TALK ABOUT TOWN.

Samoa Times and South Sea Gazette, Volume 2, Issue 68, 18 January 1879, Page 2

TALK ABOUT TOWN.

•• There's a elnVI among ye tal.-in' notes, And faith he'll :>ivnt them." One of our residents, David Chapman, is lying on his death-bed ; in fact it will lie ii matter of surprise to those few Samaritans who are attending to him and supplying hiin with his few wants in these last and lonely hours, if he is Still living when these lines appear in print before, my readers on Saturday. His disease is a serious and painful one, ami there Mill bo no hopes entertained for his recovery. Destitute of means, ami without kith 01 kin. in this part of the world, it will shortly devolve Upon the humane portion of our community to defray thd expense" of conveying him to his final resting place. On such an occasion as this, and seeing tli.it. we have such a large number of church attendants in comparison to the foreign papulation. there should he no difficulty whatever, in raising, in a few hours' notice, a sunt of money, amply sufficient for this christian act,—the hut ami the greatest that can be paid t . any man. The above- lines had scarcely been

penned before the. news of the death of Chapman reached me. On Thursday morning he was buried. A few publicans and sinners—the ehurch-going portion of thocontmiinitv were verv conspicuous by their absence—followed tin; remains" of old David to his last resting place; the resident English Missionary, Dr, Geo. A. Turner, conducting the services in bis usually quiet Uut impressive manner. 11.8.M. Consul (U.S. Swanstuli. Esq.,) was also present, and lent his flag which covered the coffin. Although there Was only a baker's dozen, at the funeral the attendance was larger than I expected, for in my experience in Samoa I have hitherto found that if an influential man dies, there is a large attendance of the " respectable " people, but when an unfortunate poor fellow " shuffles off this mortal coil," only the outsiders, —publicans, newspaper scribblers, and such like, out of the pale of Samoa civilisation, — are witnesses of the hist act that one man can perforin to a dead brother. Of course there tire some expences, such as medicine, attendance and burial to be paid for ; and it is very probable that the omount will not exceed S4O. 1 have heard some people express us their opinion that H.I;.M. Consul should pay these expoiK/js. There i.-, no doubt that he will, if he finds that the huge sunt of §4O cannot be raised in Apia tor such a charitable object; though at the same time the Community and not the Consul are responsible. A paragraph in the Consular Instructions .states : —" Payments on account of distressed British subjects are to be limited to cases of real and urgent distress, brought about by circumstances over which the applicants had no control, itc." Now Chapman has been a resident among us for somo years, and can certainly not be classed as one of those deserving of consular aid; hut sickness came upon him and he required the aid of the Samaritans. The paragraph further states:—'.'Consular officers must judge of the cases as they come before them, ami grant relief accordingly; but each case of relief is to he reported to the Secretary of State and permission is to lie asked for reimbursement of tho expenditure." The reason I go into this question at such length is because hitherto the community have thrown their christian obligations too readily upon a liberal Government, Numerous cases have occurred in which the English Consul at the time has stood the responsibility; whereas, as in this case, it more properly devolves uppq the community at large—especially ihe English section of it—to pay the expeiwbs beeped during the sickness of a poor eon itryman, than to look upon the consular ulcer as the medium of relief. When the list is taken routid wo shall Roe how far this idoois carried out in practice. It is •■aid til..; truth is stranger than fitti->.i. In mi shorl experience 1 l«.vu frequently found ll to be so; imi whether tin' following story, which 1 heard rolateil the other day, is tiction or truth I cannot say ; ut and rate it is strange ' Within a hundred] miles of the pretty town of Apia, Samoa, there lives a g.-ntlo-mnn who hails from the trrc.it II •public, lie owns a small but neat and c.uiveniently situated plantation, within flvo, hours walk from his place of ■ -us-s, j which DM attracted the eyes of two "ificr

well-known hut unmentionable citizens o! | the Giestt Republic, also living within n j hundred miles of Apia. Thaw two worthies, a few thus ago, paid a visit to the | plantation ; examined the boundaries, the quality of the soil, and took particular I stock of the liilpiunniflUti which have been made on the estate. From the assertions they were heard to make, and the Ingenious story they fabricated in order to get a "squint" of tho owner's title papers, that gentleman (the owner) fully believes, —to use his own words, —"that it was their intention, had they found the lead defect in the title, to goDup up the plantation by sneakiiigly getting a deed from the former owner, and turning me the present incumbent out, or compel me to repurchase from them at a nice little advance of say about SIOOO, the value of my improvements." The gentleman is, I believe, a Great Republican ; but this is pretty plain English. Where the cap tits, it may be worn ! Unfortunately for the success of the little scheme of these two worthies my informant was able to exhibit a valid deed, accompanied with an accurate plot and survey by the well known surveyor, Mr. Parkinson. My informant, still speaking plain Eng-lish—-although be refuses to '.clime till? names of the parties—soys, " he believes these men would steal the coppers oil' a dead negroes eyes, and pass them in the dark to Samoa girls for $lO pieces." That's a kind of warm for somebody. Who is it 1 Echo answers who I In a tit of righteous indignation my informant, with his left band on his heart and his right waving majestically (and artistically 1 hope) in the air exclaimed, " Let justice be done, though tho Heavens fall." Hah! ah! Rather tragical. 1 would suggest, as still more impressive,— " D-e-r-a-g him to the lowest duug-e-on, beneath the castle moat, ah; and there let him rmro-ttt ah ! Cykil.