252 TAMAAHMOTO RECEIVED BY VANCOUVER. [1794. 



many advantages as could be derived from the transaction, without 

 any intention to observe concomitant obligations. Tamahamaha 

 expected to receive assistance from Great Britain in conquering the 

 remaining islands of the group ; and Vancouver wished to prevent 

 other nations from resorting to Owyhee. It may be added, that 

 Great Britain has, to this day, been little, if at all, benefited by the 

 Sandwich Islands ; and that Tamahamaha, though he lived and 

 flourished for twenty-five years after the transaction above men- 

 tioned, never received a present, or even a message of any kind, 

 from his brother King George, to whom he, however, occasionally 

 sent a message by a whaling captain, reminding him that Vancou- 

 ver's promise of a ship of war had not yet been fulfilled. No such 

 promise is recorded in the journal of Vancouver ; though it there 

 appears that the islanders had reason to believe that a vessel of war 

 would be sent, for their protection, from Great Britain. 



Another circumstance connected with this pretended cession of 

 Owyhee to the British deserves particular notice. The consumma- 

 tion was delayed for some time, on account of the absence of 

 Tamaahmoto, or Kamamoko, one of the most powerful chiefs, the 

 same who, in February, 1790, captured the schooner Fair American, 

 and murdered her crew, as already stated. Vancouver had, at 

 first, refused to receive this man, or to have any intercourse with 

 him ; but when it was found to be indispensable for the cession, 

 that Tamaahmoto should give his vote in favor of it, the British 

 commander began " seriously to reflect on all the circumstances 

 that had attended his visits to the islands ; " and he, in the end, 

 became " thoroughly convinced that implacable resentment or un- 

 relenting anger, exhibited in his own practice, would ill accord 

 with the precepts which he had endeavored to inculcate for the 

 regulation of theirs." He therefore " determined, by an act of 

 oblivion in his own mind, to efface all former injuries and offences," 

 which he probably found no difficulty in doing, as the injuries and 

 offences were committed against citizens of the United States ; and 

 he accordingly intimated that he would " no longer regard Tamaah- 

 moto as undeserving forgiveness, and would allow of his paying the 

 compliments as he had so repeatedly requested, provided he would 

 engage, in the most solemn manner, that neither himself nor his 

 people (for he generally moved with a numerous train of attendants) 

 would behave in any manner so as to disturb the subsisting harmony." 

 On receiving this intimation, Tamaahmoto readily came forward ; 

 he was admitted to the table of the British commander, and was 



