Otoe people

“ This is what appeared to me to be the then state of Otaheite. The other islands, that is, Huaheine, Ulietea, and Otaha, were in a more flourishing state than they were when I was there before. Since that time, they had enjoyed the blessing of peace; the people seemed to be as happy as any under heaven; and well they may, for they possess not only the necessaries, but many of the luxuries of life in the greatest profusion; and my young man told me that hogs, fowls, and fruits, are in equal plenty at Bola-bola, a thing which Tupia would never allow. ”

“ The bush was again agitated; the painted head of an Indian emerged from among the leaves, and the form of another was dimly seen crouching in the bushes.
The Otoe at once recognised them for Sioux, the bitterest and most powerful foes of his tribe. His loud taunting laugh, accompanied by the Otoe war cry, announced to the lurking savages that they were discovered. In an instant they sprang forth, and raised the well-known war cry of their tribe. ”

“ In this brief spell of daily increasing twilight the desolate region took on a grey-blue hue; the natives, as they appeared outside their shelters, looked like greyish spectres. Ootah felt the grim grey desolation color his soul.
He had regained his strength, and his wounds had healed with the remarkable rapidity that nature effects in people who lead a primitive life; only the hurt in his heart remained. Annadoah had often visited him, and while he lay on his bed of furs she had boiled ahmingmah meat and made hot water over the lamp very solicitously. ”

“ The very thought of the effort to swim over was nauseating. So I called to the kanaka to come to me, and proceeded to share the hatch cover with him. Otoo, he told me his name was (pronounced ō-tō-ō ) ; also, he told me that he was a native of Bora Bora, the most westerly of the Society Group. As I learned afterward, he had got the hatch cover first, and, after some time, encountering Captain Oudouse, had offered to share it with him, and had been kicked off for his pains.
And that was how Otoo and I first came together. He was no fighter. ”

“ On the 12th, old Oberea, the woman who, when the Dolphin was here in 1767, was thought to be queen of the island, and whom I had not seen since 1769, paid us a visit, and brought a present of hogs and fruit. Soon after came Otoo, with a great retinue, and a large quantity of provisions. I was pretty liberal in my returns, thinking it might be the last time I should see these good people, who had so liberally relieved our wants ”

“ All have free access to him, and speak to him wherever they see him, without the least ceremony; such is the easy freedom which every individual of this happy isle enjoys. I have observed that the chiefs of these isles are more beloved by the bulk of the people, than feared. May we not from hence conclude, that the government is mild and equitable?
We have mentioned that Waheatoua or Tiarabou is related to Otoo. The same may be said of the chiefs of Eimea, Tapamanoo, Huaheine, Ulietea, Otaha, and Bolabola; for they are all related to the royal family of Otaheite. ”

“ But poor little Otto, with his face hidden in his father’s robe, cried as though his heart would break. “Oh, father!” he said, again and again, “it cannot be—it cannot be that thou who art so kind to me should have killed a man with thine own hands.” Then: “I wish that I were back in the monastery again; I am afraid out here in the great wide world; perhaps somebody may kill me, for I am only a weak little boy and could not save my own life if they chose to take it from me.” ”

“ They then removed from the vicinity of the Otoes, and erected their present village on the Loup fork of the Platte.
The Otoes, as well as the Konza warriors, will not, on any consideration, sit down whilst on a war excursion, until evening; they will lie down, and stoop down, but they must not rest upon the ground in a sitting posture. ”

“ Their manner of addressing strangers, from the king to the meanest subject, is courteous and affable in the extreme.... They certainly live amongst each other in more harmony than is usual amongst Europeans. During the whole time I was amongst them I never saw such a thing as a battle.... I never remember to have seen an Otaheitean out of temper. They jest upon each other with greater freedom than the Europeans, but these jests are never taken in ill part.... With regard to food, it is, I believe, an invariable law in Otaheite that whatever is possessed by one is common to all. ”

