PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN THE SOUTH SEAS

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXVII, Issue 37, 14 September 1899, Page 3

PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN THE SOUTH SEAS

CARDINAL MORAN ON THE SITUATION IN THE

TONGAN ARCHIPELAGO.

The following letter by his Eminence Cardinal Moran on Protestant missions in the Tongan Archipelago appeared recently in the Sydney newspapers : — The Tongan Archipelago has been casually referred to in a former letter. This interesting group merits a more special mention. The Countess of Jersey, writing in the Nineteenth Century for January, 1893, tells of the rapture with which she gazed on the placid waters that encompass those coral islands. ' There are days,' she thus writes, ' which stand out from all others as those which have given us the supreme joy of a new sensation — days which have taught us the delight to be won from some perfection in Nature or art hitherto unrealised. Such a day must surely dawn on anyone who sees for the first time the glory of the sea which girdles the coral islands of the South Pacific. As the Norddeutscher Lloyd 6.8. Lubeck steamed through the hundred isles and islets which make up the Tongan group, a day-dream of pure colour glowing beneath a tropical sun unfolded itself before our delighted eyep. The low shores covered with graceful cocoanut palm-trees seemed to float, not in a real ocean, but in melted jewels, or in rainbow rivers whose waters flowed into each other, changing every instant, so that a surface at one minute sapphire was at the next of a transparent green, or again of a deep amethyst tending to crimson, or of torquoise blue in a silver setting. Th 3 vivid hues were such as we had never seen before save in the tail of a peacock or in the plumage of a humming-bird or bird of paradise ; now they were spread before us in waves of splendour, which neither poet nor artist could ever capture or recall. The little toilers whose reefs now destroy ships and now create fresh dwelling-places for man, at least endow the world with a heritage of beauty by building reflectors in the deep, which catch the sunbeams as they fall through the seas and send back visions born of coral, light, and water.'

Some islands of the group are subject to volcanic eruptions and earthquakes. During one of the&e disturbances about 1855 a new island of considerable size arose from the waters. Wesley an ism was at this time quite triumphant at Tonga, and the name John Weßley was with due solemnity allotted to the new island. Soon after the christening, however, the island disappeared again in the waters as suddenly as it had arisen.

AN UNSUCCESSFUL BEGINNING.

A detachment from the missionary staff of the Duff at the close of last century were the first to engage on th« mission field at Tonga. The best friends of Protestant missionary enterprise confess that instead of blessing they brought scandal to the savage natives. Rev. Mr. Aikman, in his Encyclopaedia of the Protestant Minions, writes : ' The first work of these brethren was attended with deep pain, in excluding one of their number for gross immorality. The wretched man went from evil to evil, until he discarded all profession, and disowned the Sabbath, the sanctuary, and the Bible.' After a few years the whole mission ended in fiasco, and the survivors of the missionary band chose a home for themselves in New South Wales. Mr. King assures us that some of them befl| <te afterwards useful citizens in Australia. Of this 1 have no doTßii, but it is no less true that they did not win their laurels on the mission fields of the South Seas. In 1822, Rev. Walter Lawry, as representative of the Wesleyans, landed at Tonga. The history of his mission states that ' he was accompanied by two or three mechanics, and he took with him a number of horned cattle and sheep, which were presented by the Governor of New South Wales, in the hope of their breeding in the island. He also carried with him Indian corn, wheat, peas, beans, oabbages, potatoes, turnips, melons, and various other garden seeds with a view to their cultivation.' He attested that the natives were most willing to receive any gifts that he presented to them, but paid no heed to his preaching. Finding that no success attended his mission, he quitted this mission field in the following year. Rev. Mr. Thomas and other Wesley an missionaries were more successful when they landed at Tonga in 182(5. In fact the scene had now entirely changed. The young chief of Lifuka, who was endowed with singular energy, was resolved to subjugate the other

local chiefs to his rule and to become King of the whole Tongan group. He saw the advantage that would accrue to him from the friendship of the missionaries, and he hastened to identify his oause with theirs. At Baptism he took the name of George, and his wife was named Charlotte. He gradually subjugated all the Tonga Islands and made Nukualofa his capital, where for well-nigh half a century he ruled over the whole group as King George the First of Tonga. It was under the mask of Weßleyaniem that he carried on his wars, but as we will just now see, very little of the spirit of religion was shown in his method of warfare. Having secured the Kingship, which was the great object of his ambition, be allowed the Wesleyan missionaries to hold the practical control of affairs throughout his island territory.

