Mr. R. B. Howard

Fiji Resident is Nearly 100 Years Old

IN 1848, nearly 100 years ago, Mr. Rich ard B. Howard, now a resident of Suva, Fiji, was born in Victoria. He was intended and educated for the law; but he found much more interest in horses and the open spaces than in being articled to a solicitor, and when he took a tumble in an amateur turf club race, and suffered severe injuries, his articles were terminated, and he went off drov ing in Queensland. In 1864, he took three horses by steamer to a livery-stable keeper in Rockhampton.

“I was very young, but I took a great dislike to that stableman,” said Mr.

Howard. “Some time afterwards he and two companions, Palmer and Murphy, were hanged for murdering a gold-buyer whom they had robbed.”

Then the 17-y ears-old boy joined a party, to take 150 horses across unmapped and unknown country to Burketown, on the Gulf of Carpentaria. Eventually, young Howard was left to take the horses through, with only one white helper and two abos. They got through, and sold their horses, after adventures that would fill a volume.

For 15 years, young Howard followed various open-air occupations in Queens land. Then he entered the service of the State Government and eventually became Registrar-General. He was Chief Pro tector of Aboriginals in 1902, and he retired in 1913, being then 65.

That should have been the end of Mr.

Howard’s useful life. But he went to Fiji in 1917; and, as has been pointed out often, men seldom die in Fiji at an orthodox old age. Mr. Howard has lived almost another life-time (26 years) in Fiji, where he has taken a keen and often critical interest in public affairs; and present indications are that he still will have something to say when Mr.

Tojo has joined his ancestors, and the United States and Britain are arranging a new order in the Pacific.

Rev. C. W. Whonsbon-Aston, formerly of Papua and more recently vicar of Viti Levu West (Lautoka, Fiji), has gone fur ther east, and has taken over the post of Chaplain in Apia, Western Samoa.

This photo., taken in 1940, shows Mr. Howard and his “best mate”—his 10-year-old grandson, David Howard Bryce.