The Feilding Star. SATURDAY, APRIL 1, 1893. The Kanaka Slave Trade

Feilding Star, Volume XIV, Issue 121, 1 April 1893, Page 2

The Feilding Star. SATURDAY, APRIL 1, 1893. The Kanaka Slave Trade

When the proposal was first made to legalise the Kanaka slave trade, we entered our solemn protest against it. Other journals followed our example, and wrote manfully against this iniquitous traffic in human flesh, but with no eilect, and the trade is now a recognised institution protected by law. The desire for wealth, and the " powerful commercial interests, " were too strong for us. However, a new advocate in the cause of suffering humanity has sprung up in the person of Mr 11. L. Stevenson, the distinguished novelist, who has been residing in Samoa for some years for the benefit of his health, and who has had, from the nature of his position, exceptional opportunities of forming an unbiased opinion on the subject. In the course of an interview he said : " There is the greatest difficulty in being satisfied with any supervision of the traffic by the Queensland Government owing to the, multiplicity of languages among the various islands rendering it impossible for an agent to discover whether Natives go to Queensland of their own free will. As a matter of fact, many of them consent to go in order to save their lives from enemies ; and as to the question of returning, many of them, Mr Stevenson says, as often as not are sent to the wrong place, which may mean death to them. It is a common trick when an agent wishes the laborers he has on board to re-volunteer for work in Queensland to bring the vessel opposite an enemy's bay and tell the Natives they a'-e to be landed there. There are, howe.er, alleviating circumstances in the case of the Gilbert Islands, where the atolls a-e so desolate that the people aie in danger of perishing from famine. Queensland requires temporary' labor, and these islands supply its warts, and at the same time relieve their own distress. Yet, probably he had never seen anywhere anything so hideous as this labor traffic. He believed to-day undisguised kidnapping" was practised at the islands. He was ignorant of the New Hebrides, but from what he knew of the other islands he believed any race was best civilised //* situ." This confirms every word of what we said would be a natural sequence of the legalisation of this traffic. We are glad that so well known a. man has spoken, and spoken so plainly. Jlis words will find an echo in the bosom of every philanthropist iv dreat Britain and the colonies, and they may even lead to the utter destruction of the slave trade in tho South seus.