GREAT ENDURANCE

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22393, 14 April 1936, Page 10

GREAT ENDURANCE

BOAT SWAMPED IN STORM ■ FOUR TERRIBLE DAYS SPENT [from our own correspondent] SUVA. April 7 Instances of the endurance of Fijians in the water are numerous, but somewhat unusual features are attached to the story of an elderly Fijian woman who was reported as navmp been lost at sea on a recent Saturday and who was discovered four days later on a lonely reef some lis';aneo from the shore. The woman, accompanied by her small grandson, was crossing Lauthala Bay/ near Suva, during a storm, and it is presumed that their small boat was upset in a squall, for no further trace of them was seen. On the assumption that they had been drowned parties of Fijians searched the beaches in hopes of finding the bodies. Four days later men from another tribe were fishing near a distant reef when they saw a stratig figure waving to them. It proved to be the missing woman. She had either lost or discarded her clothing, and had covered herself to a certain extent with seaweed. On seeing the strange figure the Fijians at first thought that it was a tevora (devil) and were reluctant to approach her, but finally did so. The woman was past speaking and she had been badly scratched and torn, presumably in her endeavours to climb on to the exposed reef in tlio rough sea. How long she had been in the water she could not tell, but it was apparent that she had been either in the water or on the reef, over which the sea broke at high tide, for at least four days. She was taken to .i near by village where she was cared for until she was in a lit state to return to her own village. The woman then explained that they had been carried out across the bay and on the following day the small boat had been swamped by a heavy sea and the boy at once disappeared. After a long time in the heavy sea she managed to reach the reef where sho remained until found four days later.