146 Letter 1X, 
until an opportunity presents itself of getting over by a 
vessel. 
The live stock belonging to these natives consists of pigs 
and fowls. With regard to these two kinds of animals, found 
very generally over the Pacific islands, it seems to be the cur- 
rent impression that they were originally left upon them by 
Cook and other early navigators. This, as far as the New 
Hebrides are concerned, is incorrect; for instead of giving 
these animals to the New Hebrideans, Cook, when he dis- 
covered the islands, found them there, and got presents of them 
from the natives. Quiros, too, it may be recollected, states 
that he discovered them on Santo nearly 300 years ago.’ 
They must, then, be indigenous to the islands, or have been 
brought by the natives when they originally landed upon them. 
To one not versed in such matters, the pigs appear much like our 
own, only they are, on the whole, longer in the legs and noses, 
and are generally black in colour: while the fowls exhibit the 
long bare legs, the sloping body, and reddish colour, which are 
the undoubted characteristics of the Malay breed. Both of 
these animals afford good food to the inhabitants, and both of 
them are fed on cocoanuts, 
One of the most extraordinary things connected with this 
people is the number of different languages spoken by them. 
There are known to be at least twenty, and these languages are 
as distinct from one another as Greek from English—perhaps 
more so. 
I don’t suppose that anywhere on the globe there are so 
many languages spoken within such a small radius. On the 
island of Tana alone there are no less than six ; and these can- 
not properly be called dialects, for the speaker of one is unin- 
telligible to the speaker of another. The cause of this extra- 
ordinary diversity lies, probably, in the facts—first, that they 
have no written language; and secondly, that their continual 
