Typee: A Romance of the South Seas

by Herman Melville

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  GENERAL INFORMATION GATHERED AT THE FESTIVAL--PERSONAL BEAUTY OFTHE TYPEES--THEIR SUPERIORITY OVER THE INHABITANTS OF THE OTHERISLANDS--DIVERSITY OF COMPLEXION--A VEGETABLE COSMETIC ANDOINTMENT--TESTIMONY OF VOYAGERS TO THE UNCOMMON BEAUTY OFTHE MARQUESANS--FEW EVIDENCES OF INTERCOURSE WITH CIVILIZEDBEINGS--DILAPIDATED MUSKET--PRIMITIVE SIMPLICITY OF GOVERNMENT--REGALDIGNITY OF MEHEVI

  ALTHOUGH I had been unable during the late festival to obtaininformation on many interesting subjects which had much excited mycuriosity, still that important event had not passed by without addingmaterially to my general knowledge of the islanders.

  I was especially struck by the physical strength and beauty whichthey displayed, by their great superiority in these respects over theinhabitants of the neighbouring bay of Nukuheva, and by the singularcontrasts they presented among themselves in their various shades ofcomplexion.

  In beauty of form they surpassed anything I had ever seen. Not a singleinstance of natural deformity was observable in all the throng attendingthe revels. Occasionally I noticed among the men the scars of woundsthey had received in battle; and sometimes, though very seldom, the lossof a finger, an eye, or an arm, attributable to the same cause. Withthese exceptions, every individual appeared free from those blemisheswhich sometimes mar the effect of an otherwise perfect form. But theirphysical excellence did not merely consist in an exemption from theseevils; nearly every individual of their number might have been taken fora sculptor's model.

  When I remembered that these islanders derived no advantage from dress,but appeared in all the naked simplicity of nature, I could not avoidcomparing them with the fine gentlemen and dandies who promenade suchunexceptionable figures in our frequented thoroughfares. Stripped ofthe cunning artifices of the tailor, and standing forth in the garbof Eden--what a sorry, set of round-shouldered, spindle-shanked,crane-necked varlets would civilized men appear! Stuffed calves,padded breasts, and scientifically cut pantaloons would then avail themnothing, and the effect would be truly deplorable.

  Nothing in the appearance of the islanders struck me more forciblythan the whiteness of their teeth. The novelist always compares themasticators of his heroine to ivory; but I boldly pronounce the teethof the Typee to be far more beautiful than ivory itself. The jaws of theoldest graybeards among them were much better garnished than those ofmost of the youths of civilized countries; while the teeth of the youngand middle-aged, in their purity and whiteness, were actually dazzlingto the eye. Their marvellous whiteness of the teeth is to be ascribedto the pure vegetable diet of these people, and the uninterruptedhealthfulness of their natural mode of life.

  The men, in almost every instance, are of lofty stature, scarcelyever less than six feet in height, while the other sex are uncommonlydiminutive. The early period of life at which the human form arrivesat maturity in this generous tropical climate, likewise deserves to bementioned. A little creature, not more than thirteen years of age, andwho in other particulars might be regarded as a mere child, is oftenseen nursing her own baby, whilst lads who, under less ripening skies,would be still at school, are here responsible fathers of families.

  On first entering the Typee Valley, I had been struck with the markedcontrast presented by its inhabitants with those of the bay I hadpreviously left. In the latter place, I had not been favourablyimpressed with the personal appearance of the male portion of thepopulation; although with the females, excepting in some trulymelancholy instances, I had been wonderfully pleased. I had observedthat even the little intercourse Europeans had carried on with theNukuheva natives had not failed to leave its traces amongst them. One ofthe most dreadful curses under which humanity labours had commenced itshavocks, and betrayed, as it ever does among the South Sea islanders,the most aggravated symptoms. From this, as from all other foreigninflictions, the yet uncontaminated tenants of the Typee Valley werewholly exempt; and long may they continue so. Better will it be for themfor ever to remain the happy and innocent heathens and barbariansthat they now are, than, like the wretched inhabitants of the SandwichIslands, to enjoy the mere name of Christians without experiencing anyof the vital operations of true religion, whilst, at the same time, theyare made the victims of the worst vices and evils of civilized life.

  Apart, however, from these considerations, I am inclined to believe thatthere exists a radical difference between the two tribes, if indeedthey are not distinct races of men. To those who have merely touched atNukuheva Bay, without visiting other portions of the island, it wouldhardly appear credible the diversities presented between the varioussmall clans inhabiting so diminutive a spot. But the hereditaryhostility which has existed between them for ages, fully accounts forthis.

