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Aug.] THE NATIVES. 427 



sometimes held among civilized Americans. They are faithful friends, 

 good neighbours, and pay implicit obedience to the laws and customs 

 by which they are governed. Acts of injustice and oppression are 

 scarcely known among them ; but charity, kindness, and benevolence 

 prevail to the greatest extent. They will fight bravely in the cause of 

 a friend ; but are never quarrelsome or revengeful on account of any 

 private injury they may have received themselves. Their personal 

 contests are very rare, however ; but when they do occur, they are 

 conducted with the strictest regard to honour and fair play. A man 

 will not attack his neighbour, whatever be his provocation, until he has * 

 first ascertained that the physical prowess of his antagonist is not 

 much inferior to his own ; as they hold it in abhorrence to take advan- 

 tage of the weak. 



F or active industry, cheerful diligence, and patient perseverance no 

 parallel can be found for them among the natives of any island in the 

 Pacific Ocean, that I have ever visited. The men, women, and chil- 

 dren are all in active motion from sunrise to sunset ; either in catching 

 fish, or at work on their canoes, war implements, fishing apparatus, 

 wearing apparel, or habitations. Every thing they do is executed with 

 the greatest neatness and ingenuity, notwithstanding they have no better 

 tools than such as they themselves manufacture from shells, stones, 

 and the teeth of fish. It is expressly forbidden by their laws to 

 remain in bed after the sun has risen, cases of sickness and bodily 

 infirmity excepted ; dyspepsia and liver complaints, therefore, with the 

 thousand and one ills that civilized flesh is heir to, are unknown to the 

 natives of these happy islands. 



In describing the virtues and amiable qualities of these natives, I 

 would not be understood to say that there were no exceptions, nor any 

 solitary instances of violating the laws. A perfect state of society 

 does not, and perhaps never can, exist on this diversified globe. The 

 very necessity of a law implies the contrary. To strike a woman is 

 justly considered by the natives of Bergh's Group as an unnatural and 

 unmanly act, whatever may be the provocation. But if a woman prove 

 refractory, disobedient, or abusive to her husband, and gentle means 

 will not reclaim her, she is transported to a small island of the group, 

 where none but women reside, and the man who is known to take one 

 of them off, without permission of the government, must suffer death. 

 Punishments still more severe are inflicted on the man who ill-treats 

 his wife. 



For feats of strength, agility, and address some of these natives 

 would put our best circus performers to the blush. They will throw 

 a rapid succession of somersets, back and forward, without any thing 

 elastic beneath their feet ; and they are equally expert in running, 

 jumping, climbing, pitching heavy substances, &c. They will ascend 

 a cocoanut-tree, which is tall, straight, and smooth as the mast of a 

 ship, with as much apparent ease and agility as a sailor will ascend 

 the ratlines of shrouds that have just been well set up. They excel also 

 in swimming, and appear to be as much at home in the water as the 

 seal or the tortoise. They will dive to the bottom in fifteen fathoms 

 of water, and bring up half a dozen pearl oysters, with as much 



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