CHAPTER VII 
GENERAL ACCOUNT OF THE SOUTH SEA ISLANDS 
Description of the people—Tattowing—Cleanliness—Clothing—Ornaments 
and head-dress—Houses—Food—Produce of the sea—Fruits—Animals 
—Cooking—Mahai-making—Drinking salt-water—Meals—Women eat 
apart from the men—Pastimes—Music—Attachment to old customs— 
Making of cloth from bark—Dyes and dyeing—Mats—Manufacture of 
fishing-nets—Fish-hooks—Carpentry, etc.—Boats and boat-building— 
Fighting, fishing, and travelling tvahahs—Instability of the boats— 
Paddles, sails, and ornaments— Pahies— Predicting the weather — 
Astronomy—Measurement of time and space—Language—Its resemblance 
to other languages—Diseases—Medicine and surgery—Funeral ceremonies 
—Disposal of the dead—Religion—Origin of mankind—Gods—Priests— 
Marriage—Marais—Bird-gods—Government—Ranks—Army and battles 
—Justice. 
ALL the islands I have seen are very populous along the 
whole length of the coast, where are generally large flats 
covered with a great many bread-fruit and cocoanut trees. 
There are houses scarcely fifty yards apart, with their little 
plantations of plantains, the trees from which they make 
their cloth, ete. But the inland parts are totally uninhabited, 
except in the valleys, where there are rivers, and even there 
there are but a small proportion of people in comparison with 
the numbers who live upon the flats. 
These people are of the larger size of Europeans, all very 
well made, and some handsome, both men and women; the 
only bad feature they have is their noses, which are in 
general flat, but to balance this their teeth are almost with- 
out exception even and white to perfection, and the eyes of 
the women especially are full of expression and fire. In 
colour they differ very much; those of inferior rank who 
