Books: Life of John Coleridge Patteson

C >> Charlotte M. Yonge >> Life of John Coleridge Patteson

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The Banks Islands, as usual, were much more hopeful, Santa Maria
coming first. Canoes came round the vessel, and the honesty of the
race showed itself, for one little boy, who had had a fish-hook given
him, wished to exchange it for calico, and having "forgotten to
restore the hook at the moment, swam back with it as soon as he
remembered it. There was a landing, and the usual friendly
intercourse, but just as the boat had put off, a single arrow was
suddenly shot out of the bush, and fell about ten yards short. It
was curious that the Spanish discoverers had precisely the same
experience. It was supposed to be an act of individual mischief or
fun, and the place obtained the appropriate name of Cock Sparrow
Point.

It was not possible to get into the one landing-place in the wall
round Mota's sugar-loaf, but there was an exchange of civilities with
the Saddleites, and in Vanua Lava, the largest member of the group, a
beautiful harbour was discovered, which the Bishop named Port
Patteson, after the Judge.

The Santa Cruz group was visited again on the 23rd of September.
Nothing remarkable occurred; indeed, Patteson's journal does not
mention these places, but that of the Bishop speaks of a first
landing at Nukapu, and an exchange of names with the old chief
Acenana; and the next day of going to the main island, where swarms
of natives swam out, with cries of Toki, toki, and planks before them
to float through the surf. About 250 assembled at the landing place,
as before, chiefly eager for traffic. The Volcano Isle was also
touched at, but the language of the few inhabitants was
incomprehensible. The mountain was smoking, and red-hot cinders
falling as before on the steep side. It was tempting to climb it and
investigate what probably no white man had yet seen, but it was
decided to be more prudent to abstain.

Some events of the visit to Bauro are related in the following letter
to the young cousin whose Confirmation day had been notified to him
in time to be thought of in his prayers:--

'Off San Cristoval: October 5, 1857.

'My dearest Pena,--It was in a heathen land, among a heathen people,
that I passed the Sunday--a day most memorable in your life--on which
I trust you received for the first time the blessed Sacrament of our
Saviour's Body and Blood.

'My darling--,as I knelt in the chiefs house, upon the mat which was
also my bed--the only Christian in that large and beautiful island--
my prayers were, I hope, offered earnestly that the full blessedness
of that heavenly Union with the Lord Jesus Christ, and in Him with
the Father and the Holy Ghost, might rest upon you for ever. I had
reckoned upon being on board that Sunday, when the Holy Eucharist was
administered on board our vessel; but as we reached Mwaata, our well-
known village at San Cristoval, on Saturday, we both agreed that I
had better go ashore while the vessel went away, to return for me on
Monday. My day was now passed strangely enough, my first Sunday in a
land where no Sunday is known.

'It was about 3 P.M. on Saturday when I landed, and it was an effort
to have to talk incessantly till dark. Then the chief Iri went with
me to his house. It is only one oblong room, with a bamboo screen
running halfway across it about half-way down the room. It is only
made of bamboo at the sides, and leaves for the roof. Yams and other
vegetables were placed along the sides. There is no floor, but one
or two grass mats are placed on the ground to sleep on. Iri and his
wife, and an orphan girl about fourteen or fifteen, I suppose, slept
on the other side of the screen; and two lads, called Grariri and
Parenga, slept on my side of it. I can't say I slept at all, for the
rats were so very many, coming in through the bamboo on every side,
and making such a noise I could not sleep, though tired. They were
running all about me.

'Well, at daylight I sent Gariri to fetch some water, and shaved and
washed, to the great admiration of Iri and the ladies, and of others
also, who crowded together at the hole which serves for door and
windows. I lay down in my clothes, all but my coat, but I took a
razor and some soap ashore.

'Sunday was spent in going about to different neighbouring
settlements, and climbing the coral rocks was hard work, the
thermometer at sea being 85° in the cool cabin, as the Bishop told me
to-day.

'Of course many people were at work in the yam grounds, several of
which I saw; but I found considerable parties at the different
villages, and had, on the whole, satisfactory conversations with
them. They listened and asked questions, and I told them as well as
I could the simplest truths of Christianity.

'I had a part of a yam and drank four cocoa-nuts during the day,
besides eating some mixture of yam, taro, and cocoa-nut all pounded
together.

