When J Cook discovered New Caledonia for European civilization in 1774, the Kanak people he found there had already discovered the place some 4 to 6000 years earlier. They may have walked in by way of Papua New Guinea. Cook found them even friendlier than the natives of the Friendly Isles (Tonga). ..we were re­ceived with great courtesy (#1.1.27  [S190]29. The character of both men and women is remarkably agreeable - in this they excel all other people.. we have met. Their good-will, when they have occasion to show it, cannot be exceeded by any­thing unless it be their zeal to do so. They are profoundly unhappy if they cannot render themselves obliging and agreeable, be it by cutting wood, carrying water, filling barrels or rowing. If you interrupt them in such work, they seem uneasy that their best efforts are not good enough for you [S560]135 quoting second lieutenant Clerke of Cook's party. Hodges painted the Kanaks as generally healthy and smiling - #1.1.27 [S560]44-46.

The local Kanak chief, Ti Booma, invited Cook and his crew to his village - Balade, on the East coast of the main island (Grand Terre), with a polite, formal speech, and Cook thanked him similarly. Cook invited his new friends to see a part of his boat, the Resolution and some of the wonders of European civilization - the telescope, quadrant, multi-coloured cloth.. on board (#1.1.1, [S190]29, [S560]85, 135).. He also gave the Kanaks some dogs and pigs - creatures they had never seen before. The Kanaks eagerly helped the English replenish the Resolution's food and water supplies.

Cook and his party stayed about two weeks before moving on. During that time they climbed to the top of the mountain range that runs along the middle of the island and looked down on the other side. They recorded the island's extraordinary beauty, the variety of its flora (some 80 to 90% of which was endemic and grew no where else), saw outcroppings of heavy rock and deduced the island's mineral wealth #1.1.29[S560]88. They also noticed that Kanak villages were clean, their homes comfortable, lawns mown (important for English gentlemen), and that the trees in, and around, the villages were full of birds with beautiful plumage and melodious songs. They made life there even more agreeable #1.1.27[S190]31.

Many Kanaks wanted to board the Resolution and see the world. Several Tahitians on the boat had learned some English, and some Kanaks knew Maohi (Polynesian) - probably from Wallisians who had come to live in nearby Ouvea some 50 years earlier. These people had eased communications since the first exchange of polite speeches. Space on the Resolution was limited. But Cook named the islands west of the Grand Terre "The Loyalties" to commemorate Kanak hospitality and loyalty.

Cook's dogs and pigs remained in Balade. Initially the Kanaks treated them with great respect - they were emanations of Cook's personality. But the dogs chased the songbirds, and the pigs behaved very badly - smashing earthenware pots to eat the food in them, pushing people aside to get into their huts, and scaring children [S190]35. Cook forgot to leave instructions for use of the gift animals: "Kill and eat when fat". . The Kanaks took the pigs to the uninhabited island of Balabio - when the French were delighted to find a herd of some 300 about a century later [S190]37, 38.

From his own point of view, a Kanak and his natural environment were one and the same process ([S370]121, 166). He used plant names for his internal organs - creepers for intestines, sap for blood [S370]63.., etc. Traditional Kanaks asked forgiveness of trees before cutting them. Europeans think land belongs to them or to other people. Pre-colonial Kanaks felt that they belonged to the land; they were projections of everything around them -sea, sky, plants, animals.. into their existences. The did not have individual egos. The concept "I" did not exist, and they had no words to represent it ([S370]178). Their egos were tribal; they were expressions of the land's will to live. A Kanak's rocks, totems, sacred places, kinship bonds were him. He lived in a universe of processes and relationships, rather than in space filled with objects.

Kanaks' egolessness may have given them telepathic abilities that seem impossible to Europeans (however, see [P035]). They claim to have learned many healing and other properties of plants in this way. The placenta of a new-born Kanak was buried next to a small tree - he grew up with his tree. If he was sent off to war in Europe, his relatives would watch the tree. If it wilted, they knew he was in trouble.

Rather than thinking of himself as bot­tled up inside his skin, and looking out at the world from behind his eyes, his con­sciousness was not limited in space or time. Ancient Kanaks did not live in linear time. Their languages do not have three tenses -past, present, future; only 'is' and 'may be' [S370]155. Some  Kanaks still talk to their ancestors. There are many places called "Mu" in Kanaky (2 Mont Mus, Ouemo (Wai-Mu - Mu-water). Old Kanaks say "The continent of Mu still exists". It is potential becoming actual again - just as winter is potential spring. Every spring is the same and different. This year's spring flowers differ from last year's. Modern quantum theory's probability and time reversal postulates seem to confirm the Kanak world view.

Kanaks did not seek to dominate nature or each other. What was important for them was living in balance. They did not over-fish any parts of the ocean or clear any forests excessively. (Money has changed much of that - for the worse). That intuitive sense of balance enabled them to match their populations with the fertility and beauty of their land for thousands of years. The social order was matrilineal ([S370]168). A mother's brother looked after her children. Kanak women knew many contraceptives and controlled their reproduction.

