Social Condition of the Fijis.

Cromwell Argus, Volume III, Issue 129, 30 April 1872, Page 7

Social Condition of the Fijis.

The Fiji Gazette begins a leader with the rather startling inquiry, “ The next generation in Fiji, what will it he ?” and then proceeds to explain the diflicnlty standing in the way of the problem The vast majority of our settlers appear to have no desire or intention to form such matrimonial and family alliances as are essential to the respectability of society. With too many, the morality of society is only a subject to be laughed at. We cannot understand the position they take up. The charms of Fiji women we fail to appreciate. Wo could never see them. What qualification do they possess to enchant! Is it their mannners ! Or is it' the mental superiority of these sable beauties that obtain for them preference amongst white men over white ladies 1 Nor do the white admirers of black beauty confine their allections to the aboriginal females of Fiji. As the palates of old used to scour the ocean for a variety of fish, so the varying tastes of many of our settlers rake the islands of the entire Polynesian group for a supply of spouses, varying in colour from a London chimney-sweep just emerged from a six-storey chimney, to the colour of a faded penny, or the face and features of a Chinaman. What will the next generation be, then i We pause to consider. Put it is not in their tints and their features, thenface and their form only, we feel curious. A far more serious consideration lies in thenmorals. What will bo the morality of such a generation of offspring ? What can it bo I The early settlers in America never sank to this. Even the best-looking rod Indian chicftainess could not draw their affection from the British maids who, though separated from them by the ocean, they resolved should he their wives. And where is the .mother in the colonies who would refuse to the Fiji planter the hand of her daughter !■ It is not a scarcity of the white material that makes him buy the black. How many young and accomplished ladies are there in the colonics who would cheerfully Uy to the sunny tropics I How readily would they come, and as loving wives make home happy.