SAMOA AND FIJI
The Samoa, or Navigator's, Islands, discovered by a Dutch navigator in 1722, attracted but little attention until the introduction of Christianity in 1830. Only a few of the group are inhabited; the others are chiefly barren rocks.
The islands are of volcanic origin, and earthquakes are frequent, but not severe. Fringing coral reefs form barriers that in a great measure protect the islands from heavy seas. The group lie on the steamship route between Australia and the Pacific coast of North America; hence they are important to the United States. The larger islands are mountainous and well forested. Some of the mountains attain the height of five thousand feet.
Early in the '80's there were three rival chiefs, each of whom wanted to be king. As a result, they were at war most of the time, and the property of Americans and Europeans suffered greatly. So, in 1889, Great Britain, Germany, and the United States formed a joint protectorate over them. Ten years later another outbreak was stirred up by foreign adventurers; so the islands were annexed to Germany and the United States for the sake of peace. The two largest, Savii and Upolu, were ceded to Germany; Tutuila and the Manua group were taken by the United States. On condition of having a free hand in the Cook group, Great Britain gave up all claims.
A rich soil, tropical temperature, and a generous rainfall make the islands productive. Americans who live there claim that in no other part of the world can the necessaries of life be obtained so easily as in Samoa. Savii, the largest island, has a smaller area of cultivable land than the others. Once upon a time, however, it was the most densely peopled and the richest island of all Samoa. Then a volcanic eruption covered much of its surface with ash and lava. Perhaps in time the lava fields may become good soil, as they have in Hawaii.
Tutuila is one of the four islands belonging to the United States; the other three, Tau, Ofu, and Olosenga, belong to the Manua group. All of them together are not half the size of Rhode Island. Tutuila is perhaps the most important island of Samoa, because of its fine harbor, Pago Pago—Pango Pango, the Samoans pronounce it. Pago Pago is certainly a fine harbor. The entrance is so narrow that it can be closed easily; then it widens out into a bay two miles long and nearly half a mile wide. When the Panama Canal is completed, Pago Pago will be right in the track of steamships from Europe and the United States bound for Australia.
Apia, on the island of Upolu, is the port of the Germans. The harbor is larger, but it is not so well protected. In 1889, when a typhoon struck Apia (both the town and the shipping), very few buildings escaped damage or destruction. And the shipping?—well, there was not much left. There were six warships and a lot of sailing-vessels in the V-shaped harbor. When the storm raged hardest it seemed to grow a bit more furious. Some of the vessels dragged their anchors and were piled up as wrecks on the beach. Others foundered and went to the bottom with all aboard. Three or four managed to get out of the bay into the open sea, where they were fairly safe.
But Pago Pago harbor is large and deep. What is still better, it is surrounded by bluffs and mountains that will shelter a big fleet against even the fury of a typhoon.
Most of the islands are covered with a dense vegetation, tropical and richly colored. There is an abundance of hardwood trees, but the breadfruit, banana, and cocoa-palm are the most useful. The breadfruit-tree grows wild, but it is also cultivated. The fruit is about the size of an ordinary cantaloupe. In some species the fruit is filled with seeds nearly as large as chestnuts and these are sometimes eaten. The best fruit, however, is filled with starchy matter.
It is cooked in many ways, but it is greatly relished when baked in hot ashes covered with live coals. After it is thus cooked, it is cut open and the rich juicy pulp scooped out. When cooked with meat and gravy it is superior to the finest mushrooms.
The cocoa-palm is a source of not a little profit. The thick husk yields a fibre that is much used in making coarse mats; the dried meat of the nut is the copra of commerce. Large quantities are exported to the United States and Europe in order to obtain the oil; and the oil is used chiefly to make soap.
The native Samoans are lighter colored than most Polynesians, and are the finest native peoples of the South Pacific Ocean. Many years ago missionaries and teachers settled in Samoa and they found the natives to be pretty apt scholars. By nature they were dignified and polite; they also learned quickly the arts of civilized life. Nowadays nearly every native village has its church and school-house. The Samoans are fond of music and one may hear American hymns and melodies in nearly every native house.
The native houses are larger than most of the houses one finds among the Pacific islands. Two or more long posts support the ridge pole and a great number of shorter posts hold the lower edges of the roof. The roof itself consists of closely fitted mats of brush thickly thatched with the leaves of wild sugar cane. A well-made roof lasts a dozen years or more.
Mats of sugar-cane closely woven are loosely fastened to the outer rows of posts so that they can be easily put up or taken down. They form the side walls of the house. The floor is made of clay, paved with pebbles. Usually there is a floor covering of mats. In the centre of the floor is a fire pit which serves for the purpose of cooking during the day and to drive out the mosquitoes at night. The beds and chairs are mats and the pillows are made of bamboo.
The Samoans know how to live well. With each house there is pretty certain to be a garden in which yams, taro, sweet potatoes, bananas, fruit, and chickens are grown. Then, there are fish and shrimps that can be caught in abundance. But the chief and most highly prized dish is called "poi." Taro and kalo are names—or a name, rather; for they are different forms of the same word—given to several plants that grow from starchy bulbs. One kind of taro looks much like a lily that grows higher than a tall man. The bulb, or root, is first baked and then ground to a paste with water. When thus prepared, it is set aside until it begins to ferment; then it is ready to be eaten. A great dish or pot of poi is placed on a mat and the family gather around, one after another dipping it out with their hands. To foreigners poi has a most unpleasant, disagreeable taste. When made into cakes and baked, however, it is much relished by foreigners.
