natives who have had no chance; their villages without streets, and their curious huts—the tambu and canoe houses—an unlucky trader.
wild and ferocious as the natives of the solomon group are they possess some fine characteristics. many of them far surpass the rough european, in those parts, in generosity and disposition.
the more you travel, the more you find that both men and beasts treat you in much the same way as you would treat them under similar conditions. there is undoubtedly a silent telegraphy which tells a savage or a wild beast, more plainly than it would a civilised human being, the attitude you are holding towards him, and he instinctively holds that same attitude towards you.
solomon island village, near marau sound, new florida
the solomon islanders have a name for being the most treacherous and bloodthirsty race in existence, but when one remembers the way they were treated by the first invaders of these islands, {85} the spaniards and french, and afterwards by the whalers and the roughest traders that ever stepped aboard a schooner, it is really a wonder that they permit a white-faced man to pass within coo-ee of their islands.
from the earliest days they have learned to fear the white men, and, acknowledging their superior powers and weapons, they naturally resorted to treachery and cunning to outwit them. if they had known the white man only as a benefactor, their attitude towards him and their state of civilisation would have been very different from what it is now. the possibility is that they would have developed into as fine and intelligent a race as the maoris.
had the maori war been at the beginning of the white man’s career in new zealand, that country would not be the paradise it is to-day, nor would the coloured natives be the men of knowledge and wisdom some of them are. they would have been given such a bad start that they would not have got over it.
from the very beginning the maoris were treated with respect, and their naturally fine disposition answered to the call, and thousands of them so trusted the englishman that had the war {86} gone on for another thirty years their faith in him would not have been shaken.
the solomon islanders have had no chance, they have been feared from the beginning and shot down on the slightest provocation. it is only now that they are beginning to discriminate between the bad and the good white man, and i am perfectly safe in saying that a straight man can go amongst them unarmed, and if he treats them well he will be as safe with them in the densest bush as he would be in crowded piccadilly.
the native villages are very different from those in new guinea. very few of them are built on piles, but in some of the small interior villages pile dwellings can still be seen. they are, however, only some two to four feet off the ground, like many others found in the countries of all savage races. streets, too, are not discovered as often in the solomons as elsewhere, the houses being built with no particular design. a clump of bush will be dotted with houses, with only small paths leading from one to the other. the houses are of the typical hut shape, built of wood and thatched. a ridge pole resting on two uprights supports the roof which is triangular in shape, and the sides are formed in a similar fashion. before thatching, both the roof {87} and sides are formed by poles lashed together on which the thatch is worked. the door, if it can be so called, is merely an aperture which opens from a raised platform, and to get into the hut it is necessary to step—one generally falls—down into the room.
early morning, gavutu, solomon islands
there are no windows, and the door is the only place for letting in the light and letting out the smoke of the fire, which is generally burning in the centre of the hut on the floor. most dwellings are divided into two parts; one is used for sleeping purposes, whilst the other is occupied in the day time. the solomon islander is luxurious and likes a bed to lie on, which is made very much like an ordinary miner’s bed: two logs form the top and bottom on which rest a dozen or more long poles lashed together. the whole is covered with mats. a pillow made of a small round log is used by the particularly luxurious.
beyond the actual necessities, such as these beds and a few cooking-pots, and weapons of war and field, there is nothing else in the huts, and the interiors are gloomy and depressing.
the platform outside is used by the owners to sit and lounge on. the roof of the house projects over the platform and protects those sitting on it from the sun and rain. {88}
each house belongs to its individual owner, and not, as in many other places, to the village. there are strict laws governing property, and on the death of the owner it is handed down to his or her nearest relation. the same law applies to yam patches and land plots. each man holds certain rights which are protected by the people, and though the laws are unwritten, they are closely adhered to—superstition playing a great and important part in preventing any violation of them.
the chief of the village generally inhabits a much larger house than his subjects, and in many cases he has other houses round him for the accommodation of his wives, relatives, and descendants.
palavanua is the name by which the smaller houses are called, and euro is the name given to the larger ones. though the euros are of similar construction, they are far more elaborately built and are generally used as a shelter for war canoes or for the spare habitation of a chief. nearly all villages have an euro in their centre, and they are sometimes used on state occasions for meetings and ceremonies. the chief’s private house is taboo, or sacred, and no one but he may enter it; an awful calamity would befall an intruder. {89}
some chiefs have a separate compartment in their own home where their wives sleep, whilst others prefer to have them a little distance off.
each house has one particular pole in front of it, holding the ridge pole which is “hope,” or sacred. it is grotesquely carved with figures in threatening attitudes; and all manner of rubbish is laid at the foot of this household god, piled up loosely, and looking very much like an ordinary rubbish heap. old axe-heads, tins, shells, worn-out hats, canes, old cooking-bowls, and pipes, are amongst the most popular articles given to this god.
there seem to be no particular laws regarding sleep, the married women only are partitioned off, whilst every one else is at liberty to sleep where he or she feels most inclined.
the canoe houses are very well built. ingova’s at rubiana was a particularly good one, having two large doors with slits above them running nearly to the roof to admit the long and high prows of his canoes. the sides of the house were partitioned off into shelves where his favoured guests were allowed, and expected, to sleep. on three sides it is surrounded by dense scrub, or was a few years ago, and the front looked out on to the lagoon. this place, rubiana, is one of the most difficult {90} places in the world to enter, and it was probably chosen by the wily old chief for that very reason. one entrance from the sea, termed the “back passage,” is simply a maze of small islands, and it requires a man not only of extraordinary courage but of consummate skill to navigate a boat through them without damaging it. having safely manipulated the passage all is well, and the wide expanse of clear calm water which fronts rubiana well repays the anxiety spent in reaching it.
