Chapter X

NATIVES HUMANELY TREATED--AUSTRALASIAN LADIES--VISIT TO THE
AUSTRALIAN METHODIST MISSION--NEW IRELAND DESCRIBED--SETTLEMENT
EFFECTED--HIGHER PLANE OF CULTURE

There was sufficient material in the daily life at Herbertshöhe to fill many pages. I began to get accustomed to the ways and manners of the place, although I was often amazed at the long hours through which the Germans would “sit” and “soak,” to use a forcible if inelegant expression.

Still, justice compels me to admit that British youths, generation after generation, have shortened their lives by excessive drinking in India. Now they have learned their lesson and find it does not pay! Most of them look forward to the day when they may enjoy their hard-earned pensions in England, and experience has shown that this is rarely the case with those who in early manhood gave way to drinking in hot climates.

In my early matutinal strolls about the little settlement I saw plenty of natives. If alone in a plantation I always kept a good lookout to the rear, having no wish to be surprised unawares. When I saw one coming along the path behind me, I would turn to admire the view, fix a calm but smiling gaze on the noiseless pedestrian, which shyness, or some undefinable savage quality, prevented him from returning.

I would wonder at times when I studied these elementary humans, what pleasure the Almighty derived from the contemplation of His handiwork. Were I not steeped in the belief that law and order, otherwise evolutionary processes, govern this universe, the existence of primitive man would make me cavil at “the goodness of God,” as glibly expressed by some semi-educated clerics who, incurably blind themselves, seek to lead those whose eyes are often wide open to the Light. Such words as the following, even in the light of poetic licence are, to my mind, incentives to disbelief:--

“God whose pleasure brought
Man into being, stands away
As it were a hand’s breadth off, to give
Room for the newly-made to live.”

Many a laugh we enjoyed over the jargon, known as Pidgin-English. The kanaka’s description of a piano his mistress had just received, amused me greatly: “Missus have one fellow big box, she fight him, he cry!”

The fact that personally I never witnessed anything approaching rough usage on the part of the Europeans at Herbertshöhe, must not be omitted. In fact, it was repeatedly borne in upon my comprehension that the plantation managers and others would have welcomed additional powers to deal punitively with those they employed; but the protective policy of the administration regarding the treatment of these coloured labourers, based on the principle that without natives torrid lands are useless, leaves nothing to be desired from the humane standpoint.

As each day some resident would take me for drives or offer me hospitality, I was able to stow away much miscellaneous information. It should be understood that in this remote spot no vehicle is to be hired, and if the Germans are unfavourably disposed towards a visitor, the latter sees nothing.

On two occasions the manager of the hotel procured the loan of a gig from a friend and drove me about nine miles in a south-easterly direction to a plantation owned by the New Guinea Company, where the wife of the manager with much hospitality received me. She had not been in this colony very long, having lived in German East Africa, where rubber constitutes a lucrative export. She was greatly interested in the island entymology, and had taught one or two kanaka lads to catch the butterflies without damaging them, and to place them carefully between triangularly folded pieces of paper, for which she paid them. I was given a good selection, for which I was truly grateful. The drive to her house led uphill, mostly through the New Guinea Company’s plantations, and past several managers’ houses. The first time, the youthful Bavarian who drove me was like a boy let loose from school the moment the hotel was out of sight. He chatted and laughed, and when we came upon groups of kanakas clearing a road, his humour knew no bounds.

“Oh! you one fellow kanakas, you work too hard, far too hard, you’ll die too soon for sure!” he roared at them, pointing with his whip, and laughing loudly at their looks of blank astonishment, as he chaffed them over the languid ease which characterises the movements of this physically weak race.

In the evening, the good-natured fellow drove all the way out again to fetch me, and then on each occasion we took at breakneck speed short cuts over cart tracks, bumped this way one moment, and with the rebound holding on for dear life the next, but in the highest of spirits reaching the hotel before dark in time for dinner.

Another evening I took some lantern slides of Jamaica to the Roman Catholic schoolhouse, being escorted thereto and back again by two intelligent youths. In one of the class-rooms I held forth to the half-caste children and the sisters upon the beauties of the West Indies, whilst two of the Fathers manipulated the lantern.

Amongst the European residents at the afternoon tennis-parties, presided over by Queen Emma, I made the acquaintance of two Australians and a New Zealander. The former were from Sydney, and the husband occupied the position of manager of the Forsyth stores at Herbertshöhe, his wife lived in a small house not far distant. The latter had first made the acquaintance of the colony and of her future husband under the auspices of the Australian Methodist Mission. The excitement of converting cannibalistic natives from the errors of their way had paled before the attractions of matrimony, and she had espoused a German manager, belonging to the Forsyth firm, and lived very happily some ten miles distant. She was kind enough to invite me to stay a few days with her before leaving New Britain.

The above mission, founded by Dr George Brown in 1775, had as its first sphere of labour the opposite coast of New Ireland, where, at Hunter’s Harbour, the intrepid missionary in the _John Wesley_ first anchored. The same year, however, saw also the foundation of a second station at Nodup, on the north of the Gazelle, just at the foot of the Mother. The mission is continuing its active work, aided by Samoan cathechists, some of whom I saw when escorted by Queen Emma in her steam-launch to Raluana, a few miles along the shores of the bay westward of Ralum, to visit two Australian ladies who were finding the work of teaching strenuous and the mode of life somewhat harder, I fancy, than they had bargained for.

