Page:Ballads, Stevenson, 1890.djvu/67

 NOTES TO THE FEAST OF FAMINE.

In this ballad I have strung together some of the more striking particularities of the Marquesas. It rests upon no authority; it is in no sense, like "Rahéro," a native story; but a patchwork of details of manners and the impressions of a traveller. It may seem strange, when the scene is laid upon these profligate islands, to make the story hinge on love. But love is not less known in the Marquesas than elsewhere; nor is there any cause of suicide more common in the islands.

Note 1, verse 2. "Pit of Popoi." Where the bread fruit was stored for preservation.

Note 2, verse 15. "Ruby-red." The priest's eyes were probably red from the abuse of Rava. His beard (verse 18) is said to be worth an estate; for the beards of old men are the favourite head adornment of the Marquesans, as the hair of women formed their most costly girdle. The former, among this generally beardless and short-lived people, fetch today considerable sums.

Note 3, verse 20. "Tikis." The tiki is an ugly image hewn out of wood or stone

Note 4, verse 76. "The one-stringed harp." Usually employed for serenades.

Note 5, verse 109. "The sacred cabin of palm." Which, however, no woman could approach. I do not know where women were tattooed; probably in the common house, or in the bush, for a woman was a creature of small account. I must guard the reader against supposing Taheia was at all disfigured; the art of the Marquesan tattooer is extreme; and she would appear to be clothed in a web of lace, inimitably delicate, exquisite in pattern, and of a bluish hue that at once contrasts and harmonises with the warm pigment of the native skin. It would be hard to find a woman more becomingly adorned than "a well tattooed" Marquesan.

Note 6, verse 155. "The horror of night." The Polynesian fear of ghosts and of the dark has been already referred to. Their life is beleaguered by the dead.

Note 7, verse 171. "The quiet passage of souls." So, I am told, the natives explain the sound of a little wind passing overhead unfelt.

Note 8, verse 208. "The first of the victims fell." Without doubt, this whole scene is untrue to fact. The victims were disposed of privately and some time before. And indeed I am far from claiming the credit of any high degree of accuracy for this ballad. Even in a time of famine, it is probable that Marquesan life went far more gaily than is here represented. But the melancholy of to-day lies on the writer's mind. 55