320 EASTER ISLAND. 



competent to give me a translation of the characters, I wrote down part of 

 what he pretended to interpret for me, and my hopes were raised to the highest 

 pitch. This day was Sunday, the only day when he was at leisure to attend to 

 such things. During the following week I had mislaid the manuscripts, and 

 when he came again on the succeeding Sunday, I thought it best to begin anew 

 with the translation, and I proceeded to again write down his interpretation, 

 both in his own dialect and in the-Tahitian dialect of the Malay language. As 

 I proceeded, however, it struck me that the second translation of the same char- 

 acters differed materially from the first. This thought kept growing upon me 

 more and more as I advanced, until at last I became convinced that he was 

 deceiving me, and that he did not or could not truly interpret the character. 

 I concluded, however, not to be too hasty in the matter ; and so I gently told him 

 to go away for the present, and to come back again on the following Sunday. 

 He did not come again on that day, and not until the next Sunday. In the mean- 

 time, however, I had found the first manuscript, and having compared it with 

 the second, I found that they differed very greatly. When he finally came again, 

 I requested him to again go over his former translation, so that I might correct 

 the errors and omissions in my manuscript. He did so, and I found that his 

 third pretended interpretation again differed from either of his former transla- 

 tions. I then called the attention to these facts told him that it was impossible 

 that the same characters should have three different meanings on three differ- 

 ent Sundays; that he knew nothing, probably, of the meaning of the characters; 

 that he was trying to deceive me, and that he had better leave. He left. 



"The Bishop has also been trying his hand in translating the inscriptions. 

 He showed me a manuscript book of considerable thickness, which he thought 

 contained an interpretation of most of the characters on the ' photos ' marked 

 Nos. 5 and 6 on our list, being the two sides of one of the blocks. In this work 

 he says he was assisted by one of his own people, (a native of Easter Island now 

 in the employ of the Mission) who acted as interpreter. I advised him to sub- 

 ject him to a similar test to that to which I had subjected mine, when I fear he 

 will be undeceived as I was. He promised to do so when opportunity occurred. 



"Mr. De Greno informs me that when he was on Easter Island he saw two 

 very old, decrepit natives, whom he was told were taught, in their early youth, 

 to read and inscribe the records, and thought that it was quite probable that 

 they could do so. 



" In regard to the great stature which you say in your letter is mentioned by 

 Roggewein, I have noticed that their stature was rather small than great sel- 

 dom exceeding six feet, and rarely attaining that. I made inquiries of them as 

 to the probable cause of this difference between the stature of their ancestors 

 and their present height. They stated, in answer, that some twelve years ago 

 their island was visited by a number of Peruvian vessels, as many as nine at 

 one time. These vessels sent a part of their crews on shore, armed, and then 

 the vessels surrounded their island, firing on them with cannon, while the boats' 

 crews, combined, were driving and firing upon them with muskets. In this 

 manner a number of them were killed, for they had no firearms, and were too 

 timid to make close work of it. The consequence was, they were obliged to sur- 

 render, and after being all collected in one place, their pitiless conquerors pro- 

 ceeded to select all the largest and most powerful men, and after securely put- 

 ting them in irons, took them on board the vessels and carried them off into 

 slavery, to carry heavy sacks of guano on the Chincha Islands. They have 

 some boys, however, growing up, and who promise to make large men. I 

 have had one of them photographed for you (No. 17) by himself, and again in 

 the groups, (Nos. 10 and 11) where he is the central figure, being already 

 taller than the full-grown men beside him. 



