Nakaeia was feared;it does not appear that he was hated.Deeds that smell to us of murder wore to his subjects the reverend face of justice;his orgies made him popular;natives to this day recall with respect the firmness of his government;and even the whites,whom he long opposed and kept at arm's-length,give him the name (in the canonical South Sea phrase)of 'a perfect gentleman when sober.'
When he came to lie,without issue,on the bed of death,he summoned his next brother,Nanteitei,made him a discourse on royal policy,and warned him he was too weak to reign.The warning was taken to heart,and for some while the government moved on the model of Nakaeia's.Nanteitei dispensed with guards,and walked abroad alone with a revolver in a leather mail-bag.To conceal his weakness he affected a rude silence;you might talk to him all day;advice,reproof,appeal,and menace alike remained unanswered.
The number of his wives was seventeen,many of them heiresses;for the royal house is poor,and marriage was in these days a chief means of buttressing the throne.Nakaeia kept his harem busy for himself;Nanteitei hired it out to others.In his days,for instance,Messrs.Wightman built a pier with a verandah at the north end of the town.The masonry was the work of the seventeen queens,who toiled and waded there like fisher lasses;but the man who was to do the roofing durst not begin till they had finished,lest by chance he should look down and see them.