The islands of the Pacific

Front matter

WWWK

- s

©cy vV ^

Preface To Second Edition

This new edition of the Islands of the Pacific is issued to meet the steady demand for information concerning those Islands. The book is thoroughly revised and brought down to the present date. Additional matter has been inserted, considerable sections have been rewritten, and the arrangement of the old edition has been largely changed. New illustrations have also been inserted.

In view of the increased interest in the Islands of the Pacific by reason of the far-reaching political changes in that part of the world by the events of the present decade, the publishers feel confident that this new edition will place in the hands of the reading public just the things they wish to know and which they could not learn elsewhere.

The book is a continuous argument, showing, first, the failure of mere influences from civilization without Christianity and of Roman Catholic Missions to uplift the Islanders, and then the success of genuine Christian Missions. It shows also that this success indicates the truth and value of Christianity, and the certainty that Christianity will prevail over the world.

Preface

This book has grown out of an effort to sketch briefly the history of the Mission Enterprise in Hawaii. It was found difficult to do this properly without recounting considerable of the history of other islands of the Pacific, inasmuch as all the missions of that ocean have been so co-related in their origin and results that to describe one of them it was necessary to describe all. And so difficult was it to obtain information about these missions from numerous books, some of them rare and costly and others out of print, that a brief and comprehensive resume of all the missions in the Pacific seemed desirable.

The aim of this book is to promote interest in Christian Missions. While great interest is now awakened respecting the islands of the Pacific by descriptions of their enchanting scenery, by investigations of their geology, natural history, ethnology and antiquarian treasures, and by advertisement of industrial and commercial enterprises for developing their resources, it seems desirable that fuller description be given of the enterprises for lifting their inhabitants from their primeval paganism into Christian civilization ; enterprises which are sublimely above the almost universal greed and selfishness of mankind, and which by their already achieved success kindle prophecy of a new era of light and blessing for all the Pacific Ocean and all the world.

PREFACE.

In publishing this book the author gratefully acknowledges the permission of the following authors to use pictorial illustrations from their publications, and also indebtedness to them and others for some of the information given in this book : Miss C. F. Gordon-Cumming, author of "At Home in Fiji" and "Cruise in a French Man-of-war;" George Palmer, author of "Kidnapping in the South Seas ;" A. H. Hallam Murray, publisher of Erskine's " Islands of the Western Pacific ;" Macmillan and Company, publishers of Siemens' ' ' Mission to Viti ;" Geo. Reel and Sons, publishers of Ellis' "Polynesian Researches;" D. Appleton and Company, publishers of "Fiji and the Fijians ;" the American Tract Society, publishers of Williams' ' ' Enterprises in the South Sea Islands ;" Pacific Press Company, publishers of "The Story of Pitcairn's Island;" Arthur Inkersley, attorney at law, and Prof. W. D. Alexander, author of "A Brief History of the Hawaiian People."

J. M. ALEXANDER.

CoNTENTSchapter I.

The Pacific Ocean, its Islands and Peoples page i

Chapter I. The Pacific Ocean, Its Islands And Peoples

In the year 15 13 the Spanish adventurer, Vasco Nufiez De Balboa, crossed the Isthmus of Darien, and from the summit of the Sierra De Quarefua caught the first glimpse ever obtained by European eyes of the ocean that washes the western coast of America. In joy at his discovery he fell on his knees, rough bandit though he was, and gave thanks to God.

In the year 1521 Fernao de Magalhaes passed through the strait now known by his name, and first of Europeans voyaged upon this ocean. In admiration of its calm beauty, as contrasted with the stormy waters of the South Atlantic, he named it the Mar Pacifico.

Afterwards for many years this ocean had a peculiar fascination for explorers. Magalhaes and Sir Francis Drake each sailed across it to the Moluccas. It is probable that in the year 1555 Juan Gaetano ventured far north over its unexplored waters and visited Hawaii ; but he concealed his discovery for the benefit of Spain.

In 1606 Pedro Fernando De Queros discovered the New Hebrides, and in the following year Tahiti. In 1768 Capt. James Cook was sent by the British Government to observe the transit of Venus from Tahiti, and in subsequent voyages discovered the Antarctic Continent, New Caledonia, some of the Hervey Islands, and finally, in January, 1778, the Hawaiian Islands, where he was killed in an affray with the natives.

