Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAboutZurich Herald, 1927-12-15, Page 3'Where ea.cl.litinting is a. Sport stitions that Prompt the Natives to Acts o .. h Power Behind the Revolt in the Solomon Isla Super Barbarous . Cruelty—What Fate Awaits the British inhabitants?—A Chief C0.16 w!7on of 100 Heads " By a Retired Missionary i;.write fast warships are speed- liead^Huntine Methods. !ng Serosa the blue waters of the In the dense, rain-dreephed jungle Southern Pacitic towards that myster- they lie in wait Presently, probably Mus group of islands that lies three bundred• miles east of New Guinea.. Will they arrive in time to avert ghastly holocaust of white women and .ehildre�n—or will the fierce, fanatical, and cruel head hunters of the Solo - mons wreak their vengeance before help arrives? That, I think, is the question every anon who has set foot in those strange Pacific islands is asking htmeelf at 'this moment. The world knows very little of the Solomon Islands; less of those ,strange sub -men, half man, half devil, sof mixed Papuan. and• Melanesian blood, who rove in that tropical vege- tation. • Since 1899, when the Union Jack 'Oast flew against the lark green folie :ago of humid Malaita, we have striven to inculcate some notions of humanity into the heads of these terrible fiends in human shape. Have we succeeded? 'The tale of ill-starred Cadet Lillie•, of :District Commissioner Bell and of the -fifteen loyal native police answers the question. These unfortunate., white people, .and the ill-fated crew of the Auks have been massacred. Even worse, for those of us` -who know of what 'these islanders aro capable, is the •contemplation of the possible fate of 'the women and children now in Sight, head-hunters capture them bother with 1t. The islands are very fertile, tbougti so damp. as to be most unhealthy for Europeans. Yams, and coco-nut and tropia vegetables enmity the needs of these savages. They have never learnt to raise corn. Warriors Alll Fol' them the aim and end of life is to take life. They take life, so far as one can see, for the sake of tatting it, It has been said of thein that they hunt other trilaes--there are hundreds of tribes and all at enmity—from a zest and abundance - of the warlike r spirit. from the next village, connee a grout? But I formed another opinion myself of tr-head- They fall upon them, cut after a Year among thein. When the heir -heads, hands and feet off, and Solomon. Islander goes forth to do run back well pleaseii with their battle he is thinking first and last of ghastly spoil. in order his kitchen. He wishes to. slay his The heads have been taken to weaken the spirit forces of the enemy: the hands and feet so that not even the spirits can -run or oast Si spear in ghostly battles When the head-hunters arrive home their return is celebrated with en- thusiasm—the more heads the great- er the jubilation. It is usual to expose the trophies upon poles at first while a mad, fantastic dance is executed around them, a dance in which. women and children join with equal zest. After this orgy, the hunters take their spoil off. The heads' areeleft to Samoa that they are the Greeks of, the decay for a time, and in that tropic, Pacific I have lived among them, enemy in order to eat h m. • The islands to -day are a`Brltish Pro- tectorate. with a white population of around five hundred.There are 150,- 000 savages, some of whom have been cajoled into growing bananas and nuts in a half-hearted manner. But throughout the eleven thousand :miles, of the islands ,the proportion of ground cultivated is negligible, Noth- ing, no power on earth, can teach this savage the art of agriculture and hus- bandry. It is said of the gentle people " of autdOQn1 shelter for this. :purpose Fromdescribed in .a Dominion Department of Agriculture pamphlet on The win- { i t Beef Cattle in Ontario, en ter Feed ng o ee It consists of a single -boarded abed Treat Your Friends toHome.' facing south, a large door in the trout humid climate decay comes with tragic swiftness. Then starts a process the full sec- rets of which we do not yet know. But the main facts we clo know, and They are these- With the Solomon Is - made Candy being open at all times. Across the , yard is a covered feeding, trough over Old Mother Hubbard. which is placed the hay rack. 