president's address — SECTION F. 137 



and some returned in that vessel to Samoa. The islands of Aniwa 

 and Futuna, in the New Hebrides, are peopled by natives originally 

 belonging to Tonga and Futuna proper, N.W. of Samoa, intermixed 

 with natives of Tanna. Other islands in the group are inhabited 

 by Malayo-Polynesians, probably from the east. 



On the island of lai (Uvea), in the Loyalty Group, some cast- 

 aways from Tonga and Wallis Island have long been settled, one 

 party — Uveans (WaUis I.) — occupying the northern end of the 

 island, and the other on the southern extremity, which they call 

 Tonga. The original inhabitants, laians, occupy the central dis- 

 tricts. A description given me by these, and also by some natives 

 of the Union Group, in some measure accounts for the manner in 

 which these waifs get driven away to distant islands. They were 

 accustomed to move from one island to another, long distances 

 apart, in their clumsy prahs in times of scarcity of food or other 

 emergencies ; and the night time, when the sea is calm and the 

 wind light, was generally selected for these voyages. They steered 

 by the stars, ami if th^ nigiit became cloudy, or an adverse wind 

 arose, they would simply lower the sails, entreat the protection of 

 the gods, and then quietly resign themselves to drift whither the 

 sea and winds might bear them. 



We have notices of two instances of castaways which occurred 

 last year. On the passage of the Changsha to China, in February, 

 she picked up fifteen Malay castaways. Their food supply consisted 

 solely of cocoanuts and a little water. When picked up the poor 

 natives were huddled together in four junks. They had started 

 from Amboina with a fleet of seventeen junks, and they had been 

 thirty days knocking about at the disposal of the wind and the sea. 

 During a gale thirteen of the junks went down. These survivors 

 were landed by the Changsha at Amboina. In April the American 

 mission vessel conveyed to their homes at Tapvituea. in the Gilbert 

 Group, a family of natives of that island, who had been carried 

 away during a gale. I hey had gone out one night in a small canoe 

 to fish ; the wind came on to blow hard, and the canoe drifted out 

 of sight of the island. They liad neither food nor water in the frail 

 canoe, while for forty days they driited over the wild ocean. One 

 of the four perished. At the expiration of those terrible forty days 

 the canoe reached Ocean island. The survivors stayed on Ocean 

 Island some days, and were then taken by a vessel to the island of 

 Annungion. Then they were picked up by the Morning Star and 

 conveyed to their home. 



These instances will afford some evidence of the manner in which 

 the islanders are often borne from their native lands by accident, 

 and have found asykuns in distant parts of the Pacific. Yet we cannot 

 suppose that the various groups were occupied and populated under 

 such distressing circumstances. The evidence is much clearer that 

 the advance of the aborigines Avas made under voluntary influences 

 and with settled desiy-ns. 



