THE STORY OF
CHALMERS OF
NEW GUINEA

BY
JANET HARVEY KELMAN

WITH PICTURES BY
W. HEATH ROBINSON

LONDON: T. C. & E. C. JACK
NEW YORK: E. P. DUTTON & CO.

Tamate and Robert Louis Stevenson in Samoa

TO
MARGARET, JAMES, AND CHRISTOPHER
FOR THE SAKE OF
MY DEAR FRIEND
E. F. M.

Printed by

Ballantyne, Hanson & Co.
Edinburgh

WHY THESE STORIES
ARE TOLD

SEVENTY years ago a group of children gathered round a wise and kindly Scotchwoman, and ever, as one tale ended, they shouted, “Tell on, Bell, tell on.”

Some of the stories she told are forgotten, and it is many days since the fortunes she read were proved true or false, but other little children re-echo the old request, and James Chalmers knew well how to answer it when he wrote for us of Kone and of Aveo, of the wild waves of the Pacific, and of the wilder men on its islands.

His life’s adventure here is over. He will not come back to us nor tell us one tale more. But who shall say that we may not reach him one day, greet him with the old words, “Tell on, tell on,” and listen, rapt and eager, to stories of brave deeds and strange voyages in that new world in which he lives?

CONTENTS

LIST OF PICTURES

THE STORY OF
CHALMERS OF NEW GUINEA

CHAPTER I

BOYHOOD IN ARGYLL

JAMES CHALMERS was born sixty-five years ago at a little town in the West Highlands of Scotland. He was the son of a stonemason, but his home was close to the sea, and he was more eager to sail than to build.

One kind of building he did try. That was boat-building. But he and his little friends did not find it as easy as it looked, so they gave it up and tarred a herring-box instead. When it was ready James jumped into it for “first sail.” His playmates on the beach towed him along by a rope. They were all enjoying the fun when the rope snapped, and the herring-box, with James in it, danced away out to sea. A cry was raised and a rush made for the shore. The fishermen were fond of the daring little fellow who was always in mischief. Soon they caught him and brought him safe to land. But they shook their heads when they saw how fearless he was. They knew he would soon be in some other danger.

When James was seven years old he left his first home and went to live in Glenaray, near Inveraray. Still the mountains of Argyll rose round his home. They were dim misty blue in summer, but in autumn and spring they were strong deep blue like the robes in stained-glass windows. But the new home was not on the sea-shore. James could not tumble about in boats and herring-boxes all day long as he had done before.

Soon he found another kind of daring to fill his thoughts. From his home in Glenaray he and his sisters had three miles to walk to school. Other boys and girls crossed the moors from scattered farm-houses and crofts. A large number of children came from the town of Inveraray, and they gathered to them others whose homes lay between the town and the school. Here were two parties of young warriors ready to fight. James and the moorland groups were the glen party. The others were the town party. Some trifle started warfare. First there was a teasing word, then a divot of turf, and then before any one knew what had happened, stones were flying and fists pounding, and the clans were at war once more on the shores of Argyll.

The spirit of battle ran so high that on fighting days James and his sisters did not go straight home. They joined the larger number of the glen party and went round by the homes of the others, so that they had only the last little bit to go alone. There they were safe from the foe. But on days of truce they went with the town party to the bridges over the Aray. The Aray is a wild mountain stream, and when rain falls in the hills, it rushes wildly down and carries all before it.

One afternoon, when the sunshine had burst out after heavy rain, the children were going home together. As they came near the bridges the rush of the water and its noise drew them close to the banks of the stream.

James was there. He heard a cry: “Johnnie Minto has fallen in!”

He threw off his coat and gave a quick glance up the stream. There he saw Johnnie’s head appear and disappear in the rush of the water. Without a moment’s thought he slid down to the lower side of the bridge and caught his arm round one of its posts. Just above him Johnnie was tumbling down in the wild water. One quick clutch and James held him firmly. The water was so fierce and rapid that it seemed he must let go. He did let go, but it was the bridge that he lost hold of, not the boy! He let the current carry them both down till he could catch a branch that overhung the water. By it he pulled himself and his little foe (for Johnnie was of the town party) towards the edge of the stream till the other boys could reach them and drag them on to the bank.

A branch that overhung the water

Once James heard a letter read that had come from an island on the other side of the world. It told of the sorrows and cruelties that savages have to bear. He was touched. The stories of hardship made him wish to do and dare all that the writer of the letter had dared. The stories of sorrow made him long to help. He said to himself that he too would go when he became a man.

But soon he forgot all about that, and thought only of how much fun he could get as the days passed.

As he grew older he became very wild. He could not bear to meet any one who might urge him to live a better life.

He entered a lawyer’s office, but the work did not interest him, and he filled his free time with all kinds of pranks, so that soon he was blamed for any mischief that was on foot in the town.

He was the leader of the wildest boys in Inveraray, but he himself was led only by his whims and the fancy of the moment. Until one day he found his own leader, who made work and play more interesting and delightful than they had ever been before.

James found that his life was not aimless any longer. It was full of one great wish—the wish to serve his hero, Jesus Christ.

Then he thought of his old longing to go and help those who were in pain and sorrow far away from Scotland.

It was not only because he was sorry for them, and because he wished to do the brave and daring things that others had done. These thoughts still drew him on. But far more than these, the love he had for his newly found Master made him wish to go.

He felt that it was a grand thing to be alive and young, and able to do something to bring to other lives the joy and strength that had come into his own.

Before he could go, however, he had to learn many things.

