Apia—R.L.S. visits Samoan Homesteads—Apia Beach Incident—Samoan Music and Dancing—I am nearly drowned—Native Song—Native Music and my own Compositions, which reproduce South Sea Characteristic Music and Atmosphere—I sleep in Cannibalistic Cooling-off Larder—“Barney Dear” and Old Naylor

On the beach about a mile from Apia, in our ramblings together, we came across Robert Louis Stevenson. He was paddling in a shallow by the shore, his pants tucked up to his knees, his legs sun-scorched and browned. It was fearfully hot, and at first he did not recognise me, for I was as brown as a nut, and had on a tremendous umbrella hat; the rim was a foot wide and dipped downwards. I had told him when I last saw him that I was going away to South America, as at the time I thought I had secured a berth on a “Frisco” schooner that lay in the Bay, and so he was somewhat surprised to see me.

I had just caught a monster sea-eel, and as he gazed upon it I offered it to him. He would not take it till I convinced him that I did not want it. His friend plucked a palm leaf and gingerly grabbed the slippery victim, and as he did so, we were all suddenly startled by hearing shouts and the sounds of pistol shots along the shore.

“What’s that?” said R.L.S. He seemed pleasurably excited at the idea of some adventure coming, and we all went off together in the direction of the noise. At that time there was often a feud between the various native tribes who differed on some political matter; also there were often fights between the natives, some who were adherents to King Malieatoa Laupepa, and others who swore by Mataafa. It so happened that it was only a squabble of a minor kind, and when we arrived near the scene of the conflict, the ambushed natives bolted.

Stevenson seemed somewhat disappointed. I gathered from his manner that he would have loved to have seen a real native battle, for his eyes flashed with excitement at the prospect of what might be happening as we went up the steep shore, and his friend, who was a careful and jovial-looking man, about Stevenson’s own age, warned him to be careful as he heedlessly went forward.

Out came the native children rushing excitedly from among the forest trees; Stevenson spoke to them half in pigeon-English and half in Samoan, as they excitedly pointed toward the direction in which the guilty natives had gone. All being quiet, and the prospect of more excitement from that quarter disappearing, we went back to the shore, and searching about found the eel which Stevenson’s friend had dropped at the sound of the pistol firing. Having found it, we all went off into a native homestead some distance away from the shore, wherein lived a family who appeared to be on very good terms with R.L.S.

They were all dressed in the “upper ten” native fashion of Samoa. One of them was wearing an old American naval officer’s cast-off suit. The women had their hair done in fashionable style with red and white blossoms stuck in at the bunched sides, also on their native girdles, and what with their plump handsome faces and intelligent eyes, looked strikingly attractive. There were several children, and they all welcomed him and rolloped around us with delight.

Stevenson was soon engaged with the elder, who, I think, was a Mataafa chief, who could not speak English; but R.L.S. seemed to understand all he said, and by the way he made him repeat phrases over and over again, I should think the chief was correcting Stevenson’s pronunciation of some Samoan words.

The native boys and girls were dressed neatly in ridis, and tappu-cloth blouses, their hair parted and combed smoothly, and very polite, too, they were, as they brought Stevenson their school-books, wherein they had written their English lessons. Stevenson seemed to take a deep interest in their efforts, patted them on the heads approvingly as he examined their books and this greatly delighted them. In the corner of the large shed-like place, wherein we all stood, the youngest son of about six years of age, quite naked, stood on his head singing with gusto, as R.L.S. gave him a lead pencil as a gift, for he seemed to be very fond of children and greatly enjoyed seeing their delight. Lifting the little girls up, he held them high over his head, as the parents smiled approval at his antics to make them laugh, and Samoan children are never so pleasing and pretty as when their cheery little brown faces laugh, as their mouths stretch, and all their pearly teeth are exposed to view.

As we said good-bye to the chief and his wife, Stevenson put the youngest girl on his back as though to take her away with him. Although she was only a mite of about three years old, she seemed to see the joke, and waved her hands towards the homestead as we all walked away: then when he put her to the ground she scampered off so fast homeward that you couldn’t see her tiny legs going!

I am telling you all this so as to attempt to give an idea of Stevenson’s character, as he appeared to my eyes as a lad. It was then evening time, and the sun was setting over the hills as we all went down the forest track, and in the distance two white women and a native were coming up towards us. It was R.L.S.’s wife and a friend. Mrs Stevenson affectionately greeted him with a loud kiss! And then started to give him a dressing-down for going off and not keeping some domestic appointment.

