IN THE NEW HEBRIDES.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 54, 27 November 1907, Page 3

IN THE NEW HEBRIDES.

MRS. MILNE'S HEROIC WORK.

riicro was something very incongruous in tho situation. The lady on whom I had called looked so entirely a lady of civilisation, one who had spent her life in quiet citv scenes, whoso interests had centred round her homo and family, and her Church: and yet tho tale sbo told was one of savagery and crime, and thd black ignorance of which she had personal knowledge. Wo met in a pretty, drawing-room on the slope of Mount \ ictoria, and wo began our conversation with suitable remarks about tho weather. In five minutes we were back in the Now Hebrides of forty years ago, and, in tho same even tone as that in which sho had discussed the weather Mrs Milne was telling mo something ot what-it meant to bo a missionary's

Mrs. .Milne, who has spent,the last thirtyeight years m the New Hebrides, and who, for the sake of tho work, had to consent to years of separation from her young" family, has lately told several North Island audiences the story of her life in those islands. ■ Mrs Milne was only 19 when sho married a youiiE divmity student, and left Edinburgh, her birthplace, and until then her homo, to cross the world and plunge into what is only too well described as a "pit of heathen darkness. ' Hint was 111 186S, and in these days of quick communication ono can perhaps hardly realiso what an /amount of cournao and faith were required' to urgo two' younc people to such an adventure. '

Their voyage of four months brought them to Now Zealand, too late to catch tho mission boat, Dayspring, as they had wished so they had to remain for some months waiting for her return, and then they wero taken to Erromanga, tho Martyr's Isle, findinjr themselves settled in a mission house just across the crook from tho spot where, years before, John Williams had been murdered an association in itself quito enough to make many young girls wish to turn back to civilisation. But there was no less dotcrmination and patience than courago in tho making of this missionary's wife, and one cannot

think that even at the outset of her thirtyeight years' service she faltered in her work. After a few months in Erromangn, Mr. and Mrs. Milne went to another island of the group, Nguna, where they lived for six months in a" grass hut, moving afterwards into a throe-roomed cottage. The Now Hebrides is a marvellous place for tongues. Not only does every island have a different language, but often the people of ono island will speak several perfectly distinct languages; and, apart from other considerations, such a condition of things does noj; make for good feeling among neighbours. * These people, gentle and kindly in their dealings with the missionary and his wife, were furious savages when their passions wore, roused, and when they had killed an enemy they ato him.

Mr. and Mrs. Milne worked here for seven years before their work began to niako any headway, and when at last an opening name, it was through a tribal quarrel. There had been a murder of a bnslmiaii, and tho bush tribes canio down to wreck vengeance on tho peoplo living round tho mission station. I , or a fortnight fclioro were sorties and attacks, and wild firing. "They were not good marksmen with guns," said Mrs. Milne so no ono was killed. Had they been armed with native weapons the result might hnvo been very different. We hid in the mission house while thp-firing was going on. No, we were not -in danger, though several times we thought we were, when word would come that the bush people meant to kill us." Once the assurance was so convincing that Mrs. Milne and the baby ynd her nurse were placed in a boat to bo taken across to tho small island whither tho baslimon had driven their enemies. Mr. Milno ' refused to go. Ho would stay by his post. As he was saying farewell to his wife, a messenger arrived in haste to say that the old lady who acted as go-between for the two forces said the missionary's wife must not go away; she was _ quite safe: the quarrel was a black man's. So Mrs. Milne turned back to her homo. Some days after, whon her husband was away on a boating excursion, the bush people came down in all their war-paint, armed with tomahawks, knives, spears, and guns, and treacherously murdered ono of the enemy who had ventured across from the island for food. Then, with shouts of joy. they liurried off to the mission-house well to , quench their thirst, and gloat over tlioir victory. It was a horrible situation for Mrs. Milne, who watched them from the house. ' '

The quarrel finally yielded to arbitration, and Mr. Milne'had the satisfaction of seeing the chief of tho bush tribe make peace with his enemy,- whom he allowed to return to the devastated village. Then the victor gradually became a convert, and the first ty-each in the ranks of heathenism was made. There is evidently not much joy in being a woman in heathen New Hebrides, for they are regarded byJtho men as merely animals, worth perhaps so ma,iiy pigs, and they have no higher idea of themselves, in spite of the fact that every woman there is practically selfsupporting. Each person has some bit of ground to cultivate, and when a man has seven or eig'ht wives it means that he is tho proprietor of seven or eight pieces of lan'l, and of thoir cultivators. He does not sit down and go to sleep because of that, but works his own plot, and having carried his food to the native equivalent to a clubhouse, a largo building which belongs to tho men,-'and which no woman is allowed to enter, lio cooks it there and oats it with his mates, and then returns to tho huts of the women, where he helps thorn' to eat the fruit of their industry. When a wife dins or elopes with another man, as sometimes happens even in tlio Ncti' Hebrides, or when she escapes to another island, her husband mourns her loss, because it is tho loss of personal property worth so many pigs. The first lesson the missionaries have to teach is that women ai'.o to bn treated decently, and the native teachers who go to settle in unknown islands among people w/iose language-* they cannot speak, begin their teaching right away, by showing how Christianised natives regard and treat their wives.

"it is very hard to bcliovo that tho natives <viu do some of the cruel ■ things they undoubtedly have done," said Mrs. Milne, "because they are naturally kindly; and when they have become. Christianised and left their evil ways, it is impossible to help becoming very fond of them. They arc child-liko and happy."

Mr.- Milno is at present in the New Hobrides, completing a translation of tho New Testament, and tho son is taking up his father's mission work. Mrs. Milno doos not tliink that she herself will return to tho islands, but- hopes that will soon leave, to devote himself W> the publication of the translation he lias been making.