about the watch from the men of this later French voyage.] When he understood the cause of their dispute, he called them all, “kau vale,” (a pack of fools), and explained, in the following manner, the use of the watch. Making a circle in the sand with sundry marks about its circumference and turning a stick about the center of the circle to represent a hand of the watch, he informed them that the use of the watch was to tell where the sun was. When the sun was in the east the watch would point to such a mark, and when the sun was highest it would point here, and when in the west it would point there. This, he said, the watch would do although it was in a house and could not see the sun. In the night time, he added, it would tell what portion of a day’s length it would be before the sun would rise again. It would be difficult to convey an adequate idea of their astonishment. One said it was an animal; another said it was a plant. When the man told them it was manufactured they all exclaimed, “fonua poto,” (clever country!). This man prided himself upon his knowledge of the use of a watch, calling himself, “Papalangi,” (a European). [Papalangi literally means, burst from the sky — a vivid description of how it must have seemed to the Tonga islanders when the tall masts and white sails of the European ship first appeared, apparently out of no where, off the shore of their islands.]
About the 20th of December I returned to Lifuka along with Finau. My life was still not only uncomfortable, but often exposed to many dangers; or, at best, I suffered many insults from the wantonness and malevolence of the lower orders. Tuitui was by no means my friend; but, on the contrary, endeavored to persuade Finau to kill both me and the other Englishmen, lest a ship should arrive, and learning from them the fate of the Port au Prince, take an ample revenge for the injury done to my countrymen. But Finau fortunately was not of this opinion. He conceived that white people were of too generous and forgiving a temper to take revenge; and therefore declined doing us any further mischief. Finau had probably acquired this favorable idea of us from observing that Europeans were not accustomed to knock out the brains of those under their command for every trifling offence.
As I had in my possession a few printed books and some writing paper I was often found by Finau either writing or reading. One day Finau desired me to give up all my books and papers. When I had done so, I had the mortification to find that they were ordered to be burned. On requiring an explanation of this extraordinary conduct on the part of a man who appeared on other occasions to be so much my friend, I was informed through the medium of Tuitui that the King could not, on any account, allow me to practice witchcraft to the injury of the Tonga people. He said that it was well known to the King and many others that those books and papers were instruments and means of invocation to bring down evil or plague upon the countrymen. I could not very well comprehend Tuitui’s interpretation. But when I afterwards understood the language, the King explained to me his opinion of books and papers and gave his reasons for that opinion in the following account. Finau told me:
“Some years ago, on the arrival of a European vessel, one of the white men came to live among us by choice. This man’s name was Morgan. He lived for a considerable time on terms of great friendship with us and was much respected. Some time later there came another European vessel. From this ship also there came several white men to live by choice among us. The white men that came last built a house in which they used often to shut themselves up to sing and perform ceremonies. Matters went on very well for some time. At length a quarrel ensued between Morgan and the other white men. At first it was about an iron pot which he wanted to borrow of them; and then about some pigs which they said he had stolen from them. Upon this they informed the chiefs that this Morgan had been a bad man in his own country and was under sentence of banishment for his crimes; but from the full execution of which he had escaped.” (He had actually escaped from Botany Bay, a prison colony in Australia.)
“The people then began to treat Morgan with every species of insult, so that his life was very uncomfortable and often in great danger. Morgan in his turn told the chiefs who the missionaries were. ‘They were men sent out by the King of England to bring pestilence upon the people of Tonga, and that they accordingly shut themselves up in this house to perform witchcraft and make incantations which was the cause of the pestilence that then raged.’” (There was an epidemic at the time which was very fatal among the chiefs, two or three dying every day.) [This epidemic, like so many others that were later to strike down so many people in the Pacific Ocean Islands, undoubtedly was introduced by the men on these European ships. Whether it was influenza, syphilis, gonorrhea, measles, smallpox, or tuberculosis we have no way of knowing from Finau’s report.] “Morgan said, ‘All their books were books of witchcraft.’
“The chiefs began to take Morgan’s statement into serious consideration; there certainly was a great mortality among us. The white men often assembled and sang very loud. Besides which, they would not let the Tongan people be present; and to prevent them from peeping through the crevices of the reed fencing of the house, they stopped them up with all kinds of filth, knowing that the cleanliness of the Tonga people would not then allow them even to approach. The chiefs said to themselves, ‘If these people are doing no harm, why do not they allow us to be present? We do not conceal our ceremonies from them, why do not they expose theirs to us?’
“In the meanwhile Morgan said to the chiefs, ‘You see the effect of their incantations; several of you are dying every day. By and by, you will be all cut off, and the King of England will take possession of your islands. For although you have the remedy in your power, you make no use of it.’
“The chiefs took the alarm in time. They rushed upon the white men and killed all but three, who were at that time under the protection of Veasi, a great chief”
Such was the cause of the fate of the missionaries as related to me by the King. I often afterwards heard the same relation from other chiefs. I inquired what became of the three that were under the protection of Veasi and learned that they were killed during a civil war. They might indeed have made their escape, along with some natives who invited them into a canoe which was going to another island. But they chose to remain, urging for their reason that they had not quarreled with any of the Tonga people, and consequently they would not be hurt. The others informed them, however, that it was the Tongan custom not only to kill an enemy, but also all his friends and relations, if possible. The three missionaries then replied that as they had done no harm, and meant no harm, their God would protect them. At this moment, a party of natives who were lying in wait in a neighboring thicket rushed out and killed them with their spears. The natives in the canoe pushed off from the shore and made their escape.