CIVIL AND RELIGIOUS ORDINANCES.

Prominent among those missionaries was the Rev. Shirley Baker, who for more than 20 years, till his enforced departure from Tonga ;in 1890, may be said to have been supreme in both Churoh and State. Under this Weeleyan administration a number of civil and religious ordinances were enacted, prominent amongst them being the sanction of divorce. Small as was the population of the kingdom, as many as 200 divorces were granted in one year. Heavy fines of £12, £15, and even £20 were imposed for the slightest infraction of the Wesleyan laws. In those early days the missionaries enjoyed a monopoly of English cottons and oiher similar goods, and nothing was left undone to ensure a profitable result. All were obliged to wear a sufficient measure of dress whilst assisting at the religious service, but the native tape 1 , woven from the fibre or bark of tiees, was forbidden. By special edict it was commanded that under penalty of £100 all the native tapes were to be consigned to the fire on or before the Ist January, 1876. The simplest amusements were forbidden ; public confession of faults was commanded ; and all such faults were to be severely punished at times with stripes, at times by burning and mark with a red-hot iron on the flesh, more frequently by forced labour, or by compelling the natives to act in the menial capacity of carrying, on their backs, the missionaries or their wives and children.

In the meantime everything did not proceed smoothly for Rev. Shirley Baker. Whilst the administration of affairs was in bis hands, some disorders were reported at headquarters in London, and an order was issued removing him from office. He visited Sydney, however, and matters being satisfactorily arranged, he was reinstated by the Australian Board of Management in his former position. After a time, however, he was dissatisfied with the way that religious affairs were being carried on in Tonga, and he accordingly assumed the role of church-reformer. He easily obtained King George's approval that Wesleyanism would be recognised as the religion of the State of Tonga, and furthermore that they would sever all connection with the Wesleyan Boards of London or Australia, and form a self-governing communion, to be known as the Free Church. As was to be expected, thof-e Reforming religious measures did not find favour with all his Wesleyan co-religionists in Tonga. Though the newly-created Church was in name at least proclaimed to be Free, every effort was made by the King and by Baker, who was now appointed Prime Minister, to force attendance at the Free Church service, and to compel the natives to adopt the formed lotu. Many of the Wesleyan ministers were indignant at the hostile proceedings of their reforming brother, and a considerable number of their congregations followed them. Rival Wesleyan Churches were now set up side by side As service was held at the same hour, every effort was made by the preacher in one pulpit to drown the voice of his opponent in the adjoining church ; if bis own strong voice did not suffice, the ringing of bells, and singing of the natives, and other inharmonious noises were availed of. So bitter was the feeling stirred up by this irreligious rivalry that an attempt was made on Mr. Baker's life ; and by way of requital six native Wesleyans of the older communion were sentenced to death and several others were deported to Fiji. The British Government felt constrained at length to interfere.

A WHOLE CABINET IN HIMSELF.

Lieutenant Baden-Powell, who visited the islands about this time, presents a vivid sketch of the close of Rev. Mr. Baker's career (In Savage Ides and Settled Lands, by B. F. S. Baden-Powell. London, 1892). He found, he says, in Tonga two rival Wesleyan Churches, which had their origin in the jealousies among the missionaries themselves. He adds : ' The Rev. Shirley W. Baker, who was probably chiefly responsible for this state of things, is one of the best-known men in connection with Tonga. He started as a Wesleyan missionary many years ago. He rose in the favour of the King, till finally he was made Premier of Tonga, resigned his missionaryship, and started a Free Church in opposition. But he was not content with this ; he was soon able to assume other offices as well. At the time of his enforced retirement he united in himself the offices of Auditor-General, Agent-General, Minister of Foreign Affairs, Minister for Land?, Minister for Education, President of the Court of Appeal, and Judge of the Land Court, and in one or other of these capacities he alone had the exclusive control and knowledge of the finances of the country. The Treasury funds were wisely invested into the Bank of New Zealand, and, as AgentGeneral, he had the sole control of the&e foreign-invested funds. He, with his family, had quarters in the King's palace, or rather the King was allowed one room, the Premier occupying the rest of the house. He lived well and kept his public accounts carefully.' Mr. Powell gives a few specimen items of these accounts as follows :— 'Police uniforms, hardware, Parliamentary expenses, tanks, medicines, building materials, etc., £769 6a 21. ' Freight, £700 19s sd. 1 Articles in a Colonial newspaper, on the Government of Tonga (very favourable to Mr. Baker), £50.' And the writer adds : ' Certain other expenses were entered in the books, which, although personal, might reasonably be charged to public funds.' Among these were cab-hire on a visit to Auck*

