Evening journal., 1889-04-10
A SAILOR KING.
Carl BENJAMIN, Washed Ashore on a
PRcifc Island, Becomes Chief


Pacific Island, Becomes Chief.
George Wright. who arrived at San
Francisco on the steamer Australia day
or two ago from the Caroline Islands,
brings a queer story Of the sudden rise Of
sailor to distinction in the largest
island of an archipelago seventy five
miles west of Haweis, where Mr. Wright
has trading store
1.-The sailor, said Mr.. Wright, is Carl
Benjamin, and he has no less than nine
teeen wives and ffty-odd copper-colored
children. He was wrecked in the
schooner Bombazine off the Ladrone
Islands nine years ago, and tloated at sea
on a raft a couple of weeks before he
struck land Ii you win look at a map
of the Pacific you will find lying midway
between the Tropic of Cancer and the
equator. 900 miles west of the Marshall
group, thirteen dots. On some maps
they are marked Thirteen Islands, well
inhabited That is all to point out their
significance. 1t is on the biggest of
these, called by the sailor BENJAMIN
Island, after himself, that he has taken
up his home. 1t is about ten by twenty
miles in extent. Well inhabited means
that there is quite a sprinkling of dark
skinned natives there, as well as many
more who move to and fro in the archi-
pelago with boats They eat bread fruit,
bananas, cocoanuts and fish. They don't
work at all. Benjamin had got to be
King. He has nothing at all to do but
go swimming in the surf, talk the native
gibberish, which he has learned CT loll
under palm tree. Sometimes he has
his wives fan him while he lazily smokes
the kaseba leaf, which grows plentifully
there, and which after one becomes used
to it, is liked better than tobacco.
Benjamin is doing some good work
there, however. He carried three or four
books with him on his raft, the last thing
you would have expected, and he has
contrived TO teach the natives English.
| Benjamin is an American of German OF
Jewish descent, and is a lover of books.
The first thing heIdid was to select an in
telligent native and teach him the al
phabet. The fellow learned rapidly and
soon began TO teach it to others and a
number of them can now speak English,
while the rising generation Immediately,
around are gradually picking up know
ledge of the language Benjamin is looked
upon as a sage. The chiefs. of whom
there are four, come to him for points,
and of their own accord they have made
him their ruler, the chiefs being sort
Of cabinet.
Benjamin has picked out the hand
soonest women for wives, and they esteem
it quite an honor. The King lives in the
biggest bamboo house in the village oi
ki, struggling aggregation Of native
houses on coral reef. His children are
of all ages, and are a sprightly, lively
lot. Nobody bothers much with clothes
in the South Pacific, still Benjamin wear.
a little something, and is gradually pre-
vailing on the natives to do so too. ii,
keeps telling them that there is no civil
zation without some clothes. Benjamin
is about 30 years old He was formerly
from NewDerryport, Mass, but says tha'
he no longer has any desire to return
to America. He is the only white man
with one exception, for hundreds O
miles around. He has taken to wearing
string of shells around his neck likl
the natives, and he sometimes initiates
them and puts dots of blue paint, go
from a native shrub, on his face. Thi
is only on state occasions, however, whei
there is to be discussion of importan
questions with the chiefs. The perma
nent population of his island is about go
or ZOO. The island is indented with beau
tiful bays, and is dotted with trees AM
shrubs of a tropical growth which ar
for most of the year covered with fra
grant flowers. Benjamin Island is abou
800 miles west of the Marshall group. p
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