Part 6 (1/2)
Yesterday I went down to consult Clarke, who took the view of delay. Has he changed his mind already? I wonder: here at least is the news. Some little while back some men of Manono-what is Manono?-a Samoan rotten borough, a small isle of huge political importance, heaven knows why, where a handful of chiefs make half the trouble in the country. Some men of Manono (which is strong Mataafa) burned down the houses and destroyed the crops of some Malietoa neighbours. The President went there the other day and landed alone on the island, which (to give him his due) was plucky. Moreover, he succeeded in persuading the folks to come up and be judged on a particular day in Apia. That day they did not come; but did come the next, and, to their vast surprise, were given six months'
imprisonment and clapped in gaol. Those who had accompanied them cried to them on the streets as they were marched to prison, 'Shall we rescue you?' The condemned, marching in the hands of thirty men with loaded rifles, cried out 'No'! And the trick was done. But it was ardently believed a rescue would be attempted; the gaol was laid about with armed men day and night; but there was some question of their loyalty, and the commandant of the forces, a very nice young beardless Swede, became nervous, and conceived a plan. How if he should put dynamite under the gaol, and in case of an attempted rescue blow up prison and all? He went to the President, who agreed; he went to the American man-of-war for the dynamite and machine, was refused, and got it at last from the Wreckers.
The thing began to leak out, and there arose a muttering in town. People had no fancy for amateur explosions, for one thing. For another, it did not clearly appear that it was legal; the men had been condemned to six months' prison, which they were peaceably undergoing; they had not been condemned to death. And lastly, it seemed a somewhat advanced example of civilisation to set before barbarians. The mutter in short became a storm, and yesterday, while I was down, a cutter was chartered, and the prisoners were suddenly banished to the Tokelaus. Who has changed the sentence? We are going to stir in the dynamite matter; we do not want the natives to fancy us consenting to such an outrage.
f.a.n.n.y has returned from her trip, and on the whole looks better. The _High Woods_ are under way, and their name is now the _Beach of Falesa_, and the yarn is cured. I have about thirty pages of it done; it will be fifty to seventy I suppose. No supernatural trick at all; and escaped out of it quite easily; can't think why I was so stupid for so long.
Mighty glad to have f.a.n.n.y back to this 'h.e.l.l of the South Seas,' as the German Captain called it. What will Cedarcrantz think when he comes back? To do him justice, had he been here, this Manono hash would not have been.
Here is a pretty thing. When f.a.n.n.y was in Fiji all the Samoa and Tokelau folks were agog about our 'flash' house; but the whites had never heard of it.
ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON, Author of _The Beach of Falesa_.
CHAPTER XI
_Sept._ 28.
MY DEAR COLVIN,-Since I last laid down my pen, I have written and rewritten _The Beach of Falesa_; something like sixty thousand words of sterling domestic fiction (the story, you will understand, is only half that length); and now I don't want to write any more again for ever, or feel so; and I've got to overhaul it once again to my sorrow. I was all yesterday revising, and found a lot of slacknesses and (what is worse in this kind of thing) some literaryisms. One of the puzzles is this: It is a first person story-a trader telling his own adventure in an island.
When I began I allowed myself a few liberties, because I was afraid of the end; now the end proved quite easy, and could be done in the pace; so the beginning remains about a quarter tone out (in places); but I have rather decided to let it stay so. The problem is always delicate; it is the only thing that worries me in first person tales, which otherwise (quo' Alan) 'set better wi' my genius.' There is a vast deal of fact in the story, and some pretty good comedy. It is the first realistic South Sea story; I mean with real South Sea character and details of life.
Everybody else who has tried, that I have seen, got carried away by the romance, and ended in a kind of sugar-candy sham epic, and the whole effect was lost-there was no etching, no human grin, consequently no conviction. Now I have got the smell and look of the thing a good deal.
You will know more about the South Seas after you have read my little tale than if you had read a library. As to whether any one else will read it, I have no guess. I am in an off time, but there is just the possibility it might make a hit; for the yarn is good and melodramatic, and there is quite a love affair-for me; and Mr. Wilts.h.i.+re (the narrator) is a huge lark, though I say it. But there is always the exotic question, and everything, the life, the place, the dialects-trader's talk, which is a strange conglomerate of literary expressions and English and American slang, and Beach de Mar, or native English,-the very trades and hopes and fears of the characters, are all novel, and may be found unwelcome to that great, hulking, bullering whale, the public.
