New Caledonia
New Caledonia
VICARIATE APOSTOLIC
New Caledonia, one of the largest islands of Oceania, lies about 900 miles east of Queensland, Australia between 20° 10′ and 22° 16′ S. lat., and between 164° and 167° E. long. It is about 250 miles long by 30 broad, and has an area of 7650 square miles. It is a French colony, its principal dependencies being the Isle of Pines and Loyalty Islands (including Lifou, Mare, and Uvea). Its population, together with that of these dependencies, is estimated at 53,000 inhabitants (13,000 free; 11,000 of convict origin; 29,000 black). The coasts of New Caledonia are deeply indented, and the island is almost entirely surrounded by an immense madrepore reef, which now retires to some distance from and now approaches close to the shore, but regularly leaves a broad channel of water between itself and the island. This species of canal, in which the sea is always calm, greatly facilitates communication between the various settlements on the coast. The island is very mountainous, and about one half of its area is thus uncultivatable. The so-called central chain, which divides the island into an eastern and a western section, attains the height, of over 5500 feet. The hills which fringe the coast, and at times rise sheer from the water, do not in general exceed the height of 600 feet. Between these lesser ranges stretch good-sized plains of great fertility, admirably watered by numerous streams which the natives skilfully utilize for purposes of irrigation. The streams of the same basin usually unite to form one river which is navigable for vessels of light draught for about a dozen miles from the coast. Unlike most intertropical regions, the island has no well-defined wet season, some years being very rainy and others characterized by prolonged droughts. The scenery is wonderfully beautiful and for salubrity of climate the island is almost unrivalled. The temperature rarely reaches the extremes of 96° by day during the hot season (December to March) and 56° by night during the cold (May to August). The administration has divided the island into three sections: the convict settlement, that reserved exclusively for the natives, and the remainder which is leased to colonists by the French Government. The chief agricultural products are coffee, maize, sugar, grapes, and pineapples, while efforts are being made at present to foster the cultivation of wheat, rubber, and cotton. The island also possesses valuable deposits of nickel, cobalt, chrome, and copper ores, all of which are being exploited chiefly by Australian miners. Discovered by Captain Cook in 1774, the island was occupied by the French in 1853, and on 2 Sept. 1863, a decree was passed authorizing the establishment of a convict settlement there. In May, 1864, the first criminals arrived, and between that date and 1896, an aggregate of about 22,000 were transported thither. As no convicts have been sent since 1896, the convict element of the population is rapidly diminishing. Nouméa is the chief town and the seat of government. It has an excellent harbour for the improvement of which various works are in course of execution. The colony is administered by a governor, assisted by a council consisting of various officials and two notables nominated by the governor. There is also an elective general council.
The ethnology of the natives, whose number is gradually decreasing, is somewhat uncertain, but they probably spring from a mixed Melanesian and Western Polynesian stock. Their height is above that of the average South Sea Islander; they are as a rule well built and quite erect; their colour varies from a very dark brown to a light complexion, and their hair is coarse and woolly. Cannibalism, which was generally practised on the island in former times, has disappeared in consequence of the strict measures taken by the administration. Although the men of the same tribe live together in the greatest harmony (such being in fact a leading dictate of their religious belief) intertribal wars have been always frequent, and have been in the past almost the sole occasion of cannibalism, as the flesh of a fellow tribesman is one of the most intelligible of their numerous and in very many cases peculiar taboos. The native religion is so closely intertwined with superstitions that distinction is rather difficult. The natives undoubtedly have a firm belief in a future life; the dead are supposed to live under the great mountain Mu, where the good are welcomed after death and where the general conditions bear some striking analogies to the Harmonic Hades. Ancestral worship is universally practised among the pagan natives, and there is a special class whose office it is to feed the deceased kinsmen, partly by consuming the food as their proxies and partly by exposing it for them in a taboo hut. The natives live together according to their tribes under chiefs, who exercise an extensive authority in purely native affairs. The food of the natives consists of yams, taros, sugar-cane, dried fish, and shell-fish. At various places on the island are held markets, at which the natives of the coast, and of the mountains meet to exchange produce, dancing forming a regular feature of the transaction. Though excellent farmers the natives are lazy.