land (£46) ; annual subscription to the club in Auckland ; photo graphs of Mr. Baker ' in order that the nation at large should be > able to see what kind of a man they had as chief Civil servant.' The British Government at length interfered ; 'all pleasures must have their end, and the greatest of men will sometimes fall. One fine day an English man-of-war arrived at Nukualofa, having on board the High Commissioner of the Pacific. . . . Within a day or two Mr. Baker left Tonga, with pretty clear instructions as to what course would be taken should he again visit his old home. Poor man 1 It is hard, indeed, to be turned out of house and home (even though it be another's house), and to be deprived of such a privilege as utilising the moneys lying idle in the Tongan Treasury ' (p. 325). How things were even as late as 1892 is thus told by Mr. Powell : ' The Wesleyan and the Free Churches stand side by side in rivalry not far from the palace (in Nukualofa). At times open hostilities are carried on between these two by means of loud and prolonged bell-ringing during one another's services.' This rivalry of the Wesleyan parties still continues, but by royal edict the unseemly pulpit Btrife has in part been remedied, as the contending churches are obliged to hold their respective services at different hours.

A CONTRAST.

It is not necessary to dwell upon the results of all this contention as regards religion on the native mind. I will cite only the words of Mr. Louis Becke, whose writirgs on the Islands of the Pacific have received widespread attention. In an interview with the London Chronicle reporter in September, 1896, he was asked : ' The islands are practically missionaries' colonies, are they not 7' He replied : ' Yes, they are, unfortunately. I use the word unfortunately advisedly, for (Wesleyan) Christianity, especially in Tonga, has changed a fine, war-like race into a sort of oily, grovelling hypocrites. Of course there are missionaries and missionaries, and the individual in these elements is everything. The Roman C.ttholic priests do magnificent work.' The statement here made regarding the Catholic missionaries is confirmed by one of our Australian writers in his Modern Buccaneer (London, 1894), in which he relates :

' At the Marist Mission at Tongatabu I was received most kindly by the venerable Father Chevron, the head of the Church in Tonga. His had been a life truly remarkable. For 50 years he had laboured unceasingly among the savage races of Polynesia, had had hairbreadth escapes, and passed through deadliest perils. Like many of his colleagues, he was unknown to fame, dying a few years later, beloved and respected by all, yet comparatively unhonoured and unsung. During the whole course of my experiences in the Pacific I have never heard the roughest trader speak an ill word of the Marist Fathers. Their lives of ceaseless toil and honourable poverty tell their own tale. The Roman Catholic Church may well feel proud of these her most devoted servants. One morning Captain Robertson joined me ; the Father seemed pleased to see him. On my mentioning how kindly they had treated me, a stranger and a Protestant, he replied, ' Ay, ay, my lad ; they are different from most of the missionaries in Tonga, anyway, as many a shipwrecked sailor has found. If a ship were cast away, and the crew hadn't a biscuit apiece to keep them from starving, they wouldn't get so much aa a piece of yam from some of the reverend gentlemen.' The decay of the native population which has been remarked in the other Protestant missions holds good also of Tonga. The first Wesleyan missionaries reckoned the population of the three main groups of the Tongan Islands at 30,000. From the Statesman's Year Book for 1899 we learn that the latest census gives the total native population as 17,500. The Wesleyan adherents in 1876 were reckoned at 23,000 ; their number at present is reduced to about 13,000.

A RELIGIOUS WAR,

I would wish, however, in the present letter to call attention particularly to the violent means and cruel persecution to which the Weßleyans and other Protestant missionaries had recourse whilst they endeavoured to enforce their tenets in the Tongan and other islands-group of the Pacific.

