REASON FOR THE NAME OF THE ISLAND — SINGULAR LEGEND — THE SAILOR AMONG THE SAVAGES — APPEARANCE OF THE NATIVES — A SAVAGE WAR DANCE — MODE OF DRESSING THE HAIR — COSTUME OF THE MEN — A CURIOUS WEAPON — PRESUMED ORIGIN OF THE SAVAGE ISLANDERS — DEFEAT OF THE TONGANS — CODE OF LAWS AND PUNISHMENTS — CANOE MAKING — SAILING — NIUAN ARCHITECTURE — DISPOSAL OF THE DEAD.

Between the Hervey and the Tongan groups, there lies an island which was called by Captain Cook “Savage Island,” on account of the behavior of the natives, who not only declined his overtures of peace, but attacked him “like so many wild boars.” The native name of the island is Niue.

This ferocity of theirs is due to an ancient custom of putting to death all strangers who land on their shores, a fate from which even their own people do not escape, if they have been absent for any length of time. The history of this strange people has of late years become better known, owing to the exertions of the missionaries, who have discovered that fear rather than ferocity was the cause of this savage custom. They had an idea that their island was naturally free from disease, and that all ailments were brought by foreigners, and they in consequence had a law that all foreigners should be killed as soon as they could be captured.

On one occasion a native teacher narrowly escaped death in consequence of his absence. He was obliged to exert all his powers of eloquence to persuade his countrymen to spare him for a time, so that he might keep himself far away from their residence, and purify himself by the healthy air of Niue.

When Mr. Williams visited the island, he contrived to induce two lads to go off with him for the purpose of being instructed. They were at first very miserable on board, and howled incessantly for the first few days, thinking that the white sailors were cannibals and that they were only carried off to be fattened and eaten. Finding, however, that the sailors were eating pork, and not human flesh, they became reconciled to their lot, and were even pleased at the prospect of seeing new lands. These lads were taken to Raietea, and, having been educated for their task, were sent home again. Unfortunately, soon after their arrival, an epidemic disease spread over the island, and the natives, naturally attributing it to the two travellers, killed them both.

The first white man who landed there since the time of Cook met with a singular fate. A ship was lying off the island, and bartering with the natives. Just as the ship got under weigh, the master flung one of the sailors overboard among the savages, who took him on shore, and held a great debate as to the course to be pursued. Some were for keeping up the old custom, and killing him, but others argued that the man had not landed of his own free will, and that he ought not to be liable to the usual penalty, even though salt water was in his eye—this being the mark of a shipwreck.

After a vast amount of discussion they agreed to a compromise, put him into a canoe, gave him a quantity of bananas and cocoa-nuts, and sent him out to sea. The man contrived to slip on shore again without being seen, and, after hiding in caves for some days, he succeeded in getting on board a whaler that was passing near the island.

The appearance of the natives as they were before the missionaries came to them was anything but prepossessing. Mr. Williams gives a graphic account of an old chief who was induced, after much trouble, to come on board. “His appearance was truly terrific. He was about sixty years of age, his person tall, his cheek-bones raised and prominent, and his countenance most forbidding. His whole body was smeared with charcoal, his hair and beard were long and gray, and the latter, plaited and twisted together, hung from his mouth like so many rat’s tails. He wore no clothing except a narrow strip of cloth round his loins, for the purpose of passing a spear through, or any other article he might wish to carry.

“On reaching the deck the old man was most frantic in his gesticulations, leaping about from place to place, and using the most vociferous exclamations at everything he saw. All attempts at conversation with him were entirely useless, as we could not persuade him to stand still for a single second. Our natives attempted to clothe him, by fastening round his person a piece of native cloth, but, tearing it off in a rage, he threw it upon deck, and, stamping upon it exclaimed, ‘Am I a woman, that I should be encumbered with that stuff?’

“He then proceeded to give us a specimen of a war dance, which he commenced by poising and quivering his spear, running to and fro, leaping and vociferating, as though possessed by the spirit of wildness. Then he distorted his features most horribly by extending his mouth, gnashing his teeth, and forcing his eyes almost out of their sockets. At length he concluded this exhibition by thrusting the whole of his long grey beard into his mouth, and gnawing it with the most savage vengeance. During the whole of the performance he kept up a loud and hideous howl.” On the preceding page the artist has given the reader an illustration of this singular war dance of the Niuans.

These islanders do not use the tattoo, though they are fond of decorating their bodies with paint. Those who come on board European vessels are delighted to be adorned with streaks and spots of red and green paint, especially the latter, which is a novelty to them, and for which they are willing to pay highly. At a little distance, they look much as if they were suffering from some cutaneous disease, but a closer inspection shows that their appearance is partly due to the salt of the sea crystallizing on their oiled bodies, and partly to the multitudinous flies which settle upon them.

The hair is sometimes seen very short and sometimes very long, and this is the case with both sexes. They allow it to grow to a considerable length, and when it is a foot or eighteen inches long, they cut it off, and plait it into thin bands which are worn round the waist. The men prize these ornaments highly, and Captain Hood thinks that the love-locks are exchanged, and are valued accordingly. The younger men do not wear their beards, but the elders suffer them to grow to a great length, plait them, and adorn them with pieces of oyster or clam shell. They know the art of coloring the hair a yellowish red by the application of lime.

As to dress, the men think it quite needless, and wear nothing but the belt round the waist. Some, however, wear a very small apron, only ten or twelve inches square, and this is considered rather in the light of ornament than of dress. They are of moderate stature, rather under than over the middle height, thus forming a strong contrast to the gigantic Marquesans and Samoans. The natural color of the skin is a clear brown, and their limbs are round and well shaped.

