Teopicalities

BRITAIN’S new “secret weapon”? The Italian propaganda radio, broadcastmg from Rome on October 8, H? l 0 S n S “The English are reduced to such straits that they have had to the f Armv” lbalS frCm the Fiji Islands to the Army . * T HE first European to settle in Tahiti, X as far as published records show, o w J ls m Spaniard. This man, who a death sentence, was a member of the crew of the “Aguila”, commanded by Don Domingo Boenechea, who arrived m Tahiti in 1772 and anchored at Teahupo o off the Taiarapu peninsula.

Boenechea gave the island the name of Isla d’Amat, after the Viceroy of Peru who had sent the expedition to the South Seas. He had occasion to sentence four of the ship’s company to death for misconduct. The fifth escaped the penalty by hiding in the mountains. This man was subsequently adopted into the family of the high chief, Vehiatua. It is said that traces of Spanish blood can be found in the countenances of his descendants at Teahuno’o to this day. —“Vakatini ” « • TTNTIL February, 1940, when the Huns U over-ran Holland and destroyed postal communications, the former

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“PIM” y ’wS was re forw r arde e d d to S D°°™’ S olla " d V b t y his boyhood friend Goedicke, now sl resident of to & the 1 ’“ PIM ” a ' savs Sat d when 1 h P a to tne ± iivi , says mat wnen ne was a b?y in Mecklenberg, the late Kaiser and his brother, Prince Henry, were living S-PHAr,^ lle l Mac eir fathe r,, (C - rown Prince Frederick) was away with his regiment r T ?^ C ?- Pr H l - S t an ar h- two Princes and Goedicke and his brother. we s e Pf a y ma t e s during a whole summer, and the acquaintanceship thus begun lasted during their lives. In the early

’eighties, Mr. Goedicke was at Darwin Northern Australia, and there he went on a shooting expedition with the Duke of Manchester, who was a close perFonal friend of Crown Prince Frederick It was the Duke who suggested to Mr. Goedicke during a kangaroo hunt at the back of Darwin, that he should become a British

was' SS touS*‘&

Goedicke has letters from the late Kaiser’s Chamberlain, saying that Wil helm 11, who always took a keen interest in Pacific affairs, carefully read every issue of the “PIM”. * T'feFFORF ix/Tr tt K M J? - denklns - of th e yacht Golden x Hmd returned to New Zealan d from Tahiti recently, with the anchor of the ship “Bounty” which acquired from the Chief of Arue - tde Auckland War Memorial Museum ss??5 s ?? August “PIM”), he made two presen rations to the Papeete Museum. One was rar ?, and valuable Volumes I, 11, and it 1 9* the “Transactions” of the London Missionary Society workers in French Oceania, covering the years 1797 to 1808, w. hlC x he had recently purchased from the London office of the Society. The other gift was a choice collection of Moa bones from Doubtless Bay, New Zealand. ♦ WE who dwell in the Antipodes know " tha f A , meri £ a is -wouXlfn/and

L*M be takes SnSrt thTdTrkLS

out of the northern sk“ ° f the Here is D£irt of a theeditor of the “PIM”, from Mrs. Isobel Field of Serene pQiifnmio • “In every town, city and village of the United States there is a group of people working for Britain; subscriptions coming in from the people themselves, not from the Government, though supplies are going over in increasing quantities; and the armament factories are working overtime ”

Mrs. Field is the step-daughter of

Robert Louis Stevenson, and lived with him in Samoa, some 50 years ago.

Mrs Field sent the following two little poems, as embodying American sentiment towards Britain:—

Refugee

I shall remember, till I die, Manhattan traced against the sky, Alabaster, ivory, Rising baseless from the sea; A dream-white city, morning-kissed To rose and pearl and amethyst; A toery fabric piled upon The insubstantial mists of dawn, And lovely to my wondering eyes As the far shores of Paradise.

I shall remember, till I die, Her glistening towers, the tranquil sky And how I wept—who did not weep For bombs and guns and murdered sleep— To see a path of gold ’twixt me And the calm strength of Liberty.

For A War Pilot

(Note by an editor in Montana, where the poem was first published:—-“The following verses were written by a little Montana girl, as her tribute to the RAF. They seem to me re markable, both in themselves, and as evidence of the emotion which the exploits of the British pilots rouse in the hearts of the American people,”) If I must die, let it be swift and shattered flight Through the smoking, violated night In a rush of space.

