aroundworldortra00peebiala-1

FROM NEW ZEALAND TO CHINA. 119
Englishmen, because of its cotton-planting advantages.
The climate is tropical. Naviti Levu is the most populous
of the isles ; and Thakombau, a native six feet high, and
kingly in bearifig, is the most influential of the chiefs.
Levuka, though having few natural advantages, is the
principal
commercial mart. Cotton, sugar, and coffee planters
do well. Cocoanuts are abundant, and some wool is exported.
The ramie plant, or China-grass, samples of which
I remember to have seen in New Orleans, grows finely in
these islands. Cannibalism was practiced here till 1854.
What Americans there are here, were originally from the
Southern States. White men are in possession of three hundred
and fifty thousand acres of these cotton and coffee
growing lands.
In a recent copy of " The Fiji Times," I find a labored
article under this heading "
: Spiritualism in Fiji.''^ The
writer, after speaking of the natives as " low and depraved
in the moral scale," assures us that, "low and brutal" as
they are, they " believe in a future state of existence, in
apparitions, and the efficacy of charms ;
" their " prophets
profess to talk with the dead ; and they cure by striking the
diseased part with the hand."
This writer, treating of Spiritualism
among the European residents, says, " There is a
deep interest, among the more thoughtful of our citizens,
upon this important subject. . . . Those who believe, affirm
that the phenomena throw new light upon the Scriptures,
as well as demonstrate immortality." There is a " want
among us," he further says, " of a good test medium."
The Fijis must soon fall into the hands of the English.
LONGINGS FOE THE LAND.
And still a prisoner on this ocean cHpper, — a vault, a
charnel-house ; oh, how monotonous ! Nearly two months
now at sea, utterly oblivious to all the doings and rushing
activities of land-life ; and yet a long distance from Hong
Kong ! Each returning day brings fair skies or dripping