He went to stay at Cheshunt College, near London. The head of the college was a great man. It made it easier to be good to live beside him. Often afterwards, amongst hardships and dangers, his students thought of him, and of what he had said to them at Cheshunt, and were braver and stronger because of him.

While James Chalmers was at college, part of his work was to preach at a village eight miles away, and to go to see the people who were in trouble there. He was a big strong man, and enjoyed his walk of sixteen miles. Perhaps that was why this village, the farthest from the college, was placed under his care. The people there loved him, and to-day they still are glad to think that the “Apostle of New Guinea,” as he was afterwards called, once preached and worked amongst them.

Mr. Chalmers could be solemn when he spoke of God and of life and death, and when he was with the villagers in times of sorrow and pain. But he still enjoyed all the glad things of life that he had loved in his boyhood, boating and swimming and fun of all kinds.

If he was in a restless mood when the others wished to study, the only way they could make him quiet was to give him charge of his part of the house. Then woe betide the man who made a noise. If some one else tried to keep order and he wished to romp, nothing would silence him.

One evening at supper time, as the students sat talking round the table, they heard a slow lumbering step in the passage. “Pad-sh, pad-sh,” it came, nearer and nearer, till the door burst open, and a great grisly bear walked in on his hind legs. The men started up. The bear shuffled in amongst them. He grabbed a quiet timid student. Then the lights went out!

The great grisly creature

There was a great scrimmage. No one knew where the bear was, and no one could find matches. Even brave men did not wish to be caught in the dark by a runaway bear!

When at last the lights were lit, and they saw a man’s face looking out from under the great head of the bear, they did not know whether to laugh more at him or at themselves.

They had been jumping here and there and dodging about, to get out of the way of James Chalmers in a bearskin!

The students were not the only people who were alarmed at the made-up bear. There was an Irishman who came to the college to sell fruit. One day, as he found his way along the halls, he met the bear. It was at the end of a passage, and they met so suddenly that the poor Irishman could save neither himself nor his basket from the paws of the great grisly creature.

CHAPTER II

THE “JOHN WILLIAMS”

WHEN James Chalmers was twenty-four years of age, he and his wife left England for Australia in the John Williams. The lady he had married was eager to help in the great work that he had undertaken, so they were both very happy when they knew that they had really started on their long voyage. They enjoyed life on board ship and won many friends amongst the passengers and amongst the sailors.

The ship in which they sailed was new, and was one of the swiftest on the sea. She had been built with money given by hundreds of children, that she might take Mr. and Mrs. Chalmers and others who went to live as they did, from island to island on the Pacific sea.

They arrived safely at Sydney, in Australia, and from that town they sailed for the second part of their voyage.

The name of the island on which their first home was to be was Rarotonga. They could not go straight to it because others were on board, and the John Williams had to sail here and there amongst many islands. At one, two of her passengers must be left behind; at another, new voyagers must come on board; while here, there, and everywhere great bales of cargo must be landed. In these bales there were beads and knives, tomahawks and tobacco, and iron in bars, and rolls of cloth.

All these things were the money the white people used when they wished to buy food, or land, or boats, or houses from the people who lived in the islands.

It was very awkward to have to carry yards and yards of cloth instead of silver coins or bank notes! But bank notes and coins would have been of no use to the islanders; so the only way to do was to take to them what they wished, and the things the John Williams carried in her hold were the things they liked best.

Round many of the islands in the Pacific lie reefs. The reefs are built of coral by tiny insects, and they rise from a great depth almost to the surface of the water. The mingling colours of the coral are very wonderful when they are seen through the liquid blue and green of the waves.

But although these reefs are beautiful, they are very dangerous. If a ship runs upon one, the great waves quickly dash her to pieces as they break over her.

There are openings where the reef is broken for a short distance, or where its crest lies so far under the surface of the water that boats may safely enter the calm bays that lie within.

Very few ships had sailed in those seas fifty years ago. The captains had to guess where the reefs lay. Sometimes they sailed slowly, dropping a long line with a weight at the end of it, to find out if the ship had entered more shallow water. This is called “heaving the lead.”

As the John Williams sailed near the first island at which she was to anchor, her passengers were watching the shore; they were delighted with the beauty of the island. It was a clear afternoon, and the rich land and trees offered a kind welcome to those who were to work there. Those who meant to go farther on, to other islands, thought that if this first stopping-place were like the others, there would, for them too, be much to enjoy.

The reefs amongst which their vessel was sailing were beautiful, and their eyes were dazzled by the glisten and glimmer of colour under the water at the ship’s side.

All at once those who were not standing very firmly on the deck were thrown down, and every one was trying not to believe the truth. But very soon no one could doubt it. Their beautiful ship had run on an unseen rock. She had all sail set and was going fast, so it was with a great crash that she struck.

Every one thought of what must be done to save the ship and her cargo. If they had had time to look round they would have seen hundreds of dark men running about the shore and hauling canoes to the water’s edge. In a very short time the canoes were all round the ship, and the men were clambering up on deck.

Though they knew very little English, they all spoke at once, and they shook hands with every one. Then they began to help to work. It was a strange sight. Dark men and white all together hauled down the sails and launched the boats. Close to the reef, dark men dived into the water with blankets soaked in tar. They hoped to stop the holes the reef had made in the ship. White men gathered clothes and books and cargo together, and saw them put into the boats to be sent on shore. Through all the noise of boxes hauled along the decks and thrown out of the way, and high voices shouting questions and orders, came the steady thud of the pumps and the swish of the water as it poured back to the sea from the hold.

At high water the ship looked shattered, it is true, but when low tide came she looked ridiculous. Her stern went down as the tide fell, but her bows stuck fast high up on the reef. She looked like a great rocking-horse whose head has got so high that it cannot get down again.

