36 A MISSION TO VITI. 



turned to their former religion, the principal features 

 of which seem to be a belief in a Supreme Being, and 

 the worship of ancestors. The French have been more 

 successful in the neighbouring island of Fotuna, where 

 the Roman Catholic priests established a flourishing 

 mission. 



The Eotuma men can nearly all speak a little En- 

 glish ; they are a good-looking people, with as light a 

 skin as the Tonguese, rich black, often curly, hair, worn 

 very long, and regular, frequently Jewish, features. The 

 latter peculiarity has been remarked by all who have 

 visited Rotuma, and amongst the men working on the 

 Somosomo estate there was one who bore the nickname 

 of " Moses," in consequence of his undeniable resem- 

 blance to an unadulterated Hebrew. They circumcise, 

 tattoo around the loins, and perforate the left ear, into 

 which they put a gay flower, or the rolled up leaf of 

 the Dracaena terminalis. The Rotuma men are a hard- 

 working set, and, if Fiji should become a European 

 colony, their island will be likely to supply a good 

 number of useful hands. I have seen them pull an oar 

 all day long under a broiling tropical sun, or work away 

 at the mill and oil-presses, without ever losing their 

 good temper or complaining. True, in Somosomo they 

 were well fed, and had as much as they liked to eat of 

 yam, pork, or fish. Hardly a day elapsed without a pig 

 being clubbed for their especial benefit. One of them 

 invariably attended to the cooking, not only for the men 

 but also for us. He gloried in the name of Koytoo, and 

 was the youngest and best-looking of the lot, with rich 

 curly hair, and a figure as symmetrically formed as a 



