THE ISLANDS OF THE PACIFIC No I.

Daily Southern Cross, Volume XXIX, Issue 5064, 13 November 1873, Page 3

THE ISLANDS OF THE PACIFIC No I.

" WTTN-ty years ago the multitudinous islands of the Pacific were almost as littU known to fthe people of Etuopo as those of the West Indies were to the geographers of the 10th •century. The greater part -of the information then obtainable concerning them was derived from narratives of missionary enterprise, or from the journals of commanders of vessels of war — in either case wutten by men destitute of commercial or industrial experience. Even up to the present time the most erroneous opinions have continued, to prevail with respect to the character 'and customs of the barbarians ot Polynesia, and the oliinate and resource? of 'che lands which they inhabit. These remarks will, however, scarcely apply to the Society Islands, which have long been a French military oolony ; to Hawaii, which in fact, if not in name, may be doomed an American possession ; or the Fijis. which, from tho learned labours of Dr. Seemann and Colanel Smythe, and tho recent enterprige of Australian commercial adventurers, have become in a measure well known to us »"• Arouad the first of these, to wit, the threat Island of Tahiti, and its tubutanes, history has thrown a halo of romance. With what intense delight have most of ih, in our young days, pored over the quaint accounts of Captains Wallis and Cook of what they witnessed among those then unknown barbarians. These accounts were so truthful, as far ag the evidence of their own eyesight was concern jd, but so erroneous in other respects, as wutten by men lacking all practical experience of garage usagp or habits of thought It was by reason of this ignorance that the great navigator bestowed the name of the " Friendly" Islanders upon those who had determined his death, which, though he then escaped it by au accident, ultimately overtook him at tho hands of tb e Hawaiians through his own fatal obstir^y t j l0 re^ n \ t of overmuch good nature And want of con caption of tho motives ar jd digpogihon of the people with whom he had to deaL Great C , a P* am ook ! , U s any of us, as colonists of ISew Zealand ftver tm]y rPCngnlse how immense were tll0 regoarc hes of tins man, and how st' jpendous the , r regi ,i tg ? Anr | to have been cub off> ag he wag> in the very bloom ' ji g gJory^ sharing tho same strange i* tp iity which seems to have followed almost *!-tl the fathers of navigation in the Pacific ' Thus Balboa, who first discovered ita existence (and having dragged, with ia credible labour, the timbers of his vessel across the mountains of Darien, was the first to sail upon its waters), fell under the headsman's axe. He was executed at Acla, on a charge of treason against ths King of Spain. Perhaps it was a punishment upon him in consequence of his having, with great ceremony, upon first reaching the Pacific shore, taken possession of the entire South Sea on behalf of his Holiness the Pope. A picture of this ceremony is still to be seen in the church of St. Franois, in tho town of. Nombre de Dios upon Darien, wherein Vasco Nunez is represented in complete armour, ■tanding np to his waist in the salt water, with a aword in one hand and in the other a flag bearing the keys of St. Peter and other religious insignia. Magellan, who, having passed throuch the Straits which bear bis name, was the first to reach the Indies by a western route, was slain by the aword in the quarrels of a Carbasiau King. Alonzo de Saavedra, who first attempted the passage of the North Pacific from Manila to Mexico, died on the Equator. This man (who was of the family of the great Cervantes) proposed to the King of Spain to cut a canal through the isthmus of Panama, a project which has been revived in these days and will boyond all doubt bo effected before the end of this century. In his memoir on the subject ne describes very circumstantially the ro,ate between the San Miguel and the Atra f ,o (the one now proposed by the American Engineers ) and represents to his Majesty that the amount of excavation was but F,fliall in comparison to that effected in the great canal of Nabuchodonosor as 1 elated 'oy Herodotus, and recommends that the Indian tribes of the isthmus should be forcibly compelled to work at it3 construction, seeing that "Providence had evidently placed them there in order that they by their labours might assist in the extension of the commerce of Christendom." This Saavedra was likewise the first discoverer of New Guinea (which he named Tierra del oro) of which the credit has been given to Luiz Vaz Torrez, for he landed about that part which is now known aa Dory Harbour, where deserted from him one Bnto Patahn, and four othors, who finding their way two years afterwards back to the Philippines, were there hanged for so doing. Of a like mind and destiny was Alvaro de Mendana, who inaugurated a scheme for the colonisation of tho Solomon Islands (to which he gave that name, as says Hakluyt, " to the intent that the Spaniards, believing that it was fiom thence that Solomon had obtained the gold wherewith he beautified tho temple of Jerusalem, might bo tho more readily disposed to go and inhabit the same ") where he died, and was buried in a settlement whioh was called Santa Yiabel de la Estrella, where are to this day ruins of great fortB and magazines. Although these are grown up with forest, they are known to beachcombers and strolling mariners — a faot which makes it seem the more strange that in these days men of scieaco take no trouble to investigate such interesting remains. After them oame our country man William Dam pier, the discoverer of New Britain, and the most entertaining »nd Teraoioui of all early voyagers who wrote of their experience of the Great South Seas. L«t any one who has read bis book go and sit, as I haro done, on the stone parapet of the battery (of six pieces) which fronts the River of Guam, and he may well see in hit mind's eye the triok which William played on the Governor of the Ladrones. are places in this world upon whioh three centuries have made no change, and Guam ia one of them.) Dampior's fato was more melancholy than J»U. Of tho great captains whom the world remembers, in whatsoever geas, some were ■lain in brawls (like Fernando Magellan), lome lost in storms (like Sir Humphrey Gilbert), some died in tbeir own lands, orowned. with honours and old ago, but Dampier disappeared out of men's memory, and the last that is known of him was that he was aeen in a low lodging in Southwark, dwelling in great poverty. Such likewise was the end of Fernando Quiros, who from a common sailor beoamo an admiral, and commanded an expedition wherein he discovered many islands in the Pacific, and on which ecoasion the famous Torres was his lieutenant and Torquemada his historian. The last that is known «£ him is whnt is written by the Cardinal Valenza : — " I have seen in a . wine-shop of Seville one Fernando Quiros, ' who had been an adventurer in the Indies and beyond, and who told ice be had seen there psople who did eat their wives and other relative* in place of consigning them to tombs, which did not so much surprise me, seeing that the same thing has been related by the anoients." Thus we see that it i« an infinitely more melancholy destiny to be lost at home than to be loit at sea ; for in the oase of these men no one seemed to hare mourned for them, or to havo marvelled what became of them, but the whole civilised world was interested in the fat* of M. de Ia Perouse, and would now giye much greater rewards to the man who could find out what ultimately became of him than were given to Dillon who was lucky enough to find his anchors and chains. Roggewien also reaped no reward of his labour, for after having found the Samoan Isles, and from thence made his way to Batavia, there his journals and charts were Impounded, and himself cast into prison, bom whence being discharged ho shortly