The workers are not under vows to remain; most of them return home after a few years spent in this extensive mission-field. The pointed meaning of Bishop Coppée’s remark: “We are here for life,” was apparent. It was not difficult to sum up for oneself in which of the two rival communities lay real heroism.

Then on different occasions I was taken by one of the partners of the Forsyth firm through their plantations, where besides copra, rubber, planted three years before, was not sufficiently established to yield handsome returns. A German war-ship had entered Blanche Bay, and one morning the honour of an invitation to an official lunch from their Excellencies reached me. Seated opposite to Queen Emma, an imposing figure for the occasion, the Governor, who sat between us, proved himself a perfect host, as well as a brilliant conversationalist.

Another day a delightful picnic was organised, and we started from Ralum in three or four carriages of sorts, our destination being a newly-made reservoir built for plantation purposes, through which a running stream flowed, some eight miles distant. Here we were to have a swim before lunch, when the gentlemen were to join us. On our way we found the way blocked by a fallen tree; several kanakas were endeavouring to remove it, but without success. I wondered what would happen, for our little cavalcade had come to a full stop on rising ground, much to the apparent distaste of a pair of fine horses harnessed to the high carriage wherein I had been invited to seat myself. Queen Emma, however, showed herself full of resource. She sprang out of the little low carriage she was driving, and directed the natives to hack a way through the dense bush which flanked the narrow roadway: thus we circumvented the obstruction. The drive back was exciting to the Danish lady and myself. Our native driver who sat in front, totally unable to control his horses, allowed them to plunge madly down a long hill, at the bottom of which was a brook filled with water. We swayed and bumped down the rough road, got splashed up to our eyebrows, but fortunately the steep ascent the other side quieted the creatures somewhat, and though I am not nervous behind good horse-flesh, certainly a special Providence had us in His keeping as we swished round sharp corners, arriving safely at Ralum before the rest of the party. Late that evening I returned to the hotel in my hostess’s rickshaw, it being pitch dark.

At meal-time Dr Thurnwald was always interesting; from him I learnt a good deal of what the Germans had done in New Ireland. This long, narrow island, 240 miles in length, where there are continuous mountain chains, containing porphyry, basalt and volcanic rocks, possesses altitudes rising to 10,000 feet. The approaching visitor in many places sees nothing but virgin forests extending from the sea-shores to the heights beyond. Both on the east and west coasts the mountains mostly skirt the shores, and but little strand is visible. In the rainy season deep intersecting chasms and valleys are washed by mountain torrents.

In this island, says Dr Thurnwald, there is a marked difference between the people of the northern part to those of the south of New Ireland, who are considered to be racially allied to the kanakas of the Gazelle Peninsula. In the north they display far superior intelligence, and therefore are preferred for plantation labour, but owing to its mountainous character, the island does not present such opportunities for cultivation as New Britain, and another great obstacle to its development lies in its lack of good harbours. Excepting on the south coast there is very little anchorage. Of the interior, as yet, not much is known.

In 1888 Count Joachim Pfeil crossed from east to west, opposite the Duke of York Islands, where the mountains are several thousand feet lower than the rest of the chain. The region is highly volcanic, and in the islands of St John and Caens, with Gardner and Fischer on the east coast, hot springs abound, and there are many extinct craters. The coasts are now familiar to Europeans, who constantly pass up and down from Herbertshöhe to Nusa in the extreme north, where after much difficulty and several catastrophes, the Germans have at last succeeded in establishing settlements.

The first enterprise in this remote locality was effected by the Hernsheim firm in 1880, and not long after a second was established at Kapsu, some twenty miles south of Nord Cape. The efforts of the pioneers have been most successful, and a network of good roads connects the little port of Nusa with the surrounding plantations. A few of the coral islets in Byron’s Straits, which divide New Ireland from New Hanover, have been placed under cultivation, and in the south-east of the last-named island there are level tracts which will probably also serve for the growing of copra.

Before the establishment of a police station, the natives were exceedingly troublesome, but they have now learnt to respect the “mailed fist,” and have settled down into an industrious people, making roads from one village to another and keeping them in good order. In this locality cannibalism is a thing of the past, though it flourishes in parts of New Ireland where European rule does not yet extend a salutary check.

Totemism obtains amongst the northern inhabitants of New Ireland, polygamy is fashionable, initiation ceremonies for youths, with seclusion before marriage for brides, are customs in full force. Cremation plays an important part in the funeral ceremonies; sometimes a figure to represent the deceased accompanies the proceedings which, at the conclusion of the festivities, is flung into the flames with the corpse.

One feature, unique in the Archipelago, connects the inhabitants of Siara, a district lying to the south of Cape St Maria, with the natives of the St John and Caens Groups, between whom there is friendly intercourse which, in these latitudes, generally points to more or less blood relationship. Here Polynesian influence is distinctly discernible in the tattooing. It is generally practised by the women of the locality, and their naïve fancy objects to see both sides of the face alike; therefore on one cheek a native will have lines depicting the fronds of a fern, on the other circular tracings denoting the section of a nut which grows in the district.