a deck-hand on board the eldorado—a socialist—a fo’c’sle fight—buying an island—apemama—king tembinok—the eldorado sails—tembinok’s palace—seeking the enemy—the captured chief—the hurricane
in sydney long ago i shipped as deck-hand on board the eldorado, a schooner bound for fiji and the gilbert groups. the first night out we squared the yards; the wind was aft and the canvas bellied out steadily as we dipped along under the stars at a good eight knots.
on board, as saloon passenger, was a mr milburn, a socialistic crank of the theorist school. he was aboard on the outlook for an island which he could buy and which would suit a socialistic colony, and he had got it into his head that apemama was a likely spot to start his scheme. the skipper, a yankee with long face and billygoat whiskers, was mostly drunk, and would stand on the poop aft, telling milburn that the king of apemama was an old pal of his and he knew for a positive fact that he wanted to sell his dominion. milburn’s blue eyes shone with delight as the skipper listened to him and kept saying: “the very thing, the very spot! i guess you’ll be glad yer shipped aboard here when yer see the isles,” and then he would smack milburn on the back, for they were having high jinks in the cabin aft. milburn had plenty of money and gave it freely to the skipper, who could hardly conceal his satisfaction as he opened bottle after bottle of whisky and gave us cigars.
we arrived in due course at suva, fiji. milburn went ashore and looked around and was delighted with all he saw. the skipper kept close to him and said: “i guess if you like this d——d place you’ll go daft with joy when you see apemama.” we only stayed two days at fiji and then left for the group of islands of which apemama was one. with fair winds we made a quick trip and soon dropped anchor off the lagoon isle. milburn, through a telescope, gazed enthusiastically across the lagoon and on to the atolls and groves of distant waving coco-palms; the skipper stood beside him and, as milburn gazed, smacked him on the back and nudged him in the ribs, saying: “i guess that’ll suit you right enough, eh?” he told milburn to leave the purchasing to him and the isle would soon be milburn isle, the socialistic el dorado of the south seas.
i instinctively knew that the skipper was on some scheme, and i had discovered that he was the biggest liar on earth and sea, so when he said that he knew that milburn could purchase apemama i had my own doubts; but milburn was a bit soft, treated the skipper with drink and money in advance and had positive faith in his promises.
later milburn and i sat on the cabin settee and had a whisky each. we liked each other, for, to tell the truth, we were the only respectable members of polite society on board, for the crew was made up of two or three americans or negroes, three polynesians, a half-blood, a lascar and a dutch american. i felt a bit out of sorts, for the night before there had been a terrible row in the fo’c’sle while the crew were sitting around their bench, shuffling and playing cards by the oil fo’c’sle lamp.
i was standing smoking and watching, when suddenly i was astonished to see them all jump off their feet and start a regular tribalistic battle; one had been caught cheating and they took sides. you never saw such a jumbled sight of struggling figures as the shadows of knives danced on the walls. a white man fell on top of a half-blood, who fastened his yellowish teeth into his opponent’s ear; he wouldn’t let go, and the white pounded away at his face with his clenched fists, as the half-blood tugged and chewed away at his ear. as the american punched him he cried out: “yer-rrrr-rr-ip! yerrr-rr-ip!” and the white man shouted: “you d——d —— —— ——,” and many more things, only to be described in dashes. a chinaman who was shouting: “kee-honk! chow k-rrr—chrry!” suddenly fell, as an empty hundred-pound beef tub hit him behind the ear. he was buried overboard that same night; and what with one thing and another, as i said before, i was a bit out of sorts and glad of a little whisky for medicinal purposes. milburn also was a bit shaky. the skipper had shot the tip of the half-blood’s chin off and then the matter ended, and all i got out of it was a lost tooth and the knowledge that white men in a passion get purply red in the neck and foamy at the mouth, and that the eyes of the savage races turn yellowish and their brown lips whitish.
the skipper, who had gone on shore, returned at sunset with four canoes crammed with natives, and a solemn-looking old chap with a large, flattish nose, wide nostrils and a wrinkled face expressing chimpanzee astuteness. he was introduced to milburn, as his half-naked form clambered up the rope gangway and he leapt on deck. to my surprise i heard that he was king tembinok.
with a retinue of dusky courtiers, dressed in cast-off shirts, in indian file behind him, he strutted along the deck, gazed almost scornfully at the crew, who were specially mustered to pay respect to royalty, and then looked us all up and down as though we were a menagerie group on show. royally did he carry himself, demanding little attentions from his retinue, who obeyed his every wish with alacrity. he swung a huge war-club to and fro, as though his whole being itched to find fault and brain the first native who might, to his intense relief, mistake his hurried orders.
