6 Ka Han a Kapa. 



the same sex as Adam, who in the "Breeches Bible" was reported to have used this 

 impossible leaf to fashion the garment which has given name to this rare edition of 

 the Scriptures, we need not wonder at the mistakes of travelers even centuries after 

 the Bab3donian captivity. Captain Cook, it will be remembered, believed that the 

 Hawaiians were cannibals, from a misunderstanding of what was told him by islanders 

 of whose tongue he knew little or nothing. Hence, in all the early glimpses we shall 

 get of this essentially Polj-nesiau art we find our view clouded by statements incor- 

 rect if not impossible, and words or names no longer recognizable. 



In the light of our present knowledge of things Polynesian we cannot read 

 again the fascinating pages of Cook's observations without Monder at the general 

 accuracy- of his accounts of what he saw, and we must acknowledge the debt we owe 

 to him and the scientific men who were with him on his three voj-ages. The 

 Forsters, Banks, Sparrman, Solander and others, and we must not forget his Bernese 

 artist (with him on his last vo3-age)' whose pictures were far more accurate than was 

 usual at that time. I shall quote here in full what these discoverers have to tell us, 

 and we can later compare all this with the Hawaiian manufacture which was doubt- 

 less the most complete technicallj- and artisticall}*. 



The first of Cook's voA-ages was edited by the Reverend Dr. Hawkesworth, 

 who had the great advantage of the journal of Mr. Banks, but the disadvantage of 

 feeling obliged to correct and modify- to suit his own clerical taste the rough but 

 definite statements of the Commander (then Lieutenant) James Cook. He also saw 

 fit (with the full permission of Air. Banks) to shape his narrative as issuing from 

 Cook. Fortunatel}' the journals of both these distinguished men have in late ^ears 

 been published, the one verbatim," the other edited b}- Sir Joseph D. Hooker.^ I shall 

 take ni}' extracts from these later published journals as of course more authentic. 

 And first comes that of Cook, crisp and sailor-like, nor is all the odd spelling to be 

 laid to the gallant Captain's door, for his journal was written b}- a clerk in an age 

 when orthograph}' was even less grounded than at present. 



[July, 1769, at Tahiti.] "I shall now describe their way of making Cloth, 

 which, in mj- opinion, is the onl}- Curious manufacture they have. All their Cloth 

 is, I believe, made from the Bark of Trees ; the finest is made from a plant which thej- 



'Weber, whose drawings are preserved in the British Museum. 



^Captain Cook's Journal during his first vo)-age round the World made in H. M. Hark "Kndeavour." 1768-71. 

 Edited by Capt. W. J. Iv. Wharton, R.N., F.R.S. London, 1893. 



^Journal of the Right Hon. Sir Joseph Banks, Bart., K.B., P.R.S. Edited b)- Sir Joseph I). Hooker. London, 1S96. 



One should read the introduction to each of these publications to understand fully what Hawkesworth did to 

 the combined journals, but I may quote here an extract from Prior's Life of Malone : — " Hawkesworth, the writer, 

 was introduced by Garrick to Lord Sandwich, who, thinking to put a few hundred pounds into his pocket, appointed 

 him to revise and publish Cook's Voyages. He scarcel}- did anything to the JISS., yet sold it to Cadell and Strahan, 

 the printer and bookseller, for ^^6000. " 