So she rocked up and down twice a day with the tide, till at last, after all her cargo had been taken on shore, she was heaved off the reef into deep water. A great shout of joy rose as she slipped free.

But though she was free, she was greatly damaged, and had to go back to Sydney for repairs. She returned to the island nearly ten weeks later, as strong and seaworthy as ever.

Then they sailed away again, first to the Loyalty Islands and then to Savage Island.

Mr. and Mrs. Chalmers saw how glad many of the natives were to welcome back their white friends. They saw, too, that the lives of men and women who had been savages had become noble and brave because white men who loved Jesus Christ had gone to live amongst them. This made them long greatly to reach their own home and begin work there.

The ship was ready to sail from Savage Island. All the bales of cloth and the bars of iron that were to be left there had been put on shore. The cocoanuts and other gifts that the natives had brought had been taken to the ship. Every one hoped to sail for Samoa next morning. Mr. and Mrs. Chalmers went on board, while some of those who were to sail with them stayed on land for one night longer.

At night the wind fell and a great calm lay on everything. The John Williams lay out to sea, far beyond the reef, with her bow heading away from the island. The air was warm and the southern night seemed full of peace to all except the captain.

Though the ship had been lying waiting to set sail, she was not at anchor. No anchor could find holding-ground in the great depth of water.

The captain saw that his ship had been caught in a current, and that she was being carried steadily backwards to the island. Between the ship and the island lay the reef!

The John Williams had three boats. One after another they were launched and filled with rowers. Each boat carried a strong line with her. By these three lines the captain hoped the boats might hold the vessel against the current. The men were strong and eager to save their ship. They rowed to the seaward side of her and pulled hard at the oars. They toiled on and on till they were tired and aching, but still they lost way. Faster and faster the ship drifted towards the reef, dragging her boats after her.

Again they tried to anchor, but still no bottom could be found. Darkness fell deeper around them. Every sail was set in the hope that some breeze off the land might come in time. Blue lights were burnt on deck, that their friends on shore might know of their danger.

Thunder muttered. Flashes of lightning gleamed across the darkened sky. The white surf loomed nearer and nearer; the ship rose and fell on the backwash of the waves that broke on the reef.

Nothing could save her, but lives must be saved if possible. Seventy-two people were packed into the three boats, and very soon after the last one had left her side, the John Williams struck the reef.

Rain poured down on the open boats as they rowed sadly from the wreck. The landing-place was some miles away, and the surf was foaming wildly.

Earlier in the evening those on shore had caught sight of the blue lights. Some had run along the rocks to a point near the wreck. As they ran, the natives kept up a hooting cry that roused every one by the way. It was eerie to hear their call through the darkness and storm.

By the time the boats were trying to reach the shore, fires and torches burned brightly all round the bay to guide their rowers.

But no boat could reach the shore that night. The poor drenched voyagers had to leave their boats and get into canoes, then to leave the canoes and be carried by natives through the surf! In spite of all, they reached land safely.

But it was with sad hearts that they looked out across the bay at the wreck of their ship during the days that followed.

At last, in spite of many other delays, more than sixteen months after they had sailed from England, Mr. and Mrs. Chalmers reached the island of Rarotonga, where their home was now to be. The natives there knew a little English. As one of them carried Mr. Chalmers ashore he turned to him and asked:

“What fellow name belong you?”

“Chalmers.”

Natives were crowding on the shore to see the stranger and to hear who he was. The man who carried him wished to be the first to find out and to tell the others. But the “Ch” and the “s” were too harsh for him to say, so instead of “Chalmers,” he shouted, “Tamate!” And Mr. Chalmers was called “Tamate” to the end of his life. Mrs. Chalmers was called “Tamate Vaine,” which was the native way of saying “the wife of Chalmers.”

CHAPTER III

RAROTONGA

RAROTONGA is one of the fairest islands in the world. It has a white sandy beach; within that lies a belt of rich land. On this land, and even on the lower slopes of the mountains that tower one above the other in the centre of the island, banana trees, chestnuts, and cocoanut palms grow in clumps.

Tamate and Tamate Vaine quickly settled down to their work in Rarotonga. The life there was very quiet after the constant change and danger of the voyage.

The people who lived in Rarotonga called themselves Christians. They had given up fighting and the worship of the strange wild spirits whom their fathers had thought to be full of power. But though they had done this, many of them were still selfish and lazy.

Tamate would have liked to go at once amongst men who were much wilder, and who had never heard of the God who is love.

When he saw what his work in Rarotonga would be, he wrote to England to those who had sent him. He asked them to send some one else to Rarotonga, some one who would like to work quietly and to teach; and to let him go to a more dangerous place, where he could make it easier for others to follow him. But no one else could be sent then, and he could not leave his post.

When he found that he must stay in Rarotonga, he made up his mind that since he could not get the work he wished, he would throw all his strength into the work he had to do.

Part of it was to train native lads so that they might become teachers and go to other islands. Though they were men, he had to teach them a great many things that boys and girls learn at home when they are very little. He had to train them to be thrifty, and tidy too, because, when they went away to teach they would have to till their own gardens, and to grow their own crops, and to be at the head of a school without any one to guide them.

As Tamate spoke to the people in church Sunday after Sunday he wondered where all the young men were. There were old men and women, and young women and children, and there were his students, but he scarcely ever saw any other young men.

Where could they be?

He found that they spent their days, and often their nights too, in the thick tanglewood that is called “the bush,” and that they drank orange beer there, and sometimes foreign drinks too. These revels made them useless for anything else.

