Typee — A Closer Reading

CHAPTER I. A LAND-SICK SHIP The sea—Longings for shore—A land-sick ship—Destination of the voyagers

CHAPTER II. TO THE MARQUESAS Passage from the cruising ground to the Marquesas—Sleepy times aboard ship—South Sea scenery—Land ho!—The French squadron discovered at anchor in the bay of Nukuheva—Strange pilot—Escort of canoes—A flotilla of cocoa-nuts—Swimming visitors—The _Dolly_ boarded by them—State of affairs that ensue.

CHAPTER III. AFFAIRS ABOARD State of affairs aboard the ship—Contents of her larder—Length of South Seamen’s voyages—Account of a flying whale-man—Determination to leave the vessel—The bay of Nukuheva—The Typees.

CHAPTER IV. LAST NIGHT ABOARD Thoughts previous to attempting an escape—Toby, a fellow-sailor, agrees to share the adventure—Last night aboard the ship.

CHAPTER V. THE ESCAPE A specimen of nautical oratory—Criticisms of the sailors—The starboard watch are given a holiday—The escape to the mountains.

CHAPTER VI. DISAPPOINTMENT The other side of the mountain—Disappointment—Inventory of articles brought from the ship—Division of the stock of bread—Appearance of the interior of the island—A discovery—A ravine and waterfalls—A sleepless night—Further discoveries—My illness—A Marquesan landscape.

CHAPTER VII. A WILD-GOOSE CHASE The important question, Typee or Happar?—A wild-goose chase—My sufferings—Disheartening situation—A night in the ravine—Morning meal—Happy idea of Toby—Journey towards the valley.

CHAPTER VIII. INTO THE VALLEY Perilous passage of the ravine—Descent into the valley.

CHAPTER IX. CAUTIOUS ADVANCE The head of the valley—Cautious advance—A path—Fruit—Discovery of two of the natives—Their singular conduct—Approach towards the inhabited parts of the vale—Sensation produced by our appearance—Reception at the house of one of the natives.

CHAPTER X. MORNING VISITORS Midnight reflections—Morning visitors—A warrior in costume—A savage Æsculapius—Practice of the healing art—Body-servant—A dwelling-house of the valley described—Portraits of its inmates.

CHAPTER XI. ADVENTURE IN THE DARK Officiousness of Kory-Kory—His devotion—A bath in the stream—Want of refinement of the Typee damsels—Stroll with Mehevi—A Typee highway—The Taboo groves—The hoolah hoolah ground—The Ti—Timeworn savages—Hospitality of Mehevi—Midnight musings—Adventure in the dark—Distinguished honours paid to the visitors—Strange procession, and return to the house of Marheyo.

CHAPTER XII. ADVENTURE OF TOBY Attempt to procure relief from Nukuheva—Perilous adventure of Toby in the Happar Mountains—Eloquence of Kory-Kory.

CHAPTER XIII. A GREAT EVENT A great event happens in the valley—The island telegraph—Something befalls Toby—Fayaway displays a tender heart—Melancholy reflections—Mysterious conduct of the islanders—Devotion of Kory-Kory—A rural couch—A luxury—Kory-Kory strikes a light _à la_ Typee.

CHAPTER XIV. KINDNESS OF THE ISLANDERS Kindness of Marheyo and the rest of the islanders—A full description of the bread-fruit tree—Different modes of preparing the fruit.

CHAPTER XV. MELANCHOLY CONDITION Melancholy condition—Occurrence at the Ti—Anecdote of Marheyo—Shaving the head of a warrior.

CHAPTER XVI. IMPROVEMENT Improvement in health and spirits—Felicity of the Typees—A skirmish in the mountain with the warriors of Happar.

CHAPTER XVII. A STRANGER ARRIVES Swimming in company with the girls of the valley—A canoe—Effects of the taboo—A pleasure excursion on the pond—Beautiful freak of Fayaway—Mantua-making—A stranger arrives in the valley—His mysterious conduct—Native oratory—The interview—Its results—Departure of the stranger.

CHAPTER XVIII. BATTLE OF THE POP-GUNS Reflection after Marnoo’s departure—Battle of the pop-guns—Strange conceit of Marheyo—Process of making tappa.

CHAPTER XIX. DANCES History of a day as usually spent in the Typee valley—Dances of the Marquesan girls.

CHAPTER XX. MONUMENTS The spring of Arva Wai—Remarkable monumental remains—Some ideas with regard to the history of the pi-pis found in the valley.

