50 cook's voyage to SEPT. 



from it, though the climate is one of the hottest, and 

 Tee had been dead above four months. The only 

 remarkable alteration that had happened, was a 

 shrinking of the muscular parts of the eyes ; but the 

 hair and nails were in their original state, and still 

 adhered firmly; and the several joints were quite 

 pliable, or in that kind of relaxed state which hap- 

 pens to persons who faint suddenly. Such were Mr. 

 Anderson's remarks to me, who also told me, that, 

 on his enquiring into the method of effecting this pre- 

 servation of their dead bodies, he had been informed 

 that soon after their death, they are disembowelled, 

 by drawing the intestines, and other viscera, out at 

 the anus ; and the whole cavity is then filled or stuffed 

 with cloth, introduced through the same part ; that 

 when any moisture appeared on the skin, it was care- 

 fully dried up, and the bodies afterward rubbed all 

 over with a large quantity of perfumed cocoa-nut 

 oil ; which, being frequently repeated, preserved 

 them a great many months ; but that, at last, they 

 gradually moulder away. This was the information 

 Mr. Anderson received ; for my own part, I could 

 not learn any more about their mode of operation 

 than what Omai told me, who said, that they made 

 use of the juice of a plant which grows amongst the 

 mountains ; of cocoa-nut oil; and of frequent wash- 

 ing with sea- water. I was also told that the bodies of 

 all their great men, who died a natural death, are pre- 

 served in this manner ; and that they expose them to 

 public view for a considerable time after. At first, 

 they are laid out every day, when it does not rain ; 

 afterward, the intervals become greater and greater ; 

 and, at last, they are seldom to be seen. 



In the evening, we returned from Oparre, where 

 we left Otoo, and all the royal family ; and I saw 

 none of them till the 12th, when all but the chief him- 

 self paid me a visit. He, as they told me, was gone 

 to Attahooroo, to assist, this day, at another human 

 sacrifice, which the chief of Tiaraboo had sent 



