Letters from Fijian missionaries and other news items concerning them copied from the Methodist Fiji-language journal Ai Tukutuku Vakalotu.

The Petits Freres comprised an order of Fijian lay brothers, founded by Mgr Vidal in 1890 to assist in teaching at mission schools and in the maintenance of Catholic mission property in Fiji. See also PMB MS 432

Most of the reports are undated, but several are dated 1919 and one dated 1923.

See PMB MS 432, material relating to Roman Catholic Mission Fiji.

The papers are:

1. 'Quelques Notes sur Fiji, les Fijiens et la Religion Catholique a Fiji'
2. 'Conference sur les Meke fidjiens', by Father C.M. Flaus, SM
3. 'La Culte des Morts a Fiji a l'Ouest et a l'Interieur', by Father J. de Marzan, SM
4. Notes on the Roman Catholic Mission in Fiji, 1925, by Father J. Oreve, SM
5. 'Superstitions Rewiennes', 1891, by E.R. (i.e. Father E. Rougier, SM)
6. Notes on 'Le Deluge ... aux Fijis', by Father J. de Marzan, SM
7. 'Noms des Oiseaux ... de Namosi', by Father J.L. Guinard, SM

A compilation of extracts on the sugar industry of Fiji, culled from The Fiji Times from 1869 to 1886. The notes were gathered for a paper on the early history of Fiji's sugar industry, which was published in the Transactions of the Fiji Society, 1959, Vol.7, No.2, pp.104-130.

Isobel Whippy was in Fiji from 1963. She wrote several short plays for school children from 1968 onward. 'Pritchard' was her first major drama, which won a $100 prize in a drama contest for the South Pacific Festival of Arts in Suva in May 1972.

The play concerns the first British Consul in Fiji, William Thomas Pritchard, who arrived in Levuka in September 1858 and was dismissed from his post in January 1863. It is based on a theory that the Consul lost his job because of a love affair with a young woman - possibly a part-European - who gave birth to two children by Pritchard, before he married her in the British Consulate in Levuka a few days after his dismissal. The play is in two acts - the first covering the period from September 1858 to June 1859; the second from November 1859 to July 1862. There is an epilogue concerning the year 1864.

See PMB MS 432, material relating to Roman Catholic Mission Fiji.

An address given to the Pacific Theological College, Suva, on 18 May 1971.

James Valentine Tarte (1837-1918) was born in England and migrated to Ballarat, VIC, Australia in 1857. He went to Fiji in 1869 and took up land on Taveuni where he remained until his death. Some of his descendants still have plantations on Taveuni (1972).

The document is a duplicate typescript. The reminiscences were probably written by hand originally, but the whereabouts of a manuscript is not known. Nor is it known where the original typescript is. The last page(s) of the present copy are missing, and there is nothing to indicate exactly when the document was written. However, the author states on P.17 that he wishes he could 'put the clock back 50 years'; on p.13 he indicates that he was writing in Brisbane; and on p.30 he says; 'I am writing this for my two sons ...' It is an entertaining account of Tarte's early life in England, his journey to Australia, the early years of Ballarat, financial losses and departure for Fiji, his purchase of land on Taveuni and establishment of a cotton plantation, his marriage to Clara Berry in March, 1871 (the first European wedding in Fiji), his purchase of additional land and construction of a sugar mill, his venture into coffee and cattle, and the vicissitudes of plantation life.