These duplicities,
always deplorable when discovered, are never more fatal than with men
imperfectly civilised. Almost incapable of truth themselves, they
cherish a particular score of the same fault in whites. And Mataafa is
besides an exceptional native. I would scarce dare say of any Samoan
that he is truthful, though I seem to have encountered the phenomenon;
but I must say of Mataafa that he seems distinctly and consistently
averse to lying.
For the affair of the Manono prisoners, the chief justice is only again
in so far answerable as he was at the moment absent from the seat of his
duties; and the blame falls on Baron Senfft von Pilsach, president of the
municipal council. There were in Manono certain dissidents, loyal to
Laupepa. Being Manono people, I daresay they were very annoying to their
neighbours; the majority, as they belonged to the same island, were the
more impatient; and one fine day fell upon and destroyed the houses and
harvests of the dissidents "according to the laws and customs of Samoa."
The president went down to the unruly island in a war-ship and was landed
alone upon the beach. To one so much a stranger to the mansuetude of
Polynesians, this must have seemed an act of desperation; and the baron's
gallantry met with a deserved success.
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