This paragi'aph is from a Lopdon journal :
"Toleatnwhat France is doing to spread the blessings of civiliza-
tion in her distant dependencies we may turn with advantage to New
Caledonia. With a view to attracting icee settlers to that penal colony,
M. Feillet, the Governor, forcibly enptoprialed the Kanaka cultivators
from the best of their plantations, with a derisory compensation, in spite
of tbe protests of the Council General of the island. Such immigrants
as could be induced to cross the seas tlius found themselves in possesion
of thousands of coflee, cocoa, banana, and bread-fruit trees, the raising
of which had cost the wretched natives years of toil, whilst the latter had
a few five-franc pieces to spend in the liquor stores of Noumea."

You observe the combination? It is robbery,
humiliation, and slow, slow murder, through poverty



216 Following the Equator

and the white man's whisky. The savage's gentle
friend, the savage's noble friend, the only magnani-
mous and unselfish friend the savage has ever had,
was not there with the merciful swift release of his
poisoned pudding.
There are many humorous things in the world;
among them the white man's notion that he is less
savage than the other savages.*

* See Chapter on Tasmania, post*



CHAPTER XXII.
Nothing is so ignorant as a man's left hand, exc^t a lady's watch.
