24 STATE OF THE ISLAND. 



quesan tongue,) than from any desire to profit 

 by the good counsel offered to them. Eutiti 

 expressed much anxiety to retain the missionaries 

 in his territory, and was at little pains to conceal 

 the selfish policy that influenced him. He per- 

 sists in regarding their interests as identical with 

 those of the shipping frequenting the surround- 

 ing seas, and in some measure with the British 

 government; from which last he entertains great 

 hopes of receiving a valuable present of cannon 

 and ammunition. 



The entire island continued to be in a state of 

 profound peace, and since our last visit its tran- 

 quillity had been interrupted only on one occa- 

 sion, when a woman from the weather valley, 

 Mutabu, having hung her cloth upon a sacred 

 edifice at Vaitahu, the people of the latter village 

 armed themselves to avenge the sacrilege by the 

 slaughter of the offending tribe. Their angry 

 feelings were calmed, however, by the remon- 

 strances of the missionaries ; and the feud was 

 at length amicably settled, by the inhabitants of 

 Mutabu paying the offended party a number of 

 hogs, as an atonement for the offence of their 

 countrywoman. The only advance these island- 

 ers had made in civilized arts was an attempt 

 to distil an ardent spirit from fermented bananas, 

 under the tuition of some Society and Sandwich 



