54 Transactions.—Miscellaneous. 
crab, that feeds on the cocoa-nut. The inhabitants of such islands, where 
no forethought is necessary to provide food, nor any necessity for constant 
work, must have destroyed in them any idea of responsibility, which is the 
ground-work of morality, and are on account of the necessary poverty of 
their language, almost precluded from receiving instruction. It is hard to 
conceive how men, under such circumstances, can be anything but savages. 
Sea birds frequent all the islands, but on those uninhabited they 
assemble in great numbers; nearly twenty varieties congregate on the 
islands visited for guano. The chief kinds are Gannets and Boobies, Frigate 
birds, Terns, Noddies, and Petrels, together with some game birds and the 
Tropic bird. Some lay their eggs in tufts of grass, as the tern, which 
numbers millions on some islands during the breeding season. The noddy 
burrows in the ground, and makes a hole for its eggs. The Gannet and 
Booby make their nests of piles of sticks, and roost on the trees if they can 
do so. At night the different kinds form separate communities, closely 
huddled together; but during the day they seek their food to the windward 
promiscuously. 
There is a great contrast between the meagre productions of the coral 
islands and the abundance and variety of those of older formation, such as the 
islands of Society, Samoa and Fiji. In these islands there are mountains and 
valleys, and rivers and streams, and in addition to all the productions of 
atolls, there are hundreds of species of plants that furnish food, clothes, 
spices, dyes, scents, timber for ships and houses, and ornamental woods for 
cabinetmakers. The inhabitants can choose between the yam, the kumara, 
the taro, the breadfruit, the banana, the plantain and the cocoa-nut, and in 
addition they have the choicest fruits and medicinal plants. Cotton grows 
abundantly on all these islands, from the Marquesas to Fiji, and the sugar 
cane is not only cultivated by Europeans, but is also indigenous to the 
Tahitian and Fijian islands. In the choice of a special article of diet, the 
natives of the different island groups differ as much from each other as the 
inhabitants of the countries of Europe. 
The Sandwich Islanders prefer the taro, and with them the cocoa-nut is 
a delicacy once reserved for the men. In the Society and Samoan Islands 
the breadfruit is preferred ; whilst in the Fijis, where all the products 
flourish in the greatest perfection, the yam is the staple food. The culti- 
vation ofthe yam is with the Fijians the great national business, and their 
calendar of eleven months is based upon the growing, curing, and storing of 
their favourite food. In reading over their calendar, one is forcibly reminded 
of the similar influence that the cultivation of wheat had amongst the Jews 
in marking their seasons and periods of offerings to the priests. Here it 
