



Produced by Jeroen Hellingman and the Online Distributed
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       Two Years with the Natives in the Western Pacific

                               By

                       Dr. Felix Speiser

        With 40 illustrations from photographs and a map








PREFACE


This book is a collection of sketches written on lonely evenings
during my voyage; some of them have been published in daily papers,
and were so kindly received by the public as to encourage me to
issue them in book form. In order to retain the freshness of first
impressions, the original form has been but slightly changed, and
only so much ethnological detail has been added as will help to an
understanding of native life. The book does not pretend to give a
scientific description of the people of the New Hebrides; that will
appear later; it is meant simply to transmit some of the indelible
impressions the traveller was privileged to receive,--impressions
both stern and sweet. The author will be amply repaid if he succeeds
in giving the reader some slight idea of the charm and the terrors
of the islands. He will be proud if his words can convey a vision of
the incomparable beauty and peacefulness of the glittering lagoon,
and of the sublimity of the virgin forest; if the reader can divine
the charm of the native when gay and friendly, and his ferocity when
gloomy and hostile. I have set down some of the joys and some of the
hardships of an explorer's life; and I received so many kindnesses
from all the white colonists I met, that one great object of my
writing is to show my gratitude for their friendly help.

First of all, I would mention His Britannic Majesty's Resident,
Mr. Morton King, who followed my studies with the most sympathetic
interest, was my most hospitable host, and, I may venture to
say, my friend. I would name Mr. Colonna, Resident de France,
Judge Alexander in Port Vila, and Captain Harrowell; in Santo,
Rev. Father Bochu, the Messrs. Thomas, Mr. Fysh, Mr. Clapcott; in
Malo, Mr. M. Wells and Mr. Jacquier; in Vao, Rev. Father Jamond; in
Malekula, Rev. F. Paton, Rev. Jaffrays, Mr. Bird and Mr. Fleming;
in Ambrym, Rev. Dr. J. J. Bowie, Mr. Stevens, Mr. Decent; in
Pentecoste, Mr. Filmer; in Aoba, Mr. Albert and Rev. Grunling; in
Tanna, Rev. Macmillan and Dr. Nicholson; in Venua Lava, Mr. Choyer; in
Nitendi, Mr. Matthews. I am also indebted to the Anglican missionaries,
especially Rev. H. N. Drummond, and to Captain Sinker of the steam
yacht Southern Cross, to the supercargo and captains of the steamers
of Burns, Philp & Company. There are many more who assisted me in
various ways, often at the expense of their own comfort and interest,
and not the least of the impressions I took home with me is, that
nowhere can one find wider hospitality or friendlier helpfulness than
in these islands. This has helped me to forget so many things that
do not impress the traveller favourably.

If this book should come under the notice of any of these kind friends,
the author would be proud to think that they remember him as pleasantly
as he will recall all the friendship he received during his stay in
the New Hebrides.


BASLE, April 1913.





CONTENTS


    Chap.                                               Page
            Introduction                                  1
    I.      Noumea and Port Vila                         19
    II.     Maei, Tongoa, Epi and Malekula               28
    III.    The Segond Channel--Life on a Plantation     35
    IV.     Recruiting for Natives                       53
    V.      Vao                                          85
    VI.     Port Olry and a "Sing-Sing"                 109
    VII.    Santo                                       136
    VIII.   Santo (continued)--Pygmies                  161
    IX.     Santo (continued)--Pigs                     171
    X.      Climbing Santo Peak                         179
    XI.     Ambrym                                      191
    XII.    Pentecoste                                  224
    XIII.   Aoba                                        241
    XIV.    Loloway--Malo--The Banks Islands            250
    XV.     Tanna                                       270
    XVI.    The Santa Cruz Islands                      277





LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS


    Shore in Graciosa Bay                       Frontispiece
                                                 Facing page
    Women From the Reef Islands in Carlisle Bay            3
    Native Taro Field on Maevo                            10
    Man from Nitendi working the Loom                     15
    A Cannibal before his Hut on Tanna                    22
    Dancing Table near Port Sandwich                      31
    Old Man with Young Wife on Ambrym                     40
    Front of a Chief's House on Venua Lava                47
    Man from Nitendi                                      54
    Cannibal from Big Nambas                              61
    Woman on Nitendi                                      70
    Canoe on Ureparapara                                  77
    Dancing-Ground on Vao, with Ancestor Houses           85
    Dancing-Ground on Vao                                 93
    Woman from Tanna                                      99
    House Fences on Vao                                  106
    Gamal near Port Olry                                 115
    Group of Large and Small Drums near Port Sandwich    129
    View along the Shore of a Coral Island               136
    Interior of a Gamal on Venua Lava                    147
    Wild Mountain Scenery in the District of the Pygmies 163
    Irrigated Taro Field on Santo                        179
    Dwelling of a Trader on Ambrym                       191
    View from Hospital--Dip Point                        199
    Women cooking on Ambrym                              205
    Fern Trees on Ambrym                                 218
    Group of Drums and Statues on Malekula               227
    Cooking-House on Aoba                                241
    Fire-Rubbing                                         244
    Tattooing on Aoba                                    251
    Dwelling-House on Gaua                               255
    Ancestor-House on Gaua                               258
    Drum Concert on Ureparapara                          261
    Interior of a Gamal on Gaua                          264
    Men from Tanna                                       270
    Women from Tanna                                     272
    Canoe from Nitendi                                   277
    Man from Nitendi, Shooting                           279
    Man from Nitendi, with Pearl Shell Nose              284
    Man from Tucopia                                     287
    Map                                                  291









TWO YEARS WITH THE NATIVES IN THE WESTERN PACIFIC


INTRODUCTION


Late in the sixteenth century the Spaniards made several voyages
in search of a continent in the southern part of the great Pacific
Ocean. Alvara Mendana de Neyra, starting in 1568 from the west coast of
South America and following about the sixth degree southern latitude,
found the Solomon Islands, which he took for parts of the desired
continent. In 1595 he undertook another voyage, keeping a more
southerly course, and discovered the Queen Charlotte Islands; the
largest of these, Nitendi, he called Santa Cruz, and gave the fitting
name of Graciosa Bay to the lovely cove in which he anchored. He tried
to found a colony here, but failed. Mendana died in Santa Cruz, and
his lieutenant, Pedro Vernandez de Quiros, led the expedition home. In
Europe, Quiros succeeded in interesting the Spanish king, Philip III.,
in the idea of another voyage, so that in 1603 he was able to set sail
from Spain with three ships. Again he reached the Santa Cruz Islands,
and sailing southward from there he landed in 1606 on a larger island,
which he took for the desired Australian continent and called Tierra
Australis del Espiritu Santo; the large bay he named San Iago and San
Felipe, and his anchorage Vera Cruz. He stayed here some months and
founded the city of New Jerusalem at the mouth of the river Jordan
in the curve of the bay. Quiros claims to have made a few sailing
trips thence, southward along the east coast of the island; if he had
pushed on far enough these cruises might easily have convinced him of
the island-nature of the country. Perhaps he was aware of the truth;
certainly the lovely descriptions he gave King Philip of the beauties
of the new territory are so exaggerated that one may be pardoned
for thinking him quite capable of dignifying an island by the name
of continent.

The inevitable quarrels with the natives, and diseases and mutinies
among his crew, forced him to abandon the colony and return home. His
lieutenant, Luis Vaez de Torres, separated from him, discovered and
passed the Torres Straits, a feat of excellent seamanship. Quiros
returned to America. His high-flown descriptions of his discovery did
not help him much, for the king simply ignored him, and his reports
were buried in the archives. Quiros died in poverty and bitterness,
and the only traces of his travels are the names Espiritu Santo,
Bay San Iago and San Felipe, and Jordan, in use to this day.