The natives who knew Mr. Chalmers, and were beginning to love him, begged him not to go near the young men when they were drinking, because they were wild and fierce, and might kill him.

But Tamate never was afraid of any one. He went away alone, and plunged here and there through the bush, until he came upon a band of young men. Then he sat down and chatted with them. Very soon they liked him so much that though they would not give up drinking, yet they could forgive him when he knocked the bungs out of the beer barrels and let the beer run away. He was so brave and fearless that he could do this when the men were standing watching him.

Sometimes one or two of the young men gave up drinking, but Tamate wished to get hold of them all, not of one or two only, so he kept on winning their friendship, and waited.

His chance came. He heard that the young men were meeting to drill for war, and that they called themselves volunteers. This was startling. War had ceased on the island. No one was likely to attack them from over the sea. Why should they drill?

Tamate thought of the battles of Glenaray. He knew it would be useless to talk to these wild lads about peace and kindness, but he thought of another plan. He said to them:

“Why do you drill out of sight like this? Why not let every one see that you are ‘Volunteers.’ You must come to church, and sit together in the gallery.”

The first Sunday after that a few of them came to church. The next week many more came, and from that time the Sunday Service became part of their drill. So eager were they to look well when they came to it, that they began to plant their lands that they might sell the fruit they grew, and buy clothes.

Coral for the new staircase

By-and-by the little church in Rarotonga needed a new platform and a new staircase. Then a great joy came to Tamate. He saw his young bushmen, whom he had first seen round their midnight fires, wild and fierce and useless, away out on the reefs cutting coral for the new staircase. They had learned to love the church and its services, and some of them became soldiers in the army of Jesus Christ.

When the church was ready to be opened again, there was great eagerness and stir. The natives had given nearly all that was needed. But there was still £25 worth of wood unpaid for.

Tamate was sure that the gifts that would be brought on the opening day would be worth much more than £25, but when he said so to a group of men, the doorkeeper said to him:

“How are you going to get in?”

“Why, by the door, of course.”

“No, you will not. I have the keys, and I will not open the door until everything is paid. Of course you may try the windows.”

Tamate was very glad that his doorkeeper cared so much about this debt. Though he had not meant to be so strict, he yielded to his friend.

But although the doorkeeper would let no one enter a church that was not paid for, he did not mean to keep any one out of church for a single day.

Soon a great noise was heard in the village. Boom went the drums. Boom! boom! High above their booming the voices of the villagers rose. Every one was called together to give what they could spare for the church. Very soon all was paid, and many gifts were left over.

All the time that Tamate was in Rarotonga he was longing to be at more dangerous work amongst those who lived to fight and kill each other, and who had no one to teach them.

His thoughts were so much with these wild tribes that he made others think of them too. Many of his students had caught his spirit, and longed, as he did, to go to the island of New Guinea, where very wild men lived and fought. Some of the teachers he had trained went before him. They knew it was dangerous, but they went with joy, because they too had learned how great and glad a thing it is to live for others.

At last Mr. Chalmers was allowed to leave Rarotonga and to go to New Guinea.

New Guinea is an island three times as large as Great Britain. It is very rich in fruits, in ebony wood, and in other things that traders like to find. It lies near to Australia. But the savages who lived in it were so fierce, and its rocky coast was so wild, that no one had tried to trade in the south-eastern end of it. Those who knew anything about it thought that to go there meant to die.

Four years before Tamate went to New Guinea, some of his teachers had landed at one of its villages, which was called Port Moresby. Here they found Mr. Lawes and his wife, who some months earlier had made their home there. They were the first white people who had lived amongst the natives of that wild coast. They found many tribes of natives, and each tribe was at war with the tribes around it. If two chiefs had a quarrel with each other, they brought their tribes to fight it out. Then the two tribes went on paying each other back in turn, till all their villages were burned and very many of their warriors were killed. Every one was either killing, or being killed, or afraid of being killed.

The men of New Guinea were large and strong, and they liked to look handsome. They thought it very handsome to have their hair standing far out on the tops of their heads and all round, with beautiful bright feathers stuck into it. They liked, too, to wear sticks like tusks through their noses, and rings through their ears, and necklaces of bones.

They daubed themselves all over with bright, sticky paint. But what they thought most handsome of all was to have a great many tattoo marks. When a man had killed another he was allowed to have his skin pricked with coloured dye. Afterwards the dye would never come out, no matter how hard the skin was scrubbed.

No one was allowed to have these coloured marks until he had killed a man. That was why the wild men of New Guinea were so proud of tattoo marks. Each mark proved that the man who bore it had been strong and clever.

It did not always prove that he had been brave, because sometimes the spear that had killed had been thrown from behind the foe.

CHAPTER IV

THE DEATH OF BOCASI

TAMATE was on his way to New Guinea at last, and soon the ship in which he sailed was within sight of the island. But that did not mean that he could land at once and begin his work there. He had many things to think of. He must choose a place where the reefs would allow his boat, if he ever had one, to anchor safely; and where any ships that passed could come near enough to let him get on board. He wished to be able to go here and there along the coast, and to open up many roads for others to follow.

He must also have firm ground on which to build a house. The natives of New Guinea could live in swamps. They chose great trees, cut off the branches and fixed the stem deep in the mud. High up above the swamp they built a platform across the tops of the tree trunks, and then a house on the platform. They clambered up to their houses by palm-leaf ladders. Sometimes their villages were built right out into the sea, so that they could paddle about in their canoes in and out underneath their homes.

But though those who had been born in New Guinea could live so, the hot, damp air, and the smells which rose from the swamps would have killed strangers.

Besides that, Tamate wished to teach those he gathered about him to grow many kinds of plants for food, so he had to choose a place where the soil was good.