She was a vivacious amiable lady, without any side whatever; dressed like an Australian squatter’s wife, and bare throated like Stevenson himself, and they both wore white shoes without wearing socks, in sandal fashion.

As we walked along the track Stevenson was very observant and asked the natives the names of various tropical trees. He had a cheery musical laugh, and a pronounced habit of gazing abstractedly in front of him while anyone was talking to him, a habit which was especially noticeable when his wife was with him, for he seemed to look upon her as a sort of helpmate to relieve him and take the burden off his shoulders, by answering and apologising to those who interrupted his meditations. At other times he was just the reverse and strangely talkative, and could not talk fast enough to his friends, whom he seemed very much attached to, as he took down notes in a pocket-book. He had the appearance of a man of very strong character, affectionate and tender to children and all those about him.

I should think he was one of those who would show great courage if he were called on to do so, for once on Apia beach a white man was thrashing a Samoan boy who had been stealing fruit and fish from a basket which he had left outside a grog saloon. Stevenson, who happened to be strolling down the beach to take a boat out to a schooner anchored in the bay, caught sight of the coward blows being inflicted on the frightened lad, and as the trader did not cease, Stevenson went straight up to him and pushed him aside, and heatedly expostulated with him about his brutality. The ruffian stared astonished at R.L.S. and then used some offensive epithet, at which Stevenson’s face went rigid as he stared at him with flashing eyes, and almost lost control of himself. I saw that had not the man had the instinct to see that Stevenson was not the slightest bit frightened of him and gone away muttering to himself, Stevenson would have knocked him down.

I think it was that same evening that I went to a native feast at Satoa village. The guests were mostly of the Samoan best-class natives. It was a lovely night. Overhead sailed the full moon in the dark blue vault of a cloudless heaven, as by the huddled native village homes the assembled privileged guests squatted around, forming a ring of dark bodies as they watched the weird fantastic dance which celebrated the birth of a child to a celebrated chief. The stage of the forest floor was adorned with the Samoan professional dancers and singers. I shall always remember the weird beauty of that romantic scene as they swayed and danced, chanting strange ear-haunting melodies, all their faces alight with animation and the joy of being alive as they sang old South Sea love songs, suddenly stopping in their wild dances as the words of the choruses breathed thoughts of love and impassioned vows of plighted lovers. They would stop perfectly still and gaze for a few moments, staring in each other’s eyes like statues, or the figures of romantic love pictures, only their lips moving as they sang the words of delight into the listening maids’ ears, then once more suddenly start off whirling round with their arms, swaying rhythmically, their faces gazing upwards, and sometimes over their shoulders.

I can truly say that I have never seen anything so really romantic, or heard music that so truly expressed human emotions, excepting perhaps when, some years after, I was troubadouring on the frontier of Spain, and played the violin, accompanying the Spanish peasants as they sang in parts the romantic “Estudiantina.” The Spanish maids gazed into their lovers’ eyes, as they sang, much the same as the savages of the South Seas did on that night of which I am now telling you.

A day or so after the preceding incidents, I made the acquaintance of a Mr Powell, who was a friend of Stevenson’s. I was playing the violin on an American ship that had put into Apia harbour, and he was on board. He was one of the head missionaries, and struck me as a very pleasant gentleman. I was trying to get a berth on the boat, which was going to San Francisco, but I did not succeed. The night before she left I was in the fo’c’sle, playing the fiddle, with the sailors who had accordions and banjos, and as we were playing “Down by the Swanee River” R.L.S. peeped in at the door. I could just see him by the dim oil lamp, as he gazed over the shoulder of Mr Powell, his friend, who was with him. His face lit up with a gleam of pleasure as he listened to the rough sailor concert as one of the crew danced a jig.

Though Stevenson at the time must have been in consumption, he never struck me as delicate, but, on the other hand, looked one of the thin wiry kind, always alert, and boyishly curious in all that was going on around him; when he laughed it was as though to himself over some pleasant memory, and his eyes gazed with a feminine gleam, half revealing the emotional strain of the woman and the firmness of the man in his intellectual face—the mixture that all brave men are made up of. I was unusually observant at that time through my increased knowledge that he was a writer far above the average, and I also noticed the respect with which he was treated by those around him, and especially the natives, who were comical in their unconcealed pride when he spoke to them.

If I had seen and spoken to R.L.S. without knowing who he was, I should have thought he was a skipper or mate of some American or English ship; his manner was easy, in fact, almost rollicking at times.

