Held Up!

A "Good Old Custom” On Norfolk Island

Written for The Pacific Islands Monthly by

Lt.-Colonel T. Orde Lees, O.B.E., A.F.C.

UNTIL I read about it in The Pacific Islands Monthly, I do not remem ber clearly having ever heard of Nor folk Island.

From what I read I became roman tically interested in this modern his torical spot and determined to include it in my itinerary on my way from Japan, where I live, to England, my native land.

I went to much trouble and consid erably greater expense than I need otherwise have done, so as to visit the descendants of the famous Bounty.

Sailing from Port Vila in the Mor inda, we arrived at Norfolk Island on January 3. The next morning my wife and I, together with a dozen or more other passengers, decided to go ashore.

The captain of the Morinda kindly placed the ship’s motor boat at our disposal for the purpose, but for con venience in landing we were placed in a rowing boat towed by the motor boat.

The rowing boat was the property of Messrs. Burns, Philp.

On reaching the jetty, the motor boat slipped the rowing-boat, which drifted alongside the jetty under her own way.

Our passage down the jetty was ob structed by a Mr. Victor Edwards, who demanded from each passenger the sum of two shillings. As other pas sengers were following behind me. I judged that it was no time for alter cation, but asked Mr. Edwards what the charge was for and what service, if any, it represented. He replied that it was for “return boat fare.”

As Mr. Edwards was not the owner of the boat, and as neither he nor any of his men did anything at all towards propelling the boat, it seems to me that this is in the nature of a “hold up.” People of whom I inquired about it merely laughed and said it was “an old custom,” and seemed to think that no one ought to mind paying so small a sum. But then they were all people who did not have to pay it.

Inquiries amongst my fellow passen gers revealed that they were all just as much incensed about it as I was. It is, of course, the principle of the thing rather than the amount that consti tutes its impropriety. Really, a Mr.

Nobody, standing on the pier, has no earthly right to charge passengers an admittance fee to an island unless he or his employees own or propel the landing boat or are the proprietors of the jetty. I understand that Mr. Ed

wards is neither, and I should be very much surprised to learn that he is in any way authorised to make such a charge.

As to our return journey, this was made in the motor-boat of the Morinda so that no employee of Mr. Edwards had anything whatever to do with it.

It seems a pity, just when the is landers are doing their utmost to encourage tourists, that Mr. Edwards, or anyone else, should be allowed to waylay well-disposed tourists and mulct them of, in the aggregate, a substantial sum. No intimation whatever was given to passengers about this charge before leaving the ship, nor in the boat.

The first one learns of it is having one’s landing obstructed on the jetty by Mr.

Edwards, where argument is undesir able.

I might add that when I included Norfolk Island in my itinerary I wrote to the authorities there offering to lec ture on the island, free of charge, in aid of the hospital or any other charity as can be gathered from the enclosed letter. Owing to changes in the sched ule of the Morinda I should have been unable to have fulfilled my promise, but that is no reason why I should become a hold-up victim on landing.

I might add that Mr. Edwards’s ac tion deprived a tourist car of two pas sengers, for having been once tricked I declined the attractive offer of the driver of a car to make a tour of the island. I was afraid of being tricked a second time. I was afraid of being set down far from the ship and of being forced to pay a ransom for the return journey.