VII.
Meetings Ordinary and Extraordinary.

The politics of Tonga are a never-ending struggle between the faikava and the fono. In the intervals of the solemn ceremony of kava-drinking the most outrageous scandal is talked, the most startling lies invented,—for kava loosens the tongue-strings without muddling the senses. Were it less, cheering and more inebriating it would be politically innocuous, for it is easier to govern a nation of drunkards than a people suffering from the diseased garrulity born of the pepper-root. Kava is drunk in every village in Tonga at least once a-day. Beside the doorpost in every house lie the flat and the round poundingstones whitened with the dusty fibres; and at each gathering, failing the moral character of an absent friend, politics, or church matters—which are so interlaced with politics that they are the more dangerous of the two-are the subject of conversation. To purify the air of the cloud of lies and miscomprehension that the faikavas have discharged into it, periodical fonos are necessary.

A fono is a compulsory meeting of the people to listen to the orders of some person in authority. Before Chris-page 86tianity changed the face of the land the fono took the place of written law. The matabules, hereditary censors of public morals, summoned a fono to lecture the young chiefs whenever they had made a wider breach of the proprieties than their rank permitted. Nowadays its uses are various. In every village at six o'clock on Monday mornings there are fonos, at which the mayor reads out Government orders, and urges diligence on the defaulting taxpayers. There are Premier's fonos and king's fonos, the latter being very solemn functions, only adopted in cases of great national importance; but in all fonos alike no discussion is allowed, and the people are only summoned to hear what those set in authority choose to tell them.

The chief's orders of old were published abroad by the crier (fanongonongo), and this custom is revived whenever Government orders have to be proclaimed without the formality of a public meeting; but this time-honoured method is not often resorted to on account of the inaccuracy to which the human memory is subject. When Mr Baker promulgated his Wild Birds Protection Act, he instructed the criers to cry the preamble and a résumé of the Act—That whereas certain birds, particularly specified, were of public utility as the destroyers of worms, fleas, and other noxious insects, they were not to be killed on pain of heavy penalties. But the crier's version was: "Hear me, all people. It is the command of the Government—worms, fleas, and all creeping things are useful, so also are birds, therefore it is ordained that they shall not die; whosoever shall kill any bug, or flea, or worm, or bird, or other such thing, shall be grievously punished." It is right to say that the Tongans received the order page 87without surprise, for the protection of insects seemed to them quite as reasonable as the protection of birds, or indeed as any other of Mr Baker's statutes.

On our return to Tongatabu we found the air surcharged with the gossip of the faikava. Two noblemen and the Government bandmaster, all disaffected for different reasons, had filled the islands with a story that ran as follows: "The Government was lying when it said that it was in want of money, for had not the Premier, when he opened the Treasury, found a bag containing a hundred thousand sovereigns, and hidden them for the use of the Cabinet Ministers? Was he not deceiving the people when he told them to pay their taxes, or their country would be ruined?" "Mr Baker has gone to America, and has told the President what Britain has done, and he will come back in an American man-of-war to try the High Commissioner, and punish his enemies." "A British official is in Tonga to pay Tukuaho for betraying the country, and to arrange for annexation." It was plain that a fono must be held to cleanse the political atmosphere.

My colleague did not dare to summon the entire island to a fono without the express sanction of the king, so he determined to assemble the mayors from every village, knowing that they would carry an embroidered version of his speech to their constituents. Shortly after sunrise on the appointed day horsemen poured into the town, and tethered their horses outside the disused church at Pangai whither we were called to address them. As we entered the building at the pulpit end a policeman cried "Koe Palemia," and the mayors rose and saluted page 88with hands lifted above their heads. They were of every age—from the dressed-up monkey fresh from college, in black coat, trousers, and bare feet, proud in the possession of all human knowledge, to the grey-headed elder in the quiet dignity of the vala of native cloth. Tukuaho made a capital speech, denying emphatically the false reports that had been set about, and appealing to the patriotism of his hearers to get their taxes in and save their country from ruin. They must, he said, hold fonos, at which only those who were in arrears with their taxes should attend, and as each man completed his payments he should be relieved from further attendance. Then he called upon me for my maiden speech in Tongan, and I delivered myself of a string of platitudes about the independence of Tonga, and the desire of England to see her stand alone: that England did not want Tonga, having quite enough to do with the slice of the world she had already, to which Tonga was but a fly-blow on the map: that I had come at the king's request, not to meddle in their concerns, but to help them, and when they wanted help no longer I should go away. Then the spokesman fidgeted and asked leave to proffer a request. They were tired, he said, of talking to those who would not listen to them: would the Premier himself come and hold their fono? After some discussion it was settled that we should hold a fono in each of the three great divisions of the island.