After a long time he sighted the island of Suau, which looked as if it might be the right place. It lay close to the mainland.

In the bay beside it a single canoe paddled about. There was only one man in the canoe—a big, wild, cruel-looking native. He was fishing. Though he was fierce and strong, he was in terror when he saw the ship. His fishing was forgotten, and he paddled with all his might for the shore.

But the ship could sail much more quickly than his canoe, and soon she overtook him.

Tamate held up some bright beads and a piece of iron, and offered to give them to him, to show that he meant to be friends and not to hurt him in any way. The man waited to get the gifts, and then made off to the shore, while the ship anchored in the bay.

Very soon canoes came out to the vessel, and dark figures clambered up her sides and over her deck. They were very curious to know what kind of a thing this big “canoe” was, and to see the strange white people on board; and they wished to get beads and iron if they could!

Tamate Vaine sat knitting. And as the natives looked at everything and every one, they watched her too. She was the first to win a friend; for there was one big savage, called Kirikeu, who was so much charmed by her and by her knitting that he did not trouble to go with the others to see all that was in the boat, but sat still and watched her. They could not talk to each other at all; but when at sunset time he knew that he must go ashore, he made signs to her that he would go away and sleep, and that when morning came he would return with a gift for her. He could not tell her what the gift would be, but he showed her it would be something to eat.

By the time the sun began to rise next morning the canoes of Suau were ready to paddle to the ship again. Leading all the others was one in which Kirikeu sat with the food he had said he would bring.

But although Kirikeu was friendly, all the others were not. Many of them looked as if they would be glad to pick a quarrel. Their faces were frowning and angry.

Still, Tamate thought he would risk it. From a sailor who had picked up a good many of the words spoken on another island which lay near, he had learned all that he could. At many of the points at which he had landed to look for a home, he had used those words, but he found that no one knew them. The tribes in New Guinea speak many different languages. Here at Suau he found that the natives did know what he meant when he used the words the sailor had taught him. This made him more eager to stay. One other thing he must have. That was good water. A party from the ship landed. When Kirikeu knew that they were looking for water, he led them to a fresh stream.

Near the stream Tamate saw a piece of land that he liked. He bought it from the chief. Then he and his teachers began to build a house. The natives followed him into the woods, and he showed them which trees he wished, and gave them tomahawks with which to cleave the stems. They thought this great fun. They did not do what he wished, because they cared for him, nor because they meant to be friendly. They were just like boys with new knives, ready to cut anything. If they had not been a little afraid of the white man, they would have liked to kill him with the tomahawks, and so get all the cargo in the ship.

Tamate and his wife lived in one end of the chief’s house until their own was built. They hired a room from him. It was a strange room. The bed was spread on the floor. It had no table, nor chair. A wall, only two feet high, ran between it and the room in which the chief lived. It was startling, on wakening in the dim light before the sun rose, to see bones and skulls glimmering from the roof, and dark figures passing through the room.

Houses do not take long to build when they are quite simple, and are made of tree stems and palm fronds. Soon the new house was firm and strong. There was very little in it, and the seats and tables and beds were bare and plain.

Tamate was eager to get all his beads and cloth into the house in order to let the little ship that still lay in the bay sail away. It was not easy to take this bulky money from the boat to the house. Whenever a native saw anything he wished to have, he thought he would like to get it at once, and asked for it. If it was not given to him, he grew angry, and perhaps he stole it when no one was at hand.

One afternoon a band of armed natives passed Tamate. They were daubed with war paint, and looked very terrible. They carried their spears and clubs as if they were ready to use them at any moment. In spite of the daubs of paint, Tamate knew that some of them were men who had been friendly with him. He shouted a greeting to them, but they frowned, and hurried on to the chief’s house where the teachers were. He hastened after them, and went in amongst them. He found that they were led by a chief from the mainland, and that they wished gifts. The Suau chief round whose house they crowded, was very angry. He talked and shouted to the warriors from his platform. Then he called to the teachers to bring guns. When he saw that they would not do it, he rushed in and seized one himself.

Tamate tried to calm his friend, and to make him see that they would not fight, because they had come to bring peace to the island, not war.

The fierce-looking man whom they had seen first in his canoe in the bay, ran at Tamate with his club in the air.

“What do you want?”

“Tomahawks, knives, iron, beads; and if you do not give them to us we shall kill you!”

“You may kill us, but never a thing will you get from us.”

He had to hold to his word alone. The teachers wished him to give the mainland chief and his people some little things for fear they would kill them all. But he said:

“Can’t you see, if we give to these men, others will come from all round and ask gifts, and the end will be that we shall all be killed. No; if they mean to kill us, let them do it now, and be done with it!”

Then Kirikeu came, and begged him to give something. By this time this first Suau friend cared a great deal for the white man, and wished to help him. He thought it was the only way to get rid of the warriors. But Tamate said:

“No, my friend, I never give to people who carry arms.”

Then Kirikeu and the Suau chief began to shout to the strangers again. At last the wild yells came more seldom, and the men from the mainland went with the men of Suau into the bush to talk out the quarrel. Once more they sent to ask for a gift, and once more they were answered as before:

“I never give to armed people.”

Next morning Kirikeu brought the mainland chief to Tamate. Now the warrior was unarmed. The anger and fury of the night before were gone. When he found that he could not force the stranger to give him anything, and that Kirikeu and the Suau chief would not allow him to kill him, he thought that the best thing to do was to try to make peace, and this Tamate gladly did.

