414 A V O Y A G E T O 



J777« mark of i'erpe<5t to Latoolibooloo ; but we have obferved 



July. 



\_.^^.»^ him leave off eating, and have his victuals put alide, when 

 the latter came into the fame houfe." Latooliboaloo affumed 

 the privilege of taking any thing from the people, even if 

 it belonged to the king ; and yet, in the ceremony called 

 Natcbe, he aflifted only in the fame manner as the other 

 principal men. He was looked upon, by his countrymen, 

 as a madman ; and many of his actions feemed to confirm 

 this judgment. At Eooa, they fliev/ed me a good deal 

 of land, faid to belong to him ; and I faw there a fon of his, 

 a child, whom they diftinguiflied by the fame title as his 

 father. The fon of the greateft Prince in Europe could 

 not be more humoured and carefled than this little Tarn- 

 maha was. 



The language of the Triendly Iflands, has the greateft 

 affinity imaginable to that of New Zealand, of Wateeoo, and 

 Mangeea ; and, confequently, to that of Otaheite, and the 

 Society Iflands. There are alfo many of their words the 

 fame with thofe ufed by the natives of Cocos Ifland, as ap- 

 pears from the vocabulary collected there by Le Maire and 

 Schouten*. The mode of pronunciation differs, indeed, 

 confiderably, in many inftances, from that both of New 

 Zealand, and Otaheite; but, flill, a great number of words 



* See this vocabulary, at the end of Vol. ii. of Dalrymple's Colle£lion of Voyages. 

 And yet, though Tafman's people ufed the words of this vocabulary, in fpeaking to 

 the. natives of Tongataboo (his Amfterdam), we are told, in the accounts of his 

 voyage, that they did not underftand one another. A circumftance worth obferving, 

 as it fhews hov/ cautious v/e fliould be, upon the fcanty evidence afforded by fuch 

 tranfient vifits as Tafman's, and, indeed, as thofe of moft of the fubfequent naviga- 

 tors of the Pacific Ocean, to found any argument about the affinity, or want of af- 

 finity, of the languages of the different iflands. No one, now, will venture to fay, 

 that a Cocos man, and one of Tongataboo, could not underftand each other. Some 

 of the words of Horii Illand, another of Schouten's difcoveries, alfo belong to the 

 diale(^ pf Tongataboo. See Dalrymple, as above. 



are 