How necessary it is to know the customs of the country! How baneful it is to be presumptuous! Our best intentions may be ruined by the ignorance of the one, and the influence of the other.
The story Finau told Mariner about the English people who came to live in Tonga is an historical fact. The Missionary Society of London purchased a ship, the Duff, and embarked four ordained ministers, a surgeon, and twenty-five missionary-settlers together with six wives and three children for the purpose of “imparting the principles of civilization to the South Sea Islanders.” Commanded by Captain James Wilson, a seaman who became a pious convert, the Duff sailed from London on August 10, 1796. Most of the missionaries were left at Tahiti, and then the Duff sailed for Tongatapu where she anchored in the harbor on April 9, 1797 (nine years before Mariner arrived). The men of the Duff were surprised to be met by two Englishmen, Benjamin Ambler and John Connelly, who, by their own election, had left an American whaling ship together with an Irish man named Morgan. The journal of William Wilson, first mate and brother of the Captain reports: “Ambler had not been long on board when he informed us of a design which, if ever put in execution would probably have ended the voyage, if not our lives at this place. The plot, he told us, was to attack the ship and at that moment every man in eight large double canoes and in many hundred single ones were apprized of the intention, and prepared to join as soon as the attack commenced … It is said that Finau, who came in the large double canoe when we first anchored, was at the head of this plot.”
Friendly relations were nevertheless established and nine missionaries were left at Tongatapu. The Duff went on to the Marquesas where one missionary was deposited and then returned, via Tahiti, to Tongatapu on the 18th of August 1797. The missionaries left at Tongan reported, “The Lord had preserved them from the machinations of their countrymen who had done all in their power to make the poor heathens destroy them.” One missionary left with the Duff, but eight remained at Tongatapu.
The missionary side of this story that Mariner heard from the Tongan chiefs was that Morgan instigated the Tongan people to rise up against them. These events occurred just after Finau and Tupouniua had assassinated Tuku’aho, the then reigning King of Tonga, setting off a civil war. The missionaries fixed the date of the fateful assassination as taking place on April 21, 1799. The eight missionaries became mixed up in the general melee that occurred after the assassination and in Finau’s wars on the island of Tongatapu. They recorded much the same sequence of events that Finau reported to Mariner. The missionaries who had attached themselves to a particular chief were considered — as was the Tongan custom — to be part of that chief’s retinue and, as a consequence of these battles, three of the missionaries were killed. Finau succeeded in getting the others situated in a safe place, away from the region of the battles, but even then they only barely managed to preserve their lives. Four missionaries later escaped in the Betsy, bound for Port Jackson in Australia. George Vason, much to the horror of his compatriots, took a native wife and stayed on in Tonga; but he left in 1801 on the ship the Royal Admiral. When Vason returned to England, he wrote a small, unsigned, book titled: Authentic Narrative of Four Years’ Residence in Tongatapu. His book gave a sketchy report of Tongan life, but he observed many of the same things that Mariner reported. He spent much of his time in the company of Finau and their relationship was a friendly one. No doubt the recollection of the pleasure of Vason’s company induced Finau to “adopt” Mariner.
Myself, and my English companions, being, at first, ignorant of the language and the customs of the people, were often much distressed for want of food. Sometimes food was brought to us; but often not. Sometimes we were invited by the natives to walk in to their houses and eat with them; but frequently we seemed to be quite neglected, and were reduced to the necessity of procuring what we wanted by stealth. At length, through Tuitui’s interpretation, I made known our wants to the King, upon which he seemed greatly surprised at our apparent stupidity, and inquired how food was obtained in England. When the King heard that every man procured the necessary supplies for himself and family by purchase, and that friends, for the most part, only partook by invitation, and that strangers were scarcely ever invited unless with a view of forming an acquaintance, he laughed at what he called the ill-nature and selfishness of the white people. He told me that the Tongan custom was far better, and that I had nothing to do when I felt myself hungry but to go into any house where eating and drinking were going forward, sit myself down without invitation and partake with the company. After this, the natives made this “selfishness,” as they considered it of the Europeans quite proverbial. When any stranger now came into their houses to eat with them, they would say jocosely, “No! We shall treat you after the manner of the Papalangis. Go home and eat what you have got, and we shall eat what we have got!”
Myself and my English companions, now about five in number, (the others were dispersed upon different islands) began to be heartily tired of our way of life and requested the King to give us a large canoe that we might rig it as a sloop; and, with his permission, endeavor to make Norfolk Island on our way to Australia. On further solicitation, he gave us leave to build a vessel for this express purpose. But in the progress of the work, we happened, unfortunately, to notch one of the axes. He then refused any longer the use of them.
Thus cut off from all present hopes of escape, it became more than ever necessary to conform our minds to the manners and customs of the people we were among. In a short time, the ever changing events of war served to create a degree of activity in the mind, destructive of habits of disagreeable reflections and fruitless regrets.