HENRI ROCHEFORT ON NEW CALEDONIA.

Samoa Times and South Sea Gazette, Volume 3, Issue 145, 17 July 1880, Page 2

HENRI ROCHEFORT ON NEW CALEDONIA.

Count Victor-Honri d Roehefort-Lucay, better known as Mousieur Henri Rochefort the most conspioiions Frenchman who remains in focile under the Thirl Republic, has just published a noteworthy book relating his experiences as a political conI vict in Now Caledonia. It appears, j indeed, undor the form ef a romance, l entitled the " Kvad-i," but there are I many indieati in i that it is :i personal record of some of the moving advontures which happened to hhneclf while actually detained at Noumea. He gives an account, lialf melancholy, of the penal settlement to which he was sont, and every page of his narrative is alive with tbot sportive and astonishing humour which has made him so redoubtable an opponent, and so amusing a writer. M. Rochofort assures hitf readers that the geographical form of New Caledonia is no more poetic than that of & boot-leg, to which it has a, remarkable likeness. He observes that Captain Cook, taking a true British commercial view of his discovery, abandoned it to France on account of its sterility, for that, its beings steadfastly determined to preserve in its resemblance to the boot-leg he has already mentioned, it produces no raoro than a moraol of leather. The natives devour a, sort of green clay to assuage the pangsof hunger, and support their stomachs, against the void of utter eruption which is abhorred by nature. They are nourished, however, when they can leally get food, upon lizard*, spiders of a hairy sort, and a kind of cookchafer, all of which they eat alive wiih an evident senso of relish. The olimate of the coun- • try is suoh that whenever Noumea is not a cistern it becomes an oven. The house* are no more substantial than though they were made of packing cases, aid even the official building, to which the pompous name of " the Governor's Palace "is given, can only be compared to a Swiss chalet. - The European population is composed of-the worst sweepings of society—political ami financial riff-raff, dead-beats from Monaco, swindler* from the Stock Exchange, runaway lads who have brought disgrace on their families, and. Indies of no character. Those personsnaturally form a strong contrast to theideal patriots who figure in M. Rochefort's novel, and be baa drawn some type* of oharocter with a master-hand—types also which are quite new. It it perhaps saying quite enough for a novel to rocdrd" that it is a faithful and vivacious portraiture of manners, containing passage* of true, wit and pathos; it is nevertheless not easy to lay down M Rochefort'o book without a feeling of disappointmentFor a considerable time ho'woe the moat popular nun in France. Ho wasoourtwl both by the Press and the Governraont. Now here U this ox-Minister, this brilliant writer and popular tribune, without place, calling, or profession, when somewhat past middle' age, and constrained to write for his living.