556 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1959 
into the Tropics, not a propitious locality for permanent European 
settlement. It is interesting to note, however, that he was now almost 
back where he had started, for Tongatapu is less than 100 miles 
from Tofua, the island off which the mutiny had taken place 
7 months before. 
The Lau Islands—After leaving Tongatapu the course was still 
set to the westward for “a few days,” after which they came upon a 
small, low island: 
Here Christian proposed to stop. The boat was sent on shore to ascertain 
whether the island was inhabited or not. Before they had time to land people 
were seen on the beach. After landing and remaining awhile on shore the 
boat returned to the ship with the news. Had this been an uninhabited island, 
Christian would have destroyed the ship and stayed there. Finding the 
inhabitants were numerous they sailed away that night to windward 
(Teehuteatuaonoa, 1826). 
This would appear to be the “low lagoon island, which they call 
Vivini, where they got birds, eggs and cocoa nuts,” mentioned in 
Jenny’s first narrative. 
The only small, low islands lying a few days sail to the westward 
of Tongatapu are the Southern Lau Group of Fiji, distant approxi- 
mately 220 miles and consisting of Vatoa, Ono-1-Lau, Tuvana-i-tholo, 
and Tuvana-i-ra. Of these only Vatoa and Ono-i-Lau possess lagoons, 
so that Vivini must have been one or other of these islands. 
The name cannot be traced anywhere in the Pacific: but this means 
little since most local place-names, including those on Vatoa and Ono- 
i-Lau, have never been published, and in any case it could be merely 
the Tahitian rendering of a name given by the mutineers. 
Its position rather favors Ono-i-Lau (lat. 20°39’ §.), as lying 
nearest to the parallel of 21° S. on which Christian appears to have 
been sailing since he left Rarotonga, and it had, at least in recent 
years, the larger population (586 as against 171, in 1936). On the 
other hand, Vatoa is the lower (209 feet as against 370 feet) and has 
a less intricate lagoon entrance for boats. 
The evidence, however, is too inconclusive for us to say with any 
confidence which of the two islands was visited by the Bounty, a pity 
because, while Vatoa was seen by Cook in 1774, Ono-i-Lau is not 
believed to have been discovered until 1820, when Bellingshausen 
sighted it.?7 
Pitcairn’s Island—It was now toward the end of November; 2 
months had passed since leaving Tahiti and the mutineers must have 
21Tt appears that of Fiji’s historians only Sir Everard Im Thurn has discovered Jenny’s 
narrative and realized its significance. In his introduction to Lockerby’s Journal, Sir 
Everard quotes the appropriate portion (from the Bengal Hurkaru) and goes on to state 
that, in his opinion, it ‘“‘suggests with much probability, that the Bounty herself, after 
the mutiny and her subsequent return, under Christian, to Tahiti, actually touched at a 
Fijian island, and that this island, rather than Pitcairn, might have become the hiding 
place of the mutineers” (Im Thurn and Wharton, 1925, pp. XVITI—-XIX). 
