Paul Gauguin by John Gould Fletcher — Read

The Marquesas Islands are small and, in contrast to the coral and basaltic formation of Tahiti, of volcanic origin. They lie about a thousand miles nearer to the equator and this makes their climate more humid and less supportable to white men. Owing to this fact, and to the fact that they are out of the track of steamers between San Francisco and Sydney, they have preserved more of their unspoilt character.

The natives are said to be the finest in appearance of any Polynesian peoples. In distinction to the Tahitians, who are either red or olive brown, their skin is largely of a clear golden color. In this they resemble the Maories of New Zealand, as in the practice of face-tattooing common among the males. They were formerly great fighters and ferocious cannibals, as Herman Melville's "Omoo" tells us. The first white settlers amongst them were French Roman Catholic missionaries who, by buying up most of the valuable land, by discouraging the drink traffic and by preventing other familiar colonial abuses, have succeeded in preserving the native stock fairly well. The Marquesas have never become the sink of vice and corruption which is Tahiti.