RUINED BY CLOTHES

Greymouth Evening Star, 5 December 1929, Page 8

RUINED BY CLOTHES

ISLANDERS’ “LIFE OF EASE.” LONDON, October 2. Mr Robert Gibbings, a young artist who has just returned to England after four months’ work in the South Sea Islands, states that the enforced wearing of clothes and a life of ease has sapped the strength of the natives there. He told a reporter: “They used to be strong men with an average height of 6ft 2in. Now they are all dying of consumption. They sit in their houses ; and do nothing. Our habits have ruined .them. One magnificent valley noted for its 5000 strong and healthy inhabitants 20 years ago is now absolutely deserted.” Mr Gibbings states that he has discovered three new’ letters written by Paul Gauguin, the famous French PpstImpresisonist painter, who died of starvation in one of the Isles in 1903. They had apparently been found beside his body. . Gauguin, whose pictures now sell at more than £lOOO each, had waged a fierce war by letters with the French Government on behalf of the natives.