VOYAGE TO THE PACIFIC OCEAN. 67 



operations, were untrodden ground. The inhabit- 

 ants, as far as could be observed, were unmixed with 

 any different tribe, by occasional intercourse, sub- 

 sequent to their original settlement there ; left en- 

 tirely to their own powers for every art of life ; and 

 to their own remote traditions for every political or re- 

 ligious custom or institution ; uninformed by science ; 

 unimproved by education ; in short, a fit soil from 

 whence a careful observer could collect facts for 

 forming a judgment, how far unassisted human nature 

 will be apt to degenerate ; and in what respects it can 

 ever be able to excel. Who could have thought, 

 that the brutal ferocity of feeding upon human flesh, 

 and the horrid superstition of offering human sacri- 

 fices, should be found to exist amongst the natives 

 lately discovered in the Pacific Ocean, who, in other 

 respects, appear to be no strangers to the fine feelings 

 of humanity, to have arrived at a certain stage of 

 social life, and to be habituated to subordination and 

 government which tend so naturally to repress the 

 ebullitions of wild passion, and expand the latent 

 powers of the understanding? 



Or, if we turn from this melancholy picture, which 

 will suggest copious matter for philosophical specu- 

 lation, can we without astonishment observe to what a 

 degree of perfection the same tribe (and, indeed, we 

 may here join, in some of those instances, the American 

 tribes visited in the course of the present voyage) 

 have carried their favourite amusements ; the plaintive 

 songs of their women ; their dramatic entertainments ; 

 their dances ; their Olympian games, as we may call 

 them ; the orations of their chiefs ; the chants of 

 their priests ; the solemnity of their religious pro- 

 cessions ; their arts and manufactures ; their ingeni- 

 ous contrivances to supply the want of proper mate- 

 rials, and of effective tools and machines ; and the 

 wonderful productions of their persevering labour 

 under a complication of disadvantages ; their cloth 

 and their mats ; their weapons ; their fishing instru- 



f 2 