No more explorers came to the islands till 1767, when a Frenchman,
Carteret, touched at Santa Cruz, and 1768, when Bougainville landed
in the northern New Hebrides, leaving his name to the treacherous
channel between Malekula and Santo.

But all these travellers were thrown into the shade by the immortal
discoverer, James Cook, who, in the New Hebrides, as everywhere else,
combined into solid scientific material all that his predecessors had
left in a state of patchwork. Cook's first voyage made possible the
observation of the transit of Venus from one of the islands of the
Pacific. His second cruise, in search of the Australian continent,
led him, coming from Tongoa, to the New Hebrides, of which he first
sighted Maevo.

Assisted by two brilliant scientists, Reinhold and George Forster,
Cook investigated the archipelago with admirable exactitude, determined
the position of the larger islands, made scientific collections of
all sorts, and gave us the first reliable descriptions of the country
and its people, so that the material he gathered is of the greatest
value even at the present day. The group had formerly been known as
the "Great Cyclades"; Cook gave it its present name of "New Hebrides."

Incited by Cook's surprising results the French Government sent La
Perouse to the islands, but he was shipwrecked in 1788 on Vanikoro, the
southern-most of the Santa Cruz group; remains of this wreck were found
on Vanikoro a few years ago. In 1789 Bligh sighted the Banks Islands,
and in 1793 d'Entrecastaux, sent by Louis XVI. to the rescue of La
Perouse, saw the islands of Santa Cruz. Since that time traffic with
the islands became more frequent; among many travellers we may mention
the French captain, Dumont d'Urville, and the Englishmen, Belcher and
Erskine, who, as well as Markham, have all left interesting accounts.

But with Markham we enter that sad period which few islands of the
Pacific escaped, in which the scum of the white race carried on
their bloodstained trade in whaling products and sandalwood. They
terrorized the natives shamelessly, and when these, naturally enough,
often resorted to cruel modes of defence, they retaliated with deeds
still more frightful, and the bad reputation they themselves made
for the natives served them as a welcome excuse for a system of
extermination. The horrors of slave-trade were added to piracy, so
that in a few decades the native race of the New Hebrides and Banks
Islands was so weakened that in many places to-day its preservation
seems hopeless.

Thus, for the financial advantage of the worst of whites, and from
indolence and short-sighted national rivalry, a race was sacrificed
which in every respect would be worth preserving, and it is a shameful
fact that even to-day such atrocities are not impossible and very
little is done to save the islanders from destruction.

The only factor opposing these conditions was the Mission, which
obtained a foothold in the islands under Bishop John Williams. He
was killed in 1839 by the natives of Erromanga, but the Protestant
missionaries, especially the Presbyterians, would not be repulsed,
and slowly advanced northward, in spite of many losses. To-day the
Presbyterian mission occupies all the New Hebrides, with the exception
of Pentecoste, Aoba and Maevo. To the north lies the field of the
Anglican mission, extending up to the Solomon Islands.

In 1848 Roman Catholic missionaries settled in Aneityum, but soon
gave up the station; in 1887 they returned and spread all over the
archipelago, with the exception of the southern islands and the
Banks group.

Of late years several representatives of free Protestant sects have
come out, but, as a rule, these settle only where they can combine
a profitable trade with their mission work.

Owing to energetic agitation on the part of the Anglican and
Presbyterian Churches, especially of Bishop Patteson and the
Rev. J. G. Paton, men-of-war were ordered to the islands on police
duty, so as to watch the labour-trade. They could not suppress
kidnapping entirely, and the transportation of the natives to
Queensland continued until within the last ten years, when it was
suppressed by the Australian Government, so that to-day the natives
are at least not taken away from their own islands, except those
recruited by the French for New Caledonia.

