SAVAGE TRIBES

Hokitika Guardian, 13 September 1932, Page 8

SAVAGE TRIBES

VISIT TO THE NEW HEBRIDES

AMONG THE HEAD-HUNTERS

AUCKLAND, September 10,

Villages inhabited by cannibals and iiiead-hunters \ve>r e visited by officers and ratings from H.M.S. Veronica on her recent ■ island cruise. The villagers were bn the island o’f 'Eepiritu Santo in' the AeW Hebrides Group, Wliere the' interior plateau povered with dense bush is still inhabited by extremely primitive people. Th 6 Veronica's port of call at the island ■ was "fHog Harbour.- An officer described-the island as one of the most interesting he had visited. On. 1 fiat land near ’ the coast ther e were plantations with- all the amenities of civilisation; One could sit in a planter’s residence listening to gramophone ; music and •“ .Seeing occasional j motor-lorries passing outride laden wih copra, and heart almost unbelievable tales of atrocities committed by natives in the interior. ’■ 1 ’ "

Two'parties- from the Veronica visited the interior,. the officer said, -and were able to do so only through the services of native guides. ■When the central plateau Was, reached all' traces of civilisation were left behind, -and th 9 guides led them through a 1 seeming l ly impassable wilderness/ 11 - “• No wait® mail rtm'ld’'hope ,to find his way unaided iiil that" dense bush. There were numerous -dative villages scattered aV over the central plateau, and the natives, although they were untamed', were no! openly hostile to Europeans;

v‘T shall never forget walking' 'into rihefinst vi'l’bge we visited,” the officer said. We had been tramping through a gloom of jungle, when' ' suddenly we emerged into a clearing. For a nio,/Tnent • Wewbre almost (blinded by a sudden light, and then We found ourselves gazing down barrels of'half a dozen 1 old ; muzz!e J loadings guns held by na»ked writriors, whose 'bodies 1 were painted in.- weird colbufs. ' Our' guide explained who we were, and we were not molceted. Some' early’ ' European trader ' onoe traded ' thesd old -muzzle.loading guns to the natives, and to them a gun means -untold wealth. -They •know that' they can obtain powder and •shot only frem white t/rade-rs, and consequently they do not dare to quarrel |with Europeans. Tjhere is not the (.slightest doubt" that- they are headi hunter's ' and cannibals among them|se!ves,‘lbut ; their ware are entirely con- | fined to 'the; interior. It is rib use tilling to 'suppress them.-'Their villages jar© scattered in aimCjt impassable country,- and in consequence it would take jin armbd force of unbelievable size -to isubdue them. ,

1 ’Ae" it constitute no menace ]>•. trading and the only thing to do is Ito let' them continue in their bar.be vie f waysr'iSimilar conditions'-exist’ -in many of the islands in’ the New ‘Hebrides', i tnd it '-is‘ '-6hly through ' the' efforts of jthe missionaries that these natives aa-e jlikely to become more or less civilised.”