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National Geographic : 1960 Oct
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Bounty Descendants Live on Remote Norfolk Island Another big annual event is "Bounty Day," anniversary of the June 8, 1856, arrival of the Pitcairners on Norfolk. "We've always had a procession of de scendants of the mutineers, dressed in naval uniforms," the administrator told me. "Now the other islanders also march along, in cos tumes of the time when the Pitcairners landed here." They parade to the cemetery and then to Government House, where they sing two sacred songs, one of them composed by Charles Driver Christian-he of the five-shil ling fine. Gayest part of the day comes with luncheon. The islanders spread tablecloths end to end along a wall of the old convict barracks and sit on the grass, feasting on mountains of island specialties. Dishes pass from table cloth to tablecloth. Then comes a cricket match-Bounty vs. All-Comers. Cricket isn't the only sport to keep the islanders active. They bowl, enjoy tennis, and golf on the nine-hole course at Kingston. A convict ruin forms one wall of the club house. Because the island is so small, the golf course also serves as pasture. Barbed wire keeps grazing cattle from the greens, and the players enter over a stile. For food the islanders rely on their fertile fields and on livestock descended from cattle, sheep, and pigs left on Norfolk for the Pit cairn colonists. Norfolk has grown various crops for export, but unpredictable world trade has not favored them as nature has. Bobbing in the Swells, a Boat Loads Bean Seed, Norfolk's Money Crop As laden trucks approach Cascade jetty, islanders guide the bags into the tender for transfer to a ship. Australian farmers will use the blight-free seed. Women sort beans best, their husbands contend, because they have nimbler fingers; men do all the field work. Mrs. David Buffett, who can grade seven bushels a day, culls broken and discolored beans. Her son Boyd wrestles a Teddy bear. () NATIONALGEOGRAPHICSOCIETY 577
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