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PLES OF 

 SOCIE- 



Sbciety-Illes fometimes refort, in order to procure fome of thelt- f rinci 

 red feathers,, for they are the moil valuable article of commerce, 

 and there is nothing which a Taheitean would not give or grant in 



to acquire fome of thefe precious feathers,. We brought fome 



©rder 



bright red feathers from England, but they foon found out they 

 v/ere only cocks feathers,, and died red, and for that reafon did 



but refufed to give 



not efteem them 



they 



ok 



indeed 



any thing in return. .Whereas, when we came the fecond time 



in i774> to 0-Taheitee after we had been to Tonga Tabu, where 

 the natives make various ornaments of red feathers, we procured 

 for them, not only numbers of hogs, the moH valuable article of 



4 



trade, but likewife mourning drelTes, which the natives refufed 



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to part with before, w^hen Mr. Banks was there, and during our- 

 firil flay in their happy ifle. The rage after thefe . trifling orna- 

 Bients was fo great, that Potatoa a chief, whofe magnanimity and 



noble way of thinking, we never queftioned before, wanted even 



to proftitute his own wife, for a parcel of thefe baubles. All kinds 



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of iron tools are likewife become great articles of commerce, 

 fince their connexions w4th. Europeans. The Spaniards firfl 

 made the inhabitants of all thefe iflands acquainted with iron|. 



d I am of opinion, that 



0-Tah 



of Spanlfli. 



origin 5 for when Oliver van Noort came in the year 1 6bo to 



Quaham one of the Ladrone Iflands, he faw more than 200 canoes 



full 



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