PACIFIC AND BEERING'S STRAIT. 193 



wounds, one before and another behind the middle 

 of the right deltoid muscle, where the flies were 

 feeding without molestation, and the person seemed 

 almost unconscious of them and of the ulcers. No 

 preternatural tumefaction denoted any excess of in- 

 flammation. No unhealthy hue in the countenance 

 of man or woman intimated any internal disease 

 lurking within the body." By far the greater part 

 of the males go entirely naked, except a girdle, 

 which is made of a banana-leaf split into shreds, and 

 tied round the loins, not intended to answer the 

 purpose of concealment ; and they differ from all 

 other inhabitants of the Pacific in having no maro. 

 Some wear a turban ; others a piece of paper cloth 

 thrown over the shoulders. 



The huts of the Gambier Islanders are so small 

 that they can only be intended as sleeping-places 

 during bad weather : they are in length from eight 

 or ten feet to fifteen, excepting the larger houses of 

 the areghe ; they are built of the porou wood, and 

 covered in with a pointed roof thatched over with 

 the leaves of the palm-tree. In some the door is 

 scarcely three feet high, and it is necessary to creep 

 on all-fours to enter. On the inside they are neat, 

 and the floor is covered with mats or grass. The 

 larger huts of the village on Mount Duff are so con- 

 structed that one side can be conveniently removed, 

 by which means they are rendered cool and com- 

 fortable. 



The large house, or that of the areghe, was about 

 thirty -nine feet in length by eighteen or twenty in 

 width ; the pitch of the roof was about twenty-five 

 feet in height, and that of the perpendicular sides of 

 the house about ten feet ; but these dimensions were 

 vol. i. o 