There can be no question but that the Wesleyan lotu was forced on the natives by King George and his brother chiefs at the point of the sword. Von Kotzcbue, in his New Voyage Around the World, attests that the religious war was ragiug at the time of his visit, and he writes : ' The new religion was forcibly established, and whoever would not adopt it put to death. With the zeal for making proselytes, the rage of tigers took pos-ession of a people once so gentle.' He adds : ' The bloody peroecution instigated by the missionaries performed the office of a desolating infection.' A few years later the American Commodore Wilkes, in United States Exploring Expedition, attests that he fouDd at Tongatabu a religious war promoted by the Wesleyan missionaries : ' I was much surprised and struck (he says) with the indifference with which Mr. Babone (one of the missionaries) spoke of the war. He was evidently more inclined to have it continue than desirous that it should be put a stop to ; viewing it, in fact, as a means of propagating the gospel. I had little hopes of being instrumental in bringing about a peace, when such un-Christian views existed where it was least to be expected.' Rev. John Williams himself admits that his Wesleyan converts 'acted with great cruelty towards their enemies, hewing them in pieces while they were begging for mercy.' For instance, at Hoale a heroic resistance was made by a considerable body of natives. When the village at length surrendered all the survivors were put to the sword, and the victors amused themselves by throwing the infanta up in the air and catching them on their spears in their fall or hacking them to pieces with their axes.

The siege^of Pea by King George and bis Wesleyan followers presents perhaps the most singular episode in Tongan history. Pea was a populous and important township, and the adherents of the old pagan worship had concentrated their forces thei'e. Some escapees from Norfolk Island took an active part in strengthening its fortifications. The walls, arising to the height of 20 feet, were formed of the butts of cocoanut trees, and were several feet in

thickness. All the attacks of King George against the fortress were fruitless. Her Majesty's ship Favourite, commanded by Captain Croker, touched the island in 1841. The missionaries represented to him that their lives were in jeopardy from the attacks of the Pagan enemy, and that the only hope of peace for the island was to compel the surrender of Pea. He was further assured that a mere display of British force would be sufficient to assure success. lie accordingly landed a. considerable body of volunteers from his ship, and with a parade of three hundred pieces of cannon marched to the for.,. Ko enemy was to be seen, and not a nhot was fired from the walls till the officers with drawn swords reached the entrance to the fort. On a sudden a deadly volley was discharged. The captain and two officers were shot dead ; 19 men were dangerously wounded ; the rest fled, and the three pieces of cannon fell into the hands of the victors. Some yearß later Pea through treachery was seized by King George's troops and completely razed to the ground. Any natives that were found were put to death. It was only in 1861 that this enforcement of Wesleyanism by warfare was bright to an end in Tonga, when by the intervention of the British! Government and the presence of French frigates, religious toleration was made the law of the land.

The Tongan Wesleyans, however, had still a free hand to assist their brother converts in Fiji in enforcing the Wesleyan lotn throughout that island group. Several of the Fijian chiefs hod become Catholics, but being assailed by the united forces of Bau and Tonga, who were well supplied with muskets, they were one by one defeated and forced to apostatize. The cry of the victors everywhere was, accept WesUyanism or death.

ALL FOB THE SAKE OF RELIGION.

