372 NORTHMOST AUSTRALIA 



fleet, who had travelled and seen the world and returned to their 

 homes the envied possessors of tangible riches in the form of Euro- 

 pean wares. Indeed, many of the first fleet boys, like Byron's 

 " restless spirit," soon got " sated of home," and took the first 

 opportunity of returning to the plantations. 



On the plantations themselves, I had many opportunities of 

 observing the gangs of field labourers, and, in my opinion, they were 

 fairly happy and contented, and took a pride in their work. They 

 even imbibed some Christianity, no doubt of a crude order, suited 

 to their comprehension. On this point the evidence of the Rev. 

 A. C. Smith, Convener of the Presbyterian Foreign Missions Com- 

 mittee, is significant, and I should suppose him to be a sufficiently 

 respectable and responsible authority. 



As regards recruiting and its abuses, the reader who desires to 

 pursue the subject further may profitably peruse the whole of the 

 literature referred to in the footnote, and especially (contra) Palmer's 

 Kidna^-ping in the South Seas, and Duffield's Labour Traffic 

 (also Moresby, as in the two preceding chapters), and (pro) 

 Wawn's The South Sea Islanders and the Queensland Labour Trade. 

 This Captain was engaged in recruiting for practically the whole of 

 the period during which it was practised. He declares emphatically 

 that he never engaged in kidnapping and never saw it, but suspected 

 that some other parties might have been guilty. He depicts the 

 growing difficulties of the traffic under fresh enactments one of 

 Duffield's " points " for instance that, whereas others might send 

 outpunitory expeditions to avengeisland murders, it became at length 

 " a hanging matter " for the recruiter to defend himself against 

 treacherous attacks by natives, as in the words of the old adage, 

 " one man may steal a horse while another is hanged for looking 

 over a wall." The gist of Wawn's argument is summed up in his 

 dedication, which is as follows : 



" To the Sugar Planters of Queensland, who have spent the best years of their 

 lives and millions of money in developing an Industry which represents not less than 

 Ninety per cent, of the total Agricultural value of that Colony ; and which at one time 

 bade fair to eclipse even the great Pastoral and Mining Industries in wealth and impor- 

 tance : To those Bold Pioneers who have opened up the rich pastoral districts along 

 the Coast, and have been the means of settling thousands of Europeans on the Land ; 

 and who have done more towards the practical civilisation of the Cannibal and the 

 Savage than all the well-intentioned but narrow-minded enthusiasts of the Southern 

 Pacific : To those Good Men and True who, after a quarter of a Century of hard work 

 and doubtful prosperity, have been basely betrayed and unscrupulously sacrificed 

 to the greed of the political place-hunter and the howling ignorance which follows 

 in his train I dedicate this work, with much sympathy and respect." 



In 1885 it was decreed that within five years all Polynesians 

 should be returned to their homes and that from the passing 

 of the Act no more should be landed in Queensland. Repatriation 

 commenced forthwith, but it was complicated, embittered and 

 delayed by a number of circumstances, chief among which was the 



