Book of the Bush — 02 - Purging Out The Old Leaven Pt 2
Previous to the year 1828 some flax had been brought to Sydney from New Zealand, and manufactured into every species of cordage except cables, and it was found to be stronger than Baltic hemp.
On account of the ferocious character of the Maoris, the Sydney Government sent several vessels to open communication with the tribes before permitting private individuals to embark in the trade.
The ferocity attributed to the natives was not so much a part of their personal character as the result of their habits and beliefs.
They were remarkable for great energy of mind and body, foresight, and self-denial.
Their average height was about five feet six inches, but men from six feet to six feet six inches were not uncommon.
Their point of honour was revenge, and a man who remained quiet while the manes of his friend or relation were unappeased by the blood of the enemy, would be dishonoured among his tribe.
The Maoris were in reality loath to fight, and war was never begun until after long talk.
Their object was to exterminate or enslave their enemies, and they ate the slain.
Before commencing hostilities, the warriors endeavoured to put fear into the hearts of their opponents by enumerating the names of the fathers, uncles, or brothers of those in the hostile tribe whom they had slain and eaten in former battles.
When a fight was progressing the women looked on from the rear.
They were naked to the waist, and wore skirts of matting made from flax.
As soon as a head was cut off they ran forward, and brought it away, leaving the body on the ground.
If many were slain it was sometimes difficult to discover to what body each head had belonged, whether it was that of a friend or a foe, and it was lawful to bake the bodies of enemies only.
Notwithstanding their peculiar customs, one who knew the Maoris well described them as the most patient, equable, forgiving people in the world, but full of superstitious ideas, which foreigners could not understand.
They believed that everything found on their coast was sent to them by the sea god, Taniwa, and they therefore endeavoured to take possession of the blessings conferred on them by seizing the first ships that anchored in their rivers and harbours.
This led to misunderstandings and fights with their officers and crews, who had no knowledge of the sea god, Taniwa.
It was found necessary to put netting all round the vessels as high as the tops to prevent surprise, and when trade began it was the rule to admit no more than five Maoris on board at once.
The flax was found growing spontaneously in fields of inexhaustible extent along the more southerly shores of the islands.
The fibre was separated by the females, who held the top of the leaf between their toes, and drew a shell through the whole length of the leaf.
It took a good cleaner to scrape fifteen pounds weight of it in a day; the average was about ten pounds, for which the traders gave a fig of tobacco and a pipe, two sheets of cartridge paper, or one pound of lead.
The price at which the flax was sold in Sydney varied from 20 pounds to 45 pounds per ton, according to quality, so there was a large margin of profit to the trader.
In 1828 sixty tons of flax valued at 2,600 pounds, were exported from Sydney to England.
The results of trading with the foreigners were fatal to the natives.
At first the trade was in axes, knives, and other edge-tools, beads, and ornaments, but in 1832 the Maoris would scarcely take anything but arms and ammunition, red woollen shirts, and tobacco.
Every man in a native hapu had to procure a musket, or die.
If the warriors of the hapu had no guns they would soon be all killed by some tribe that had them.
The price of one gun, together with the requisite powder, was one ton of cleaned flax, prepared by the women and slaves in the sickly swamps.
In the meantime the food crops were neglected, hunger and hard labour killed many, some fell victims to diseases introduced by the white men, and the children nearly all died.
And the Maoris are still dying out of the land, blighted by our civilization.
They were willing to learn and to be taught, and they began to work with the white men.
In 1853 I saw nearly one hundred of them, naked to the waist, sinking shafts for gold on Bendigo, and no Cousin Jacks worked harder.
We could not, of course, make them Englishmen--the true Briton is born, not made; but could we not have kept them alive if we had used reasonable means to do so?
Or is it true that in our inmost souls we wanted them to die, that we might possess their land in peace?
Besides flax, it was found that New Zealand produced most excellent timber--the kauri pine.
The first visitors saw sea-going canoes beautifully carved by rude tools of stone, which had been hollowed out, each from a single tree, and so large that they were manned by one hundred warriors.