New Caledonia was separated from Central Oceania and erected into a distinct vicariate Apostolic by decree of 2 July and Brief of 13 July, 1847. Besides the main island, the vicariate includes the Isle of Pines and the Belep and Loyalty Islands. The mission is entrusted to the Marist Fathers, who, besides ministering to the French settlers and convicts, have devoted themselves sedulously and with the greatest success to the conversion of the natives. According to the latest, statistics the vicariate includes: 35,000 Catholics (11,500 natives); 48 missionary priests and 40 brothers of the Marist Congregation; 126 sisters; 61 catechists; 68 churches and several chapels; 45 schools with 1881 pupils; 1 orphanage with 50 inmates. The present vicar Apostolic, who is the fourth to fill the office, is Mgr. Chaurion, titular Bishop of Carlopolis.
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Statesman’s Year Book (London, 1910); Missiones Apostolicæ (Rome, 1907); GUILLEMAND, Australasia, II (London, 1894), 455-63, in Compendium of Geography and Travel; ATKINSON, The Natives of New Caledonia in Folk-Lore, XIV (London, 1903), 243-59.
THOMAS KENNEDY Transcribed by Joseph McIntyre
The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume XCopyright © 1911 by Robert Appleton CompanyOnline Edition Copyright © 2003 by K. KnightNihil Obstat, October 1, 1911. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., CensorImprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York
Fuente: Catholic Encyclopedia
New Caledonia
an island of the South Pacific Ocean, belonging to France, and lying about 720 miles east-north-east of the coast of Queensland, in Australia, in lat. 200-220 30′ S., long. 1640-1670 E., is about 200 miles in length, 30 miles in breadth, and has a population estimated at 60,703. New Caledonia is of volcanic origin, is traversed in the direction of its length, from north-west to south-east, by a range of mountains, which in some cases reach the height of about 8000 feet, and is surrounded by sand-banks and coral-reefs. There are secure harbors at Port Balade and Port St. Vincent, the former on the north-east, the latter on the southwest part of the island. In the valleys the soil is fruitful, producing the cocoa-nut, banana, mango, breadfruit, etc. The sugar-cane is cultivated, and the vine grows wild. The coasts support considerable tracts of forest, but the mountains are barren.
The inhabitants of New Caledonia, who resemble the Papuan race, consist of different tribes. They speak a language kindred to the Australian tongues, and are hospitable and honest. They are a well-formed people, tall and robust, but indolent. Their skin is deep black, and their hair coarse and bushy. They are fond of painting their faces, and even in settlements they wear but little clothing. Their huts, built of spars and reeds, thatched with bark, and entered by a very small opening, bear some resemblance to beehives.
New Caledonia was discovered by captain Cook in 1774. In 1853 the French took official possession of it, and it is now comprised under the same government with Otaheite and the Marquesas Isles. New Caledonia has hitherto been scarcely visited by Protestant missionary enterprise. Some teachers from Samoa attempted to form a community on the Isle of Pines about 1852, but were driven away. French Roman Catholic priests have, however, labored in this quarter for many years with great zeal and courage, worthy of better results than they have secured. It is not easy to obtain a connected view of these attempts from the loose and disjointed statements contained in the Annales de la Propayation de la F’oi, the only authority to which we have access. We find that for several years there have been a vicar apostolic of Melanesia and Micronesia, whose head- quarters have varied according to circumstances. One of these dignitaries, bishop Epalle, was murdered in 1846, in the exercise of his vocation, at the Solomon Islands, in the neighborhood of New Guinea. The priests, his companions, absolutely forbade the reprisals which a French officer would fain have exercised for his death, and the mission in that quarter has since been abandoned. Bishop Epalle has been succeeded in his vicariate by monseigneur Collomb, titular bishop of Antiphelle, whose head-quarters for some time were in New Caledonia. In 1845 and in 1846 we find priests laboring with very indifferent success among these intractable savages; and in 1847 a ferocious onslaught was made on their little quarters in Balad. in which two priests were killed, and bishop Collomb himself narrowly escaped with his life. The assault was wholly unprovoked; but one of the party seems to have unfortunately exhibited a gun in self-defense, which heightened the exasperation of the assailants. Violent though deserved retribution was taken for it by the crew of a French vessel of war. The French occupation in this instance seems therefore to have been preceded for some years by the missionary efforts of their ecclesiastics. Very recently the labors of the Roman Catholic missionaries have been crowned with greater success than heretofore. Several thousand natives have embraced Christianity, and formed prosperous settlements, where are now cultivated a variety of vegetables and fruits, including wheat and barley, besides the raising of live-stock. The number of islanders who have embraced Christianity is estimated at 5000. They are proving industrious and temperate citizens. During the last French revolutionary movement the Commumists condemned to penal life were sent to this island. See the (London) Quarterly Review, 1854, pt. 1, p. 97 aq.