On one Island may be found a hundred varieties of ferns alone. The damara or kauri-pine, so prized in New Zealand, grows there, as also the bread-fruit tree, the banana, the papua-apple, the chestnut, and above all the cocoa-nut, which for refreshing drink competes with the vine of other lands, and for varied uses and services to man almost rivals the very palmtree of Palestine. The sandal-wood, for its sacred odours and idol incense, has been almost swept entirely away,—as much as £70,000 worth being carried off from Erromanga alone!
Among native foods, the yam and the taro hold the foremost place, not inferior to our finest potatoes; besides the banana, the sugar-cane, the bread-fruit, and the cocoa-nut, which flourish to perfection. Their arrowroot is in some respects the finest in the world, and is kept only for special uses as yet, but may develop into a great and valuable industry, as Commerce opens up her markets and stretches out her hands. The English cabbage has been introduced and grows well; also the planting of cotton and of coffee.
The scarcity of animals is marvellous. The pig, the dog, and the rat are their only four-footed creatures; and some affirm that the rat is the alone indigenous quadruped in all the New Hebrides! Lizards and snakes abound, but are declared not to be poisonous. There are many small and beautiful pigeons, also wild ducks and turkeys, besides multitudes of ordinary fowls. Goats have now been largely introduced, as well as sheep, and various European animals. Fish, of course, swarm in millions around the shores, and a whaling station on Aneityum sent into the market £2,000 worth of oil in a year.
The Natives are practically quite naked, till induced by the Missionary to “wear a shirt”—the first sign of renouncing Heathenism and inclining towards Christianity. They are Cannibals of a very pronounced type, and Savages without any traces of civilization, except those connected with war(!),—without a literature, and almost without a religion, except only the dread of evil spirits, the worship of ancestors, and the lowest forms of fetishism, trees, stones, etc. They are partly Malay and partly Papuan,—a mixture of Ham and of Shem,—some with hair crisp and woolly, stuck full of feathers and shells, others with hair long and wavy, twisted into as many as 700 separate whipcords on a single head, and taking five years to finish the job! Their bows and arrows, tomahawks, clubs and spears, are sometimes elaborately carved and adorned; and they can twist and weave grasses and fibres into wondrously beautiful mats, bags, and girdles. They make bracelets out of shells, sliced and carved in marvellous ways, as also ear-rings and nose-rings; and in many similar methods they show some savage sense of beauty.
Polygamy, with all its accompanying cruelties and degradations, universally prevails. Infanticide is systematically practised; and even the despatch of parents, when they grow old and helpless. Widows are put to death on almost every island to bear their husbands company into the spirit world. There is not an unmentionable vice hinted at in Romans i. which is not unblushingly practised on those Islands, wheresoever the Gospel has not dawned.
For the best published information on all these subjects, consult the work by Dr. John Inglis: “In the New Hebrides” (Nelson & Sons, 1887),—Reminiscences of noble Missionary Service for three-and-thirty years.
A SELECTION FROM
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