The gum trees of New Holland are extremely hard, and their wood is so heavy that it sinks in water like iron.
But the kauri, with a leaf like that of the gum tree, is the toughest of pines, though soft and easily worked--suitable for shipbuilding, and for masts and spars.
In 1830 twenty-eight vessels made fifty-six voyages from Sydney to New Zealand, chiefly for flax;
but they also left parties of men to prosecute the whale and seal fisheries, and to cut kauri pine logs.
Two vessels were built by English mechanics, one of 140 tons, and the other of 370 tons burden, and the natives began to assist the new-comers in all their labours.
At this time most of the villages had at least one European resident called a Pakeha Maori, under the protection of a chief of rank and influence, and married to a relative of his, either legally or by native custom.
It was through the resident that all the trading of the tribe was carried on.
He bought and paid for the flax, and employed men to cut the pine logs and float them down the rivers to the ships.
Every whaling and trading vessel that returned to Sydney or Van Diemen's Land brought back accounts of the wonderful prospects which the islands afforded to men of enterprise, and New Zealand became the favourite refuge for criminals, runaway prisoners, and other lovers of freedom.
When, therefore the crew of the schooner 'Industry' threw Captain Blogg overboard, it was a great comfort to them to know that they were going to an island in which there was no Government.
Captain Blogg had arrived from England with a bad character.
He had been tried for murder.
He had been ordered to pay five hundred pounds as damages to his mate, whom he had imprisoned at sea in a hencoop, and left to pick up his food with the fowls.
He had been out-lawed, and forbidden to sail as officer in any British ship.
These were facts made known to, and discussed by, all the whalers who entered the Tamar, when the whaling season was over in the year 1835. And yet the notorious Blogg found no difficulty in buying the schooner 'Industry', taking in a cargo, and obtaining a clearance for Hokianga, in New Zealand.
He had shipped a crew consisting of a mate, four seamen, and a cook.
Black Ned Tomlins, Jim Parrish, and a few other friends interviewed the crew when the 'Industry' was getting ready for sea.
Black Ned was a half-breed native of Kangaroo Island, and was looked upon as the best whaler in the colonies, and the smartest man ever seen in a boat.
He was the principal speaker.
He put the case to the crew in a friendly way, and asked them if they did not feel themselves to be a set of fools, to think of going to sea with a murdering villain like Blogg?
Dick Secker replied mildly but firmly.
He reckoned the crew were, in a general way, able to take care of themselves.
They could do their duty, whatever it was; and they were not afraid of sailing with any man that ever trod a deck.
After a few days at sea they were able to form a correct estimate of their master mariner.
He never came on deck absolutely drunk, but he was saturated with rum to the very marrow of his bones.
A devil of cruelty, hate, and murder glared from his eyes, and his blasphemies could come from no other place but the lowest depths of the bottomless pit.
The mate was comparatively a gentle and inoffensive lamb.
He did not curse and swear more than was considered decent and proper on board ship, did his duty, and avoided quarrels.
One day Blogg was rating the cook in his usual style when the latter made some reply, and the captain knocked him down.
He then called the mate, and with his help stripped the cook to the waist and triced him up to the mast on the weather side.
This gave the captain the advantage of a position in which he could deliver his blows downward with full effect.
Then he selected a rope's end and began to flog the cook.
At every blow he made a spring on his feet, swung the rope over his head, and brought it down on the bare back with the utmost force.
It was evident that he was no 'prentice hand at the business, but a good master flogger.
The cook writhed and screamed, as every stroke raised bloody ridges on his back; but Blogg enjoyed it.
He was in no hurry.
He was like a boy who had found a sweet morsel, and was turning it over in his mouth to enjoy it the longer.
After each blow he looked at the three seamen standing near, and at the man at the helm, and made little speeches at them.
"I'll show you who is master aboard this ship."
Whack!
"That's what every man Jack of you will get if you give me any of your jaw."
Whack!
"Maybe you'd like to mutiny, wouldn't you?"
Whack!
The blows came down with deliberate regularity; the cook's back was blue, black, and bleeding, but the captain showed no sign of any intention to stay his hand.