'Doors Went to her cupboard open to the outside from both the feed 'Twos Christmas Eve, ao I'm hold, tro;agh and hay rack so that th feed . Fox gieta. she hail candy, m1' Beare, can be forked in direct from a sleigh :As much as the cupboard would holde or cart in a 'few' minutes. Steers' may Whynot tallowMotheri;ubbard's be, fed a shed throughouttiles, example this Christmas; and 18t Gandy most severe winter with xcellen r sults. Silage for Winter Lambs. At the 1 apuskasit►g, Ontario, Ex git,s does not know the real spirit of perimental Statim, an investigation, Christmas time. ' Besides, what is more acceptable than a box of home- made candles? Then, too, Such a gift Wee ve the probleru of what to give to that !serval who seems to have everything. , Success in candy making depends upon the use of good ingredients, care- ful testing and ---in the case of cream candies, fudge, for example -plenty, of elbow grease, For one who makes help out cal that to ng Christmas list? The feminine giver who has not had the fun of making candies for her has been conducted during the las four wiutors to determine the relative value of sunflower and oats, peas and vetch silage as a part of the ration for •winter lambs. The results indicate an •advantage for the suniiower silage, Theaverage daily gain per lamb, over the four years, was 0.24 lb., for those Zed sunflower silage, against 0.17 lbs. for those fed oats, peas and vetch. and I would say that they.. deserve that tribute. What can one say of the Solomon Islander, unless one describes him the hell -hound of the southern seas?s get into those• dark heads liYl,il '-"- to reduce the size of the captured he. first glimmerings of Christianity! It is utterly impossible. Dreamers, head. far from the ground, may say that To achieve this singular end, . he faith and works make all things poi takes infinite pains, working labor,:Bible. o'usly with primitive .tools to remove perhaps, but ,speaking as one who from the skull every particle of bone. has seen the head-hunters of the"Solo At the end pieceof a week bone has re- mon Isles I can only say this, that at - skull the moved every of from the ter all these years, the net result of and carry them off for their frightful skull without injuring the flesh In any the all these contact with white men zites in the dense jungle. way. Then follows the astonishing I is the present dastardly white n To the reader, to whom the South- process of smoking the head and men women and little children. treating it, so that it shrivels slowly Even but surely. I have seen a Solomon Island vil- lage—a mere clearing in the jungle ringed about with huts made of tree branches—human heads: no bigger than an apple. Th, hunter who possesses the most heads. is the finest fellow in the tribe. Old hunters, I have been told, have accumulated as many as a hundred heads during a lifetime of murderous forays. The First White Victims. The first white men to land upon these islands were a party of hardy sailors led by the great Spanish ex- plorer Mendana. 01 the landing party only two escaped -back to their ship: they were> attacked by the savages who fell upon them, and carried them off into the impenetrable jungle. The reputation of the islands spread through the Pacific, and roving sea- men gave them a wide berth. But in 178? Carteret, a French sailor, landed with a powerfully -armed force. He drove off the first screaming hordes, and pushed his way inland. It is recorded in the diaries of that sturdy sailor that after a day's toiling through the jungle, his men rested at night on the fringe of a dense plan- tation. They were, although they did not =know it, on the site of a deserted island village, Suddenly a sailor poking among the undergrowth uttered a cry of dismay. His comrades rushed up and there at their feet, they saw looking up at them with sightless eyes, the ghastly faces of five white men. That was pjrobably the first know- ledge of the foul secrets of the head=. hunters the white man ever got. For years learned' men debated the prob- lem of how these heads—they were, carried back to Europe—had been re- duced to the size of the heads of dolls. No explanation seemed to meet the facts.;,. The Solomon Islanders have never teemed eventhe rudiments of agricul- ture, and they have had little need to landeriit1is an art—and his art only- t -ern Pacific is a piece of dream, sun drenched and