'People offered me food and nuts everywhere. Walked back with a boy
called Tahi for my guide, and stopped at several plantations, and
talked with the people.

'Sat out in the cool evening on the beach at Mwaata, after much talk
in a chiefs house called Tarua; people came round me on the beach,
and again I talked with them (a sort of half-preaching, half-
conversing these talks were), till Iri said we must go to bed. Slept
a little that night.

'I can truly say that you were in my head all day. After my evening
prayers, when I thought of you--for it was about 9 P.M. = 10.10 A.M.
with you, and you were on your way to church--I thought of you,
kneeling between your dear mamma and grandmamma, and dear grandpapa
administering to his three beloved ones the Bread of Life, and I was
very happy as I thought of it, for I trust, through the mercy of God,
and the merits of our Lord, that we shall be by Him raised at the
Last Day to dwell with Him for ever. But indeed I must not write to
you how very unworthy I felt to belong to that little company.

'This morning about eleven the vessel's boat came off for me, with
the Bishop. I had arranged about some lads coming on with us, and it
ended in seven joining our party. Only one of our old scholars has
come again: he is that dear boy Grariri, whose name you will
remember.

'Now I have had a good change of shirts, etc., and feel clean and
comfortable, though I think a good night's rest will do me no harm.
I have written to you the first minute that I had time. What a
blessed, happy day it must have been for you, and I am sure they
thought of you at Feniton.

'Your loving cousin,

'J. C. P.'

This strange Sunday was spent in conversation with different sets of
natives, and that some distinct ideas were conveyed was plain from
what old Iri was overheard saying to a man who was asking him whether
he had not a guest who spoke Bauro: 'Yes,' said Iri, adding that 'he
said men were not like dogs, or pigs, or birds, or fishes, because
these cannot speak or think. They all die, and no one knows anything
more about them, but he says we shall not die like that, but rise up
again.'

On Monday, the 7th of October, Grera was revisited, and Toto, a last
year's scholar, came forth with his welcome in a canoe; but it was
rather a mixed success, for the danger of the vessel on her previous
visit was a warning against bringing her into the harbour, where
there was no safe anchorage, and this disappointed the people.
Thirteen, indeed, slept on board, and the next morning sixty canoes
surrounded the vessel, and some hundred and sixty came on deck at
once; but they brought only one pig and a few yams, and refused to
fetch more, saying it was too far--a considerable inconvenience,
considering the necessity of providing the Melanesian passengers with
vegetable food. The whole nine slept in the inner cabin, Orariri on
Patteson's sofa, 'feet to feet, the others on the floor like herrings
in a barrel.'

The great island of New Caledonia was next visited. The Bishop had
been there before, and Basset, one of the chiefs, lamented that he
had been so long absent, and pleaded hard to have an English
missionary placed in his part of the country. It was very sad to
have no means of complying with the entreaty, and the Bishop offered
him a passage to Auckland, there to speak for himself. He would have
come, but that it was the season for planting his yams; but he hoped
to follow, and in the meantime sent a little orphan named Kanambat to
be brought up at Auckland. The little fellow was pleased enough with
the ship at first, but when his countrymen who had been visiting
there left her, he jumped overboard and was swimming like a duck
after them, when, at a sign from the Bishop, one of the Pitcairners
leapt after him, and speedily brought him back. He soon grew very
happy and full of play and fun, and was well off in being away from
home, for the French were occupying the island, and poor Basset
shortly after was sent a prisoner to Tahiti for refusing to receive a
Roman Catholic priest.

Nengone were reached on October 23, and most of the old scholars were
ready with a warm welcome; but Mr. Creagh, the London missionary, had
taken Wadrokala away with him on an expedition, and of the others,
only Kowine was ready to return, though the two married couples were
going on well, and one previous scholar of the Bishop's and four new
ones presented themselves as willing to go. Urgent letters from the
neighbouring isle of Lifu entreated the Bishop to come thither, and,
with a splendid supply of yams, the 'Southern Cross' again set sail,
and arrived on the 26th. This island had entirely abandoned
heathenism, under the guidance of the Samoans. The people felt that
they had come to the end of the stock of teaching of these good men,
and entreated for an Englishman from the Bishop, and thus, here was
the third island in this one voyage begging for a shepherd, and only
one English priest had been found to offer himself to that multitude
of heathen!