The suffering victim's cries seemed to inflame his cruelty.
He was a wild beast in the semblance of a man.
At last, in his extreme agony, the cook made a piteous appeal to the seamen: [ILLUSTRATION 2]
"Mates, are you men?
Are you going to stand there all day, and watch me being flogged to death for nothing?"
Before the next stroke fell the three men had seized the captain; but he fought with so much strength and fury that they found it difficult to hold him.
The helmsman steadied the tiller with two turns of the rope and ran forward to assist them.
They laid Blogg flat on the deck, but he kept struggling, cursing, threatening, and calling on the mate to help him; but that officer took fright, ran to his cabin in the deckhouse, and began to barricade the door.
Then a difficulty arose.
What was to be done with the prisoner?
He was like a raving maniac.
If they allowed him his liberty, he was sure to kill one or more of them.
If they bound him he would get loose in some way--probably through the mate--and after what had occurred, it would be safer to turn loose a Bengal tiger on deck then the infuriated captain.
There was but one way out of the trouble, and they all knew it.
They looked at one another; nothing was wanting but the word, and it soon came.
Secker had sailed from the Cove of Cork, and being an Irishman, he was by nature eloquent, first in speech, and first in action.
He reflected afterwards, when he had leisure to do so.
"Short work is the best," he said, "over he goes; lift the devil."
Each man seized an arm or leg, and Blogg was carried round the mast to the lee side.
The men worked together from training and habit.
They swung the body athwart the deck like a pendulum, and with a "one!
two!
three!"
it cleared the bulwark, and the devil went head foremost into the deep sea.
The cook, looking on from behind the mast, gave a deep sigh of relief.
Thus it was that a great breach of the peace was committed on the Pacific Ocean; and it was done, too, on a beautiful summer's evening, when the sun was low, a gentle breeze barely filled the sails, and everybody should have been happy and comfortable.
Captain Blogg rose to the surface directly and swam after his schooner.
The fury of his soul did not abate all at once.
He roared to the mate to bring the schooner to, but there was no responsive "Aye, aye, sir."
He was now outside of his jurisdiction, and his power was gone.
He swam with all his strength, and his bloated face still looked red as the foam passed by it.
The helmsman had resumed his place, and steadied the tiller, keeping her full, while the other men looked over the stern.
Secker said: "The old man will have a long swim."
But the "old man" swam a losing race.
His vessel was gliding away from him: his face grew pale, and in an agony of fear and despair, he called to the men for God's sake to take him on board and he would forgive everything.
But his call came too late; he could find no sureties for his good behaviour in the future; he had never in his life shown any love for God or pity for man, and he found in his utmost need neither mercy nor pity now.
He strained his eyes in vain over the crests of the restless billows, calling for the help that did not come.
The receding sails never shivered; no land was near, no vessel in sight.
The sun went down, and the hopeless sinner was left struggling alone on the black waste of waters.
The men released the cook and held a consultation about a troublesome point of law.
Had they committed mutiny and murder, or only justifiable homicide?
They felt that the point was a very important one to them--a matter of life and death--and they stood in a group near the tiller to discuss the difficulty, speaking low, while the cook was shivering in the forecastle, trying to ease the pain.
The conclusion of the seamen was, that they had done what was right, both in law and conscience.
They had thrown Blogg overboard to prevent him from murdering the cook, and also for their own safety.
After they had done their duty by seizing him, he would have killed them if he could.
He was a drunken sweep.
He was an outlaw, and the law would not protect him.
Anybody could kill an outlaw without fear of consequences, so they had heard.
But still there was some doubt about it, and there was nobody there to put the case for the captain.
The law was, at that time, a terrible thing, especially in Van Diemen's Land, under Colonel Arthur.
He governed by the gallows, to make everything orderly and peaceable, and men were peaceable enough after they were hanged.
So Secker and his mates decided that, although they had done nothing but what was right in throwing Blogg over the side, it would be extremely imprudent to trust their innocence to the uncertainty of the law and to the impartiality of Colonel Arthur.
Their first idea was to take the vessel to South America, but after some further discussion, they decided to continue the voyage to Hokianga, and to settle among the Maoris.