inhabited by romantic Emil worshippers,. the cause of this sudden uprising is probably a com- plete mystery. Yet, armecawith some knowledge of the dark ways of the primitive minds ,of these -savages, the explanation is .quite simple. Unfriendly to the "White. Devils." The Solomon Islander has many un- pleasant traits, but the first one to strike the stranger is his .ingrained -distrust of the white man. There is no way of winning him as there is with more simple and 'friendly sav- ages. He holds the white man to be an imported devil, and as such he op- poses him at every gpportunity. When Malaita and the other larger 'islands of this group, which comprises •some Six hundred miles of small. tree - •covered isles, were,first brought into .contact with white men, the islanders gave battle. They rushed down from, their primeval jungles, uttering their barbaric cries, to give battle. The white men had guns and fired. But these strange death -dealers mere- ly convinced the savages of the devilish . nature of their enemies. Many whites were killed outright, a some, less fortunate, were carried. off 'wounded, into the dense jungle, there to undergo the tortures of which I shall give details id a moment, What has caused the rising of to- -day, with its frightful massacre and ;promise of worse? Simply this: The :spirits• of: these islanders who fell be- fore the grape shot of the first white men to land have, according to the "wise meir" of the tribes, been• abroad in the jungle. conjuring the islanders to avenge their deaths. The present outbreak, then, Is noth- ing more than a war of revenge for the deaths .of •ancestors long ' since dead. When I spent a summer on Malaita, .and covered. on one long tour the spar par- allel lines of islands that extend to- wards the open ocean from New Guinea, only one certain fact c6uld I .ascertain about the religious — it would be truer to say superstious= beliefs of these terrible savages. The Wood Sacrifice. The Solomon Islander believes in the perpetual presence- of his ances- tors, he holds that alley hover unseen but felt, in the density of the rain- Bodden 'undergrowth, he believes they. make demands, call for blood sacra- lces. When the spirits of these ancestors demand the heads of enemies, then the men of the SoTomons obey. Lust for blood, fear of the revenge of the dead spirits, frenzy that is very much like madness, convert them into fiends in human Nape. 1 have referred to the habit of head-hunting, and the subject merits a few words. With all savages, even with a people so benighted as the Solomon Islanders, one lands always a dim idea behind the ferocious act. When the . Solomon Islander set. e out to capture the heads of his ene- mies he has several clear ideas in his mint. First, he believes that the spirit of the enemy resides in the head and that if he possesses that head he can keep the spirit within i'orever captive. ' Then, on -certain of the isles of this large group, the idea is common taht the heads of the enemies mai be of- bred f fared as a sacrifice to the Bethel% that the rata may not fall too abundantly * ethey Sri S very wet islands—and that. the primitive crops rita'y prosper. When lfe Solomon Isilander goes heathlu ing---•al 1. hereI must • make it clear that for hundredn of yearn these islanders leave been drenched to the •bleed of many enemy tribes who wage eternal warfare ttpon each: other ..-.b5,,-, ace' he tares cod threes; en a retired missionary is a man - There is one argument for these fel- lows: and it is n'ow on the way to them, travelling at twenty knots an hour and carrying the guns that speak the language of death—a tongue these wretched' savages understand.. "atat :eft lea riteesa: h s fM is The feed cost .per 100 pounds was $10.3 for the former and $15,03 for the am greatis a valuable asset, deal of candy, a candy thereto latter. Below are a few recipes which will Wintering Turkeys. r Turkeys intended for breeders make a nice assortment for Christmas boxes: should be selected in the fall before Caramel Nut Fudge fattening for market takes place. Only milk, 4 Well -matured birds possessing good 2 cups white sugar, 3 1/2 cuptablespoons constituttianal vigor shoutd be chosen.tablespoons butter, �z teaspoon vanilla, pinch salt, 3 eup broken pecan meats. Cook sugar, milk, and caramel to- gether until a soft ball is formed in cold