When the trading steamers come it is quite an event in the monotonous life of many of the small traders. Mails and provisions are sought with an {187} eagerness that is delightful, for when a man has talked nothing but native languages, and seen nothing but black men for weeks, these visits are naturally the important event, and a newspaper or two, if such luxuries can be found, no matter how old, are seized on by traders as if they were gold.

Copra is practically the only industry that flourishes without artificial aid. Even that is now being helped along, as the natives see there is money in it, and some of the thrifty chiefs are making their men plant the trees and look after them.

Traders and settlers now have plantations of coffee, bananas, and a few other profitable products, as I have already mentioned, and this industry is beginning to be successful. Taros and yams are cultivated by the natives, and require a good deal of attention, and so nearly all the work is left to the women. Yams vary from about the size of a small marrow to a much larger affair. The “Chief’s Yam” is pale pink in colour, and the ordinary ones are like a white mealy potato. In taste they resemble a cross between an artichoke and a potato. Nearly all the villages possess a yam-house, which is a sort of platform made of bamboo with a thatched roof over it; the yams are hung from the top or lie on the platform to dry. {188}

There is a kind of arrowroot which grows wild in the bush, besides a few other native vegetables, but the latter are not of much account unless they are cultivated.

The knowledge of agriculture learned by some of the natives who have returned from Queensland comes in useful. Sometimes evidences of it are to be seen here and there, but it is a lamentable fact that they do not make better use of their opportunities.

Whilst in Queensland they work well, especially the women, and nowadays there is no difficulty experienced in getting labour from these islands. When the labour boat calls, the recruiting agent is soon able to fill his vacancies, and the men he brings back laden with goods make an excellent bait for others.

When engaging the natives a small quantity of money in advance is, I believe, paid to them as an inducement to go, and then they sign on for two, three, or more years to work at the Queensland Sugar Refining Company’s places at Bundaberg, Mackay, and elsewhere on the Queensland coast.

When there, they live chiefly in compounds, and seem to enjoy the change of life. Their chief duties are to cut the sugar-cane, stack it, and put {189} it on the trolleys, which carry it to the refinery works.