These and other voyagers in a few years made known to the world the contour and extent of the Pacific Ocean and the number and situation of most of its islands. But they had little idea of the importance of this ocean, of the vast commerce that would traverse its waters, or of the imperial civilizations that would spring up along its borders. Nor can we even now fully realize the importance of this part of the world. Senator Wm. H. Seward, after his journey around the world, remarked that "the Pacific Ocean, its shores, its islands, and the vast regions beyond, will become the chief theatre of events in the world's great hereafter." This remark, though somewhat rhetorical, correctly points to a wonderful future era of this ocean. Already the great nations of the old world are turning their attention thither, considering its routes of commerce, seeking its strategic points for military operations, and, with the rapacity with which they have partitioned amongst themselves the dark continent of Africa, grasping for its islands. Already higher enterprises than theirs have far advanced ; and the pagan populations are rising out of their primeval degradation into Christian civilization ; and now, as Balboa from the

THE OCEAN, ITS ISLANDS AND PEOPLES. 3

Isthmus discovered a new ocean, we from our present standpoint may behold, not far distant, a new age of enlightenment and benevolence, a Pacific Age, about to dawn over all this ocean.

Of all the matters that attract attention to this part of the world none are more important than these philanthropic enterprises. To understand them it is necessary first to take a brief survey of the physical features of this ocean and of its islands, and of the character and history of its peoples.

The Pacific Ocean is the largest expanse of water in the world, covering an area of 67,810,000 square miles : more than a quarter of the earth's surface. Its greatest dimensions are 10,000 miles east and west along the Equator, from South America to Asia, and 9,000 miles north and south, from Behring Strait to the Antarctic Circle. Its average depth is 2,500 fathoms, and its greatest depth yet discovered 4,475 fathoms, or about five and a quarter miles, a depth found between the Caroline and Ladrone Islands.

The islands of this ocean are classified as the Continental and Oceanic. The Continental islands lie near and parallel to the continents of Asia and Australia, from the Aleutian Islands on the north to Sumatra and New Zealand on the south. The Oceanic islands occupy the rest of the ocean. They lie in lines or ranges trending from southeast to northwest, a few in lines tranverse to this direction ; and each island is elongated in the same direction with the group to which it belongs. These lines of the islands are generally parallel to the outlines of the continents and to the great mountain ranges of the world ; which indicates that the same cosmic forces that lifted the continent and their mountain ranges upheaved these islands.

The Oceanic islands are of two kinds ; the coral and the volcanic. The coral islands consist of atolls and elevated islands. The atolls are mere sand-banks, formed by accumulations of debris washed by the ocean upon coral reefs, and are generally not more than ten or twenty feet in height above high water-mark. They are narrow, varying from a few yards to a hundred yards in breadth. They generally inclose lagoons, into which the ocean washes from the leeward sides. The coral polyps, that have formed these atolls, cannot live at greater depths than one hundred feet below the ocean's surface. Therefore they must have worked either in shoal waters around subsiding islands, till the islands sank, leaving lagoons in their places, or on rising islands, till lagoons were enclosed by reefs on the rims of the submarine craters.

Both processes have prevailed. Prof. Alexander Agassiz, in making artesian borings on Funati of the Fiji Group, found that coral was there continuous to six hundred feet below the ocean-level. By such borings at Honolulu coral and bits of wood were brought up from depths of eight hundred feet below ocean-level. In the Fiji Group there are hills of coral, varying from twenty to six hundred feet in height, and on Vavau of the Tongan Group a mountain, Talau, nine hundred feet in height, consists entirely of coral. These facts indicate that there have been both a subsidence and an elevation of the islands. These geologic

THE OCEAN, ITS ISLANDS AND PEOPLES. $

changes may be ascribed to the processes of wrinkling of the earth's crust, as it has undergone contraction by reason of its gradual loss of heat, and to cosmic influences perhaps of the sun and moon. The lagoons do not fill with coral, because the coral polyps thrive only in the pure aerated water on the outsides of reefs.

