Tropicalites

“BLESSED are the meek, for they shall inherit the Kingdom of Heaven.” I think of that, sometimes, when writing about the Chinese. As a nation, they are being thrashed and battered by the Japa nese. As individuals, they are attacked and jeered at frequently. Every now and again, some writer in this journal says a few bitter words about their expanding activities in the Pacific Islands. But they never reply, never protest, never re taliate in a fashion that anyone may notice. Knocked back, in one place, they appear silently somewhere else, and carry on. Sometimes one wonders if they are human. But they are human—if the quality of hatred is any indication. They hate the Japanese; and, if one could see behind the scenes, one would be amazed at the thoroughness with which they boy cott Japanese institutions —and, notably, Japanese goods. Japan, of course, is try ing to control and mould China to her Imperialistic will. On the extent to which she succeeds depends much of the future of the world. Is it possible to mould a people so unresistant and unimpression able as the Chinese?

These reflections are induced by recent protests from the Solomons against the unchecked increase there of Chinese traders and Chinese trade. Various Euro pean traders there seem to have thrown everything except their copra driers at the Chinese. But the Chinese never reply, and go placidly on. * * * POLYNESIAN melodies die hard. At times they may be put aside in favour of something more modern, but again and again the Polynesian girl will turn to the repertoire of her mother.

Of late, all the Tahitian belles have been humming a little song known as “Manu rere,” or “The Flying Bird.” One heard it in every village; it had seized the imagination of the young Polynesians of both sexes in much the way that a new jazz record does with juvenile European listeners. It was sung at a smart tempo, as is invariably the case in Tahiti, and the words, naturally, were in the Tahitian tongue.

Though its Tahitian singers were not aware of the fact, “Manurere” actually originated in New Zealand. It is an old Maori melody. During the war the former native Minister (Sir Apirana Ngata, M.P.) composed new and more appropriate words for an ancient theme, and that is how the modern “Manurere” came into existence. When the Rarotongans heard it at Waitangi last year, they were so intrigued with its lilting melody that they took it back with them to the Cook Islands.

From Rarotonga to Tahiti is not far after all, and “Manurere” soon became the rage in French Oceania.—E.R. * * * HERE is a question for anthropologists.

Is “Europeanisation” of native races necessarily “degeneration”?

An English water-colour artist, Mr. W.

A. Macdonald, who passed through Syd ney recently, after 14 years in Tahiti, told the newspapers that “Tahiti was a beau tiful place, but had changed for the worse. This was not due to the French Administration, but to the degeneration of the natives. To-day there were too many half-castes. The old race was passing away.”

The Polynesians of 100 years ago had a fine racial pride and spirit. Europeans admired them, and settled among them and cohabited with them, and proceeded to convert them to European customs habits and outlook. They succeeded only

too well. And now they insist that the half-castes and the “Europeanised” com munity they created, are “degenerate.”

Negro and Asiatic peoples have ac cepted European culture, and have not degenerated. Why should such a process be regarded as inevitable in the case of former virile and attractive races of the South Seas? * * * THE gentleman described in a recent issue of “Smith’s Weekly” as having made a launch trip from Samarai to Dar win, afterwards “going on alone” from that point to Rabaul, whence he tramped to the Bulolo goldfield, has been awarded a Jubilee Medal, by unanimous vote of an hilarious Territories population. * * * COCONUT oil may be falling into some little disfavour as an ingredient of soap and margarine—but it has other uses. The “Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene” says: “Until recently the Ranchi European Mental Hospital was in fested with bugs, in spite of the fact that disinfection was carried out once a month by means of the immersion of the iron beds and fittings into boiling water, and although mattresses, pillows, etc., were subjected to the effects of steam. A method which has brought about complete eradication of the bugs is by merely wiping down all bedsteads once a week with a rag dipped in coconut oil. The cost of the procedure is exceedingly small and does away with all the bother of moving the beds, boiling mattresses, etc.” * * * THE centenary falls this year of the death of Mrs. Cook, the wife of the famous navigator of the Pacific. A lonely old woman, she lived until her ninety second year—the last of her family. All six children of James Cook and his wife died before their mother. James, the eldest, a promising young officer in the Royal Navy, died in 1794. He was last seen being rowed to the sloop “Spitfire” on a winter evening, at Poole, in 1794.

What happened to him has never been satisfactorily explained; the presumption

is, of course, that he was drowned. Natha niel the next son, was drowned when the “Thunderer” sank in a hurricane off Jamaica in 1780. Hugh, the third son, died of scarlet fever in 1793, soon after his admittance to Christ’s College, Cam bridge. The three other children did not survive infancy. Mrs, Cook left £1000 to the Church of St. Andrew the Great in Cambridge for the preservation of her tomb and that of her son Hugh; also the maintenance of the memorial to her famous husband and other members of the Cook family. * * * THE Bishop of Melanesia has decided to follow the example set not long ago by his episcopal brother, the Bishop in Polynesia, and take unto himself a wife. Bishop Baddeley will arrive in Sydney towards the end of the year on his way to Western Australia where his mar riage will take place with Miss K. Nutter Thomas, daughter of the Bishop of Ade laide, and Mrs. Nutter Thomas. After a honeymoon visit to England, they will make a stay in New Zealand on their way back to the Mission field. The young Bishop, who has made himself popular in his tropical diocese, had a distinguished war record. Since his appointment in 1932 he has extensively covered his widely scattered diocese.