The Native Culture in the Marquesas (Classic Reprint)

Book excerpt: Excerpt from The Native Culture in the Marquesas The inhabitants of the Marquesas Islands number today about eighteen hundred, including a handful of whites, and many mixed bloods - for the most part white and Chinese mixtures with the native. Although, accord ing to the reports of early visitors, the natives of these islands were the finest physical specimens in the Pacific in the early days, very few of them today may be classified even as examples of good physique. Exceed ingly few are physically sound or free from serious disease of some kind. The whites have brought, and still bring, syphilis, gonorrhea, a type of rapid consumption called by the natives pakoko, influenza, and many other minor ailments. Smallpox at one time ravaged two of the northern islands and the Chinese brought leprosy. Degeneration of the native physique is due to these diseases against which the natives have been in no way pro tected; to liquors, drugs, and tobacco; and to an inactive, listless life with decay of native standards resulting in the breaking down of their whole system of life and thought and the elimination of all their natural avenues for expression - a conditions that has been brought about largely by the organized and unorganized forces of white influence. The near disappearance of this people has been and is due to lack of comprehension on the part of whites of all the nations in contact with them; to abuse that the alutruism of a few conscientious missionaries has been totally unable to counterbalance, and to the trait in the native character which leads to uncontrolled abandonment to sensory indulgence. (see pi. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.