50 A NATURALIST IN CANNIBAL LAND 



I soon learnt was that it is best to take them from 

 their home district to another district if you want to 

 get good work. They are far more reliable when they 

 are away from home. The difficulties of getting 

 native labour in New Guinea are now very quickly 

 increasing. Wherever the white man has taken up 

 his dwelling the natives have become possessed of 

 such of the white possessions as they need, and it is 

 difficult then to get them to work. Any one wishing 

 to get reliable native workmen in the South Sea Islands 

 nowadays always tries to tap a district where the 

 natives are unaccustomed to white men. Very soon 

 after the white men come to a place to settle, the 

 natives get as much of white " trade " as they wish 

 a little cloth, steel, mirrors, and the like. Having 

 obtained these, they feel very little of that pressure 

 which drives the people of civilised lands to work in 

 order that they may live. The South Sea Islander 

 can live with very little work indeed, and altogether 

 without the work which the white man wants done. 



Some of the white officials in New Guinea mostly 

 those by the way who know most closely the coastal 

 districts consider that there is a real " economic 

 pressure " on the natives. Thus a well-known resident 

 magistrate reported to his Government last year : 



" Statements are at times made that natives exist 

 in comparative luxury in their own villages without 

 doing any work. But this can hardly be true 

 generally. The native must eat and he can only get 