Mr. Pritchard, in his Polynesian Reminiscences (page 304 to 310), gives some instances of the persecution to which the native Catholics were thus subjected, instances, I may remark, which came under his own immediate observation. I cite his testimony as being: a witnesß in such a matter of unquestionable authority. He had held the office of British Consul at Samoa, and subsequently in Fiji, and, being himself a Protestant, had in many ways befriended the various Protestant missions. He gives in detail the story of Togitogi, a Fijian chief, as related by the sufferer in person in September, 1861. About 18 days before that date Togitogi and other minor chiefs were summoned before Semisi, who with an armed body of Tongans had come to Tamasua, in the Yawasi islands of the Fiji group. The following in abbreviated form is Togitogi's narrative : ' When we got to Tamasua, Semisi, the chief, Tui Bua, and the Tongan Wesleyan teacher, Maika, were sitting together waiting for us ; aad there were very many Tongans around them, and all armed. As soon as we were near Semisi, the Wesleyan teacher Maika pointed me out, and Semisi said : You are a bad man, Togitogi ; how is it that you do not follow that which is good 1 How is it that you do not follow Maika, the teacher ? You must be flogged. Then some Tongans put down their muskets and tied my hands behind me ; they tied my wrists and my elbows. Two Tongans held me, one one each side of me. Semisi said to me : You must throw away the lotu Katolika (the Catholic religion) and you must follow the religion of Maika the teacher (Wesleyanisin). As Semisi said this, a Tongan began flogging me with five piece of Walai (a creeping vine). I soon fainted and fell down. I do not know when they stopped flogging me ; but before I fainted, my blood was running down very much and spurted all about. My family tell me that when I fainted and fell down, I was lifted up and held up by the same men who had been holding me before, and that I was flogged while I was in a fainting state, and kicked about until my head hung down and they could not hold me up any longer. When I came round again, I was bleeding all over my back, and I felt the skin was off ; the skin was off my wrists, too, and the flesh was cut all over roy back and arms, The marks are on my back and my hands now ; you can see them yourself. When Semisi saw I was come around again, he said to me : You must obey Maika the teacher, you must throw away the lotu Katolika (Catholic religion), and follow the lotu dma (the true religion, Wesleyanism). Maika was all the time by the side of Semisi, and I heard him say : Togitogi must be flogged.' Two others were flogged at the same time. Togitogi added that if they escaped further suffering, they owed it to an Englishman named Hicks, who reproached Senjisi for his cruelty : ' You flog them (he said) because they are Catholics, and wou't follow Maika, the Tonga teacher, and give their land to the Tongans. It is prohibited for you to do this.' Semisi replied : ' These men make the land very bad, they do not obey us ; I want to make them all follow the true lotu (Wesleyanism). They are lotu Katolika (Catholics), they will not follow Maika, the true teacher.' Togitogi also said : 'If it had not been for Hicks, all the people who were Roman Catholics were to be flogged. Semisi said so. It wan through Maika only that we were flogged ; he told Semisi to flog us, and he wax angry with us because we were of another lotu. Ringa also was flogged. He wai| made to kneel, as we Roman Catholics do when we say our prayersji They then flogged him till he fainted. Then they held him up and flogged him again. He is a Roman Catholic. The marks of the flogging are on his back now.'

To this narrative Mr. Pritchard adds : ' Besides Togitogi, five others were flogged in the same heartless manner, and with precisely the same object. Semisi and Maika, the Wtsleyan teacher, consulted together, and the latter pointed out wh > wee the men to be flogged ; and unquestionably, but for the unexpected and bold interference of Hicks, whose English blood was routed by the insane cruelty of the man Semisi, very many more would have suffered. I, myself, saw the cuts on the poor fellows' backs, and horrible they looked. Though 18 days had elapsed, they were still unable to walk upright, and the pieces of vine with which they were so mercilessly lacerated still had erreat clots of blood hardened upon them. And all this Semifi and Maika the teacher did in the name and under the cloak of religion, and found defenders in Fiji and elsewhere.' Mr. Pritchard afterwards on meeting with Semisi reproached him with his cruelty. He coolly replied : ' How else can we make these heathen Fijians become Christians ? I did it all for the sake of religion. It

was all to make them Christiana.' And agaiu he repeated : 'It was all done to promote Christianity.'

PERSECUTION OF CATHOLICS IN HAWAII.

