Je puis vous dire que c'est le seul coin de la terre ou habitent des hommes sans vices, sans préjugés, sans besoins, sans dissensions. Nés sous le plus beau ciel, nourris des fruits d'une terre féconde sans culture, régis par des pères de famille plutôt que par des rois, ils ne connaissent d'autre dieu que l'Amour. Tous les jours lai sont consacrés, toute l'isle son temple, toutes les femmes—me demandez-vous? Les rivales des Geôrgiennes en beauté et les sœurs des grâces toutes unes.
Such was the simple, innocent, happy island life when Tahiti was discovered by the white man, whose pretended object was to bring to the natives the benefits of modern civilization. As to the immediate effects of European civilization on the morals of the natives, Ariitaimai has the following to say in reply to the alleged laxity of Tahitian morals:
No one knows how much of the laxity of morals was due to the French and English themselves, whose appearance certainly caused a sudden and shocking overthrow of such moral rules as had existed before in the island society: and the "supposed" means that when the island society as a whole is taken into account. Marriage was real as far as it went, and the standard rather higher than that of Paris; in some ways extremely lax, and in others strict and stern to a degree that would have astonished even the most conventional English nobleman, had he understood it
The third European to visit Tahiti was that intrepid explorer, Captain Cook, who entered Matavai Bay on the 13th of April, 1769, in Her Majesty's bark, the Endeavor, on his first voyage around the world. He met chief Tootahah, under whose protection he settled on Point Venus. He was accompanied by a staff of scientists, among them Joseph Banks and Dr. Solander, a Swedish naturalist. Captain Wallis' "queen" was again on the shore to meet the strangers. Captain Cook gives a detailed account of her visit:
She first went to Mr. Banks' tent at the fort, where she was not known, till the master, who knew her, happening to go ashore, brought her on board with two men and several women, who seemed to be all of her family. I made them all some presents or other, but to Obariea (for that was the woman's name) I gave several things, in return for which, as soon as I went on shore with her, she gave me a hog and several bunches of plantains. These she caused to be carried from her canoes up to the fort in a kind of procession, she and I bringing up the rear. This woman is about forty years of age, and, like most of the other women, very masculine. She is head or chief of her own family or tribe, but to all appearance hath no authority over the rest of the inhabitants, whatever she might have when the Dolphin was here.
NATIVE HUT CLOSE BY THE SEA
Cook ascertained at this time, that Obariea was the wife of the most influential chief of the island, Oamo, but did not live with him. She had two children, a daughter eighteen years old, and a boy of seven, the heir to the throne. He says in his Journal:
The young boy above mentioned is son to Oamo and Obariea, but Oamo and Obariea do not at this time live together as man and wife, he not being able to endure with her troublesome disposition. I mention this because it shows that separation in the marriage state is not unknown to these people.
When Cook made his second visit to the island, in 1774, he learned that Oamo and Obariea, or, as they are called in the genealogy of the Tevas, Amo and Purea, had been driven from Papara into the mountains. Vehiatu, the victor, made Amo resign, and the regency of that part of the island was entrusted to Tootuhah, the youngest brother of the deposed chief.