Since I wrote, I have been likewise drawing up a doc.u.ment to send it to the President; it has been dreadfully delayed, not by me, but to-day they swear it will be sent in. A list of questions about the dynamite report are herein laid before him, and considerations suggested why he should answer.
_October_ 5_th_.
Ever since my last s.n.a.t.c.h I have been much chivied about over the President business; his answer has come, and is an evasion accompanied with schoolboy insolence, and we are going to try to answer it. I drew my answer and took it down yesterday; but one of the signatories wants another paragraph added, which I have not yet been able to draw, and as to the wisdom of which I am not yet convinced.
_Next day_, _Oct._ 7_th_, _the right day_.
We are all in rather a muddled state with our President affair. I do loathe politics, but at the same time, I cannot stand by and have the natives blown in the air treacherously with dynamite. They are still quiet; how long this may continue I do not know, though of course by mere prescription the Government is strengthened, and is probably insured till the next taxes fall due. But the unpopularity of the whites is growing.
My native overseer, the great Henry Simele, announced to-day that he was 'weary of whites upon the beach. All too proud,' said this veracious witness. One of the proud ones had threatened yesterday to cut off his head with a bush knife! These are 'native outrages'; honour bright, and setting theft aside, in which the natives are active, this is the main stream of irritation. The natives are generally courtly, far from always civil, but really gentle, and with a strong sense of honour of their own, and certainly quite as much civilised as our dynamiting President.
We shall be delighted to see Kipling. I go to bed usually about half-past eight, and my lamp is out before ten; I breakfast at six. We may say roughly we have no soda water on the island, and just now truthfully no whisky. I _have_ heard the chimes at midnight; now no more, I guess. _But_-f.a.n.n.y and I, as soon as we can get coins for it, are coming to Europe, not to England: I am thinking of Royat. Bar wars.
If not, perhaps the Apennines might give us a mountain refuge for two months or three in summer. How is that for high? But the money must be all in hand first.
_October_ 13_th_.
How am I to describe my life these last few days? I have been wholly swallowed up in politics, a wretched business, with fine elements of farce in it too, which repay a man in pa.s.sing, involving many dark and many moonlight rides, secret counsels which are at once divulged, sealed letters which are read aloud in confidence to the neighbours, and a ma.s.s of fudge and fun, which would have driven me crazy ten years ago, and now makes me smile.
On Friday, Henry came and told us he must leave and go to 'my poor old family in Savaii'; why? I do not quite know-but, I suspect, to be tattooed-if so, then probably to be married, and we shall see him no more. I told him he must do what he thought his duty; we had him to lunch, drank his health, and he and I rode down about twelve. When I got down, I sent my horse back to help bring down the family later. My own afternoon was cut out for me; my last draft for the President had been objected to by some of the signatories. I stood out, and one of our small number accordingly refused to sign. Him I had to go and persuade, which went off very well after the first hottish moments; you have no idea how stolid my temper is now. By about five the thing was done; and we sat down to dinner at the Chinaman's-the Verrey or Doyen's of Apia-G.
and I at each end as hosts; G.'s wife-Fanua, late maid of the village; her (adopted) father and mother, Seumanu and Faatulia, f.a.n.n.y, Belle, Lloyd, Austin, and Henry Simele, his last appearance. Henry was in a kilt of gray shawl, with a blue jacket, white s.h.i.+rt and black necktie, and looked like a dark genteel guest in a Highland shooting-box. Seumanu (opposite f.a.n.n.y, next G.) is chief of Apia, a rather big gun in this place, looking like a large, fatted, military Englishman, bar the colour.
Faatulia, next me, is a bigger chief than her husband. Henry is a chief too-his chief name, Iiga (Ee-eeng-a), he has not yet 'taken' because of his youth. We were in fine society, and had a pleasant meal-time, with lots of fun. Then to the Opera-I beg your pardon, I mean the Circus. We occupied the first row in the reserved seats, and there in the row behind were all our friends-Captain Foss and his Captain-Lieutenant, three of the American officers, very nice fellows, the Dr., etc., so we made a fine show of what an embittered correspondent of the local paper called 'the shoddy aristocracy of Apia'; and you should have seen how we carried on, and how I clapped, and Captain Foss hollered '_wunderschon_!' and threw himself forward in his seat, and how we all in fact enjoyed ourselves like school-children, Austin not a shade more than his neighbours. Then the Circus broke up, and the party went home, but I stayed down, having business on the morrow.