The only thing that could be done was to take John Cho, a former St.
John's scholar, to receive instruction to fit him for a teacher, and
with him came his young wife Naranadune, and their babe, whom the
Bishop had just baptized in the coral-lime chapel, with three other
children.

The next few days were spent in great anxiety for Wailumai, a youth
from Grera, who was taken ill immediately after dinner with a most
distressing difficulty of breathing. He proved to have a piece of
sugar cane in his throat, which made every breath agony, and worked a
small ulcer in the throat. All through the worst Patteson held him
in his arms, with his hand on his chest: several times he seemed
gone, and ammonia and sal volatile barely revived him. His first
words after he was partially relieved were, 'I am Bishop! I am
Patihana!' meaning that he exchanged names with them, the strongest
possible proof of affection in Melanesian eyes. He still seemed at
the point of death, and they made him say, 'God the Father, God the
Son, and God the Holy Ghost! Jesus Christ, Son of God.' At last a
favourable change took place, but he continued so ill for several
days that his two attendants never did more than lie down in their
clothes; nor was it till the third day that he at length coughed up
the piece of cane that had caused the mischief. He still required so
much care that Patteson did not go on shore at Norfolk Island when
the five Pitcairners were exchanged for Mrs. Selwyn.

On November 15 Auckland harbour was again reached after this signally
prosperous voyage. It is thus summed up in a letter written two days
later:--

'November 17, 1857: St. John's College.

'My dear Miss Neill,--Thanks for your £21. 2s., and more thanks still
for your prayers and constant interest in this part of the world.
After nearly seventeen weeks at sea, we returned safely on Sunday
morning the 15th, with thirty-three Melanesians, gathered from nine
islands and speaking eight languages. Plenty of work for me: I can
teach tolerably in three, and have a smattering of one or two more.

'One is the wife of a young man, John Cho, an old scholar baptized.
His half-brother is chief of Lifu Isle, a man of great influence.
The London Mission (Independents) are leaving all their islands
unprovided with missionaries, and these people having been much more
frequently visited by the Bishop than by the "John Williams," turn to
him for help. By and by I will explain all this: at present no time.

'We visited sixty-six islands and landed eighty-one times, wading,
swimming, &c.; all most friendly and delightful; only two arrows shot
at us, and only one went near--so much for savages. I wonder what
people ought to call sandal-wood traders and slave-masters if they
call my Melanesians savages.

'You will hear accounts of the voyage from Fanny. I have a long
journal going to my father, but I can't make time to write at length
any more. I am up before five and not in bed before eleven, and you
know I must be lazy sometimes. It does me good. Oh! how great a
trial sickness would be to me! In my health now all seems easy.
Were I circumstanced like you, how much I should no doubt repine and
murmur. God has given me hitherto a most merciful share of
blessings, and my dear father's cordial approbation of and consent to
my proceedings is among the greatest....

'The anniversary of my dear mother's death comes round in ten days.
That is my polar star (humanly speaking), and whensoever it pleases
God to take my dear dear father to his rest, how blessed to think of
their waiting for us, if it be His merciful will to bring me too to
dwell before Him with them for ever.

'I must end, for I am very busy. The weather is cold, and my room
full of lads and young men. If I was not watching like a cat they
would be standing about in all sorts of places and catching cold.

'I send you in a box, a box made by Pitcairners of Pitcairn woods.

'Ever your loving old pupil,

'J. C. PATTESON.'

The little New Caledonian remained at Taurarua with the Bishop, and
as there was no woman at St. John's to take the charge of Cho's wife,
she was necessarily sent to Mrs. Kissling's school for Maori girls,
while her husband pursued his studies at St. John's.

Patteson often gave his services at the Maori village of Orakei,
where there was to be a central native school managed by Pirimona
(Philemon), a well-trained man, a candidate for Holy Orders.

'However, this did not satisfy his countrymen. As if I had not
enough to do, old Wi comes with a request from the folks at Orakei
that I would be their "minita," and take the management of the
concern. Rather rich, is it not? I said, of course, that I was
minita for the islanders. "Oh, let the Bishop take another man for
that, you are the minister for us." He is, you know, wonderfully
tatooed, and a great object of curiosity to the boys!

