We shall try to account for this fact by showing that on most of the Oceanic islands all land had been appropriated, which led to a state of things inconsistent with slavery as a social system.
In the following paragraphs we shall inquire what our ethnographers have to say about landed property in Oceania and the extent to which the land had been appropriated.
§ 5. Land tenure in Polynesia.
In this and the following two paragraphs we shall not mention all particulars of land tenure given by the ethnographers, but only those which may enable us to decide whether all land had been appropriated.
Mahler, speaking of Polynesia and Micronesia generally, remarks that on many islands the burial-places occupied large tracts of land; but this does not prove that there was abundance of land, for these places were hardly ever anything but (according to Penny), “barren points where the wind howls and the sea moans, or rocky caverns in which the waves dash with sullen roar”[31].
Waltershausen tells us that in Polynesia the cultivated land belonged to the king and nobility, to the exclusion of the labouring classes. The upper classes also owned the fruit-trees, the small coral islets surrounding the larger islands, the lakes, the rivers, and those parts of the sea which extended from the land to the reefs. The untilled land was the property of the tribe and, unless the king forbade it, every one might cut the [[315]]wood growing on it for building houses and canoes; but only the ruling classes might take it into cultivation[32].
Mariner states that in Tonga property principally consists in plantations, canoes and houses. The plantations are owned by the chiefs and the nobles. Agricultural labourers are very much despised; they serve the chiefs on whom they are dependent. West tells us that “the feudal principle, that the whole country belonged exclusively to the king, regulated the disposal and tenure of lands,” and so the lower classes were in a slavelike condition. “Lands were held in fief. The great landlords derived them by hereditary right, in conjunction with their chieftainship, but held them at the will of the supreme ruler.” These landlords distributed their lands among their relations and followers[33].
In Niué or Savage Island, “the land belongs to clans represented by their heads”. “At present there is land enough for all, and the junior members of the clan come to the headman whenever they want land to plant upon. Titles can be acquired by cultivation”[34].
“The land in Samoa” says Turner “is owned alike by the chiefs and these heads of families. The land belonging to each family is well known, and the person who, for the time being holds the title of the family head, has the right to dispose of it. It is the same with the chiefs. There are certain tracts of bush or forest land which belong to them. The uncultivated bush is sometimes claimed by those who own the land on its borders. The lagoon also, as far as the reef, is considered the property of those off whose village it is situated.” Von Bülow concludes from the legends and traditions of the Samoans that formerly all the land belonged to the chiefs. But now the land is owned by the families[35].