Noa Noa | Page 6

myself with the distinctive characteristics of the
Tahitian face, I had wished for a long time to make a portrait of one of
my neighbors, a young woman of pure Tahitian extraction.
One day she finally became emboldened enough to enter my hut, and to
look at photographs of paintings which I had hung on one of the walls
of my room. She regarded the Olympia for a long time and with special
interest.
"What do you think of her?" I asked. I had learned a few Tahitian
words during the two months since I had last spoken French.
My neighbor replied, "She is very beautiful!"
I smiled at this remark, and was touched by it. Had she then a sense of
the beautiful? But what reply would the professors of the Academy of
Fine Arts have made to this remark?
Then suddenly after a perceptible silence such as precedes the thinking
out of a conclusion, she added,
"Is it your wife?"
"Yes."
I did not hesitate at this lie. I--the tané of the beautiful Olympia!
While she was curiously examining certain religious compositions of

the Italian primitives, I hastened, without her noticing it, to sketch her
portrait.
She saw it, and with a pout cried out abruptly, "Aïta (no)!" and fled.
An hour later she returned, dressed in a beautiful robe with the tiaré
behind the ear. Was it coquetry? Was it the pleasure of consenting of
her own free will after having refused? Or was it simply the universal
attraction of the forbidden fruit which one denies one's self? Or more
probably still, was it merely a caprice without any other motive, a pure
caprice of the kind to which the Maoris are so given?
Without delay I began work, without hesitation and all of a fever. I was
aware that on my skill as painter would depend the physical and moral
possession of the model, that it would be like an implied, urgent,
irresistible invitation.
She was not at all handsome according to our æsthetic rules.
She was beautiful.
All her traits combined in a Raphaelesque harmony by the meeting of
curves. Her mouth had been modeled by a sculptor who knew how to
put into a single mobile line a mingling of all joy and all suffering.
I worked in haste and passionately, for I knew that the consent had not
yet been definitely gained. I trembled to read certain things in these
large eyes--fear and the desire for the unknown, the melancholy of
bitter experience which lies at the root of all pleasure, the involuntary
and sovereign feeling of being mistress of herself. Such creatures seem
to submit to us when they give themselves to us; yet it is only to
themselves that they submit. In them resides a force which has in it
something superhuman--or perhaps something divinely animal.
*
* *

Now, I work more freely, better.
But my solitude still disturbs me.
Indeed, I saw in the district young women and young girls, tranquil of
eye, pure Tahitians, some of whom would perhaps gladly have shared
my life.--However, I did not dare approach them. They actually made
me timid with their sure look, their dignity of bearing, and their pride
of gait.
All, indeed, wish to be "taken," literally, brutally taken (Maü, to
seize), without a single word. All have the secret desire for violence,
because this act of authority on the part of the male leaves to the
woman-will its full share of irresponsibility. For in this way she has not
given her consent for the beginning of a permanent love. It is possible
that there is a deeper meaning in this violence which at first sight seems
so revolting. It is possible also that it has a savage sort of charm. I
pondered the matter, indeed, but I did not dare.
Then, too, some were said to be ill, ill with that malady which
Europeans confer upon savages, doubtless as the first degree of their
initiation into civilized life...
And when the older among them said to me, pointing to one of them,
"Maü téra ( take that one)," I had neither the necessary audacity
nor confidence.
I let Titi know that I would be pleased to take her again.
She came at once.
The experiment succeeded badly. By the boredom which I felt in the
company of this woman so used to the banal luxury of officials, I was
able to measure the real progress which had already been made toward
the beautiful life of the savages.
After a few weeks Titi and I separated forever.

Again I was alone.
---
My neighbors have become my friends. I dress like them, and partake
of the same food as they. When I am not working, I share their life of
indolence and joy,