Australia, New Zealand and some islands of the South seas

by Frank G. Carpenter

I am disappointed in Apia. From Robert Louis Stevenson’s letters and the place it once held in international affairs I had expected to find it a large city. It is really a small town with a foreign population of less than five hundred British, Germans, New Zealanders, and Swedes, with a few Americans and French for good measure. Its buildings are bungalows, with roofs of galvanized iron, strung around the harbour.

Our steamer was greeted by a great crowd of Samoans and the whole population of foreigners, through which I went up to the Tivoli Hotel, my headquarters during my stay. It did not take me long to exhaust the sights of Apia. The town has a half-dozen business houses engaged in shipping cacao and copra and in furnishing the natives with different kinds of fancy goods, cottons, and tinned stuffs. There are also two photographers, a number of consuls, and a baker’s dozen or so of government officials.

My guide over the island of Upolu was one of the Samoan chiefs. He was half naked when I came into his house, a kind of thatched shack not far from Apia, but he dressed himself in my presence and went about with me. I found that he spoke good English, knew the islands well, and was very intelligent, as are all the natives I have so far met.

With him I visited many of the native houses. Owing to the hot climate, the Samoan dwelling is scarcely more than a roof made of plaited branches supported on a number of slender posts through which all the airs of heaven may circulate. The walls are mats of fibre which are rolled up inside and against the roof when not in use, and which may be let down to keep out the wind and rain. Not a nail is used in the construction of such a house, but instead the parts are tied together with yards of plaited coconut fibre called cinnet. The men spend much of their leisure time plaiting cinnet, some of which is as fine as twine.

The floor of the typical hut is a circular terrace raised about two feet above the ground and surrounded by a shallow ditch. The terrace is made of stones closely fitted together, and over it is spread a layer of white coral pebbles gathered from the beach to form the carpet for the hut. The pebbles, which serve for mattresses as well as floor covering, are sometimes known as “Samoan feathers.” When the native is ready for bed he simply lays a fibre or grass mat upon them, takes down his pillow from the rafters, crawls under his mosquito net, and goes off to the Land of Nod. His pillow is no more than a little log set on four short legs so as to raise his head well off the floor.

The Samoans have always been noted for their hospitality. They give all strangers a cordial welcome, and food, lodging, and even clothing may be had in any native house without thought of compensation. Nevertheless, when a white visitor stays in a Samoan home he gives presents on leaving to the full value of his entertainment. No native guest ever does this, but the foreigners have been so liberal in the past that they have led the people to expect gifts. No Samoan host would, however, lower himself so greatly as to take money. In almost every settlement there is a “Taupo,” or “Maid of the Village,” elected by the people to receive guests and take a leading part in all public ceremonies and festivals. When she goes any distance from home the maiden is surrounded by a train of elderly women as chaperons. She holds office for a few years, or until she is married.

The Samoans are a clean people. Everywhere I see them in bathing. The women and the men wade about waist-deep in the streams and swim together in the surf, splashing one another, and acting more like children than grown-ups.

The young women have beautiful forms. They are as straight as the statue of Venus in the Capitoline Museum at Rome, and as plump and as well formed as the Venus de’ Medici. Their complexions are of a rich chestnut brown and their large soulful eyes are full of smiles. Unfortunately they often bleach their black hair to a bright red by the use of lime. Both women and men are good-natured, gentle, kind, and easily governed.

I have been asked to investigate the chances for Americans to get rich in the Samoan Islands. Robert Louis Stevenson made about twenty thousand dollars a year out of his books, but as far as I can learn, for all his sweating on his cacao plantation, he did not get a cent out of it. The islands have an excellent climate. It is good for consumptives, and if the consumptive were anything else than an impractical newspaper or literary man he might prosper at coconut raising or in growing cacao. There are cacao planters on Upolu who are making money.

Cacao plants produce the seeds from which chocolate is made. The trees are planted in rows about fourteen feet apart and it is four years before they come into bearing. After that time, if properly cared for, they are profitable. One Samoan planter has recently netted more than twelve hundred dollars a year from sixty acres, and there are others who are doing equally well.