THE SOCIETY ISLANDS. 123 
given us considerable information concerning 
the condition of the Tahaitians before their con- 
version to the Christian faith. 
To estimate the effect of this great change, 
we must compare Christian Tahaiti as it now 
is, with the accounts these early voyagers have 
left us of its heathen times; and as every reader 
may not be conveniently able to do so, a short 
review of them may not be considered un- 
welcome. 
The Society Islands, of which Tahaiti is the 
largest, are, like many others, either fragments 
of a Southern continent swallowed up by earth- 
quake, or a mass of rock ejected from the bot- 
tom of the sea by subterranean fire, which 
gradually becoming covered with a fertile soil, 
is now adorned by the most beautiful vegetation. 
It consists of two peninsulas united by a nar- 
row isthmus, which together are about one 
hundred and twenty miles in circumference ; 
towards the centre of each rise wild rocky 
mountains, intersected by deep ravines, from the 
side of which, thickly wooded almost to their 
summits, flow numerous streamlets of pure 
transparent water, forming the most picturesque 
G 2 