“you misser milbur, who want to buy island?” he said, gazing up at milburn, who looked slightly embarrassed as he bowed, while the skipper rubbed his hands together and smiled with inward satisfaction. “yes, your majesty, such is my wish, if your dominion is for sale.” at this the king bowed graciously and said: “good isles, much land, plenty houses and coco-palms, but me sell to white man if the money ’nough.” “i have come specially from australia to buy an island, and your land is most suitable, and i have the money to buy it,” milburn answered. king tembinok bowed once more, till the royal robe of tappu-cloth touched the deck in front of his feet and revealed his bare legs behind him. his beady, intelligent eyes rolled with delight, and somewhat destroyed his majestic bearing, as the skipper bowed him and milburn into the dining saloon. he turned his head, spat in the tiny calabash that his orderly ever held behind him, and disappeared.
i don’t know the exact details of what passed in the cabin, but the king eventually came out on deck blind drunk, with four bottles of whisky and rum, two bottles under each arm. his retinue tied ropes round him, and his big dark lips slobbered and grinned as they slowly lowered his royal carcass down into the boat. the skipper leaned over the side and shouted, telling them to clear off ashore.
it appeared that milburn had bought the island and given the king a large amount in cash as a deposit, and had also given a hundred pounds to the skipper as commission and for his kindness and help in the transaction.
the sun had set, and milburn was a bit the worse for whisky, and anxious to get ashore and see the island, which was only natural. the skipper looked a bit uneasy and tried to persuade him to go to bed and go ashore on the morrow, but he was determined, and as the skipper went into his cabin milburn called the native occupants of a canoe that was hovering by the ship’s bows and bargained with them to take him ashore. he begged me to go with him, and at last i accepted the offer, for i also was eager to have a look round, and in a tick i slid down the rope and off we went towards the shore.
with a jerk the canoe touched the reef and we jumped ashore. before us lay groves of moonlit coco-palms, pandanus and island pines; behind us the silvered breakers were charging and curling over the lines of coral reefs as we tramped together up the shore. milburn’s mouth opened with excitement and pleasure. “dear, dear,” he said, as his eyes gleamed with delight about the bargain he had made. side by side we stood on the plateau and gazed on the glimmering island landscape, looking at the natives and their children moving about near their den-like homes. i, too, felt some of milburn’s enthusiasm, for the isle seemed a very paradise of peace and quiet. i almost envied the socialist colonist, who, i thought, would soon live at apemama, and i made up my mind to stick to mr milburn, for i saw that he would soon be the reigning monarch and my influential friend.
not far off glimmered the whitish terraced stockade of the king’s palace. “come on,” said milburn, “we will go and see the king; he’s a good fellow and by now will be sober.” saying this he led the way, and the natives, who had answered our inquiries with awestruck eyes, followed us as we passed by the palms and kicked the sand up with our boots, our monstrous shadows gliding across the still moonlit lagoon as we went by. little native children came with their dark mothers from the native homes among the palm-trees and looked at us with awestruck eyes.
as we strode on milburn’s walk became almost majestic, as he thought of his kingship over that island, and i must admit i felt a bit swaggery too over my prospects. it was excusable, though, in me, for i had had many ups and downs, and all the bread i had cast on the waters had returned to me after many days, buttered with phosphorus paste, so to speak.