I met Mrs Stevenson again later, and she asked me to come up to their home and bring the violin, and chided me for not keeping an appointment I had made before. I promised to go, but never went; unfortunately I went off in the morning of the appointed day, on a cruise with my comrade. A hurricane came and blew us out to sea, several times we nearly turned upside down and once a sea went right over the boat, and away went my comrade. I leaned over the side to drag him back, and he grabbed hold of me and over I went also. We could both swim, but I went under, came up and found I was under the boat. It was a terrible feeling of despair and fright that went through me as my head bobbed under the keel; the universe seemed to be a tremendous black grip that had got me into its death-clutch. All the life in my body seemed to wrench my bones apart as I swallowed water and gave a desperate plunge downward in my last bit of consciousness, and came up to the surface just by the boat’s side.

My comrade clutched my head by the hair, and when I was in the boat again safe I almost hugged him with affection, the wind and the flying clouds overhead, all sunlit, made me feel delirious as I thought how near I had been to never seeing them again! At last, after a terrible struggle, we landed some miles round the coast. Our hands were bleeding and blistered through straining at the oars to keep the boat’s head to the seas, and desperate bailing to stop us from being swamped.

As we landed on the beach and pulled our boat safely up the shore, an old native man came running down from the palm patch and offered us shelter, which we gladly accepted. He turned out to be an old servant of some Mataafa chief, full of spite for being out of favour with his late illustrious master, but proud of being a late vassal to Samoan royal blood. He had a nice roomy homestead, two large rooms. Though he was old, his wife looked only twenty. They had one child, a few months old. My chum and I kissed it affectionately and drank bowls of kava which our host kindly gave us. We stayed the night, slept on sleeping mats. All night torrents of rain fell, the hurricane and wind nearly blew the house down and lifted me off my mat, for the room was open three feet from the ground all round in the Samoan style. It was a warm wind; with the moan of the seas breaking on the shore below, the moaning of the bending coco-palms and the wailing cry of the baby at regular intervals, I had no sleep.

In the morning we went down to the boat; our fishing tackle, revolver and my coat had vanished from the locker. I had my suspicions about our host, and we felt very much annoyed, for we could not go back and accuse him after his hospitality, as we were only absolutely certain in our suspicions, and had no witnesses to prove we had been betrayed—like the astute Fijian maids about whom I told you some pages back. I deeply regretted the incidents of that cruise, which caused my not being able to keep the appointment with Mrs Stevenson.

When I arrived back I went to their home, but they were all away on a cruising trip, I think. I stayed with Holders, my comrade, for some little time after that, long enough to teach him to play simple melodies on the fiddle, and on those nights I composed some of the melodies of my “Entr’actes,” “Song of the Night,” “The Monk’s Dream” and many others which have since been embodied in my compositions for pianoforte, orchestra and military bands.^[5] I also composed at that time my waltz, “A Soldier’s Dream,” which was played at Government House, Sydney. I received a letter of praise from Sir Henry Parkes and felt very pleased; that waltz became popular all over New South Wales, although it was unpublished, and played from manuscript.

Holders was not one of the polished kind, but he was better, being a brave good-hearted fellow, and I liked his companionship all the more because he did not drink. Though I found drunken men amusing in my travels of the South Seas, my instincts secretly detested them, and gave me a kind of sorrow akin to sympathy for men so affflicted.

Eventually we both secured berths on a large schooner, bound for Fiji. On board was an American missionary who had not been long out from Home. He became very friendly with me, and I liked him very well, and there was a link of comradeship between us for we were both homesick. The crew were nearly all Samoans who cheerily sang the whole day and night. I slept in the deck-house with them as there was no room aft, where I should have slept, as we had four passengers. The skipper was never sober, and came to the deck-house one night and continued to sing. I think he had got the delirium tremens. He made us crowd sail on when it was blowing a gale and take sail in when a four-knot breeze was on; swore that he saw spirits dancing on the deck, and that the natives had put evil spirits and demons on his track. He went off to sleep at last, and I and the mate took charge of the ship and the passengers were much relieved, and the Samoans started off on their old idol songs ad libitum.

Two of them had fine voices; their songs were old folk-lore chants telling of South Sea heroes. I would get them to sing to me and so learnt them off by heart and played them on the violin, but the melodies all seemed to lose their wild atmosphere when played as simple strains and divided into bars, unwedded to the Samoan words and the intonation of the wild childlike voices of the Islanders. Most of the South Sea strains are in minor keys; I give you here as near as possible my own impression of the melodies as I heard them sung.

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