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I Remember .... by Inez Hames (1972) Wesley Historical Society (NZ) Publication #(27) 5 Page 1 I Remember .... by Inez Hames (1972) Contents Foreward 1 Early Days 2 Teaching at Nailaga in Ba, Fiji 3 Davuilevu, the head mission station 4 More about Davuilevu 5 Dilkusha 6 The "Southern Cross" crossed the Pacific, and some Meditations on Money 7 A Hurricane 8 Inland Journeys 9 Two Centenaries 10 Various Holidays 11 Life in Kadavu 12 Matavelo Girls' School 13 New Zealand Interlude 14 Back to Fiji 15 Last Teaching Years 16 Independent Fiji Appendices Wesley Historical Society (NZ) Publication #(27) 5 Page 2 I Remember .... by Inez Hames (1972) FOREWORD The first "marama sisita" I met on arriving in Fiji in 1938, was "Miss Ames" - her father had met me at the boat in Suva, and I spent my first few days at Davuilevu in her cottage. I recall being somewhat overwhelmed by her effortless identification with the Fijian people, her knowledge of their way of life, and her fluency in the language. After eighteen years' service, Miss Hames had already made a substantial contribution in the field of education. Those years were, however, but a beginning - the thirty which followed were to be a period of far-reaching change for the peoples of Fiji, and were to bring to the fore one of Miss Hames' most endearing qualities - her readiness to accept new ways and ideas. Not for her the backward looking nostalgia for the "old days". She finds the present exciting, is delighted to see so many of her former pupils realising their full potential as leaders in the community, and must surely rejoice in the knowledge that she has contributed so much towards this. These memoirs are fascinating. They are completely lacking in sentimentality, and, spiced with her delightfully astringent sense of humour, they reveal her great affection for Fiji and its people. This is indeed Volunteer Service Abroad writ large. May McIntosh Lower Hutt 22 May 1972 Wesley Historical Society (NZ) Publication #(27) 5 Page 3 I Remember .... by Inez Hames (1972) Chapter 1 Early Days There was no telephone in the house where I was born in 1892 in Paparoa, ninety miles north of Auckland. Nor of course were there motor cars. My father took a bridle from the saddle shed, and walked out into the fields, or paddocks, as we call them in New Zealand, and, catching one of his horses, led it to the front gate, saddled it, and rode six miles on unmetalled roads to get a doctor for me. This was in 1893. I had a bad cold, and there was heavy breathing. When Dr Montaigne came, he diagnosed congestion of the lungs, and nothing could be done. The child would last a few hours. To the young couple with their first child this seemed intolerable. My father had heard that there was a man visiting the district who used homoeopathic cures, and that he would be riding that day on horseback from Paparoa to Maungaturoto. So he rode out across his farm a mile and a half to the government road. He reached the road, and, dismounting, saw hoof-marks going to Maungaturoto. He followed, overtook Mr Rimmer, explained his trouble, and they returned together to our home, where my mother was anxiously watching over me. Hot and cold wet pack treatment was the remedy. Firewood was burnt in the kitchen stove all night. Kettle after kettle of hot water kept blankets hot as fomentations. A crisis passed, and I recovered. This incident shows the utter isolation of early settlers in North Auckland. To me, growing up in beautiful Paparoa valley, it all seemed so normal that, even now, in the 1970s, I find it quite an effort to realise how far from normal it was. We led pleasant lives. There was an abundance of eggs, and milk and butter; mutton when a sheep was killed; bacon and pork of our own curing; more than abundance of fruit; vegetables from our own garden. There were acres of beautiful playing grounds; in winter long evenings by big log fires, and plenty of well-selected books. There were horses to ride, when we went to church or to visit friends. What did it matter to a child that there was a serious economic depression, and that the farm income was very small? I was well into my teens before I tasted an ice cream. Occasionally my father brought home a few boiled lollies. He had built up his library by foregoing mid-day meals on holidays in Auckland and purchasing from second-hand book shops. Our mother made our bread. We made butter in a treadle-barrel churn. My father ran sheep on his 500 acre farm and kept cows for home use. Life was free. We could ride out visiting and come home when we liked. The few cows could wait for milking. But indeed the whole story of the Albertland settlement is so far from normal as to seem, when considered now, fantastically unusual. We must picture England, where, halfway through the nineteenth