[Note: this transcription was produced by an automatic OCR engine]

INTR OD UCTION 5

of many losses. To-day the Presbyterian mission
occupies all the New Hebrides, with the exception of
Pentecote, Aoba and Maevo. To the north lies the
field of the Anglican mission, extending up to the
Solomon Islands.

In 1848 Roman Catholic missionaries settled in
Aneityum, but soon gave up the station ; in 1887 they
returned and spread all over the archipelago, with the
exception of the southern islands and the Banks group.

Of - late years several representatives of free
Protestant sects have come out, but, as a rule, these
settle only where they can combine a profitable trade
with their mission work.

Owing to energetic agitation on the part of the
*Anglican and Presbyterian Churches, especially of
Bishop Patteson and the Rev. G. Paton, men-of—war
were ordered to the islands on police duty, so as to
watch the labour-trade. They could not suppress kid—
napping entirely, and the transportation of the natives
to Queensland continued until within the last ten
years, when it was suppressed by the. Australian
Government, so that to-day the natives are at least
not taken away from their own islands, except those
recruited by the French for New Caledonia.

Unhappily, England and France could not agree
as to who should annex the New Hebrides. Violent
agitation in both camps resulted in neither power
being willing to leave the islands to the other, as
numerical superiority on the French side was counter-
balanced by the absolute economical dependence of
the colonists upon Australia. England put the