A MOTHER'S REVENGE

Taihape Daily Times, Volume 8, Issue 142, 19 June 1916, Page 3

A MOTHER'S REVENGE

FEARFUL STORY FORM SUVA Down at Loma Luma, some .180 miles from Suva, a man and his wife fell foul of the Fijian chief in their district. The chief vowed vengeance. One day the husband and wife were obliged to lave their hut for a couple of hours. They left their young child, aged only a few r mouths, behind in a safe spot. On their return they found to their horror that the child had disappeared. They searched high and low for hours, but when darkness fei‘l they were in despair. A pot of yams and some meat had been stewing slowly on some embers. The woman lifted the lid. There she saw a terrible sight, and shrieked wildly, “My child! My child-’’

For there, seething in the broth, was the dead body of her infant child. The man. it is said, ordered his wife to sharpen the long cane-knife belonging to the household. They did this together. Then the woman said to her husband: “It is better that I should kill the perpetrator of this deed. You must continue to live and rear children. Let me go.” And he let her go! In the darkness she slipped away, and hid outside the chief’s house. For hours she waited her opportunity, and then when he was fas asleep she crept into the hut and mutilated him in such a way that lie died soon after. But his assailantmanaged to slip away without being discovered.

The next morning the village was in mourning for the death of th e chief, Wailing was heard on every side, But th e woman and her husband did not weep Their’s was a dry-eyed sorrow —a gnawing at the heartstrings for the child that had met with such a horiblc death. It was the fact that the woman did not wail Avith the other women of the village that attracted the attention of the villagers They began to question her At first she made no response, but the fierce exulfaiou in her breast at a revenge that had justice in its accomplishment loosed her tongue. To the amazement of the crowd she declaimed as follows: —“Why do I not cry for the death of the chief ? I will tell yon. The chief has robbed me of my only child. He threw the child into a pot of boiling yams and boiled it to death. Therefore, I kilted the chief: Yes, with my knife I mutilated him in such a way that he could not live. And I am glad that I did it.” The woman and her husband were handed over to the police,, who conveyed them both to Levnka Thence rhev have been brought to Suva gaol. If tin' statements given by the natives are correct, the case is one which will surely be brought within the limits of thy unwritten law.