In weapons, they use the spear, the club, and the bow, all made well and neatly. They do not seem to invade other islands, and their warfare is therefore waged mostly among themselves. It seems rather strange that in an island only thirty miles in circumference war should exist, but in Niue, the usual Polynesian custom exists of dividing an island into several districts, among which is perpetual feud.

They use a very curious weapon. On their island are a number of caves in the coral limestone, similar in character to that which has been described in page 1006, though not approached in the same curious manner. From the roof hang vast numbers of stalactites, from which water continually drops. Indeed, the natives owe their fresh water almost entirely to these caves, and since the missionaries came to reside among them have learned to collect it by digging wells in the caves, into which the water flows, and so insure a certain instead of a precarious supply. The floor of the caves is covered with stalagmitic masses, and from these the natives make oval balls about the size of cricket balls, which they hurl from the hand with wonderful force and accuracy, not using the sling, as is the case with so many Polynesian tribes. Specimens of these balls are in the Christy collection.

These caves are evidently due to the character of the island, which is partly coral and partly volcanic, the coral having been upheaved by volcanic force, leaving the surface fissured and broken by the sudden violence of the shock. The native legend respecting the origin of the island points to the same conclusion. They state that the island was raised to its present elevation by two of their ancestors, named Hananaki and Fao, who swam there from Tonga, and found the island only just above the waves. They stamped twice upon it, the first stamp elevating the island to its present height, and the second clothing it with trees and plants. They made wives for themselves out of the Ti tree, and so the island became peopled. We may easily see in this tradition a record of the two facts that the island was elevated suddenly from the sea, and that the inhabitants are not aborigines, but emigrants from some other part of Polynesia, probably from Tonga. Though they believe themselves to be derived from this origin, they have been subject to invasion from the restless and daring Tongans, whom they repulsed by an ingenious stratagem. The Tongans, possessed of far better weapons and better disciplined than the Niue islanders, and being equally courageous, were rapidly completing the conquest of the island, when the natives took advantage of the peculiar formation of their country.

The reader will remember that Niue is rocky, and covered with deep and narrow clefts, the result of the upheaval which elevated the island above the sea. Across one of these the Niuans laid small branches, which they covered with banana and cocoa-nut leaves, and then strewed over all a slight covering of earth, which they arranged so as to look exactly like the surrounding soil. They then executed a sham retreat, and slipped round to the further side of the chasm, so that the Tongans, flushed with victory, rushed on their retreating enemies with yells of triumph, and a great number of the foremost and best warriors were hurled down to the bottom of the cavern. Before the survivors could recover from their surprise, an attack was made upon them in overwhelming numbers, and of the whole Tongan expedition not a man escaped alive.

It was formerly thought that the Niuans were cannibals, but, as far as can be ascertained, the natives have never eaten human flesh. They do not even care for animal food of any kind; and, though at the present time they have pigs in abundance, they use them almost entirely for the market to European ships, contenting themselves with bananas, yams, taro, and fish. Strangely enough, they have not imported into Niue the custom of kava drinking, and they stand almost alone in their non-use of tobacco.

Polygamy is still practised among the inhabitants of Niue, though it is fast dying out under the influence of the missionaries, who have further conferred a vast boon on the people by their discouragement of infanticide, which at one time prevailed to a terrible extent. The mere check which they have placed on this custom has already raised the number of the population by more than three hundred—a considerable increase when the small size of the island is taken into consideration.

Even before the missionaries came, a tolerably comprehensive and just code of laws was in existence, so that the Niuans were in reality much less savage than many of their neighbors, and the missionaries had a better ground to work on than in other islands of more promising aspect. Their standard of morality was much higher than is usually the case among savages, infidelity among women being severely punished. So great was their horror of this crime that illegitimate children were always thrown into the sea until the missionaries taught the people that, though the parents might be liable to punishment, the innocent children ought not to suffer.

Their punishment consisted generally in deprivation of food. For example, for some offences, the criminal was tied to a post, and allowed no food except bitter and acrid fruits, while for more serious offences he is lashed hand and foot to a bamboo for a considerable length of time, only sufficient food being given to save him from actually dying of starvation. For these punishments the missionaries have induced the natives to substitute forced labor in well sinking, road making, and other useful works.

The Niuans are good canoe-makers, constructing their vessels very neatly, and ornamenting them with devices in shells and mother-of-pearl. They manage these canoes well, and as a rule are excellent swimmers. There are, however, some families living in the interior of the island who, although they can be barely four miles from the sea, have never visited it, and are greatly despised by their neighbors because they can neither swim nor sail a canoe.

The native architecture is not particularly good, but it has been much improved by the instructions of the Samoan teachers, who have instructed the Niuans in their own mode of building houses, upon which the Niuans have engrafted their own mode of adornment, so that altogether the effect of a modern Niuan house is quaint, and at the same time artistic. The natives seem to be wonderfully quick at learning, and have even acquired the use of the pen, so that a Niuan can now be scarcely better pleased than by the gift of a pencil and a supply of white paper.

Nothing shows the wonderful advance that these people have made more than the fact that they have not only utterly discarded their old habit of murdering foreigners, but that they display the greatest eagerness to be taken as sailors on board European ships. They contrive to smuggle themselves on board without the knowledge of the captain and crew; and whereas in former times it was scarcely possible to induce a Niuan to venture on board an European ship, the difficulty is now, to find a mode of keeping them out of the vessels.

The method of disposing of the dead is twofold. When one mode is followed, the body is laid on a bier and left in the woods until all the flesh has decayed, when the bones are removed to the family burying-place, which is usually a cave in the limestone rock. When the other method is employed, the body is laid in a canoe, and sent adrift in the sea to go wherever the wind and tides may carry it.