A Footnote to History | Page 5

was disregarded. The language had recently to borrow from the
Tahitians a word for debt; while by a significant excidence, it possessed
a native expression for the failure to pay--"to omit to make a return for
property begged." Conceive now the position of the householder
besieged by harpies, and all defence denied him by the laws of honour.
The sacramental gesture of refusal, his last and single resource, was
supposed to signify "my house is destitute." Until that point was
reached, in other words, the conduct prescribed for a Samoan was to
give and to continue giving. But it does not appear he was at all
expected to give with a good grace. The dictionary is well stocked with
expressions standing ready, like missiles, to be discharged upon the
locusts--"troop of shamefaced ones," "you draw in your head like a
tern," "you make your voice small like a whistle-pipe," "you beg like
one delirious"; and the verb pongitai, "to look cross," is equipped with
the pregnant rider, "as at the sight of beggars."
This insolence of beggars and the weakness of proprietors can only be
illustrated by examples. We have a girl in our service to whom we had
given some finery, that she might wait at table, and (at her own request)
some warm clothing against the cold mornings of the bush. She went
on a visit to her family, and returned in an old tablecloth, her whole
wardrobe having been divided out among relatives in the course of
twenty-four hours. A pastor in the province of Atua, being a handy,
busy man, bought a boat for a hundred dollars, fifty of which he paid
down. Presently after, relatives came to him upon a visit and took a
fancy to his new possession. "We have long been wanting a boat," said
they. "Give us this one." So, when the visit was done, they departed in
the boat. The pastor, meanwhile, travelled into Savaii the best way he
could, sold a parcel of land, and begged mats among his other relatives,
to pay the remainder of the price of the boat which was no longer his.
You might think this was enough; but some months later, the harpies,
having broken a thwart, brought back the boat to be repaired and

repainted by the original owner.
Such customs, it might be argued, being double-edged, will ultimately
right themselves. But it is otherwise in practice. Such folk as the
pastor's harpy relatives will generally have a boat, and will never have
paid for it; such men as the pastor may have sometimes paid for a boat,
but they will never have one. It is there as it is with us at home: the
measure of the abuse of either system is the blackness of the individual
heart. The same man, who would drive his poor relatives from his own
door in England, would besiege in Samoa the doors of the rich; and the
essence of the dishonesty in either case is to pursue one's own
advantage and to be indifferent to the losses of one's neighbour. But the
particular drawback of the Polynesian system is to depress and stagger
industry. To work more is there only to be more pillaged; to save is
impossible. The family has then made a good day of it when all are
filled and nothing remains over for the crew of free-booters; and the
injustice of the system begins to be recognised even in Samoa. One
native is said to have amassed a certain fortune; two clever lads have
individually expressed to us their discontent with a system which taxes
industry to pamper idleness; and I hear that in one village of Savaii a
law has been passed forbidding gifts under the penalty of a sharp fine.
Under this economic regimen, the unpopularity of taxes, which strike
all at the same time, which expose the industrious to a perfect siege of
mendicancy, and the lazy to be actually condemned to a day's labour,
may be imagined without words. It is more important to note the
concurrent relaxation of all sense of property. From applying for help
to kinsmen who are scarce permitted to refuse, it is but a step to taking
from them (in the dictionary phrase) "without permission"; from that to
theft at large is but a hair's-breadth.


CHAPTER II
--THE ELEMENTS OF DISCORD: FOREIGN

The huge majority of Samoans, like other God-fearing folk in other
countries, are perfectly content with their own manners. And upon one

condition, it is plain they might enjoy themselves far beyond the
average of man. Seated in islands very rich in food, the idleness of the
many idle would scarce matter; and the provinces might continue to
bestow their names among rival pretenders, and fall into war and enjoy