The £1,000 Door

Gauguin Vogue in Tahiti

From Our Own Correspondent.

Papeete, Mar. 20.

THE Gauguin vogue came upon the world in 1916 or thereabout.

We of Tahiti—absorbed as we were in war news —did not know of it until after the visit of a distinguished English novelist, who came to our island to ab sorb atmosphere for the book, founded on the life of Gauguin, he was then

writing.

This writer had a marvellous method of acquiring local atmosphere. Day after day, from morning until night, he would sit at a table in the Hotel Tiare veran dah, with a frheezy colonel (who had once been a soldier of fortune in Ecuador, or some such place, and had contracted emphysema while campaigning in the high Andes, but could, nevertheless, swear lustily for 15 minutes without repeating himself); a man with a big beard; and his secretary—over a perpetual game of bridge.

Once only, to our knowledge, did he leave that game of bridge. On that occa sion, he hurriedly summoned a motor car and disappeared in a cloud of dust; to return, several hours later, bearing a house-door of the type common in the island, the glass of its upper half com pletely covered by a painting.

The author told us it was the door of the house occupied by Gauguin while he dwelt in the district of Pa’a’a. He had painted over the glass to prevent curi ous passersby and exploring neighbours from peering into the interior.

The owner of the house was glad to get rid of what he considered a mons trosity and take in exchange a new door of bright, clear glass.

Months later, when news came that the English author had disposed of the door to a collector for the tidy sum of £l,OOO sterling, the house-owner became a pessimist, an atrabilarian and a mis anthrope for the remainder of his days.

Nor did he suffer alone.

During the tragic years when Gauguin, weak in body and poor in pocket, was resolutely pursuing his ideal, he had dis posed of many sketches and small can vases in exchange for trifling sums. Most of them had been cast aside as of no interest or value.

But, when the intelligence of the £l,OOO door reached Tahiti there began a gen eral ransacking of old boxes, rubbish heaps, under houses, and dusty comers of outbuildings, with indifferent success.

One householder remembered having stored a bulky roll of Gauguin sketches on the top shelf of an ancient clothes press. But he found nothing. A general house cleaning, some months before, had consigned the sketches with other flotsam to a bonfire.

And so elsewhere. Very few were re trieved. Moisture, omniverous worms and the decay of neglect had completed the destruction.

Rev. and Mrs. A. Mason, of North Mala, 8.5.1., who have been associated with the Melanesian Mission for over 20 years, departed from Sydney for England on long leave by the March

“Maloja”.

Monsieur Francois Gagnon died on March 10 at Canala, New Caledonia, at the age of 65.