While the others were building, Mrs. Chalmers had been winning another friend. A bold young warrior, named Bocasi, used to sit beside her on the platform of the chief’s house. He taught her to speak the Suau words, and she taught him to knit.

Many other natives were becoming friendly to the strangers. Sometimes they brought gifts of vegetables and fish, and sometimes they invited them to their feasts.

Tamate thought that he might leave his teachers in charge at Suau for a short time, and go, in the little ship that still lay in the bay, to see some other villages along the shore. He was very busy clearing out some “bush” near the house, that he might get it planted before he went, when one of the crew came to him, and said:

“I ’fraid, sir, our captain he too fast with natives. One big fellow he come on board, and he sit down below. Captain he tell him get up. He no get up. Captain he get sword, and he tell him if he no get up he cut head off! He get up; go ashore. I fear he no all right. Natives all look bad, and he been off trying to make row we fellow.”

Tamate knew that the “big fellow” was Bocasi. He was vexed that he and the captain had quarrelled, but he did not think there was danger. He said to the sailor:

“Oh no; I think it is all right.”

Then he told the men to stop work. As he was paying them, he heard two shots fired from the ship. He reached the house with a bound. The ship was a small one, not the one in which they had come to Suau, but another which had stayed beside them with cargo until they could land everything they needed. Its crew numbered only four, and this morning the captain and the cook had been left alone on board. The other two were on shore, helping to clear and to plant.

Whenever Tamate heard the shots, he sent these two sailors off to their captain. As he looked out to the ship, he saw natives swarming all over her deck, and some of them tugging at her anchor chain. On a point of rock that ran out towards the ship other dark figures crowded.

What could the captain be doing? Was he going to let the men in the canoes carry the line from his vessel to the wild crowd on the rocks, that they might pull the little ship ashore and wreck her?

Then a great noise rose from the beach, where the ship’s boat lay, and the two sailors came running back to say that natives were in the boat, and would not let it go back to the ship.

Tamate ran off, leaping over fences and bushes till he reached the shore. He sprang to the boat. The natives fled before him, and soon the sailors were rowing hard to reach the ship.

When the natives on board saw them coming they took fright, slipped down into their canoes, and made for the shore. Those on the reef ran back to the village. When the sailors reached the ship, they found their captain lying on deck with a spear-head in his side, and gashes on his head and foot. They were so angry that they began to fire at the crowd of natives that surged backwards and forwards on the shore. Two men were wounded. Tamate did not know what to do first. He longed to get to the ship to stop the firing, but for the moment all he could do was to bandage the wounds of the two natives. Meanwhile the villagers were arming. Clubs and spears seemed to spring from the ground on every side. Angry voices asked, “Where is Bocasi?” “Where is Bocasi?”

Bocasi had gone to the ship and had not come back.

Mr. Chalmers asked two native men to take him in a canoe to the ship. He was very anxious to know what had kept Bocasi. He was too eager to wait till he was on board, so he shouted when he came near—

“Is there still a man on board?”

“Yes, he board.”

Something about the voice of the man who answered made Tamate’s heart sink. He cried, “Is he shot?”

“Yes, he shot dead. Yes, he dead!”

When he got on board he found the captain faint and white. Bocasi had tried to kill the captain, and the captain had shot Bocasi.

The captain might die of his wound. He must be sent to some place where he could be nursed. The body of Bocasi must be taken to Suau. The people there were angry already. When they saw the dead body they would be full of fury. If Tamate went back in the same canoe with it, they would kill him in their first burst of wrath. His wife and the teachers would be left at their mercy, and all his dreams of help for the men of New Guinea would be over. If he let the body go before him, his wife and the teachers would be slain, and he would not be allowed to land again.

One thing must be done first. By hook or by crook he must get ashore before the body. The canoe in which he had crossed lay alongside. The men were just going to place the body in it to row it to the shore.

“Stay,” he cried; “wait for a larger canoe to carry Bocasi’s body.”

While they paused, he seized one native who was still in the canoe, and said, “Take me to shore quick, and give me time to reach the house before you land the body.”

It was never easy to disobey Tamate, so before the other native had time to object, the little canoe was safely on its way to the shore.

Mr. Chalmers was grateful to reach his house and to be amongst the men of Suau again, but he knew that the hardest time was still before him.

When the dead body was brought to land there was great mourning and wailing. Bocasi was a warrior. He was young and handsome, and his people were proud of him.

The natives could not make up their minds what to do. Now they carried their weapons lowered for peace. Again they strutted about with them raised for war. East, and north, and west canoes could be seen. They were all coming to Suau. From each canoe as it touched the island a band of armed men landed, joined the crowd and added to the tumult. As the twilight fell, Tamate sent out bandages and medicine to the captain, and told him to be ready to sail that night.

A party of natives came rushing to the fence which ran round the bare new built house.

“Come out and fight,” they shouted, “and we will kill you for Bocasi.”

Then a chief came. “You must give payment for Bocasi’s death,” he said.

“Yes, I will give, but remember I have had nothing to do with Bocasi’s death.”

“You must give it now.”

“I cannot. If you will come to-morrow when the big star rises I will give it you.”

The chief went sulkily away.

Soon afterwards a native stole out of the bush. He did not speak angrily nor ask for gifts. He had come on another errand.

“Tamate,” he said, “you must go to-night. At midnight you may have a chance. To-morrow morning when the big star rises they will kill you.”

“Are you sure of it?”

“Yes, I have just come from the chief’s house. That is what they have agreed. They will do nothing till to-morrow morning.”

Tamate told this to his wife, and asked her if she wished to go away. Perhaps he knew what she would say. At any rate she answered as he would have done.

“We will stay. God will take care of us. If we die, we die: if we live, we live.”