soon we were asking the high chiefs if we could see the king. at first they demurred, and held a council by the stockade gate. milburn tried to explain to them that the island was now his. “you no savee,” he said, as they guarded the entrance and looked at him fiercely and curiously. “no see king,” they replied, but milburn put a silver coin into the hand of the head vassal, and then at once, with much ceremony, we entered through the stockades of coral rock and bamboo posts and went up by the palisade that led to his majesty’s palace bungalows. four high chiefs accompanied us, with ponderous war-clubs that enforced the laws of apemama. at the end of the winding pathway, shaded by palms, they all stopped and said: “you want see king tembinok?” “yes,” said milburn, showing great irritation at the delay and absurd ceremony that we had to go through to seek the king’s presence; for had not the king a few hours before embraced him and departed from the eldorado’s decks very drunk? again we all moved on. walking through a narrow archway we entered the royal waiting chamber; it was high-roofed for a south sea palace, and thick tappu-cloth curtains divided it from the room wherein king tembinok sat. “he does things in style,” said milburn, as we looked round and listened to four apemama females who sat by the royal doorway, twanged strings fastened across gourds and sang songs that told of love and the mighty deeds of tembinok’s ancestors. “i wonder if he’s sober,” i muttered, thinking to myself how different and austere all looked from what i had anticipated. suddenly the leading chief, who was in front of us, said: “tereoaka” (“white man”). then we watched, for he turned and said something to us that intimated that the king was approaching. the thick tapestry curtain suddenly divided; my heart beat rapidly. king tembinok stood before us! at first milburn instinctively looked over and beyond the king’s shoulder, for we had not yet realised that he was the king; then in a moment i saw it all; the old liar of a skipper had brought a dummy king on to the ship and milburn had been done! milburn seemed dazed, then once more loudly demanded to see the king! tembinok stared fiercely at him. i gave milburn a nudge, but he seemed to lose his head and shouted once again: “where the hell’s the king?” the king, thinking he was mad, in a loud voice shouted a command in his own language; at once all the chiefs raised their clubs and the royal serenading of the palace harem suddenly ceased! i lifted my hands and made rapid signs, and in my fright pointed to my own head, to intimate that milburn was insane. i thought it the only thing to do, for his sake and mine also. tembinok seemed to understand me, but he stood before us wrinkling and frowning fiercely at milburn’s manner. he had been disturbed from his sleep. his tall form was robed in a discarded man-o’-war’s uniform and his corpulence bulged it considerably. his sleepy eyes still looked fierce as he gazed upon us, and then milburn shouted: “i’ve bought this island! where’s the late king?” tembinok could understand a little english, and on hearing this stared speechless with amazement, then lifted his hand as though to give milburn a clout. milburn was a fool, but no coward, and i really believe he would have gone for tembinok if i had not hurriedly grasped him and shouted: “you blind ass, the skipper’s done you. this is king tembinok.” not till i said that did milburn see the whole situation, and then, to my great relief, he breathed out: “well, i’m d——d.” then, by gesticulations and pidgin-english, we told tembinok all, at which he became most courteous and invited us to come ashore on the morrow and look round the palace.
milburn was almost mad with rage and itching to get back to the ship to have a reckoning with the yankee skipper. i saw that he was, after all, not the kind of man to be done, and that he believed in getting his money’s worth and being boss in his own line, notwithstanding his theories on socialism. we both grasped tembinok’s hand and accepted his kind invitation to call at the palace the next day; and then the high chiefs, wondering at the whole business, rolled their banana-leaf cigarettes between their fingers, bowed and led us out of the royal presence and through the gates of the palace stockades.
we hurried down to the shore; all was silent except a few natives singing as they took a moonlight bathe in the waves. we looked across the lagoon and both stared; the ship was gone! seaward, like a bird with many wings, fast disappearing under the brilliant moon, we saw afar the eldorado taking advantage of the breeze; for the skipper was crowding on all sail. he had flown!
i will not tell you what milburn and i said. heaven will forgive us; it was unprintable. all our belongings were on board too! we were both stranded, and the skipper had made the most profitable voyage of his life. we told the natives to keep a lookout for the next trading-boat and, side by side, without saying a word, but deep in thought, we went back to the palace.
