17^9. ROUND THE WOBLD. 199 



reconciled some of our people to it so much, that 

 they preferred it to our own sauces, especially with 

 iish. The natives seemed to consider it as a dainty, 

 and do not use it at their common meals ; possibly, 

 because they think it ill management to use cocoa- 

 nuts so lavishly, or, perhaps, when we were at the 

 island, they were scarcely ripe enough for the purpose. 



For drink, they have in general nothing but water, 

 or the juice of the cocoa-nut ; the art of producing 

 liquors that intoxicate, by fermentation, being happily 

 unknown among them ; neither have they any narco- 

 tic which they chew, as the natives of some other 

 countries do opium, beetle-root, and tobacco. Some 

 of them drank freely of our liquors, and in a few in- 

 stances became very drunk ; but the persons to whom 

 this happened were so far from desiring to repeat the 

 debauch, that they would never touch any of our 

 liquors afterwards. We were, however, informed, 

 that they became drunk by drinking a juice that is 

 expressed from the leaves of a plant which they call 

 Ava Ava. This plant was not in season when we 

 were there, so that we saw no instances of its effects ; 

 and as they considered drunkenness as a disgrace, 

 they probably would have concealed from us any in- 

 stances which might have happened during our stay. 

 This vice is almost peculiar to the chiefs, and consi- 

 derable persons, who vie with each other in drinking 

 the greatest number of draughts, each draught being 

 about a pint. They keep this intoxicating juice with 

 great care from their women. 



Table they have none ; but their apparatus for eat- 

 ing is set out with great neatness, though the articles 

 are too simple and too few to allow any thing for 

 show ; and they commonly eat alone ; but when a 

 stranger happens to visit them, he sometimes makes 

 a second in their mess. Of the meal of one of their 

 principal people I shall give a particular description. 



He sits down under the shade of the next tree, or 

 on the shady side of his house, and a large quantity 



o 4 



