CHAPTER V
CANNIBALS
WILL HALLEY and his crew, taking advantage of the
darkness of night and the sleep of the passengers, had fled
with the only boat. There could be no doubt about it.
The captain, whose duty would have kept him on board to
the last, had been the first to quit the ship.
"The cowards are off!" said John Mangles. "Well,
my Lord, so much the better. They have spared us some
trying scenes."
"No doubt," said Glenarvan; "besides we have a captain of our own, and
courageous, if unskillful sailors, your
companions, John. Say the word, and we are ready to
obey."
The Major, Paganel, Robert, Wilson, Mulrady, Olbinett
himself, applauded Glenarvan's speech, and ranged themselves on the deck, ready
to execute their captain's orders.
"What is to be done?" asked Glenarvan.
It was evident that raising the Macquarie was out of
the question, and no less evident that she must be abandoned. Waiting on board
for succor that might never
come, would have been imprudence and folly. Before the
arrival of a chance vessel on the scene, the Macquarie
would have broken up. The next storm, or even a high
tide raised by the winds from seaward, would roll it on
the sands, break it up into splinters, and scatter them on
the shore. John was anxious to reach the land before
this inevitable consummation.
He proposed to construct a raft strong enough to carry
the passengers, and a sufficient quantity of provisions, to
the coast of New Zealand.
There was no time for discussion, the work was to be
set about at once, and they had made considerable progress when night came and
interrupted them.
Toward eight o'clock in the evening, after supper, while
Lady Helena and Mary Grant slept in their berths, Paganel and his friends
conversed on serious matters as they
walked up and down the deck. Robert had chosen to stay
with them. The brave boy listened with all his ears, ready
to be of use, and willing to enlist in any perilous
adventure.
Paganel asked John Mangles whether the raft could not
follow the coast as far as Auckland, instead of landing its
freight on the coast.
John replied that the voyage was impossible with such
an unmanageable craft.
"And what we cannot do on a raft could have been done
in the ship's boat?"
"Yes, if necessary," answered John; "but we should
have had to sail by day and anchor at night."
"Then those wretches who abandoned us —"
"Oh, as for them," said John, "they were drunk, and
in the darkness I have no doubt they paid for their cowardice with their lives."
"So much the worse for them and for us," replied Paganel; "for the boat
would have been very useful to us."
"What would you have, Paganel? The raft will bring
us to the shore," said Glenarvan.
"The very thing I would fain avoid," exclaimed the
geographer.
"What! do you think another twenty miles after crossing the Pampas and
Australia, can have any terrors for us,
hardened as we are to fatigue?"
"My friend," replied Paganel, "I do not call in question our courage nor
the bravery of our friends. Twenty
miles would be nothing in any other country than New
Zealand. You cannot suspect me of faint-heartedness. I
was the first to persuade you to cross America and Australia. But here the case
is different. I repeat, anything
is better than to venture into this treacherous country."
"Anything is better, in my judgment," said John Mangles, "than braving
certain destruction on a stranded
vessel."
"What is there so formidable in New Zealand?" asked
Glenarvan.
"The savages," said Paganel.
"The savages!" repeated Glenarvan. "Can we not
avoid them by keeping to the shore? But in any case what
have we to fear? Surely, two resolute and well-armed
Europeans need not give a thought to an attack by a handful of miserable
beings."
Paganel shook his head. "In this case there are no miserable beings to
contend with. The New Zealanders are
a powerful race, who are rebelling against English rule,
who fight the invaders, and often beat them, and who
always eat them!"
"Cannibals!" exclaimed Robert, "cannibals?" Then
they heard him whisper, "My sister! Lady Helena."
"Don't frighten yourself, my boy," said Glenarvan;
"our friend Paganel exaggerates."
"Far from it," rejoined Paganel. "Robert has shown
himself a man, and I treat him as such, in not concealing
the truth from him."
Paganel was right. Cannibalism has become a fixed
fact in New Zealand, as it is in the Fijis and in Torres
Strait. Superstition is no doubt partly to blame, but cannibalism is certainly
owing to the fact that there are moments when game is scarce and hunger great.
The savages began by eating human flesh to appease the demands
of an appetite rarely satiated; subsequently the priests regulated and satisfied
the monstrous custom. What was a
meal, was raised to the dignity of a ceremony, that is all.
Besides, in the eyes of the Maories, nothing is more
natural than to eat one another. The missionaries often
questioned them about cannibalism. They asked them
why they devoured their brothers; to which the chiefs made
answer that fish eat fish, dogs eat men, men eat dogs, and
dogs eat one another. Even the Maori mythology has a
legend of a god who ate another god; and with such a
precedent, who could resist eating his neighbor?
