Among the Islands by Mrs. B. J. Cady

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Sep 27, 1906

Among the Islands

By Mrs. B. J. Cady

MRS. B. J. CADY

We recently made a visit to the opposite end of the island upon which we are just now living. A white man, whom we often met in Tahiti and Raiatea, had invited us to visit him when we should come to Huahine, so we improved our first opportunity of doing so. This man's son came in their boat one day to bring cotton, and we went back with him. When we started from town, we thought we had quite a boat load of people and luggage; but when we had gone part way, we drew up toward land and stopped.

The former king was one of our party. He has a great deal of land in various places on the island. We have been told that in olden times, whenever the king placed his feet upon the ground, that land would henceforth be his property. The king did not walk, but was carried about by strong men, and when he saw a piece of land he would like for his own, he would ask to be set down there. They say that this is the reason why the royal family in each island owns so much land.

Well, we stopped at a place which belonged to this king, and the people living on the place brought four immense baskets full of breadfruit and emptied them into the boat, and also two large bunches of the same tied together. We had thought before that the boat was full, but room was readily found for the extra cargo. Then a man climbed a cocoanut tree, and got a number of green nuts and husked them, and brought them

into the boat.

After getting started again, the king took the nuts, one at a time, broke a hole in the end, and passed one to each of us to drink. Nearly every one learns to like the water of the young cocoanuts, and it has this advantage, it is sure to be pure. The meat of the green nuts is very palatable, and more digestible than that of the ripe cocoanuts.

We were out about six hours before we reached our destination. After we had sailed for some distance, we came to the narrow pass between the two islands, where the wind was shut off by the hills. The water was very shallow in this pass, so the boys pushed the boat along by means of long poles until we got out on the other side of the island; then they had to row, as the wind was ahead.

We enjoyed the scenery, for Huahine is a very pretty island. Its scenery varies from that of Raiatea, for its surface is much more uneven and the coast line more irregular. It was a bright moonlight evening, and we enjoyed our boat ride.

When we reached the house of our friend, it was already eight o'clock, and we soon began to feel sleepy. But our host had not had an opportunity of visiting with white people for several months, and he felt like talking, so we did not retire till after midnight. Though our hostess was not able to provide us with soft beds to sleep on, and we had to sleep on the floor right in the living-room, we were tired enough to sleep well. The children had a very large pet hog that was allowed to run about in the back yard. In the middle of the night it would climb up on the veranda, and stand in the door grunting. As we were sleeping on the floor near the open door, I felt afraid it would come into the house, and called Mr. Cady to get up and drive it away. After being driven away the second time, it concluded to go under the house to sleep for the rest of the night, but it came back again another night. I learned afterward that it was in the habit of sleeping on the veranda floor, and that it had just come up there to sleep, and probably would not have come into the house at all.

We had a pleasant and, we trust, a profitable visit with this family. The man is not religious, and has never taken an interest in spiritual things, but we tried to help him to see the importance of preparing for the future life, and hope that some seed may sink into his heart and bear fruit. His wife is a native woman, and they have a fine family of eight children. The wife is an industrious woman, and the children have been taught to do their share of the household duties. Fish is one of their principal articles of diet, and the children spend much of their time out in the boat or the canoes fishing.

On Sunday we went to visit another white man whose home was about two miles away. He is an aged man, and badly afflicted with dropsy. His wife, who died a few years ago, accepted the Sabbath truth, and was faithful to the light that she had until her death.

We also attended church in the native village near by, and in the evening Mr. Cady held a meeting there, illustrating his talk with some stereopticon views. A brother of the king recently died and was buried beside the church, as that is the home district of that family. His widow is now giving new names in his memory to all the leading natives of the island. It is a custom among them, when a person dies, to give names to the relatives to commemorate some incident in connection with the dead friend. Then the people are called by these new names. Because of this, a native always has a goodly number of names. The people of the island are also all in mourning for the prince who died, though they are not required to wear black continually. If they have one black dress and wear it occasionally, that is all they consider necessary. The men wear a band of black crape around the sleeve of their coat, and sometimes have a band of crape on the hat. The women want black hats also for mourning, and as they have no material here for making black hats in the natural color, they take any hat and paint it with black stain, which does very well.

When we were ready to come home, our kind friends brought us back in their boat around the opposite side of the island from which we had gone. All our journey was made in the lagoon, where the large waves of the ocean were shut out by the coral reef. In only one place we had to pass very near an opening in the reef, and though it was for only a short distance that our boat was rocked by the swells from the open sea, it made us feel quite uncomfortable for a while.

We passed by Mount Tapu (sacred), which looms up behind the village of Maeva. This mountain stands out alone, away from the other mountains, and is shaped differently from all other mountains of this island. The people have an old legend, saying that their heathen god Oro brought it over from the island of Moora, which is a hundred miles away, and planted it here ages ago.

We are always glad to get back into the place we call home, even though it may be only a temporary one and affording but few conveniences. We have a hearty invitation from this family to visit them again, and though it is inconvenient to go so far in a small boat, we hope to go again sometime.