On these strips of sandy soil seeds, borne thither by winds and waves and birds, have produced considerable vegetation. But the flora does not comprise more than fifty species. The atolls are subject to drouths, being too low to intercept the clouds and draw from them rainfalls ; and, for this reason, they are called " the deserts of the Pacific." Their inhabitants subsist on cocoanuts, pandanus and fish.

The elevated coral islands, which are few in number, are situated among volcanic islands, to which class they belong, and consist partly of volcanic rocks and soil. They are very fertile, and many of them are veritable Edens of beauty and fruitfulness, being covered with a luxuriant and varied vegetation.

The volcanic islands are so called, because of their volcanic origin. Their whole framework is volcanic rock. On nearly all of them there are extinct craters, and on some of them there are active volcanoes. They vary in height from a few hundred to fourteen thousand feet. Most of them are very picturesque, being deeply cleft with valleys, and crowned with peaks, pinnacles and crags; and over most of them there spreads the richest tropical vegetation of every tint and shade of green. Vines so overrun the cliffs and trees that their appearance has been compared to waterfalls of foliage. Tourist have described some of these islands as like earthly paradises, and have remarked that " it is difficult for the most glowing imagination to conceive of places more enchanting."

Around most of these islands are barrief- reefs, extending parallel with the shore at distances varying from a few yards to several miles. Opposite the large valleys there are openings through these reefs; for the coral polyps cannot live in the muddy waters that are poured forth by the streams of the valleys. These openings form good entrances to excellent harbors, while the barrier-reefs protect the shores from the violence of ocean waves in time of storms, and thus enclose quiet waters that are of great value for fishing, and for voyaging from village to village.

The climate in all these islands has less extremes of heat and cold than occur at similar latitudes on the continents, as it is modified by the winds and currents of the ocean. In the extreme South Pacific these currents flow with the winds to the east, and send north along the Patagonian coast a stream which trends with the trade winds to the northwest, and moderates the heat of the Southern Tropics. In the Western Pacific the Japanese Gulf Stream flows northeast to the Aleutian Islands, and then south along the coast of North America, and trending with the northeast trade winds to the southwest moderates the heat of the Northern Tropics. Where these currents do not moderate the heat the temperature of the ocean sometimes rises to 85 ° Fahren.

THE OCEAN, ITS ISLANDS AND PEOPLES. J

heit ; as is the case near Mexico and near Sumatra. In the South Pacific, especially in the neighborhood of the Samoa Islands, violent hurricanes sometimes occur during the period from December to April.

The inhabitants of the Oceanic islands are of four races, Polynesians, Papuans, Fijis and Micronesians.

The Polynesians are a brown people, the finest in physical development of the Pacific races. They are naturally of amiable, affectionate and happy temperament. Their origin is traced to the Dravidians of India.

Of the many evidences of their derivation from the Dravidians the strongest are the facts that their language and the Dravidian language have causative prefixes of verbs, and inclusive and exclusive pronouns, as well as many similar words, and that their traditions point to India as their mother country. That they did not originate from the Aryans is proved by the fact that the Aryan languages lack these causative prefixes and inclusive and exclusive pronouns. That they did not originate from the Malays is proved by the utter difference of their language from the Malayan, which is largely Mongolian.

The Dravidians originated from the Turanian race, a branch of which, in very ancient times, invaded India. There 2,000 years B. C, the Dravidians were invaded by Aryans from the northwest, and by them driven to the ocean coasts. Thence, fleeing from enemies, or dreaming of Elysian islands, they ventured forth on the ocean, and became the greatest navigators of the ancient world. They voyaged around more than three-fifths of the circumference of the globe, sometimes going in mere hollowedlogs over two thousand miles; as between Tahiti and Samoa on the south and Hawaii on the north. They colonized most of the islands between Madagascar and Easter and between New Zealand and Hawaii. The New Zealanders and the Hawaiians kept carefully genealogies of their rulers ; and these genealogies coincide in the names of two very ancient kings and their queens, who, according to their traditions, reigned in Hawaiiki, the chief island of Samoa, or a district in one of the Society Islands. In one of these places, probably seven hundred years ago, they were one nation.

