Returned to San Francisco from
a seven months' cruise in the North Pacific, I decided the time had
come.
The brig Galilee was sailing for the Marquesas, but her crew
was complete and I, who was an able-seaman before the mast and young
enough to be overweeningly proud of it, was willing to condescend to
ship as cabin-boy in order to make the pilgrimage to Typee. Of
course, the Galilee would have sailed from the Marquesas without me,
for I was bent on finding another Fayaway and another Kory-Kory. I
doubt that the captain read desertion in my eye. Perhaps even the
berth of cabin-boy was already filled. At any rate, I did not get
it.
Then came the rush of years, filled brimming with projects,
achievements, and failures; but Typee was not forgotten, and here I
was now, gazing at its misty outlines till the squall swooped down
and the Snark dashed on into the driving smother. Ahead, we caught
a glimpse and took the compass bearing of Sentinel Rock, wreathed
with pounding surf. Then it, too, was effaced by the rain and
darkness. We steered straight for it, trusting to hear the sound of
breakers in time to sheer clear. We had to steer for it. We had
naught but a compass bearing with which to orientate ourselves, and
if we missed Sentinel Rock, we missed Taiohae Bay, and we would have
to throw the Snark up to the wind and lie off and on the whole
night - no pleasant prospect for voyagers weary from a sixty days'
traverse of the vast Pacific solitude, and land-hungry, and fruit-
hungry, and hungry with an appetite of years for the sweet vale of
Typee.
Abruptly, with a roar of sound, Sentinel Rock loomed through the
rain dead ahead. We altered our course, and, with mainsail and
spinnaker bellying to the squall, drove past. Under the lea of the
rock the wind dropped us, and we rolled in an absolute calm. Then a
puff of air struck us, right in our teeth, out of Taiohae Bay. It
was in spinnaker, up mizzen, all sheets by the wind, and we were
moving slowly ahead, heaving the lead and straining our eyes for the
fixed red light on the ruined fort that would give us our bearings
to anchorage. The air was light and baffling, now east, now west,
now north, now south; while from either hand came the roar of unseen
breakers. From the looming cliffs arose the blatting of wild goats,
and overhead the first stars were peeping mistily through the ragged
train of the passing squall. At the end of two hours, having come a
mile into the bay, we dropped anchor in eleven fathoms. And so we
came to Taiohae.
In the morning we awoke in fairyland. The Snark rested in a placid
harbour that nestled in a vast amphitheatre, the towering, vine-clad
walls of which seemed to rise directly from the water. Far up, to
the east, we glimpsed the thin line of a trail, visible in one
place, where it scoured across the face of the wall.
"The path by which Toby escaped from Typee!" we cried.
We were not long in getting ashore and astride horses, though the
consummation of our pilgrimage had to be deferred for a day. Two
months at sea, bare-footed all the time, without space in which to
exercise one's limbs, is not the best preliminary to leather shoes
and walking. Besides, the land had to cease its nauseous rolling
before we could feel fit for riding goat-like horses over giddy
trails. So we took a short ride to break in, and crawled through
thick jungle to make the acquaintance of a venerable moss-grown
idol, where had foregathered a German trader and a Norwegian captain
to estimate the weight of said idol, and to speculate upon
depreciation in value caused by sawing him in half. They treated
the old fellow sacrilegiously, digging their knives into him to see
how hard he was and how deep his mossy mantle, and commanding him to
rise up and save them trouble by walking down to the ship himself.
In lieu of which, nineteen Kanakas slung him on a frame of timbers
and toted him to the ship, where, battened down under hatches, even
now he is cleaving the South Pacific Hornward and toward Europe - the
ultimate abiding-place for all good heathen idols, save for the few
in America and one in particular who grins beside me as I write, and
who, barring shipwreck, will grin somewhere in my neighbourhood
until I die. And he will win out. He will be grinning when I am
dust.
Also, as a preliminary, we attended a feast, where one Taiara
Tamarii, the son of an Hawaiian sailor who deserted from a
whaleship, commemorated the death of his Marquesan mother by
roasting fourteen whole hogs and inviting in the village. So we
came along, welcomed by a native herald, a young girl, who stood on
a great rock and chanted the information that the banquet was made
perfect by our presence - which information she extended impartially
to every arrival. Scarcely were we seated, however, when she
changed her tune, while the company manifested intense excitement.
Her cries became eager and piercing. From a distance came answering
cries, in men's voices, which blended into a wild, barbaric chant
that sounded incredibly savage, smacking of blood and war. Then,
through vistas of tropical foliage appeared a procession of savages,
naked save for gaudy loin-cloths. They advanced slowly, uttering
deep guttural cries of triumph and exaltation. Slung from young
saplings carried on their shoulders were mysterious objects of
considerable weight, hidden from view by wrappings of green leaves.
Nothing but pigs, innocently fat and roasted to a turn, were inside
those wrappings, but the men were carrying them into camp in
imitation of old times when they carried in "long-pig." Now long-
pig is not pig.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 40 of 80
Words from 39576 to 40588
of 80724
