Missionaries and Traders.

Is Jealousy Root Cause of Antagonism?

[Written for Pacific Islands Monthly by Gordon Thomas .] No doubt Mr. Yogurt is quite capable of keeping his own pen up against the challenge which General-Secretary Burton throws down in the January but the topic of discussion is such a well-worn subject in the Islands that it would be unfair to re strict expressions of opinion only to these two gentlemen.

Ever since my arrival in New Guinea —over 20 years ago—l have repeatedly heard discussions on missions and traders from various angles.

I have witnessed the bitter, almost fanatical, antagonism existing between Gospel-bearers of different denomin ations; I have watched the intrigues between trader and missionary, and the more subtle machinations being carried on between missionaries and government officials, and vice versa.

I have lived in both camps, and have studied closely the viewpoints of each, and have attempted to analyse, on an impartial and logical basis, the Why and the Wherefore of these constant antagonism, intrigues and machina tions: and, as a result, it appears to me that the fundamental reason for the aggressive attitude adopted by the various sections of the white com munity in a black country is jealousy — a jealousy of the power exerted by the “other chap” over the native.

A mission deplores the influence exercised by a trader. To the mis sionary, the trader is purely and simply out to exploit the natives. He obtains his livelihood from profits real ised from the produce of an ignorant, unsophisticated race who know little of the economic values of raw material.

Furthermore, he sells to these natives calicoes and cheap baubles at fabulous profits to himself. In short, he is the most ferocious of profiteers; a parasite of whom the natives must be warned, and whose influence must be combated and usurped by the missionaries and changed for an influence of good and uplift.

On the other hand, the trader, ac customed to a docile acquiescence from the natives in the matter of cutting copra, fishing trocas, and purchasing his trade lines, resents the advent of a missionary who, in an endeavour to in gratiate himself with natives who are living in Darkness and who provide a promising field for sowing the seeds of the Gospel, gratuitously issues presents of calicoes and tobacco, and, at the same time, explains to the natives that they are receiving but a tithe of the money due to them for their produce, and are being criminally overcharged for a calico or three sticks of tobacco.

The missionary prays fervently for the day when his power influence may dominate the native; the trader dog gedly fights to maintain his old power; and thus the war is commenced. It is a struggle for the possession of sup remacy over the native. Subsidiary to that arise the hundred and one bicker ings and intrigues; local court cases and ultimate appeals to politicians, the Press and Exeter Hall.

Both factions hold interests that

have little relation one with the other.

On the one hand, the dissemination of Christ’s Gospel and the spiritual awak ening of a benighted race; on the other, the purchasing of raw material which previously had no economic value to the native. There seems no logical reason why the two factions should not be able to propagate the Gospel and extend the economic resources of the natives without interfering with each other.

In parenthesis one might ask if it is the recognised policy of Missions to protect the primary producers and con sumers from the exploitation of the middle-man. Why, then, do they not take up the cudgels on behalf of the struggling planters in the grip of mon opolists who demand their pound of flesh far more persistently than the small trader.

Out of this struggle for power arise such expressions of opinion as men tioned by Mr. Vogan in regard to the trading activities of the Methodist Mis sions. (Mr. Burton apparently reads into Mr. Vogan’s remark a reference to the individual missionary. This, I must admit, I was unable to interpret from the latter’s article.) Mr. Vogan presumably was referring to the Papuan Missions. His observa tions there apparently prompted him to make such a statement. Personally, my own experiences have been limited to New Guinea and the British Solo mons, and I must agree with General- Secretary Burton’s remarks where he mentions the mission stores for the “brown staff.” It was, however, these very stores which caused no little dis content amongst traders owing to the fact that in these stores goods were re tailed to the native teachers at prices considerably lower than the ruling rates for trade lines, thus diverting business from the traders’ stores to

that of the Missions; and also creating in the mind of the natives generally a suspicion that they were being vic timised by the trades, whose living de pended on their profits: Whereas the Mission, as Mr. Burton states, made no profit “but frequently a considerable loss,” which they as individuals could well afford as their salaries were not in any way dependent upon store profits.

The argument was advanced by the Mission that, as it only catered for their teachers, the store could not affect the native population as a whole.

As a matter of fact, no small quantity of native money found its way to the store through the teachers, who made cheap purchases for their friends.

And thus the breach between mis sion and trader was widened.

It is easy to understand the mission viewpoint. They desire to assist in every way their native teachers so as to allow them to obtain the greatest value for their monthly salary. They are impervious to the complaints of the traders, as a section of the com munity deserving but little considera tion.

Of more recent experience, I can cite numerous instances of trade goods be ing given away by missionaries; in some instances as a return for some trifling service; in others as a means of ingratiating themselves with natives whom later they hope to number amongst their own particular denomin ation. These instances, however, do not refer to Mr. Burton’s particular So ciety.

There is nothing exceedingly out rageous in that. The traders naturally object, as it is interfering with their legitimate livelihood by a man or men who distribute largesse at the expense of enthusiastic donors in civilisation.

If, however, the missionary attains his ultimate end —which, we must naturally assume, is the Christianising of the black races —then the expenditure has been justified.

It has always seemed to me to be one of the regrettable features of Islands life that the white people, following their various pursuits, cannot live in more amicable relation, one to the other, than they do. There is some thing wrong somewhere something radically unchristianlike —when it is impossible for half-a-dozen so-called civilised Christians, living among na tives, to practice the common ethics of Christianity by being a little more charitable and a little less hostile: a little more tolerant and less selfish each to the other.

A prayer which might well be prayed throughout the South Seas is; Lord, Give Us All a Better Understanding of Our White Brethren.

The Man who made mention to His followers about going into the world to spread the Gospel at another time, made the remark about the Pharisee and the Publican. The Pharisee, of course, is always “the other chap.”