Kava is the national drink. It is made from the roots of a shrub belonging to the pepper family. The root is ground between stones and then soaked in water. After a while it is pounded and rubbed until all the milky juice is squeezed out of it. When "extra-fine" kava is wanted, young girls chew the root until it has become pulpy. After standing a day or two it is strained and is then ready to be drunk. It is a cooling and refreshing drink, but if taken too freely is apt to tangle one's legs uncomfortably.
On account of its delightful climate and beautiful scenery, Samoa is one of the most attractive places in the world in which to live. Back in the mountains, a few miles from Apia, Robert Louis Stevenson spent the last few years of his life, and his body is buried on the top of the mountain near by. Stevenson was greatly beloved by the natives, and after his death he was mourned by them as one of their very best friends.
Of all the islands in the South Pacific Ocean, the Fiji group is the most important. All told there are more than two hundred islands, but scarcely one-third of them are inhabited, or even habitable. Two of them are large. One, Viti Levu, is about the size of Connecticut; the other, Vanua Levu, is about two-thirds the size of that State. The famous Dutch sailor Abel Janszoon Tasman, whose name is remembered in Tasmania, saw the larger islands in 1643. About one hundred and thirty years later Captain Cook called at Viti Levu and found himself in the midst of a great cannibal feast. In 1840, Captain Charles Wilkes, in charge of a United States expedition, explored them; shortly afterward they became a possession of Great Britain.
The larger islands are great domes of lava built up by volcanic eruptions; many of the smaller ones are coral formations, and all are fringed with coral reefs. Dense forests of tropical vegetation cover the larger islands. Cocoanut and other palms are everywhere to be found. A species of pine, much like the kauri pine of New Zealand, grows on the larger islands. Among the forest trees are also several kinds of tree-ferns and a tree-nettle. When the pointed leaves of the latter prick the skin they sting the flesh as badly as does a wasp.
The English have done well by both the islands and the islanders. They have made the islands yield a good yearly profit to the government itself, but they have also made the natives industrious and contented. When the first British settlements were made in Fiji, the islanders were in a most degraded condition. They did no work except to grow a few yams, bananas, and breadfruit. Their chief employment was war, and this was carried on, not for conquest, but to capture as many as possible. A few captives were held as slaves, but most of them were fattened—to be killed and eaten at the royal feasts.
Native canoe, Fiji Islands
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Notwithstanding all this there was the making of a very superior people in them; for when the missionaries and the teachers got among them the natives proved very apt pupils. Now there are more than twelve hundred church buildings—and a school-house or two for every church. Some of the ministers and teachers are English, but there are about four thousand native teachers and ministers, nearly all of whom were trained for their work in the island schools.
They are fine farmers, probably the best in the islands of the Pacific. They grow bananas, pineapples, peanuts, and lemons for the Australians, copra and tobacco for the British, and rice, taro, and garden vegetables for themselves. They have learned to irrigate their farms, using open ditches and bamboo mains. They make the finest canoes to be found in the Pacific. Some of the canoes are barges nearly one hundred feet in length; and not even the Hawaiians are more expert in using them.
Not a little profit to the islanders comes from the sea. They are expert divers and gather large quantities of pearl shells, which find a ready market with the button-makers of Europe. Fish are caught, dried, and sold in China. One sea product, the bêche-de-mer, a marine animal commonly called "sea-cucumber," is highly prized by the Chinese, who use large quantities; most of it is gathered by the Fijians.
Sugar, however, is the chief product of the islands, and the sugar plantations are owned by great companies that have invested millions of pounds sterling in the business. The plantations altogether produce more than three million dollars' worth of sugar yearly. The native islanders will not work in the sugar fields; so coolies from India were brought to the islands to work on the plantations.
Suva (Viti Levu), and Leonka (Ovalu), the two largest towns, are much like European cities, except that the houses are low and have large yards filled with shade trees and flowers. In the native villages the dwellings are much like those in Samoa, though a trifle better, perhaps. The side walls are covered with plaited reeds, and the roof is thatched with palm leaves securely fastened. In the lowlands it is customary to build a platform of rock upon which the house stands and into which the foundation poles are set. This is done for two reasons: when a typhoon sweeps over the islands, the lowland coast is sometimes flooded; moreover, the wind blows with such terrific force that none but the most strongly built house will withstand it.
In the centre of the floor is a pit, or fireplace, much like the cooking-place one sees in Samoa or in Hawaii. Chickens and pieces of meat to be roasted are hung from a frame over the pit. Yams and other vegetables are boiled in earthen vessels which the native potters make. The floors are covered with closely woven mats; and in order to keep them clean an earthen vessel filled with water is kept outside so that whoever enters the house may bathe his feet. Inasmuch as the natives go barefoot one may see the usefulness of this custom.
Great Britain has many islands in this part of the Pacific; Gilbert, Ellice, Tonga, Cook, and some of the Solomon group all fly the Union Jack. There is an English governor, or "High Commissioner," as he is styled, who looks after British affairs in the islands. In Fiji he is the real governor, but in many of the islands native chiefs and kings govern their peoples about as they please, provided they do not interfere with British interests.