XIV explained

What happens

Themes in this chapter

• Civilization vs. Nature

  The narrator contrasts the ease of Polynesian life with the struggles of European artisans, highlighting the gap between savage and civilized existence.

• Freedom and Captivity

  The narrator feels trapped by his illness and the natives' restrictions, longing for escape as boats approach.

• Cultural Relativism

  The narrator reflects on the different values and efficiencies of Typee society compared to his own, such as in child-rearing and daily tasks.

Characters to notice

• Narrator

  Still ill and melancholy, he becomes hopeful at news of boats but is prevented from leaving; he anxiously awaits Toby's return.

• Toby

  Recovered from his wound, he leaves with the boats promising to return in three days, but does not come back.

• Fayaway

  Shows tender sympathy for the narrator and reluctantly reveals that Toby has gone with the boats.

• Kory-Kory

  Devotedly attends the narrator but actively prevents him from going to the beach.

• Tinor

  Treats Toby's wound with vegetable remedies; returns from the beach without Toby.

• Marheyo

  Mentioned as the head of the household where the narrator resides.

Key passages

• “A gentleman of Typee can bring up a numerous family of children and give them all a highly respectable cannibal education, with infinitely less toil and anxiety than he expends in the simple process of striking a light; whilst a poor European artisan, who through the instrumentality of a lucifer performs the same operation in one second, is put to his wit's end to provide for his starving offspring that food which the children of a Polynesian father, without troubling their parents, pluck from the branches of every tree around them.”

  A Typee man raises his children with far less effort than it takes to make a fire, while a European worker struggles to feed his family despite having instant fire-starting tools.

  Highlights the contrast between the ease of Polynesian life and the hardships of civilized existence.

• “The word 'botee! botee!' was vociferated in all directions; and shouts were heard in the distance, at first feebly and faintly; but growing louder and nearer at each successive repetition, until they were caught up by a fellow in a coconut tree a few yards off, who sounding them in turn, they were reiterated from a neighbouring grove, and so died away gradually from point to point, as the intelligence penetrated into the farthest recess of the valley.”

  The cry 'botee! botee!' spread through the valley like a vocal telegraph, passed from person to person until it reached the most remote areas.

  Describes the islanders' efficient communication system.

• “My earnest questions appeared to embarrass the natives greatly. All their accounts were contradictory: one giving me to understand that Toby would be with me in a very short time; another that he did not know where he was; while a third, violently inveighing, against him, assured me that he had stolen away, and would never come back.”

  The natives gave conflicting answers about Toby's whereabouts, confusing and alarming the narrator.

  Shows the narrator's growing anxiety and the natives' evasiveness.