afterwards died in great miseiy To \\u d u[> this Criteg»i v of calamities we cannot cite a more striking instance than that of Dumont D'Urville, who, after having rendered himself famous as a navigator of the Pacific, was burned to death in a railway carnage between Paris and Versailles. But to return to the discoveripa of Cook, he and Sir Joseph Banks, and Di Solander, and other scientific swells, following the tracks ot WaIIis and Carteret, went out to Tahiti. (U maj be aaiil by way of paienthcsis here, tli it none <>l these h.h k ill> its ougin.il diicovoiei, <v> there can be no quostton of its being the La Sagitt.ma of Fernando Qnnos . that island, so long and lofty, whero " Fiancisco Vonce, having bound a rope about his waist, swam through the breakers and landed on the coral shore, whore a vast assemblage of Imhaus, paint°d and armed, received him with great hospitality, and afterwards took him back in safety to his ship." Also it is miiro than probable that this was the land reported of by the pilot, Juan FeiUiindc/, "where were many laine sti earns nad people of a light complexion, dressed in woven cloth.' 1 ) At Tahiti, Cook and his companions pliuted a tamaund tieo, erected an observatory, and took note<< of the transit of Venus (for which purpose they had lieon apncially sent out j upon this voyage) That tamarind tree has now become huge and umbrageous, and I havo beneath its> shadow witnessed upon diveis occasions a transit of Venus ] much more worthy of observation than any i which caint! beneath their notice, iov I havii there emptied mv,y bottlos of Chateau La^oso in the company of indigenous damsel^, whoso oyea and curls (to bonow an e\pi<Msion of Artomus Ward) "were ( nough to make a man lump into a mil I pond without, bidding his relations qood bye." A history of this ibland of Tahiti, written by some man possessing the requisite local knowledge, could not fail to be intensely interesting, and if truthfully recorded, prove unquestionably valuablo in the future To bogiu with their own account of themselves. Barbarian tradition is nob worth much, but, if supported by any collateral testimony, possesses a certain amount of value to the scientilio inquirer. Wo will sot aside the question of who were the three Maauu who fished up the earth from the bottom of the ocean ? or the whereabouts of the mysterious Hawaii (Haw<uki) ; the legend of the Are Ura (Whare Kara), which reminds one strangely of some part of the " Niebelungen f,ied " (it is to be regretted that somo of the scholars of Europe do not get hold of these stories and investigate them), the voyages of Rongomatano, or the sorceries of Ilnie nui to Po. These may be meie myths, but are, for all that, strongly suggestive of some ancient connection between these Maoris (as Maoris they call themselves all the copper coloured races of the Pacific) and some of the peoples of the old world ; but the°e questions ho within the domain of legitimate inquiry. From whence came the builders of pyramids so enormous as those which are (or were) to he found in the vSociety Islands ? Who were those white men of whom they spoko as having come to them from the rising snn ? What men put up that iron cross on Taravau with the monogram of the King of Spain upon it ? From whence came that ram which Cook found on Bora Bora ? There is something worth knowing at the bottom of all this, if one could only get at the truth. Ay ! but truth is bo hard 'o get at, as we have a notablo instanco in the case of the mutiny of the ' Bounty' — a story so well known to the world that one would have thought it altogether disposed of. But hero we have now, more than 80 years after, a new history of that affair, published with evidence so reliable that wo find tho leading newspapers of Great Britain lauding the mommy of Fletcher j Christian as "an unfortunate, brave, and honourable nr>an," and lamenting that Captain Bhgh "should have ever afterwards been permitted to hold his Majesty's commission, instead of being held up to universal contempt." Tiuly Time is tho great avenger, and seta many a man's memory right before posteiity ; but if that is any adrantage to the dead man is not so obvioua. Then followed the arrival of the first missionaries from Europe, who, like the traveller in the Gospel, "foil among ■ thieves " by the way, from whoso hands the Emperor Napoleon (piemier) did generously release them, bidding them God speed on the good work j upon which they were engaged, and to whom they rendered that amount of gratitude which might fiom them be reasonably expected. After this succeeded the long wars of Pomare the Gieat (?) of which it is a pity that tho world does not know more, as the recital of them would materially support the aphousm that "Jesuitism is not confined to Homo " Let us not despise the day of small things, there is a useful lesson to be gained even out of the politics of Lilhput — and there were #reat men who came to the surface in those days : Joe, the armourer, who first fixed a cannon upon a slido between two double canoes ; and Robeits, who had once been a clerk in Cox and Greenwood's, who was the King's ministor ; and Kipole, the Captain of tho Guard Ah, one should have spen those things, or have heard them from tho lipa of those who passed through it all, as I have hoard ! These were stirring times. None tho less so when the young Queen came to wear the maro, "Lallcine des Gabiers," she who is Queen even now, though a pensioner of France— tin old woman with wrinkled cheeks and a scarlet, gown. She is not much to look at now, but many men in times past have taken their lives in their hands to do her a service, and I do not anppose since the days of Chastelard there liyed a woman about whom more lies have been told. She was a woman who, as she never failed to make friends, never forgot them, and aho had many brave and clerer men. Captains Hunter, and Henry, Middleton, Moerenhout, the Baron de Thierry— but Bhe had one evil geniuB whose name was Pritchard, who took upon himself the office of her political adviser, and embroiling her ia a quarrel with the Jesuits caused her Kingdom to be taken from under her feet. I have said this much concerning Tahiti for tho reason that it is the longest known to us of any of the islands inhabited by tho Maori race. The immediate cause of its annexation by a European State was tho mismanagement of a man who had virtually usurped to lumsolf the supremo power on the place and who was destituto of commercial or political experience. That which did so happen to tho Tahitians is an example ( with variations of the modus operandi ) of what must eventually happen to ovory other island of the Pacific — to wit an epitome of tho manifest destiny of all Polynesia.

