Volume 14 Australasia - dana ward's homepage

284 AUSTRALASIA.in their physical appearance. The western islanders with their fair complexionresemble the Yisayas and Tagals of the Philippines ; those of the central islandshave a red coppery colour, while farther east the natives of the Seniavin groupare almost black and like the Papuans. In TJalan they are still darker, withslightly crisp hair. The people of Nukunor and Satoan are descendants ofSamoau immigrants, as is evident from their physique, language and usages.Lastly, in some of the islands the European element is already so strong that mostof the children present a type approaching that of the whites.The population has certainly decreased since the arrival of the Europeans, butnot, as has often been asserted, in virtue of some mysterious and inevitable lawaffecting inferior races. Epidemics little dreaded in the "West doubtless becometerrible scourges in Oceania, and such is the terror caused by measles, for instance,that in Yap and elsewhere the people combine to attack the infected villages,and stamp out the plague by killing the victims and compelling the others towithdraw for some weeks to the interior. Nevertheless the maladies introducedby foreign sailors do not suffice to explain the disappearance of the race, whichhas suffered still more from the raids of these foreigners, who carry off the nativesto work on the plantations in Fiji and other archipelagoes. After the CarolineIslanders have thus been swept away, philosophic travellers indulge in meditationson the fatality which dooms the so-called inferior races to perish at contact withthe civilised whites. Nevertheless there are certain favoured spots such as Lukunor," pearl of the Carolines," in the Mortlock group, where the population is evenrapidlv increasing by the natural excess of births over the mortalitj', and whereevery inch of the land is carefully ciiltivated.Taken as a whole, the Caroline natives are a mild, hospitable, industrious, andpeaceful race. They allow their women much freedom, treat their children withgreat tenderness and faithfully observe the laws of friendship, comrades becomingbrothers by an interchange of names. In certain places, notably Ualan, thepeople had no weapons of any sort, no strife or warfare. They even still leadsimple, peaceful lives, except in the neighbourhood of the factories and missions,where their habits have been modified by contact with Europeans. Tattooing isextensively practised, the systems varying greatly according to the localities,tribes, and social position. Some of the chiefs and nobles are further distinguishedby badges such as the white shell worn on the hand by the aristocratic families inYap, where combs of orange-wood and ebony are reserved for the free men.Their food consists chiefly of the rima or bread fruit, the taro {arum csculeiifHin),the sweet jjotato introduced from the Philippines, iish and other marine fauna.They cultivate no rice, which the j^lantcrs are said to have vainly attempted tointroduce into the archipelago. The dwellings, in general much smaller and far lesscommodious than those of Melanesia and Papuasia, are in many places mere roofsof foliage resting on the ground and entered on all fours through openings afcboth ends. But every village possesses one spacious and more carefully constructedbuilding, which serves at once as a boat-house, a hostelry for strangers, arefuge during rainy weather, and a playroom for the children. Although they