Unhappily, England and France could not agree as to who should annex
the New Hebrides. Violent agitation in both camps resulted in neither
power being willing to leave the islands to the other, as numerical
superiority on the French side was counter-balanced by the absolute
economical dependence of the colonists upon Australia. England put
the group under the jurisdiction of the "Western Pacific," with
a high commissioner; France retorted by the so-called purchase of
all useful land by the "Societe Francaise des Nouvelles Hebrides,"
a private company, which spent great sums on the islands in a short
time. Several propositions of exchange failed to suit either of the
powers, but both feared the interference of a third, and conditions
in the islands called urgently for a government; so, in 1887, a
dual control was established, each power furnishing a warship and a
naval commissioner, who were to unite in keeping order. This was the
beginning of the present Condominium, which was signed in 1906 and
proclaimed in 1908 in Port Vila; quite a unique form of government
and at the same time a most interesting experiment in international
administration.

The Condominium puts every Englishman or Frenchman under the laws
of his own nation, as represented by its officials; so that these
two nationalities live as they would in any colony of their own,
while all others have to take their choice between these two.

Besides the national laws, the Condominium has a few ordinances to
regulate the intercourse between the two nations, the sale of liquor
and arms to natives, recruiting and treatment of labourers, etc. As
the highest instance in the islands and as a supreme tribunal, an
international court of six members has been appointed: two Spanish,
two Dutch, one English and one French. Thus the higher officials of
the Condominium are:


    One English and one French resident commissioner,
    One Spanish president of the Court,
    One English and one French judge,
    One Dutch registrar,
    One Spanish prosecuting attorney,
    One Dutch native advocate,
    One English and one French police commissioner.


The Santa Cruz Islands were annexed by England in 1898 and belong to
the jurisdiction of the Solomon Islands.



Geography

The New Hebrides lie between 165 deg. and 170 deg. east longitude, and reach
from 13 deg. to 20 deg. south latitude. The Santa Cruz Islands lie 116 deg.
east and 11 deg. south.

The New Hebrides and Banks Islands consist of thirteen larger islands
and a great number of islets and rocks, covering an area of about
15,900 km. The largest island is Espiritu Santo, about 107 x 57
km., with 4900 km. surface. They are divided into the Torres group,
the Banks Islands, the Central and the Southern New Hebrides. The
Banks and Torres Islands and the Southern New Hebrides are composed
of a number of isolated, scattered islands, while the Central group
forms a chain, which divides at Epi into an eastern and a western
branch, and encloses a stretch of sea, hemming it in on all sides
except the north. On the coast of this inland sea, especially on the
western islands, large coral formations have grown, changing what was
originally narrow mountain chains, running north and south, to larger
islands. Indeed, most of them seem to consist of a volcanic nucleus,
on which lie great coral banks, often 200 m. high; these usually
drop in five steep steps to the sea, and then merge into the living
coral-reef in the water. Most of the islands, therefore, appear as
typical table-islands, out of which, in the largest ones, rise the
rounded tops of the volcanic stones. They are all very mountainous;
the highest point is Santo Peak, 1500 m. high.

The tides cause very nasty tide-rips in the narrow channels between
the islands of the Central group; but inside, the sea is fairly good,
and the reefs offer plenty of anchorage for small craft. Much less
safe are the open archipelagoes of the Banks and Torres Islands and
of the Southern New Hebrides, where the swell of the open ocean is
unbroken by any land and harbours are scarce.

There are three active volcanoes on the New Hebrides--the mighty
double crater on Ambrym, the steep cone of Lopevi, and the volcano
of Tanna. There is a half-extinct volcano on Venua Lava, and many
other islands show distinct traces of former volcanic activity,
such as Meralava and Ureparapara, one side of which has broken down,
so that now there is a smooth bay where once the lava boiled.

Rivers are found only on the larger islands, where there are volcanic
rocks. In the coral rocks the rain-water oozes rapidly away, so
that fresh-water springs are not frequently found, in spite of very
considerable rainfall.



