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with lands and houses, and they were permitted to take their choice of 

 wives amongst the belles of the island. 



" The white man landed ! need the rest be told? 

 The new world stretched its dusk hand to the old ; 

 Each was to each a marvel, and the tie 

 Of wonder warm'd to closer sympathy. 

 Kind was the welcome of the sun-born sires, 

 And kinder still their daughters' gentler fires. 

 Their union grew : the children of the storm 

 Found beauty link'd with many a dusky form ; 

 While these in turn admired the paler glow, 

 Which seemed so white in climes that knew not snow. 

 The chase, the race, the liberty to roam. 

 The soil where every cottage show'd a home ; 

 The sea-spread net, the lightly launched canoe. 

 Which stemmed the studded Archipelago 

 O'er whose blue bosom rose the starry isles ; 

 The healthy slumber, earn'd by sportive toils ; 

 The palm, the loftiest dryad of the woods 

 Within whose bosom infant Bacchus broods ; 

 The cava feast, the yam, the cocoa's root, 

 Which bears at once the cup, the milk, the fruit ; 

 The bread-tree, which, without the plovigh-share, yields 

 The un-reap'd harvest of unfurrowed fields, 

 And bakes its unadulterated loaves 

 Without a furnace in unpurchased groves — 

 These, with the luxuries of seas and woods. 

 The airy joys of social solitudes. 

 Tamed each rude wanderer to the sympathies 

 Of those who were more happy, if less wise : 

 Did more than Europe's discipline had done, 

 And civilised civilisation's son ! " 



This extract, the only one I can make room for, from Byron's poem of 

 " The Island, or Christian and his Comrades," epitomises the attractions 

 of Otaheite, which are set forth by Morrison at greater length, and if in 

 less poetical, at least in picturesque language and in an equally appreci- 

 ative spirit. I may just observe, in passing, of Byron's poem, that it is 

 of no value to us historically, seeing that the scene of Christian's 

 adventures and death is laid at Otaheite, whilst as you will find presently 

 the real tragedy occurred under entirely different circumstances, 1,200 



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