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THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



^^m 



AN OLD MARQUESAN BRINGING HOME A 

 LOAD OE ERESLI BREADFRUIT 



His legs are enlarged from a disease known 

 as fefe, a form of elephantiasis. The Mar- 

 cjuesan has fallen upon evil days, fraught with 

 sickness, misery, and mixed blood. 



fluence could be praised or censored for 

 either. Granting that he was a cruel, 

 licentious cannibal, it must also be con- 

 ceded that he approached the ideal com- 

 bination of health, wealth, and happiness 

 to a degree rarely, if ever, attained by 

 any civilized community. 



I have said that the coming of Captain 

 Cook, in 1774, presaged disaster for the 

 Marquesans. As a result of his previous 

 voyages. Cook was more or less familiar 

 with the life and habits of the Polyne- 

 sians, and found no difficulty in winning 

 the confidence of the savages in this re- 

 mote group. 



The\- welcomed the white men to their 

 shores, and in return Cook brought them 

 fruits and vegetables from other lands to 

 add to their store of food. He intro- 

 duced cattle, sheep, and goats on the 



islands, and made the warriors invaluable 

 presents of iron and steel tools and 

 knives. So far the famous English voy- 

 ager is on the credit side of the ledger. 

 But unfortunately there is a debit page 

 as well. 



A LAND OE NEGLECTED RESOURCES 



Welcomed literally with open arms by 

 the women and girls, the crew of his 

 vessel left behind them a trail of disease 

 hitherto unknown. Today great herds of 

 cattle, sheep, and goats roam unmolested 

 over the islands, while the Marquesan, 

 when he eats meat at all, contents him- 

 self with the same pig which he held in 

 high esteem long before the white man 

 came; year after year the fruit Cook in- 

 troduced rots on the ground, but the evil 

 results of his visit have multiplied a thou- 

 sandfold. 



His report placed the Marquesas lit- 

 erally and figuratively "on the map." 

 That was 145 years ago, and since then 

 the history of the islands is the tragic 

 story of a losing fight by a race of sav- 

 ages against a civilization represented in 

 this instance by the whaler, the mission- 

 ary, the trader, the "blackbirder," and 

 finally their conquest and subjugation by 

 a foreign power. 



Let me say here, lest some of my mis- 

 sionary friends take exception to the 

 company in which they are placed, that 

 the arrangement is purely chronological. 

 Several sporadic attempts were made 

 from 1812 to i860 to christianize the is- 

 lands, but with the exception of the 

 heroic Kikela, a native Hawaiian who 

 came as a missionary to Hivaoa, these 

 were, in' the main, short-lived. 



THE ARRIVAL OE THE ERENCH 



In 1842 Admiral Du Petit-Thouars 

 took possession of the entire group in the 

 name of France, ostensibly to protect the 

 missionaries in their labors for Chris- 

 tianity. Forts were built on several of 

 the islands and troops installed to enforce 

 French authority. 



The ensuing fifty years is a record of 

 desultory warfare between the French 

 soldiers and the Marquesan warriors, in 

 which the latter, always at war with each 

 other and poorly armed, were constantly 

 defeated: of "blackbirders" from North 