Another strange notion is, that in eating a dead enemy
they consume his spiritual being, and so inherit his soul,
his strength and his bravery, which they hold are specially
lodged in the brain. This accounts for the fact that the
brain figures in their feasts as the choicest delicacy, and
is offered to the most honored guest.
But while he acknowledged all this, Paganel maintained,
not without a show of reason, that sensuality, and especially hunger, was the
first cause of cannibalism among
the New Zealanders, and not only among the Polynesian
races, but also among the savages of Europe.
"For," said he, "cannibalism was long prevalent among
the ancestors of the most civilized people, and especially
(if the Major will not think me personal) among the
Scotch."
"Really," said McNabbs.
"Yes, Major," replied Paganel. "If you read certain
passages of Saint Jerome, on the Atticoli of Scotland, you
will see what he thought of your forefathers. And without going so far back as
historic times, under the reign of
Elizabeth, when Shakespeare was dreaming out his Shylock, a Scotch bandit,
Sawney Bean, was executed for the
crime of cannibalism. Was it religion that prompted him
to cannibalism? No! it was hunger."
"Hunger?" said John Mangles.
"Hunger!" repeated Paganel; "but, above all, the
necessity of the carnivorous appetite of replacing the bodily
waste, by the azote contained in animal tissues. The lungs
are satisfied with a provision of vegetable and farinaceous
food. But to be strong and active the body must be supplied with those plastic
elements that renew the muscles.
Until the Maories become members of the Vegetarian Association they will eat
meat, and human flesh as meat."
"Why not animal flesh?" asked Glenarvan.
"Because they have no animals," replied Paganel; "and
that ought to be taken into account, not to extenuate, but
to explain, their cannibal habits. Quadrupeds, and even
birds, are rare on these inhospitable shores, so that the
Maories have always eaten human flesh. There are even
'man-eating seasons,' as there are in civilized countries
hunting seasons. Then begin the great wars, and whole
tribes are served up on the tables of the conquerors."
"Well, then," said Glenarvan, "according to your mode
of reasoning, Paganel, cannibalism will not cease in New
Zealand until her pastures teem with sheep and oxen."
"Evidently, my dear Lord; and even then it will take
years to wean them from Maori flesh, which they prefer
to all others; for the children will still have a relish for
what their fathers so highly appreciated. According to
them it tastes like pork, with even more flavor. As to
white men's flesh, they do not like it so well, because the
whites eat salt with their food, which gives a peculiar
flavor, not to the taste of connoisseurs."
"They are dainty," said the Major. "But, black or
white, do they eat it raw, or cook it?"
"Why, what is that to you, Mr. McNabbs?" cried
Robert.
"What is that to me!" exclaimed the Major, earnestly.
"If I am to make a meal for a cannibal, I should prefer
being cooked."
"Why?"
"Because then I should be sure of not being eaten
alive!"
"Very good. Major," said Paganel; "but suppose they
cooked you alive?"
"The fact is," answered the Major, "I would not give
half-a-crown for the choice!"
"Well, McNabbs, if it will comfort you — you may as
well be told — the New Zealanders do not eat flesh without
cooking or smoking it. They are very clever and experienced in cookery. For my
part, I very much dislike the
idea of being eaten! The idea of ending one's life in the
maw of a savage! bah!"
"The conclusion of all," said John Mangles, "is that
we must not fall into their hands. Let us hope that one
day Christianity will abolish all these monstrous customs."
"Yes, we must hope so," replied Paganel; "but, believe
me, a savage who has tasted human flesh, is not easily persuaded to forego it. I
will relate two facts which prove it."
"By all means let us have the facts, Paganel," said
Glenarvan.
"The first is narrated in the chronicles of the Jesuit
Society in Brazil. A Portuguese missionary was one day
visiting an old Brazilian woman who was very ill. She
had only a few days to live. The Jesuit inculcated the
truths of religion, which the dying woman accepted, without objection. Then
having attended to her spiritual wants,
he bethought himself of her bodily needs, and offered her
some European delicacies. 'Alas,' said she, 'my digestion
is too weak to bear any kind of food. There is only one
thing I could fancy, and nobody here could get it for me.'
'What is it?' asked the Jesuit. 'Ah! my son,' said she,
'it is the hand of a little boy! I feel as if I should enjoy
munching the little bones!'"
"Horrid! but I wonder is it so very nice?" said Robert.
"My second tale will answer you, my boy," said Paganel: "One day a
missionary was reproving a cannibal for
the horrible custom, so abhorrent to God's laws, of eating
human flesh! 'And beside,' said he, 'it must be so nasty!'
'Oh, father,' said the savage, looking greedily at the missionary, 'say that God
forbids it! That is a reason for
what you tell us. But don't say it is nasty! If you had
only tasted it!'"