NEW FIELDS FOR FEMALE ENTERPRISE.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume VII, Issue 1832, 4 May 1888, Page 3

NEW FIELDS FOR FEMALE ENTERPRISE.

"Oould not the S.P.O.j£ ," writea » correspondent, " or any other association furthering female emigration, Bend oat a contingent) of lady'helpa to the Samoan Islands ? The dearth of European women m these little Edens is loading to a state of things which entirely sets at naught the theory sot forth m Mr Grant Allan's story of the Rev. John Greedy and othsr ethnological studies, Marriages of white men with Samoanwomenare very common, and we do not hear of these dusky wives lapsing into savagedom. This is a correspondent's, aoaoqnt : • I qannot q*y I like Samoa : the Islands are beautiful, but I don't admire the Natives, ard white people appear bo mixed up with them, many having married Ssmoau women. They are very presuming* and swarm about European hocse9 gettlug what they can ; and a man apoears not only to have marribd a wife, but' the whole tribe, who consider they have a right to his property. Then the marriage of Europsanß with Natjve wrmen ia uot a blpdtng tie ; it Is if performed At the consulate, and duly registered, but if performed by a Na'Jve missionary it ia only binding at Samoa, and a man wishing to be rid of his wife on easily do bo by leaving the island. Only too often even this loose oereroony is not performed, yet men. women, and chil dron do nol appear to suffer any shame ia their own or other people's eyes. I like Fiji muoh better; there the European keeps his place ; very few white men are married to Natives, and if they are, the marriage is aB binding as m England, and the punishment for a white man living with a Native women nob married to him is very heavy; and a Native there never or rarely presumes toentera house without pesmiasion.' Olearly this is a case m which emigration societies should take the initativo, since, while no Europe m wives are to be had m Samoa, who can blame white settlers for taking to themselves dusky brides ? One of these mixed marriages, we can vouch for, is a happy one. The wife, however, had a little education, although Bhe still sees as much of Samoaos as of Europeans, and always speaks to her children m her native tongue, the father using Enslish." ..'••■■