EAST INDIANS IN FIJI [To TUE EntrOa or ma "
Sescritos."]
Spa—Australian mails which were sunk last month mutained the issue of the Spectator for May 26th. Thus the only intimation I have received of your review of my book, The New Pacific, appears in Sir grerard ins 'churn's letter in the issue of June nth. A. an impression exists in the minds of some readers of the Spectator here, who have not yet read my book, tint intermarriage between Indians and Fijians is accepted by me as common, I should like to say that no statement to that effect is made. My knowledge of the facts prompts me to endorse Sir Everard ins Themes stutements; and the mention of the Rev. Cyril Basin's name as an authority may be supplemented by another. The Rev. J. W. Burton, who was Mr. Bavia's predecessor in the mission to the Indians in Fiji, assured me some time before The New Pacific was written or projected that the Fijians and the Indians do not intermarry, each looking askance at the other. The mischief of the indenture system lies in the lack of Indian women. Men vastly outnumber women; yet the Indians have large families in Fiji, and are increasing fast in spite of the handicap. The Fijinus, who do not increase to any appreciable extent, will be lost in the rising flood in a not far distant future.—I am. Sir, &c.,
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