News now came from Vavau that Mr Watkin and Mr Baker's son and former private secretary had between them contrived to stir up a hornet's nest. The boy, with the secrecy of a conspirator, had been distributing leaflets and photographs of his celebrated father, and the minister page 89of peace had been talking war. My informant, the Wesleyan missionary, showed me a letter from one of his native colleagues which left no doubt upon the point. Mr George Brown, the energetic and able head of the mission, would have liked Mr Watkin to be allowed rope enough to hang himself, but as that would have involved the starvation of the Government, already reduced to inanition, I decided to "belay." I was armed with a letter from the High Commissioner—to be given or withheld as I thought fit—warning him in plain terms that abstention from politics was required of him. The time for using this letter had now come. There being a special reason for an interview for the purpose of adjusting the outstanding accounts between the Government and the Free Church, I invited him to meet me at the public offices, and asked C— to be present and take notes of the conversation. The reverend gentleman was rather restless throughout the interview, and seemed particularly uncomfortable at seeing an unobtrusive figure busily writing columns of figures at the other table. Experience of his absent colleague's methods of diplomacy had taught him where traps were to be suspected. I kept him in conversation for some minutes upon matters affecting the welfare of the Church, and then he seized his hat, and would have beaten a precipitate retreat had I not stopped him, and handed him the letter. As he read it his face became cadaverous, and his hand trembled so that he could not have understood the words. I told him that there was a particular reason for giving him the letter at this moment, since he was reported to have been using the language of disaffection at Vavau, and, before he page 90could express the denial that rose to his lips, I read him a quotation from one of his sermons in which he talked of the injustice done to the good Baker, and of fighting. I asked him whether to talk to natives of fighting was not likely to put the idea into their heads, if it was not there already. He said, "When I said that I meant to warn them of doing anything so foolish; and though I do sympathise with Mr Baker, there were many of his actions with which I did not at all agree." I then told him that the Government, with great reluctance, had resolved to take action against him unless he gave me a formal assurance that he would not only abstain from opposing them, but would also hold himself responsible for the actions and language of his subordinates; and I added that we expected more from him than mere abstention — he must give us a loyal support. After some hesitation he promised to do all that lay in his power, and C— took his words down as he spoke them. He then said that there was one thing which he wanted very much to know—who had given me the information? I told him that I did not doubt his curiosity, but that I had not the slightest intention of enlightening him. The man might have fared badly if his identity had been known. Whoever he was, he was a good reporter.

However difficult it may be to sympathise with a man who has betrayed his employers, I could not help pitying Mr Watkin, who was made responsible for the actions of the most self-satisfied and insubordinate body of ecclesiastics in the world. Since Mr Baker's departure it was evident that his influence over them was waning, and page 91already they were asking why they should not elect one of themselves as President of their "Conference," and why their salaries should be lower than that of their white brother. From this it is only a step to a new and original interpretation of the Scriptures, and to a bastard Christianity like the Hauhauism of the Maories and the Tuka of Fiji.