Climate

The climate is not hot and very equable. The average temperature in
Efate in 1910 was 24.335 deg. C.; the hottest month was February, with
an average of 27.295 deg., the coolest, July with 11.9 deg. C. The lowest
absolute temperature was 11.9 deg. C. in August, and the highest 35.6 deg.
C. in March. The average yearly variation, therefore, was 5.48 deg.,
and the absolute difference 23.7 deg..

The rainfall is very heavy. In December the maximum, 564 mm., was
reached, and in June the minimum, 22 mm. The total rainfall was 3.012
mm., giving a daily average of 8.3 mm.

These figures, taken from a table in the Neo-Hebridais, show that the
year is divided into a cool, dry season and a hot, damp one. From May
to October one enjoys agreeable summer days, bright and cool, with a
predominant south-east trade-wind, that rises and falls with the sun
and creates a fairly salubrious climate. From November to April the
atmosphere is heavy and damp, and one squall follows another. Often
there is no wind, or the wind changes quickly and comes in heavy gusts
from the north-west. This season is the time for cyclones, which occur
at least once a year; happily, their centre rarely touches the islands,
as they lie somewhat out of the regular cyclone track.

A similar climate, with but slightly higher temperature, prevails on
the Santa Cruz Islands.



Flora and Fauna

The vegetation of the New Hebrides is luxurious enough to make all
later visitors share Quiros' amazement. The possibilities for the
planter are nearly inexhaustible, and the greatest difficulty is
that of keeping the plantations from the constant encroachments of
the forest. Yet the flora is poorer in forms than that of Asiatic
regions, and in the southern islands it is said to be much like that
of New Caledonia.

As a rule, thick forest covers the islands; only rarely we find areas
covered with reed-grass. On Erromanga these are more frequent.

In the Santa Cruz Islands the flora seems richer than in the New
Hebrides.

Still more simple than the flora is the fauna. Of mammals there are
only the pig, dog, a flying-fox and the rat, of which the first two
have probably been imported by the natives. There are but few birds,
reptiles and amphibies, but the few species there are are very
prolific, so that we find swarms of lizards and snakes, the latter
all harmless Boidae, but occasionally of considerable size.

Crocodiles are found only in the Santa Cruz Islands, and do not grow
so large there as in the Solomon Islands.

Animal life in the sea is very rich; turtles and many kinds of fish
and Cetaceae are plentiful.



Native Population

The natives belong to the Melanesian race, which is a collective
name for the dark-skinned, curly-haired, bearded inhabitants of the
Pacific. The Melanesians are quite distinct from the Australians,
and still more so from the lank-haired, light-skinned Polynesians of
the eastern islands. Probably a mixture of Polynesians and Melanesians
are the Micronesians, who are light-skinned but curly-haired, and of
whom we find representatives in the New Hebrides. The island-nature
of the archipelago is very favourable to race-mixture; and as we know
that on some islands there were several settlements of Polynesians,
it is not surprising to find a very complex mingling of races, which
it is not an easy task to disentangle. It would seem, however, that
we have before us remnants of four races: a short, dark, curly-haired
and perhaps original race, a few varieties of the tall Melanesian
race, arrived in the islands in several migrations, an old Polynesian
element as a relic of its former migrations eastward, and a present
Polynesian element from the east.

Every traveller will notice that the lightest population is in the
south and north-east of the New Hebrides, while the darkest is in
the north-west, and the ethnological difference corresponds to this
division.

In the Banks Islands we find, probably owing to recent immigration,
more Polynesian blood than in the northern New Hebrides; in the Santa
Cruz group the process of mixing seems to be just going on.

The number of natives in the New Hebrides and Banks Islands
amounted, according to the approximate census of the British Resident
Commissioner in 1910, to 65,000. At a conservative estimate we may say
that before the coming of the whites, that is, a generation ago, it was
ten times that, i.e. 650,000. For to judge from present conditions,
the accounts of old men and the many ruined villages, it is evident
that the race must have decreased enormously.



