As Their Neighbours

See Them Dutch Opinion of Australians in Papua and New Guinea

IN “Koloniaal Tijdschrift” (the periodi cal of the Netherlands East Indies civil servants) Dr. F. T. Marijn has published articles about the Civil Ser vice in Papua and the Mandated Terri tory.

After giving a description of the frame of government in both territories, he compares the task and the economic and social conditions of the civil servants in the Australian colonies with those in the Netherlands East Indies. He thinks that salaries and living conditions compare unfavourably but that, on the other hand, the regulations for recreation leave and long leave are more attractive than in the Netherlands Indies, where every six years a furlough of eight months is granted, with paid-passage to Europe and a little more than half-pay.

“What is the most striking quality of the Australian civil servants?” he goes on; and thus replies: “There are several; Their great sober ness, sportivity and practical ideas of government—they all seem to love the country and like the people of New Guinea. Inspection tours and expedi tions are physically very heavy. There are no rest-houses —at least, not in the sense of the word as we use it. They mostly camp, or pass the night, in a so called ‘rest-house’, a building in native style without any furniture or comfort.

“Very frequently, they must cut their way through the woods or follow native tracks, right onto a hill and straight down again—tracks of the kind that made the Italian explorer, d’Albertis, sigh that he preferred the climbing of Mont Blanc to that of a 400 metres hill in New Guinea. And he had experience of both.

“Physical hardships do not seem to count very much with them and, although their theoretical knowledge of native custom law is small, they all have a practical and enviable knack in applying it to native problems.

“But their first quality seems to be perseverance and the great devotion with which they fulfill their task”.