VATE. 225 



In conformity with the desire expressed by the chiefs, 

 the Missionaries of tlie ' Dayspring ' left two native teachers 

 in tlie isle of Vate whom they had trained in their schools. 



This island was named by Captain Cook, who discovered 

 it in 1774, Sandwich Island ; the natives call it Vate, or 

 Fate, or sometimes Eflit. It is fiom thii'ty to thirty-five 

 miles long, and about lialf that in width : it is subject to 

 frequent shocks of earthquake, which are sometimes 

 tolerably violent ; in the year 1864 there were as many as 

 six sharp ones. The soil is of remarkable fertility. 



Nothing positive is known respecting the amount of 

 population, wliich is variously computed at from ten to 

 twenty thousand inhabitants, distributed in some sixty 

 villages, more tl:an half of wliich are on the coast. The 

 climate, without being precisely unliealthy, is t(jlerably damp; 

 ])ut there is no assignable cause for the decrease of popula- 

 tion reported by the only missicinaiy and white man who 

 has hitherto lived in the island. According to his calculation, 

 in 1864, it winild appear that a tenth of the {jopulation had 

 died in the village wliere he lived, !)ut this amount exceeds 

 the average ; it seems, however, certain tlint the deaths are 

 always in excess of the births. Inlhienza constantly occurs ; 

 in 1861 the island was severely scourged by an epidemic 

 attack of measK's accoiu])anied with dysentery. 



The lanyuaoe has a sireat affinity to those of the neish- 

 bouring islands. It is snid there are three di>tinct dialects, 

 one of them spoken in the i.sles of File, Mele, and the 

 adjacent islets, another all round the coast, and a third in 



