A Polynesian

Romance

Career of Peter H. Buck

THE career of Professor Peter Buck, who has just been appointed to the directorship of the Bernice Pauahi Bishop Museum, of Honolulu, is a romance of modern Polynesia, writes Mr. Eric Rams ’den in the Sydney Morning Herald of February 22.

It is superfluous to say that the post is the most important scientific one in the Pacific. The wealthy Bishop Museum has, in recent years, carried out important anthropological and ethnological research in the different islands of the Pacific, British, French, American, irrespective of nationality. The international character of the Bishop Museum is again exempli fied by the appointment of Professor Buck, a British subject of aristocratic Maori lineage. To the Maori people he will always be known as Te Rangi Hiroa.

The late Rider Haggard once referred to the Bishop Museum as “the finest and most unique museum in the world cover ing a special field.” It was founded in 1889 by Charles R. Bishop, the American husband of Bernice Pauahi, a Hawaiian princess. Mrs. Bishop traced her descent from Kalaniopuu, the moi or king of Hawaii at the time of Captain Cook’s visit, when the group consisted of several dis tinct autonomous sovereignties; she was also descended from King Kamehameha the Great. Charles Bishop, her husband, became one of the wealthiest and most influential commercial men in the group.

On the death of Mrs. Bishop in 1884 her will provided for the establishment of the Kamehameha School, and among her effects were numerous curios of great value.

Foundation Of Bishop Museum

Mr. Bishop realised that in years to come, the collection would increase in value and importance, and it was placed in a “cabinet” for the use of teachers and students of the schools. Five years later he decided to establish the Bishop Mu seum as a memorial to his wife, and a perpetual trust was founded for that pur pose. Other collections were purchased and added to the original “cabinet,” until to-day the Bishop Museum’s feathered cloaks and ancient Hawaiian weapons are unrivalled in the world.

Apart from the actual collections on view, the Bishop Museum has placed the whole Pacific in its debt by publishing scientific and historical bulletins. In all probability Teuira Henry’s “Ancient Tahiti,” founded on the observations of her grandfather, Rev. J. M. Orsrhond (a missionary well known in New South Wales in the early part of last century), would never otherwise have seen the light of day.

Professor Buck was himself engaged in scientific investigation in Samoa, the Cook Islands, the Gamblers, and else where, on behalf of the Museum of which he is now the head. James F. Stimson, a brilliant American, is now working In the Tuamotu group compiling a dictionary of the greatest importance to Polynesian scholars. Kenneth Emory has worked in Tahiti. Indeed, the compass of the inves tigations carried out throughout the Pacific by the Museum’s staff reflects the highest credit. The pity is that we did not possess a similar foundation years ago.

Peter Buck is the world’s authority on Polynesian textiles. Indeed, one could quite easily say that he was the leading authority in the world on Polynesia. But

his interest in weaving and plaiting com menced many years ago in New Zealand, and eventually led him to the path of scientific investigation, the road that was to win him world-wide fame.

He started life with few advantages.

Ngarongo-ki-tua, his mother, a chief tainess of Taranaki, died when he was an infant. In the village school he found himself treated as a Maori, though his father was a Pakeha (European), and in the Maori village he was regarded as a Pakeha. “The only way in which I could hold my own,” he once told me, “was to keep a lap or so ahead of the other child ren in the school, and I had little difficulty in doing that!” There came a time when the ambitious half-caste lad thought he would have to abandon all hope of a scholastic career. But, eventually, he en tered Te Aute College, and also later, the Medical School in Dunedin, carrying all before him.

Won D.S.O. In Great War

After serving his people as a medical officer of health, he entered Parliament as successor to the late Hone Heke, and became a Cabinet Minister. The Cook Islands, where, years later, he performed important scientific research, for a time were administered by him. Then came the Great War, for which he left as second in command of the Maori Pioneer Bat talion and returned with a D.S.O, After

the war he became Director of Maori Hygiene; it was while occupying that position that the Bishop Museum, attract ed by his writings, offered him the post of ethnologist.

No man realises more what an import ant part a wife plays in his life than Peter Buck. Throughout his long and fascinating career, on his many journey ings retracing the canoe tracks of his ancestors across the Pacific wastes, on his quests for scientific knowledge in Europe and America, Mrs. Buck has been his con stant companion and help. She also served with distinction in the war, and received an M.B.E.

The tragedy is that Peter Buck’s ser vices have been lost to New Zealand.

What a different story might have been told if he had been appointed Administra tor of Western Samoa!