At break of day, on Monday the 27th, we unmoored, and at the same time I sent the barge and cutter to fill the few water-casks that were now empty. When they came near the shore, they saw, to their great surprise, the whole beach covered with inhabitants, and having some doubt whether it would be prudent to venture themselves among such a multitude, they were about to pull back again for the ship. As soon as this was perceived from the shore, the queen came forward, and beckoned them; at the same time guessing the reason of what had happened, she made the natives retire to the other side of the river; the boats then proceeded to the shore, and filled the casks; in the mean time she put some hogs and fruit on hoard, and when they were putting off would fain have returned with them to the ship. The officer, however, who had received orders to bring off none of the natives, would not permit her; upon which she presently launched a double canoe, and was rowed off by her own people. Her canoe was immediately followed by fifteen or sixteen more, and all of them came up to the ship. The queen came on board, but not being able to speak, she sat down and gave vent to her passion by weeping. After she had been on board about an hour, a breeze springing up, we weighed anchor and made sail. Finding it now necessary to return into her canoe, she embraced us all in the most affectionate manner, and with many tears; all her attendants also expressed great sorrow at our departure. Soon after it fell calm, and I sent the boats a-head to tow, upon which all the canoes returned to the ship, and that which had the queen on board came up to the gunroom port, where her people made it fast. In a few minutes she came into the bow of her canoe, where she sat weeping with inconsolable sorrow. I gave her many things which I thought would be of great use to her, and some for ornament; she silently accepted of all, but took little notice of any thing. About 10 o'clock we were got without the reef, and a fresh breeze springing up, our Indian friends, and particularly the queen, once more bade us farewell, with such tenderness of affection and grief, as filled both my heart and my eyes.[53]
At noon, the harbour from which we sailed bore S.E. 1/2 E. distant about twelve miles. It lies in latitude 17° 30' S., longitude 150° W., and I gave it the name of Port Royal Harbour.
[Footnote 53 1: Of this queen, as Captain W. calls her, the reader will see more particulars in the account of Cook's visit to this island. Her name was Oberea. She was wife to Oammo, who governed the greater part of Otaheite in behalf of his son, according to the custom of the place; but at the time of Wallis's arrival, she cohabited with Toopäea, a native of Ulietëa, and remarkable among these islanders for his wisdom and information.--E.]
SECTION VIII.
A more particular Account of the Inhabitants of Otaheite, and of their domestic Life, Manners, and Arts.
Having lain off this island from the 24th of June to the 27th of July, I shall now give the best account of its inhabitants, with their manners and arts, that I can; but having been in a very bad state of health the whole time, and for great part of it confined to my bed, it will of necessity be much less accurate and particular than I might otherwise have made it.
The inhabitants of this island are a stout, well-made, active, and comely people. The stature of the men, in general, is from five feel seven to five feet ten inches, though a few individuals are taller, and a few shorter; that of the women from five feet to five feet six. The complexion of the men is tawney, but those that go upon the water are much redder than those who live on shore. Their hair in general is black, but in some it is brown, in some red, and in others flaxen, which is remarkable, because the hair of all other natives of Asia, Africa, and America, is black, without a single exception. It is generally tied up, either in one bunch, in the middle of the head, or in two, one on each side, but some wear it loose, and it then curls very strongly: In the children of both sexes it is generally flaxen. They have no combs, yet their hair is very neatly dressed, and those who had combs from us, made good use of them. It is a universal custom to anoint the head with cocoa-nut oil, in which a root has been scraped that smells something like roses. The women are all handsome, and some of them extremely beautiful. Chastity does not seem to be considered as a virtue among them, for they not only readily and openly trafficked with our people for personal favours, but were brought down by their fathers and brothers for that purpose: They were, however, conscious of the value of beauty, and the size of the nail that was demanded for the enjoyment of the lady, was always in proportion to her charms. The men who came down to the side of the river, at the same time that they presented the girl, shewed a stick of the size of the nail that was to be her price, and if our people agreed, she was sent over to them, for the men were not permitted to cross the river. This commerce was carried on a considerable time before the officers discovered it, for while some straggled a little way to receive the lady, the others kept a look-out. When I was acquainted with it, I no longer wondered that the ship was in danger of being pulled to pieces for the nails and iron that held her together, which I had before puzzled myself to account for in vain, the whole ship's company having daily as much fresh provision and fruit as they could eat. Both men and women are not only decently but gracefully clothed, in a kind of white cloth, that is made of the bark of a shrub, and very much resembles coarse China paper. Their dress consists of two pieces of this cloth: One of them, a hole having been made in the middle to put the head through hangs down from the shoulders to the mid leg before and behind; another piece, which is between four and five yards long, and about one yard broad, they wrap round the body in a very easy manner. This cloth is not woven, but is made, like paper, of the macerated fibres of an inner bark spread out and beaten together. Their ornaments are feathers, flowers, pieces of shells, and pearls: The pearls are worn chiefly by the women, from whom I purchased about two dozen of a small size: They were of a good colour, but were all spoiled by boring. Mr Furneaux saw several in his excursion to the west, but he could purchase none with any thing he had to offer. I observed, that it was here a universal custom both for men and women to have the hinder part of their thighs and loins marked very thick with black lines in various forms. These marks were made by striking the teeth of an instrument, somewhat like a comb, just through the skin, and rubbing into the punctures a kind of paste made of soot and oil, which leaves an indelible stain. The boys and girls under twelve years of age are not marked: But we observed a few of the men whose legs were marked in chequers by the same method, and they appeared to be persons of superior rank and authority. One of the principal attendants upon the queen appeared much more disposed to imitate our manners than the rest; and our people, with whom he soon became a favourite, distinguished him by the name of Jonathan. This man, Mr Furneaux clothed completely in an English dress, and it sat very easy upon him. Our officers were always carried on shore, it being shoal water where we landed, and Jonathan, assuming new state with his new finery, made some of his people carry him on shore in the same manner. He very soon attempted to use a knife and fork at his meals, but at first, when he had stuck a morsel upon his fork, and tried to feed himself with that instrument, he could not guide it, but by the mere force of habit his hand came to his mouth, and the victuals at the end of the fork went away to his ear.
