480 THE VOYAGE OF H.M.S. CHALLENGER. 



head is sometimes moved slowly from side to side, but never shaken. In pointing out the 

 way to a place, the lips are pouted in order to indicate direction at the same time that 

 the hand is used to point with in the ordinary manner. The use of the arms and head 

 in gesture language is very remarkable, and conversations are carried on thus in an 

 extremely animated manner with the help of very few actual words. 



As has been said, the coxswain of the pilot's boat, the ex-member of the nobility, 

 wore a pea-jacket ; when a photograph was taken of the boat's crew, it was 

 impossible to • persuade him to take it off in order to make the group uniform ; he 

 w r ould only promise that if he were photographed in the group with the jacket on, he 

 would allow himself to be taken separately afterwards without it. The jacket was a thick 

 garment of the usual pilot cloth, fit only for an English winter, but the man evidently 

 regarded it as a decoration and mark of distinction, and a proof that he was coxswain. 



Much difficulty was experienced in getting a lock of hair from one of the boat's 

 crew, and success was attained only by the help of a missionary, who explained that 

 it was not wanted for purposes of witchcraft. The man also evidently was loth to part 

 with even a single lock of what was his chief pride. 



The Friendly Islands were, at the time of the Expedition's visit, treated as an 

 independent pow r er ; they had a national flag (white cross quartered on red), a King, 

 taxes, and other accompaniments of national life. A poll tax of seven dollars a year was 

 levied on each adult, a duty of one dollar per gallon on wine, two dollars per gallon on 

 spirit, and one shilling on each bottle of beer, and there was a charge of £100 for a 

 licence to sell intoxicating drinks. In consequence of these prohibitory duties no liquor 

 was sold at any of the islands, and to protect the morals of the natives, seamen were 

 fined if they remained on shore after 9 p.m. 



The most prominent feature in the town of Nukalofa (see fig. 175), as the principal 

 place in the island is called, is the small white church which stands on the summit of a 

 rounded hill about 40 feet in height. Conspicuous also is the King's House, a respectable 

 looking small one-storied wooden building with a verandah. There is, further, the Govern- 

 ment Building, a neat wooden structure with a tower in the centre and a wing on 

 either side, each containing a single office. Here the revenue of the Friendly Island 

 group, which amounts to about £7000 or £8000, is dispensed, and the King's seal attached 

 to documents. At a small printing office close by an almanac, a magazine, bibles, and 

 a few books are printed in the native language. The remainder of the town consists 

 almost entirely of native houses. The houses of the Tongans are small and oblong 

 in shape, about 20 feet by 10 feet in dimension ; the walls are of reed mats or plaited 

 cocoanut leaves, and the thatch of reeds; the posts and beams, often of cocoanut stems, 

 are lashed together with plaited cocoanut fibre ; the ground within is simply covered 

 with Pandanus mats. There are usually two doors or openings opposite one another 

 in the middle of each side of the house, which are closed with a mat only, and in most 