CHAPTER XXI. A FESTIVAL Preparations for a grand festival in the valley—Strange doings in the Taboo Groves—Monument of Calabashes—Gala costume of the Typee damsels—Departure for the festival.

CHAPTER XXII. THE FEAST OF CALABASHES The Feast of Calabashes.

CHAPTER XXIII. RELIGION OF THE TYPEES Ideas suggested by the Feast of Calabashes—Effigy of a dead warrior—A singular superstition—The priest Kolory and the god Moa Artua—Amazing religious observance—A dilapidated shrine—Kory-Kory and the idol—An inference.

CHAPTER XXIV. BEAUTY OF THE TYPEES General information gathered at the festival—Personal beauty of the Typees—Their superiority over the inhabitants of the other islands—Diversity of complexion—A vegetable cosmetic and ointment—Testimony of voyagers to the uncommon beauty of the Marquesans—Few evidences of intercourse with civilized beings—Dilapidated musket—Primitive simplicity of government—Regal dignity of Mehevi.

CHAPTER XXV. MARRIAGE CUSTOMS King Mehevi—Conduct of Marheyo and Mehevi in certain delicate matters—Peculiar system of marriage—Number of population—Uniformity—Embalming—Places of sepulture—Funeral obsequies at Nukuheva—Number of inhabitants in Typee—Location of the dwellings—Happiness enjoyed in the valley.

CHAPTER XXVI. SOCIAL CONDITIONS The social condition and general character of the Typees.

CHAPTER XXVII. FISHING PARTIES Fishing parties—Mode of distributing the fish—Midnight banquet—Timekeeping tapers—Unceremonious style of eating the fish.

CHAPTER XXVIII. NATURAL HISTORY Natural history of the valley—Golden lizards—Tameness of the birds—Mosquitoes—Flies—Dogs—A solitary cat—The climate—The cocoa-nut tree—Singular modes of climbing it—An agile young chief—Fearlessness of the children—Too-too and the cocoa-nut tree—The birds of the valley.

CHAPTER XXIX. TATTOOING A professor of the fine arts—His persecutions—Something about tattooing and tabooing—Two anecdotes in illustration of the latter—A few thoughts on the Typee dialect.

CHAPTER XXX. MUSIC Strange custom of the islanders—Their chanting, and the peculiarity of their voice—Rapture of the king at first hearing a song—A new dignity conferred on the author—Musical instruments in the valley—Admiration of the savages at beholding a pugilistic performance—Swimming infant—Beautiful tresses of the girls—Ointment for the hair.

CHAPTER XXXI. CANNIBALISM Apprehensions of evil—Frightful discovery—Some remarks on cannibalism—Second battle with the Happars—Savage spectacle—Mysterious feast—Subsequent disclosures.

CHAPTER XXXII. ATTEMPT TO ESCAPE The stranger again arrives in the valley—Singular interview with him—Attempt to escape—Failure—Melancholy situation—Sympathy of Marheyo.

CHAPTER XXXIII. THE ESCAPE The escape

SEQUEL NOTE.—The Author of “Typee” was more than two years in the South Seas, after escaping from the valley, as recounted in the last chapter. Some time after returning home the foregoing narrative was published, though it was little thought at the time that this would be the means of revealing the existence of Toby, who had long been given up for lost. But so it proved. The story of his escape supplies a natural sequel to the adventure, and as such it is now added to the volume. It was related to the Author by Toby himself.

Fayaway and I had a delightful little party on the lake I found him ripe for the enterprise, and a very few words sufficed for a mutual understanding between us At last we gained the top of the second elevation We were soon completely encircled by a dense throng The body was carried into the house and laid on a mat Thus arrayed, I would have matched the charming Fayaway against any beauty in the world Mehevi About midnight I arose and drew the slide

The sea—Longings for shore—A land-sick ship—Destination of the voyagers.

Six months at sea! Yes, reader, as I live, six months out of sight of land; cruising after the sperm whale beneath the scorching sun of the Line, and tossed on the billows of the wide-rolling Pacific—the sky above, the sea around, and nothing else! Weeks and weeks ago our fresh provisions were all exhausted. There is not a sweet potato left; not a single yam. Those glorious bunches of bananas which once decorated our stern and quarter-deck, have, alas, disappeared! and the delicious oranges which hung suspended from our tops and stays—they, too, are gone! Yes, they are all departed, and there is nothing left us but salt-horse and sea-biscuit.

