CHAPTER XVIII

A search for rubber-trees on the plateau of Ahoa; a fight with the wild white dogs; story of an ancient migration, told by the wild cattle hunters in the Cave of the Spine of the Chinaman.

I went one day with Le Brunnec, the French trader, in search of rubber trees on the plateau of Ahao, above Hanamenu, on the other side of Hiva-oa Island.

Mounted on small, but sturdy, mountain ponies, we followed the trail across the river and up the steep mountain-side clad with impenetrable jungle, climbing ever higher and higher above deep gorges and dizzying precipices, until at noon we crossed the loftiest range and dipped downward to the wide plateau.

A thousand feet above the valley, level as a prairie, and indescribably wild and deserted, the plain stretched before us. At some distance to our right a long and narrow mound rose five hundred feet from the plateau, a hill that did not mar the vast level expanse, but seemed instead a great earthwork piled upon it by man. Its green terrace was a wild garden of flowers and fruit growing in luxuriant confusion, watered by a stream that leaped sparkling among tall ferns.

There was no breadfruit, for it will live only where man is there to tend it, and in all the extent of the tableland there was no human being or sign of habitation. Wild cattle and boars moved in droves among the scattered trees, or stood in the shallow stream watching us with curiosity as we passed. Thousands of guinea-pigs scampered before our horses' feet, and the free descendants of house-trained cats from the cities of Europe and America perched upon lofty branches to gaze down at our cavalcade.

I have seen the Garden of Allah, and the Garden of Eden,--if I can believe the Arab sheik whose camel I bought for the journey,--I have been in Nikko at its best, and known Johore and Kandy en fête, but for the hours in which I looked upon it this plateau of Ahao was the most exquisite spot upon the earth. The wilderness of its tropic beauty, the green of its leafage, the rich profusion and splendor of its flowers, the pale colors that shimmered along its far horizon, and the desolate grandeur of Temetiu's distant summit wrapped in thunderous clouds, gave it an aspect primitive, mysterious, and sublime.

Upon the trees hundreds of orchids hung like jewels, and vines were swung in garlands. Flowers of every hue spread a brilliant carpet beneath the horses' hoofs; the hart's-tongue, the manamana-o-hina, the papa-mako and the parasol-plant, with mosses of every description and myriads of ferns, covered the sward. Some were the giant tree-ferns, tall as trees, others uncurled snaky stems from masses of rusty-colored matting, and everywhere was spread the delicate lace of the uu-fenua, a maiden-hair beside which the florist's offering is clumsy and insignificant.

We made our own way through the tall grass and tangles of flowering shrubs, for there were no trails save those made by the great herds of wild cattle that wandered across the plain. Three thousand head at least I saw grazing on the luxuriant herbage, or pausing with lifted heads before they fled at our approach.

"They are descendants of a few left by shipmasters decades ago," said Le Brunnec. "Twenty years ago they roamed in immense herds all over the islands. I have chased them out of the trail to Hanamenu with a stick. Like the goats left by the American captain, Porter, on Nuka-hiva, they thrived and multiplied, but like the goats they are being massacred.

"Both cattle and goats were past reckoning when, with peace fully established and the population dwindling, the French permitted the Marquesans to buy guns. The natives hunt in gangs. Fifteen or twenty men, each with rifle or shot-gun, go on horseback to the grazing grounds. The beasts at the sound of the explosions rush to the highest point of the hills. Knowing their habits, the natives post themselves along the ridges and kill all they can. They eat or take away three or four, but they kill thirty or forty. They die in the brush, and their bones strew the ground."

I told him of the buffalo, antelope, and deer that formerly filled our woods and covered our prairies; of Alexander Wilson, who in Kentucky in 1811 estimated one flight of wild carrier pigeons as two thousand millions, and of there being not one of those birds now left in the world so far as is known.

Le Brunnec sighed, for he was a true sportsman, and would not kill even a pig if he could not consume most of its carcass. Often he half-lifted the shot-gun that lay across the pommel, but let it drop again, saying, "We will have a wild bird for supper."

We pitched our tent as the moon hung her lantern over the brow of the hill. Never was tent raised in a spot lonelier or lovelier. We chose for our camp the shelter of a moto tree, one of the most lordly of all the growths of these islands. Not ten of them were left in all the Marquesas, said Le Brunnec as I admired its towering column and magnificent spread of foliage. "The whites who used the axe in these isles would have made firewood of the ark of the covenant."

We made a fire before our tent and cooked a wild chicken he had shot, which, with pilot-biscuit and Bordeaux wine, made an excellent dinner. Darkness closed around us while we ate, the wide plateau stretched about us, mysterious in the light of the moon, and the night was cool and pleasant. We lay in lazy comfort, enjoying the fresh light air of that altitude and smoking "John's" mixture from Los Angeles, till sleepiness spilled the tobacco. Our numbed senses scarcely let us drag our mats into the tent before unconsciousness claimed us.

