TRISTAN DA CUNHA

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 3, Issue 690, 16 November 1933, Page 3

TRISTAN DA CUNHA

LONELY ISLAND HOME OF THE EMPIRE'S MOST REMOTE COLONY. PRIMITIVE EXISTENCE. Tristan da Cunha ha sbeen called "the miost desolate spot on earth." 'I have just returned from a stay of four years on Tristan da Cunha as Priest-im-Charge and later :as Magistrate and H. M. Commissioner of the ' tiny colony, and I can endorse bh'at description, writes the Rev. A. G. Partridge in the London News-Chro-nicle. This most remote of the Elmpire's possessions comsists of a towering mountain of black volcanic rock, set 1400 miiles from the nearest humian life in the middle of the South Atlantic and inhabited by 164 settlers of mingled British-Italian-Dutch-South African-Creole ancestry, with th'e outlook and vocabulary of children of four. For four years I have shared life with these incongruous "British subjects," living on a diet of potatoes, and — when weather permitted — fish, only relieved with tea, fiour, tobacco and other luxuries with the yearly arrival of a supply ship. Four years of life in a village of primitive stone huts, perched on a plateau at the foot of a sheer black 1 volcano, utterly cut off from any news of the world and in constant fear of starvation. . . . A Riddle of Fate. It must seem incredible to civilised people that the Tristans voluntarily remain in exile. Several times the South African Government has tried to persuade them, to move to the mainiand,' evjen off'aring 'them land and loans. But the islanders have refused. Just before I left for the last time the potato crop on Tristan' — the staple food for the next year— was wiped out by foul weather. Since then no word has been received. The special relief ship sent was driven back by mountainous seas. What may be found by the next ship to battle its way to Tristan da Cunha no one can siay. . . . Marrying young as they do, and suffering from hardly any disease, the Tristans are increasing rapidly. In ten years the island will not be able to support them. It will then be emigration — 'Or starvation. As it is, this British colony is only kept from' annihilation by the stores sent in the yearly supply ship by the Tristan da Cunha Fund. The arrival of this ship, with its preoious cargo of fiour, tea, sugar, tinned goods, canvas, clothing and so on, is the one excitement in the islanders' life. The few weeks before its arrival are often a time of acute want, almost approaching starvation. On one oceasion we went without any food for three days. Ship Ahoy. The sight of a distant ship arouses pand'emonium. Every soul on the island drops work and, screaming hysterieally "Ship-^ho!" rushes to my house. The women pick up their skirts and dance, the men leap in the air and turn somersaults, the children scream, the hundreds of dogs bark frantieally. . . • And then, in a rush, the men are manning four of the island's five boats (for one is alwiays held in reserve) and rowing frantieally out to the ship. 'There is a rigid tradition in th'e division of stores. The stores individually addressed to certain islanders by generous people at home who have "adopted" them. ars, of course, not divided. But every other commodity is shared out to the eighth of an ounce amiong the islanders. iClothes are made into equal bundles on the beach, while the "chief man" faces a wall where he cannot see [ them. One of the men then touches ' a bundle and asks: "Whose?" to which the chief man replies with a name at random. •Apai't from this division of supplies there is no. Communism on Tristan, though many people consider it an ideal site for such a regime. All the islanders started with equal opportunities. Some were diligent, some •lazy, and each has found his own level. Some have few or no sheep — the mO'St precious possession — and the island's "millionaire" has fifty. There is, of course, no money. My excitement at the supply •ship's approach was as great as the islander's, but mainly because of the arrival of n'ews. What has happened to the world? Has a great war broken out? Is England prosperous or bankrupt? Has there been a Test match? For all I know the incoming ship may 'be an "enemy" auxiliary cruiser come to annex the island as a base. . . j In mentality, customs, and even speech, the islanders are a relic of England of th'e Napoleonic Wars — . when the colony was founded by an ex-soldier disgusted with the lack of work in England — (and the foreign blood has been sternly anglicised by the British element! 'It is 'extna.ordinary to see these folk — many of them extremely tropical in appearance — d'oing the old English dances and singing the songs. They are, perhaps, th'e healthiest people on earth. Inter-marriage has not hurt them, for there are eight distinct families and many combinations are possible. Deatn is caused only by old age and such "accidental" illness as pneumonia. No death from ■diseiase has occurred since Wdlliam Glass, the founder, died of cancer. No Home for Microbes. This can only be explained by _supposing there are no germs^ on Tristan — (wh'en a supply sbip arrives, ^ when the entire island goes down with influenza. Even children, escape the usual childish ailments. This seems to me to present extremely interesting material for medieal research. In view of the present-day primitiveness of Tristan, it is interesting to note that the island is-quite prohably a relic of the semi-mythical continent of Atlantis. Tristani da •Cunha, with its sister islands, Nigh'tingiade and Inaccessible, and the distant Ascension and St. Helena appear to be the tops of a cbain of immensely ,high mountains which have sunk to the bottom of the sea. This mountain theory is horne out by the abrupt-

ness with: which the sea bed descends to immerse depths off the shores of Tristan. iWlhiat a contrast! From the world's greatest eivilisation to the world s most primitive eivilisation.