Oh! for a refreshing glimpse of one blade of grass—for a snuff at the fragrance of a handful of the loamy earth! Is there nothing fresh around us? Is there no green thing to be seen? Yes, the inside of our bulwarks is painted green; but what a vile and sickly hue it is, as if nothing bearing even the semblance of verdure could flourish this weary way from land. Even the bark that once clung to the wood we use for fuel has been gnawed off and devoured by the captain’s pig; and so long ago, too, that the pig himself has in turn been devoured.

There is but one solitary tenant in the chicken-coop, once a gay and dapper young cock, bearing him so bravely among the coy hens. But look at him now; there he stands, moping all the day long on that everlasting one leg of his. He turns with disgust from the mouldy corn before him, and the brackish water in his little trough. He mourns no doubt his lost companions, literally snatched from him one by one, and never seen again. But his days of mourning will be few; for Mungo, our black cook, told me yesterday that the word had at last gone forth, and poor Pedro’s fate was sealed. His attenuated body will be laid out upon the captain’s table next Sunday, and long before night will be buried, with all the usual ceremonies, beneath that worthy individual’s vest. Who would believe that there could be any one so cruel as to long for the decapitation of the luckless Pedro; yet the sailors pray every minute, selfish fellows, that the miserable fowl may be brought to his end. They say the captain will never point the ship for the land so long as he has in anticipation a mess of fresh meat. This unhappy bird can alone furnish it; and when he is once devoured, the captain will come to his senses. I wish thee no harm, Peter; but as thou art doomed, sooner or later, to meet the fate of all thy race; and if putting a period to thy existence is to be the signal for our deliverance, why—truth to speak—I wish thy throat cut this very moment; for, oh! how I wish to see the living earth again! The old ship herself longs to look out upon the land from her hawseholes once more, as Jack Lewis said right the other day when the captain found fault with his steering.

“Why, d’ye see, Captain Vangs,” says bold Jack, “I’m as good a helmsman as ever put hand to spoke; but none of us can steer the old lady now. We can’t keep her full and bye, sir: watch her ever so close, she will fall off; and then, sir, when I put the helm down so gently and try like to coax her to the work, she won’t take it kindly, but will fall round off again; and it’s all because she knows the land is under the lee, sir, and she won’t go any more to windward.” Ay, and why should she, Jack? didn’t every one of her stout timbers grow on shore, and hasn’t she sensibilities as well as we?

Poor old ship! Her very looks denote her desires: how deplorable she appears! The paint on her sides, burnt up by the scorching sun, is puffed out and cracked. See the weeds she trails along with her, and what an unsightly bunch of these horrid barnacles has formed about her stern-piece; and every time she rises on a sea, she shows her copper torn away or hanging in jagged strips.

Poor old ship! I say again: for six months she has been rolling and pitching about, never for one moment at rest. But courage, old lass, I hope to see thee soon within a biscuit’s toss of the merry land, riding snugly at anchor in some green cove, and sheltered from the boisterous winds.

“Hurrah, my lads! It’s a settled thing; next week we shape our course to the Marquesas!” The Marquesas! What strange visions of outlandish things does the very name spirit up! Lovely houris—cannibal banquets—groves of cocoa-nuts—coral reefs—tattooed chiefs—and bamboo temples; sunny valleys planted with bread-fruit trees—carved canoes dancing on the flashing blue waters—savage woodlands guarded by horrible idols—_heathenish rites and human sacrifices_.

Such were the strangely jumbled anticipations that haunted me during our passage from the cruising ground. I felt an irresistible curiosity to see those islands which the olden voyagers had so glowingly described.

The group for which we were now steering (although among the earliest of European discoveries in the South Seas, having been first visited in the year 1595) still continues to be tenanted by beings as strange and barbarous as ever. The missionaries, sent on a heavenly errand, had sailed by their lovely shores, and had abandoned them to their idols of wood and stone. How interesting the circumstances under which they were discovered! In the watery path of Mendanna, cruising in quest of some region of gold, these isles had sprung up like a scene of enchantment, and for a moment the Spaniard believed his bright dream was realized. In honour of the Marquess de Mendoza, then viceroy of Peru—under whose auspices the navigator sailed—he bestowed upon them the name which denoted the rank of his patron, and gave to the world, on his return, a vague and magnificent account of their beauty. But these islands, undisturbed for years, relapsed into their previous obscurity; and it is only recently that anything has been known concerning them. Once in the course of a half century, to be sure, some adventurous rover would break in upon their peaceful repose, and, astonished at the unusual scene, would be almost tempted to claim the merit of a new discovery.