Then they asked the wives of the teachers. They were brave too. They said, “Let us live together or die together.”

That night they gathered quietly for evening service in their strange new home. They could not sing lest the sound should bring the natives to attack them. Though the teachers knew English, they were not quite at home in it, so Tamate spoke in Rarotongan, that they might follow every word.

On the hush, broken only by his voice in prayer, a grating sound fell. It was the clank of the chain, on the side of the ship and on the windlass, as the anchor was drawn up.

When they rose from prayer and looked out, the ship was leaving the bay. The last chance of escape was gone. They were alone amongst the fierce and angry natives.

Instead of going to sleep, Mr. and Mrs. Chalmers spent the night making parcels. They tied up large gifts for the near friends of Bocasi and smaller ones for the others.

Through the darkness came the sound of war-horns, and the shouts of bands of fighters who came from the other side of Suau and from the mainland. At four next morning the chief strode in. He looked at the gifts.

“It is not enough; can you not give more?”

“If you wait till the steamer comes I may.”

“I must have more now.”

“I cannot give you more now.”

Groups of natives came to the fence. They shouted: “More, give more.”

But no notice was taken and they went away. Daylight came, and still the new house and those within it were unhurt. Kirikeu wandered near the house.

“Let no one go out,” he said.

The day passed slowly, but still he kept close to the house.

About three o’clock next morning Tamate lay down to rest. But scarcely had he fallen asleep when his wife roused him.

“Quick! They have taken the house.”

The door was only a piece of cloth hung across the entrance. Tamate sprang to it and drew aside the curtain. In front of him a great band of armed men swayed. Another party blocked the end of the house. In the dim light the chief from the mainland stood out as leader.

“What do you want?” shouted Tamate.

“Give us more, or we will kill you and burn the house.”

“Kill you may, but no more payment do I give. If we die we shall die fighting.”

The chief cowered in fear. The weapon of the white man was uncanny and strange. The courage of the white man alone against them all was stranger still.

“Go!” said Tamate; “tell the others there must be an end of this. The first man who crosses the line where the fence stood is a dead man. Go!”

And they went! They went and talked. Talked wildly and fiercely too, but in less than two hours Kirikeu came to say that all was well.

On the shore they saw a large war-canoe ready to start, and watched the quick dark figures of the natives as they lifted hundreds of smaller canoes into the water. The warriors from the mainland shouted back: “We return to-morrow, to kill not only the white man and his friends, but to kill all of you.” But before to-morrow came they thought they would stay at home!

The white man’s courage had awed the natives, and though the chief of Suau would have liked to get larger presents, he did not wish the strangers to be killed. The iron and beads they brought had made him wealthy. When he saw that nothing would move Tamate, he turned against the others.

“If you try to kill him,” he said, “you must kill me first.”

That was why the mainland chief said he would kill the men of Suau with the strangers!

CHAPTER V

THE SPIRITS OF THE HEIGHT

IN time the natives grew friendly again. Then Tamate thought of other places. He had not come to New Guinea to teach and help the people of one little island on its shore only.

He wished to go here and there and everywhere, that far and wide he might let men know that he and those who followed him meant peace and friendship. So he would open the way. Later he would go back to leave teachers with the chiefs whose friendship he had won. In many villages his students would have been killed at once if they had gone alone. It needed a man of strong courage, quick wit, and great heart to go first. All these he had.

When he went away to make peace with new tribes he would have liked to take his wife with him, and she wished very much to go. But she was as eager as Tamate was to think of others first. She was a strong woman. She did not say much, but whenever she saw what was the right thing to do she did it. She knew that the teachers would be lonely if they both went, and that the natives might not be so willing to please them as they now were to please her husband and herself. So when Tamate went away she stayed at Suau.

It was very hard to say good-bye, because each of them knew that they might never meet again, and that either of them might need the other more than they had ever needed any one.

One time it was more hard than it had been before. Tamate wished to visit the village of Tepauri. The tribe who lived there were at war with Suau. In the last battle the people of Suau had killed a great many of the others. Tamate wished to make peace between the two tribes.

One afternoon he said: “I am going to Tepauri to-morrow; will you go with me?” Even Kirikeu refused to go with him.

That evening, as he and Mrs. Chalmers sat at their door, a troop of natives came to them. The dark men carried strange white things in their arms. When they came near they set them down in front of the house. They were skulls! Kirikeu spoke for the others. He said: “Friend, are you going over there to-morrow?”

“Yes, I mean to go.”

“Do you see these skulls? They belonged to people we killed from over there. They have not been paid for. They will take your head in payment, for you are our great friend!”

He looked hard at Tamate and added: “Will you go now?”

“Yes, I will go to-morrow morning, and God will take care of us.”

Beni, a Rarotongan teacher, was a widower. Tamate said to him: “You heard all the natives said yesterday. I am going to Tepauri. Will you come?”

He agreed, and the two went off together. When they reached Tepauri they found themselves in the midst of a wild dancing mob. The natives shouted and waved their spears and their clubs, and made believe to throw them.

Every now and again they cried: “Goira, Goira.”

This sounded like a Rarotongan word which meant “spear them.” The natives caught Tamate’s hand and rushed along the shore with him. The teacher was forced to follow close behind, and still the men of Tepauri danced and shouted and aimed their spears at unseen foes.

They came to the bed of a stream. Tamate stuck his heel against a stone to try to stop himself, but he was lifted over it and on and on, stumbling and running and clambering up the stony bed. He turned to Beni and said, “Try to get back. They may let you go.”

“I am trying all the time.”

“What do you think of it?”

“Oh, they are taking us to the sacred place to kill us!”