I was wakened by the blood-chilling howls of a wolf-pack in full cry, and a shout from Le Brunnec, "The dogs!"

He stood by the open flap of the tent, a black silhouette of man and gun. When I had clutched my own rifle and reached his side I saw in the moonlight a score of huge white beasts, some tangled in a snarling heap over the remains of our supper, others crouching on their haunches in a ring, facing us. One of them sprang as Le Brunnec fired, and its hot breath fanned my face before my own finger pressed the trigger.

The two wounded brutes struggled on the ground until a second shot finished them, and the rest made off to a little distance, where Le Brunnec kept them with an occasional shot while I brought up the terrified ponies, snorting and plunging. More wood thrown on the coals spread a circle of firelight about us, and Le Brunnec and I took turns in standing guard until morning, while the white dogs sat like sheeted ghosts around us and made the night hideous with howls. One or the other of us must have dozed, for during the night the beasts dragged away the two dead and picked their bones.

These, Le Brunnec said, were the sons and daughters of dogs once friendly to humanity, and like the wild cats we had seen, they bore mute testimony to the numbers of people who once lived on this plateau.

When dawn came the mountain rats were scurrying about the meadows, but the dogs had gone afar, leaving only the two heaps of bones and the wreckage of all outside the tent to tell of their foray. The sun flooded the mesa, disclosing myriad fern-fronds and mosses and colored petals waving in the light breeze as Le Brunnec and I went down to the stream to bathe.

Alas! I lolled there on the bank, thinking to gaze my fill at all this loveliness, and sat upon the puke, a feathery plant exquisite to the eye, but a veritable bunch of gadflies for pricking meanness. It is a sensitive shrub, retreating at man's approach, its petioles folding from sight, but with all its modesty it left me a stinging reminder that I had failed to respect its privacy.

At noon we came to the hill that rises from the plateau, and found at its base a cistern, the sole token we had seen of the domain of man, except the dogs and cats that had returned to the primitive. It was a basin cut in the solid rock, and doubtless had been the water supply of the tribes that dwelt here hemmed in by enemies. There was about it the vague semblance of an altar, and in the brush near it we saw the black remains of a mighty paepae like that giant Marai of Papara in Tahiti, which itself seemed kin to the great pyramid temple of Borobodo in Java. Melancholy memorials these of man, who is so like the gods, but who passes like a leaf in the wind.

Lolling in the stream that overflowed the edge of the ancient cistern, we discussed our plans. Le Brunnec was convinced that the eva, which we had found in considerable numbers, was a rubber-tree. He said that rubber was obtained from many trees, vines, roots, and plants, and that the sap of the eva, when dried and treated, had all the necessary bouncing qualities. We were to estimate the number of eva trees on the plateau and size up the value of the land for a plantation. Thus we might turn into gold that poison tree whose reddish-purple, alluring fruit has given so many Marquesans escape from life's bitterness, whose juice wounded or mutilated warriors drank to avoid pain or contempt.

Idling thus in the limpid water, we heard a voice and started up surprised. A group of natives looked down upon us from the hill above, and their leader was asking who were the strange haoe who had come to their valley.

Le Brunnec shouted his name--Proneka, in the native tongue--and after council they shouted down an invitation to breakfast. We had no guns, or, indeed, any other clothing than a towel, our horses being tethered at some distance, but we climbed the hill. Half way up the steep ascent we were confronted by a wild sow with eight piglets. Le Brunnec said that one of them would be appreciated by our hosts, but the mother, surmising his intention, put her litter behind her and stood at bay. To attempt the rape of the pork, naked, afoot, and unarmed, would have meant grievous wounds from those gnashing tusks, so we abandoned the gift and approached our hosts empty-handed.

We found them waiting for us in the Grotto of the Spine of the Chinaman, a shallow cave in the side of the hill. There were seven of them, naked as ourselves, thick-lipped, their eyes ringed with the blue ama-ink and their bodies scrolled with it. They had killed a bull the day before and had cooked the meat in bamboo tubes, steaming it in the earth until it was tender and tasty. We gorged upon it, and then rested in the cool cave while we smoked. They were curious to know why we were there, and asked if we were after beef. I disclaimed this intention, and said that I was wondering if Ahao had not held many people once.

"Ai! E mea tiatohu hoi! Do you not know of the Piina of Fiti-nui? Of the people that once were here? Aoe? Then I will tell you."

While the pipe went from mouth to mouth, Kitu, the leader of the hunters, related the following:

"The Piina of Fiti-nui had always lived here on the plateau of Ahao. The wise men chronicled a hundred and twenty generations since the clan began. That would be before Iholomoni built the temple in Iudea, that the priests of the new white gods tell us of. The High Place of the Piina of Fiti-nui was old before Iholomoni was born.

