| Show written tor for this paper TRAVELS LETTER NO LI 11 saturday february 1896 some time after midnight the Tea arrived in the vicinity of malihi after which she stood off and on till morn ing when we approached the passage oy bi the village the boat was lowered and among those who landed were el dei def cutler and myself the inhabitants who were nearly all josephites were ut ui in n force and lined the stone wharf as ye we landed after the usual handshaking all around we were conducted ta one ot of the houses where the people gathered fathered around and a long religious conversation was soon commenced and kept up for hours aau a native josephite missionary of considerable ability took his side ot of the question of succession but was badly whipped on every point which he himself acknowledged as he was confronted with such historical evidence as he had not known before judging from his statements the white josephite missionaries in order to carry their point with the natives in the islands have made use ilse of such lies and glaring falsehoods in regard to the true church as would have put a missouri to shame in the thirties abi shame ame to such a mode of procedure these poor natives who for or so po many years had bad been left to themselves without a single elder irom from america to advise them were not in a position to judge as to the correctness of what they were told by these amisa ries nes who represented themselves as F elders ibets of the same church to which F elders iders addison pratt benjamin grouard and co laborers belonged but they no doubt forgot to tell that their so called reorganized church did not have an ex otence till 1860 while elder pratt and his companions re representing presen ding the true church performed their missionary labors on the pacific islands from 1844 to 1852 one instance was related to me by elder cutler where some money was gathered by the ila natives datives tives for missionary purposes both our elders and the ihen josephite Osep hite missionaries were represented when a donation is made by the natives ti ves it is customary for the leading men to make a little speech explaining the donation about to be made and the motive that has prompted the same on the occasion referred to the man who made the speech was very particular to explain that the donation was intended for or the representatives of that same church which elder addison pratt and companions had established upon the islands upon which the josephite preacher acher deliberately stepped forth and claimed it this ned is the monty got it and kept it not getting money under false fals pretenses re he tenses I 1 would like to know what is josephites on manahi are making arence reat eat preparations for holding a con wence there in april a they have built feast east large eating house and expect a great on the occasion they claim a of on malihi which fre are nearly all the inhabitants of the wand land elder cutler and I 1 returned to toe ship for dinner with the boat which nat as landing merchandise 1 and I shipping sobra ata PO but we landed again in the alter after noon when we took a long walk around the motu on which the village stands and also looked for shells on the seashore returning to the village we had another long conversation witti and others and went on board with the last boat just after sundown soon after that we sailed toward the south returning to apatzki the wind was again in our favor and we made good time the moon beamed beautifully upon us and the voyage was pleasant the island of malihi also called waterland island is sixteen miles long from southwest to northeast and six wide its east end lies in latitude 1400 23 south longitude 1450 52 west it is aiso sixty miles west ot tamaroa Tak aroa ninety miles northwest of rotoava Rot oava Fak arava and miles northeast of tahiti the coral reef at the west end of malihi is quite broad some of the are half a mile wide and several miles lung long and well covered with cocoanut coco anut trees the boat passage where we went in and out is near the west end of the island on the south side it is the only passage leading from the ocean to the lagoon sunday february about i 11 clock 0 in the night we had bad arrived off the coast of Ao AD ataki which island lies about twenty miles northeast of and twenty five miles southeast of aru tua and we now stood off and on till morning about 8 we passed through a narrow passage between two on the west side of apatzki and near the north end of the island into the lagoon thence the ship turned to the left and cast anchor close to a motu where the ships boat landed with thir teen of the natives besides elder cutler and myself while we elders took a bath in the ocean and read from our books under the shade of a cocoanut coco anut tree the natives gathered about dozen eggs filling eleven or twelve good gizea boxes and barrels this birds bird which is considerable smaller than an ordinary pigeon is very plentiful on some borne ol of the Tuam its eggs are spotted and exceedingly large nearly the size oi of chicken chickens Is eggs for a bird of that size and each bird only lays one egg at each breeding season which it deposits in the coral sand in places where the brush growth is small and scattered this being the season for hatching the islet seemed