Omoo, p.39
Omoo,
p.39
3.“arva”: Kava; an intoxicating beverage made from the crushed root of the kava plant. In chapter 23 of Typee, Melville describes the process: The roots of the kava plant are broken into small bits, then masticated thoroughly; water is poured over the masticated pieces, they are stirred with a finger, and the beverage is ready. Also called “arva tee,” or kava tea.
4.a war…at Papeetee: Queen Pomare IV fled Tahiti when the French took control in 1842. She and her followers determined to wage a war against the French.
5.Rizzio: David Rizzio (c. 1533–1566), secretary and confidant of Mary, Queen of Scots, killed by her husband because of Rizzio’s influence on the queen.
CHAPTER 66
1.Cæsarian operation: Birth by cutting into the abdomen, as was the case of Julius Caesar.
CHAPTER 67
1.Hegira: Journey, especially when undertaken to escape from a dangerous or undesirable situation; the term comes from the flight of Muhammad from Mecca in 622 and is the basis for the Muslim calendar.
2.Darby…Joan: Reference to poems and songs of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries that describe an older married couple who are “all in all to each other.”
3.Waiurar: Vairao, a village on the southwestern side of Tahiti Iti, the smaller island attached to Tahiti Nui to form the island of Tahiti.
4.Loohooloo: Which specific village Melville describes here is unknown.
CHAPTER 68
1.“Yar onor boyoee”: Ia orana oe i is Tahitian for “How do you do?” In Tahitian, Ia orana oe i teie po is “Good evening” and Ia orana oe is “Good morning.”
2.“Pehee Lee Lees”: In Tahitian, small fish is rendered ia iti. Pehee is the Marquesan word for “fish” that Melville used in Typee (French paeki); “Lee Lee” is his pidgin English version of “little” or “small.”
CHAPTER 69
1.most important…in the Tropics: Interestingly, most of the common food plants of Polynesia—coconut, breadfruit, taro—are introductions, coming especially from the Malay Archipelago or eastern tropical Asia. This introduction occurred in a remote period, as seen by the spread of these plants throughout the Pacific and by the number of local varieties.
CHAPTER 71
1.Merry Andrew: Clown.
2.Tom-fool: Half-wit.
CHAPTER 72
1.“poteen”: Moonshine.
CHAPTER 74
1.Koar-wood: Wood from Acacia koa, the koa tree, that was used for timber.
2.palmetto-leaves: Leaves from a low-growing, fan-leaved palm that were used for weaving or thatching.
3.Queen Elizabeth: Queen Elizabeth I (1533–1603), who reigned as queen of England and Ireland 1558–1603, daughter of King Henry VIII and his second wife, Anne Boleyn.
CHAPTER 76
1.Borabora, Huwyenee, Raiatair, and Tahar: Bora Bora, Huahine, Raiatea, and Taha’a: the Leeward Islands of the Society group.
2.disconsolate Willie…Lullee: Fictional as the story of Willie and Lullee may appear, it is actually a true story. Edward T. Perkins visited Moorea in 1853 and met the English carpenter, now married to his Tahitian love. In the ten years since Melville’s visit, she had aged and lost her left eye. Perkins’s tale is told in Na Motu (1854), where Charles Roberts Anderson, Melville in the South Seas (1939), found it (305)
3.Leviathan: The Leviathan is based on Melville’s third whaleship, the Charles and Henry, a Nantucket vessel under the command of John B. Coleman Jr. Coleman was the best of the captains under whom Melville sailed.
4.plenty of both: Whaleships notoriously skimped on the amount of food they gave the sailors. The Charles and Henry, on which the Leviathan is based, was different in that Captain John B. Coleman Jr. believed in giving his men enough to eat.
5.“running rigging”: Lines such as halyards, braces, sheets, and so on that are used to set and furl the sails and turn the yards.
6.sheaves: Wheels within the blocks or pulleys for rope to run over.
CHAPTER 77
1.“Barbaree”: Barbary Coast; originally the North African coast, but later the term came to mean the district or section of a city noted as a center of gambling, prostitution, and riotous nightlife.
