A.—3b

18

proportion of land capable of being utilized for agricultural purposes. They have been since 1842 regarded as belonging to France ; but 1 believe that since 1859 that nation has abandoned all claim to them, beyond tho right of protecting the Catholic missions there established, and has withdrawn the small garrison which for a time it maintained. French colonization in Oceanica, whether in the Marquesas or elsewhere, does not appear to have produced any useful result. They seem to confine themselves to the building of a barracks, an arsenal, a prison for the lodgment of military or political offenders, a landing quay and some fortifications by the labour of those unfortunates, a custom-house for the levying of exorbitant duties upon necessary importations, a Jesuit mission, and a congeries of low grog-shanties. The whole may be summed up in a few words : —" Casernes, conciergerie, bureau maritime, mission, cafe, salon de billiards, voila tout." The result is indolence, demoralization, stagnation ; complaints of oppression on the part of the indigenes, eternal squabbles and intrigues among the officials ; expensive public works, in a few years abandoned to irreparable decay; wharfs washed aw ray by the sea, gridirons (for shipping) and machinery rusted and disabled, cannon slides and shot piles undermined by the land crabs until they almost disappear under the surface of the soil; churches half erected, then forsaken and overgrown with jungle ; and a community of idle, dejected, discontented, absinthe-drinking roues, whose only object in life seems to be to kill the time until the arrival of that year of jubilee which shall bring the welcome transport that shall restore them to La Belle France. The population of the Marquesas is supposed to be not more than 12,000, of whom about one-half are upon Dominica (or Hivaod). This island is the most fertile of the group, if there be any difference in that respect, for the soil of the whole of them is most productive. As Sir Edward Belcher says, " Every inch upon which vegetation can find a hold is covered with it." Dominica is twenty miles long by about seven miles broad. There are many harbours, but the best is on the N.AV. called by whalers Haunamanu. Here is a large settlement, as there are considerable ones in every harbour, the island being populous. These people are very handsome, of great stature and fine features, with a very light complexion, but very much tattooed. They are very loose in their morals, and given to drink. They make toddy from the cocoa palm, and live in a chronic state of muddle. They have muskets, but are civil to strangers, and might be made a good people if they could be kept sober. There are European beachcombers on the island, who, as a rule, drink very much, and have large families of half-bred children—splendid creatures to look at, but of degraded habits. There are also some Jesuit missionaries, who have not succeeded in converting any one, but have done very well in planting cotton. The whole island is like a great garden gone to waste. The principal mission in the group is on Roapoa, a very beautiful and productive island, not much frequented, but having more than 1,000 inhabitants, living chiefly on the west side, which is not so precipitous as the other, and has much fine sloping land, as well as secure harbours. Nukuhiva is the main island, and by its name the whole group is known to the other Polynesians. It is about twenty miles long by ten miles broad. Like the others it is inexhaustibly fertile. It was formerly very populous, but the people have been almost exterminated by drunkenness and war among themselves since tho introduction of firearms. There are said to be not more than 2,000 inhabitants remaining. Here in a bay, called Port Anna Maria, was the French military establishment ; but the buildings are now in ruins, the wharfs washed away, and the garrison removed, all but some three or four gensdarmes and a pilot, and I believe they only remain because they have native wives, and do not want to leave them. Hakaui, to the west of Port Anna Maria, is a great land-locked harbour, with a narrow entrance, only 200 yards wide, but very deep. It is one of the most beautiful sites for settlement in the whole world; a man who has seen it once can never forget it. But there is nothing here except all manner of tropical vegetables and fruits growing wild, a village of grass huts, and a couple of hundred debauched and drunken savages. The Austral Isles, which lie southward of the Society Group, are especially adapted to European settlement, inasmuch as, from their latitude, they possess a temperature in which European products are readily acclimatised, together with tropical vegetables. They extend from the neighbourhood of tho tropic of Capricorn to 27° south. They consist of five islands—Eapa, Baivavai, Tubuai, Eurutu, and Eimatara. They average from fifteen to twenty-five miles in circuit each, Eapa being the largest, and they contain altogether about 3,000 inhabitants, who seem as though dying out since the introduction of European habits of clothing and living, which have evidently exercised a pernicious influence upon their constitutions. Forty years ago, these islands were very populous; in a few years, they must be uninhabited, unless people be introduced from elsewhere. The climate of these isles is most delightful, as, though bordering on the tropic, the thermometer does not show more than from 75° to 80° during the greatest heat of the whole year. For nine months of the year, the wind blows from the S.E. and from the westward for the remainder. They are all volcanic, consisting chiefly of ashes, decomposed tufas, and vegetable mould; consequently they are wonderfully fertile. Eapa (which is the most barren) is a very productive island; and Tubuai, which is called the best, is spoken of even in Tahiti as "the garden of the South Sea." Ido not know whether the French profess to include any of the Austral Isles under their protectorate excepting Eapa, which was taken possession of by the vessel of war " Latouche Treville," in 1867, in consequence of the Panama Mail Company having selected it as a coaling station, for which purpose its very fine harbour was used until that service was discontinued. All the natives of the Austral Group profess the Protestant religion. They are inoffensive, hospitable, and intelligent; they can all, I believe, read and write, and display an extravagant affection for the English, all their teachers having been trained in English mission schools. They were proselytes of the famous John Williams. They dislike the French beyond measure —a prejudice no doubt due to their sectarian training. But their islands could be purchased (as far as the will of the islanders is concerned) by English capitalists for a comparatively trifling amount, and it is possible that the French might not desire to interfere with any such arrangement, as they do not derive any revenue from the Austral Isles, neither have they much connection with them, excepting that a few