there is little wonder that in this stronghold ingova was able to defy his enemies, and with his army of head-hunters carry terror into the villages of his neighbours, but of these exploits anon.
tambu houses are also built and used as meeting-houses, and being freed from “taboo,” in the sense that any one may enter them, they are used by the young men of the village as a kind of rendezvous, and crowds of natives can always be seen lounging about in them or sitting in rows gossiping. they are also used for general meetings, councils, and certain ceremonies. it is customary, and etiquette, to go direct to the tambu house on arriving at a village, and there, before the crowd, state your business. in this way you are sure to win the good opinion of the natives. there are always {91} plenty of them waiting to hear anything of interest.
old ingova’s war canoe house, rubiana lagoon, new georgia, solomon islands.
fifteen years or more ago, old ingova, the notorious head-hunting chief of rubiana lagoon, was about at the height of his power, and his raids of slaughter to neighbouring islands were of dreadful frequency. it was to this canoe house that he returned after a successful expedition in his great tomako (war canoes) laden with ghastly trophies, but ever since rear-admiral davis, then of h.m.s. royalist, sacked this place in 1891, all has been comparatively quiet, though i did hear, while i was there, that ingova had led a head-hunting raid or two.
the old shed, for it looks very like one, stands near the margin of the lagoon, not far from the fringe of the thick bush and forest. all is fast falling into decay, and the whole place has a haunted feeling about it. inside was an old war canoe and the remains of former splendour. till you came to look carefully at the structure its size did not strike you, but i found it was about 72 feet long by 30 broad, and quite 30 odd feet to the top pitch of the roof; the high slots above the two doors were made to let out the tall fore-peaks of the canoes.
the erection of a tambu house is generally an excuse for a big festival, and at one time required a human head to be sacrificed and eaten, and was thus the cause of many a head-hunting expedition.
bones of human beings can still be seen hanging in these houses. the body of the victim was always eaten at the feast, and, besides it, pigs, fish, and other animals were devoured in large quantities. gorging is anything but a crime in the solomon islands; in fact, it is not an uncommon sight to see a native so puffed up with over-eating that his friends have to lay him out on the ground and then gently knead his back—this operation they find helps to digest the food, though personally i would not like to recommend it to a dyspeptic.
at santa catalina there is a very fine specimen of a tambu house, over sixty feet in length. all the principal posts are carefully carved with weird representations of fishing expeditions, fights, war canoes, head-hunting expeditions, and other pictures of the daily life and occupations of the solomon islander. the ridge pole, which is bigger than the usual run of these poles, is carved all over with {92} pictures which no modern journal would care to reproduce. the roofs of most tambu houses are more or less alike in general construction. they are supported on four or five rows of posts, the central one being about fourteen or fifteen feet high, whilst the outside ones do not run to more than three or four feet high, owing to the slant of the roofs.
throughout the group there is not one village standing out above all others, and there is no capital town, but on every island there are villages, and the chief in each considers his the capital.
the two largest islands of the solomon group are bougainville and guadalcana; bougainville, the larger of these two, belongs to germany.
guadalcana, from the sea, is an uncanny looking place—a great dark mountain gradually rising to a height of 8000 feet, covered with dense, dark foliage and culminating in a volcano. the lion’s head near by is a ragged cluster of grey rocks. here and there patches of sage green relieve the monotony of colour and show where clumps of palms are growing. a thin line of bright yellow sand, and the white foam of the sea as it breaks over the reefs, add colour to the island and make of it a strange picture.
on the fringe of a prim?val forest, simbo, solomon islands
one of the most impressive sights to be seen on some of these islands was the real tropical forest. this picture shows just the commencement of one, through which a native track wound its way. though it was a brilliantly fine day, yet i remember when we were fairly into the forest depths it was just like twilight; while here and there long streaks of sunlight were streaming through the tree-tops, reminding us of the lights coming through the windows of a cathedral. we all went indian file, and in many places the bush was so thick that we lost sight of each other; now and then we came upon a small native village.
on the east side of guadalcana is a little trading {93} station, where not long ago “french jack” resided, until at an untimely moment the blacks swooped down on him, carried away his wife and cut him to pieces; the crew of the little trading-boat, when it called for his copra, found his remains and buried them. but this is an old story, one of the many that come from these islands. a call from the governor and the arrest of a few of the culprits is the way in which these stories end, and the captives eke out the rest of their existence in durance vile at fiji, or if proved guilty pay the proper penalty.
for his place of residence poor “french jack” had chosen one of the brightest spots on the island and built his hut in the most approved style, with an uninterrupted view of the sea. close by his hut was a long shed where his servants, or “boys” as they are called, slept after their work of drying the copra, husking ivory, and attending to the other light duties of a trader’s establishment. at the back of his house was his yam patch and banana grove; behind that the wild thick scrub and the bush.
a lonely spot for any one to live, but such are many of the settling places of a trader, and to those who live in the bush there is no feeling of loneliness: in the crowded streets of a big city these same men might be overpowered by their solitude.
