"VAILIMA LETTERS"

Dominion, Volume 14, Issue 8, 5 October 1920, Page 5

"VAILIMA LETTERS"

Pen'onal letters are tometlmei a. good deal more interesting' reading than letters written ostensibly for publication. This would apply in the case of '•Y&iiima letters," a. series of chatty informative letters written by Captain/Hassell 6. ,de F. Garland • (late a.D.O. to' His Excellency Lord .Liverpool, and now acting in the same capacity to the Governor of Fiji), to.' Mr. Gavin Hamilton, private secretary to Lord Liverpool, whilst-the writer was ! in Samoa as A.D.O. to Major-General Sir Alfred' Bobin, when the latter officer was Actinj-Ad m'niatrator. "The Letters," which ha.ve been published - by Messrs. Ferguson and Hicks,' are dedicattd to "the many; kind friends.it.has been ; my good fortune to find in the islands of the Pacific, but principally to the Ohief, to G.M.H., and to the good people who. assisted in tho publication of these' letters." Captain Garland gives in a very intimate and cheery manner—in which' traoes of a-soldier in the recent great campaign may le detected—very faithful .and altogether interesting snapshots of official life from day to day. This, of course, takes in the humorous "kava drinking" welcomes accorded to "The Ohief," and incidentally the writer; visits to the principal rointa of interest in the group, to the big plantations the outlying islands, with, here and there, peeps at the native customs and sentiment, the whole giving a very fair idea of-life— the;best side of life perhaps—in Samoa. Naturally when living at "Yailima," a T good deal of reference is made to t' o late Bobert Louis Stevenson, and on more than one occasion Captain Garland made the hill journey along the hyblscUs(lamed track to i-here lie the remains of ; one of the greatest' "purists" , iti the language. Captain Garland 'does ; not qiiote the lines of "Eequeim," as . nearly . every} visitor to the tomb has done, but he! sheds a new light in his simple description of the tf.mb. He says:. "Thn tomb is of concrete with a flat haie, and a smaller coflln-shaped platform, en .-it. Into this latter is. let, at the .easternend, a brass tablet over the. place where Mrs., Stevenson's' anhes have been deposited. On this tablet is described the Terse he wrote tq his wife:— /"Teacher, tender comrade, wife, ■ . A fellow-farer throughout life,' Heart whole and soul free, ' _THo.augU6t, Father-gave to j me." • 'linscribed in concrete' on the' left ■ side of the tomb are the words of .his Eequiem, while on the 'ether : side"one finds them in-Samoan. . .... The tomb is over four, hundred feet above the house; and therefore a thousand feet above sea-level, and) as it is only four miles from tho haibour, you seem to' look right into it, When one gazes at the grave 'and its several tons' of concrete, one is struck with two thoughts—flrst, what a great love must have prompted those-people to carry him up to this last resting place of , his desire, ( and secondly what a labour it must have , been ■ to carry up not only the body but also the matonal for the tomb. There' was no track in those days." Captain-Garland speaks of the excellent use made of coral. concrete at the outlying island of Safotu,. where there' was dancing, sivas, speeches, .and a.feast" to welcome "The Chief.". "Thtre waa' not a great ■ many chiefs present, but in all probability," says' the. writer naively," "this was accounted for by the faot. that - these tillages in particular have lost, very heavily during the epidemic." "Yailima Letters" . are certainly a worth-while contribution to the nowest outlook on these interesting islands now trader the care of New Zealand.