“ But I shall think Otoo always. Whenever I think of myself I shall think of you. Whenever men call me by name I shall think of you. And beyond the sky and beyond the stars always and forever you shall be Otoo to me. ”

“ I had never met with a behaviour so free from reserve and suspicion, in my intercourse with any tribes of savages, as we experienced in the people of this island. It was very common for them to send up into the ship the several articles they brought off for barter; afterward, they would come in themselves, and make their bargains on the quarter-deck. The people of Otaheite, even after our repeated visits, do not care to put so much confidence in us. I infer from this, that those of Owhyhee must be more faithful in their dealings with one another, than the inhabitants of Otaheite are. ”

“ I went off again, and the next time I came around it was cool and starry night and Otoo was pressing a drinking cocoanut to my lips.
We were the sole survivors of the Petite Jeanne. Captain Oudouse must have succumbed to exhaustion, for several days later his hatch-cover drifted ashore without him. Otoo and I lived with the natives of the atoll for a week, when we were rescued by a French cruiser and taken to Tahiti. In the meantime, however, we had performed the ceremony of exchanging names. In the South Seas such a ceremony binds two men closer together than blood-brothership. ”

“ And should you follow the story to the end, I hope you may find it a pleasure, as I have done, to ramble through those dark ancient castles, to lie with little Otto and Brother John in the high belfry-tower, or to sit with them in the peaceful quiet of the sunny old monastery garden, for, of all the story, I love best those early peaceful years that little Otto spent in the dear old White Cross on the Hill.
Poor little Otto’s life was a stony and a thorny pathway, and it is well for all of us nowadays that we walk it in fancy and not in truth. ”

“ It was therefore more likely they would remain ashore upon the defensive; as we were told they did about five or six years ago, when attacked by the people of Tiarabou, whom they repulsed. Five general officers were to command in this expedition; of which number Otoo was one; and if they named them in order according to the posts they held, Otoo was only the third in command. This seems probable enough; as being but a young man, he could not have sufficient experience to command such an expedition, where the greatest skill and judgment seemed to be necessary. ”

“ Those of Otaheite do not inter their dead, but expose them to waste by time and putrefaction, though the bones are afterward buried; and as this is the case, it is very remarkable that they should inter the entire bodies of their human sacrifices. They also offer other animals and vegetables to their gods; but are by no means attentive to the state of the sacred places where those solemn rites are performed; most of their morais being in a ruinous condition, and bearing evident marks of neglect. The people of Atooi, again, inter both their common dead and human sacrifices, as at Tongataboo ”

“ The Eowas and Whannos always eat with the king; indeed I do not know if any one is excluded from this privilege but the Toutous. For as to the women, they are out of the question, as they never eat with the men, let their rank be ever so much elevated.
Notwithstanding this kind of kingly establishment, there was very little about Otoo's person or court by which a stranger could distinguish the king from the subject. ”

“ Among these were Otow, the father of Otoo, and Oreepyah, his brother; also another chief of Matavai called Poeeno: and to these men I made presents. Two messengers likewise arrived from Otoo to acquaint me of his being on his way to the ship; each of whom brought me as a present from Otoo a small pig and a young plantain-tree as a token of friendship. The ship was now plentifully supplied with provisions; every person having as much as he could consume. As soon as the ship was secured I went on shore with the chief Poeeno, and accompanied by a multitude of the natives. ”

“ A loud yell burst from the Sioux, and they darted below the ridge of the hill, beyond his sight,192 to escape the dreaded shot. The moment that they disappeared, the Otoe sprang forward and ran. He had succeeded in gaining several hundred yards through the underwood, when his route was again detected. He again raised his head above the bushes; his pipe was again to his shoulder, and pointed in the direction of the hostile group. ”

“ For three days and nights, spell and spell, on the cover and in the water, we drifted over the ocean. Toward the last I was delirious most of the time, and there were times, too, when I heard Otoo babbling and raving in his native tongue. Our continuous immersion prevented us from dying of thirst, though the sea water and the sunshine gave us the prettiest imaginable combination of salt pickle and sunburn. In the end, Otoo saved my life; for I came to, lying on the beach twenty feet from the water, sheltered from the sun by a couple of cocoanut leaves. ”

