EASTER ISLAND—METRAUX 439 
could not decide whether these men were a heterogeneous crowd of 
European beachcombers or real Polynesians, the sons of the sea 
rovers who had colonized the island. That European blood flowed in 
their veins, there was no doubt. Some of the men who came aboard 
and tried to sell their curios looked decidedly French; others might 
almost have had brothers or cousins in Hamburg or in London. Yet 
there was something exotic in all of them and traces of old Polynesian 
descent could be seen in their black, wavy hair, in the strange, viva- 
cious dark eyes, in the high foreheads. These first Easter Islanders 
whom I met impressed me as of mixed race. Later, genealogical 
investigations showed that only a third of the present inhabitants 
could claim descent from a pure Polynesian ancestry—and the claims 
were not always well attested. 
There is one misconception about these people which should be 
dispelled. It has been stated over and over again that the modern 
Easter Islanders are a degenerate population and that they can have 
nothing in common with the people who carved the statues and 
inscribed the tablets. This is not true. They appeared to me in 
many ways to be highly gifted. 
During the 6 months I spent on the island, I found myself com- 
pelled to admire their ingenuity and their remarkable talent for 
assimilation. No European village has given me the impression of 
more intelligent adaptation to a changing world. This capacity is 
doubtless responsible, in part, for the passing of the old culture. 
Though the most isolated people in the world, the Easter Islanders 
are constantly on the lookout for new ideas, new fashions—and also 
new vices. Their extraordinary faculty for exploiting any weakness 
or interest in their visitors has had some amusing results. For ex- 
ample, a few years after the missionaries came to the island, the 
natives started to speculate on the antiquities and on the mysterious 
past of their little country. Finding that foreigners were interested 
in the small wooden images of emaciated figures which had been one 
of their forefathers’ greatest artistic achievements, they proceeded 
to produce crude imitations by the hundreds. The modern craftsmen 
are without illusion as to the perfection of their work, but they excuse 
themselves by saying: “Why should we bother about beauty and 
finish when our patrons don’t discriminate between good and bad 
images and we get in exchange the soap and clothes we want?” 
Thanks to this commercial instinct, several of their old industries 
have been kept alive. 
One of their greatest and most profitable activities is palming off 
on amateur archeologists rough stones alleged to be ancient artifacts 
or well-made imitations of them. The very day of my landing a 
native cynically proposed to cooperate with me in faking old imple- 
619830—45——-29 