literally covered with eggs and as the natives approached bent pro ached with their boxes and barrels bent on robbing the poor birds these flew fiew up by the tens of thousands and then kept flying to and fro overhead until the sun was virtually darkened by their great numbers and some of them while making makin hilious noises noises came in in uncomfortably uncomfortable e itose proximity to the heads of those who were willfully destroying their prospects of offspring some of the birds which are good for eating were killed by the sailors who also caught some fish and gathered a quantity of cocoanuts cocoa nuts to take on board after spending about three hours on the uninhabited islet we returned to the ship about 3 p m soon afterwards anchor was weighed and we sailed back to the ocean the same way that we came and now spent the remainder of the day and the following night sailing to and fro off the west coast of apatzki monday february 24 h early in the morning elder cutler and myself landed with the ships boat at dakaka the only village on the island of apatzki here we met mr lutherr devore a josephite Jos ephue missionary and wife they are from the th state of ohio we had bad a long and spirited but friendly iri endly conversation and I 1 found mr devore more consistent and reasonable than most josephite missionaries that I 1 have con versed with if he is sincere and honest in in heart as he claims to be he is not apt to remain a josephite alkhis all his days he did not believe that the church organ ize iced ed by joseph smith the prophet in 1830 was rejected because of polygamy but for other causes and when I 1 showed him the absurdity of some of the these causes he gave in and agreed with me in that it certainly did not appear reason able that god full of love aud and long lone suffering and who bore so patiently with the children of israel and the Nep hites of old would be so hard on his children in the last days as to reject a whole church indi indiscriminately scrim binately merely because a few men in it appeared to do wrong when it was an acknowledged fact that the great majority were striving to the best of their ability to do right he laid great stress upon the fact that the nauvoo temple was not finished but bat acknowledged that even that token as a chief cause of rejection did not seem to be consistent for who but god himself is to determine what he means b by a reasonable time to finish a temple Z in are the facts that enemies came upon the temple builders and drove them away from their home not to be con si dered and after all was not the temple finished the answer can be given both in the affirmative and the negative it was finished sufficiently for fir blessings to be given in it and duly dedicated but if finished means the last coat of paint in the last room and the highest possible polish and finish that can be put on a building on the in side as well as on the outsider then the nauvoo temple was never finished af nor was the kirtland temple not nor any other public building so far as that is concerned that I 1 know anything about but if the church was rejected because the nauvoo temple was not finished then it must hive have been rejected in the days ot of joseph smith and not afterwards lor for it is a historical tact fact that irom from the ft of april ij when its cornerstones were laid until the martyrdom of joseph joseo JN smith on june 1844 a period of 4 1 nearly three years and three months thi the temple walls were only raised to the windows of the first story while from the time of the martyrdom till may matt 1845 when the capstone was laid a period of about eleven months the rot rest of the walls were built and completed under the direction of brigham young and the other apostles then the root roof was put on the attic story and tower built and the temple finished sufficiently to be publicly dedicated may this proves that if there is any blame T attached to any one tor for not pushing the work forward on that building fast enough it belongs to a date prior to june 1844 for after that the work progressed so fast and incessantly that people generally were astonished and A the illinois alarmed I 1 claim that it is is simply absurd to charge brig 4 ham young and the church alter josephs death with any neglect in regard to the building and finishing of the nauvoo vo 0 te temple m ale and it is doubly absurd to think th that at the lord would reject a whole church numbering at the time more than people because a certain stone building was not built as quick as might have been the case had everybody put forth their best efforts nor is there anything in the revelation of january xyth 1841 nor in any other reve aaion that will justify any sensible person in coming to any such conclusion mr devore is the head of josephite missionary operation in the south sea islands besides him and wife there is only one other missionary and his wile wife in this field namely mr chase and companion anion who came from tonga to V tahiti ahito together wath myself in the richmond mr devore said that most of the he people on apatzki about seventy in number are josephites those few who are not belong to 10 the catholics we have thus visited four islands Ka I 1 arutun malihi and apatzki where the josephites have decoyed decayed the