“ Strange men were running here and there with flaming torches, and the now continuous shrieking of women pierced the air.
Just beneath the window lay the figure of a man half naked and face downward upon the stones. Then suddenly Otto cried out in fear and horror, for, as he looked with dazed and bewildered eyes down into the lurid court-yard beneath, a savage man, in a shining breast-plate and steel cap, came dragging the dark, silent figure of a woman across the stones; but whether she was dead or in a swoon, Otto could not tell. ”

“ As little enquiry was made after Aotourou, the man who went away with M. de Bougainville. But they were continually asking for Mr Banks, and several others who were with me in my former voyage.
These people informed us, that Toutaha, the regent of the greater peninsula of Otaheite, had been killed in a battle, which was fought between the two kingdoms about five months before, and that Otoo was the reigning prince. Tubourai Tamaide, and several more of our principal friends about Matavai, fell in this battle, as also a great number of common people ”

“ Whenever any one of the great chiefs thinks a human sacrifice necessary, on any particular emergency, he pitches upon the victim. Some of his trusty servants are then sent, [pg 31] who fall upon him suddenly, and put him to death with a club, or by stoning him. The king is next acquainted with it, whose presence, at the solemn rites that follow, is, as I was told, absolutely necessary; and indeed on the present occasion, we could observe, that Otoo bore a principal part. The solemnity itself is called Poore Eree, or chief's prayer ”

“ He is stronger than we. Otee has been angry with the real men for many years. He is gone over to the palefaces and helps their god against the real men. My young men shall take their guns back to the palefaces to-morrow, and shall bring back fire-water, and we will drink, and forget that the days of Powhatan are past and that Otee fights against us. Also when the Pamunkey is red with to-morrow's sunset, my brothers from the Blue Mountains shall turn their faces homewards. ”

“ During her three years of married life, O'Tei had made, under shadow of these groves, a firm and steady friend, without whose support she thought sometimes that she must lie down and die--the cold but kindly Abbess Masago.
As has been told, the second wife or concubine of the late Hojo, so soon as her fickle lord grew weary of her, shaved off her hair and donned the Buddhist habit. Monastic life in Japan is a strange anomaly. Many an abbess or abbot, supposed to have retired from the world, bestows from the seclusion of the grove mundane advice and counsel. ”

“ Ottoo the king, his two brothers, and all the principal chiefs, appeared extremely anxious for our safety; and [107] after the prisoners were on board, kept watch during the night; were always keeping a sharp look out upon our cables, and continually spurring the centinels to be careful in their duty. The prisoners' wives visited the ship daily and brought their children, who were permitted to be carried to their unhappy fathers. To see the poor captives in irons, weeping over their tender offspring, was too moving a scene for any feeling heart. ”

“ Soon after our arrival, and while dinner was preparing, a messenger arrived from Eimeo, and related the conditions of the peace, or rather of the truce, it being only for a limited time. The terms were disadvantageous to Otaheite; and much blame was thrown upon Otoo, whose delay, in sending reinforcements, had obliged Towha to submit to a disgraceful accommodation. It was even currently reported, that Towha, resenting his not being supported, had declared, that, as soon as I should leave the island, he would join his forces to those of Tiaraboo, and attack Otoo at Matavai, or Oparre. ”

“ Otto met them; he had a basket in his hand and said: 'Look, here is something that an old man has just left for you.'
When the girls looked into the basket they saw a pair of most beautiful bracelets of precious stones, dark red, and made in the shape of a ripe raspberry and with an inscription: 'To Lisa and Aina'; beside them there was a diamond breast pin in the shape of a raspberry worm: on it was inscribed 'Otto, never destroy the helpless!'
Otto felt rather ashamed: he quite understood what it meant, but he thought that the old man's revenge was a noble one. ”