Their language is mellifluous, consisting chiefly of vowels. Dwelling indolently and listlessly in the comforts of the Tropics, they expressed their few, simple ideas by soft vowel sounds and abbreviated words. They thus so contracted their words and dropped their consonants that at Hawaii only twelve letters are needed to spell all the Hawaiian words. Very remarkably throughout the Pacific they have the same language, similar traditions, and worship the same deities.

The Papuans occupy the New Hebrides and the adjacent islands on the southwest. They are a black, frizzlyhaired people, small in stature and in every respect inferior to the Polynesians. Their languages abound in consonants and closed syllables, and are divided into many dialects. The Fijis are a mixed race, part Polynesian and part Papuan, inferior to the Polynesians, and superioi to the Papuans. The Micronesians, also, are a mixec race, derived from the Japanese, Polynesian and Papuar races. They are darker in complexion and smaller ii.

THE OCEAN, ITS ISLANDS AND PEOPLES. 9

stature than the Polynesians ; but in the western Micronesian islands they are of lighter complexion, and more like the Japanese.

For ages these oceanic races lived secluded on the islands of their watery domain, a world by themselves, with a romantic history of voyages from island to island, of pagan orgies, and savage wars. They labored under disadvantages, for advancing in civilization, from their lack of metals, of which to make tools, and from the very salubrity of their climate and productiveness of their soil, which obviated the need of labor for a livelihood. They had but to throw the net into the still waters inside their reefs to catch fish, and to reach out the hand to pluck the ripe plantain or breadfruit, and in the perennial mildness of their climate could live almost without clothing. With great skill they made dwellings, canoes, and household fabrics, by the use of stone adzes and knives of bones and shell, and beat out a poor kind of clothing from the bark of trees ; but in their primitive condition they were generally little better in appearance than herds of wild animals.

In their social condition they were not much better. Though occupying regions of enchanting beauty, they were by no means, as represented by some writers of fiction, mere sinless creatures of love and light. The popular author, Hermann Melville, has humorously written of the felicity of their condition, with "no taxes to pay, no mortages to be foreclosed, without the everlasting strife of civilized nations for money." But they did not merely enjoy freedom and frolic and love-

IO THE ISLANDS OF THE PACIFIC.

making. Savage strife often embittered their lives. Wars among them were almost incessant and most cruel. Rev. John Williams once visited Hervey Island, and found that its population had been diminished by war from two thousand to sixty. Seven years afterwards he again visited this island, and found that there were only five men and three women surviving ; and these were still contending who should be king.

In all these islands immorality was appalling, and frightful crimes of frequent occurrence. Infanticide was so common that from one fourth to two thirds of the children were strangled or buried alive. The sick and the aged were so commonly killed that few persons died natural deaths. Cannibalism was practiced in many of the islands. In Hawaii and in a few other islands it was unknown ; but in the Marquesas and the Fiji Islands it prevailed with horrors unsurpassed elsewhere in the world. Distressing superstitions darkened all the lives of the natives and held them in iron bondage. In the long night of their isolation from enlightening influences they had come to worship innumerable gods and demigods and demons, with which they supposed the sky and earth and sea to swarm. With this worship were combined painful restrictions, called tabu, divination, sorcery, the use of charms to cure sickness, and black arts to employ evil spirits in destroying their enemies. Their worship was also accompanied with human sacrifices and wild carousals that have been described as like orgies of the infernal regions.

It should be noted that these races were not utterly

THE OCEAN, ITS ISLANDS AND PEOPLES. II

evil nor utterly wretched. Paganism does not make men fiends. Some remnants of man's nobler nature survive his fall. In the wild barbarism of these islanders some forms of social order and civil government existed, and beautiful instances occurred of friendship and parental and conjugal affection ; and there was much of comfort and enjoyment in their beautiful surroundings, with their balmy climate and profusion of delicious fruits. But with the best that may be said of their condition it must be admitted that it was not to be envied, but was calculated only to excite pity and call for benevolent enterprise in their behalf.