water. Add butter and remove from fire. Let stand until almost cold. Add vanilla and beat until cool and thick. Add nuts when mixture begins to thicken while beating. melting The caramel is made by one cup sugar in a skillet over fire, stirring constantly. Remove from flame when the sugar is melted and a caramel color and add one eup of boil- ing water and let simmer a few min- utes. Store in a fruit jar. This is should receive only limited rations nice for flavoring custards, and icings duringhthe winter mrnths. Hard grain as well as candy, and will keep inde- should be given preference to mash ,finitely. or ground grains. Equal parts of oats, i gutter Scotch wheat and buckwheat are suitable, 1 cup brown sugar, ' cup yellow but the buckwheat should be discon- i corn&yip 1 tablespoon vinegar, iia tinned in the spring. In the winter 1 cup water, 1/4 cup butter, one feeding a day is sufficient, the 1 water, ingredients buts together tax grain being scattered in the litter. Ce tin vanilla} until brittle when. Grit and oyster shell should be pro- i testedincold water. Remove from vided. Early in March an extra daily feed of grain should be begun, and ; fire. add vanilla and if you have a starting about ten days later a wet, metal tmixtuoe blestop or rylarge r e c okle-sheeonfuls s, mash made up of equal parts of bran, ° drop 11 shorts, ground oats, and cornmeal ! these. The candy does not stick and properly mixed and moistened with i siee and easier to handle than when n a more t poured in a sheet and cut in squares. Divinity 2 cups white sugar, lie cup white corn syrup, 1'a cap boiling water, 2 egg whites,• 1/z cup broken nut meats, � cup candied cherries, candied pine- apple, figs, dates, chopped fine. Bail the sugar, syrup, and water until a hard ball terms in cold water.e Beat egg whites stiff and dry; pour syrup over them gradually. Beat constantly and when mixture begins to stiffen add candided fruit and nuts. Spread in a sheet one inch thick on a greased platter. When candy is ready for packing, Cut wax paper to fit boxes, cut candy New York designs are featuring the fur piushes, specially for the school girl. Here is a one -button, popular straight line model in the new ma- terial' of muskrat pattern. Every precaution should be taken secure birds that are free from dis- ease, and males unrelated to the fe- males. Proper housing and feeding during the winter is important. Ac- cording to a Dominion Department of Agriculture bulletin on turkeys, the birds should not be confined to houses during the winter but should be allow- ed to roam at will during the day. The only shelter necessary at night is a straw barn or closed -in shed. Tur- keys should never be housed with hens or in heated houses, but protec- tion from draughts, rain and snow is ssary. The- +breeding turkeys quicker sales for higher prices when the animate are dehorned. Potato Diseases. Diseases of the potato are respons- ible for very heavy losses each year. Fortunately these diseases are better understood --'`'than they were a few years ago, making it possible to re- duce loss by low yields and rotting to a comparatively low point. Some of the diseases are recognizable in the growing crop; others are identified in the tubers. By a system ot inspection, both in the field and of the harvested crop, most of the diseases that cause serious loss can be identified, making it fairly easy to avoid using diseased seed. This work of inspection car- ried on by the Botanical Division of the Experimental Farms, extends throughout the Dominion and is lead- ing to a more general use of seed cer- tified to be practically disease-free. Pamphlet No. 84 of the Department of Agriculture at Ottawa, gives the rules and regulations governing the production of Canadian certified seed potatoes. The standard, which was necessarily comparatively low .in the early days, has been raised year by year, and for the present year permits of only three per cent. disease on second field inspection and no mixed varieties at tuber inspection. This pamphlet, which is available at the Publications Branch, Department of Agriculture, Ottawa, explains certifi- cation an dthe steps necessary to ob- tain it. It also gives useful informa- tion on growing certified seed, storing the crop, and much other information useful to the growers of potatoes. Wintering Steers In Open Sheds. Expensive