AMONG THE CANNIBALS 111 



slipped to their knife -handles, and for a minute you 

 could hear a pin drop. The Suluhows fell back, dismay 

 on every face. The skipper and myself alone kept 

 our heads and were cool, ' did not turn a hair, by 

 ' as the forecastle said afterwards. The other pig 

 brought forth twenty axes. ' One for every man, by 

 Jove ! ' said the skipper. 



* Put those axes over the side, and tell the chief of 

 Suluhow we take his pigs and return his axes, and ' 

 (significantly) ' he may want them to-morrow. Are 

 his fighting fences up? Tell him, you interpreter, give 

 him our message go I and you Solomon men take 

 your pigs forward and eat them.' 



So savage were the Obas they refused to touch a 

 bit of the feast, nor would the hands forward or we 

 aft. I imagine few of us whites slept that night ; two 

 of us, armed, marched up and down, the two four- 

 pounders aft on each side of the wheel were cleaned 

 and reloaded. At 3 a.m. the whites were silently 

 mustered, and gently and very quietly up came the 

 kedge and the jib, and we moved silently to the reef 

 passage, like some huge night-bird under the silvery 

 moon, with hardly a breath of air. 



At daylight we made the open sea, and up went all 

 sail. The Solomon men came pouring out of the hold 

 yelling and shouting, but all was ready. The thirty 

 lads aft behind me yelled their wild Oba war chant, 

 and swung their two -foot knives aloft, and the blades 

 gleamed in the rising sun. Every white and boat -boy 

 was armed and waiting, even to the man at the wheel. 



' Take us back/ yelled the Suluhow men in their 

 pidgin -English, ' no want go Fijiwe gammon.' 



* I no gammon I talk, you no sign, you sign on ; 



