Lovely Makogai.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18959, 4 January 1930, Page 21 (Supplement)

Lovely Makogai .

(CONTINUED FROM PAGE 19). Cricket and Sailing. Besides cricket and swimming, the favourite sport of the male patients of the island is sailing model yachts. These yachts built in varying forms from that of a full rigged ship to a sailing canoe are often almost big enough to carry a man and are built and tended with the greatest care. They are sailed in the lagoon and almost continuously the races go on. When the writer visited the island, in the middle of last year, there were three w'hite patients at the asylum. They were happy enough, but felt very keenly their disfigurement, although it was slight by comparison with some of the native cases. These three whites have got the natives tremendously interested in cricket, and many matches are played with the earnestness of a Test of world importance. One of the Europeans has been engaged in the last three years on building a speed boat. He is a qualified boat builder, and is taking enormous trouble over his ship. He explained that to keep himself occupied, he constantly remodels the boat, on lines suggested by the various periodicals he is sent. He could have finished it in a few .months, but finds the constant work keeps his mind from brooding. Island Babies. There are sometimes babies born on Makogai by some special dispensation of providence free from the scourge that curses their parents. These little ones are immediately segregated, and are brought up by the sisters. Many leave the island with their parents, who have been cured, but in any case, they do not worry, as they are probably better looked after than the3 r would be in their own homes, and they also get schooling. In charge of the island as medical superintendent, and, incidentally, Magistrate, there is a charming Canadian. Dr E. A. Neff, who has devoted a great deal of time to research into the disease. He is on the track of a subextract from the oil of a native Fijian nut, dilo, which rejoices in the botanical name of “Calophyllum inophyllum”. Dr Neff has hopes that this extract will be even more effective against leprosy than chaulmoogra oil. Makogai is a most impressive settlement in its astounding optimism. The greatest curse of the islands is intensified there by concentration, but in the face of this, patients and staff are happy, all believing that their release from bondage is assured.