PACIFIC ISLANDS UNDER JAPANESE MANDATE 



61i 





Photograph from Junius B. Wood 



A MEETING OE THE "BIG CHIEEs" OE THE PAEAO ISLANDS ON KORROR 



He of the helmet is the Aybathul, a chief of first rank and practically king of the Palaos. 

 He and one other member of the group are wearing bracelets of bone, symbols of dignity. 

 The handbag of plaited leaves carried by each chief is the Palao equivalent of a cigarette 

 case or tobacco-pouch, for it contains the "makings" for betel-nut chewing. 



tionalities of distant lands, has substituted 

 work and worry for that care-free life. 

 This man, a native leader, was interpreter 

 for the Japanese chief of police. He 

 might have been an Ijokelekel or a Jaute- 

 leur in another age. 



"I have forgotten the name of the sol- 

 dier who won the fight," he said, lapsing 

 again into silence. 



The name wouldn't come. He called 

 in the rough Ponape dialect. The light 

 step of bare feet came along the narrow 

 porch. Leaning over the low wall was a 

 woman, bare from the waist up, straight- 

 featured, with threads of gray in the 

 smooth black hair, sharp-eyed and strong- 

 muscled, as if a bronze Venus of fabled 

 Nanmatal had been conjured into the 

 dim light of the flickering lantern. With- 

 out raising his head, the man spoke in 

 their native language. 



"Nanparatak," she said. Homer would 

 have picked a better name for the South 

 Seas Achilles. I wrote it down while 

 the jargon was fresh. When I looked 

 again the dusky vision had disappeared 



as silently as the mythological Helen of 

 Troy. The legend of Greece and that of 

 Ponape have strange points of similarity. 

 "Jauteleur and Soutolour were killed, 

 and Ijokelekel divided Ponape into five 

 tribes, just as they are today," he re- 

 sumed. "But they did not live in either 

 of the cities, for the gods who had built 

 them were angry. Nobody has lived in 

 them since, and when people go to them 

 it rains and thunders, for the gods do 

 not want them to be disturbed. Nobody 

 has disturbed them since the German 

 governor died." 



A DANCE ON PONAPE, CENTER OE THE 

 JAPANESE MANDATORY ISEANDS 



On another day the natives gave a 

 dance. It was a good show, but, con- 

 sidering the elaborate preparations and 

 number participating, sadly abridged and 

 expurgated. Saddened by the march of 

 events in America, somebody wrote, "You 

 Cannot Shimmy on Tea, ' and probably 

 the same applies to the South Seas. The 

 League of Nations very wisely specifies 