Before many days had passed, there had occurred the first case of
that fatal tetanus, which became only too well known to those
concerned in the Mission. Of course, all weapons were taken from the
scholars; but one of the San Cristoval boys, named Tohehammai,
fetched one of his own arrows out of Mr. Dudley's room to exchange
with an English lad for a shirt, and as he was at play, carrying the
arrow in his left hand behind his back and throwing a stick like a
spear with the other, he sharply pricked his right arm, within the
elbow, against the point of the arrow; but thinking nothing of the
hurt, and knowing that the weapons were forbidden playthings, he said
nothing for twelve days, but then complained of stiffness in the arm.
Two doctors happened to be at the college that day; one thought it
rheumatism, the other mentioned the word tetanus, but for three days
more the arm was merely stiff, it was hung in a sling, and the boy
went about as usual, until, on the fifteenth day, spasmodic
twitchings in the arm came on.

Liniment of chloroform was rubbed in, and the boy was kept under
chloroform, but in vain; the next day his whole body was perfectly
rigid, with occasional convulsions. About 4 p.m. his throat had
become contracted, and the endeavour to give him nourishment brought
on convulsive attacks. The Bishop came at 8. p.m., and after another
attempt at giving him food, which produced a further spasm, he was
lying quietly when Patteson felt his pulse stop.

'"He is dying!" the Bishop said. '"Father, into Thy hands we commend
his spirit."'

Patteson's 'Amen' came from his heart. The poor fellow made no sound
as he lay with his frame rigid, his back arched so that an arm could
be thrust under it. He was gone in that moment, unbaptized.
Patteson writes:--

'I had much conflict with myself about it. He had talked once with
me in a very hopeful way, but during his illness I could not obtain
from him any distinct profession of faith, anything to make me feel
pretty sure that some conviction of the truth of what he he hd been
taught, and not mere learning by rote, was the occasion of his saying
what he did say. I did wish much that I might talk again with the
Bishop about it, but his death took us by surprise. I pray God that
all my omission and neglect of duty may be repaired, and that his
very imperfect and unconscious yearnings after the truth may be
accepted for Christ's sake.'

The arrow was reported to have been poisoned, but by the time the
cause of the injury had been discovered it had been thrown away and
could not be recovered for examination. Indeed, lockjaw seems to be
so prevalent in the equatorial climates, and the natives so
peculiarly liable to it, that poison did not seem needful to account
for the catastrophe.

Altogether, these lads were exotics in New Zealand, and exceedingly
fragile. In the very height of summer they had to wear corduroy
trousers, blue serge shirts, red woollen comforters, and blue Scotch
caps, and the more delicate a thick woollen jersey in addition; and
with all these precautions they were continually catching cold, or
getting disordered, and then the Bauro and Grera set could only
support such treatment as young children generally need. The Loyalty
Islanders were much tougher and stronger and easier to treat, but
they too showed that the climate of Auckland was a hard trial to
their constitutions.

On the last day of March came tidings of the sudden death of the
much-beloved and honoured Dr. James Coleridge of Thorverton.

'It is a great shock,' says the letter written the same day; 'not
that I feel unhappy exactly, nor low, but that many many memories are
revived and keep freshening on my mind.... And since I left England
his warm, loving, almost too fond letters have bound me very closely
to him, and sorely I shall miss the sight of his handwriting; though
he may be nearer to me now than before, and his love for me is
doubtless even more pure and fervent.

'I confess I had thought sometimes that if it pleased God to take you
first, the consciousness that he would be with you was a great
comfort to me--not that any man is worth much then. God must be all
in all. But yet he of all men was the one who would have been a real
comfort to you, and even more so to others.' To his cousin he
writes:--

'Wednesday in Passion Week, 1858: St. John's College.

'My dearest Sophy,--Your letter with the deep black border was the
first that I opened, with trembling hand, thinking: "Is it dear dear
Uncle gone to his eternal rest; or dear Aunty? not that dear child,
may God grant; for that would somehow seem to all most bitter of all-
-less, so to speak, reasonable and natural." And he is really gone;
that dear, loving, courageous, warm-hearted servant of Christ; the
desire of our eyes taken away with a stroke. I read your letter
wondering that I was not upset, knelt down and said the two prayers
in the Burial Service, and then came the tears; for the memory of him
rose up very vividly before me, and his deep love for me and the
notes of comfort and encouragement he used to write were very fresh
in my mind. I looked at the print of him, the one he sent out to me,
with "your loving old Uncle" in pencil on it. I have all his
letters: when making a regular clearance some months ago, I could not
tear up his, although dangerous ones for me to read unless used as a
stimulant to become what he thought me. His "Jacob" sermon in his
own handwriting, I have by me. But more than all, the memory of his
holy life, and his example as a minister of Christ, have been left
behind for us as a sweet, undying fragrance; his manner in the sick-
room--I see him now, and hear that soft, steady, clear voice
repeating verses over my dear mother's death-bed; his kindly, loving
ways to his poor people; his voice and look in the pulpit, never to
be forgotten. I knew I should never see him again in this world.
May God of His mercy take me to be with him hereafter.

