THE OLDEST INHABITANTS. 169 
hundred and twenty years old; and there was another 
man, sharing the same house with him, who had seen 
four generations of the same family: excellent proofs 
of the fine physical constitution of the natives, and the 
healthiness of these mountains. Ro Tui Kuku was 
quite childish, and when we spoke to him and pre- 
sented him with a little American tobacco, he said that 
he must be off home. He had great-great-grand-chil- 
dren living, the eldest of whom was about ten years old. 
Another personage attracted our attention. He was 
the court fool of the occasion, and had dressed himself 
in a very fantastic manner. The fools attached to the 
courts of South Sea chiefs are very often hunchbacks, 
the natives being fully sensible of the great fund of 
humour which that class of people generally possess, 
as a set-off, it would almost appear, for the physical 
deformity which so often exposes them to unmerited ridi- 
cule, and which is now considered in Europe an essential 
condition of the most comic figure the popular mind 
has conceived. But the Namosi fool was an exception 
to this rule. He was in every respect a fine fellow, more 
than six feet high. On his head he wore a contrivance 
made of sticks and feathers resembling the shovel- 
bonnets ladies used to wear some years ago, and his face 
and body were painted in a very ludicrous manner. He 
talked in a feigned voice, imitating a woman, and 
probably gave utterance to many witticisms and good 
jokes, as he kept his countrymen in roars of laughter 
whenever he opened his mouth. When the meeting 
broke up, we had to recross the river in order to get to 
Danford’s house; a strong Tonguese belonging to the 