Language

The languages belong to the Melanesian and Polynesian classes. They are
split up into numerous dialects, so widely different that natives of
different districts can hardly, if at all, understand each other. It
is evident that owing to the seclusion of the villages caused by the
general insecurity of former days, and the lack of any literature,
the language developed differently in every village.

On some islands things are so bad that one may easily walk in one day
through several districts, in each of which is spoken a language quite
unintelligible to the neighbours; there are even adjoining villages
whose natives have to learn each other's language; this makes them
fairly clever linguists. Where, by migrations, conditions have become
too complicated, the most important of the dialects has been adopted
as a kind of "lingua franca."

Under these circumstances I at once gave up the idea of learning a
native language, as I never stopped anywhere more than a few weeks; and
as the missionaries have done good work in the cause of philology, my
services were not needed. I was, therefore, dependent on interpreters
in "biche la mar," a language which contains hardly more than fifty
words, and which is spoken on the plantations, but is quite useless
for discussing any abstract subject. In nearly every village there
is some man who can speak biche la mar.



Colonization

As we have seen, colonization in the New Hebrides was begun by the
whalers, who had several stations in the southern islands. They had,
however, little intercourse with the natives, and their influence
may be considered fairly harmless.

More dangerous were the sandalwood traders, who worked chiefly in
Erromanga. They were not satisfied with buying the valuable wood
from the natives, but tried to get directly at the rich supplies
inland. Naturally, they came into conflict with the natives, and
fierce wars arose, in which the whites fought with all the weapons
unscrupulous cruelty can wield. As a result, the population of
Erromanga has decreased from between 5000 and 10,000 to 800.

Happily, the northern islands were not so rich in sandalwood, so that
contact with the whites came later, through the coprah-makers. Coprah
is dried cocoa-nut, which is used in manufacturing soap, and the
great wealth of cocoa-nut palms attracted coprah-makers as early
as the 'Seventies of the last century. They were nearly all ruined
adventurers, either escaped from the Noumea penitentiary or otherwise
the scum of the white race. Such individuals would settle near
a good anchorage close to some large village, build a straw hut,
and barter coprah for European goods and liquor. They made a very
fair profit, but were constantly quarrelling with the natives, whom
they enraged by all sorts of brutalities. The frequent murders of
such traders were excusable, to say the least, and many later ones
were acts of justifiable revenge. The traders were kept in contact
with civilization through small sailing-vessels, which brought them
new goods and bought their coprah. This easy money-making attracted
more whites, so that along the coasts of the more peaceable islands
numerous Europeans settled, and at present there are so many of these
stations that the coprah-trade is no longer very profitable.

Naturally, many of these settlers started plantations, and thus grew
up the plantation centres of Mele, Port Havannah, Port Sandwich, Epi
and the Segond Channel. Many plantations were created by the "Societe
Francaise des Nouvelles Hebrides," but owing to bad management these
have never yet brought any returns.

Thus, to the alcohol peril was added another danger to the
natives,--work on the plantations. They were kidnapped, overworked,
ill-fed; it was slavery in its worst shape, and the treatment of the
hands is best illustrated by the mortality which, in some places,
reached 44 per cent. per annum. In those days natives were plentiful
and labour easy to get, and nobody worried about the future; so the
ruin of the race began, and to-day their number hardly suffices for
the needs of the planters.

Then the slave-trade to Queensland, Fiji, even South America began,
so that the population, relatively small from the first, decreased
alarmingly, all the more so as they were decimated by dysentery,
measles, tuberculosis and other diseases.

Against all these harmful influences the missions, unsupported as they
were by any authority, could only fight by protests in the civilized
countries; these proved effectual at last, so that the missions deserve
great credit for having preserved the native race. Yet it cannot be
said that they have restored its vitality, except in Tanna. It seems
as