Chapter II. Uncivilizing Influences From Civilized Countries

Deplorable as was the primitive condition of the Pacific Islanders, it was rendered even worse by evil influences that came to them from enlightened nations. Among the early voyagers to the Pacific were indeed some worthy men, who led irreproachable lives and exerted good influences. But most of the new-comers plunged into every form of dissipation. It became proverbial that in coming to this far-away ocean many men, even from the best circles of society, "hung up their consciences off Cape Horn," and seemed to conclude that "God did not rule west of America." Some of these adventurers were from the worst classes of civilized communities; from the dark corruption that seethes in great cities, and pours forth only to blight and blast wherever the ships of commerce sail. The histories of some of these men would be darker than those of the heathen themselves.

The first to sail on the waters of this ocean were the explorers, who, after Magalhaes' discovery of the strait at the southern extremity of South America, went thither in great numbers to search for gold. Foremost among these were the Spaniards ; and these, with many other early navigators, belonged chiefly to the same class of buccaneers who under Cortes devastated Mexico, and under Pizarro did sad work in Peru. As might be supposed, many of these navigators were guilty of great excesses and atrocities in the Pacific Islands. The fact that the colony formed by them at Tahiti in those early times gave to that island the name, " Isla D'Amat," indicates the style of life they led.

After these Spaniards came navigators from other nations, among whom was the English Lieutenant Bligh, whose mutinous crew, after setting him adrift in a boat, led a wild life of drunkenness and murder on Pitcairn Island. No one of these navigators ranked higher in scientific attainments and character than Capt. James Cook ; yet one of the historians of his voyages, Mr. George Foster, who accompanied him as a naturalist, narrates that at Tahiti and other islands further west his vessels were sometimes the scene of indescribable debaucheries with the natives, and that often these were cruelly treated and more than once killed by his officers for trivial offences. A murder of this kind at Hawaii was doubtless the chief cause of the massacre of the great navigator himself. From the conduct of this expedition, led by so respectable a man, it can be inferred how scandalous must have been the behavior of the seamen of ships commanded by sensual and brutal captains.

The next class of adventurers to visit this ocean was the traders, who came to search on the northwest coast of America for furs and in the islands of the Tropics for sandal-wood, beche-de-mer (a marine slug), copra (dried cocoanut), and pearl shells. The sandal-wood was sought for sale in China, where it brought high prices for use as incense in idol-worship ; the beche-de-mer also was sold to the Chinese, who used it for food ; and the furs and copra and pearl shells were taken to Europe. Sometimes one vessel would engage in all these forms of trade, going first to the Arctic for furs, then to the Tropics for sandal-wood, and finally taking silks and tea from China to Europe. The profits of these trades were very great, but the conduct of the traders towards the islanders was even worse than that of the explorers. They often gave sad lessons of treachery and cruelty, which all too well the natives practised in return.

"In 1842 three English vessels visited the island Vate, of the New Hebrides, and there took by force a large quantity of fruits and vegetables and two hundred hogs. The natives made resistance, and a fight ensued in which twenty-six natives were killed and the remainder of the natives driven to take refuge in a cave. The crews of the ships then piled wood at the mouth of the cave, and set it on fire and suffocated all within. The next year the crew of the Cape packet were massacred at this island.

"At Mare, of the New Hebrides, three natives once swam off to a vessel that called for sandal-wood, and while bargaining got into an altercation with the captain. He fired on them, killing two ; the third swam ashore. A few months afterwards the crew of the Lady Ann were massacred at this island."

It was to avenge such outrages as these that the missionary, Rev. John Williams, was murdered by the natives of Erromanga. The early missionaries at Hawaii remarked of some of these traders that they made their vessels "like floating exhibitions of Sodom and Gomorrah," and that their influence was only "to make the Hawaiians a nation of drunkards. "

The infernal spirit of some of these traders was shown by an outrage they committed at Tanna, of the New Hebrides, which is recounted by Rev. John G. Paton in his interesting Autobiography. During the year i860 three captains came to Port Resolution, of Tanna, and gleefully informed Mr. Paton that to humble the Tannese and to diminish their number they had put on shore at different ports four young men ill with the measles. As Mr. Paton remonstrated they exclaimed, ' ' Our watchword is, ' Sweep these creatures away and let white men occupy the soil. ' They then invited a chief by the name of Kapuku on board one of their vessels, promising him a present, and confined him for twenty-four hours without food in the hold among natives ill with the measles, and finally sent him ashore without a present to spread the disease. "The measles thus introduced spread fearfully, and decimated the population of the island. In some villages men, women and children were stricken down together, and none could give food or water to the sick or bury the dead. "

The sandal-wood trade was followed in 1828 by the whale fishery. The ships engaged in this business often visited the islands to obtain supplies or to spend the winter. The writer has seen as many as a hundred of them at one time at the port of Lahaina, of the Hawaiian l6 THE ISLANDS OF THE PACIFIC.

