In 1885, Captain Joshua Slocum set off, alone in his sloop, to circumnavigate the globe.
https://www.gutenberg.org/files/6317/6317-h/6317-h.htm#CHAPTER_VI
After leaving Tierra del Fuego, he landed, 72 days later in Samoa where, in the company of Mrs. Robert Louis Stevenson, they embarked, together, on a sight-seeing tour.
He wrote:
As I sailed farther from the center of civilization I heard less and less of what would and what would not pay. Mrs. Stevenson, in speaking of my voyage, did not once ask me what I would make out of it. When I came to a Samoan village, the chief did not ask the price of gin, or say, "How much will you pay for roast pig?" but, "Dollar, dollar," said he; "white man know only dollar."
"Never mind dollar. The tapo has prepared ava; let us drink and rejoice." The tapo is the virgin hostess of the village; in this instance it was Taloa, daughter of the chief. "Our taro is good; let us eat. On the tree there is fruit. Let the day go by; why should we mourn over that? There are millions of days coming. The breadfruit is yellow in the sun, and from the cloth-tree is Taloa's gown. Our house, which is good, cost but the labor of building it, and there is no lock on the door."
While the days go thus in these Southern islands we at the North are struggling for the bare necessities of life.
For food the islanders have only to put out their hand and take what nature has provided for them; if they plant a banana-tree, their only care afterward is to see that too many trees do not grow. They have great reason to love their country and to fear the white man's yoke, for once harnessed to the plow, their life would no longer be a poem.
Many years ago, I've yet to find who it was, I read of one of the great orators who went to Washington to speak on behalf of his people. I've searched many times for the transcript the eloquence of which I cannot approach, but to paraphrase:
Until you came our lives were spent hunting and fishing, enjoying the company of our wives and children and other pursuits of leisure. If we accept your ways, all our time will be taken up by hoeing and weeding. No thank you.
In 1927 the global population was 2 billion (see the bubble in In Nomine Terra Calens)
Along with the influence of two phenomenal perversities, christianity and capitalism, we've managed to decimate not just what once were veritable paradises, but the entire planet!
Captain Slocum visited a mere 139 years ago. And, as evidenced by Mrs. Stevenson's behavior and the Chief's exhortation, the Big Two had yet to make a full impression.
Now, as science hopes to save us by colonating Mars and beyond, I'm reminded of a cynical friend's saying:
"It's pretty to think so."
