196 cook's second voyage SEPT. 



to their price. But this is by no means the case : 

 the favours of married women, and also the unmar- 

 ried of the better sort, are as difficult to be obtained 

 here, as in any other country whatever. Neither can 

 the charge be understood indiscriminately of the 

 unmarried of the lower class, for many of these admit 

 of no such familiarities. That there are prostitutes 

 here, as well as in other countries, is very true, per- 

 haps more in proportion, and such were those who 

 came on board the ships to our people, and fre- 

 quented the post we had on shore. By seeing these 

 mix indiscriminately with those of a different turn, 

 even of the first rank, one is, at first, inclined to 

 think that they are all disposed the same way, and 

 that the only difference is in the price. But the 

 truth is, the woman who becomes a prostitute, does 

 not seem, in their opinion, to have committed a crime 

 of so deep a dye as to exclude her from the esteem 

 and society of the community in general. On the 

 whole, a stranger who visits England might with 

 equal justice, draw the characters of the women 

 there, from those which he might meet with on board 

 the ships in one of the naval ports, or in the purlieus 

 of Covent Garden and Druiy Lane. I must, how- 

 ever, allow that they are all completely versed in the 

 art of coquetry, and that very few of them fix any 

 bounds to their conversation. It is, therefore, no 

 wonder that they have obtained the character of 

 libertines. 



To what hath been said of the geography of these 

 isles, in the narrative of my former voyage, 1 shall 

 now only add, that we found the latitude of Oaiti- 

 piha bay, in Otaheite, to be 17 46' 28" south, and 

 the longitude 21' 25--" east from Point Venus ; or 

 149 18' 24" west from Greenwich. The difference 

 both of latitude and longitude, between Point Venus 

 and Oaiti-piha, is greater than I supposed it to be, 

 when 1 made the circuit of the island in 1769, by 

 two miles, and 4 J miles respectively. It is, there- 



5 



