34 TONGA TABOO. 



The natives cultivate yams, sweet-potatoes, bananas, cocoa-nuts, 

 bread-fruit, sugar-cane, shaddock, limes, and the ti (Spondias dulcis); 

 the pandanus is much attended to, and is one of their most useful 

 trees, and of it all their mats are made ; a little corn is grown, and 

 they have the papaw-apple (Papaya), and water-melon. The mission- 

 aries have introduced the sweet orange from Tahiti, and a species of 

 cherimoyer (Annona); many other things have, as I learned, been 

 attempted, but have hitherto failed. I presented the missionaries 

 with a variety of both fruit and vegetable seeds, and trust that they 

 will succeed and be of advantage to future visiters; the natives, I was 

 told, understand the different kinds, discriminating among them in 

 their planting. 



The botany of this island resembles that of the Samoan Group. A 

 species of nutmeg was found here, differing from either of the Samoan 

 ones : the trees were very full of fruit, and much larger ; one of them 

 was observed a foot and a half in diameter, and upwards of forty 

 feet in height. There was a number of ornamental shrubs. A de- 

 scription of climbing plants, which it was found a difficult matter to 

 trace among the varieties of forest trees, gave a peculiar character 

 to some parts of this overgrown island. 



The climate of Tonga is humid and the heat oppressive, rising 

 frequently to 98° in the shade; much rain falls; the mean tempera- 

 ture during our stay was 79-25°. The trade-winds are by no means 

 constant, and westerly winds occasionally blow in every season, 

 which, from their variable character, have obtained the name with 

 the natives of "foolish winds." 



We had to regret the state the island was in, as it prevented our 

 making that full examination of it that I had intended and hoped ; 

 we saw enough, however, to satisfy ourselves that Tongataboo is not 

 the cultivated garden it has been represented to be. The Ficus tree 

 figured in the voyage of the Astrolabe, whose trunk is there stated to 

 be one hundred feet in circumference, was visited. We were sur- 

 prised to find it had no proper trunk, but only a mass of intertwined 

 roots, through which it is possible to see in many directions, rising 

 to a height of eighty or ninety feet, when it throws around its great 

 and wide-spreading branches. Two other species of Ficus were found, 

 one with labiate branches and horizontal spreading arms, the other 

 with a trunk about nine feet in diameter. 



The climate cannot be considered salubrious ; very heavy dews fall 

 at night, and no constitution can endure frequent exposure at this 



