Life of John Coleridge Patteson : Missionary Bishop of the Melanesian IslandsYonge, Charlotte M. (Charlotte Mary)
Religion
Life of John Coleridge Patteson : Missionary Bishop of the Melanesian Islands
Yonge, Charlotte M. (Charlotte Mary)
Missions -- Melanesia; Patteson, John Coleridge, 1827-1871
They met near Tanna, but not before the Bishop had been in Dillon's
Bay, on the island of Erromango, the scene of Williams's murder, and had
allowed some of the natives to come on board his vessel as a first step
towards friendly intercourse. The plan agreed on by the Bishop and the
Captain was to go as far north as Vate, and return by way of the Loyalty
Isles, which fringe the east coast of New Caledonia, to touch at that
large island, and then visit the Island of Pines, at its extreme south
point, and there enquire into a massacre said to have taken place. This
was effected, and in each place the natives showed themselves friendly.
From New Caledonia the Bishop brought away a pupil named Dallup, and
at two of the Loyalty Islands, Nengone or Mare, and Lifu, where Samoan
teachers had excited a great desire for farther instruction, boys
eagerly begged to go with him, and two were taken from each, in especial
Siapo, a young Nengone chief eighteen or nineteen years old, of very
pleasing aspect, and with those dignified princely manners which rank is
almost sure to give. The first thing done with such lads when they came
on board was to make clothes for them, and when they saw the needle
employed in their service, they were almost sure to beg to be taught the
art, and most of them soon became wonderfully dexterous in it.
On the Island of Pines, so called from the tower-like masses of the
Norfolk pine on the shores, was at that time the French Bishop of New
Caledonia, the Oul, as the natives called him and his countrymen, for
whom they had little love. After an interview between the two bishops,
the 'Undine' returned to New Zealand, where the native boys were
brought to St. John's College. The system of education there combined
agricultural labour and printing with study, and the authorities and the
boys shared according to their strength in both, for there was nothing
more prominent in the Bishop's plan than that the coloured man was not
to be treated as a mere hewer of wood and drawer of water, but, as a
Maori once expressed the idea: 'Gentleman--gentleman thought nothing
that ought to be done at all too mean for him; pig-gentleman never
worked.' The whole community, including the ladies and their guests,
dined together in hall.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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