Islands. When the crews of these ships took their furloughs on shore they easily had everything their own way, and sometimes made bedlam of the quiet villages of the natives.

When the whale fishery declined, on account of the discovery of coal-oil, numerous agricultural enterprises were started in some of the islands and vessels were sent to the western part of the Pacific to procure laborers for these enterprises. These vessels were sometimes sent out under trustworthy officials, who took care that the laborers were taken only with their voluntary consent and with well-explained contracts for wages and for their free return to their island homes. But irresponsible parties sometimes undertook to supply plantations in Australia and Fiji by methods as infamous as the slave-trade of Africa. A captain of a small vessel would sometimes get clearance-papers from Sydney for trading in copra and trepang, and then cruise to kidnap the natives who would come off in canoes with supplies. Sometimes he would assume the guise of a missionary. Painting his vessel white, that it might resemble the mission packets, he would approach an island with a white flag flying, and on arriving at port go ashore dressed like a respectable gentleman, wearing spectacles, carrying an umbrella over his head and a Bible under his arm. As the natives joyfully flocked to meet him, he would invite them aboard his ship and into his cabin, and then suddenly seize and manacle them, and put his vessel to sea amid the cries of their relatives and friends in the surrounding canoes.

An outrage of this kind occasioned the death of

Bishop Patteson, of the Melanesian Mission. "Some traders once painted their ship in imitation of his, and by this artifice were able to kidnap some natives from the island of Nakapu, of the Swallow Group, for the purpose of sending them to plantations in Queensland and Fiji. When the missionary ship, as it cruised among the islands, again approached Nakapu, the natives, mistaking it for the kidnapping craft, determined to avenge themselves. The bishop, unsuspicious, lowered his boat and went to meet them coming in their canoes. According to their custom they asked him to get into one of their boats, which he did, and was taken to the shore. He was never seen alive again. Immediate search was made and his body was found, pierced with five wounds and wrapped in a coarse mat, with a palm-leaf laid on his breast."

This infamous traffic in human flesh has been recently carried on for furnishing laborers to plantations in Guatemala and South America. In 1890 the ship Alma took 400 natives of Micronesia to Guatemala, and two years afterwards only 180 of them were living, the rest having died of fevers contracted in the malarious swamps of the plantations. In 1892 the brig Tahiti took 300 natives from the Gilbert Islands to labor on plantations in America, and was capsized near the coast of Mexico, and afterwards found floating bottom up. Not one of its living freight was ever heard of.

On the 23d of April of the same year the steamer Monserrat, Capt. W. H. Ferguson, manager, and Capt. Blackburn, sailing-master, cleared from San Francisco l8 THE ISLANDS OF THE PACIFIC.

ostensibly for a trading voyage to Nanaimo, but really for a kidnapping expedition to the Gilbert Islands. The publishers of the newspaper "Examiner," of San Francisco, secretly sent a reporter, Mr. W. H. Brommage, as one of the crew, from whose narrative the following items are culled.

Mr. Ferguson had made a bargain with the planters of San Jose* de Guatemala that they should pay him $100 per head for laborers. With such an inducement he "shipped " all he could get by fair means or foul, whether little children, or men and women bent over with age and hardly able to walk up the gangway of the steamer. The chief inducement of the natives to embark on the steamer was the hope that they might earn money on the plantations to pay the heavy debts of their king, on account of which their lands were held by treacherous traders. Many of the natives had died of starvation because they were forbidden by the traders to gather their own cocoanuts. They ' ' shipped " for seven dollars per month for labor for five years. The form of the contracts that were made with them was legitimate, but they were entrapped into making them by deceit, violence and cruelty, and the amount of wages contracted for was entirely inadequate to yield them the profit they expected, while most of them would die in the feverstricken marshes to which they were going.