Nobody had actually seen them throw Blogg overboard except the cook, and him they looked upon as a friend, because they had saved him from being flogged to death.
They had some doubts about the best course to take with the mate, but as he was the only man on board who was able to take the schooner to port, they were obliged to make use of his services for the present, and at the end of the voyage they could deal with him in any way prudence might require, and they did not mean to run any unnecessary risks.
They went to the house on deck, and Secker called the mate, informing him that the captain had lost his balance, and had fallen overboard, and that it was his duty to take charge of the 'Industry', and navigate her to Hokianga.
But the mate had been thoroughly frightened, and was loth to leave his entrenchment.
He could not tell what might happen if he opened his cabin door: he might find himself in the sea in another minute.
The men who had thrown the master overboard would not have much scruple about sending an inferior officer after him.
If the mate resolved to show fight, it would be necessary for him to kill every man on board, even the cook, before he could feel safe; and then he would be left alone in mid-ocean with nobody to help him to navigate the vessel--a master and crew under one hat, at the mercy of the winds and the waves, with six murdered men on his conscience; and he had a conscience, too, as was soon to be proved.
The seamen swore most solemnly that they did not intend to do him the least harm, and at last the mate opened his door.
While in his cabin, he had been spending what he believed to be the last minutes of his life in preparing for death; he did his best to make peace with heaven, and tried to pray.
But his mouth was dry with fear, his tongue clave to the roof of his mouth, his memory of sacred things failed him, and he could not pray for want of practice.
He could remember only one short prayer, and he was unable to utter even that audibly.
And how could a prayer ever reach heaven in time to be of any use to him, when he could not make it heard outside the deck-house?
In his desperate straits he took a piece of chalk and began to write it; so when at last he opened the door of his cabin, the four seamen observed that he had nearly covered the boards with writing.
It looked like a litany, but it was a litany of only three words--"Lord, have mercy"--which were repeated in lines one above the other.
That litany was never erased or touched by any man who subsequently sailed on board the 'Industry'.
She was the first vessel that was piloted up the channel to Port Albert in Gippsland, to take in a cargo of fat cattle, and when she arrived there on August 3rd, 1842, the litany of the mate was still distinctly legible.
Nothing exalts a man so quickly in the estimation of his fellow creatures as killing them.
Emperors and kings court the alliance of the conquering hero returning from fields of slaughter.
Ladies in Melbourne forgot for a time the demands of fashion in their struggles to obtain an ecstatic glimpse of our modern Bluebeard, Deeming; and no one was prouder than the belle of the ball when she danced down the middle with the man who shot Sandy M'Gee.
And the reverence of the mate for his murdering crew was unfathomable.
Their lightest word was a law to him.
He wrote up the log in their presence, stating that Captain Blogg had been washed into the sea in a sudden squall on a dark night; vessel hove to, boat lowered, searched for captain all night, could see nothing of him;
mate took charge, and bore away for Hokianga next morning.
When these untruthful particulars had been entered and read over to the four seamen, they were satisfied for the present.
They would settle among the Maoris, and lead a free and happy life.
They could do what they liked with the schooner and her cargo, having disposed of the master and owner; and as for the mate, they would dispose of him, too, if he made himself in any way troublesome.
What a wonderful piece of good luck it was that they were going to a new country in which there was no government!
The 'Industry' arrived off the bar at Hokianga on November 30th, 1835, and was boarded by a Captain Young, who had settled seven miles up the estuary, at One Tree Point, and acted as pilot of the nascent port.
He inquired how much water the schooner drew, noted the state of the tide, and said he would remain on board all night, and go over the bar next morning with the first flood.
The mate had a secret and wanted to get rid of it.
While looking round at the shore, and apparently talking about indifferent subjects, he said to the pilot: "Don't look at the men, and don't take any notice of them.
They threw Blogg, the master, overboard, when he was flogging the cook, and they would murder me, too, if they knew I told you; so you must pretend not to take any notice of them.
What their plans may be, I don't know; but you may be sure they won't go back to the Tamar, if they can help it."