tembinok had been thinking the matter over in our absence and was in a great rage at being impersonated. he was a wonderful-looking old fellow, with bright eyes, a keen yet half-humorous expression and slightly full lips. he carried himself as though he was the one and only king on earth. he at once invited us to stop till a boat came and gave us a chance to go away. it was well for the skipper that he had gone, for i really believe the ship would have been bombarded that same night by the native king’s battalions, so great was the royal rage. we gave tembinok a description of the sham king, and then some natives, who had come aboard, accepted a bribe and told all; he was a marquesan chief who then lived on the neighbouring isle kuria and was a deadly enemy of tembinok. a war council was held and things began to look much brighter than i expected for milburn, who promised to give me a hundred pounds if i stuck to him and helped him get some of his deposit back, and also a bit of his own back off that fraudulent king.
that night we stopped at the palace. poor old milburn looked pale and almost cried when he thought of how he had been done, and i could see that he had set his heart on getting the island. tembinok turned out a good sort; the fierce expression of his countenance had changed to one of majestic benevolence, as he gazed upon us and we humbly sat on mats before him. “you buy island?” he said, and then with a most conspicuous attempt at concealing his cynical amusement solemnly gave orders to his head wives, who sang to him and fanned off the droves of mosquitoes that attacked his eyes and face.
the palace contained many rooms, through which crept barefooted native girls busily attending to the numerous requirements of the head queen. she was a fat, oily-looking woman, of about forty years of age, who put on terrible side and blinked her eyes as we surveyed her respectfully. two eunuchs kept blowing cooling breath on to her perspiring body, for the little wind that blew was extremely hot.
we slept nearly all next day and then went to see the neighbouring villages; the natives had comfortable wooden homes (maniaps) built on posts, open at the sides to let the wind in. we soon tired, and again returned that night to the palace and were then allowed, for the first time, to go over the various rooms. i was astonished at all we saw, for it was furnished well with native and european furniture. it seemed hard to believe that the memory of the king could go back to cannibalism and strangulating festivals; indeed, such things were still practised in moderation. on the walls hung clubs, muzzle-loading rifles and many murderous weapons of savage warfare and law.
a pretty maid blew weird music through a bone flute, serenading the queen, who moved her fat lips in lisping murmurs of melody, while six squatting maidens waved their long arms and sang. on the wooden walls the shadows of the pandanus and palms waved in the brilliant moonlight that lit the palace glooms.
no king in the south seas lived in such royal state as tembinok; he reigned supreme in his terraced seraglio and lived a life of luxury and command, a life that to western minds would seem one of selfish debauchery and fiery lust, but by the code of south sea morals was one of extreme virtue and moderation amounting to self-sacrifice.
milburn gasped with horror as a samoan attendant told us of tembinok and his ancestors. with their own hands they had strangled wives and concubines who had given elsewhere that which was destined for the royal favour only. in some of the bed-chambers still lay the bones of the victims who had been sharers in the offence, for they were buried under the floor matting. they were generally chiefs who had met their end, through some slight suspicion, from the club of tembinok or his ancestors who reigned before him. they would creep by night into the supposed culprit’s sleeping-room and crash his skull in while he slept. often down those very corridors, where milburn and i sat listening, crept, in the dead of night, files of harem wives, stealthily moving towards the woman who it was suspected had given herself up to other than the king. with exultation alight in their eyes they would do tembinok’s bidding, for jealousy of each other was their one pronounced virtue, and seldom was more than one stifled scream heard, as they clutched the sleeping victim on her bed-mat, all their hands struggling in rivalship together to strangle the sleeping concubine who had betrayed their master. as the samoan from apia, who was employed at the palace, told us all this, milburn and i felt a bit uncomfortable about our own presence, and i looked carefully at the revolver which i always carried with me. then i had several drinks from milburn’s flask, and that and the thought of the hundred pounds he had promised me stifled my qualms; we went off to our allotted apartments, slept close together and, to our great satisfaction, survived the night.
fortunately i had several plugs of ship’s tobacco and so secured the friendship of chiefs of high ancestral standing. i held the plugs tightly in my hand and they each in turn bit off the allowance i allotted them. they seemed very proud men and kept saying, “me great chief,” and giving details of their ancestry, for having no peerage or who’s who they were obliged to remind people, to keep the old names going.
