The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1908-12-17
Don't Eat White Men.

It was only recently the news
came out of the western Pacific of
the killing of a missionary on one
Of the Solomon Islands to be the
funeral baked meat of cannibal
feast.
Private advices from the official
charged with the investigation of
the murder comment upon the prob
ability that the story had come out
&c civilization as tale of cannibal-
ism. The missionary had been kill
eG, the writer said. for tresspassing
upon the sacred precincts of one OF
the native secret societies while
their solemn mummery was in pro-
gress, due warning of which had
been given by the deep reverOera-
tion made by energetic swinging of
the bull roarer.
But there was evidence OF any
scrt to offset the statement made
by the murderers that they had not
eaten the white man. Their state
ment found confirmation in the
condition of such of the bones as
were recovered. for each had been
brought to a high polish and stain
ed with turmeric TO a brilliant yell
low.
The charge Of eating white men
seems very hard 70 DOWN. Even
now, when every one should know
better, it is by no means unusual
to find the statement mat the Ha-
wai.ans at Kealakekua ate Capt.
Cook, yet they were not canniba.s
at all.
In the western Pacific where can
nibalism is constantly practiced ex-
cept under the immediate eye of
white men, it is natural to be sus-
picious of practitioners of such gas
tronomy. Yet it is highly improba-
Bile that a white man, who might p-
killed in the most jovial way by
| these sayages, would ever be eaten
By them.
Here is a piece of testimony on
the subject from II sedate German
who has lived for thirty years and
more among these cannibals of the
Pacific, Herr Parkinson of the Bis
| marck Archipelago.
During my long residence in
these islands, he writes, Il have
not been abe to establish to my sat
! isfaction a single case in which
white men, though butchered, have
actually been eaten by the Mean-
| es.ans. The bodies of the murder
ed have often enough been dismem-
bered and single pieces sent to re-
mote districts as trophies of the
perpetration of the murder, but as
| to the eating of any of these por-
tons no definite information can be
had.
1T Geems quite difficult to COM
prehend why the cannibal who eats
his own kind should repect the
white man as an aricle OF food.
| Yet, If W. consider the senseless SUI
| perstition of the Mcanessian, which
in my opinion has driven him to
cannibalism, because through eating
the bodies of the slain he expects
TO come into full enjoyment of
all the powers of him who is eaten,
thus does it become comprehensi-
BILE that he will not eat the body OF
a white man whom he has killed
tecause of his belief that th2 spir-
| 1t OF the murdered man will exert
ar influence over him which he
does not at all regard as desh able.
THE late King Goroi of the Short
land Islands once told me in an
swer to my question the not partic-
rlarly fiattering reason spirit be-
long all white MAJ no good" In
general one receives the reply that
the white man as meat does not
taste good. This ! hold to be a
subterfuge under which the sly ma
tive8 hides his dread of the spirit
of the white slain"