2.lanyards: Ropes used to secure the shrouds that support the masts of a ship.
3.half-pay: Reduced pay of an officer not in service.
4.Smollett: Tobias Smollett (1721–1771), eighteenth-century British novelist.
5.Amelia!—Peregrine!—…Count Fathom!: Characters from Smollett’s novels. Amelia is evidently Emilia Gauntlet, Peregrine’s beloved in The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle (1751); Count Fathom is from The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom (1753).
CHAPTER 78
1.Guayaquil: Port in Ecuador.
CHAPTER 79
1.Angel of Vengeance: There are twelve angels of vengeance, of which six are known by name: Satanel, Michael, Gabriel, Uriel, Raphael, and Nathanel (Zathael). The twelve angels of vengeance were among the first formed at Creation. They exact vengeance or retribution upon sinners at the express command of God.
CHAPTER 80
1.muskets of the Bounty’s men: Pomare I consolidated his power with the aid of the Bounty mutineers resident on Tahiti and their guns.
2.Narii: King Pomare II came to power after winning the Battle of Narii against his Tahitian opponents in 1815.
3.Aimata: Aimata Pomare IV Vahine-o-Punuateritua (1813–1877), known as Aimata or Pomare IV, was the daughter of Pomare II and the sister of Pomare III. She succeeded her brother as ruler of Tahiti in 1827 and ruled for fifty years.
4.Tartar: A group of people from Central Asia; the name is generally applied to the group who under the leadership of Genghis Khan overran Asia and Eastern Europe.
5.cara-sposa: Wife.
6.Jezebel: The infamous wife of Ahab, king of Israel, in I Kings 16: 31; the name later came to connote a wicked and impudent wife.
7.barons of King John: The barons rebelled against King John (1167–1216) in 1215 over excessive taxation and captured London. The king met with the barons and agreed to their demands. He signed a document known as the Magna Carta, or “Great Charter.”
8.bye-blow of Tararroa: Illegitimate child of Taaroa, the father of the gods in Polynesian mythology.
9.cousin-german: First cousin.
10.“King George”: King George III (1738–1820) reigned from 1760 until he lapsed into madness in 1811. His son George (1762–1830) governed as prince regent 1811–1820 and then reigned as King George IV 1820–1830.
CHAPTER 81
1.Tior: Tai’oa. The Tai’oa people actually live in Haka’ui Bay on Nuku Hiva, but Melville persists, here and in Typee, in calling it Tior, his spelling of Tai’oa.
2.visited the place more than once: Melville writes of his visit to Haka’ui Bay, his “Glen of Tior,” in chapter 4 of Typee. 3. Souchong: A variety of black tea.
4.King Charles’s Beauties: The mistresses of King Charles II (1630–1685), “the Merry Monarch.”
5.Hogarth: William Hogarth (1697–1764), English painter and engraver.
6.Rake’s apartment: Melville refers to the apartment portrayed in Hogarth’s A Rake’s Progress (1735), a series of eight paintings that were then engraved.
CHAPTER 82
1.sea-potations: Drinks.
2.luckless ship in the fishery: Like the fictional Leviathan, the Charles and Henry on which Melville sailed in 1842 was a luckless ship. Captain John B. Coleman Jr. treated his crew decently and gave them enough to eat, but he did not have much luck finding whales.
3.lance: A teardrop-shaped cutting tool with a long shaft used to kill whales.
4.Kentucky: Kentucky is used by Melville throughout his works as a symbol of the land of tall men. In Moby-Dick, for example, he writes that the whale’s phallus is “longer than a Kentuckian is tall” (chapter 95) and that Egyptian mummies “do not measure so much in their coffins as a modern Kentuckian in his socks” (chapter 105).
5.“bird”: Convict.
6.Crowding all sail: Setting as much sail as possible.
7.braced the yards square: Turned the yards so that they were all at right angles, or “square,” to the ship; with such a configuration, the wind is coming from behind the ship, and the ship is running downwind.
8.sailor’s cradle: The sailor’s cradle is the ship; sailors are rocked to sleep when out to sea, cradled in the bosom of the ocean.
Herman Melville, Omoo
