226 THE QUEENSLAND LABOR TRADE. 
be able to get away quickly in the event of a quarrel on shore. They 
turned round just outside the breakers and then backed in. ‘This is 
an operation requiring considerable skill, but most of the native 
crews had served a long apprenticeship and were very skilful boatmen. 
The boats were double-ended and were steered with a long steer-oar 
run through a strop. | 
The governor-in-council reserved the right of forbidding recruiting 
in any certain part. For many years but little recruiting was done 
at Santa Cruz; the kidnapping there in the early years had been the 
direct cause of the murder of Bishop Patteson, and his death and the 
death of Commodore Goodenough, coupled with the known hostile 
character of the people, caused the labor ships to give Santa Cruz a 
wide berth. Moreover, in the other islands men were comparatively 
easy to obtain. However, one or two adventurous spirits tried 
recruiting at Santa Cruz and obtained men from the neighborhood of 
Graciosa Bay and also in considerable numbers from the Reef Islands. 
In the year 1888 there was an abnormal mortality among these Santa 
Cruz recruits in Queensland and it was decided to forbid recruiting 
there altogether. The poor things frequently died of nostalgia on 
their way to Queensland; they never learned enough English to enable 
them to communicate their needs, either to the whites or to men of 
their own color. No one besides themselves could talk their language, 
so that their lot in Queensland was indeed a hard one. Yet these 
laborers were so profitable to the state that in 1893 the regulation for- 
bidding recruiting at Santa Cruz was rescinded and more of the people 
were taken to the plantations, but with the same sad result. In one 
special case, the island of Tongoa in the New Hebrides, the native 
chiefs requested that their island be exempt; this was done, but their 
young men paddled over to the next island and recruited there. 
There can be no question that the labor trade has contributed very 
largely to the depopulation of the islands. We have the witness of 
Bishop Patteson, in 1871, that all the Banks Islands, with the exception 
of Mota and part of Vanua Lava, were depopulated. Of Mae, inthe 
New Hebrides, he wrote: 
“Nothing can be more deplorable than the state of the island—I counted 
in all about 48 people in the village where of old certainly 300 were to be 
seen. Nouméa, Fiji, Brisbane, Tanna, is in everybody’s mouth, muskets 
in everyone’s hand, and many more in the houses.” 
A very small percentage of these men ever returned home and many 
who did return brought contagious diseases. The possession of rifles 
also was an important factor in hastening the decrease of the popu- 
lation everywhere. Doubtless in most cases a spear is a far more 
deadly weapon in the hands of a Melanesian than a Snider carbine, for 
any shot at a moderate distance, but as a rule a native seldom risks a 
shot from far off and prefers fairly to scorch his enemy with the powder 
of the cartridge, sticking the barrel right up against him. 
