The San Mateo item. (San Mateo City, Putnam County, Fla) 189?-19??, 1910-04-02
A DYING RACE IN I
A FRUITFUL (
COUNTRY. (
ByF. W. ChristlaO, B. a.
9 iI29 3 ~

luxuriant country that soon Will be
without inhabitants. II Is appalling
but cannot be denied.
These people who are vanishing
from the face OF the earth, are in
habitants OF the Marquesan Islands.
Fifty years ago the native popula-
ton when France annexed these is
lands was 10000 Now, counting
half-castes, and these no great num-
Der, there are left some 1000 sur
vivors, many of them feeble, apathe-
ito and slckly. The birth rate is very
tiny; the death rate is appalling
Every year the poor, miserable rem
nants are sinking lower and lower into
apathy and despair.
Drink and opium have so muddled
and enfeebled their will power that
they have scarcely strength and en-
ergy sufficient for the simplest and
most indispensable labors requisite
TO support bare life, much less for
the sustained labors of graphing
with nature boldly, and forcing the
jungle under cultivation. Kindly,
well-meaning officials say, LET the
poor people die in peace" Whole
tracts OF land, once the site of well
cultivater plantations, now be idle.
And sadder still than this:
All over sun-scorched, drought.
smitten Nuku-Hiva in the north,
whore the palm trees are perishing
with blight and the valleys are filled
by day with swarms OF singing sand.
fly and by night with millions OF mos.
quitoes; all over fertile Hiva-Oa in the
south, with its kindlier climate,
where the moribund Marquesan race
clings on to life most firmly, up hill
and down dale you may ride, and
see the grim, massive Paepaes, or
solid platforms, built of huge basalt |
blocks, marking the sites OF former |
thriving townships, sad monuments |
OF a vanished population.
The people are dead, thatch and
roof and roof-tree have fallen in, the
bones OF the dead city alone are left,
with here and there a weather-worn
and battered Tiki or rudely carved
stone image, marking, like a grim
the march of Time the
Destroyer. 1t was prophetic IN
stinct that inspired the mournful pihe
or chant Of Arira, the Tahitian sage
and poet:
THE fallen fau-leaves strew the
sand,
The sea shall swallow coral strand,
Our folk shall vanish from the
land"
French Polynesia, OF which the /
Marquesan Islands are a part. is d.
Vided, like Caesars Gaul, into three
the Paumotus and the
All OF these islands are
)n the decline.
In Paumotu, or Low Archipelago,
for many years there was a
'ast output OF pearl shell into the
Western markets, the white mans
civilization has not had much oppor
unity TO do much mischief, for the
.ow Archipelago islanders are too .
ough and sturdy, too sober and nat
rally hard working, TO be gravely /.
ffected by the undesirable influences
I the seaport town of Papeete. some
wo hundred and fifty miles away '.
Int recent attacks of blight and
eavy typhoons have done great mis-.
hief 10 the cocoanut palm trees, /,
'hlch grow in millions on these
tolls, Hence a shortage IN the copra
sturns Also very recently an enor
Ious tidal wave swept the Low Arch
'elago. destroying about thousans 8
YES, and doing incalculable damage J
property So the pearling industry 8
nguishes also.
Ia Tahiti things are worse still s