"But, old as was the clan, there came a time when it grew small in number. For longer than old remembered they had been at war with the Piina of Hana-uaua, who lived in the next valley below this plateau. These two peoples were kinsman, but the hate between them was bitter. The enemy gave the Piina of Fiti-nui no rest. Their popoi pits were opened and emptied, their women were stolen, and their men seized and eaten. Month after month and year after year the clan lost its strength.

"They had almost ceased to tattoo their bodies, for they asked what it served them when they were so soon to bake in the ovens of the Hana-uaua people. They could not defeat the Hana-uaua, for they were small in number and the Hana-uaua were great. The best fighters were dead. The gods only could save the last of the tribe from the veinahae, the vampire who seizes the dead.

"The taua went into the High Place and besought the gods, but they were deaf. They made no answer. Then in despair the chief, Atituahuei, set a time when, if the gods gave no counsel, he would lead every man of the tribe against the foe, and die while the war-clubs sang.

"Atituahuei went with the taua to the giant rock, Meae-Topaiho, the sacred stone shaped like a spear that stood between the lands of the warring peoples, and there he said this vow to the gods. And the people waited.

"They waited for the space of the waxing and waning of the moon, and the gods said nothing. Then the warriors made ready their u'u of polished ironwood, and filled their baskets with stones, and made ready the spears. On the darkest night of the moon the Piina of Fiti-nui was to go forth to fight and be killed by the Hana-uaua.

"But before the moon had gone, the taua came down from the High Place, and said that the gods had spoken. They commanded the people to depart from Ahao, and to sail beyond the Isle of Barking Dogs until they came to a new land. The gods would protect them from the waves. The gods had shown the taua a hidden valley, which ran to the beach, in which to build the canoes.

"For many months the Piina of Fiti-nui labored in secret in the hidden valley. They built five canoes, giant, double canoes, with high platforms and houses on them, the kind that are built no more. In these canoes they placed the women and children and the aged, and when all was ready, the men raided the village of the Piina of Hana-uaua, and in the darkness brought all their food to the canoes.

"At daybreak the Fiti-nui embarked in four of the canoes, but one they must leave behind for the daughter of the chief, who expected to be delivered of a child at any hour, and for the women of her family, who would not leave her. The hidden valley was filled with the sound of lamentation at the parting, but the gods had spoken, and they must go.

"When the four canoes were in the sea beyond the village of Hana-uaua, all their people beat their war-drums and blew the trumpets of shell. The people of Hana-uaua heard the noise, and said that strangers had come, but whether for a fight or a feast they did not know. They rushed to the shore, and there they saw on the sea the people of the Fiti-nui, who called to them and said that they were going far away.

"Then the Hana-uaua tribe wept. For they remembered that they were brothers, and though they had fought long, the warriors of Fiti-nui had been good fighters and brave. Also many Fiti-nui women had been taken by the men of Hana-uaua, and captured youths had been adopted, and the tribes were kin by many ties.

"The two tribes talked together across the waves, and the tribe of Hana-uaua begged their brothers not to go. They said that they would fight no more, that the prisoners who had not been eaten should be returned to their own valley, that the two clans would live forever in friendship.

"Then the people of Fiti-nui wept again, but they said that the gods had ordered them to sail away, and they must go.

"'But,' said the chief of the Fiti-nui, 'you will know that we have reached a new land safely when the Meae-Topaiho falls, when the great spear is broken by the gods, you will know that your brothers are in a new home.'

"Then they departed, the four canoes, but the daughter of the chief did not go, for her child was long in being born. She lived with the people of Hana-uaua in peace and comfort. And when the season of the breadfruit had come and gone, one night when the rain and the wind made the earth tremble and slip, the people of Hana-uaua heard a roaring and a crashing.

"'The gods are angry,' they said. But the daughter of the chief said, 'My people have found their home.' And in the morning they found that the Meae-Topaiho had fallen, the blade of the spear was broken, and the prophecy fulfilled.

"That was four generations ago, and ever since that time the people of Hana-uaua have looked for some sign from their brothers who went away. Their names were kept in the memories of the tribe. Ten years ago many men were brought here to work on the plantations, from Puka-Puka and Na-Puka in the Paumotas, and they talked with the people.

"Aue! They were the children's children of the Piina of Fiti-nui. In those low islands to which their fathers and mothers went, they kept the words and the names of old. They had kept the memory of the journey. And one old man was brought by his son, and he remembered all that his father had told him, and his father was the son of the chief, Atituahuei.

"These people did not look like our men. The many years had made them different. But they knew of the spear rock, and of the prophecy, and they were in truth the lost brothers of the Hana-uaua people.

"But the Hana-uaua people, too, were dying now. None was left of the blood of the chief's daughter. No man was left alive on the plateau of Ahao.

"Their popoi pits are the wallows of the wild boar; on their paepaes sit the wild white dogs. The horned cattle wander where they walked. Hee i te fenua ke! They are gone, and the stranger shall have their graves."