The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1897-03-08
One Feature Of Life On the Pa
GifC Islands.
GROWING POWER IN POLYNESIA
An Obstacle in the Way
of Civilization.
Alexander SeIkirk the First in the
PaCific-Robert Louis Steven
sons Opinion of them.

The name OF "beach-comber" is Of
doubtful origin. 1t is known that i,
was applied more than century ago
to those worse than pirates, wreck
ers,r along the shores of Great Brit
ain and OF our own country. These
wretches hailed wrecks as a godsend,
and by false lights they helped to pro-
duce them. Their harvest was in the
cargoes cast upon the sands when the
ship had gone to pieces, and in the
fotsam taken from the sea when the
waves had subsidized.
Light houses, buoys and well organ
lied life-saving stations have banished
the beach-combers from the civilized
shores. Although equally brutal and
Indifferent to the laws controlling the
rights 20 life and property, the beach
comber of the Pacific islands is an en-
tireIy different character from his Am
erican and English predecessor, says
the Washington Star. With his life
lines cast in those favored purple
isles" where nature is so lavish of her
bouhties, the POlynesian beach-cOmber
has lost his love of wealth. He has
adopted the modes of life of the people
on whom he forced himself, and al
though he has not in all things adopt
ed their guiIeless methods, something
OF the poetry of his surroundings and
the simplicity of his associates comes
to him after he has ceased to yearn
for the bustling, selfish world, upon
which he has forever turned his back.
A few years ago, while in Apia. the
capital of Samoa, the one city of the
Navigator's Islands. a city with one
street and that street with very few
houses, l gladly accepted an invitation
from my old friend, Robert Louis Ste
venson, to spend night with him in
his picturesque home up the noun
tain. within hearing of the waterfall
and within sight of the worlds most
beautiful bay" as he put it.
HIS PART IN LIFE.
Before this l had started in to study
the Polynesian beach-comber, and
had just returned from the Island or
Tetuna, where l had learned much to
increase my interest in the subject,
without at all adding to my respect
for it.
| found my kindly, brilliant host an
enthusiast on the subject of beach
combers. and had he lived he would
have added another fascinating chap
ter TO a subject that has inspired The
II rfc.esf ffr1Tsc NJ
the last two centuries.
After repeating my limited expert
ence with these fellows. / was de-
nouncing the whole band, when Ste
yenson interrupted me in a half laugh
ing. half serious way:
MY dear boy" he said, IS nearly
as l can recall his words, OF which i
made a note the next day. you forge
that students of psychology, as Well
as students of physiology, fnd their
most abnormal subjects the most in
teresting. The beach-cOmber Is not q
thinker. but he has set me a-thinking.
How much he has done for litera-
ture-
started .u surprise. and then my
host went on to describe the beach
comber who is to be found in nearly
all the inhabited islands of the Pacific,
from the AlGulldn 5Ibup " 'tAC NAH''
tiers of islets that fringe southern New
Zealand. These men, he explained,
were Americans and representatives
of nearly every maritime people in the
world. Nearly all were Geserters from
ships. Some were fugitive criminals.
hut a majority were driven TO eX-
tremes by the cruelty of their masters
Many had no home ties, no sense OF
obligation. and no idea of duty; but
for these deficiencies they were hardly
TO blame. They Coutrasted the beauty
of these lovely islands and the perfect
freedom of the graceful natives with
the fetid fOrecastIes of the whaler or
merchantmen on which they served.
and they compared the tyranny OF their
captain with the low voices and seduc-
tive eyes of the beautiful maidens OF
POLYNESIA. They yielded to the latter
and deserted by thousands-indeedI
they have been deserving for more than
a century, and the end Is not YET.
These deserters. now called peach
eombers." whether they reside on the
shore or in the interior. have taken
native wives Where the custom per
nitted they took more than one, and
the result is a new race of half-breeds
A. a rule this race is physically SUI
perior TO either of the originals. but
unfortunately the greater mental ca
uacitv that accompanies this greater
strength and grace has not been used
in an ennobling way
.sVhat the frontiersmau was 70 Am
erica the beach-comber, though not
with the heroic nature and splendid
nurDose of the former, is destined to
he to Polynesia said Stevenson.
But what has he done for htera-
ture p l asked.
Nothing directly" was the response.
shut then, neither has the frontiers
man. the soldier, the sailor, or any