NOTE TO THE FIRST EDITION.
THE KEY TO THE PANAMA CANAL.
While these pages were passing through the press, I have received details from various sources, which prove that the policy referred to at p. 241 is being actively carried out.
Not content with holding the Marquesas, the Paumotus, Tahiti, and the Gambier Isles, France seems resolved to annex every desirable island lying to the east of Samoa, thus securing possession of every good harbour and coaling station lying between New Zealand and the coast of South America; and also, diverting all the trade of these isles, from Britain’s Australian colonies, to a French centre, which shall command the great commercial highway of the future, when the Panama Canal shall be completed. Raiatea in the Society Isles has recently been formally annexed, and the independence of Huahine and Bora-Bora threatened.
Now a further step is contemplated. The Austral and Hervey groups still remain free. They are self-governed, and Christianity is firmly established among their people.
According to the latest information, a French man-of-war visited their principal isles last August, to command the inhabitants to divert their present trade from New Zealand to Tahiti, assuring them that Great Britain had undertaken not to interfere with French action anywhere to the east of Samoa. The islanders, who had at first received the French vessel with all honour, no sooner got an inkling of the true object of its visit than they became alarmed, and returned all presents which had been made to them by the captain; who thereupon assured them that the French admiral was on his way thither, and would soon bring them to their bearings, and that they would have to accept a French protectorate.
Remembering the history of French protection in Tahiti, the Australs and Hervey Islanders are now justly alarmed for their own independence.