Let not my face Be warped with fright.

But, at God’s height And far beyond the blight Of this mad, murderous race, There may I trace My name in flames, fire-bright, If I must die. —Gretchen Wellman, Hardin, Montana. ♦ IT has often been written of the Tahi tians that they have long lost all understanding of racial pride. Such, however, is not the case as the following incident, related by Mr. Eric Ramsden, secretary of the Pacific Islands Society, when speaking before the Royal Austra lian Historical Society in Sydney in October, testified. At a recent function in Sydney, he had occasion to introduce one of the Tahitian de Gaulle vqlunteers to a French member of the Society. In presenting the soldier, by way of com pliment to the lady, Mr. Ramsden referred to him as a “taata Firani” (a French man). The Tahitian shook hands, and then said, in his own language; “No, I am not a Frenchman. I am a Tahitian!

The speaker contrasted this declaration with the reception a Maori resident of Sydney received lately at the hands of a young Maori air trainee. Seeing this young man in uniform in the street, he went and addressed him with the courteous and traditional: “Tena koe”.

“Oh, how do you do,” the youth, who understood his own tongue thoroughly, replied. Instead of proffering his nose in the hongi, he merely offered his hand. * VISITORS to Suva who inspect the imposing block of Government buildings invariably pause at the entrance to the Legislative Council Cham bers to admire a fine bronze bust of a Fiji hillman, which stands on a granite

pedestal in a prominent position. There

is an interesting story connected with

this statue, symbol of the proud Fijian race.

In 1933, Mr. John W. Vandercook. an American traveller and novelist (one of his thrillers” is entitled “Murder in fU 1 • anc * .wife made a trip across the island of Viti Levu, in company with their fellow-countryman, Dr. S. M.‘ bert, then Rockefeller Foundation repre sentative in the Pacific. They were greatly taken with the natives of the interior and particularly impressed by a stalwart Fijian who was carrying for them. Mrs.

Vandercook, a sculptress, took a number of photographs of him and made measure ments of his head. On her return to USA. she modelled a splendid bust of the Fijian. A short time afterwards, she died Ah her work was cast in bronze and exhibited at a leading New York Art Gallery. Later, Mr. Vandercook, through Dr. Lambert, presented the statue to the Government of Fiji, and it was mounted and placed in its present position.

IT is interesting to note how even “hard-boiled” and educated Euro peans succumb to superstitious ideas after living several years in the more remote islands of the Pacific. So-called “ghosts” and strange coincidences are easily disposed of with the lights of the city all round, but in the gentle silence of a tropical evening, the sceptic pauses, and thinks, and recalls how little man knows of the supernatural.

An apt instance of such superstition in the Polynesian islands is the impor tance attached to the defilement of a “marae” (chiefly burial-ground and place of sacrifice,). For instance, should a native in the Cook Islands be stricken with a disease, particularly elephantiasis, his record will be delved into and it will soon emerge that, at one time or another, he defiled a “marae”, either by removing

the stones, lighting a fire there, or some other such action.

The average European will dismiss this with a shrug, but give him a couple of years residence in the Pacific and he is not so confident. Another five years will convince him that there may be some thing in it, and there are few “old timers” who would care to tear up a known “marae” (he would have to do the job with his own hands, as no native labourer would be willing to take the risk) even though it should be on his own land.

What is it they say about the Islands?

In three months you know everything, after two years you are not so sure, and after ten years you realise that you know practically nothing.—R.l. • GREAT oaks from little acorns grow.

A friend in Britain, writing last December to Mrs. James Burns, wife of a director of Burns, Philp &' Co Ltd., Sydney, mentioned that she might care to raise funds among her acquaint ances to purchase a mobile canteen for the “blitzed” areas of England. Mrs.

Burns got busy and formed a small com mittee. BP provided office accommodation for them and assisted in a number of other directions. The response was so immediate and generous that nearly £24,000 was subscribed in six months.

So, instead of one canteen, it was possible to purchase a fleet of 21 mobile canteens, three dinner van canteens, 14 motor cycles, 20 auto cycles, and 24 bicycles. These were formally handed' over to the Women’s Voluntary Services in Britain on October 21, when the Queen inspected the entire fleet of vehicles.

Mr. G. Briggs, roadmaster, of Nama tanai, TNG, has arrived in Sydney to join the RAAP.