Referring to the hardships and suffering to which these Catholic natives in Fiji were subjected on account of their religion, leads back our thoughts to the Hawaiian group. I may remark that English and other Protestant residents gave repeated expression to their horror and indignation at the cruelty which was there exercised towards the Catholic natives. Captain Beechey, writing in 1831, attests that ' the system of religious restraint was alike obnoxious to the foreigners residing at Honolulu, and to the natives.' I take the following authentic statement of facts from the Supplement to the Sandwich I*land Mirror, of January 15, 1840 (printed and published at Honolulu), and reprinted in San Francisco in July, 1897. Three priests, one of them Rev. Mr. Short, an Irishman, landed at Honolulu in 1827. They were favourably received, and for a time the natives were allowed to nock to them fok instruction. After a few months the Protestant ministers became alarmed at their success, and in April, 1728, Rev. Messrs. Bingham, Clark, and Chamberlain got themselves appointed a Commission to inquire into the proceedings of those unwelcome visitors. As a result, a royal order was issued in 1829, prohibiting the natives from attending at Catholic worship or receiving instruction from the Catholic priests. The only Catholic chapel as yet erected was little better than a native hut, thatched with grass. A few of the more fervent natives, despite the prohibition continued to privately assemble there, but on the 7th January, 1830, an armed band invaded the unpretentious sanctuary and carried off to prison a few native converts that were praying there. Three of the most prominent of these converts were a little later ' summoned before an inquisitorial tribunal, and because they would not instantly renounce the religion they had embraced, were inhumanly beaten with a stick by a native high in authority, one of the most promising members of the Protestant Church.' In the month of March eight other natives were arrested and arraigned for embracing the Catholic re'igion : ' For this dreadful crime they were sentenced to the hard labour of cutting stones on the reef, where they were compelled to toil for more than six weeks, with no provision made for their food, and none allowed, except the scanty pittance they occasionally obtained from their friends ; and when at night they were suffered to seek rest, their limbs were confined by chains, in such uncomfortable positions that sleep was impossible.' Six native females were ' condemned at the same time for the same offence, and were sentenced to make each fifteen mats of six fathoms by five in dimension.' These females were kept in prison for several months, and one of them, Alokia Keluhonnanui, was so wasted by sickness and hardship that sh« ' expired with her young infant, about a month after she had obtained her freedom.' Another native convert, by name Anoloniko Kihawahine, a man noted for exemplary deportment and mild disposition, was subjected to special persecution for no other crime but his religion ; ' he was seized in a most barbarous manner, loaded with irons, and confined in a fort for the space of three months, with scarcely sufficient food to sustain nature, subjected to be kioked, spit upon, and abused by every unfeeling wretch who felt willing to display his temperament in acts of such brutal barbarity.' He was freed from this torture only to be punished anew with thirteen others, one of whom, Nanakea, was a blind man, 70 years of age. All of these, ' for not renouncing their faith in the Catholic creed, were compelled to labour as prisoners for eighteen long months, associated with criminals of the lowest order, in carrying stones to build the great wall at Waikiki.' Mr. Reynolds, an officer of the American frigate Patomac, in an account of his visit to Honolulu, states that he was filled with horror at seeing those natives thus treated, and he in particular refers to one of them, ' a woman who, carrying an infant on her back, was bearing large stones in her arms.' He added : 'this punishment was inflicted because they were Catholics, and would not change their religion for the missionaries at the Island.' In April, 1831, an order was given for the expulsion of the Catholic priests. An Englishman named Hill had at that time arrived at Honolulu. We are told of him that he ' immediately joined with the American missionaries in the hue and cry against the Catholic Church. This mendicant and impostor declared himself an agent of the English Episcopal Mission Society, and that he had come to these seas for the purpose of extending the blessings of Christianity.' He assumed the name of Lord Hill, and everything that malice could devise was done to poison the minds of the King - and ohiefs against the Catholics. The decree of banishment against the priests was carried out on Christmas Day, 1831, when they were put on board a ricketty old brig of 140 ton, and a month later they were landed on the coast of California, 'on a barren strand, with two bottles of water and one biscuit, and there left on the very boach r without even a tree or shrub to shelter them.'

TREATED AS SLAVES FOR CONSCIENCE SAKE.

It was only at the remonstrance of Commodore Downs, of the Potomac, that the natives, who had been for eighteen months treated as slaves ' for conference sake,' were released from bondage. The firmness of those sufferers for the faith led many other natives to auk for instruction in Catholic truth. In 1836 Protestant missionaries stirred up the Government to renewed efforts to extinguish every spark of Catholicity in the Islands. A well-instructed native named Kimione Paele and several others were seized and enslaved to what was known as the scavenger's task. Of Kimione Paele, the document from which I take the account of this persecution, writes : — ' He had not only to perform the office of scavenger, but was loaded with chains about the neck, the waist, and the legs ; he was beaten in the most cruel manner, kicked, trampled, and spit upon by the members of the Protestant Church, but more feelingly so by Mr. John J , a native, celebrated for his piety, who sought every opportunity and devised every means in his power to augment