The purpose of marriage is not the fertilization of the wife by her husband -for men are not aware of their role in this process. A woman becomes pregnant when she passes through certain forests or peaceful places - the néo - where she is impregnated by mythological genes. A husband's role is to put her in a mood in which she receives the good-will of the spirits of the ancestors and totems. The husband is responsible for welcoming the child into the world [S370]167. Kanak friends informed me that their pre-colonial ancestors were not as ignorant of the role of males in reproduction as [S370] maintains. Néos were beautiful places, off-limits to men, where young and pregnant women went to be in peace, also to listen to songbirds, the wind in the trees, the surging of the ocean. These infused the 'spirits of place' into their bodies. Conception was a gradual process of which intercourse played a part - the rest was as necessary. It continued after birth. Uncle-and-nephew, grandfather-and-grandson were often seen together - the little boy asking questions of his relative, learning, growing in wisdom. These 'duos' were thought of as entities or process, each had a single name - for example duaeri for grandfather-grandson [S370]173.  The wisdom of the people was transmitted continuously from generation to generation without interruption.  A child became his/her renewed ancestors.

This, and egolessness, reduced men's needs to steal each other's lands and women. Life was usually pleasant in Kanaky before the whites came. The summer season was like football season - a time for ritualized male rivalry. Kanak sports were like medieval European jousts and melees. A little blood could flow - but that was not the aim of the game. A young man was not allowed to touch a woman until he had proved himself in battle.  Kanak 'wars', matches, really, never lasted more than a day, were carefully choreographed and eagerly watched from grandstands [S610]68 by almost everyone who was not out on the field. Men got themselves into the fighting mood in the morning with fearsome body paint, war dances and insults - and clashed in the afternoon. They showed-off their skills, bravery, cunning, by doing fantastic acrobatic leaps, defeating several adversaries at once, and the like. Watching women might reward their efforts with encouraging words, or by throwing them flowers.

The end of a match was decided before it began The death of a chief usually signaled the ending of hos­tilities [S610]226, [S190]152. A rain-shower could do the same. Winners' and losers' rights were pre-determined - for instance, only a chief's son might be allowed to take another chief's daughter. Nine cadavers is exceptional for the little wars between several villages - deaths are rare, and when they do occur, victors and vanquished throw them­selves on the corps [to eat the flesh0], carry the rest away with honours, bury and mourn it [S610]253. Even after [Kanak0] wars in which huts and crops were destroyed, lands belonging to the vanquished were re­turned to them, especially to clans who were masters of the soil, and who therefore guaranteed its fertility ([S610]42). Blood-sports enlivened tedium of torpid semi-tropical summers. We watch televised violence for similar reasons.

The Kanaks had no cattle before the Europeans came - protein was precious. People suffered, like the rest of nature, from starvation and thirst during ENSO-el Nino summer droughts. Starving people tend to steal other people's crops. This can cause hatred and whet appetites for war. It is easier to kill and eat another tribes' oldest, weakest, stupidest member's than one's own family and friends. This was not butchery. People did not kill each other unnecessarily - and then waste the protein. From the Kanak point of view, the industrialized butchery of the 20^th century European wars, and spectator sports without the thrill of real rivalry to select fittest partners made little sense. Westerners who are now stockpiling nuclear bombs to cause even more suffering and destruction, might do well to remember that death is inevitable, and that it is possible to die honourably. This causes least suffering and is most beneficial for those who survive.

The purpose of Kanak 'warfare' was not killing; it was the renewal of life. So is a dog fight. The Kanaks could have used stone tipped weapons, leather helmets and armour. They did not do so for much the same reason that football teams do not use machine guns. That would have spoilt the fun. That fun was waged with penis-shaped wooden clubs that somewhat resembled baseball bats. It was loving fighting.

The Kanaks were cannibals with good taste. It was an honour for an old man to die in battle. He would be eaten respectfully by both winners and losers. He knew before he went to war that if he died, he would continue to look out on the world through other peoples' eyes. Kanaks did not die from their own point of view - they 'passed on' ([S370]84).

All things considered, the ancient Kanaks probably balanced love and war more intelligently than so-called civilized peoples do. We would probably live healthier, happier lives if our social order was more matrilineal, the boys were free to enjoy more ritualized blood-sports while other people watched the real, but restrained violence, This may bde happening. The grand old medieval-Kanak traditions reviving as hooligans brawl bloodily outside football stadiums while the sanitized, sterilized game goes on inside them. Rather than preventing hooligans from brawling, the police could organize them into melees, and charges onlookers for seeing real bloodsports. Some girls will doubtless want to watch to know who the winners are - and may throw flowers down to their favourites. Natural selection is far older than recorded history. It is best done with least destruction and suffering. When Cook discovered New Caledonia, the island was about as close to Paradise as any place enjoyed by ordinary mortals. It could become so again.