AUSTRALIA’S ISLAND WARDS
Most people associate Thursday Island with its great neighbour New
Guinea, the second largest island on the globe. Of what we might call
mainland New Guinea I have already written in my book on Java and
the East Indies. You will recall that it is divided into Dutch New
Guinea, Papua, and former Kaiser Wilhelm’s Land. Both Papua and the
former German possessions are now administered by Australia. Besides
former Kaiser Wilhelm’s Land, the Territory of New Guinea embraces the
Bismarck Archipelago and some of the Solomon Islands. Germany owned
also the Marshall and the Caroline Islands, lying north of the Equator,
which are now governed by Japan, while former German Samoa is under
the jurisdiction of New Zealand. Australia has the responsibility of
looking after nearly one hundred thousand square miles of territory
outside the Commonwealth, and although she is determined to remain an
“all-white” continent, she has under her jurisdiction thousands of
primitive coloured peoples.
The natives of former Kaiser Wilhelm’s Land are, if anything, wilder
and more savage than those of Papua. Thousands of them go naked save
for breech cloths of bark for the men and short petticoats of woven
grass for the women. Along the extreme northern coast are tribes that
are entirely nude, with the exception of a shell necklace and a few
bird-of-paradise feathers stuck in their woolly hair. Some tribes paint
themselves in stripes of white, red, yellow, and black, and others scar
themselves with flints or by fire.
I have photographs of native houses recently taken in New Guinea. Some
of these houses are of great size, and many families live under one
roof. The buildings are frequently set upon piles, a platform of poles
being first constructed, a skeleton framework built upon this, and mats
of woven leaves or grass fastened to it. The mats are so arranged that
they can be raised or lowered to keep out the mosquitoes and the flies,
which are exceedingly troublesome. In other parts of the island there
are houses built in the trees, to which the people retreat in times of
danger.
The different tribes are frequently at war with one another, and the
missionaries tell me that sometimes these feuds go on between tribes
and villages for generations. Cannibalism exists in some localities,
though not to a great extent. The British have observed it among the
people along the Gulf of Papua, and it is found also in northern New
Guinea. The ordinary food of the natives is about the same as that of
the Samoans, their chief diet being the yam, the taro, which is a kind
of potato, and the banana.
The islands of the Bismarck Archipelago have some tribes stranger
even than those of New Guinea. On one of them, according to good
authorities, the girls are kept in wicker cages from the age of six or
eight years until they are married. The cages are built inside large
houses set aside for the purpose. The girls are let out once a day to
bathe, but otherwise they are not permitted to leave their traps. Their
food is handed in through the bars, and they pace up and down at times
like caged lions. These cages are under the charge of the old women of
the tribe, who see that the girls do not flirt with the passers-by or
peepers-in. The young men have the right to look at the cages now and
then, and probably, after making proper presents to the guards and the
parents of the girl, one may woo the maiden of his choice through the
bamboo meshes.
I am told that these girls do not suffer in health from their
imprisonment, and that notwithstanding their seclusion they make
very good wives, and later on are by no means averse to having their
daughters caged up as they were. In this hot climate the people mature
rapidly, and the marriageable age for a girl is eleven or twelve years.
The unmarried damsel of fifteen is considered an old maid.
New Britain, the principal island of this group, is three hundred and
fifty miles long. New Ireland, the next in size, is about two hundred
miles long and only twenty miles wide. New Britain is traversed by a
mountain chain whose tallest peak is The Father. It is seventy-five
hundred feet high and is an active volcano.
In New Ireland the people of each village are divided into two
classes and marriage between the classes is strictly forbidden. If
a woman marries outside her class the punishment is death, but the
male offender merely pays a fine. Both women and men go naked, and
cannibalism is common. The people live in small huts shaped like
beehives, surrounded by bamboo fences. The young unmarried men have
common houses where they live together.
