292 
Wild Life in Southern Seas. 
And there is one thing to be said of the Niue 
native ; and that is, that, with all his faults, he 
would give his life for the white missionary 
who is not only his teacher and adviser in things 
spiritual, but his doctor, his protector, and his 
friend. 
“White men lead such a lazy existence in 
South Seas, do they not ? ” is a question often 
asked, and usually answered in the affirmative. 
But there are exceptions to every rule, and the 
white trader, and his white or native wife on 
Savage Island, do not lead the dreamy, careless, 
and lazily happy sort of life which Herman 
Melville has written in those charming books— 
“Typee” and “ Omoo.” Not that he is kept 
continuously busy all the year round, for it 
sometimes happens that the native rulers place 
a fono upon the coconut trees, and during the 
period that the fono (the tapu of other islands) 
is in force, which may be from one to six 
months, the business of copra-making ceases, 
and although there is much other island produce 
to be bought, such as arrowroot, fungus, and 
cotton, these form but a comparatively minor 
adjunct to the mainstay of the island trade, 