it was a beautiful isle, and next morning i felt glad to be with milburn there and felt extremely happy; birds sang up in the pandanus-trees, sunlight danced on coral-floored waters, the very fish seemed happy as they leapt in the still lagoons. milburn said he would like to stay there all his life, and for a while he forgot his sorrows; and well he might, for i knew that if he persevered in trying to get his money back he would have plenty of trouble in store for him. “when i get my deposit back i’ll stop and go cruising these seas,” he said, and i agreed to go with him.
on the slopes by tembinok’s palace romped the native children, while the apemama maids sewed dress material into new designs, for the fashion changed and the ridis would be increased by one inch, or reduced, or an extra tassel added. the chief characteristic of apemama ladies was not modesty, but the bareness of their curved figures served as steel armour to protect their loose virtue; for the rumours of punishments that had been dealt out for amorous crimes made white men and brown men alike regard the maiden bareness with horror.
that day tembinok and his war council decided to go with a fleet of canoes to kuria and seek the chief who had aided our skipper in his cruel duplicity. milburn heard this decision with delight, but, to tell the truth, i must confess that my joy was considerably damped when the council added that we also should go with them to seek and attack the enemy. we did not like to appear afraid, so we asked for a little time to decide, and finally told the high chief to tell tembinok that we would follow the fleet of canoes in a boat some distance behind!
during the day the sun shone down on the isle in dazzling tropic flame; the whole town lazily lolled and snoozed in the shades of the palms or by the piazzas of their homes, by groves of bananas and pandanus. in the afternoon, to kill time, we went for a row in a native boat across the lagoon and up and down the creeks and shallows of the atolls. the water was as clear as crystal, and we could look over the boat’s side and see numerous brightly coloured fish darting and hovering among the scintillating seaweeds that waved gently over floors of sparkling corals; and as we watched it seemed that we looked through a vast magnifying-glass at forests or worlds far away, as branches shone with rich crimson, green, indigo or blue deep down in those depths that shone like some magic world blazed up by rainbows.
to our delight and relief, for we were both deep in thought over the coming battle, before sunset the sails of a schooner came through the sky-line, and before the stars hung in the darkening blue over the sea she was ploughing toward us, within five miles of the immense island lagoon.
it had been arranged that the high chief taku and fifty warriors should put off at dusk to seek the enemy. it all seemed like a dream to me; i had to shake myself to realise the position, for it seemed more like some tale from fiction than reality. but it was real enough, for there stood milburn in the flesh before me, talking to the natives. i found that their great incentive to help us was milburn offering to buy cargo for them all as soon as the next trading ship called at apemama. the cargoes consisted chiefly of trifles, ornaments, old tickless clocks, muzzle-loaders, tobacco and artificial jewellery; the latter adorned the bodies of the whole tribe and was the chief dress of marriageable maids. “what’s the good of this game, mr milburn?” i said, as darkness fell and i saw the natives filling their canoes with ammunition—war-clubs, and old-fashioned muzzle-loading rifles. “are you determined to go?” “most decidedly,” he replied, “and after i have settled with this case i’ll settle with your skipper.” “right you are,” i answered.
at dusk the canoes shoved off the silver sands and put to sea. milburn and i, armed to the teeth, in an old ship’s boat, bravely crept behind. it was a clear, starlit night; so bright were the stars that they looked like flowers of flame in the deep, dark blue vault; our shadows glided through the waters that mirrored the heavens as we paddled by. as we passed the schooner, that had anchored at sunset, out came a boat to meet us, and then i saw that milburn was a careful man and also why he was so brave. he had been aboard and told the skipper all, and arranged for them to watch for us and come and convey our boat across to kuria. i dare say they all got a good tip from him.
when at length we arrived the natives crept by a lagoon; milburn and i sat in the boat silent with excitement, as we smoked, kept a sharp outlook and waited results. taku knew where the enemy lived. the whole horde crept to his hut and discovered him fast asleep, blind drunk; he had just finished up the remaining rum that milburn had given him on the ship.