the torture and suffering of this miserable man.' The wife of this Kimione was after a while also seized ' and condemned for being a Catholic, to labour with her husband at his filthy employment. At night they were chained together by the hand and the foot, with no place on which to rest but the cold eirth, and no' food to sustain nature but the offals rejected by prisoners.' What is meant by ' scavenger's work' is set forth in detail, as witnessed by the writer of the document. It is repulsive, but it shows to what extremes men pretending to liberality can push their malice when persecuting Catholics for their religion : ' They were compelled, for days and years, in the capacity of scavengers, daily with the scorching sun blazing upon their uncovered heads, with their naked and bare hands, to remove the exoremental filth, which was hourly accumulating in a public and exposed place, appropriate for the convenience of the soldiers and menials attached to the fort.' Of the same Kimione it is said that he was often so laiden with chains that his neck was brought in oontant with his knees. It is added: ' During all this period of protracted torture which these sufferers were constrained to endure, they were constantly subjected to insults and abuse the most unfeeling, and exposed to the open gaze of their merciless persecutors.'

Some priests who, in the meantime, had landed in Hawaii were, with the exception of one British subject, once more driven into banishment with every accompaniment of contumely. One of these, Rev. Mr. Bachelot, was in a dying condition when he was forcibly dragged on board the schooner. He expired at sea some days later, and his remains were interred at Ascension Island, where a monument was subsequently erected to mark his resting-place. The priests being thus banished, an ordinance, dictated by the Protestant missionaries, was published by the King on December the 18th, 1837, forbidding any priest or teacher of the Catholic faith evermore to set foot in his dominions. On the 29th of June, 1838, nine natives were ' condemned for being Roman Catholics' and associated with Kimione in hib slow martyrdom ; 'they were compelled daily to toil like beasts of burden, and whether the sun blazed upon their uncovered heads, or the rain fall in torrents upon their naked bodies, there was no remission ; brutality forced th .m, famished and sick and wretched as they were, to labour without cessation, and to suffer without commiseration.' Of some of the female converts who were thns suffering for their religion it is remarked that ' during the first six months of their slavery they were compelled to work on the public road of the Palama, without covering for the night, or food provided for them for the day ; and this they did without uttering a murmur or a sigh, but with cheerfulness and resignation.' On the 15th of June, 1839, sixty-seven natives, ' men and women were driven like a herd of cattle into the village, accused of the heinous crime of favouring the Catholic religion. These pitiful objects, several of them females with children on their backs, others in that state which huaniby at least required should have been left quietly at home ; many old and decrepit, and a few wasted with sickness, had been forcibly brought from the district of Waianei, a distance of forty miles, over mountain and through dale, with no provision made for their sustenance and no shelter at night but the broad canopy of heaven.' One of these native sufferers named Luahina was so exhausted that he was left behind a few miles from Honolulu : 'he soon sank under the weight of accumulated misery, and expired in the evening of the day on which he had been forsaken.' I will cite only one other passige, which brings before us the terrible torture to which these persecuted natives were subjected. Two females, on June 24, 1839, were hurried to the fort at Honolulu, ' to be

TORTURED TILL THEY SHOULD RENOUNCE THEIR FAITH

in the religion of the Pope. On their arrival at the fort at 5 p.m. they were repeatedly ordered to renounce the Catholic religion and embrace Mr. Bingham's religion ; this they refused firmly to do, preferring rather torture and death. The elder of the two (about r>o years of age) was then drawn up to a withered tree, her arms placed round one of the branches about seven feet high, and there shackled with irons, so that she might be said to hang by her w lists, as phe could barely touch the ground with her toes. The other female was brought up to the caves of a low thatched house, a"d her arms were forced around one of the rafters about six feet in height and then made fast by irons on the wrist. In this position her ankles were aleo fastened with irons. During the night heavy showers of rain fell, which poured in torrents upon the -exposed persons of those miserable beings, and in the morning when the sun shone forth its scorching rays blazed upon the uncovered heads of the poor sufferers, who were becoming more and more exhausted as their torture was protracted. In this situation they were found by a large number of the most respectable of the foreign residents who vie-ited the fort about 11 a.m. to witness the scene of persecution. The gentlemen succeeded in liberating the prisoners from their awful and critical position. When taken down, nature was quite exhausted : they were unable to stand without support, their hands quite cold, the wrists lacerated and swollen, and their heads burning with fever caused by the scorching rays of a vertical sun. They had then suffered torment for 18 hours without water and food of any description, and would probably, had it not been for the timely intervention of the foreigners, in a few hours more have expired at the stake.' It was only in 1840, through the intervention of the French and British Governments, that this cruel persecution for religion's sake waa brought to a close.