FIRST PROVINCE OF THE GREAT OCEAN. 103 



attempts, took them up again, and, at last, re- 

 nounced them entirely. 



He appeared readily to understand what we 

 told him respecting the social institutions of Eu- 

 rope ; of our manners, customs, and arts ; but 

 what most struck him, was the peaceable chival- 

 rous nature of our voyage, with which he connected 

 an intention to teach the new-discovered people 

 what might be good and useftd to them. By this, 

 it is true, he chiefly understood what served for 

 food ; but he was also sensible that our superiority 

 depended upon our greater knowledge in general ; 

 and he assisted, to the utmost of his power, our 

 researches, where they would have appeared very 

 idle, even to many of the better informed among 

 ourselves. 



When we arrived at Oonalashka, and he had 

 contemplated this sterile country, entirely desti- 

 tute of trees, he hastened to request us to plant 

 some cocoa-nuts, which we had still on board, and 

 to which he offered to add some belonging to him- 

 self, in suitable situations ; he urged us to make 

 the trial, representing the misery of the inhabit- 

 ants, and was with difficulty persuaded that it 

 would be quite useless. Nature, above all, attract- 

 ed his attention and curiosity. The oxen in Oo- 

 nalashka, which, for the first time, put him in 

 mind that he had seen them before on the Pelew 

 islands, constantly employed him, and he went 

 every day into the fields to look at them. On the 

 whole voyage nothing gave him more pleasure 



H 4- 