Our three great fonos were a decided success. We rode first to Hihifo with an informal escort of mounted police and clerks, not excepting the faithful spy, Peter. Tungi, being past the age and figure for equestrian exercise, travelled in an American buggy, which stuck fast every now and then in the deep mud caused by the rains, while we rode on at the untiring canter that is the easiest pace for Tongan ponies. Few of our escort had girths, and not all had saddles, but this did not seem to incommode them in the least. We reached Kolowai, the chief town, plastered with mud, and halted under the celebrated colony of flying-foxes. They were a revolting sight. Four great banyan and ironwood trees shaded the road, and these were covered with the living fruit so thickly clustered that the branches drooped with their weight. Thousands upon thousands hung there from their hind-claws, sleeping, crawling, squealing, quarrelling, stretching their uncanny sails, and scratching their light — brown heads with a winged claw. The leaves and the grass beneath the trees had long ago been killed by their unwholesome presence; and the stench was so overpowering that we had to edge to windward. They are tabu—Heaven knows why, for they do immense damage to the plantations—and they are never shot at. Formerly, it is said, they page 92frequented some Toa-trees near to the sea, but the great battle fought there in May 1799 frightened them away, and they chose to emigrate to the large trees in the centre of the town. Ata told me that at sunset half go away to feed, while the others keep guard during their absence, but that they never fail to come back about midnight to take their turn of sentry-duty. Without vouching for this as a scientific fact, I can bear witness that they fly beyond Nukualofa, thirteen miles away, for hundreds of them were shot at nightfall as they flew in a continuous string towards the Government banana plantations near the lagoon. One thus brought down had a little one clinging to her body, befurred and bewinged, a perfect miniature of its mother. In a few days it became perfectly tame, and at night showed no inclination to leave the verandah where it hung in the daytime.

The fono was held opposite Ata's house. Only tax-payers were summoned, but they numbered several hundreds, and included a few women—widows—holding tax-allotments. They formed a compact semicircle, each bringing a cocoa-nut-leaf to sit upon. On the outside of the ring a few policemen, armed with thick batons, stood erect in attitudes of stern attention. We, the authorities, sat in a row in the verandah and addressed the crowd in turn,—Tukuaho in mood of suave conditional, I in bald indicative, and Ata, their chief, in uncompromising imperative. Taxes,—we must have taxes, or—many terrible things would happen. Tonga would lose her independence for one thing, and the police would come and sell by auction the property of defaulters for another. I am bound to confess that the latter threat appeared to be the more page 93dire of the two. Having lunched at the sacred enclosure of Kanokubolu, the scene of the massacre in 1800 in which the recreant missionary Vason took part, we rode off along the shore, leaving Tungi to water the seed we had sown.

The meeting at Mua was a far more picturesque affair. Five or six hundred people were assembled in a wide circle, six deep, under the shade of the historical banyantrees beneath which Captain Cook sat when he witnessed the Great Inaji on the 17th June 1777.¹ Acting on my colleague's advice, I gave some sensational instances of the squandering of money by our predecessor, and this part of my speech was listened to with breathless attention. As I told of the sums spent on cab-hire in Auckland, on boots and shoes, and on strong liquors, even Mr Baker's supporters looked discomfited. It was curious to note the alteration in Tukuaho's style when addressing his own people at Mua. Elsewhere his style was persuasive: here he took no trouble to give reasons or explanations. He simply asserted facts, and his people accepted them. He is a fine speaker, less polished in delivery than his shrewd old father, Tungi, but more manly and open. The audience was enthusiastic—even old Nuku cried "Malo!" as if he had forgotten that he was in disgrace. He had advised his people not to pay their taxes, an offence that would have landed him in jail if he had been less aristocratic; but being a member of the Upper House, he could be threatened only with impeachment for conduct unbecoming a Nobele. I watched him carefully at this meeting, and decided that he was mad, but not sufficiently so to be harmless, for he is an inveterate talker. When Tongans page 94troubles were at their worst in 1886 Nuku held a fono, and thus addressed his people:—

"All the great nations of the earth have made treaties with Tonga. We have a treaty with Germany, a treaty of mutual love and respect. We have a treaty with France: this is for the mutual protection of religion. We have a treaty with America: this is to secure freedom of trade, so that a Tongan may go and sell things in America, just as an American may come and sell things in Tonga. And we have a treaty with Britain, but that is a very different thing: Tonga and Britain are like two cocks, each standing on his own dunghill, trying to raise his head above the other and crow him down!"