buildings are not neces- sary for the winter feeding of cattle and ofte nadd to the overhead expense and labor. Where indoor accommo- dation is not readily available, steers can be fed outdoors equally if not The Value of Dehorning. Experience has proved the great ad- vantage, from every standpoint, of de - horning commercial cattle. Horns are always a handicap to such cattle. They add to the cost of production and discount the selling value of the animals. Of course the ideal method to follow is to prevent the growth of horns in, the calf. When steers' are purciiaased for feeding it is better to get -ones already dehorned, otherwise they should be dehorned as soon as possible. In a pamphlet entitled De - horn Your Commercial Cattle, which may ' be obtained from the Pubhca- tions Branch, Department of Agricul- ture, Ottawa, the process of deborning is fully described. The operation, in the case of •grown cattle, is to a cer- tain extent painful, but its advantages are so great that it should not be dis- pensed with: Where the cattle are fed loose, feeding them in mixed lots of horned and hornless animals should alwaysbe avoided, otherwise they will finish very unevenly. The horn- less cattle, after painful experience, become timid and refuse to come up to the feeding racks or mangers until th bulk of the feed is gone. They be- come undernourished, while the horn- ed ones, eating too much, develop di- gestive troubles. Besides this, live stock shippers find that dehorned stock are more easily loaded on the cars, show less shrinkage and dam- age in transit, and are more economi- cal of space. Cattle salesmen make sour skim -milk should be given at noon.—Issued by the Director of Pub- licity, Dominion Department of Agri- culture, Ottawa. in uniform pieces, gauging the size lief the pieces by the width of the box. Ir two layers are packed, have wax paper and card -board between layers. i AMrF� "Could i kisa you good night?" Wrap the boxes neatly and tie with Christmas colors and a gay little card and you have a very attractive and. "Gosh! 1 begin to doubt 1t.1° acceptable gift. Candy may be made two weeks or mere ahead to relieve congestion at Griggs—"Do you ever guee that de -f christmas time. Fortunately, even pressed roactg, that vague sense of the chocolate and caramel fudges some approaching trouble?" Briggs—can be made as much as two weeks "Sure. I feel that way every summer before needed without diminishing before my wife comes back from the their good qualities. beach." I--------�:^----' It is seldom that passing a new law. CANADIAN DAIRYMEN is the best way of mending a broken I OPPOSED TO DUMPING one. PREMIER CALI_SOi PRESIDENT Left to Right: M r.. Ienry 'Chilton ot'the Br.itislt, lalmbasse; Icon. Vincent Massey, Canadian minister; Castle ot thda TAI.t ti Stitteo iatata departmep,t. Government Shows But Little Sympathy With Com- plaints Ottawa, Ont,--C+aneellation of the trade treaty between Canada and Aus tralia was urged recently by the Na. tional Dairy Council and the Canadian Council of Agriculture, before mem- bers of the federal cabinet. The Dairy Council thought that the dump- ing clause should be applied. to Aus- tralian butter, that New Zealand should be excluded from the treaty and that the treaty itself should be concluded within the required six 1 months' notice. ' J. A. Robb, bMinister of Finance, de., fended the treaty, saying ,that the dairy industry as a whole was not suf• j feriug, and that cream and milk pro.. . jjjj chores were finding good markets and 1 prices. He said that the delegates seemed to overlook the fact that other industries were benefiting by it, tha balance of trade between the tetra countries being in Canada's favor by some $12,000,000. W. L. Mackenzie King suggested that the matter might better be brought before Parliament for debate;, — +— Isaac, an Aberdeen Jew, had a great experience the other day, which made me believe that honesty is the beet policy, "While travelling in von of the tram -ears, the conductor forgot to ask tie for my taro, bob vas veli penny. I could have lett without sap ins, but did not succumib to the ten* tattoo; en *- tattoo; so I gave bin a tbreepelang bit, and get fivepehee chemic. Thui. the doing of right thing's bratigs it►• own Deward," _ Rt Hon W. L, Meatenzie King, and Mr. William r. 0 ''I iN' !J tl b b e.")1•3';'';0.';'11 fi ,1