1 62 cook's voyage to dec. 



With regard to the little island Mataia, or Osna- 

 burgh Island, which lies twenty leagues east of 

 Otaheite, and belongs to a chief of that place, who 

 gets from thence a kind of tribute, a different dia- 

 lect from that of Otaheite is there spoken. The men 

 of Mataia also wear their hair very long, and when 

 they fight, cover their arms with a substance which is 

 beset with sharks' teeth, and their bodies with a sort 

 of shagreen, being skin of fishes. At the same 

 time, they are ornamented with polished pearl shells, 

 which make a prodigious glittering in the sun ; and 

 they have a very large one that covers them before 

 like a shield or breast-plate. 



The language of Otaheite has many words, and 

 even phrases, quite unlike those of the islands to 

 the westward of it, which all agree ; and it is re- 

 markable for producing great quantities of that 

 delicious fruit we called apples, which are found in 

 none of the others, except Eimeo. It has also the 

 advantage of producing an odoriferous wood, called 

 eahoi, which is highly valued at the other isles where 

 there is none ; nor even in the south-east peninsula, 

 or Tiarraboo, though joining it. And at Mourooa 

 there is a particular bird found upon the hills, much 

 esteemed for its white feathers 5 at which place there 

 is also said to be some of the apples, though it be the 

 most remote of the Society Islands from Otaheite 

 and Eimeo, where they are produced. 



Though the religion of all the islands be the same, 

 each of them has its particular or tutelar God; whose 

 names, according to the best information I could re- 

 ceive, are set down in the following list : 



Gods of the Isles. 



Huaheine, Tanne. 



Ulietea, Oroo. 



Otaha, Tanne. 



Bolabola, Oraa. 



Mourooa, Otoo, ee weiahoo. 



