THE DIVERSIONS OF A PRIME MINISTER.*
Mn. THOMSON had the difficult task of establishing an orderly rule after a coop d'etat. A certain Mr. Baker, whose fame penetrated to Europe a few years ago, had made himself Mayor of the Palace to King George Taboo, of Tonga and its group, better known as the Friendly Is]ands. It is needless to tell the story of his doings or misdoings. It will suffice to say that the High Commissioner intervened. Mr. Baker was banished under the penalty of imprisonment if he should return under two years, and Mr. Thomson, at the special request of the High Commissioner, took up his office. It was, as has been said, a difficult task, but it had its fascinations, and these, we are not surprised to find, proved irresistible. The situation was complicated by a religious schism. The ex-Premier had broken away from the Wesleyan connection, and had established a Free Church, a term which seems to have meant in Tonga, as it sometimes does elsewhere, a Church ruled by himself. He had banished a number of his opponents, and these exiles had now to be brought back. They came, not without some substantial compensation for their sufferings. They had gone away empty, and they brought back eighty tons of luggage in mats, native cloth, and " kava " bowls. Two-thirds of a ton apiece—for there were just one hundred and twenty of them —was a fair amount of consolation. Their restoration was a. matter of necessary justice, but it did not promote peace.
The first and most pressing care of the new Government was, of course, money. The island treasury contained about
* The Divevions of a Prime Ifi).fister. By Basil Thomson. London: Blackwcod and Sons. 02,000; the claims against it amounted to 26,000, and it owed more than 28,000 to its officials. Among these officials were some Europeans, and these were in great distress. Mr. Thom- son was afraid to give their claims precedence; but the King settled the matter for him. "We Tongans," he said "can live on a bit of yarn or lcumada, but these white men must eat money or die. Let them be paid." A further difficulty existed in an improvident arrangement made by Tnkuaho, the King's grandson and nominal Premier, to take the taxes due in copra in lieu of money. (Copra, it may be explained, is dried cocoanut pulp, and is the material from which the oil is extracted.) Taxpayers not happening to possess this article had actually to buy it, to their own loss and the loss of the Government. It need hardly be said that a European resident trader was at the bottom of this little bit of financing. As the Premier had actually signed the concession, nothing more could be done than to limit the time during which it was to be operative to four months.
It was necessary, of course, for the new Minister to pay his respects to his Sovereign. King George was a notable person. He had reigned for nearly half-a-century in Tonga, and was then ninety years of age,—a ruler of the primitive type, overtopping his subjects in stature, and, in his prime at least, the best spearman and boatman in his realm. He had both intelligence and honesty. No better proof of his value can be given than the fact that his death (about two years ago) was the beginning of troubles that seem likely to end in the ruin of his kingdom.
Mr. Thomson's first interview with the King was purely formal, and consisted of a solemn brewing and drinking of " kava " (a liquor made out of the root of the long pepper). The next morning was devoted to business. King George looked back with regret to the days of independence, and having been delivered from one white master, was not dis- posed to welcome another. The trouble came when Mr. Thomson was to be sworn of the Privy Council. "Who is
this foreigner," he said, 'who comes to our Council? I thought it was to be for ourselves." However, the old man gave way ; the foreigner, it was explained to him, was to be an expounder of things that Tongan people could not under- stand. This became, in fact, his native name—" Expounder of the dark ways of civilised man."
These preliminaries settled, the first Cabinet Council was held. Not the least important of the agenda of this day was a complaint against the Minister of Finance. He never came near his office, and his assistant had resigned in conse- quence. The Minister had to be sent for, and the matter was explained to him. He burst into a pathetic self-justification. He had no one to work for him, neither 13012 nor daughter, and as he must eat, he had to work for himself. This kept him away from his duties. "Order me," he said, "to do what you will, and I will do it, but only feed me." The Premier suggested that a convict should be told off to catch fish and dig yams for him. This happy thought reconciled him to the situation. Only he thought that he should want four convicts rather than one. The Minister of Police was disposed to give more trouble. He threatened to resign, and to take his force with him into private life, because the Magistrates, for whom Mr. Thomson seems to have acted as assessor, dismissed a case which the police had brought before them. "It was a new thing in Tonga for any man whom the police accused to be let off." This indeed is the police ideal everywhere, but it is seldom expressed so frankly. The administration of justice was indeed in a strange condition. A malefactor sentenced to penal servitude was not subjected to any durance. He had to do so many days' work for Government. He might take a holiday now and then, and now and then put in a few days for him- self. If he had a horse and cart, he could lend them to the authorities, and so work off some of his sentence. Tonga was astounded when Mr. Thomson resolved actually to lock his criminals up. For a time the stability of the Government was doubtful, so influential was the class threatened. Nor did the prison officials rise at once to a proper conception of their duties. One night the acting. Premier heard a sound of merriment in the women's ward of the prison. He and the Minister of Police stole up and looked in at the window. This was what he saw :—
" There were two kerosene-lamps on the floor, a female prisoner was pounding Kava, while the other prisoners of both sexes were squatting in a circle watching a game of euchre between the
warder and a housebreaker, each with a good-looking partner from the female ward."
Amidst these and similar cases, the time passes till the day appointed for the meeting of Parliament. The Tongan legis- lators are not paid, but they are fed. The Cabinet was charged not only with the preparation of a King's speech, but also with providing a plentiful provision of meat and drink for their supporters, and not lees, we may be sure, for the Opposition. They had even to see that there was a due supply of damsels to wait. So zealous was the acting-Premier, that he insisted on good looks as well as deftness in these attendants. He was overruled indeed. A particularly ill- favoured damsel seems to have had high connections, which made it impossible to slight her by rejection. On the great day all went fairly well. The King looked his part," the one dignified figure in all that motley assembly ; " the Heir- Apparent read the speech, and read it very badly ; the King, his duty done, hastily departed, and the band "dashed reek_ lessly into the triumphal march from Tannhauser, struggled awhile, and arrived breathless at the end within a bar or two of one another."
At the morning sitting of the next day, the Address was voted ; and after the Address came the first dinner,--a gorgeous repast, for the resources of the island were still ample. As the Session wore on, the menu was diminished,— not a bad hint, by the way, if legislators are to be paid. The longer the time, the less the wage. "The Lords were allowed a glass of sherry and a glass of beer, the Cabinet Ministers half a tumbler of rum in addition; the Commons had to content themselves with beer only." The ration of drink was moderate enough, but the food consumed was enormous, and the afternoon sitting was generally spent in sleep. It was the function of the Sergeant-at-Arms to keep legislators awake, and as he seems to have fasted, he did his office with plenty of zeal. After a while, the acting-Premier thought it well to reserve the morning for Committees and to devote the afternoon Sittings to Third Readings.
Now and then it occurs to one to ask, as we read of these things,—Is this an additional chapter to Gulliver's Travels? Of course it is a serious history, but it has somethieg of the effect of Swift's famous satire. And this is Mr. Thomson's intention. "I refuse to treat seriously," he says, in his terse and pointed preface, "the fatal experiment of ingrafting Western customs upon their [the Tongans'] ancient and admirable polity." Unhappily, there are doctrinaires whom nothing can teach, and who stick, in spite of the most direct object-lessons, to their ludicrous panacea of Representative Government. Tonga, with its thirty thousand people, is but a small matter; but one thinks of a country, nearly ten thousand times as populous, where to try the same folly would be to tempt a disaster of incalculable magnitude.
Mr. Thomson deserves all our thanks for an admirably written volume, which is as instructive as it is entertaining.
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