'Thank you, dear Sophy, for writing to me; every word about him is
precious, from his last letter to me:--

'"You will believe how sweet it is to me every month now to give the
Holy Eucharist to my three dear ones."

'"All complaints of old men must be serious."

'I wish I had more time to write, but I am too busy in the midst of
school, and printing Scripture histories and private prayers, and
translations in Nengone, Bauro, Lifu; and as all my time out of
school is spent in working in the printing office, I really have not
a minute unoccupied. With one exception, I have scarcely ever taken
an hour's walk for some six weeks. A large proportion of the
printing is actually set up by my own fingers; but now one Nengone
lad, the flower of my flock, can help me much--a young man about
seventeen or eighteen, of whom I hope very much--Malo, baptized by
the name of Harper, an excellent young man, and a great comfort to
me. He was setting up in type a part of the little book of private
prayers I am now printing for them. I had just pointed out to him
the translation of what would be in English--"It is good that a man
as he lies down to sleep should remember that that night he may hear
the summons of the Angel of God; so then let him think of his death,
and remember the words of St. Paul: 'Awake, thou that sleepest,'"
etc.; when in came the man whom the Archdeacon left in charge here
with my letters. "I hope, sir, there is no bad news for you;" and my
eye lighted on the deep black border of your envelope.

'To-morrow, if I live, I enter upon my thirty-second year--a solemn
warning I have received to-day, as another year is passing from me.
May some portion of his spirit rest on me to bless my poor attempt to
do what he did so devotedly for more than forty years: his duty as a
soldier and servant of his Lord and Master, into whose joy he has no
doubt now entered.

"Easter Day.--What an Easter for him! and doubtless we all who will
by and by, as the world rolls round, receive the Holy Eucharist shall
be in some way united to him as well as to all departed saints--
members of His Mystical Body.

'April 12.--Bishop came out yesterday afternoon from Auckland. After
baptisms at 5, and evening service at 7, sat till past 11 settling
plans: thus, God willing, start this day fortnight to return the
boys--this will occupy about two months; as we come back from the far
north, he will drop one at Lifu, one of the Loyalty Islands, with
large population; he will go on to New Zealand, stay perhaps six
weeks in New Zealand, or it may be two months; so that with the time
occupied by his voyage from Lifu to New Zealand, 1,000 miles and
back, he will be away from Lifu about two and a half or three months.
Then, picking me up (say about September 12), we go on at once to the
whole number of our islands, spending three months or so among them,
getting back to New Zealand about the end of November. So that I
shall be in Melanesia, D.V., from the beginning of May to the end of
November. I shall be able to write once more before we start--
letters which you will get by the June mail from Sydney--and of
course I shall send letters by the Bishop when he leaves me at Lifu.
But I shall not be able to hear again from England till the Bishop
comes to pick me up in September. Never mind. I shall have plenty
to do; and I can think of those dear ones at home, and of you all, in
God's keeping, with perfect comfort. The Lifu people are in a more
critical state than any others just now, otherwise I should probably
stop at San Cristoval. A few years ago they were very wild--
cannibals of course; but they are now building chapels, and thirsting
for the living waters. What a privilege and responsibility to go to
them as Christ's minister, to a people longing for the glad tidings
of the Gospel of Peace. Samoan teachers have been for a good many
years among them.

'I cannot write now to dearest Aunty or Pena.

'May God bless you and abundantly comfort you.... I think I see his
dear face. I see him always.

'Your loving cousin,

'J. C. PATTESON.'

Cho's wife had arrived in a cart at the College when her baby was a
day old, so rapid is recovery with mothers in those climates. 'I saw
the baby,' observes the journal, quite strong, not dark,--but I don't
care for them till they can talk; on the contrary, I think them a
great bore, especially in wooden houses, where a child with good
lungs may easily succeed in keeping all the inhabitants awake.'