150 cook's voyage to dec. 



them without mercy ; and, unless this treatment is the 

 effect of jealousy, which both sexes at least pretend 

 to be sometimes infected with, it will be difficult to 

 admit this as the motive, as I have seen several in- 

 stances where the women have preferred personal 

 beauty to interest; though I must own, that, even 

 in these cases, they seem scarcely susceptible of those 

 delicate sentiments that are the result of mutual af- 

 fection ; and, I believe, that there is less Platonic 

 love in Otaheite than in any other country. 



Cutting or inciding the fore-skin should be men- 

 tioned here as a practice adopted amongst them, from 

 a notion of cleanliness ; and they have a reproachful 

 epithet in their language for those who do not ob- 

 serve that custom. When there are five or six lads, 

 pretty well grown up in a neighbourhood, the father 

 of one of them goes to a Tahoua, or man of know- 

 ledge, and lets him know. He goes with the lads to 

 the top of the hills, attended by a servant ; and 

 seating one of them properly, introduces a piece of 

 wood underneath the foreskin, and desires him to 

 look aside at something he pretends is coming. Hav- 

 ing thus engaged the young man's attention to ano- 

 ther object, he cuts through the skin upon the wood 

 with a shark's tooth, generally at one stroke. He 

 then separates, or rather turns back the divided parts ; 

 and, having put on a bandage, proceeds to perform 

 the same operation on the other lads. At the end of 

 five days they bathe, and the bandages being taken 

 off*, the matter is cleaned away. At the end of five 

 days more, they bathe again, and are well ; but a 

 thickness of the prepuce where it was cut, remain- 

 ing, they go again to the mountains with the Tahoua 

 and servant; and a fire being prepared, and some 

 stones heated, the Tahoua puts the prepuce between 

 two of them, and squeezes it gently, which removes 

 the thickness. They return home, having their heads 

 and other parts of their bodies adorned with odor- 

 iferous flowers ; and the Tahoua is rewarded for his 