The fono at Nukualofa was held at sunrise, and I was awakened by an excited policeman who came to say that chiefs and people were assembled and waiting for me. Launched hungry, sleepy, and uncomfortable upon an audience tired of waiting, I did not make a brilliant speech.

By holding these fonos we had now done all that lay in our power to hasten the payment of taxes pending the arrival of the king from Vavau. We were in great straits for want of money, for we had undertaken to pay the salaries regularly from the day on which we assumed office, and hitherto not a penny of poll-tax had been taken at the windows. The Government was being carried on with the Customs dues alone, which, regular though they were, did not suffice to meet the current demands upon the Treasury, exclusive of salaries. But we could do no more, and it was high time to agree upon the line of policy to be pursued to promote unanimity among our-page 95selves. The two Cabinet Ministers, Kubu, the Minister of Police, and Josateki Tonga Veikune, the Paymaster,

Asibeli Kubu, Minister of Police.

now appointed Auditor-General in his absence, had returned from their mission to Vavau and the Niuas to page 96announce the change of Ministry. We therefore summoned our first Cabinet Council.

It was held in the Parliament House, a large wooden building furnished with pews and a long table. At one end was a faded crimson dais surmounted with the royal arms: here the king sits when he opens Parliament. We took our seats round the table, Tukuaho, as President, sitting at one end, and Mataka, with his shorthand notebook, at the other. Let me describe my colleagues.

Asibeli Kubu, the Minister of Police, is a short, dark little man of about thirty, with a stiff moustache, and erect rebellious black hair. He is full of restless energy, impulsive and boyish, full of loyalty to Tukuaho, and of devotion to his administration. His mother is Lavinia, who would be Tui Tonga fefine if such dignities existed nowadays; and his father is Inoke Fotu, a Judge of Vavau, a chief of the second rank. By his mother, therefore, Kubu is a great chief. He began his official career as a

Sateki.

Police Magistrate under the Baker régime, and got himself into sad disgrace by not convicting to order. Being a creature of impulse, and not endowed with calculating tact, our Minister of Police is safer under discipline than when left to his own judgment. To-day he is dressed in a suit of flannel pyjamas with quasimilitary braid facings, his head is covered with an embroidered smoking-cap with a tassel, and his feet are bare.

Josateki, or Sateki as he is universally known, is a dif-page 97ferent stamp of man. A chief of the third rank in Vavau, he was selected by Mr Baker as his Paymaster and Assistant Premier because of his implicit obedience to orders and his power of silence. In person he is erect and slim, with grizzled hair and beard, and fine features deeply wrinkled. He lives only for his work: he is an official first and a man afterwards, a very rare quality for a native, to whom, as a rule, sustained purpose is unknown. We are not yet sure of Sateki. He is said to be hurt at my appointment as Assistant Premier, a post which, till now, he has nominally filled. If we once win him over we need not fear that he will desert us, but as he will not talk, and has never been known to laugh, he is difficult to conciliate.

The Lord Chief-Justice.

