Men Who Made the

Pacific New Booklet Supplies Background

A DEPARTURE from his usual Maori history, is a small volume of “Strange Stories Prom the South Seas,” by Eric Ramsden, published by A H. & A. W. Reed, of Wellington, NZ, for 2/6.

The “Stories” are 18 in number and cover the whole length and breadth of the Pacific, introducing such well-known Pacific characters as Gauguin, the famous French painter of Tahiti; Will Mariner, of Tonga; William Masters, who founded a new colony on Palmerston Island . . . and many more not so well known but who played their part in fashioning the romantic Pacific.

Pirates, missionaries, traders, whalers, sailors stalk through the pages, supplying the background for life on many islands where to-day United Nations troops have been fighting the Japanese. To these Servicemen, this small book is specially recommended. Although one of the most romantic regions of the world, authentic material about the Pacific and its recent past, is sadly lacking.

These brief sketches, brightly written and easy to read, collected by Eric Rams den after years of delving into all man ner of Pacific records and writings in the Mitchell Library, Sydney, and many wanderings in Polynesia, should find a place in the kit of every Serviceman in the Pacific area; and, too, a place in the bookshelves of any collector of Pacific tales.

Here is a condensation of one of the stories, concerning Pere Laval, the mad priest of Mangareva: rE French priest was already middle aged. To conquer fresh fields might well have been left to younger men.

But Pere Laval could not get the Man garevans out of his mind and at last he announced to his colleagues that he had had a vision: he had received divine instructions to convert these islands. And in 1834, with a young priest, Pere Caret, as his companion, he landed in the Gam biers. When Laval knelt on that Poly nesian strand and returned thanks for his safe journey, the Mangarevans thought he was a great magician from another country. The cross, held aloft, was the symbol of a new magic.

The youthful Caret attracted the attention of the young women. Poly nesians in those days always treated

visitors with a certain hospitality and most travellers did not hesitate to avail themselves of it. But the French priest, to their surprise, repulsed the girls. At last, the latter subjected him to an examination, which so terrified him he fled from the small island where he was residing, and rejoined his superior, Laval.

The Mangarevans were astounded at such conduct. The idea of celibacy was beyond them.

At first the priests encountered consid erable opposition, but by degrees Laval obtained political control of the Group.

Further, he determined that on every marae site would rise a Christian church.

Laval, cross in hand, faced the gigantic stone images. And when the Mangare vans saw that the representations of their gods had no power over the white stranger, they capitulated. Surely his god, they argued, was more powerful than their own. Down came the statues. The marvellous platforms of stone and coral were uprooted, and Laval started a build ing plan that was to occupy both himself and the islanders for many years.

The price that was paid was one of the most appalling in the history of European contact in Polynesia. Literally hundreds of people died, because they were quite unaccustomed to the labour demanded and the work enforced by Laval. Great blocks of stone were brought from adja cent islands to construct a cathedral three times larger than that in Tahiti.

Buildings larger than the Santa Barbara Mission in California, arose.

Laval even established a convent for Polynesian girls—warm-blooded vahine who were unaccustomed to being confined behind stone walls. Stories are still told in Mangareva about that convent.

So the people laboured for the “mad priest,” and, at last, the great cathedral was finished. On its altar gleamed the most prized pearl of King Te Ma-puteoa.

That blue pearl eventually found its way into the Pope’s collection: it is said to be still in Rome. Weighing 50 carats, it has been described as “blue as the skies.”

There was also a necklace of black pearls adorning the Madonna, on the right of the altar.

FOR some years, the Gamblers were almost forgotten by the French, and Laval had his own way. But, at last, rumours of the eccentric behaviour of the priest trickled through to Tahiti and an ofiicial was sent to investigate.

He was amazed at what he found.

When he questioned the priest con cerning the heavy death-rate, Laval replied that it was better that the souls of the Mangarevans should be saved than that they should remain alive as heathens.

Prisoners were liberated from the gaol —among them a small boy and girl whose only fault was that they had laughed during Mass.

Laval was removed to Tahiti and only

in later years was he permitted to make a visit to Mangareva.

To-day, the convent is a roofless ruin.

Breadfruit, orange and pandanus trees grow within its walls. That is all that remains of the building that housed the first community of Polynesian nuns.

There are other ruins, too, in the Spanish city Laval attempted to create. Only a handful of people attend worship nowa days in the cathedral.

PROFESSOR Peter H. Buck, of the Bernice P. Bishop Museum in Hono lulu, says that although the priest accelerated the mortality that followed in the wake of civilisation, all students of Polynesian history should be grateful for the records he left of Mangarevan tradi tions and culture. After teaching the people to write, he induced them to record, in their own language, their his tory, mythology, rituals and customs.

These, plus Laval’s own observations, remained in the archives of Laval’s Order (Picpus Order, in Belgium); but, by co operation between the Bishop Museum and the Order, they have now been published.