110 Porter* s Voyage 



terms, and requested to know the number of hogs I should re- 

 quire, stating that they had lost but few, and should be enabled 

 to supply us abundantly. I told them I should expect from them 

 four hundred, for which they would receive the customary pre- 

 sents in return. These they assured me should be delivered 

 without delay. 



CHAPTER XVI. 

 MadisQ^i's Island — Religious Ceremonies, Customs, S^'C. 



Haying now nothing to occupy me but the refitting my ship^ 

 which went on with expedition, and the loading the New-Zea- 

 lander with the oil from the Greenwich, Seringapatam, and the 

 Sir Andrew Hammond, I was enabled to make little excursions 

 occasionally into different parts of the valley, and visit the natives 

 at their houses, which was what I had not been enabled to do 

 heretofore, as my various occupations had kept me much con- 

 fined to our village. On these occasions I always met the most 

 hospitable and friendly reception from the natives of both sexes. 

 Cocoa-nuts, and whatever else they had, were offered me, and I 

 rarely returned home without several little tie ties as a token of 

 their regard. I generally took with me seeds of different descrip- 

 tions, with which I was provided, such as melons, pumpkins, 

 peas, beans, oranges, limes, &c. together with peach stones, wheat 

 and Indian corn, which were planted within the enclosures, in 

 the most suitable places for them, the natives always assisting in 

 pulling up the weeds and clearing the ground for this purpose. 

 The nature of the different kinds of vegetables and fruit that 

 each kind of grain would produce was explained, and they all 

 promised to take the utmost care of them, and prevent the hogs 

 from doing them any injury. 



I endeavoured to impress them with an idea of the value of 

 the seeds I was planting, and explained to them the different 

 kinds of fruit they would produce, assuring them of their excel- 

 lence ; and as a farther inducement to attend to their cultivation, 

 I promised them that, on my return, I would give them a whale's 

 tooth for every ripe pumpkin and melon they would bring me. 

 To the chiefs of the distant tribes, to whom I distributed the 

 different kinds of seed, I made the same promise. I also gave 

 them several English hogs of a superior breed, which they were 

 very anxious to procure. I left in charge of Wilson some male 

 and female goats ; and as I had a number of young Gallipagos 

 tortoises, I distributed several among the chiefs, and permitted 

 a great many to escape into the bushes and among the grass. 



