INSULAR A USTK. I L ASIA. 



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was called by the popular voice to the head of affairs. This remarkable man came to 

 Fiji in 1X65 from Rotumah, where he had been shipwrecked while on a collecting expedi- 

 tion. Captain Cook, V.C., then H.B.M. Consul at Levuka, attached him to tin- consulate, 

 and, recognizing his great ability, recommended him as his successor. Mr. Thurston 

 received his appointment as Acting-Consul, 

 which he held for some time, and then re- 

 tired to a plantation of his own, where he 

 remained until he was called upon to take 

 charge of affairs under " Thakambau Rex." 

 He continued at the head of the Govern- 

 ment until Fiji became a British Colony; 

 and the story of his difficulties there would 

 make a book well worth reading. It must 

 suffice here to say that, after long battling 

 with political and financial difficulties, he 

 saw that the only way out of them was 

 to call in the aid of the British Govern- 

 ment, and a formal offer of cession was 

 made by the chiefs through him. Commo- 

 dore Goodenough and Mr. Edgar Layard 

 were sent as Commissioners to inquire and 

 report, and finally, in September, 1874, the 

 British flag was formally hoisted by Sir 

 Hercules Robinson, Governor of New South Wales, who represented Her Majesty 

 on that occasion, and the group of islands known as the Fijis became a British colony. 

 Sir Arthur Hamilton Gordon was appointed as the first Governor of the new colony, 

 and landed in Fiji on the 24th of June, 1875. After a time, Mr. Thurston was 

 made Colonial Secretary under him, and retained that position until he was raised to the 

 Governorship of the colony. No one has been more intimately connected with Fiji than 

 he, and to no one does a greater share of credit for its political and commercial develop- 

 ment belong. When Sir Arthur Gordon arrived in Fiji, the greater part of the preliminary 

 work had already been done. The formerly cannibal tribes had been won to Christianity 

 by the labours of the missionaries, and the strength of the hill tribes of Navitilevu, 

 who alone remained in their heathen state, had been broken by a sharp and decisive 

 war, which, by their murderous raids, they had compelled Mr. Thurston to carry on 

 against them. Sir Arthur's work would have been much harder were it not for that 

 which Mr. Thurston and the missionaries had already done, and what he did himself 

 was made much easier by the fact that he had Mr. Thurston to help him to do it. 

 Sir Arthur Gordon was removed to the Governorship of New Zealand in 1880, and 

 was succeeded by Sir William Des Vceux. He was followed by Sir Charles Mitchell, 

 who earned the respect of all classes of men during his brief stay in the Group; but 

 the great commercial depression, consequent on the fall in the price of sugar, made a 

 more economical arrangement imperatively necessary, and Sir John Bates 'I hurston, 

 K.C.M.G., was appointed to the Governorship, his long experience and special knowledge 



A FIJIAN FEMALE. 