Of this interesting group, but little account has ever been given, if we except the slight mention made of them in the sketches of South Sea voyages. Cook, in his repeated circumnavigations of the globe, barely touched at their shores; and all that we know about them is from a few general narratives.

Within the last few years, American and English vessels engaged in the extensive whale fisheries of the Pacific have occasionally, when short of provisions, put into the commodious harbour which there is in one of the islands; but a fear of the natives, founded on the recollection of the dreadful fate which many white men have received at their hands, has deterred their crews from intermixing with the population sufficiently to gain any insight into their peculiar customs and manners. Indeed, there is no cluster of islands in the Pacific that has been any length of time discovered, of which so little has hitherto been known as the Marquesas, and it is a pleasing reflection that this narrative of mine will do something towards withdrawing the veil from regions so romantic and beautiful.

Passage from the cruising ground to the Marquesas—Sleepy times aboard ship—South Sea scenery—Land ho!—The French squadron discovered at anchor in the bay of Nukuheva—Strange pilot—Escort of canoes—A flotilla of cocoa-nuts—Swimming visitors—The _Dolly_ boarded by them—State of affairs that ensue.

I can never forget the eighteen or twenty days during which the light trade-winds were silently sweeping us towards the islands. In pursuit of the sperm whale, we had been cruising on the line some twenty degrees to the westward of the Gallipagos; and all that we had to do, when our course was determined on, was to square in the yards and keep the vessel before the breeze, and then the good ship and the steady gale did the rest between them. The man at the wheel never vexed the old lady with any superfluous steering, but comfortably adjusting his limbs at the tiller, would doze away by the hour. True to her work, the _Dolly_ headed to her course, and like one of those characters who always do best when let alone, she jogged on her way like a veteran old sea-pacer as she was.

What a delightful, lazy, languid time we had whilst we were thus gliding along! There was nothing to be done; a circumstance that happily suited our disinclination to do anything. We abandoned the fore-peak altogether, and spreading an awning over the forecastle, slept, ate, and lounged under it the live-long day. Every one seemed to be under the influence of some narcotic. Even the officers aft, whose duty required them never to be seated while keeping a deck watch, vainly endeavoured to keep on their pins; and were obliged invariably to compromise the matter by leaning up against the bulwarks, and gazing abstractedly over the side. Reading was out of the question; take a book in your hand, and you were asleep in an instant.

Although I could not avoid yielding in a great measure to the general languor, still at times I contrived to shake off the spell, and to appreciate the beauty of the scene around me. The sky presented a clear expanse of the most delicate blue, except along the skirts of the horizon, where you might see a thin drapery of pale clouds which never varied their form or colour. The long, measured, dirge-like swell of the Pacific came rolling along, with its surface broken by little tiny waves, sparkling in the sunshine. Every now and then a shoal of flying fish, scared from the water under the bows, would leap into the air, and fall the next moment like a shower of silver into the sea. Then you would see the superb albicore with his glittering sides, sailing aloft, and after describing an arc in his descent, disappear on the surface of the water. Far off, the lofty jet of the whale might be seen, and nearer at hand the prowling shark, that villanous footpad of the seas, would come skulking along, and, at a wary distance, regard us with an evil eye. At times, some shapeless monster of the deep, floating on the surface, would, as we approach, sink slowly into the blue waters, and fade away from the sight. But the most impressive feature of the scene was the almost unbroken silence that reigned over sky and water. Scarcely a sound could be heard but the occasional breathing of the grampus, and the rippling at the cut-water.

As we drew nearer the land, I hailed with delight the appearance of innumerable sea-fowl. Screaming and whirling in spiral tracks, they would accompany the vessel, and at times alight on our yards and stays. That piratical-looking fellow, appropriately named the man-of-war’s-hawk, with his blood-red bill and raven plumage, would come sweeping round us in gradually diminishing circles, till you could distinctly mark the strange flashings of his eye; and then, as if satisfied with his observation, would sail up into the air and disappear from the view. Soon, other evidences of our vicinity to the land were apparent, and it was not long before the glad announcement of it being in sight was heard from aloft,—given with that peculiar prolongation of sound that a sailor loves—“Land ho!”

The captain, darting on deck from the cabin, bawled lustily for his spy-glass; the mate in still louder accents hailed the mast-head with a tremendous “Where-away?” The black cook thrust his woolly head from the galley, and Boatswain, the dog, leaped up between the knight-heads, and barked most furiously. Land ho! Ay, there it was. A hardly perceptible blue irregular outline, indicating the bold contour of the lofty heights of Nukuheva.