The South Sea Bubble of Charles Du Breil by Louis Becke

Less than a year ago news was received of the arrival in Noumea, in New / Caledonia, of the remainder of a party of unwashed visionaries, calling / themselves the 'United Brotherhood of the South Sea Islands. ' A year / before they had sailed away from San Francisco in a wretched old crate / of a schooner, named the _Percy Edward_ (an ex-Tahitian mail packet), to / seek for an island or islands whereon they were to found a Socialistic / Utopia, where they were to pluck the wild goat by the beard, pay no / rent to the native owners of the soil, and, letting their hair grow down / their backs, lead an idyllic life and loaf around generally. Such a mad / scheme could have been conceived nowhere else but in San Francisco or / Paris.

In the latter city such another venture, but founded on more heroic / lines of infatuation, was organised eighteen years ago by the late / Charles du Breil, Marquis de Rays, and the results ought to have made / the American enthusiasts reflect a little before they started. But / having got the idea that they might sail on through summer seas till / they came to some land fair to look upon, and then annex it right away / in the sacred name of Socialism (and thus violate one of the / principal articles of their faith), they started -- only to be quickly / disillusionised. For there were no islands anywhere in the two Pacifics / to be had for the taking thereof; neither were there any tracts of land / to be had from the natives, except for hard cash or its equivalent. / The untutored Kanakas also, with whom they came in contact, refused to / become brother Socialists and go shares with the long-haired wanderers / in their land or anything else. So from island to island the _Percy / Edward_ cruised, looking more disreputable every day, until, as the / months went by, she began to resemble, in her tattered gear and dejected / appearance, her fatuous passengers. At last, after being chivvied about / considerably by the white and native inhabitants of the various islands / touched at, the forlorn expedition reached Fiji. Here fifty of the / idealists elected to remain and work for their living under a government / which represented the base and brutal institution of Monarchy. But the / remaining fifty-eight stuck to the _Percy Edward_ and her decayed salt / junk, and stinking water, and their beautiful ideals; till at last the / ship was caught in a hurricane, badly battered about, lost her foremast, / and only escaped foundering by resting her keel on the bottom of / Noumea Harbour. Then the visionaries began to collect their senses, / and denounced the _Percy Edward_ and the principles of the 'United / Brotherhood' as hollow frauds, and elected to go ashore and get a good / square meal.