第69章 LAUPEPA AND MATAAFA(11)
The centre-piece of all is the high chief himself,Malietoa-Tuiatua-Tuiaana Mataafa,king -or not king -or king-claimant -of Samoa.All goes to him,all comes from him.Native deputations bring him gifts and are feasted in return.White travellers,to their indescribable irritation,are (on his approach)waved from his path by his armed guards.He summons his dancers by the note of a bugle.He sits nightly at home before a semicircle of talking-men from many quarters of the islands,delivering and hearing those ornate and elegant orations in which the Samoan heart delights.About himself and all his surroundings there breathes a striking sense of order,tranquillity,and native plenty.He is of a tall and powerful person,sixty years of age,white-haired and with a white moustache;his eyes bright and quiet;his jaw perceptibly underhung,which gives him something of the expression of a benevolent mastiff;his manners dignified and a thought insinuating,with an air of a Catholic prelate.He was never married,and a natural daughter attends upon his guests.Long since he made a vow of chastity,-"to live as our Lord lived on this earth"and Polynesians report with bated breath that he has kept it.On all such points,true to his Catholic training,he is inclined to be even rigid.Lauati,the pivot of Savaii,has recently repudiated his wife and taken a fairer;and when I was last in Malie,Mataafa (with a strange superiority to his own interests)had but just despatched a reprimand.In his immediate circle,in spite of the smoothness of his ways,he is said to be more respected than beloved;and his influence is the child rather of authority than popularity.No Samoan grandee now living need have attempted that which he has accomplished during the last twelve months with unimpaired prestige,not only to withhold his followers from war,but to send them to be judged in the camp of their enemies on Mulinuu.And it is a matter of debate whether such a triumph of authority were ever possible before.Speaking for myself,I have visited and dwelt in almost every seat of the Polynesian race,and have met but one man who gave me a stronger impression of character and parts.
About the situation,Mataafa expresses himself with unshaken peace.
To the chief justice he refers with some bitterness;to Laupepa,with a smile,as "my poor brother."For himself,he stands upon the treaty,and expects sooner or later an election in which he shall be raised to the chief power.In the meanwhile,or for an alternative,he would willingly embrace a compromise with Laupepa;to which he would probably add one condition,that the joint government should remain seated at Malie,a sensible but not inconvenient distance from white intrigues and white officials.
One circumstance in my last interview particularly pleased me.The king's chief scribe,Esela,is an old employe under Tamasese,and the talk ran some while upon the character of Brandeis.Loyalty in this world is after all not thrown away;Brandeis was guilty,in Samoan eyes,of many irritating errors,but he stood true to Tamasese;in the course of time a sense of this virtue and of his general uprightness has obliterated the memory of his mistakes;and it would have done his heart good if he could have heard his old scribe and his old adversary join in praising him."Yes,"concluded Mataafa,"I wish we had Planteisa back again."A QUELQUECHOSE MALHEUR EST BON.So strong is the impression produced by the defects of Cedarcrantz and Baron Senfft,that I believe Mataafa far from singular in this opinion,and that the return of the upright Brandeis might be even welcome to many.
I must add a last touch to the picture of Malie and the pretender's life.About four in the morning,the visitor in his house will be awakened by the note of a pipe,blown without,very softly and to a soothing melody.This is Mataafa's private luxury to lead on pleasant dreams.We have a bird here in Samoa that about the same hour of darkness sings in the bush.The father of Mataafa,while he lived,was a great friend and protector to all living creatures,and passed under the by-name of THE KING OF BIRDS.It may be it was among the woodland clients of the sire that the son acquired his fancy for this morning music.
I have now sought to render without extenuation the impressions received:of dignity,plenty,and peace at Malie,of bankruptcy and distraction at Mulinuu.And I wish I might here bring to an end ungrateful labours.But I am sensible that there remain two points on which it would be improper to be silent.I should be blamed if I did not indicate a practical conclusion;and I should blame myself if I did not do a little justice to that tried company of the Land Commissioners.