188 THE LAST CRUISE OF THE CARNEGIE 



putter around in the garden for a few minutes occasionally, and 

 spend their days galloping through the village on their ponies and 

 and in talking. How they love to talk! They show no desire 

 to accumulate possessions and live in a little communistic society 

 where everyone is considered a member of the same big family. 



Once in a while they go out fishing. Our hope for witnessing 

 a night crayfish-hunt with torches was not fulfilled, since we left 

 so unexpectedly. Surgeon Cooke of the Mohican party gives a 

 vivid account of this "strange, weird, savage and interesting 

 sight." 



There is no native or imported intoxicating drink on the island 

 — not even the "kava" of the South Seas. Their morals seem 

 adequate to their little society. Marriage in the exclusive, per- 

 manent sense is not the rule; but polygamy is not found, since 

 mates may be changed without much ado. 



Petty stealing seems to be the commonest crime. Perhaps 

 this is because there is a no strict respect for personal ownerships. 

 From the earliest voyages of Rogewein, Cook, and La Perouse, the 

 natives have been addicted to thievery. The picture of the an- 

 cient images made by La Perouse's artist and reproduced here 

 shows examples of this propensity. One boy is reaching for a 

 hat with a stick, another is stealing a scarf, and a girl is removing 

 a book from the artists' pocket. 



Stealing is now punished by one day's hard labor in the garden. 

 This is a frightful penalty for an Easter Islander. A former 

 governor constructed a tight sentry-box and placed the culprit 

 inside for a day. It was so small that the victim could not shoo 

 away the flies — a genuine torture-chamber. 



The natives wear old-fashioned European dress, and have lost 

 the art of making bark-cloth from the paper mulberry tree which 

 grows in the crater of Rano Kao. Even their hats are acquired 

 from the ships that call here once or twice a year, and weaving 

 of rushes has been forgotten. There is no pottery, gourds being 

 used as water-vessels where the family has not acquired tin-ware 

 from trading. 



The language used is the old Rapa Nui speech modified by the 

 use of some Spanish, English, and German nouns. It is a dialect 



