University of Virginia Library

8. CHAPTER VIII.

For a while leaving Little Jule to sail away by herself, I will
here put down some curious information obtained from Hardy.

The renegado had lived so long on the island, that its customs
were quite familiar; and I much lamented that, from the shortness
of our stay, he could not tell us more than he did.

From the little intelligence gathered, however, I learned to
my surprise that, in some things, the people of Hivarhoo, though
of the same group of islands, differed considerably from my
tropical friends in the valley of Typee.

As his tattooing attracted so much remark, Hardy had a good
deal to say concerning the manner in which that art was practiced
upon the island.

Throughout the entire cluster the tattooers of Hivarhoo enjoyed
no small reputation. They had carried their art to the
highest perfection, and the profession was esteemed most honorable.
No wonder, then, that like genteel tailors, they rated
their services very high; so much so, that none but those belonging
to the higher classes could afford to employ them. So
true was this, that the elegance of one's tattooing was in most
cases a sure indication of birth and riches.

Professors in large practice lived in spacious houses, divided
by screens of tappa into numerous little apartments, where
subjects were waited upon in private. The arrangement
chiefly grew out of a singular ordinance of the Taboo, which
enjoined the strictest privacy upon all men, high and low, while

under the hands of a tattooer. For the time, the slightest intercourse
with others is prohibited, and the small portion of
food allowed, is pushed under the curtain by an unseen hand.
The restriction with regard to food, is intended to reduce the
blood, so as to diminish the inflammation consequent upon puncturing
the skin. As it is, this comes on very soon, and takes
some time to heal; so that the period of seclusion generally
embraces many days, sometimes several weeks.

All traces of soreness vanished, the subject goes abroad; but
only again to return; for, on account of the pain, only a small
surface can be operated upon at once; and as the whole body
is to be more or less embellished by a process so slow, the studios
alluded to are constantly filled. Indeed, with a vanity
elsewhere unheard of, many spend no small portion of their
days thus sitting to an artist.

To begin the work, the period of adolescence is esteemed
the most suitable. After casting about for some eminent tattooer,
the friends of the youth take him to his house, to have the outlines
of the general plan laid out. It behooves the professor to
have a nice eye, for a suit to be worn for life should be well
cut.

Some tattooers, yearning after perfection, employ, at large
wages, one or two men of the commonest order—vile fellows,
utterly regardless of appearances, upon whom they first try
their patterns and practice generally. Their backs remorselessly
scrawled over, and no more canvas remaining, they are
dismissed, and ever after go about, the scorn of their countrymen.

Hapless wights! thus martyred in the cause of the Fine Arts.

Beside the regular practitioners, there are a parcel of shabby,
itinerant tattooers, who, by virtue of their calling, stroll unmolested
from one hostile bay to another, doing their work dog-cheap
for the multitude. They always repair to the various

religious festivals, which gather great crowds. When these are
concluded, and the places where they are held vacated even by
the tattooers, scores of little tents of coarse tappa are left standing,
each with a solitary inmate, who, forbidden to talk to his
unseen neighbors, is obliged to stay there till completely healed.
The itinerants are a reproach to their profession, mere
cobblers, dealing in nothing but jagged lines and clumsy
patches, and utterly incapable of soaring to those heights of
fancy attained by the gentlemen of the faculty.

All professors of the arts love to fraternize; and so, in Hannamanoo,
the tattooers came together in the chapters of their
worshipful order. In this society, duly organized, and conferring
degrees, Hardy, from his influence as a white, was a sort of
honorary Grand Master. The blue shark, and a sort of Urim
and Thummim engraven upon his chest, were the seal of his
initiation. All over Hivarhoo are established these orders of
tattooers. The way in which the renegado's came to be founded
is this. A year or two after his landing there happened to
be a season of scarcity, owing to the partial failure of the bread-fruit
harvest for several consecutive seasons. This brought
about such a falling off in the number of subjects for tattooing,
that the profession became quite needy. The royal ally of
Hardy, however, hit upon a benevolent expedient to provide
for their wants, at the same time conferring a boon upon many
of his subjects.

By sound of conch-shell it was proclaimed before the palace,
on the beach, and at the head of the valley, that Noomai, King
of Hannamanoo, and friend of Hardee-Hardee, the white,
kept open heart and table for all tattooers whatsoever; but to
entitle themselves to this hospitality, they were commanded to
practice without fee upon the meanest native soliciting their
services.

Numbers at once flocked to the royal abode, both artists and

sitters. It was a famous time; and the buildings of the palace
being “taboo” to all but the tattooers and chiefs, the sitters bivouacked
on the common, and formed an extensive encampment.

The “Lora Tattoo,” or the Time of Tattooing, will be long remembered.
An enthusiastic sitter celebrated the event in
verse. Several lines were repeated to us by Hardy, some of
which, in a sort of colloquial chant he translated nearly thus: