684 



SAMOA. 



over two thirds of them British subjects and 

 Americans, and the others mostly German, and 

 1,000 Polynesians from other islands laboring on 

 the plantations. The imposts raised from for- 

 eigners amounted in 1893 to 114,565 German 

 marks, of which the Germans paid over 62 per 

 cent., the English 20 per cent., Americans 10 

 per cent., and other foreigners 8 per cent. Of 

 the total imports, valued at 1,303,702 marks, 

 German houses imported 51 per cent., English, 

 22 percent. ; American, 15 per cent. ; and others 

 12 per cent. Of the exports, consisting, besides 

 copra, of cotton, coffee, and fruit, and valued at 

 766,533 marks, German houses exported 62 per 

 cent, and English houses 38 per cent. 



After the restoration of Malietoa, as when 

 Tamasese was King, the foreigners domineered 

 over the natives and took advantage of them in 

 money transactions. The chiefs and people, who 

 are of the same race as the Hawaiians. became 

 involved hopelessly in debt, and the native Gov- 

 ernment, under the guidance of the two European 

 officials, the Chief Justice and Baron Senfft von 

 Pilsach, the German President of the Municipal 

 Council in Apia, who is the official adviser of 

 the King, was reduced almost to bankruptcy. 

 Malietoa, when he was first placed back on the 

 throne, abdicated in favor of Mataafa, but he 

 was induced to resume the royal authority by 

 the white officials, the Berlin Conference having 

 decided that he should be restored. Mataafa 

 again became the leader of a patriotic party op- 

 posed to foreign domination, and he was en- 

 couraged by some of the whites, who hoped to 

 profit by war and revolution. Mataafa, the 

 hero of the war with the Germans, was the 

 choice of the people, who had elected him ac- 

 cording to their laws, but were overruled by the 

 powers; hence they refused to pay the capita- 

 tion tax of $1 for each man, woman, and child, 

 which was the only source of revenue for the 

 King's Government, the customs duties and 

 other taxes levied on the whites having been 

 held to be reserved for the expenses of the town 

 and port of Apia. The treaty provided for the 

 taxation of real property in Apia, but the mu- 

 nicipal council would not pass the necessary ordi- 

 nance, although it levied the tax on vvorkingmen 

 and others whose property lay outside of the 

 town limits. The municipality was supported 

 by the customs duties until the Chief Justice de- 

 cided that they belonged to the General Govern- 

 ment. This bankrupted the municipality, until 

 the decision was overruled by the three powers 

 on complaint of the consuls, when the King's 

 Government was again left without money to pay 

 salaries and other obligations. There was con- 

 stant friction between the Chief Justice and the 

 King's adviser, who endeavored to carry out the 

 spirit of the treaty by safeguarding the interests 

 of the people, and the white planters and traders, 

 on the other hand, and their champions, the 

 foreign consuls. The treaty had imposed a curb 

 on the German Trading and Plantation Com- 

 pany, which formerly dominated the Govern- 

 ment and had a free hand to acquire all the 

 fertile land of the islands and cultivate it with 

 imported contract laborers, but in giving a better 

 chance to the British and Americans it exposed 

 the natives to the avaricious wiles of many in- 

 genious individuals instead of the more open 



rapacity of a single great corporation. The peo- 

 ple, while never questioning the patriotism and 

 good intentions of Malietoa, regarded him as the 

 creature of the whites, and except the Tuama- 

 saga, who live in the province surrounding Apia, 

 none would obey his rule, and all looked to 

 Mataafa to deliver them from the foreigners and 

 regain their independence. With the white of- 

 ficials at loggerheads with the white people and 

 the native authorities repudiated by the natives, 

 the purposes of the tripartite treaty were frus- 

 trated, and the political, social, commercial, and 

 productive conditions of the country lapsed into 

 chaos. The only real ruler was Mataafa, who 

 set up a camp and a court at Malie, not far 

 from Apia, hoping to impress upon Malietoa and 

 the whites the necessity of carrying out the 

 final act of the Berlin Conference by re-estab- 

 lishing an untrammeled native Government for 

 native affairs. He actually collected some of 

 the head tax and sent it to Malietoa, with whom 

 his relations were at first friendly, then grew 

 strained and hostile as the country sank more 

 and more into destitution and disorder. No 

 one would pay taxes. The whites not only 

 evaded the ground tax provided for in the final 

 act, but found ways to escape paying customs 

 duties. The natives gave a reason, satisfactory 

 to themselves, for withholding the head tax, 

 which was wanted for no public purpose, but 

 only to enable the judge and the president to 

 draw their salaries of $ 0,000 and $5,000 respec- 

 tively and ship the gold off to Europe. These 

 well-meaning but inexperienced and incom- 

 petent officials had no friends either among the 

 whites or the blacks. Their mistakes were 

 magnified and their motives distorted in the 

 only newspaper, and this led the president to 

 commit the serious blunder of secretly buying 

 the newspaper with some of the public funds 

 that remained in the treasury, the proceeds of 

 customs duties that had at first been more ef- 

 fectively collected and had accumulated until 

 they were assigned by the judge's contradictory 

 decrees, first to the municipality, and then to the 

 royal Government. This and the building of an 

 official residence for the president and the pay- 

 ment of salaries left the treasury empty, and 

 thus the ordinances for the building of bridges 

 and improvement of roads could not be carried 

 out. A curious example of the crude miscon- 

 ceptions of the young German was his edict de- 

 claring that the pound sterling and the 20-mark 

 gold piece were to be received at $5 in United 

 States money, which is the currency of the coun- 

 try, instead of $4.76, the exchange value. Baron 

 von Pilsach and Judge Cedercrantz both wanted 

 to resign early in 1893 when they saw that their 

 attempt at government was a hopeless failure. 

 The powers had to deliberate and confer before 

 appointing new men. Meanwhile the natives 

 were drifting into a situation that must result 

 in civil war. Mataafa's followers said that if 

 war came they would drive the whites from the 

 islands ; Malietoa's followers said that this would 

 serve them right, for they were the cause of all 

 the trouble ; the whites said that the only solu- 

 tion was to annex the islands to some European 

 power and make them rulers over the natives. 

 Mataafa's people had a few firearms that had 

 been hidden away after the last war or smuggled 



