A Promoter In

Tahiti

The Sad Story of the Fautaua Falls

BEFORE the days of radio, Papeete was the happy hunting ground of fugi tives from justice, alimony evaders, cheats, card-sharpers, false noblemen, confidence men (on holiday), usurpers (who settled permanently), and pro moters.

Of this last category there were many kinds and sizes; but the one who gathered in the greatest haul of dupes and dollars was the man who promoted a hydro electric installation for our Islands metropolis. He was endowed with all the trappings to inspire confidence—a lordly bearing, a noble paunch, a solemn man ner, a smooth tongue, and big horn rimmed eye-glasses.

There was the beginning of an electric lighting system at Papeete—a small generator actuated by a one-lunged gaso line motor —which served a few nearby buildings.

The promoter proposed to harness the falls of the Fautaua River. He issued a prospectus, which was the rosiest docu ment of golden hope we have ever beheld.

The Fautaua Falls are several miles inland. The way thither, at that time, was an overgrown track. The waterfall itself could be glimpsed from a narrow trail which climbed steeply from the bed of the gorge to the Rupe Plateau. Only natives in quest of mountain plantain, and an occasional party of young people on picnic, ever passed that way.

Consequently, the heavy, solid citizens who possessed the money-bags could not know that this upper branch of the Fautaua River was nothing more than a brook that became a mere trickle during the long months of the dry season. After reading the prospectus, one became con vinced that the promoter was about to harness an Iguazu Falls in the centre of Tahiti.

To excite interest and provide visible and tangible evidence of activity, a larger generator and a multiple-cylinder engine were imported, and electric bulbs glowed where no bulbs had glowed before. It was rather a costly proceeding; but the pro moter and his literature assured present and prospective investors that eventually water would flow, turbines would turn and income would pour as a steady stream into the coffers of shareholders. Expense would then be at an end.

Feverish activity about the offices in Papeete, and distant thunders in the mys terious depths of the Fautaua Valley, far inland, gave assurance to the most hesi tant, and money came in ever larger sums, to be exchanged for handsomely printed share certificates.

When all was over—several months later—exploring expeditions into the in terior brought back word that some masses of rock had been blown away by dynamite from the cliffs below the water fall. That was £,ll.

The men of that generation eventually became stony-eyed, cold-hearted statues of granite, from whom even the famous Wallingford could not have persuaded a flicker of interest, had he visited our shores. —A. C. R.

Operations of Rabaul Electricity Ltd., ceased on January 22, owing to the Jap anese invasion of Rabaul. The directors report that all preparations had been made to render the company’s equipment unusable to the enemy. Arrangements for the insurance of all the company’s fixed property, plant, and stocks, have been completed and premiums paid.