keople people who had been true and faithful for or many years from the true fold I 1 feel confident however that it will only be a question of time till most ot of them thein will return in fact the natives dont know what they have done and most of them are apparently incapable at present of realizing their true position as they still seem to think that they are mem bers of the original church notwithstanding their baptism into the other one the island reef of apatzki is triangular in shape and embraces a large number of covered with trees and other vegetation its western shore runs nearly due north and south there tire are two passages through which vessels can pass from the ocean into the lagoon both on the west side of the island the village lies by the south pass on a small motu containing less than twenty acres of land where a stone wharf has been built pearl fishing in the lagoon is quite Aang dangerous erous on account of the many sharks that infest it at 12 m elder cutler and I 1 returned to the ahia together with about seventy natives who were returning from their diving on arutun to their more permanent homes on tamaroa and other islands most of them were members of the church and just before stepping on 1 board the boats to go to the ship they gathered on the beach where they sang a hymn after which one of the native elders stepped to the front and offered up a short and appropriate prayer invoking the blessings of god upon us all during our voyage to tamaroa Tak aroa after getting all the peo people pleon on board together with a lot of canoes and one quite large sailing boat and tying two large boats behind the arcia set sail for taka roa ninety miles dismut distant about 2 p m we passed around the south end ot of apatzki but as the usual trade wind prevailed the progress was slow as we pad to beat against it going east the island of was visible toward tae T southwest we had evening prayer on board and the weather was pleasant pleasa nt all night I 1 t tuesday february we were beating against ahe contrary wind all ol 01 44 day and made but slow progress toward our destination in the morning joau an uninhabited island belonging to the people ot of Fak arava was seen on our right we spent the evening singing and in listening to the melodies of the natives who kept up their inharmonious selections till a very late hour wednesday february we ex pe perien ced almost a perfect calland cal calm mand and the sh ship i amade made next to no heading at all during the day in the evening the natives caught a shark weighing about seventy pounds I 1 was given a jaw as a relic and the natives had a good feast on the flesh anich to together zether with the eggs gathered on apatzki and boiled rice was the principal diet ol of the seventy odd passengers during the voyage after A after fter evening prayer elder cutler addressed the saints on the evidence of the existence of god we also sang hymns hymn and songs and enjoyed a good nights rest on deck where the moon smiled on f ship hip and ocean with all its tropical loveliness thursday february what little wind we had haa last night was favorable and we made good headway toward the northeast in the morning the island of kapota Ta was seen against the eastern horizon and later in the day we were sailing along its northwest coast this island which is twelve miles long from northeast to routh southwest west with an average width of five miles lies about ten miles southwest of tamaroa and miles northeast of tahiti the reef is nearly covered with some of them several miles long except a portion ot of the southeast side the lagoons abound with shells and the village which contains a school ranks as one of the prettiest in all the inhabitants number about seventy who are nearly all josephites A nourishing flourishing branch of the church was raised up here by the late elder alvadus hanks which branch had a continued istance existence ex till the josephites came beating continually against the head wind we found ourselves within a mile of Tea vargo the name of the village on tamaroa Tak aroa about 4 rpm m when the wind died out entirely and we were drifting slowly away from the mouth of the passage with the current the ships boat was landed and the crew by row rowing ing very hard succeeded in pulling the schooner very slowly toward land a favorable breeze finely sprang up and helped us in when near the reef a number of the native passengers sprang overboard and swam swain to the reef pulling a rope after them and when once standing firmly upon the reef they walked along and pulled the ship up to the wharf where we e were safely secured by 6 p m we had been twelve days coming from tahiti a distance of about miles by way of the islands visited but in beating against the wind as we had done we had haa sailed at least miles on landing on tamaroa Tak aroa we shacked hands with nearly all the inhabitants who had been left on the island they came down to the wharf to see the schooner wine come in and welcome their relatives and friends who were returning home the natives who had come with the ship gathered on ibe h wharf where they again sang a 3 hymn and offered up a prayer of thanksgiving before proceed ing tu to their respective homes in the village this devotion is nearly always attended tor by the |