The Co man fio\ eminent lias infoi inert the l.wlies of Atasiuc ami f,oii;uiic tli.it the )notliors and Iovcih of Midi ot tluin as au- most Miilcnt in then- (loinonstiatioiis of hostility to < <u many will bo scleetcrt. to serve 111 tJiu ( lei - man aiiny I if i; I'JHLOSOI'HY OF TUtr^H.— Hhiikpsjieiu' wild km w ill (inalit)L-. with a learned hplrit of limn in dealing riit'ly omiU an oiiportunitj of indn«itini{how thoiomjhlv lie understood tlio }>litlosnpliv of ilothin^ ' The apparel," he sa\% "oft piodainis the man " Thouifli the famrAis Lord Chcsterlldrt, the antlioi of tlu well known " Letters to lm Son," was not \ (iio it K'Miius 01 i profound philosopher, lie was a sini,'iilirlj in in of the world, and was uull fitted to otloi nl\ k o on tliis mliject. " I confess," lie says, " th.it I i mnot hplp foinung some opinion of a mini's m nsu and (h.umtei from his dress, and I beliiit most people <lo so as well as myself " Heghes cxt. Mint instructions to his son: "Take caro aUva>a," hi'si\i, " that vour clothes »ro well made and fit \nn, f"i otlii'iwise they will give you an awkward an " The foregoing lemarkH on the philosophy of dress ire <id mirahle, but they require to be supplemented with tin 1 following piece of practical advice : f*t> to m i n Cikimbps, the well-known Tailor and Outlittci of tin Citv Clothing Mart, No. 80, Queen street and IIikIibtreet, Auckland, also of Albert street, Oiahamstown, who supplies every description of clothing ready nude oi made to measure, for adults and juveniles of all claws and who ofFcis to his customers the riie <om lunation of excellence m material and woiknuinship, lie nenot dcsipns, and unjinralkkd Oil.i|iiilss — Am ] OOh'FKK '— Hrown Barrett, and Co 's standard Coffee Is both delicious and strong: Tkown, Karrett, and Co '» Excelsior Coffee desorves preferencs to any Coffoe on »ccount of puuty and distinctness of flavour Note th« brsndi ! Sold »t Almost every Qrocory EitablShment in Town and Provlno*-.— {Adt )