“It looks like it.”

The thick undergrowth was so close and tangled that there was no hope of escape into it.

“No use,” said Tamate. “God is with us, so let us go quietly.”

From the dry stones of the stream bed and the thick bush, they came to a beautiful cool pool of water, hung round with ferns and moss. Then one of the men who had dragged them along made a speech. They did not know all the words then, but they could gather the meaning of the whole. This is part of it.

“Tamate, look, here is good water. It is yours and all this land is yours. Our young men will begin at once to build you a house. Go and bring your wife and leave these bad murdering people you are with, and come and live with us.”

“Goira” was their word for water.

When Tamate and Beni returned to Suau the natives there could not believe that the people of Tepauri had not hurt them. They looked at them anxiously and said:

“They did not kill you, but did you eat anything there?”

“Oh yes, plenty.”

“You should not have done that. They will have poisoned you.”

When the natives of Suau saw that Tamate Vaine stayed alone with them when her husband went away, they were delighted. They said to each other:

“They trust us, we must treat them kindly. They cannot mean us harm, or Tamate would not have left his wife behind.”

They used to beg her to eat a great deal, so that her husband would know that they had treated her well.

But the fever that seizes so many people there had weakened Mrs. Chalmers. Her spirit was so brave and strong that neither she nor any one else knew how ill she was.

Once Tamate went for a long walk on the mainland across the water from Suau. He wished to find out if it would be wise to send teachers far inland amongst the mountains. On this walk an old chief was leader of the party. They needed him to show them the way across the mountains, but the chief was eager to help in other ways that seemed to him more useful.

It was a bright sunny morning when they set out, and merry laughter and shouts rose from the travellers. Soon they came to a spot where a woman had died. The laughter died away. With solemn faces the chief and his men tore down branches from the trees and ran on brushing their feet with the branches, to keep the spirit of the dead woman from tripping them up. When they passed that bit of road, the run quieted down to a walk. Then rain began to fall. Again the chief took the care of the journey on his head. He scolded the rain and bade it be gone.

They spent the night in a little village. Tamate tried to sleep, but ever through his sleep he heard his guide’s voice telling of the strange doings of the white man and of the great “war-canoe” that had called at Suau.

Next morning the chief gathered all the party together on an island in the midst of a stream. The way for the day lay uphill, but ere the climb began, the spirits that lived in the heights had to be made friendly. A great leaf was laid on the ground. An old cocoanut was scraped into it. Other leaves were cut into little pieces and mixed with the cocoanut, while the chief and five others sat on the ground and sang a low chant. Then they sprang up suddenly with a shout, and the natives squeezed some of the juices of the leaves and cocoanut over their heads. But this was not all. They waded into the stream and stood in deep water with their eyes gazing at the mountain-tops and their hands on their mouths. A low murmur reached the ears of those who watched them from the island. Suddenly another shout rose, and the sound of splashing water as the men plunged into the stream. The chief was the last to return to the island. Tamate asked him:

“Is it all right?”

“Yes, very good. The mountain spirits have gone, and the chief on the other side will be ready for us. We shall eat pigs. We shall put on armlets. And more food will be given to us than we shall know what to do with.”

All the way up the chief was very solemn. He would pluck a leaf, talk to it, throw it away and pluck another. A bird on a twig before him was enough to bar the way. He bade it be gone, and stood motionless till he saw it fly.

The walk was a happy one, but Tamate felt that there were many other parts of New Guinea that were more in need of teachers, so he did not place any there then.

When he returned to Suau he found his wife very ill, and in a few months he had to let her sail away to Sydney. She could not get well at Suau, but they both hoped that rest and change in Australia would make her strong again.

Another shout rose

He worked on at Suau, but the letters from Sydney brought him sad news. His wife was growing weaker instead of stronger. A few months after she had left him a friend came to help him, and he gladly left this friend in charge at Suau and sailed for Sydney, but ere he reached his wife, he read in a newspaper that she was dead. She died amongst loving friends. She was bright and strong to the end, and her thoughts were full of others’ needs. One of her last messages to her husband was:

“Do not leave the teachers.”

Mr. Chalmers sailed back to New Guinea to find a new home and new work at Port Moresby.

CHAPTER VI

KONE

PORT MORESBY is a village on the mainland of New Guinea. It lies to the north and west of the island of Suau. Here Mr. Chalmers made his new headquarters beside Mr. and Mrs. Lawes. Together they planned and began the working of a training-school that they might have New Guinean teachers.

Tamate used to say that to do Christ’s work in New Guinea one was needed to break up the ground, another to sow, and another to reap. Although during his lifetime he saw many of the fierce men of the islands won for Christ, and trying to live as He wishes men to live, still the greater part of his work was to break down the hatred and cruelty of the wildest tribes. So, though he had his house at Port Moresby, he was seldom there for any length of time.

On one of his voyages westward along the coast he sighted three canoes. The men in the canoes were waiting to trade with natives from the village of Namoa. When they saw Tamate they all went ashore and ate together on the beach. Still there was no sign of the Namoans.

“Why not walk to Namoa?” said one.

“Why not?”

“And Tamate will come too!”

He did not wish to go. He was on his way to a village farther west. But the others were very eager to have him with them, and he yielded. As they started he looked round doubtfully.

“I fear it will rain before we can get back,” he said.

“Not till we return,” answered a native woman.

“Why not?”

“The rainmaker is with us, and he only can bring rain!”

“Where is he?”

The woman pointed to a chief named Kone.

“What about rain, Kone?”

“It cannot rain, so do not fear.”

“But I think it will rain.”

“You need not fear; let us start.”