Altogether, the bushmen of Santo are none too reliable, and only the memory of a successful landing expedition of the English man-of-war a year ago keeps them quiet. On that occasion they had murdered an old Englishman and two of his daughters, just out of greed, so as to pillage his store. They had not found much, but they had to pay for the murder with the loss of their village, pigs and lives.
I tried to find boys at the south-west corner of Santo, where the natives frequently descend to the shore. A neighbour of Mr. Ch., a young Frenchman, was going there in a small cutter to buy wood for dyeing mats to sell to the natives of Malekula, and he kindly took me with him. We sailed through the channel one rainy morning, but the wind died down and we had to anchor, as the current threatened to take us back. We profited by the stop to pay a visit to a Mr. R., who cultivated anarchistic principles, also a plantation which seemed in perfect condition and in direct opposition to his anti-capitalistic ideas. Mr. R. was one of those French colonists who, sprung from the poorest peasant stock, have no ambitions beyond finding a new and kindlier home. Economical, thrifty, used to hard work in the fields, Mr. R. had begun very modestly, but had prospered, and was now, while still a young man, the owner of a plantation that would make him rich in a few years. This good, solid peasant stock, of which France possesses so much, makes the best colonists, and as a rule they succeed far better than those who come to the tropics with the idea of making a fortune in a few years without working for it. These fall into the hands of the big Nouméa companies, and have the greatest trouble in getting out of debt. Not only do these firms lend money at exorbitant interest, but they stipulate that the planter will sell them all his produce and buy whatever he needs from them, and as they fix prices as they please, their returns are said to reach 30 per cent.
Besides these two kinds of French settlers, there is a third, which comes from the penitentiary in Nouméa or its neighbourhood. We shall meet specimens of these in the following pages.
After having duly admired the plantation of Mr. R.--he proved himself a real peasant, knew every plant by name, and was constantly stopping to pick a dead leaf or prune a shoot--we continued our journey and arrived at Tangoa. Tangoa is a small island, on which the Presbyterian mission has established a central school for the more intelligent of the natives of the whole group, where they may be trained as teachers. The exterior of this school looks most comfortable. One half of the island is cleared and covered with a green lawn, one part is pasture for good-looking cattle, the other is a park in which nestle the cottages of the teachers,--the whole looks like an English country-seat. At some distance is a neatly built, well-kept village for the native pupils. I presented an introduction to the director. He seemed to think my endeavours extremely funny, asked if I was looking for the missing link, etc., so that I took a speedy leave.