Page:Williams and Calvert, Fiji and the Fijians, New York, 1860.djvu/478

 444 FIJI AND THE FIJIANS. This year Mr. Calvert made the visitation tour in the " Wesley." At Nakorotumbu, things were discouraging. At Nairara, nine persons were baptized, and the priest was married during this visit. The dis- trict was wasted by war, which had destroyed the crops ; and the sites of several towns lately burnt were pointed out. After an uneasy night in a house exposed to attack, Mr. Calvert started for Natokea, and, with much fatigue, reached the town, high up in the mountain, among craggy rocks, and overhung by steep cliffs. Here he found " the hump-backed boy of Natokea " sick, and baptized him, being greatly pleased with his earnestness. The people peeped over the rocks, but seemed afraid to come near ; but they were at last gathered together, and listened to the Missionary. After this Mr. Calvert again joined the " Wesley," and sailed to Mba, where he found the Teachers suffer- ing and labouring, but without much success, as the principal lotu Chief still continued a polygamist. About noon, Mr. Calvert started for Mbulu, the town of the head Chief, Vakambua, on a good dry road and under a scorching sun. On the journey he passed an unusually large yam-bed, a mile and a quarter long, which had a rich appearance. Tlie yams were of a sort peculiar to Mba, called vurai, and come in season four months before the common kind. Their cultivation also is peculiar, as several successive crops are grown on the same land. The path lay through a rich plain of great extent, intersected by several tidal rivers, which sometimes overflow and add to the fertility of the land. After a few miles' walking, the Missionary had to pass over a bridge two hundred yards long, through mangrove bushes skirting the town, among which the water flowed at high tide. [Mbulu is built in a swamp surrounded with mangroves, which form a good protection from hostile attack. The houses are of an inferior kind, — square, with conical roofs. Mr. Calvert waited to have an interview with the Chief, who, with his people, was out planting. He was received respectfully, but was forbidden to enter a temple, because, as he heard afterwards, no person might pass the door until a foreigner had been killed to re- venge the death of one of their Chiefs, who had been shot some years before by an American trader. A fortnight before this visit, twenty- three persons had been killed, and dragged to this town. These brutal cannibals could not wait until they reached home and the victims were offered in due order, but cut pieces off and grilled and ate them on the road. Afterwards the whole of the bodies were divided and eaten. On learning these things, the ]Iissionary felt thankful that he had passed safely from among such a people. At Namole was a Chief named Ravato, who, with thirteen of his