as we watched from the boat we saw our army on the shore, struggling along, bearing a burden with them. it was the fictitious king bound and lashed hands and feet. milburn surveyed him, at first with rage and then with curiosity, and i felt rather sorry for him: he looked so different to what he did when he had scornfully gazed at us on the decks of the eldorado. he rolled his eyes, slowly realised his position and hung his head, looking extremely pathetic as he blinked his eyes like a whipped dog and looked at us appealingly for mercy. milburn and i went to his hut, discovered nearly all the cash and came back quickly to the boat. “you killee me?” he said, and looked steadily at us. “i say, milburn,” i said, “if you take him back to apemama tembinok will club him, and you must remember he’s only a native, and after all the skipper’s to blame.” “i know that,” said milburn; and then i added: “to tell you the truth, i rather admire this old chief, when i think of the clever way he simulated kingship and took us all in.” milburn relented; indeed i think he would have done so without my saying anything. “unbind him,” he said. for a while the astonished natives stared, and then they unbound him, and milburn said: “you can go.” for a moment the chief looked as though he did not understand, then gave us both a glance of real gratitude and walked off majestically, but rather fast, in case we changed our minds.
the natives got their cargo from the schooner in the bay and i received my hundred pounds. tembinok saw us off; we booked as passengers on the bella, for that was the name of the schooner that came in the nick of time to relieve our minds for the night attack. we eventually arrived at honolulu.
twelve months after i met milburn again in sydney and he turned out a good friend to me. he never saw the skipper of the eldorado again, for the man left his ship and went off to south america, i think.
i heard of milburn a little later on as going off to paraguay on the s.s. r——, which was especially fitted out for taking a modern mayflower crew to start a socialistic republic, soon started and soon ended, for the colony turned out as miserable a failure as when milburn bought apemama.
milburn was not my friend’s real name; it seems wiser not to give that here, in this account of our experiences together in the south seas. one name he deserved, that of a brave comrade and a gentleman.
after my adventures with milburn i left honolulu in a large schooner which was bound for suva. we had only been out three days when a hurricane struck us. a cape horn slasher was nothing compared to the weather we experienced. i was standing on deck smoking with several of the crew; some of them were natives. a soft breeze came up and increased till the elements moaned with a steady hum, as the sails bellied out like drums and the foamy manes of white horses tossed away in the sunset; then with a thundering moan the hurricane’s breath struck us. the skipper yelled to us. “aye, aye, sir,” we shouted back, for a half-blood and i were aloft taking sail in; suddenly the boat lay over and the rigging to leeward nearly touched the wave-crests.
darkness slid over the ocean sky, tremendous seas came up, and the schooner backed and shivered like a frightened mammoth thing as the mountains of water jumped down on her deck. i fell forward on my face beneath the liquid mass and gripped the deck with my fingers and teeth! crash! crash! the boats were carried away. i heard my chum gasping and spitting sea-water beside me. the sea cleared and the wind shot up my legs—r-r-r—r-r-i-p—r-r—r-r-r-i-p! and my trousers split and nearly blew away. we scrambled to our feet and clung to the ropes. “hold on, lads,” shouted the skipper, and we did hold on too! scud was flying across the sky and the moon travelling like a yellow racing balloon as the wrack of mist flew under it. the phosphorescent blaze that lit the tossing foam of the travelling mountains of water around us made it all look like a ghostly scene of chaos ere creation; the winds cut the hissing wave-tops off as though invisible giant swords flashed across the ghostly ocean darkness. then another sea came over, crash! right over the galley. the cook was washed through the door, still clutching the pots that he had been trying to keep on the galley stove. his rapid exit knocked us over as he was washed by, and we all clutched each other and bravely held on, each to the other, to save our own lives. the man at the wheel was washed from the poop and joined us; the skipper took his place. no one was lost; some miracle saved the boat and all of us; the wind howled and rushed away as quickly as it arrived.
the skipper was a good sort; he had sailed in the black-birding days with cargoes of natives to the isles of mystery. now he gave us rum, and we were the happiest crew on the high seas in our new lease of life, for that is how we all felt. only experience could paint to you the wildness of a south sea hurricane, and what we sailors felt as we slid along the vessel’s deck holding on to each other’s legs and hair to prevent ourselves being clutched and torn away into the infinite waters.
we put into palmyra isle and made things ship-shape, and then left for apia and fiji, where i left the boat and took a steamer for new south wales.
