6o 
Wild Life in Southern Seas. 
dual control— i.e., the patrolling of the group 
by ships of war of both nations—-and a very 
unsatisfactory arrangement it has proved. Five 
years ago, the late Governor of Fiji, in his 
capacity of High Commissioner for the Western 
Pacific, when questioned as to the claims of the 
British settlers in the New Hebrides, and to the 
possibility of the group being annexed by either 
Power, said, “ I cannot tell how the matter will 
be settled. Both France and England want the 
New Hebrides ; each nation is determined that 
the other shall not get it. In the meantime 
things must, of course, go on as they are 
doing.” And things have been going on very 
unsatisfactorily, in the opinion of the men who 
have made the group what it is—the English 
settlers, traders, planters, and merchants. It is 
not my purpose, however, to enter into the 
rival claims of the English and French residents, 
but to give a brief description of the islands 
themselves. Yet one thing may be said, and 
that is this : The group was opened up and 
surveyed by British ships ; British and Austra¬ 
lian money has done a great civilising work 
there ; the men who first discovered them to 
commerce were Englishmen; the natives are 
