Drinks on the House

Trader’s Tale:

By Tukapa Koko

APRIL of each year in Mangaia sees our release from gloomy forebodings, enc * of ma d March is also the end of the cyclone season. A special celebration is held (among such as are wont to quaff the flowing bowl), over the dead body of defunct March, that enemy of all who have anything in the way of worldly goods to lose. pnce, however, we* islanders of Man gaia drank a different toast, in which the natives also joined. The liquor was neither wine nor beer, but carbon tetra (which science briefly calls CCh I understand?).

For non-islanders there exists, in all tropical lands, a parasite, which is called the hook-worm. Natives, or any other persons going habitually barefooted, are liable to become victims. The parasite enters, as a microscopic object, the skin of unprotected feet, and gets into a human body, to flourish (and grow to large size) in the digestive tract.

Fully developed, this awful scourge attaches itself to the intestinal walls and sucks, leech-like, its victim’s life-blood The anaemia that results is fatal—the victim “goes into a decline,” and soon passes away.

This horrible fate, however, no longer threatens Polynesians since Dr. Sylvester Lambert, the famous tropical scientist, discovered that the use of CCh prevents the parasite from getting its grip on even natives who live in infested territory. finHE Cook Islands are not included in JL the danger area; but, owing to a few cases being diagnosed in some parts of the Group, a medical fiat went forth that all persons upon this island of Mangaia should, in common with the rest of the Cook Islands population, take a dose of the newly discovered panacea as a safety measure; and “DoC” (our college-trained Rarotongan physician, a youth of 22) prepared the medicine in a large glass jug, which he proceeded to take around all the villages.

Now, in this, the “cliff village,” I am the only European. Does a chief die, I must attend his funeral; if a neighbour marries, it’s my duty to produce material congratulations. In other words, to assist the wedding feast with timely largesse; and in many other ways, too, I must shoulder the local version of the white man’s burden.

The load usually is not very heavy to bear; but when I, upon a day, saw “Doc” and his jug of vairakau (“tree-water”— Maori for medicine) coming in state up the village road, I quaked a bit.

“Face,” be it noted, is just as impor tant in Polynesia as it is in Far Cathay, And white man’s face doubly so. Let a European dodge his clearly indicated duty, and his name, thereafter, is mud.

Thus far, I’d been remarkably lucky in preserving that all-important prestige, both socially and in trade. But “Doc” was approaching, and his eye was on me!

“Doc,” of course, spoke English as a mother tongue, and was counted, as European. A nice lad but as he approached, followed by a big convict helper carrying the muslin-covered jug-, and that stalwart followed by others bearing measuring glasses and various beakers, he looked, to me, like a par ticularly vicious Gestapo executioner.

A convict at the rear bore a bowl of clear water for cleansing the glasses.

Amid the shouts of the villagers, this procession, accompanied by a Deacon with flapping shirt-tails, halted opposite my palace of commerce.

There was no help for it, short of

aetual and undignified flight into the bush at the back of the store. Even to feign indisposition was no go, with a qualified physician in charge—he’d taring me “round” first, and then dose me!

“Courage, Danton, mon brave!”

Under such conditions, it’s always better to march to the guillotine without police escort, as it were. I stepped out on the road. “Doc” measured out my “toddy,” and I drank it down, with all the dignity I could put on. The stuff tasted like bath-water mixed with var nish.

The ceremony over, the glass was washed, and everybody else, in turn, quaffed confusion to the enemy of health. The villagers appeared to be agreeably surprised that neither I nor they fell to earth in convulsions after imbibing great Dr. Lambert’s specific at the hands of his young Rarotongan disciple. 1 RETURNED to my counter and shelves. The villagers sat around in the shade, conversing, or wound fish lines in preparation for a little wooing of the finny denizens of the Pacific.

Children played (heir games upon the almost deserted road, and all was nor mal (“Doc” and his helpers had des cended to the beach villages, there to bestow again Dr. Lambert’s scientific blessing).

Now, I very seldom drink —it’s no good to a white man in the tropics—and never, at any time, over-indulge. But, at my store counter, I was beginning to feel that the cans of meat, the calico and prints, and the other trade items, were waltzing around me in a circle; and when the birdcage-like building began to join the contents, there was no denying that I ftelt very, very, dizzy. So much so that at last I had to lie down.

But before so doing, I looked out the window of my bedroom (an unglazed aperture, covered occasionally by a shutter). , , .

Gone was the enthusiasm of the in tending fishers, and gone the vivacity of the gossips. All were lying on the road side, with hands at head or middle.

Children, their play no further attrac tion, grinned and pointed; others, how ever ran forward with alarmed howls to peer’ dismally at prostrate parents A godly Deacon essayed to go home; but his progress down the village street suggested that he found the middle of the broad highway as hard to tread as any tightrope. .

Others made no attempt to rise at an, with feeble groans they lay where they had collapsed. Having noted this sad state of affairs, I flopped upon my bea, dead to the world—blotto!

The long day, as writers say, wore on.

Everyone but the children was hors de combat” for some five hours. I, having quaffed first, recovered first, when even ing’s shadows began to fall.

Later, I found out the whys and wherefors.

The CCh should have been taken fasting. But we hadnt known that By eating beforehand, the specific had acted upon us like a very generous dose of undiluted alcohol! m There is, I must mention, a heavy legal penalty in these islands for sup plying liquor to Polynesians. Many Euro peans have been deported for such offences, or heavily fined. On this occasion, however, all of Mangaia Island was under the influence —and Authority had given the order!

Samoan-born soldiers recently re turned to the Territory from active ser vice are: Sgt. E. Cook, Pte. S. P.

Churchward, Pte. C. Reid, Pte. H. Rea, and W/O Henry Krone.