THE HINDU IN FIJI.

Grey River Argus, 12 July 1922, Page 6

THE HINDU IN FIJI.

“DISGRACE TO BRITISH COMMERCE.” (Hector Bolitho in “The Observer.”) In view of Mr Sastri's visit, it. may be remarked that the Indians deserve consideration. Mr Bolitho writes:— Jndia has sent out a deputation to inquire into the long drawn out unhappiness of the Hindu in Fiji. You can leave Suva by launch on a hot, vivid morning, when the sunshine descends, and, like Midas, edges sea and land and trees with- brilliant gold. The boat drifts along the coast, touching in at little native settlements, and arrives at Navua, where years of sugar-cane have fed the mills and markets. It is here that you find the little dark man, the flotsam of Bombay hovels, growing sugar-cane, cutting it down, jabbering, living in faith, stealing his neighbour’s wife, hoarding sovereigns, and ignoring the appeal of the splendid tropical scenery amid whiah he lives in unhappy squalor. Navua is built on the banks of a river, and you arrive in the town in time for lunch. Rows of Hindu women will smile and chatter at you, with their little brown toes buried in the hot sands. Their noses are weighted with gold, and sovereigns are clamped itogether ami hung around their necks. The Hindu will not use a savings bank, so he hangs his wealth about his wife's neck, thus displaying a degree nf faith and trust which is hard to niderstand when you see the miserable little women, wizened and draped in gaudy silk. The immense plantations lie on the other side of the river, and you cross in a ferry ami travel through the vast acres of sugar-cane on a trolly, poled by two Hindus. When you meet the sugartrain, you jump off the trolly and the Hindus lift it to one side until the train passes. Then you resume your journey. The Hindus live amid the cane. Their dirty little houses are a disgrace to British commerce. They crawl into shadowy kennels, which are so dilapidated that they would fall in if it were not for the strong smell which, it is said, holds them up. In a corner there is a hole in the ground. Here you may find an earth-

enware jar half full of sovereigns and covered with the leg of an old pair of trousers, When the wife’s neck is loaded, then the jar is used—but never the white man's bank. Sometimes you see a circle of sticks in the ground with one tall pole rising 15 feet in the air. A red rag flies at the top to keep the devil away from the grave underneath. The women arc tragic, to see. One may have, her ear missing. She wandered from the family hearth for a few weeks. Her husband cut off her [ ear and took her back when the charm | of the change had faded. Even in Fiji you find the inevitable triangle. The cane waves everywhere. It | spreads across the great plains to the | foot of the hills. Far away you can I see Namosi rising to the clouds. But

you cannot forget the cluster of dirty | hovels, the thin dark figures of the i Hindus, threading their way amid the | cane, with brown backs bent to the cutting and the glint of sunlight on their steel knives. A frail old woman will hurry past with a burden twice her size on her head. Little Hindu children, whose parentage is one of the great unsolved mysteries, stare silently at you as the little truck rattles along the rails. Some of the Hindus save their money j and buy shops. But many of them live I on and on, with nobody to lead them . from their slough of dirt and bondage. ' Only those who have travelled along ■ in one of the little trucks and have j seen the pathetic monotony to which ! these unfortunate, unmoral, spiritless beings are sentenced, can feel for them. Fiji’s tragedy is psychological. It will take an inspired man to interpret the depth and mystery of the Hindu mind to white people, who are really anxious to end the regime of intolerance which has been the stonewall in Fiji’s story.