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

46 WITH NATIVES IN THE WESTERN PACIFIC

Where there is more competition, they have to be
satisfied with 30 per cent. Each piece is carefully
examined by the natives: the pipes, to see if they
draw, the matches, whether they strike, etc., while
the crowd behind follows every movement with the
greatest attention and mysterious whispers, con-
stantly on the watch for any menace to safety. The
lengthy bargaining over, the delegation turns away
and the whole crowd disappears. In the nearest
thicket they sit down and distribute the goods—
perhaps a dozen boxes of matches, a few belts, or
some yards of calico, two pounds of tobacco, and
twenty pipes, a poor return, indeed, for their long
journey. Possibly they will spend the night in the
neighbourhood, under an overhanging rock, on the
bare stone, all crowded round a fire for fear of
the spirits of the night. 7

Sometimes, having worked for another planter,
they have a little money. Although every planter
keeps his own store, the natives, as a rule, prefer to
buy from his neighbour, from vague if not quite
unjustified suspicion. They rarely engage for any
length of time, except when driven by the desire to
buy some valuable object, generally a rifle, without
which no native likes to be seen in Santo to-day. In
that case. several men work together for one, who
afterwards indemnifies them for their help in native
fashion by giving them pigs or rendering them other
services. On the plantations they are suspicious and
lazy, but quite harmless as long as they are not
provoked. Mr. Ch. had had about thirty men