  Not so easy, however, is it to assign an adequate cause for the endlessvariety of complexions to be seen in the Typee Valley. During thefestival, I had noticed several young females whose skins were almost aswhite as any Saxon damsel's; a slight dash of the mantling brown beingall that marked the difference. This comparative fairness of complexion,though in a great degree perfectly natural, is partly the result of anartificial process, and of an entire exclusion from the sun. The juiceof the 'papa' root found in great abundance at the head of the valley,is held in great esteem as a cosmetic, with which many of the femalesdaily anoint their whole person. The habitual use of it whitens andbeautifies the skin. Those of the young girls who resort to this methodof heightening their charms, never expose themselves selves to therays of the sun; an observance, however, that produces little or noinconvenience, since there are but few of the inhabited portions of thevale which are not shaded over with a spreading canopy of boughs, sothat one may journey from house to house, scarcely deviating from thedirect course, and yet never once see his shadow cast upon the ground.

  The 'papa', when used, is suffered to remain upon the skin for severalhours; being of a light green colour, it consequently imparts forthe time a similar hue to the complexion. Nothing, therefore, can beimagined more singular than the appearance of these nearly naked damselsimmediately after the application of the cosmetic. To look at one ofthem you would almost suppose she was some vegetable in an unripe state;and that, instead of living in the shade for ever, she ought to beplaced out in the sun to ripen.

  All the islanders are more or less in the habit of anointing themselves;the women preferring the 'aker' to 'papa', and the men using the oilof the cocoanut. Mehevi was remarkable fond of mollifying his entirecuticle with this ointment. Sometimes he might be seen, with his wholebody fairly reeking with the perfumed oil of the nut, looking as if hehad just emerged from a soap-boiler's vat, or had undergone the processof dipping in a tallow-chandlery. To this cause perhaps, united to theirfrequent bathing and extreme cleanliness, is ascribable, in a greatmeasure, the marvellous purity and smoothness of skin exhibited by thenatives in general.

  The prevailing tint among the women of the valley was a light olive, andof this style of complexion Fayaway afforded the most beautiful example.Others were still darker; while not a few were of a genuine goldencolour, and some of a swarthy hue.

  As agreeing with much previously mentioned in this narrative I mayhere observe that Mendanna, their discoverer, in his account of theMarquesas, described the natives as wondrously beautiful to behold, andas nearly resembling the people of southern Europe. The first of theseislands seen by Mendanna was La Madelena, which is not far distant fromNukuheva; and its inhabitants in every respect resemble those dwellingon that and the other islands of the group. Figueroa, the chronicler ofMendanna's voyage, says, that on the morning the land was descried,when the Spaniards drew near the shore, there sallied forth, in rudeprogression, about seventy canoes, and at the same time many of theinhabitants (females I presume) made towards the ships by swimming. Headds, that 'in complexion they were nearly white; of good stature,and finely formed; and on their faces and bodies were delineatedrepresentations of fishes and other devices'. The old Don then goes onto say, 'There came, among others, two lads paddling their canoe, wh
oseeyes were fixed on the ship; they had beautiful faces and the mostpromising animation of countenance; and were in all things so becoming,that the pilot-mayor Quiros affirmed, nothing in his life ever causedhim so much regret as the leaving such fine creatures to be lost in thatcountry.'* More than two hundred years have gone by since the passage ofwhich the above is a translation was written; and it appears to menow, as I read it, as fresh and true as if written but yesterday. Theislanders are still the same; and I have seen boys in the Typee Valleyof whose 'beautiful faces' and promising 'animation of countenance' noone who has not beheld them can form any adequate idea. Cook, in theaccount of his voyage, pronounces the Marquesans as by far the mostsplendid islanders in the South Seas. Stewart, the chaplain of the U.S.ship Vincennes, in his 'Scenes in the South Seas', expresses, in morethan one place, his amazement at the surpassing loveliness of the women;and says that many of the Nukuheva damsels reminded him forcibly of themost celebrated beauties in his own land. Fanning, a Yankee mariner ofsome reputation, likewise records his lively impressions of the physicalappearance of these people; and Commodore David Porter of the U.S.frigate Essex, is said to have been vastly smitten by the beauty of theladies. Their great superiority over all other Polynesians cannot failto attract the notice of those who visit the principal groups in thePacific. The voluptuous Tahitians are the only people who at all deserveto be compared with them; while the dark-haired Hawaiians andthe woolly-headed Feejees are immeasurably inferior to them. Thedistinguishing characteristic of the Marquesan islanders, and thatwhich at once strikes you, is the European cast of their features--apeculiarity seldom observable among other uncivilized people. Many oftheir faces present profiles classically beautiful, and in the valley ofTypee I saw several who, like the stranger Marnoo, were in every respectmodels of beauty.

  * This passage, which is cited as an almost literal translation from theoriginal, I found in a small volume entitled 'Circumnavigation of theGlobe, in which volume are several extracts from 'Dalrymple's HistoricalCollections'. The last-mentioned work I have never seen, but it is saidto contain a very correct English version of great part of the learnedDoctor Christoval Suaverde da Figueroa's History of Mendanna's Voyage,published at Madrid, A.D. 1613.