Then there was Ahomëe (day of dancing), the Lord Chief-Justice, a white-haired old gentleman, one of the first converts, and a great pillar of the Church in days gone by, but now very deaf of ear and dull of understanding. The Minister of Finance, Junia Mafileo, the king's nephew, had not yet arrived, and Tukuaho, as President, page 98called upon Mataka to open the proceedings. The first business was to read a letter from Mr Campbell tendering his resignation as Assistant Minister of Finance because his chief does not come to his office, and no business can be transacted in the old gentleman's absence. The Lord Chief — Justice now fell asleep, and we passed to other matters while Mr Goschen was being sent for. We had granted tea and sugar to the policemen on duty, and were deep in the discussion of the advantages of subsidising a mail service when he arrived. He is a careworn-looking old gentleman with very round eyes, classic features, and a beautiful set of false teeth, which in moments of excitement snap to and remain obstinately closed. When this happens he continues his remarks over his upper jaw, with a hissing noise like an angry snake. His hair stands up in scanty grey bristles half an inch long all over his bullet head. Though the thermometer registers 85°, he is dressed in a thick double-breasted ulster, thrown open to display a checked Crimean shirt and trousers, and an enormous pair of lawn-tennis shoes. At the desire of the Premier I rise and read Campbell's letter of resignation. The Auditor-General pokes up the Chief-Justice, who, waking suddenly, under the impression that a motion is being put, holds his right hand aloft, and babbles of tea and sugar, the last question but one before the meeting. The Premier with due solemnity says that there is a grave accusation against the Minister of Finance. As all eyes are fixed upon the unconscious Goschen, it gradually dawns upon him that he is being attacked, and his round eyes gape in startled surprise.

"What is it?" he asks, blankly.

"You are to attend your office every day," says Tungi, with emphasis.

Goschen springs to his feet in a state of frenzied emotion.

"I know," he cries, "I have not been to my office for a week. And why? Because I am alone in the world. You talk of work; well, I have been at work—my work is to fill my stomach" (he clutches the organ in question with both hands). His eyes roll, his false teeth shut with a snap, and he hisses over them, "I have no wife, no sons, no daughters.

"Feed me, and I will sit in my office all day."

Who is to fill my stomach for me? "Why," he cried, as the whole piteousness of the situation thrust itself upon him, "it's empty now. Order me to do what you will and I will do it, but only feed me." He sat down choked with his impassioned burst of eloquence. The Premier suggested that a convict should be told off to catch fish for the Minister, and dig his yams. This was a straw to the drowning financier. "Yes," he cried, "give me a prisoner, two prisoners, or even three to feed me, but I think that it will want four: feed me, and I will sit in my office all day." It was eventually decided that Goschen should attend his office on alternate days, and page 100upon this understanding Campbell withdrew his resignation. Goschen can scarcely write his own name, much less add up figures, but he is the king's nephew, and receives £120 a-year as Treasurer, and no money can be paid out of the Treasury except in his presence.

One of the many weak features in the former administration was Mr Baker's fear of dealing with Europeans. He had so wholesome a dread of consular intervention, that in the few cases in which he dared to prosecute a European in the courts the sentence was not carried into effect, and the natives were not slow in attributing this leniency to its true cause. The Constitution that declared all men equal in the eye of the law looked well enough on paper, but in practice they had come to believe that there was one law of Draconian severity for the Tongan, and another of timorous laxity for the white man.

The judicial machinery in Tonga is not less complicated than it is in other little States which are allowed to keep their independence, although within the sphere of British influence. As native magistrates are liable to human error, subjects of the treaty Powers are exempted from their jurisdiction in civil suits and in offences recognised as felonies and misdemeanours by English law. In such cases British subjects are only amenable to the High Commissioner's Court, presided over by the Deputy Commissioner in Tonga: Germans and Americans are theoretically amenable to the Consular Courts of those nations; but as there is no competent authority within the group itself, and their representatives in Samoa cannot find time to visit Tonga, they are virtually exempt from all penal-page 101ties. For offences against the local laws of police, public health, customs, and taxation, foreigners are amenable to the Tongan courts, the Consul being duly notified to be present if he will; and the subjects of all States having no treaty with Tonga may be tried by the Tongan courts without reference to any one. It was to provide for such cases that Mr Baker was about to import a European magistrate when he himself was deported.

