A MODERN ROBINSON CRUSOE. ON SUWARROW ISLAND. AN INTERESTING ISLAND INCIDENT.

Te Aroha News, Volume VI, Issue 370, 22 May 1889, Page 3

A MODERN ROBINSON CRUSOE. ON SUW ARROW ISLAND. AN INTERESTING ISLAND INCIDENT.

A vuw days ago we published a detailed account; and history of tho Suwarrow atoll, the latest addition to British annexations in the Pacific, lying between Samoa and the Marquesas Group. An episode connected with the island, which occurred shortly before its occupation fourteen years ago by the Auckland trading firm of Messrs Henderson and Macfarlane, may prove interesting, as , the matter was hardly taken notice of at the time. It is one of thoso strange and enthralling " Talcs of the Sea " of adventure and privation which occasionally come to the ears of the humdrum work-a-day world from the most unlikely and out-of-the-way spots of the globe. The sunny waters and coral, islets of the wide Pacific, especially, have been the scenes of many a queer and almost incredible exploit, and still anon some tale of romantic but rather unpleasant experience of castawaye on desert atolls of the South Seas is brought to our ears. This narrative runs that about the end of the year 1873 an American schooner cruising amongst the Pacific groups collecting pearl shell, copra, beche-de-mer, etc., and trading with the natives for tropical productions, arrived oil Suwarrow, and the captain decided to make for an anchorage in tho lagoon and ascertain what there was to be found in the place, which was then almost unknown to island traders. Entering the only harbour channel with safety, and anchoring in the placid waters of the lagoon, the attention of those on board was attracted by signals made by people on shore to attract the notico of the schooner. On landing, the master found the only inj habitants to be an American master mariner, Captain Chave, and a Kanaka from Penrhyn Island, some hundreds of miJes to the northward of Suwarrow. They had a strange story to tell those on board the pchooner, whom they greeted effusively as thoir rescuers from a life of enforced isolation and. privation which had evidently told greatly on them physically. Captain Chave related that they had been cast away on the island for twsnty months, and must have experienced all the advantages and disadvantages of an ideal Robinson Crusoelife. About two years previously in 1871, he had set out alone from the small island of Staarbuck, some seven hundred miles to the northward, well known for its large guano deposits (of the workings of which he had charge on behalf of the owning London guano importing firm), in a small, flat-bottomed sailing-boat, the only available craft, intending to make his way to another guano islet, Maiden Island, some two or three hundred miles further north. His frail craft, however, soon after leaving land was driven out of its course by adverse weather, and after some days drifted to shore at Penrhyn Island, a fertile atoll to the eastward of Staarbuck, thickly inhabited by natives. Here he persuaded a native to join him in his little vessel — shipped him as "crew," in fact — in order to proceed North to Maiden Island, or, if that were impossible, to go back to Staarbuck Island. They left in due time, but again the fates were unpropitious, and they drifted southward for days whither they knew not, until they sighted a low atoll, with an extensive encircling coral reel, which proved to be Suwarrow, hundreds of miles from their destination. They made for the shore, but were cast by the tremendous breakers on the reef, losing their boat, but " managing to struggle safely 'to dry land on the small sandbank opposite the principal island of Suwarrow, known as Home Island, from which they were divided by the entrance to the lagoon from the ocean outside. Plainly they could not remain on the desolate sandbank and live, so they soon decided to swim the perilous channel to the sheltered islet beyond, andplungingin, they gained the other beach safely, miraculously escaping the swarming, ravenous sharks which infested the channel. On the main island, only 240 acres in extent, they managed to exist for twenty long months, eking out a rather scanty subsistence on fish and birds, obtained only by laborious exertions, and land crabs and a few cocoanuts. They lived an intensely monotonous life on their little ocean domain, " with none their right to dispute," for, like the historic Alexander Selkirk, "From the centre all round to the &ea, they were lords of the foul and the brute " — or rather the crabs and the little piscine creatures of the lagoon, for nary a brute of a quadruped was there to be found on the whole ',' kingdom " bar themselves. In spite of their pride of ownership and the existence of food, and sufficient water in the sands to be obtained by digging, they felt their isolated life grow very tedious, and would not unlikely have " potted " each other — only they possessed nothing in the firearm line — out of sheer ennui had not they been picked up by a vessel in time. At last after weary months of searching the horizon for the welcome sight of a White sail looming up, they descried one fine morning the cruising schooner bearing down on the island, and, as may be imagined, they showered all sorts of blessings — not sea blessings on this occasion — on their Yankee rescuer. They were taken on board, and Captain Chave eventually reached Honolulu in safety, not being strongly enamoured of another boat cruise to Maiden Island. He is now engaged trading in a vessel on the Californian coast, and only a year or so ago passed through Auckland en route from Sydney to San 'Francisco. His experience of Suwarrow was not a particularly lively one.

H. M. Reeves won the Quarter-Mile Championship of the Amateur Athletic Association at the South Canterbury sport? in 52 seconds. Four started. The long jump championship was decided at the same meeting and was won by Mr Cuff, but the paper I received my information from did not see fie to publish the distance covered. An English amateur cricket team goes out to India this coming season. The tourists will include Lord Hawke, G. F. Vernon, J. (J. Walker, A. B. Leatham, J. H. Hornby, H. E. llhodes, Beaumont, Nesbitt, H. W. Forster, and F. L. Shand. The Parsees have already visited England twice, so it is time the English gentlemen gave them a turn. The * Irish Cyclist ' claims that a Belfast firm have invented a contrivance which fairly conquers vibration. It consists of a hollow tyre which not only answers the purpose, but also wears much longer than those in ordinary use. The ' Irish Cyclist,' however, does not inform us of the size of the new tyre. I should think it would have to be pretty thick to be of any real service, A Mr Field, a cyclist of Nelson, arrived on Sunday week from there by steamer and started overland for Wellington via the Hob Lakes on Tuesday evening last through the Waikato. He is an excellent rider and , has previously toured the South Island from i Nelson to Dunodin, and at one time held the 24 hour record for New Zealand. Ho rides a 50 inch NewKapid bicycle ordinary. He is a son of Mr Field, of Wilkins and Field, of Nelson. Mr Field has done more than anybody else to introduce the safety | machines into the colony.