Their food consists of pork, poultry, dog's flesh, and fish, bread-fruit, bananas, plantains, yams, apples, and a sour fruit, which, though not pleasant by itself, gives an agreeable relish to roasted bread-fruit, with which it is frequently beaten up. They have abundance of rats, but, as far as I could discover, these make no part of their food. The river affords them good mullet, but they are neither large nor in plenty. They find conchs, mussels, and other shellfish on the reef, which they gather at low-water, and eat raw with bread-fruit before they come on shore. They have also very fine cray-fish, and they catch with lines, and hooks of mother-of-pearl, at a little distance from the shore, parrrot-fish, groopers, and many other sorts, of which they are so fond that we could seldom prevail upon them to sell us a few at any price. They have also nets of an enormous size, with very small meshes, and with these they catch abundance of small fish about the size of sardines; but while they were using both nets and lines with great success, We could not catch a single fish with either. We procured some of their hooks and lines, but for want of their art we were still disappointed.
The manner in which they dress their food is this: They kindle a fire by rubbing the end of one piece of dry wood, upon the side of another, in the same manner as our carpenters whet a chissel; then they dig a pit about half a foot deep, and two or three yards in circumference: They pave the bottom with large pebble stones, which they lay down very smooth and even, and then kindle a fire in it with dry wood, leaves, and the husks of the cocoa-nut. When the stones are sufficiently heated, they take out the embers, and rake up the ashes on every side; then they cover the stones with a layer of green cocoa-nut tree leaves, and wrap up the animal that is to be dressed in the leaves of the plantain; if it is a small hog they wrap it up whole; if a large one they split it. When it is placed in the pit, they cover it with the hot embers, and lay upon them bread-fruit and yams, which are also wrapped up in the leaves of the plantain: Over these they spread the remainder of the embers, mixing among them some of the hot stones, with more cocoa-nut tree leaves upon them, and then close all up with earth, so that the heat is kept in. After a time proportioned to the size of what is dressing, the oven is opened, and the meat taken out, which is tender, full of gravy, and, in my opinion, better in every respect than when it is dressed any other way. Excepting the fruit, they have no sauce but salt water, nor any knives but shells, with which they carve very dexterously, always cutting from them. It is impossible to describe the astonishment they expressed when they saw the gunner, who, while he kept the market, used to dine on shore, dress his pork and poultry by boiling them in a pot. Having, as I have before observed, no vessel that would bear the fire, they had no idea of hot water or its effects: But from the time that the old man was in possession of an iron pot, he and his friends eat boiled meat every day. The iron pots which I afterwards gave to the queen and several of the chiefs, were also in constant use, and brought as many people together, as a monster or a puppet-show in a country fair. They appeared to have no liquor for drinking but water, and to be happily ignorant of the art of fermenting the juice of any vegetable, so as to give it an intoxicating quality: They have, as has been already observed, the sugar-cane, but they seemed to make no other use of it than to chew, which they do not do habitually, but only break a piece off when they happen to pass by a place where it is growing.
Of their domestic life and amusements, we had not sufficient opportunity to obtain much knowledge; but they appear sometimes to have wars with each other, not only from their weapons, but the scars with which many of them were marked, and some of which appeared to be the remains of very considerable wounds, made with stones, bludgeons, or some other obtuse weapon: By these scars also they appear to be no inconsiderable proficients in surgery, of which indeed we happened to have more direct evidence. One of our seamen, when he was on shore, run a large splinter into his foot, and the surgeon being on board, one of his comrades endeavoured to take it out with a penknife; but after putting the poor fellow to a good deal of pain, was obliged to give it over. Our good old Indian, who happened to be present, then called over one of his countrymen that was standing on the opposite side of the river, who, having looked at the seaman's foot, went immediately down to the beach, and, taking up a shell, broke it to a point with his teeth; with this instrument, in little more than a minute, he laid open the place, and extracted the splinter; in the mean time the old man, who, as soon as he had called the other over, went a little way into the wood, returned with some gum, which he applied to the wound upon a piece of the cloth that was wrapped round him, and in two days time it was perfectly healed. We afterward learned that this gum was produced by the apple tree, and our surgeon procured some of it, and used it as a vulnerary balsam with great success.