If the native courts were to be respected they must be reformed, and they must not be afraid to deal impartially with foreigners. It happened that a Russian Finn, named Holt, had brutally assaulted a German in an outlying village, where the two men were rival bakers. The case could not be trusted to a native magistrate without reducing the courts to a farce; and as there was no one else available, I reluctantly had myself appointed Special Magistrate under an Act of Mr Baker that was still in force. Rather to my surprise, the defendant appeared to his summons; the prosecutor was represented by amateur counsel, and there was a curious audience of traders and natives. Bloodstained clothes were produced and identified, and the evidence showed the feeling between the two men to be very bitter. The only defence was that the prosecutor "had done it himself by running his head against a tree." Holt was fined £10 or a month's imprisonment, and, as I expected, he chose to serve his time. Perhaps he thought that the native Government would not dare to carry out the sentence, but in this he was disappointed. I at once had a disused lock-up cleaned out and roughly furnished, and installed a white policeman as jailer, with a contract to feed his prisoner accord-page 102ing to scale at a fixed rate. The man was restive at first, and made dire threats of what he would do when he came out. He wrote to the Russian Consul in Sydney to claim an indemnity, and received answer that the consular jurisdiction did not extend to Tonga. But he served his full month, and gave no more trouble. This imprisonment of a white man had the very best effect upon those natives who were inclined to trade upon the weakness of the new Government.

I had only two other cases. A trader assaulted a native boy whose friends laid an information. I fined him 30s. or fourteen days' imprisonment in default. He raised no question of nationality until after the court rose, when he came to say that he was a naturalised American, and that I had therefore no jurisdiction over him. As he seemed a decent fellow enough, and likely to listen to reason, I pointed out that he was an Englishman by birth, and that he had no papers to prove his naturalisation: that unless he paid his fine I should certainly put him in jail: he would then, no doubt, appeal to his Consul in Samoa, who would call upon the Government for particulars: the copy of the evidence we should send would show that he had beaten a Tongan with very little provocation: the Consul would not, therefore, be likely to make a demand for indemnity in such a case, but if they did, the Government would of course pay it: by that time, however, he would have served his time in jail, which was a very uncomfortable sort of place, and full of mosquitos. Did he think that all this was worth the 30s.? Being a reasonable man he did not, and paid the money.

My third and last case very nearly led to a breach with page 103my valued colleague, the Minister of Police. A white man was summoned by the police for not keeping the road in front of his leased land free from weeds. As there had been bitter complaints by the Europeans that the native magistrates would only listen to the police in such cases, I determined to test the prosecution by hearing the charge myself. The police mustered in force, headed by the Inisipeketa. The clerks of the court sat below me with their shorthand note-books. The accused, a German, was charged with having left a clump of weeds in the road two yards from his fence: three policemen swore to the size and position of the clump. The defendant pleaded that the so-called road was an impassable swamp, and that he had weeded the road on which the traffic went. The police, however, said that they had nothing to do with the traffic, nor with the marsh. The road used to skirt the fence, and it was therefore the road within the meaning of the Act. The case was dismissed, and the myrmidons of the law exchanged glances. A few hours later Tukuaho received an official letter from Kubu saying that he could not discharge his duties if the magistrates gave such decisions; that the police were much pained with the "Expounder," and were threatening to resign. Tukuaho showed me the letter, begging me not to be angry, but to understand that the police were a little dark-minded. I sent for Kubu and his Inisipeketa, and asked them to tell me their grievance, and I would answer it. They said that it was a new thing in Tonga for any man whom the police accused to be let off; that if this were done the people would respect them no more, and crimes would greatly increase, to the shame and discomfiture of the Government. page 104Gently but firmly I explained to Kubu that if the police were always to obtain convictions, it was a waste of time to bring offenders before a magistrate; that the police, if they would be worthy of their hire, should only bring accusations that they were sure of sustaining; and then, when I had manured his mind for a new idea, I told him that to punish a man simply because the police accused him was "contrary to the Constitution." At the magic word "Konisitutone" the Minister and his satellite gave way, utterly crushed. That they should have unwittingly fallen under the charge they had so often launched against Mr Baker overwhelmed them. "Pardon us," said Kubu, with humility, "what do we know? We are dark-minded, Misa Tomisoni; you must bear with us and teach us." I pardoned him.