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returns home he does so well dressed, sporting a Waterbury watch, collars, cuffs, boots, and jewelry. He takes with him one or more boxes--["Box" is English for trunk.]--well filled with clothing, a musical instrument or two, and perfumery and other articles of luxury he has learned to appreciate."

       For just one moment we have a seeming flash of comprehension of, the

       Kanaka's reason for exiling himself: he goes away to acquire

       civilization. Yes, he was naked and not ashamed, now he is clothed and knows how to be ashamed; he was unenlightened; now he has a Waterbury watch; he was unrefined, now he has jewelry, and something to make him smell good; he was a nobody, a provincial, now he has been to far

       countries and can show off.

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       It all looks plausible--for a moment. Then the missionary takes hold of this explanation and pulls it to pieces, and dances on it, and damages it beyond recognition.

       "Admitting that the foregoing description is the average one, the average sequel is this: The cuffs and collars, if used at all, are

       carried off by youngsters, who fasten them round the leg, just below the knee, as ornaments. The Waterbury, broken and dirty, finds its way to the trader, who gives a trifle for it; or the inside is taken

       out, the wheels strung on a thread and hung round the neck. Knives, axes, calico, and handkerchiefs are divided among friends, and there is hardly one of these apiece. The boxes, the keys often lost on

       the road home, can be bought for 2s. 6d. They are to be seen rotting outside in almost any shore village on Tanna. (I speak of what I have seen.) A returned Kanaka has been furiously angry with

       me because I would not buy his trousers, which he declared were just

       my fit. He sold them afterwards to one of my Aniwan teachers for

       9d. worth of tobacco--a pair of trousers that probably cost him 8s. or 10s. in Queensland. A coat or shirt is handy for cold weather. The white handkerchiefs, the 'senet' (perfumery), the umbrella, and perhaps the hat, are kept. The boots have to take their chance, if they do not happen to fit the copra trader. 'Senet' on the hair, streaks of paint on the face, a dirty white handkerchief round the neck, strips of turtle shell in the ears, a belt, a sheath and

       knife, and an umbrella constitute the rig of returned Kanaka at home the day after landing."

       A hat, an umbrella, a belt, a neckerchief. Otherwise stark naked. All

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       in a day the hard-earned "civilization" has melted away to this. And even these perishable things must presently go. Indeed, there is but a single detail of his civilization that can be depended on to stay by him: according to the missionary, he has learned to swear. This is art, and

       art is long, as the poet says.

       In all countries the laws throw light upon the past. The Queensland law

       for the regulation of the Labor Traffic is a confession. It is a confession that the evils charged by the missionaries upon the traffic had existed in the past, and that they still existed when the law was made. The missionaries make a further charge: that the law is evaded by

       the recruiters, and that the Government Agent sometimes helps them to do it. Regulation 31 reveals two things: that sometimes a young fool of a

       recruit gets his senses back, after being persuaded to sign away his liberty for three years, and dearly wants to get out of the engagement

       and stay at home with his own people; and that threats, intimidation, and force are used to keep him on board the recruiting-ship, and to hold him to his contract. Regulation 31 forbids these coercions. The law

       requires that he shall be allowed to go free; and another clause of it requires the recruiter to set him ashore--per boat, because of the prevalence of sharks. Testimony from Rev. Mr. Gray:

       "There are 'wrinkles' for taking the penitent Kanaka. My first experience of the Traffic was a case of this kind in 1884. A vessel anchored just out of sight of our station, word was brought to me that some boys were stolen, and the relatives wished me to go and get them back. The facts were, as I found, that six boys had

       recruited, had rushed into the boat, the Government Agent informed me. They had all 'signed'; and, said the Government Agent, 'on

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       board they shall remain.' I was assured that the six boys were of age and willing to go. Yet on getting ready to leave the ship I found four of the lads ready to come ashore in the boat! This I

       forbade. One of them jumped into the water and persisted in coming ashore in my boat. When appealed to, the Government Agent suggested that we go and leave him to be picked up by the ship's boat, a

       quarter mile distant at the time!"

       The law and the missionaries feel for the repentant recruit--and properly, one may be permitted to think, for he is only a youth and ignorant and persuadable to his hurt--but sympathy for him is not kept in stock by the recruiter. Rev. Mr. Gray says:

       "A captain many years in the traffic explained to me how a penitent could betaken. 'When a boy jumps overboard we just take a boat and pull ahead of him, then lie between him and the shore. If he has

       not tired himself swimming, and passes the boat, keep on heading him in this way. The dodge rarely fails. The boy generally tires of

       swimming, gets into the boat of his own accord, and goes quietly on board."

       Yes, exhaustion is likely to make a boy quiet. If the distressed boy had been the speaker's son, and the captors savages, the speaker would have been surprised to see how differently the thing looked from the new point of view; however, it is not our custom to put ourselves in the other person's place. Somehow there is something pathetic about that disappointed young savage's resignation. I must explain, here, that in

       the traffic dialect, "boy" does not always mean boy; it means a youth

       above sixteen years of age. That is by Queensland law the age of

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       consent, though it is held that recruiters allow themselves some latitude in guessing at ages.

       Captain Wawn of the free spirit chafes under the annoyance of "cast-iron regulations." They and the missionaries have poisoned his life. He

       grieves for the good old days, vanished to come no more. See him weep;

       hear him cuss between the lines!

       "For a long time we were allowed to apprehend and detain all deserters who had signed the agreement on board ship, but the

       'cast-iron' regulations of the Act of 1884 put a stop to that, allowing the Kanaka to sign the agreement for three years' service, travel about in the ship in receipt of the regular rations, cadge

       all he could, and leave when he thought fit, so long as he did not

       extend his pleasure trip to Queensland."

       Rev. Mr. Gray calls this same restrictive cast-iron law a "farce." "There is as much cruelty and injustice done to natives by acts that are legal

       as by deeds unlawful. The regulations that exist are unjust and inadequate--unjust and inadequate they must ever be." He furnishes his reasons for his position, but they are too long for reproduction here.

       However, if the most a Kanaka advantages himself by a three-years course in civilization in Queensland, is a necklace and an umbrella and a showy imperfection in the art of swearing, it must be that all the profit of

       the traffic goes to the white man. This could be twisted into a plausible argument that the traffic ought to be squarely abolished.

       However, there is reason for hope that that can be left alone to achieve

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       itself. It is claimed that the traffic will depopulate its sources of

       supply within the next twenty or thirty years. Queensland is a very healthy place for white people--death-rate 12 in 1,000 of the population

       --but the Kanaka death-rate

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