CRUSOE'S ISLAND.

Hutt News, Volume 2, Issue 48, 8 May 1930, Page 12

CRUSOE'S ISLAND.

Tihe best boy?s story ever written was written by Daniel Defoe about the lonely life of Alexander Selkirk, a Scott Bailor, on the island ox Juan Fernandez Mfh&t do we know of Juivn Fernan:lex now?

The answer, for, most of us, is /thait we knaw very Hfctle of it. But quite recently one of the expert scientists of thefine American Smithsonian Instit.iiition Dr. Waldo Schmitt, has been living for some weeks on tiie island, studying its almoist innumerable marine inverted brates, ,and he/has 'bxought back into ■t^eworM at lai'go its laites't news :■•■ ■ ■>. Defoe uliEtced his Crusoe's island «n tlfce nonbliern shore of South ia t^e mpufrh of Orinoco River, but nobffdy is deceived by that. Alexander SpUrirk was the man he had ij.n Ms imind akd Juan Fernantlex named after the Spanish captain who first discovered"'it,, some 400 miles off the coa>sit of Qhile., was the island of Crusoe

. '■■■■.-. i An Eventful History

It has had 'fa strange,' eventful histery both before and after^ Alexander Selkirk was there ,lomging fot ' years according to Gowper 's poem ,to" the

sound of hto cjhureh-going bell ' 'oflcivil-;

isation It. was i lerniandex wio, ,• it with the' goats. Crusoe fpumd .tiLerie, which still aibo/unds. Seamen .who<d-e-, sorted from ships whicih. balled/'vfibLe^re for water had lived on, the- island' b'efove Selkirk was'left'on its shore by

his captain, till he was. taken off by"' Rogers, ; captein of a. pri\^uteer, in 1709.,

*The' Spaiards annexed the .island in 1750 and put a garrison on it, and Chiie.

•took it ov.er at tlie .beganning. of .the. last. century and. made a prison foT .crim"■jnals. A century later this ilsb pS it hid " t*c*vsed jand it Tnas said'jto h-aye. abojxt tv/enty^ inSiabits&tts. c^f itf n<jw? . ■ .• j^landit^^piatifefe^ f :^''j? '} , . .;; " *l>V\^ehini^' Irriiigs ( ihb' |news that'Crusoe's isiaaid is naturally'one oM <'tne-.j

easiest places ot exist in'(that can be found on the eairth, a paradise {for anyone who is content witth a aimless life.

About thirteen miles long and four miles widje, rising ruggedly 6t over 3000feetjWitii deep water round it

it has greenand Wooden valleys, fresh. streamfl,abii!ndant vegetation—fantastic in its exuberant 'growth, almost every or introduced as the year.sh.ave ■ gone «n), a. fertile soil, .all.useful animals, tout none : wild except a remnant of <tihJe goats'..whiea'Crusoe, knew: and such an abandance of iisliiliat fishing is its chief industry lobstrerf being exported

in; exchanged for the tinned salmon and meats and baked beans; of America.

And what of its inhabitants? Where Ci'u&oe once reigned alone are now Spanisih speakers from the South. AmerGerman families, several of whom were ship-wrecked there, an alre content ot stay-. A simple, hospitable people they are. All live on thei eastern, rainy and fertile, side/of th,e island.

The island is extremely healthy arid has no doctor; but a wireless call, can be made at tshe mainland in a emergency. It has a church to which apriest eoines once a year for a service, and to conduct 'baptismal and wedding lcexemonies. Twice a month a vessel •calls with supplies from Chile, and occasibnanly a passings vessel put's in for waiter. "Biii;, in strangest contrast with tie silence and loneliness of Crusoe, a daily programme isi Sbroadiclasit: to the island from the city of Valparaiso.

"':'.. If <&n aimless ,'. life of ease were all tlat man ueedsit could be found in tihis island of.romance.