century, the non-established churches were unfairly treated. In Herefordshire Lord Somers, disturbed that daughters only were born to him, was seriously advised that God might be punishing him for allowing Methodists to live on his estate. Consequently he ejected them all. A Methodist church committee, Wesley Historical Society (NZ) Publication #(27) 5 Page 4 I Remember .... by Inez Hames (1972) with my Great-grandfather Maddox as convenor, arranged refuge for them. My Grandparents were married in Ledbury Anglican church. Their own 'chapel' and minister were prevented by law from providing marriage facilities. Village schools were Anglican institutions. Land also was closely held by the gentry. Enterprising people in the beginning and middle of the nineteenth century wished it were possible to improve their lot. Socialist laws were far away in the future. It was not until 1834 that there were government education grants, not until 1836 that a law was passed allowing civil marriage. The Wakefield settlements in Wellington and Nelson districts in New Zealand had catered for both moneyed people and labourers. Canterbury had been settled by Church of England, Otago by Scottish people. When the idea of a Nonconformist settlement in North Auckland reached the chapels in England, many people received the suggestion with joy. Rev. William Gittos, missionary to Kaipara Maoris, heard about it, and suggested his district for the project. Decent, moral, industrious people would be good for the Kaipara. So it was arranged. These people, who called themselves Albertlanders, full of hope, were allotted sections of land in the forest. Their hardships were severe. Isolation in the heavy, unroaded forest, brought its perils. My Grandfather, a brainy, delicate schoolteacher, with a brave, severely practical wife, because he was suddenly afflicted with deafness, took his wife and four little boys to Paparoa Valley, miles from neighbours, in the midst of forest. Fierce wild pigs of the stock originally left by Captain Cook roamed among the totara, kahikatea, kauri, tree ferns and supplejacks. One day the parents, their eleven year old son and little five year old went out to work or reconnoitre, leaving little Rowland, two years old, in the care of eight year old Luther. A great pig came in looking for food. Luther picked Baby Rowland up and climbed with him on to a table, no doubt saving him from being eaten by the pig. They were not really suitable people for pioneering. Not physically, and not at all quick at seizing opportunities of gaining money. Later, others in Paparoa learnt to fell great Kauri trees and raft them down the flooded Manganui to the Northern Wairoa River to timber mills. But in other ways the Hames family were very suited to pioneering. My Grandfather came from a line of gardeners, and he and my grandmother, and later children and daughters-in-law created a lovely atmosphere of trees, flowers, fruit and vegetables. They were intensely religious. I remember grace in my grandparents' home both before and after meals. I remember kneeling by my chair after breakfast, listening to my grandfather's long prayers. And the Bible teaching given to me sitting on my grandmother's knee with an illustrated Bible has never been forgotten. Its influence has remained with me all my life. They were too far from a school to travel bush tracks for education, but their now severely deaf father taught the children, his wife supplying the hearing part of the schooling. Their brains were keen. They could have competed with credit anywhere at all. But for years they lived lonely lives. My Uncle Luther took up school-teaching Wesley Historical Society (NZ) Publication #(27) 5 Page 5 I Remember .... by Inez Hames (1972) and went to Auckland. My two aunts, who had been born in the Paparoa Valley home, became nurses. The others remained farmers. But my father saw to it that his children had every possible chance of education. My mother, a pretty, artistic woman of Baptist stock, reared in Melbourne, fell in with his wishes. One day, when my aunt Priscilla was a child, my grandmother promised her that if she memorised the whole Wesleyan Methodist hymn book, she would give her €1. Priscilla memorised it and received her pound. Rowland, who was later my father, and Priscilla in their young days had been in the habit of reciting 'Paradise Lost' to each other, as they rode horses along the ridge tracks home from church meetings in Paparoa township. They would get to the last line of one book when they reached the gate of the home paddock and lifted the twisted wire or piece of chain that fastened gate to post, rode through, and turned to replace it; or, if to avoid a deep bog of mud they followed an alternative track, one of them dismounted to let down the slip-rails.

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