The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition, Vol. 17Stevenson, Robert Louis
History
The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition, Vol. 17
Stevenson, Robert Louis
Islands of the Pacific -- Fiction; Samoan Islands -- History; Short stories
escape; Lieutenant Ulfsparre must order his men to load; and with that
the momentary effervescence died away. Next day, Saturday, 5th, the
chief justice took his departure from the islands--a step never yet
explained and (in view of the doings of the day before and the
remonstrances of other officials) hard to justify. The president, an
amiable and brave young man of singular inexperience, was thus left to
face the growing difficulty by himself. The clansmen of the prisoners,
to the number of near upon a hundred, lay in Vaiusu, a village half way
between Apia and Malie; there they talked big, thence sent menacing
messages; the gaol should be broken in the night, they said, and the six
martyrs rescued. Allowance is to be made for the character of the people
of Manono, turbulent fellows, boastful of tongue, but of late days not
thought to be answerably bold in person. Yet the moment was anxious. The
government of Mulinuu had gained an important moral victory by the
surrender and condemnation of the chiefs; and it was needful the victory
should be maintained. The guard upon the gaol was accordingly
strengthened; a war-party was sent to watch the Vaiusu road under Asi;
and the chiefs of the Vaimaunga were notified to arm and assemble their
men. It must be supposed the president was doubtful of the loyalty of
these assistants. He turned at least to the war-ships, where it seems he
was rebuffed; thence he fled into the arms of the wrecker gang, where he
was unhappily more successful. The government of Washington had
presented to the Samoan king the wrecks of the _Trenton_ and the
_Vandalia_; an American syndicate had been formed to break them up; an
experienced gang was in consequence settled in Apia; and the report of
submarine explosions had long grown familiar in the ears of residents.
From these artificers the president obtained a supply of dynamite, the
needful mechanism, and the loan of a mechanic; the gaol was mined, and
the Manono people in Vaiusu were advertised of the fact in a letter
signed by Laupepa. Partly by the indiscretion of the mechanic, who had
sought to embolden himself (like Lady Macbeth) with liquor for his
somewhat dreadful task, the story leaked immediately out and raised a
very general, or I might say almost universal, reprobation. Some blamed
the proposed deed because it was barbarous and a foul example to set
before a race half barbarous itself; others because it was illegal;
others again because, in the face of so weak an enemy, it appeared
pitifully pusillanimous; almost all because it tended to precipitate
and embitter war. In the midst of the turmoil he had raised, and under
the immediate pressure of certain indignant white residents, the baron
fell back upon a new expedient, certainly less barbarous, perhaps no
more legal; and on Monday afternoon, September 7th, packed his six
prisoners on board the cutter _Lancashire Lass_, and deported them to
the neighbouring low-island group of the Tokelaus. We watched her put to
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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