Most of the few hundred Europeans living in the Archipelago are
gathered at Rabaul, in New Britain. This is a well-planned,
spick-and-span town, once the capital of German New Guinea. Here one
of the most interesting characters of the Pacific islands had her
headquarters. This was a woman of remarkable courage and business
ability, half Samoan, who back in the eighties started German New
Guinea on the road to prosperity in the coconut business. “Queen Emma,”
as she was called, was a most enterprising trader, and it was from her
that the German New Guinea Development Company, in which the former
Kaiser was said to be a heavy investor, bought trading rights. The
enormous areas under her management were finally forbidden to German
officers because of their cruelty to the natives, whom Queen Emma
always championed. She was almost worshipped by the islanders, of whom
she employed thousands. At length, however, she married a handsome
young German officer and went to Europe to take a high place in the
society of Berlin. She died several years ago at Monte Carlo.
New Ireland, too, has its romance, for it was here that some forty
years ago a wealthy Frenchman, the Marquis de Rays, tried to start the
Free Colony of Oceania. In his prospectus New Ireland was described as
an earthly paradise in which each settler was to have fifty acres with
a house and every comfort. Would-be colonists from the crowded lands
and streets of France, Belgium, and Italy were numerous. Money was
poured into the enterprise, which, however, suffered from mismanagement
and poor organization. Arrived at the spot chosen on the unsheltered
southeast point of the island, the colonists’ ship dumped its cargo on
the open beach. Steam cranes, sugar-mill machinery, handsome carriages,
agricultural implements, bricks, crates of food, and immense piles of
clothing lay in confusion under the tropical sun. Boxes of handles for
shovels and axes were landed, but neither shovels nor axes could
be found to go with them. There were stacks of wheelbarrows without
wheels. Much of the clothing was heavy and unsuited to the climate.
The only thing entirely complete to the last detail was the building
material for a cathedral, a gift to the settlers from the French
people! It was never put up.
[Illustration: Among some Pacific island men a big waist is considered
the sign of a glutton, so they lace themselves in tightly with belts of
fibre. This man, owing to his necklaces, looped earrings, and unusual
nose plugs, is the envy of his village.]
[Illustration: The Tasman Sea is named for Abel Tasman, greatest of all
Dutch navigators. He discovered, also, New Zealand and Tasmania and was
the first man to circumnavigate Australia.]
[Illustration: At Wellington, capital and chief port of New Zealand,
the hills come so close to the water that some of the streets run
through tunnels and many of the houses are seven hundred feet up.]
Many of the intending colonists did not even leave the ship. Some died
of malaria, for quinine had been left out of the medical stores. The
rest of them scattered, a number going on to Australia. Only one, a
mere boy, decided to stay on, and he at last grew to be one of the
wealthiest men of New Guinea.
A little to the east of the Bismarck Archipelago are the Solomon
Islands. The principal island in this group is Bougainville, which
is bigger than Porto Rico. It is quite rugged, having two constantly
active volcanoes and one mountain of an altitude of more than two miles
above sea level. The natives here are of the same race as those on
the adjoining islands, and equally as savage. In most cases the men
go naked, and in some of the islands the women wear no clothing until
they are married. Both men and women pierce their ears, the holes in
the lobes being gradually stretched until they are as big around as a
napkin ring. Among some tribes the nose is pierced and a long pin of
bone or shell is stuck through it. There is some tattooing, and scars
made by burning are considered fine ornaments.
The Solomon Islanders are barely out of cannibalism, and head-hunting
was not long ago the profession and pleasure of most of the young men.
Polygamy is practised, and some of the chiefs have as many as a hundred
wives. The islanders do some farming, raising bananas, yams, and taro.
They are good fishermen, and gather shells and pearls for sale.
Coconuts are the chief product of the Solomon Islands, although it has
been proved that rubber, sugar cane, and cotton will flourish there.
But expansion of the plantations cannot be undertaken without a large
supply of labour.
Australia has introduced fairer labour conditions than she found
throughout the islands she now administers. Special ordinances provide
for a ten-hour day, a weekly day of rest, and observance of public
holidays. Board, lodging, and medical attendance are free and minimum
and maximum wages have been prescribed. There is neither slavery
nor forced labour, and the recruiting of native labour is strictly
regulated.
Missionaries, especially those of the Methodist Church, are at work
in all the islands. Their faithful labour has gone on for many years,
and there are now a large number of native evangelists. One of the
missionaries tells me that the people are being slowly but surely
civilized, and that a number of them are Christians.